Card for Cricut Circle Weekend Challenge

One of my goals is to start entering challenges. Every weekend on the Cricut Circle message board there is a challenge posted. It's a great way to challenge my creativity and get some great inspiration from a lot of talented ladies. This weekend's challenge was to use a font cartridge.

I chose the Songbird cardridge. I love the font on this cart because it is so pretty, but I also love all of the bird images that are on there. I layered my card front with two shades of blue cardstock from Core'dinations. The first was cut at 7 7/8" x 4 7/8" and the second layer was cut at 7 5/8" x 4 5/8 inches. I ran the lighter blue through my cuttlebug using the Stylized Flowers folder and sanded the image. The frame behind the bird was also cut from Songbird at 4". The cream and brown dotted paper is from the Mirabella stack from the Paper Studio. Finally, I cut out the flowerpot and bird image. The perch feature on Songbird has a lot of really pretty bird images. I cut it twice at 3" once in brown and once in blue. I trimmed the blue bird off the pot and layered it over the brown one. Then I cut the shadow in dark brown. I inked everything with Chestnut ink.

After assembling all the pieces I added brown grosgrain ribbon, with an accent from the Buttercup ribbon collection from Close to My Heart. Then I added Summer Flowersoft to the top of the pot. The sentiment inside was also from Close to My Heart and stamped in Outdoor Denim ink. I cut another bird and flowerpot image at 2" and added the bird inside.

I hope you've enjoyed my card today. Thanks for stopping by!

Baseball is Life Layout

Hey, everyone!! I wanted to share a layout with you today. I am so far behind on my scrapbooking I hate to think about it! I'm trying to get better about scrapping current things so I don't get farther behind, then picking up what I'm behind on. This layout is for my son's baseball team this year. This is his first year of playing little league baseball on a traveling team, which is a big deal where we live! I wanted to do a two page layout so I could display his team picture as well as some snapshots of the games.

I love the fact that I designed this whole layout on the gypsy! I used a 12x24 mat to get everything laid out the way I wanted it. Then, I copied the images to other mats so it would be easier to cut. It made this a snap to assemble once it was cut out.

For my background, I used some baseball paper from Hobby Lobby. I love the red stitching around the edges. All of the images used are from Sports Mania. I cut the "Baseball is Life" phrase at 4" in white with a shadow in red. The baseball mitt was cut 3 1/2" in brown with a lighter shade for the layer and the blackout in black. For the boarder at the bottom, I welded 3 of the boarder cuts of baseballs together which were 1 1/2". Since there is no blackout for the boarders, I used the hide contour feature to "hide the cuts for the stitches to have a blackout piece to put behind. This allowed the red "stitches" to show. I inked all of my cuts with Chestnut Cat's Eye ink. The photo mats were cut in red and blue to match his team picture.

Thanks for stopping by!! I hope everyone has a great day!!

First Gypsy Project!

I know I am waaaaay behind, but I just got my gypsy in the mail on Thursday! There are a lot of reasons why I hadn't gotten one yet, but the point is I finally have one. After getting it Thursday and getting it updated, I was finally able to play with it on Friday! A big thanks to my hubby for letting me use his Mac to update since my mac has an older operating system that wouldn't support the cricut sync software.

Anyway, I designed this card yesterday morning and I loved how quickly it came together. I wanted to do a quick shape card for my first project and the cupcakes from Sweet Treats immediately came to mind. Now, I must confess, I didn't realize until I got down into my craft room to link my cardridge and make the card, that Sweet Treats already had shaped cards for each image! Oh well!

I used the fourth cupcake from Sweet Treats and added two in blackout to my mat at 5" then welded them together. Then I added the regular image and layers to my mat. After linking my cartridge I was ready to cut!! I used brown cardstock for the card base. The sprinkle glitter paper for the cupcake is from the Sugar and Spice stack from the Paper Studio. I ran the top half through my Cuttlebug using my Divine Swirls folder (one of my go to folders!). I used a bright pink for the wrapper and a scrap of red for the cherry. I love how I could put all of the pieces on my mat and just cut once!! While assembling I decided I didn't like the sprinkle paper behind the wrapper so I cut another blackout cupcake in brown and cut off the top. After assembling I added some diamond stickles to the cherry to accent. On the inside I stamped a sentiment from Stampendous that says "Baked you up some Birthday Wishes!"

I was so excited how quick this was to make after designing!! I don't know why I waited to long to take the plunge on a gypsy. I designed a layout yesterday afternoon that I hope to get cut and assembled today. Thanks for looking!!!

Patriotic Centerpiece

I love to decorate for the holidays! In the summer, I usually put out my patriotic decorations at Memorial Day, and leave them all summer long. I hadn't used my cricut to make any decorations for summer before, so I decided to make a centerpiece for my table.

I started with a blue ceramic flower pot from the garden section at Walmart. Using the Stand and Salute cartridge, I cut the stars from white vinyl at 1 1/2" to go around the rim. Then, I used the boarder feature to cut the firecracker pieces at 4 1/2". I put a half styrofoam ball in the pot and covered it with red gift basket filler. Then, I began making the pieces for my "flowers". I wanted this to go in the center of my table so I made it where both sides could be the "front".

I started with the flowers. They were cut at 2 1/2" from Plantin Schoolbook with a shadow in dark blue, and the flower in the red patterned paper. The paper was from the Blue Ribbon paper pack from Close to My Heart. The yellow center flower was cut at 1 1/2". I really wanted red glitter brads for the centers, but all I had was plain ones. So, I put a mini glue dot on the top of each brad and dipped it in garnet Martha Stewart glitter.

Next were the accents. The Uncle Sam hats and firecrackers were both cut from Stand and Salute at 2 1/2". I used Diamond stickles on the "flame" of the firecrackers. For the hats, I ran the white blackout piece through my Xyron, attached the red layer, then covered them with white Doodlebug glitter so that the white parts would sparkle. God Bless America was cut at three inches from Stand and Salute and the I Love USA was from Independence Day at three inches. I used Xmas Red stickles to glitter the heart and stars.

All of these pieces I attached to bamboo sticks from the kitchen section at walmart that I had covered in floral tape. I used large glue dots to attach them. The ribbons that I tied on to the stems were from walmart as well. Then, I just arranged it!

I hope you enjoyed this project. It was a lot of fun to make and I hope it inspired you to make your own!