Stars and Buttons

Guess who is gonna get this card??

Off it goes to my favorite USAF JAG Officer!

The blue stars and the ribbon came from the Stand and Salute Cartridge, I got this huge bag of multi-size clear buttons for next to nothing and used some white scrappers floss for the bows. Now the buttons will make this card "un-machineable" for sure. So its either got to go in a care package or I'll have to pay a special visit to the post master for correct postage......but knowing me, it will probably go into a care package....got to go back to my roots as a Army Wife and spoil my servicemen who are deployed or stationed away from family!

Across the distance...

One of my best friends is currently serving in the United States Air Force, and while this is floral paper, I think its a manly floral that was OK to send him!

I love my Sizzix Texture Boutique- It can add SO much dimension to your projects, for a very reasonable price- especially if you are shopping with Meg and I at Michael's!

The "Love U Much" Embossing folder came from the Sizzix Valentine's Day folder set and at regualr price probably sold for $11+ dollars. Meg and I each scooped up a set on clearance for..............$3!!!  WOW!!  And clearly- they are good for much more than just Valentine's!

A Flower Soft Thank You!

Have you used Flower Soft? If not, I suggest you try it!  I love it!

Flower Soft is shaved foam that comes in solid colors or color mixes. You can also buy it in ultra fine or regular. This is the lavender mix and it is the regular type, not ultra fine. Meg and I picked this up when we were at Life Memories & More, a small scrapbook store in Palmer, MA. It was like $5.99 for a little pot of it and let me tell you....it was JAMMED in the pot. I could take the lid off and turn the pot upside down and it didn't budge!

You have to fluff the Flower Soft before using it- just take a little bit out of the pot and rub it between your fingers a few times to separate the pieces. Use a glue that has a low water content- like tacky glue, Sprinkle on the Flower Soft, lightly tap it and shake the excessive. I repeated it a few times and before the glue dried I took a fine glitter and sprinkeled it on top. The fine glitter sneaks in between the pieces of flower soft and give a nice sparkle to the project. Of course, I coudnt catch that on film though!



I snagged these metal "thank you" on clearance at the craft store for next to nothing! And since I dont have cropic markers and wanted something just a little softer, I used some artist grade colored pencils.

Hope you like the Flower Soft!

Another quick card off my Gyspy...

Just a quick little card to go with a little something.....

Front:

Inside:

Back:

Quick Card...on my new Gypsy!

So I've been playing on my new Gypsy here and there when I can sneak some time this week- and I just LOVE IT!  I've got 6 projets saved on it and I really feel like I am getting more out of my cartridges. Which, for the amount of money spent on them, is a really really great thing!

Here is a quick card I made to send across the US with an order of Girl Scout Cookies...

I think the thing I love most about the Gypsy is that you can lay out all the paper and know exactly where the image is going to cut. There is NO guessing!  I got every piece of paper I needed onto this 6x12 mat for my Cricut Create.

And here it is all together:

For some reason the picture is a little out of focus, and since I already packed up the cookies and the card, I cant take another photo! 

I thought I had the word "cookies" welded correctly, but my C and 1st O didn't weld so its a little not right there, but it add character, right? And belive it or not, this whole card was made from scraps. Yep. that 5x5 brown and green paper were in the scrap pile. Im THAT girl that cuts 2 inches from a 12x12 and considers the 10x10 thats left a scrap! You should see my scrap pile!

Tags

While trying to clean up my posting history, I found this post from last month that I thought I had posted, but I guess I didn't.

These were just some tags I had made for a few different Valentine's Day Projects.

The first is the tag that went on the Memo Boards I had made for the girls in my office. These were done at 3 inches, the bright pink layer was sprayed with some shimmer mist, and the heart had a pop dot behind it. I lucked out at Michael's and got a set of heart eyelets. While this one came out OK, I wouldnt buy them again- regarless of the setting I used, the eyelet either cracked, the paint chipped off, or it lost its heart shape! Lesson to be learned in there somewhere!

These tags went on all of these Memo Boards:

The following tags were made for the cookie bags the people in my surrounding offices, and for the staff at my husbands job.

 Super easy- A banner cut from the Cricut Sampler Cartridge, a heart made with a Creative Memories shape punch, and a My Pink Stamper Stamp. I chose to use a large silver eyelet on these tags becuase I was using 3 peices of curling ribbon and wanted to make sure the tag wouldnt rip when I tied the bags.

Cricut Bags by JoAnn

I'm super lucky to be able to surround myself with many crafty ladies!  Meg's mom, Jo Ann, recently started paper crafting with us having sewed for many years. For the longest time Meg was the only scrapper with a Mama Cricut- the rest of us just had babies. So Meg would tote Mama to and from home and here there and everywhere without a bag. For the amount of traveling Meg did, and how much she used it at home, it didn't make sense to spend a lot of money on one of the fancy travel bags that are marketed for the Cricuts. It would never be in the bag!  Now, Jo Ann starts paper crafting with us, gets her own machine, and the ideas just start flying!  Meg actually surprised me with this bag one night when we were out to dinner with our husbands..I was SO excited!  Its so cool!

I believe this is left over fabric from the cover Jo Ann made for Meg's Papazan Cushion and Jo Ann even made name tags for the bags!  The reverse side of the tag has my full name on it, and even a 3D embellishment to make it POP!

Now, I own the Cricut Create, if you want to see the larger bag she made for the Expression Machines, click on over to Megs Blog Post : Cricky Travel Storage

I haven't tried it yet, but I think theres even room for 'Lil Miss Gypsy in there too!

THANKS JO ANN!!!  I LOVE MY BAG!!!!

My Gypsy is HERE!!!

The long wait, and the LONG update is finally over!  My Gypsy made it here safely, is finally all updated, has all the cartridges linked to her and has her fancy new "skin" on!  I'm so excited. I waited forever and went back and forth on my decision to get one, to the point where I am sure I drove Meg NUTS!!! 

I'm not joking when I tell you it took forever to update this baby! I started right away when I got it Saturday afternoon- around 1pm. I thought the updates were finished around 5:30pm but when I went to link my cartridges, there were 5 that wouldn't link and I kept bring told to go the website for instructions on how to update it.

So I hooked it back up, let it chill with the laptop all night and this morning it was STILL not taking the update. So I tried one more time- hooked her back up on the little computer so Stan could use the big one,  and went and ran some errands. Much to my delight when I got home she appeared to be all set and I was easily able to link my last 5 cartridges to her at 10:30 this morning- 21 HOURS LATER!

And since then, I have designed and saved 4 projects on her!  So happy ~ and I LOVE the welding feature.

And a shout out to everyone who has posted How To Videos on their blogs and on You Tube. You have made learning how to use the Gypsy so much easier! Thanks!!!!

Ohh....Mr FedEx Man....

Where are you? I am not so patiently awaiting the FedEx Man who will deliver my Gypsy today!  I am really hoping he comes soon or I might burst! The cover that I ordered for her came on Wednesday- so there has been a bit of separation anxiety in my house this week!  =)

Meg, over at Crafting with Meg, is on her way to check out the nearest Hobby Lobby store to us....an hour and a half away...Sadly, I am missing the trip because the roof on my house needs a little TLC and I can not be trusted to only window shop!  Roofs are expensive!  We have had a rough winter here in New England, and it would appear that between winter, and some less than perfect roof work from the homeowners before us, we need a few repairs. Thankfully it is not a whole new roof which I was afraid of. But its still a larger expense that I wasn't prepared for this week. Oh the joys of home ownership!

Soooo...while I await my knight in a shining delivery truck to appear, I think I might go make a few scrapbook pages to post later.

Hope everyone is having a great weekend with a strong, leak-less roof above your heads!

A Thank You Card...

This was a card I made a few days ago. When I started out I didn't know what I was going to make. I had taken out the Cricut "Tie the Knot" cartridge to do a My Pink Stamper Challenge about Birds, and then didn't do it...LOL.  So I thought I should use the cartridge since I'd taken it out days earlier after digging through everything looking for the perfect birds. Since the bird idea had "flown out the window", I saw this cute flower and thought "I need those" ( I say this about many things!!!).

I used all 4 layer options, black on the shadow blackout, white for the shadow, pink for the flower and green for the leaves. I put all the layers together using Beacon's 3 in 1 Advanced Craft Glue which I have to say I LOVED. I was taken back at first by the strong scent of the glue- but quickly saw how great it works!

This is again a Standard A2 card from a chain craft store, the pink paper is cut at a 1/4 inch smaller than the card base and was embossed with the Sizzix Texture Boutique and a Sizzix folder from the Damask set I think---the folders themselves really should be labeled with their correct names! It would make it so much easier- guess I'll have to lable mine from now on.  :-)

The White middle section is 2 inches wide and 3 3/4 inches long. Both the white piece and the pink backround have the edges chalked with black chalk ink from Creative Memories. I just wanted to give it a little more demension.

To add another touch of demension, I added a strip of black velet ribbon across the card.

The Stamp is actually from a Fiskars set I scored at Joann's for a crazy cheap price!  It was in their clearance section for....wait for it.....$1.97!!!!!!  Original price.....$15!!!  That night I also got 2 sets of Inkadinkado stamps for 97 Cents Each! Those should have been $10 each! So a whopping $4 for what should have been $35 dollars in stamps.  I think thats my best haul yet!

Hope you like it!  Im really happy with it, especially since I didnt know what I was going to make when I started out.

I love reading everyone's comments...so if you were here, drop a line and say Hi!

Tomorrow is Wednesday- 1/2 way through the work week for most of us. Hope your week is going well!

PS- I actually made 5 of these cards, but only stamped one. Since its a card I can use for many different things, I can stamp them as I need one, that way the sentiment will be just right for the situation!

St Patrick's Day Cards...

These are some of the St Patrick's Day cards I made...it was an adventure getting to the final product with these cards! I tried a few new things along the way, so they took a little extra time in design and a lot of trial and error too!

These are standard A2 size white card that were bought from a craft store chain.

The green paper is Core'dinations paper that was cut 1/4 inch smaller than the A2 card, put through the Texture Boutique with the Cuttlebug embossing folder "Pebbles". Once ebmossed, I sanding the raised sides to reveal the lighter green core color of the paper. And then of couse I used the corner rounder.

The Shamrocks were cut from Designers Calendar Cricut Cartridge (using Meg's Gypsy since at this point I hadnt caved and bought one yet---I have since then, and it should be here this week!).  I used the rounded feature cut and the regular cut and they are cut at 3 inches (I believe). Before I applied them to the card, I sprayed them with some Gold Tattered Angels Glimmer Mist, and put pop dots on the back of them.

The Happy St Patrick's Day banner was done with a cut from the Cricut Sampler Cartridge, stamped with a stamp from the dollar section of a chain craft store, and when dry, it was chalked with 2 tones of green.

I stamped the outside front of the envelope with another stamp from the same dollar section of the store...I find some really great things in the dollar section- anyone else????

Over all, Im pretty happy.  Originally, the green embossed papers had ripped edges, but I wasn't really enjoying the way they looked. Anyone have any tips on ripping paper?  I would LOVE to hear them....I really want to try it more....but I never like the way it looks.....

Hope everyone is having fun gearing up for St Patrick's Day....after all, everyone is Irish on St. Patrick's Day!  We will be sporting our Irishness at our local Parade- one of the best in the country....Can't wait!

 

Stylish Blogger Award

I got this Stylish Blogger Award from Danielle over at:

Let's Craft Together

THANK YOU!!!

You should all go check out her amazing projects!

Now I am to pay the award forward to 8 other talented people and tell you 8 things about myself.

Here are the people I would like to honor with this award:

Meg- Crafting with Meg

Courtney Lee- Court's Crafts

Diana- DL.ART

Agnes-Flowerdisco's Scrap Hut

Cathryn- In the Pink

Jalisa- Patches of Pink

CarrieAnne- The Serendipitous Scrapper

Buffie- Scrapping with Buffie

All these ladies do an amazing job on their project!  Stop by their blogs, look around and follow them!!

OK, 8 things about myself.....

1. I have the best family and friends a girl could ever ask for- and I really really mean that.
2. I love my job- and got out early today to enjoy some nice weather and take my dog for a walk for some mommy/daughter time
3. I hate feet. Doesn't matter who they belong to :)
4. I love trading ideas with my crafting friends- which is why I love following everyone.
5. Shopping for scrapbooking supplies is an addiction that I can't shake.
6. My dog just found the one part of the yard that isn't covered in snow/ice and just tracked mud ALL through the living room.
7. My dogs scrapbook is the only book that is complete (embellished and journal entries done) and "up to date"- wedding one is still not done- its only been almost 8 years....
8. I JUST BOUGHT A GYPSY!!!!

Pass it on ladies- share the joy!

A "Manly" Birthday Card

I love making cards, but seems to have a hard time making cards that aren't really girly, pink, or frilly...anyone else ever have that problem?  I hope I am not the only one!

I dug though all my cricut cartridges and found this cute set of balloons on one. Since this was a 5x7 card, i cut the balloons at 3 inches and used white shadow cuts to make them pop-off the blue background.  I also used some pop dots on the back to give them even more depth.

I of course used my Sizzix Texture Boutique to give the bottom some detail, and busted out the I-rock to add some studs for a little extra detail.

Eric loved his birthday card, and that's what it was all about!