Happy Sweet 16

Exploring Cricut and More is celebrating their 4th birthday this week.  To celebrate they are hosting a birthday challenge and also sharing birthday projects all week to get our creative juices flowing.  But the fun ends on the 26th.  Fortunately I'm getting a little play time in while I'm finishing preparations for my craft show this weekend. 

I have this Forever Young cartridge that I've never really played with much and thought this  girl would be perfect to use for a Sweet 16 birthday card.  Her stance made it the perfect choice to combine with the "16" candles I cut using the Sweet Treats cartridge. 

 

The background 'paper' I used for this card isn't really paper but rather  a sheet of aluminum foil from Walnut Hollow.  I loved the way it turned out so much that I went back to Michael's this weekend and bought a pack of every color available.

My inside sentiment on this one says, "Say goodbye to dolls and toys.  Say hello to makeup and boys!  Happy Sweet 16"

 

And now I'm off to enter my card into their challenge.

Eat Ice Cream

Welcome to the first Skittles Design Team Challenge.  All design team members will be featuring a variety of skittles handmade by the wonderful Carri over at DoubleClick Connections.  Each challenge will also have a theme and our first one is all about ice cream.  What better way to celebrate National Ice Cream Month?

For my project I used the Cricut Cartridge Sweet Treats.  The cone was embossed using one of my cuttlebug folders to give it that waffle cone look.  For the ice cream I smeared a little glitter dimensional fabric paint over the cut, sprinkled with a smidge of green glitter tinsel and then used my heat gun to dry it all together.  Once dried I added a couple of the summer release skittles in Grinch Green, Caramel and Purple.

Now that you've seen my card for the challenge be sure to check out the other wonderful designs our team has put together.  Then after you've been amply inspired, create your own, link up and play along with us.

Remember the challenge ends August 5th and you are not required to use skittles but you are required to use ice cream..........

As for me, I'm going to enter this in the Anything Goes challenge over at Die Cuttin Divas.

A Good Friend Is Card

I told you I'd be making other projects, and I couldn't help myself.  I just had to get a card made with this file from Treasure Box Designs.

So last night I stayed in my craft room while the guys once again played their video games in the living room.  Fine by me.  Just means I get to craft for as long as I want while doing it in peace.

For this card I cut the TBD file at 9.58 inches high and 9.45 wide.  I did find that cutting at this size allowed me to create a cut that fit on a 5 inch high card without the feet/legs.  That means next time I need to go smaller if I want to be able to use the full file.

The sign file I cut at 4.59 inches high and 4.78 inches wide.  And in case you're curious, purchase of this cut file also comes with the poem.  I think she has 3 different sizes but I cropped the picture down to one and adjust it to the size I need when printing. 

My background paper is from the DCWV mat stack All About Girls.  I thought that bobby pins would be a great background for two girls with beautiful hair.  LOL

And now I'm off to enter this into the Super Scraps Saturday challenge over at Hiding in My Craft Room.

Have Your Cake & Eat It Too

I created this birthday card using the Sweet Treats cartridge. But I wanted to give a textured, more realistic look and feel so I applied Tulip fabric paint in white metallic to the main body of the cake. I then used my heat embossing gun and gently dried the paint paying mind to allow it to settle back down as it bubbled up. Once I had the white layer complete I moved on to the pink.

For the pink layers I applied Tombo glue and sprinkled on some Distress embossing powder and heat set that as well. The blue swirls were created using Memory Thread.  If you haven't seen this yet look in the aisle where the embroidery thread is kept.  I will say that I have not found it at Michael's - just AC Moore and Hobby Lobby.

Fishing You A Happy Birthday

I found a set of four sea life charms by Blue Moon at Walmart yesterday and instantly fell in love with them.  As soon as I saw them I knew that they would be perfect to use in tunnel cards and so I bought a set. 

I started designing the card last night and just finished it this afternoon.  For this one I used:

George to cut the inside mat and ovals for creating my tunnel and frame.

Tags, Bags, Boxes and More for the tag on the front of the card.

Sweet Treats for the cake.

Life's a Beach for all other cuts.

Rush Delivery Birthday Pop-Up

I had some free time to sit in my craft room and play around this afternoon so I decided to break out my new Everyday Pop-Ups cartridge.  I've had it for a couple weeks now but didn't want to play with it until I had time in case I had issues figuring out whatever mechanism I chose.

So for my first card I decided to use one of the easier pop-ups and went with the airplane.  For the inside piece I cut the pop-up itself and also cut layers to add color and definition to it.  Before putting it all together I made sure to score and fold all the pieces ensuring that they would lay and work together properly.

The gifts on the front of the card were cut from Sweet Treats.

Now that I've made one of the pop-ups from this cartridge I'm anxious to do some others as I'd really love to see how they turn out.  Hopefully this will be a cartridge that won't let me down!

Cupcake Time

Wouldn't you know it?  This week's Cricut Cardz Challenge was an anything goes theme and I'm so busy with getting graduation announcements and Relay for Life cards completed that I didn't have time to dream up a awesome card.  I suppose that's okay though as sometimes simple is better. 

This week I chose to use my Sweet Treats cart because

     1. I have used it very little since I purchased it

     2. I've seen this stamp of stacked cupcakes on a stand and wanted  to re-create it

     3. I've made a few sock cupcakes for gift baskets and thought it'd be great to have a card to go with it

So not only will I share my card this week but also the "cupcakes" that I have made as well.  The cupcake wrapper was made using my Easter cartridge and the idea came from greenbean over on the Cricut crafting message boards. 

The cupcake wrapper with the dots was made using a file that was created and shared by Rach1fun using Plantin Schoolbook.  And while I was waiting for my Easter cart to arrive I just had to give this one a try.

Birthday Surprise - CCC#15 Gate Fold

This week's Cricut Cardz Challenge was to create a gate fold card using any cart, theme, etc. I chose to make mine a birthday card. For this card I used the Sweet Treats cartridge for all my cuts.

Very simple card with a festive, party look.