Seriously

Happy Wednesday everyone and welcome to another Cricut Cardz Challenge.  Can you believe this is our 118th challenge?  My how the time flies.....

This week's challenge is Anything Goes.  You can make a card, project, layout - ANYTHING - so long as you use your Cricut. 

As you can tell I chose to make a card......I had to since I just received the new Suburbia cartridge in the mail a couple days prior.  I've been looking at this cartridge and salivating and on World Card Making Day I just HAD to dig in.  And just like the Child's Year cartridge, Surburbia is going to be a fun one.

Both my silhouette and the word seriously were cut from Suburbia.  At first I was going to use the question mark with the word and try to come up with some smart alek sentiment but I changed my mind.  Instead, I chose to make this an enouraging card and used the following sentiment:

Everything will be okay in the end.  If it's not okay, it's not the end.  (Author Unknown)

Now that you've seen my take on this week's challenge hop on over to Cardz TV and check out all of the other fun and exciting projects our design team created for you this week.  Then after you've been amply inspired, create your own, link up and play along with us.

I can't wait to see what you make this week.

Quick & Easy Birthday Card

Happy Tuesday everyone.  I have another quick and easy birthday card for you today.  Remember when I told you yesterday that I had cut out several items on World Cardmaking Day?  Well this is another of the several Teddy Bear Parade cuts that I made.

Of course it didn't hurt that I had a scrap piece of this wonderfully perfect paper to use for my background.  Isn't it great when you have that perfect piece just lying there in your stash waiting for the right card?  This is one of the many reasons that I don't throw out any of my scraps.  Seriously, you should see my scrap bin and shelves - I'm overflowing in them......

As you can see this was another of my one cut cards and you know that's okay because teamed up with this paper I didn't need another cut. 

So have you added the Teddy Bear Parade to your cartridge stash yet?  I'm having so much fun with this one - kinda like the Create a Critter cartridges - one and two.  And these days it's difficult to choose which one of the three I want to play with more............

Send in the Clown Birthday Card

Since Saturday was World Cardmaking Day I spent my morning cutting various goodies while all the men in the house were still snug in their beds.  I started at 6am and a couple hours later had to break to begin cooking breakfast and doing my normal Saturday routine.  But throughout the day I was crafting away - like when everyone was watching football or playing video games.

Saturday was also my youngest daughter's birthday, and that means I have have three twenty somethings running amuck in the world.  Needless to say I'm longing for the days when they were all younger and I didn't feel quite so old.  LOL

But I digress and what would a birthday celebration be without a bright, cheerful, clown to make everyone smile?  This one is from the recently released Teddy Bear Parade and given that it is the only cut for this card it made for a nice, quick and easy one to put together.

Book Reviews: Firebird & Unconditional

I was recently presented with the wonderful opportunity to preview a couple of new books that are on the market.

The first is a child's book, Firebird - written by Brent McCorkle.  As soon as I saw the cover I had to read the story.  And what a wonderful story it was.  Firebird is a little baby oriole who -like me - LOVES the sushine.  But one day when a storm comes in Firebird asks his momma why God allows the storm to take away the sun.  To this his momma enourages him to fly up through the clouds and storm to see what lies on the other side.....

What follows next is a wonderful illustration about how the Lord is allows there with us - even in the midst of a storm.

This is a wonderful story for the young and the still young at heart.

The next book, Unconditional, written by Eva Marie Everson is the story of Samantha Crawford an author who at first glance has the world by the horns.  She has a loving husband and a career that she loves.  But one fateful night her world changes when her husband is senselessly murdered. 

After that night Samantha begins a journey down a road that leads to near self-destruction as she attempts to take her life.  But the Lord has other plans for her and she is instead reunited with a childhood friend - Joe.

Joe, who is dying lives a life full of sacrifical services to children without fathers.  And while Samantha watches Joe give tirelessly to the children she begins to find new purpose in her own life.  Along the way the police find her husband's killer and Sam becomes torn between the desire for revenge and grace.

Inspired by real life events this is one book (or movie) that is sure to touch your heart strings as it serves as a gentle reminder that God's grace and love are always there surrounding us no matter what circumstances we find ourselves in.

Quick & Easy Christmas Easel Card

My weekend was full of chaos as it was the start to our craft show season.  As always it began with the Oktoberfest and I'm here to tell you that it was an awesome start!  We stayed so busy this year that I hardly had a moment to sit.  And since we were so busy that means it's time to bust tail and get cracking for the next show in four weeks - especially since we got wiped out of a few things.

So as I sit to prepare for the next show, my posts will probably be a little eratic and for that I apologize.  Just know that I haven't forgotten about you.  ;o)

Today though I have a quick and easy card for you - what else would I create at the end of such an exhausting weekend?  lol

I haven't created an easel card in such a long time I actually had to refresh my memory on how to make one.  Then I simply used my Sizzix to cut this cute reindeer and his Santa outfit and then I found a bright, cheerful paper to use as his back drop.

See?  Told you it was quick and easy.

Have a great week everyone!

Miss Your Face

Happy Friday everyone!!  Today I have another challenge for you and this time is all about the face.  That's right, our challenge this week was to create a card with a face.  And what would be better I ask you than this cut from the new Wild Cards 2 cartridge?  Okay, well there are a few and I think our awesome design team has found them all for you so be sure you hop on over to Pause Dream Enjoy to take a look.

As soon as I saw this cut I knew that I had to use it for this week's challenge.  Even better I knew exactly who I was going to send this card to.......my oldest daughter.  She has these adorable saying that end in "your face" like "hush your face". 

This was a very easy card to make since the cartridge does all the work for you.  Now I just need to find a little more time so I can sit down and play with this cartridge a bit more.

So this week's sponsor for our challenge is

Fresh Brewed Designs and this week's winner will take home 3 digis of their choice http://freshbreweddesigns.com/ .  Now go take a look at all the other great projects our team has put together for you.  Then break out those card making tools, create your own and come back here - or go to Pause Dream Enjoy - and link up your creation so you can play along with us AND be entered for a chance to win this week's prize.

I can't wait to see what you create!

Snowman Gift Tags

Well it's almost the end of the week and I don't know about you but I'm ready for the weekend.  Of course mine is going to be jam packed as this weekend begins our craft show season.  We've only got a couple of shows this year but we've doubled our booth sizes and are already talking about maybe taking on another one next year if we do well again this year.

Today, I'd like to share another set of gift tags I put together.  I used the shaving cream and food dye technique again and I just love how the yellows turned out.  The marbling and color is so perfect as a backdrop for these adorable snowmen from the Create a Critter 2 cartridge.

Surprise tho' - I did use Christmas Cheer for the "to" and "from" one these tags.  Yep, I actually used one of my older cartridges.  LOL

These tags were a lot of fun to put together and the hardest (not to mention the messiest) part was the shaving cream technique.  As you can see I "dyed" both sides of my tag thus giving them a finished look.  Don't remember what the shaving cream technique is?  You can view the tutorial here.

Now go have fun and create some gift tags while you still have time.