Have a BLAST

Hey guys, it's Friday!! I hope you have all had a good week. People are still shooting off fireworks in my neighborhood but at least by now they are are stopping around 11 pm so it is easier to get some sleep. They are beautiful to look at but annoying when you are trying to sleep.

Since Monday was July 4, aka Independence Day, I thought that I would share a patriotic themed layout with you this week. And, I have to tell you I am completely in love with how this layout turned out!!

For this layout I was loosely inspired by a single page layout I saw on youtube/pintrest by one of my favorite scrapbookers, Faith Abigail Designs. She used SVG files that she bought online to create her layout, but I decided to test myself to see if I could recreate a similar layout only using supplies I already own. It took a little time but in the end the result is WAY better than I anticipated!! 

I was able to use a coupon that gave me a free trial of the Cricut subscription service,so I had even more cartridge options available to me. It is definitely something I am considering subscribing to but that will have to wait for awhile (aka when I have money). In the end I used three cartridges that I own (Teddy Bear Parade, Stand and Salute and George an Basic) and only two that I don't (Old West for the barrel and Independence Day for the wagon and flag banner.)

I hope that you all enjoy this layout as much as I do and that you had a happy and safe 4th of July!!

Superhero Layout

Hey peeps! To start off today's post I want to make two apologies. 

The first, is that I am sorry my previous posts this week have been so short. For some reason this week I have been feeling majorly uninspired and living too much in my head, which makes for bad blog posts. I recently received my first bit of constructive criticism about my blog posts, I was told that at times it reads as dry and boring – I need to add more of my own personality into each post. Of course this has led me to overthink every word that I write and question whether or not I'm being funny. I've come to the realization that I must be "accidentally funny" because when I try it comes off as forced an unbelieveing. So I now have something (else) to work on. 

The second apology that I need to make is that this post is a day late, I had it done in plenty of time to upload but last night I suffered from a major headache and actually went to bed really early. I don't know if it was due to my "lack of sleep" the night before (I went to bed, woke up two hours later and couldn't get back to sleep, I have sleeping issues – don't judge lol) or if it was the fact that my back has been hurting and I'm too chicken to get a massage or to see chiropractor. I hope you all can forgive me. 

Now enough of this rambling, let's get to the layout. As the title says this week is a superhero themed double page layout. Last June, my niece celebrated her fourth birthday with a superhero themed party. She absolutely loves Wonder Woman and looked adorable in her costume. I went through the photos that I had from the party and I knew that I wanted to put a lot of them on this layout. That is why this layout features six 4 x 6 photo mats and one 4 x 4.

Since I wanted the focus of this layout to be about the pictures I tried to keep the design pretty minimal. I used to Cricut Plantin Schoolbook to cut the cityscape (this is one of my favorite cuts from the entire cartridge, I've used it many times) and I cut it using the "fit to page" feature on my expression. Even at the maximum size the city will not cut the entire length that you will need it, it is about a quarter of an inch short. I'll tell you how I fix this problem soon. 

I used the Cricut Create a Friend cartridge to cut my super hero girl. The actual cut is a Super boy but because so many elements of this cartridge are interchangeable I was able to simply find another hairstyle and turned the boy hero into a girl hero. I cut her out at 6 inches so that she could be the major focal point of the page. Just a little sidenote, if you're familiar with the cartridge you'll know that I added a little red piece around the neck to simulate the tie from the Cape, not only does it add a little bit of uniqueness to the character but it was also to hide one of my own mistakes. As I was adding glue to the body during assembly I almost tore our hero's neck off and didn't want to recut the entire thing. So by cutting a tiny piece of red card stock and adding it to that area I was able to mask the fact that I almost decapitated my focal point.

Now, since the birthday girl dressed as Wonder Woman, I wanted to stick with those colors throughout the layout (Plus, most superheroes share the same color combos anyway – red, white, blue and gold). The pattern papers actually came from a patriotic themed paper pad from Pebbles called Americana. Although you can't see it very well, there is a piece of gold(ish) cardstock that separates the red and blue pattern papers and it is punched using the Fiskar's Upper Crest border punch. I did this to mimic wonder woman costume which is a red top, a blue skirt and a golden belt. 

I mentioned above that the cityscape cuts just shy of the length that you need it, to solve this problem I grabbed a punch from American Crafts called Scalloped Star (it is one of the knockout punches and a part of a Christmas set of six different punches – I got it on sale at Tuesday Morning a while ago ) and I added it to the edges to cover the gap. 

To finish up the page I went through my bin of Thickers and other alphas (man is that bin scary, I just may have too many alphabet stickers LOL, but you just have to have one in every color right?) and i found that I had the same font (freedom-which is kind of fitting if you think about it) in both a red and a blue. 

Lastly, because I hate blank space, I went into my sticker/die-cut/other randomness bin and found a package of superhero themed diecuts from Recollection. I cut apart one of the frames in the pack to get the sentiment "Super Hero" and added it to a red "burst" that was also included. 

I hope you all like it and found this post to be both informative and "less dry and boring". If you have any feedback I would love for you to tell me by posting in the comments. I hope you have a fantastic weekend and I will see you back Monday with the conclusion to our Christmas 2015 card flashback. 

Birthday Card Using Songbird Cartridge

I found this card on pintrest and fell in love with it. The images are all cut from the Songbird Cricut cartridge, and since I got that cartridge for Christmas (2013) I knew I had to recreate this adorable birthday card.
 



The flowerpot with the bird is found on page 73 of the handbook (under the perch creative feature) and was cut out at 2.5"
The flower was found on page 57 (using the shifted 'flower' feature key) and actually cut out with an asterisk in the center, I just added a decorative brad that I found in my stash and it easily covered the cutout and added a pretty center to the flower.
Using a oval punch by Marvy that I have in my supplies I stamped my birthday sentiment and added 3 homemade enamel dots to finish out the tag.
I used the EK Success Scalloped Scallop punch to add a decorative edge to on of the mats.

 

For the inside I just used to same paper that I used on the outside and again I punched one of them with the EK Success Scalloped Scallop punch.

I then stamped another birthday sentiment one the inside.

 

To see the original idea for this card go to: http://mrsbscraftroom.blogspot.com/2010/03/birthday-card-cricut-songbird-cart.html

 

I just LOVE how this card turned out!!

Mother's Day 2014 Cards

Since my last post shared the Mother's Day cards that I made last year, I felt it was only fitting to share the cards that I made this year as well.

 

The first card shown below is the one that I made for my mom this year. Pink and Green paired together are a great color combination and they help each other to pop. This card was simple to make but still has an elegant and classic feel.

Below is the card that I made for one of my Aunts, it is a card that could be made for multiple occasions. It is full of bright colors and the feeling of Spring.

 



 

Mother's Day 2013 Cards

I was going through my card box to take stock of my inventory and I discovered quite a few that I had yet to post pictures of. I know I promised pictures of my Christmas albums but I still need to pull the photos off of my phone, so in the mean time I will upload the cards that I have come across.

 

These first 3 where Mother's Day cards. The first two I gave away (one to my mom and the other to my aunt) and the third is still in my "inventory"



Frozen Birthday Under the Sea

HAPPY BIRTHDAY STELLA AND KYRIA!!!

 

 

 

This first card was made for Miss Stella's 3rd birthday party. Her parents decided on a Frozen themed party because Stella LOVES the movie, so they had a Frozen cake, Frozen plates, Frozen napkins and even some Frozen balloons and temporary tattoos. I found the idea for this card on Pintrest and set about trying to replicate it.

 

The card base measures 5" x 7"

Patterned paper mat- 4.75" x 6.75"

The castle was cut from the Once upon a Princess Cartridge page 60 at 8" and I stamped it with a Hero Arts snowflake stamp in Versamark ink and heat embossed it with a silvery embossing powder.

Elsa and Anna dolls were cut from the Create a Friend Cartridge

Anna: cut at 2.75"

Body- Pg. 59

Hair- Pg. 75

Dress- Pg. 59

Elsa: cut at 2.75"

Body-Pg. 99

Hair- Pg. 63

Dress- Pg. 99

The silver snow was made by gluing silver glitter onto white cardstock and the snowflakes were left over from punching the mat for the inside of the card.

 

Olaf was printed on a piece of white cardstock and then it was cut to measure 5" x 6.75" and then punched using Martha Stewart snowflake punch around the page.

 

 

 

 



 

 

This second card was for Miss Kyria's 2nd birthday party and the theme was Under the Sea.

 

Card Base- 4.25" x 5.5"

Patterned Paper- 4" x 5.25"

Bottom Border- approx. 1" punched with Martha Stewart Embossed Petals Punch

Fish cut from Create a Critter pg. 43 at 2"

Bubbles cut from Disney Princess Dreams come True at 5"

 

The wave was in my scraps so I'm not sure where it came from exactly. Any wave would work.

Stamped with a fish Stamp for added dimension.

Grandpa's Birthday

HAPPY BIRTHDAY GRANDPA!!


If you haven't guessed it already, today is my grandpa's birthday. He turned 89 years old today and he wears it well. Looking at him you would never know that he is 89, he is always so active, whether it is from bowling on a league or mowing grass all summer he keeps himself busy which in turn keeps him looking young and healthy.

In honor of my grandpas birthday I wanted to share the birthday card that I made for him this year as well as the one that I made for him last year that for some strange reason I never posted.

This first card is actually the card I made for him last year, and it was made to celebrate one of his favorite things: COOKIES!!


And now the card for this year. I wanted to include a vintage mustang on his card this year because he has spent the better part of the last year trying to restore an old mustang into working condition.

FINAL DAY OF CARD CHALLANGE!!!! Day 31

Day 19

Day 11

Birthday Card for Great Aunt

To day I made a birthday card for my great aunt who's birthday is next week.