Cricut Cards and Envelopes

Here's a great little video from Close to My Heart showing a few fun tips and tricks to use with the new Cricut Artiste cartridge.

If you don't have the Cricut Artiste cartridge yet or have any questions about it, please feel free to contact me or visit my website, here.

Also, the While Supplies Last page on the website has been updated!  If you are not familiar with the While Supplies Last page you should check it out.   There are some great products,  greatly reduced.

Hope everyone has a happy Veteran's Day and a great week!

Happy Scrapping!  

Congratulations and More Christmas Cards

Congratulations to Ms. Barbara!  She won the Mystery Hostess for October and received $25 in freebies from Close to My Heart.  Anytime you see a "Mystery Hostess" gathering on my website, feel free to jump in.  For every $25 you spend on my website, you get an entry for a chance to win $25 in hostess rewards to be spent on ink, paper, stamps, etc. throughout the book.  At the end of the month, if orders total $150 or more,  one lucky winner will be drawn.  Don't forget, Studio J orders count as well.

I would also like to thank everyone that stopped by the Fall Festival.  It turned out to be such a pretty day.  I have been kicked into high gear trying to get ready for that.  Now, that it's over with, I can get back to business as usual in a little more relaxed mode.

Its seems as though I totally skipped all the other holidays and just jumped into Christmas card mode. There are just so many beautiful cards out there.  Everywhere you look is decorated for Christmas.  Some places started months ago. With only a month and half left, I am no where near through with what I had planned to be through with, but such is the story of my life.  I did finish making the rest of my little snowmen from the stamp set Flakey Friends.  I have had such a good time with this set.

These are the last of the ones I had stamped.  I did the one on the left in Cranberry and Pear.  The one on the right is Cotton Candy and Pear.  I just wanted to see how many color variations I could use with these little guys for Christmas.  I just think they are adorable.  This stamp set is just snow much fun! (sorry couldn't resist :))

While in the flaky mood, I decided to try another card.  This one was inspired by Allisa Chilton over at Rocky Mountain Paper Crafts.  She has some wonderful cards and a great blog if you haven't checked her out.  

For mine, I used Sky, Indian Corn Blue, and White Daisy cardstock.  This card is 6x6.  I cut the bigger snowflake from  from the Art Philosophy Cricut cartridge on page 22.  Than I layered a smaller snowflake from page 27 of the same cartridge.  The sentiment is from the Perfect Fit-Holidays stamp set and is stamped in Indian Corn Blue.  The background paper on this card is actually second generation stamping using the snowflake from Pear & Partridge Scrapbooking Workshop stamp set with Indian Corn Blue ink.   Here's the inside. 

This sentiment is from the To You and Yours stamp set.  I used another snowflake, same as the outside one, only reversed color and used the fallout from the largest one for the center.  You can barely see the stamping on the inside of the card, but I did the same thing as  for the background on the outside of the card.   A couple of blue sparkles from my stash and called it done.  

That's all for now.  Sorry for the long post.  Hopefully, I will have more to post soon.  Thanks for stopping by and have a great weekend! 

Happy Scrapping!

Clearly the Best: Alcohol Marker Madness

Here's a video from Close to My Heart talking about their new alcohol markers.   These markers are great.  Have  a look...

If you would like to order any of the products you see, feel free to visit my website, here, or contact me.  I would love to show you how :)

If you should happen to order from my website this month, be sure to join the "Mystery Hostess" gathering upon checkout.  For every $25 you spend you will receive an entry to win $25 in hostess rewards. 

Happy Scrapping!

Project Inspiration: Card Workshops on the Go

One  of the great new items that was introduced in the current Autumn/Winter idea book  is the Cardmaking Workshop on the Go.  I believe they have had card kits in the past (before my CTMH time), but never a Workshop on the Go for cardmakers.

Just like in the WotG for the featured paper packs, the cardmaking WotG's have a stamp set and embellishments unique to the kit.  There are two WotG's for cards this season, one for all occasions and one for Christmas.   Here is a video from Close to My Heart showing the features in each kit.

The great thing about these kits,  is that you have the stamp set and the instructions, complete with cutting guide, that you can use over and over again.   I have done the Avonlea kit as a group workshop  and posted on it earlier, here.   My daughter and I spent an afternoon doing the Christmas kit.    Either alone, or in a group, these kits are great.  

For more information on the kits you can check on my website here or feel free to contact me.   

Thanks for stopping by.  

Happy scrapping!

Krafty Christmas Cards

I thought I would give my cute little snowmen a rest for a while and try my hand at kraft paper.  I do love to work with kraft paper.  While surfing through the posts on Pinterest, I came across a great card.  Plain, simple, and done with kraft paper.  The 5x7 card in the middle was my spin on the original.

The patterned paper was some Christmas paper I have had in my stash for a while.   I only had one page of each paper, so I meant I was going to make it stretch.   I got four big stars out of the polka dotted sheet comfortably (cut at 4" on the Art Philosophy Cricut cartridge).  So, four big cards is what I have.  The stamped flourish is from the Love Life stamp set.  It's another one of my favorite "go to" stamp sets.  I stamped the flourishes in Colonial White pigment ink.  Make sure when using the pigment inks that you give it time to dry or heat set it.  I usually stamp and then move on to something else.    I cut stars out of Colonial White cardstock and then layered them on.  I tied a little bow from our natural hemp and added a little red sparkle. I stamped my sentiment, from the Merry and Bright stamp set,  in Ruby ink.  Voila!  Krafty and simple.  Although, I couldn't get any more stars out of my printed papers, I just couldn't let it end there.  I made the cute little note cards on either side.  Here's a closer look. 

I love mini cards.  These little jewels are 2 1/2 x 3 3/4.  I just cut strips for little banners, stamped the smaller flourish and added my Colonial White star.  I needed some way to keep these all together so I found this neat little box that's cut from the Cricut Artiste cartridge.  It's on page 57.  I cut it at 3" and it's perfect for five of these little cards with their envelopes.  

No set is complete without 3x3's :)  I used the same design on my 3x3 kraft cards and made them a neat little holder for them to fit in.  Thanks to Vicki Wizniuk for the template for this little holder.  I use it all the time.  I think it makes such a great little gift. 

This holds four cards and their envelopes.  I just decorated the belly band with a leftover star or two and it's now part of the matching set.  

Moral of the story is....never throw away scraps :) I still had some of this paper left, so I made five more Christmas cards which I hope to get posted soon.  As long as you have a good base cardstock, you can make two pieces of patterned paper go a long way. 

Thanks for stopping by.  I hope to have more posted soon. 

Happy Scrapping! 

Oval Frames

Amongst my cardmaking efforts, I managed to get a few frames done.  ( I tend to get distracted by shiny things..or zebra things..or brightly colored things...or..you get my point).  I found these great oval frames at Tuesday Mornings.  I thought they might be worth working with.  They are chipboard and open backed.  It just so happens that our Art Philosophy Cricut cartridge had just the right oval to cut the opening for the middle.  So, basically, I lucked out :)

 

This is the first one I did.  I'm not sure where I got the cream and black paisley paper from, but I have been wanting to do something with it for a while.  I cut some roses from the Artiste Cricut cartridge in Ruby and Colonial White.  I inked the edges of the Colonial white roses with Ruby ink.  The leaves are cut from Olive and Colonial White.  I used the Olive marker to add color to the Colonial White leaves.  Here's a better look.  

To me the leaves seemed too flat.  So I used the marker to give them some life.  I gently curved them around a paint brush to give them some shape as well.  

The frame around the opening was cut from the Art Philosophy Cricut cartridge.  It took several attempts to get the size right, but I finally found one that worked.  

These frames can be hung either horizontal or vertical.   The ones below were at my daughter's request.   She does love some zebra stripes. 

The flowers on the following frames were cut from the Artiste Cricut cartridge.  They were cut from White Daisy cardstock and I used Tulip (retired) ink to ink the edges. The flowers are cut in three different sizes.  Mine are 1/2" difference in size.  You ink the edges, spritz them with water, crumple them up, flatten them back out and then assemble while still damp.  I layered them with our black tulle ribbon, roughly cut into ovals.  I found some pink gemstone brads from my stash and just poked them in there.  While the flower is still damp, you can shape it as you please.  

I cut the coordinating leaves from the same key as the flower, but in black cardstock.  I used our Sparkles Black Flourish to add a little bling around the frame.   Here's the one done in Gypsy.

The flowers were done in the same manner.  I used the clear Sparkles Flourish for this frame. 

Also, I used my embossing stylus and simply drew a line down the middle with the curve of the leaf to give it a little more dimension as well. 

These little jewels will be going with me to the Fall Festival at Sunland this year at the end of this month.  If you are in the area, please stop by.   I'll have some more crafted items, cards, layout kits, and papers for purchase.   

Thanks for stopping by.  Hope to have more soon. 

Happy Scrapping!

 

More Flakey Friends

I am still having fun with my Flakey Friends.  These guys are just fun.  They make me smile.  I hope they have the same effect on whoever receives these cards.  This time I thought I would try for a blue Christmas.    So here are my little fellows in blue. 

This time I took advantage of the beautiful day outside to take the picture of this one.  The colors are definitely more true to life.  Again, I stamped the images in Memento Black ink.  I used the Sky and Outdoor Denim marker sets to color them in. It's still a little hard to tell from the picture, but I stamped the little snowflakes from the Ornamental Cheer stamp set above my snowmen and used our Clear Detail embossing powder on them.  After I heat set them, I used a sea sponge and lightly swirled on some Sky ink.  The cardstock colors are Dutch Blue (retired) and Sky.  The sentiment is from the Pear and Partridge cardmaking WOTG.  I stamped it in Dutch Blue.  The frame is a cut from the Art Philosophy Cricut Cartrdge (page 26, I use this one all the time, but I can never seem to find it unless I mark it..lol). I cut the white on the layer  function and used the fallout from that cut to put on the blue which is cut from the regular shape.  That way I can raise my sentiment for some dimension instead of it being framed in.  It gives the same look but going a different direction,  if that makes sense.    I had some blue ribbon in my stash that just happened to match and topped off my bow with a bling gem from the Boutique Assortment.  That's it, three merry little snowmen.  Oh, how dare I forget.....prisma glitter!   One cannot have happy snowmen without prisma glitter snow :) 

I'm going to try a couple of more combinations of color for these little guys, so check back soon.  Thanks for stopping by.  Enjoy the rest of your weekend. 

Happy Scrapping!