Scrapbook Friday at My Cricut Craft Room

It is Scrapbook Friday at My Cricut Craft Room and this week's theme was cars, trucks, and bikes. I was planning to do some motocross pictures, but I am feeling really emotional lately about Courtney. I am having a hard time dealing with the fact that she is now 16 and driving. I changed a scrapbooked some pictures of her driving to the theater. In some ways she is so grown up and in others, she is still a little girl.

 

The title was cut from yellow card stock using Lyrical Letters Jumbo feature. The papers are Bo Bunny. The patterned paper is from the On the Go Collections you can find here. I just tore the strip to go across the page and then inked them up. I inked the papers with Tim Holtz Wild Honey Distress Ink you can find here. The stop sign was fussy cut from the paper. The journaling is hand written. This is a simple page, but if we really want to record all the events of our lives, both big and little moments we have to have balance between the elaborate pages and the quick and simple. The second project I was working on for today, was the more elaborate. I decided to save it for another day though. Here are a few more pictures of this layout. 

Now you have two more stops. Head over to Erica's store here. She has great deals and keeps adding products. You will find something you have to have at a great price. When you are done shopping there, head over to her blog to check out what the rest of the design team made to share.
Until next time.....
Happy Crafting!
KathyJo

Robin's Nest Audition Post

The Robin's Nest is looking for a new design team, and I decided it was time to throw my hat in the ring. The Robin's Nest is an incredible company. Their current design team is amazing. If you have not been to their blog recently, quit reading right now and head over to their blog by clicking here. I promise you will be amazed and will come away inspired. Anyway, I love the products The Robin's Nest has to offer and I think they will be good companion products  to complement the design teams I am already on now. The would make my projects for each company even better.

As I thought about what I wanted to do for this project, I decided I was going to do a home decor project. I wanted a nice huge 4th of July wreath for my door. I came up with an idea, but realized that there was no way my hands would hold up to the bending, folding, pinching, and holding of all those little pieces. My fingers were going numb and I knew that this idea would have to wait until a week when the hands were in good shape. I had some photos developed and was absolutely Wowed by the fact that my child is no longer a little girl. She is now a young woman. So the layout Wow came to be...

My first instinct with this layout was to layer tons of paper and make it very elaborate, but the whole point of the layout was to capture her. Not the Wow of piles of product, but the Wow of my child becoming a woman. Anyway, I decided to do what I do best and find balance. I needed balance between the photo and the products and using techniques to highlight rather than overwhelm the photo. I think this was a pretty good mix of all those things.

The title was cut from the darker side of a sheet of BoBunny Abbey Road Truffle. The letters were cut using the Lyrical Letters cartridge using the Loop Le Loo creative key at 3". The problem was the title was fading into the background. I wanted it to pop, so I broke out the enamel powders. I thought I was going to use vintage silver, but it still wasn't wowing me. I decided to go for the gold and covered the letters with enamel adhesive and then coated in 24K Gold embossing enamel. The shine and wow factor is amazing. I immediately knew I wanted some black mini dew drops on the letters, but I didn't have any. I subbed some small Prima Black pearls, but wouldn't these Classified Mini Dew Drops have been amazing? I outlined the letters with glossy accents to give it one more layer of shimmer. It didn't photograph as well as I would have liked, but it almost looks like they are floating.

 I wanted to add the date the layout. I pulled out this chipboard tile and the fleur-di-lis pieces and covered them in embossing enamel adhesive. I sprinkled them with Ranger Black Super Fine detail embossing powder and heat seat. Using the detail embossing powder allowed the pattern on the chipboard to show. I cut some small numbers and covered them with the 24K Gold powder as well. Although these chipboard pieces were some I had on hand, you could use one of the Robins Nest chipboard pieces to mount the date.

 The two flowers were made using the Tim Holtz tattered flowers die. The edges are inked and curled to give them more depth. I am not sure what paper these are made out of as I already had them made and in a drawer, but this paper would work beautifully. The swirls and flourishes were cut using the Cricut and then layered and tucked on the page. I accented the Swirls with dew drops which you can find here. There are so many uses for these little drops of goodness. They make centers for flowers, borders, feet for little boxes, and eye catching treats on a scrapbook page like this one.

 The dew drops above and below the quote make you eye stop and read the sentiment I wanted to share with my daughter. I hope one day she will read these words and know that I meant them.

I hope you enjoyed this layout. It has so many different elements, but I hope still keeps the balance. I don't want to the story lost, because that girl in the picture... she is the real story.  Good luck to all the applicants for the Robin's Nest Design team, be sure you go follow the Robin's Nest blog, so you will see who makes the team. In the meantime, head over to the store to check out all their wonderful offerings, so you will be ready to craft along when the new design team starts sharing their products. Until next time...

Happy Crafting!
KathyJo

Day Two 100 Cart Blog Hop

June's 100 Cricut cartridge blog hop Day ONE

You should have started at

http://mycricutcraftroom.blogspot.com/

if not please start at the beginning

Also make sure to follow Erica's blog so you will know when

she has contests, prizes, challenges, swaps & special online coupons.

 

CONTEST TIME!

This month Erica is doing CUTTLEBUG giveaways!

Everyday this month she will be giving away

Cuttlebug folders.  She will even be

giving away a Cuttlebug!!

So make sure you visit

http://mycricutcraftroom.blogspot.com/

everyday during the month of June and leave a comment!

 

Don't forget to comment along the way on

all of the blogs today to

be entered to win the BoBunny Prize package that

Erica is giving away this weekend.

Winners will be announced on her blog on Tuesday!

You should have come from:

Christina

Make sure that you commented on ALL of today's blog to win the Big Bo Bunny prize pack!

I have three projects to share with you today. I signed up for three carts for the hop: Cursive 101, Independence Day, and Superman. I ended up using those and three more: Mother's Day Bouquet, Street Sign, and Stand and Salute. I really enjoyed all three of my projects for this hop.

We will start with the project for Stand and Salute and Independence Day. I applied vinyl to a galvanized tub for holiday entertaining. It can be used to hold bags of chips like I show in the pic or filled with ice to hold drinks or condiments you want to keep chilled during the cookout.

 This was not easy to photograph. The surface is so reflective that outside it was blinding me and inside my reflection is in it. I picked the tub up for $3.50 and all of the vinyl was scraps from other projects, so this was a great frugal project.

 The stars were cut from Stand and Salute. The larger stars were cut at two inches. I layered many of them with the shadow feature. The solid stars are simply the negative space from inside the stars.

 The smaller stars were cut at 3/4 inch. I did not use transfer tape on these since I was just placing them randomly.

I cut the 4th of July at 4 inches in both red and blue. I hand cut the "th" and of from the blue and layered it on the red. I love the way it came out and am thinking about going back and getting a few more tubs to decorate for other holidays.

My second project was a set of baseball jerseys and coach's shirts. I used the Superman cartridge and Street Sign. Because these were done on dry-fit shirts, I used Gorilla Grip II. This means I had to use a heat press, but if I had been doing regular t-shirts I could have used vinyl that can be applied with a regular iron.

 I used the font and font shadow feature to cut out the word Havoc. The shirt was designed in Cricut Craft Room. The key to success with vinyl is kiss cutting and reversing the image.

The back has their name and number.I also cut layered vinyl for their batting helmets.The boys wore the jerseys for a tournament last weekend and they love these jerseys. The number are so different. They aren't the same block letters most of the teams are wearing. We looked great out there.

The third project was a layout and I used lots of fun goodies while working on this. The papers are from BoBunny's Timepiece collection..

 Overall I like the feel of this layout. It was fun playing with some of my favorite new products.

 The flowers were cut from Mother's Day Bouquet. It was flower #15 amd I cut them at 2", 1 1/2", and 1". I then layered them. I didn't have a brad that matched well. These little flower brads were pastels colored. I help them with tweezers and heated it until it was good and hot. Once it was hot, I dipped it in the GlobeCraft Memories Copper Kettle embossing enamel. I heat set it for a nice smooth finish. The flower needed just a bit more, so I spritzed it with copper glimmer mist.

  I cut the title from Cursive 101 using craft cardstock and the fit to page button which made it cut at 3". I then worked a couple of letters at a time and covered it with enamel adhesive and temple stone embossing enamel.

 I took this photo to show the different stages of melting this embossing enamel. You can leave it as rough or make it as smooth as you would like.

I melted it until it was shiny and smooth like my granite countertop. I LOVE LOVE LOVE this stuff.

The little stem/vine is a Picollo lasercut piece of chipboard. I used the CopperKettle enamel powder on that too.

I little handwritten journaling. A few flourishes for that added touch. They are also Picollo pieces.

I hope you enjoyed my projects as much as I enjoyed making them. Now head on over to

 Candice

I am sure she has something fabulous to share with you. Here is the whole lineup in case you get lost along the way.

Start http://mycricutcraftroom.blogspot.com/
Amber - http://pixiperfectcreations.blogspot.com/
Heather F. www.papercrafteranonymous.com
Christina - http://cema1cema.blogspot.com/
Kathy Jo- http://skrappindiva.blogspot.com/
Candice- http://stampinpearls.blogspot.com/
Heather M. http://digipage-blog.everything-digital-scrapbooking.com/
Ashley - http://especiallymade.blogspot.com/
Erica's Project http://ericasprojects.blogspot.com/
Yvette http://gammascreativecorner.blogspot.com/
Shelley http://shelley-scrapbookingforfun.blogspot.com/
Sheila - http://2pawprints.blogspot.com/
Raquel- http://kraftykaboose.blogspot.com/
Blog Candy http://ericasblogcandy.blogspot.com/

Happy Crafting and hope to see you soon!
KathyJo

Card Tuesday

Well it is Card Tuesday at My Cricut Craft Room. Today we had the choice of following the sketch or making a card featuring a certain flower. I chose the flower thinking finding a carnation would be easy. Well, the only carnation I found was on 50 States and someone else from school has the cart right now. So, since I didn't have access to that cartridge and the red carnation cut, I decided to make my own. I went online and looked at several pictures of carnations. I pulled out Mother's Day Bouquet and chose a bloom with jaggedy edges. I used the next to the last key on the first row.

I cut them at 1", 1 1/2" and 2". I knew I was using copper on the card and didn't have any small copper brads. I held a small gold brad with tweezers, got the head good an hot with the heat tool, dipped it in vintage copper embossing enamel, and then heat set until smooth. I then poked the brad through the center of the layered cuts. Once they were secure, I spritzed them with a mini mister filled with water. Once the water soaked in and the fibers of the paper were loosened, I scrunched them up by hand and shaped into a flower. Needless to say it didn't come out looking like the carnation I was aiming for, but I liked the result anyway.

I used a premade card base and inked the edges with Spiced Marmalade Distress ink. I honestly believe the most versatile products I own are my Tim Holtz distress inks. If you are looking for a good value for your money, invest in some of these inks. A little goes a long way and you will find so may uses for them.

The papers I used for the flower and the torn piece are from the Bo Bunny 6x6 Country Garden Pad . They are beautiful. If you have never played with Bo Bunny before, they are an excellent quality paper. They cut well on the cricut, they tear beautifully by hand, and they ink exquisitely. Erica has the whole line. The trinkets are really nice and add a gorgeous accent. I didn't add one to this card because I was going for a more simple look and the trinkets are very elegant looking.

The thanks was cut from Don Juan at 3/4''. It was cut out of basic brown cardstock. I then covered it in embossing enamel adhesive and quickly covered the wet adhesive with Vintage Copper embossing enamel. Talk about a different effect. It looks like aged patina mixed with the copper. The green and white mottled look you get on old copper is there. I tried to get a good shot of this. It really is raised and metallic like metal, but I have never seen paper with this old metal look.

I hope you enjoyed my card. Now head over to My Cricut Craft Room to see what my design team sisters have created.
Happy Crafting!
KathyJo

Would You ever Guess Wednesday

It is Would You Ever Guess Wednesday over at My Cricut Craft Room. Creative function keys on our Cricuts and use cuts from the right side of the handbook. 

I decided to make a little sign for my desk that has one of my favorite sentiments on it. This was a fun projects to make. I did decide to add ribbon and hang it on the wall, as you will never see it on my messy desk. I used Designer's Calendar pg 47 and cut the Script Shadow image at 4", 4 1/2", and 5" from a cereal box. I used my Deep cut Housing blade that you can order from Erica HERE . I then cut the paper the same way. Isn't this paper adorable? It is BoBunny and also available in eErica's store HERE. The 4" piece was cut from a light pink cardstock. I used VersaMark-Dew-Drop-Perfect-Plumeria to stamp the sentiment. I wanted a disorderly feel, so I made these wacky flowers using Designer's Calendar pg 35 Script Shadow Shift image which is actually a sun. I used Versa mark jumbo java around the edges as it gives it a more finished look. I layered the three pieces using foam popdots. I scattered some gems around the surface for a playful messy look. The last thing I added was Crystal Stickles. What I love about them is that they pick up the colors around them. For instance, right above the T in the I made a dot of crystal stickles. It looks almost clear or a very pale pink. In the corners of the polka dotted papers, there is a series of aqua looking dots. Those are also the same color crystal stickles. It picks up the aqua in the paper. It was a fun little project to make and I hope you enjoy it.

Now head on over to My Cricut Craft Room and see what my design team sisters have created to share with you.

Happy Crafting!
KathyJo