Happy Mother's Day

Happy Mother's Day to everyone out there on this beautiful Sunday! I've had a great day so far. My family has treated me very well and I'm looking forward to a family walk in a nature area nearby and dinner out before the day is over. I hope you're day is going equally as well.

Today I'm sharing a Mother's Day card of course! This is one I sent to my own Mom. I wanted to try a card where a cut is only partial and it allows the card to have a 3D effect without a lot of complicated work.

After searching a bit, this dragonfly caught my eye in the Cricut Dimensional Paper cartridge which is part of the Cricut Access subscription for the Cricut Explore. For some reason, I've always been drawn to dragonflies and this one was no exception.  Here's an angled view of the card so you can see the 3D aspect a little more.

And here's the interior of the card where some of the leftover paper from the front is used to create a border on the top and bottom of the card. The Happy Mother's Day message is stamped in the card with Tuxedo Black Memento ink.

I've been seeing a lot of heat embossed sentiments on cards from various manufacturer's and crafters. I like it and have been trying my hand at it. So far, I'm not that thrilled with the results. First, it was really hard to get the ink pad I needed which everyone says is the best - VersaMark. I tried Michael's and JoAnn's numerous times and it was always sold out. I did finally find one but for this card, I made due with some regular ink. Unfortunately, regular ink is not as sticky as VersaMark so the embossing powder didn't stick evenly on the Love Ya Mom stamped message. The result was a little spotty but it worked ok. I'm going to continue trying this technique until I get it down! Practice makes perfect right? Anyway, the sentiment shape was another nested shape in the Cricut Access subscription. I believe it was in the Elegant Edges cartridge.

Well that's it from me today. Have a wonderful Mother's Day and see you soon! There will be several posts coming this week in honor of National Scrapbooking week.

Janet

$2,500 Sizzix Giveaway!

Scrapbook.com is giving away five outstanding prizes full of Sizzix products including the Big Shot Plus. Just visit the link below to enter in a multitude of ways.

Click here to enter the Sizzix $2,500 Giveaway

Happy Birthday Flowers

Hi everyone. Today I'm sharing a birthday card that I made for my awesome and wonderful Assistant at the office. She is always so bright and chipper that I had to make a card to match her personality!

Except for the three flowers, this card was made entirely with cuts from the Cricut Access subscription. The main flower accent is a Print Then Cut design with a blank banner. One of my fonts were used to add Happy Birthday as the sentiment. A card sketch helped me put this together. A card sketch is so helpful to get the creativity flowing and it really speeds things up too. Here's what the card sketch looked like. I copied pretty closely except I used an oval instead of a circle for the main part of the card.

Click to visit the Paper Play Sketches Challenge Blog

There are a lot of patterns on this card - five in total plus two different solid card stock colors on a space that's 4 1/4" x 5 1/2"! That might be a record on a card for me but it works. The colors are the same brightness and nothing is fighting each other. The easiest way to use a lot of patterns together is to use papers from the same card stack - almost anything will work together when you do that because the designer usually designs the collection to work together. These papers came from a variety of collections because I pulled pieces from my stash of scraps. That took more time and effort though.

The final touches that make this card extra special are sequins in the right corner and the three cheery flowers. I applied the white Perler Pen to cover the sequin holes and create flower centers. Last but not least, I applied Glossy Accents to the center flower with the lines and clear Wink of Stella to add some glimmer to the flowers and leaves. It's hard to see but you can see the application of white Perler Pen to create the Prima flower centers, the glitter accents from the Wink of Stella pen and the Glossy accents on the center blue star flower in this close-up.

The Cricut cuts for this card are below:
Spring Flower Banner - Enjoy the Seasons Cartridge
Bracket Label - Phrases Cartridge
Banner - Decorate! Celebrate! Cartridge (sized to make 2 different sizes)
Prima Got Flowers mulberry flowers
Viva Perlen Pen - Ice White
Yellow translucent sequins
Ranger Glossy Accents
Wink of Stella Pen - Clear

I'm pleased to enter this card into the following card challenges. Please visit them for more card and project inspiration!

Tuesday Throwdown-#291-Anything Goes_Ends 5/2
Paper Play Sketches-006_Ends 5/3
Fresh Brewed Designs Blogspot-2016-16_Ends 5/3
Crafty Gals Corner Challenges-#69_Ends 5/3
Lil Patch of Crafty Friends Challenge-#33_Ends 5/5
Hiding in My Craftroom-#249_Ends 5/7
Avenue 613 Challenge-#174_5/8
Craft Rocket Challenges-#14-Pink and Pearlie_Ends 5/10
2 Crafty Girls Challenges-18_Ends 5/11

Window Flower Box Thanks

Hey everybody and Happy Friday to you! I'm posting on Friday instead of Saturday because it's going to be a busy weekend. This week's card is a 3D thank you card with some interesting features. It's super textured. The red background page is embossed with a brick wall pattern and the window frame is embossed with a wood grain pattern. I wanted to give the impression of sheer curtains so I used pink vellum and used bits of silver card stock as tie backs. The silver and white diamond pattern looks like wallpaper and the curtains allow the background to peek through the way real sheer curtains do.

Card cuts in Cricut Design Space

The window cut is from the Cricut Access subscription. It has a rectangle for the flower box which I sized deeper so it was wide enough to hold my flowers and leaves. This cut doesn't include curtains so I found another cut for a stage and used the curtain part of it after resizing it to fit my window. After the window and curtains were designed, I searched for branch and found the cut I've used for the leaves. There are 5 branch cuts that I randomly put down as a base after the long stem part was trimmed off so that only leaves remained. Then I found a 3D flower and after they were cut, the petals were shaped using a pencil to roll the petals into a more realistic shape. It really helps to give flat flowers a more realistic look when you bend and shape the petals. After gluing the flowers on the box using white Beads in a Bottle in the centers, the box and flowers were popped up on foam tape to give some further depth. The final touches are a stamped Thanks banner and a bow made from brown and cream baker's twine. Just to give it a little more interest I rounded opposing corners of the card leaving two corners pointed.

I hope you enjoyed this one. If you'd like to make one yourself, the cuts and dimensions are below. Thanks and see you next week!

WINDOW AND FLOWER BOX RECIPE:
Card Base - 5.5" x 4.25"
Curtain Cut: Stage #M467A5 from the Twinkle Toes Cartridge - shape to fit window
Window and Box: Window Sill #M3C5E7 from the Creative Cards Cartridge - 2.43" x 3.36" box is 2.04" x .65"
Branch: #M30301 from the Garden Soup Cartridge .62" x .84"
3D Flower: #M4709B from the Flower Shoppe Cartridge - .54" x .49"

It's Time for Ice Cream!

Hey everyone! Before I tell you about this week's project, I want to announce that I'm giving away some blog candy - a $20 Amazon gift card. Just become a follower by clicking one of the choices on the right - Facebook, email, Feedburner, Bloglovin or Google+. Go to my Blog Candy Page and tell me you did. Then on June 1, I'll announce the winner on the blog and on Facebook. 

Today I'm sharing a card with you that is what I call a flap style. That's because instead of the standard square shape, the "flap" or front of the card has been cut to have a scalloped shape and the inside of the card peeps out from the negative space that the card front creates by being partially cut away.

This was a fun project. The base card is formed by combining a scalloped shape and a rectangle together. I found the scallop shape in Cricut Design space, I sized it to 4.25 x 5.5 and created a rectangle with the same dimension. Then I flipped the scallop so the straight edge of it butted against the rectangle (where the top folds over the back of the card) and welded the shapes together to form a single one. A quick fold at the join creates the final base card. A card stock accent scallop was cut out of a pretty glittered card stock of pink and and brown. This is one of my favorite color combinations. My grandma had a blouse she loved in these colors and I always think of her when I see it.

I cut a lacy scalloped circle out of white stock and a circle out of the matching accent card stock to go in the middle. Then I cut an ice cream cone shape and accented it with pink and chocolate glitter glue. I even embossed the cone to be a little more like real cones! Unfortunately you can't see that in this picture but trust me, it looks cool in real life. All the pieces were glued together and placed on the card stock. The final piece is a great example of creating your own embellishment out of parts you might not necessary think go together right away but the end result is very pleasing.

The accent in the left corner is a mauve bow made of ribbon with a brown flower and a pink faceted crystal flower on the top. I thought the white edges on the card were too bare so I added some pink chalk to the edges.

Voila! A yummy spring card to say thank you, hi or just because. Thanks for joining me today and I'll be back again next Saturday!

I am pleased to enter my card into the following challenges this week. Click on the links to go to the challenge sites and see all the beautiful projects that have been entered in each one.

Avenue 613 Challenge-#171-Entry 144-Anything Goes-Ends 4/16

Tuesday Throwdown #289-Entry111-Use Your Die Cuts-Ends 4/18

Fresh Brewed Designs-Flowers-Entry 22-Ends 4/19

Crafty Gals Corner Challenges-67-Die Cuts or Punches-Entry 82-Ends 4/19

Cute Card Thursday-#421-Handmade Embellishments-Entry 17-Ends 4/20

Hiding In My Craft Room-#247-Entry 3-Ends 4/23

Craft Rocket Challenges-#13 Favourite Colour Combo-Entry 16-Ends 4/26

Jades Sparkling Butterflies-Anything Goes Button Bows-Entry 18-Ends 4/27

Cut It Up Challenges-#94-Spring Flowers-Entry 16-Ends 4/27

Panda Time!

One of my favorite animals are pandas. Today I have a pair of panda goodness for you! I've used the same image from The Paper Shelter in two different ways and I like the results. The image is called Teamwork and it features one panda giving another panda a help up.

First up is a thank you card with our cute little image. The green card base is surrounded by a polka dot frame popped up on foam tape to give it dimension. The frame is inked in brown just to make it stand out a little bit more.

The frame and banner was cut on the Cricut Explore and the tag was also drawn with the Explore. The green holographic sequins finish it off.

Next up is a slightly different twist using the same image and with the same frame. This was a smaller image and I put it on a tag cut with the Explore. The tag opens like card and is connected at the top. The tag base is metallic gray and is matted with some cute patterned paper that I had in my scrap file. The dimensions of this tag is 3.5" x 5.5" Brown and cream baker's twine and a stamped banner make this simple little tag so sweet. This will be perfect attached to a gift or just to say thanks or hi.

I am pleased to enter my project into several challenges this week. 

Fresh Brewed Designs-Ribbon or Twine-Ends 4/12

Tuesday Throwdown 288 Robyns Fetish-Ends 4/11

2 Crafty Girls Challenges-Jade's Sparkling Butterflies #16-Ends 4/13

Cute Card Thursday Challenge #420-Something Shiny-Ends 4/13

Suzy Pants Smarty April Challenge #125-Closes 4/15

Lil Patch of Crafty Friends #31-Ends 4/16

Avenue 613 #170-Whiter Shade of Pale-Ends 4/11

Bees & Flowers Mother's Day Card

Wow! It's Saturday already. The week really went fast. Today I'm sharing a Mother's Day card. All the cuts are from Cricut.

The Mother phrase is fairly complex with seven different layers but the time to put it together was worth it because the 3D effect is really neat.

The card is accented with yellow opaque sequins and glittered flowers. The flowers have pink 3D touches which are achieved with Beads in a Bottle. I'm using this more and more, especially to cover up the holes in sequins. The 3D dimension it adds and the fact I control the sizes make it a very versatile product.

The inside is stamped with a very simple message.

Finally, I embossed the envelop with a honeycomb pattern to match the bee theme. Lately, I've been finding ways to make the envelope a little more interesting and this is a quick and easy way to do it.

I am pleased to participate in the following challenges this week:
CardzTV Card Designers Challenge 5   (ends 4/7)
Fresh Brewed Designs #12 Use Yellow (ends 4/5)
Jades Sparkling Butterflies - Anything Goes #16 (ends 4/13)
Avenue 613 Challenge #169-Anything Goes (ends 4/3)

If you like this card it's for sale. Buy Me!

Happy Birthday Girl

Happy Saturday everyone! Tonight's post is a sweet birthday girl. She was stamped and colored using Spectrum Noir markers. I added a little bling and more shading with Wink of Stella glitter markers. The stamp is from StampWorkz. Here's a close-up.

And here's the inside sentiment. Lately I've been dressing up the envelopes a little. This one got a glitter embossed package.

Well, that's all for me tonight. Hope you have a wonderful weekend and a very Happy Easter!

I am pleased to enter my card into these challenges:
Crafting from the Heart Challenge-104
Little Scrap Pieces 3/26/26
Fresh Brewed Designs-201611
Craft Rocket Challenges-11-anything-goes
Glitter N Sparkle Challenge-180
Lil Patch of Crafty Friends-30

Follow my blog via Blogger, Facebook, Bloglovin' or Google Circles and win something sweet for yourself! Everyone who is a new follower gets an entry into a drawing for a $20 gift card from Amazon from me.

Chose one of the notice methods on the right and leave me a comment with your email or PM me privately on Facebook so I can contact you if you win. That's it!

A winner will be published and notified by June 1, 2016. You'll have 2 weeks to claim the card if you're the winner. Good luck!

Envelope Punch Easter Basket

I do a good bit of scrap booking and over time I've acquired paper with large patterns thinking they'd be great in a scrapbook but I realized that though that type of paper looks great in the store, it usually doesn't work at all for scrap booking because it dominates the pictures. Though I can't really use it, I also can't bare to waste the paper either. The result is that I've hung on to paper like this that I really like. That's why I love today's project. I finally found a use for the cute Easter egg paper that I've had for years!

This basket is made with a envelope card punch. I've recently discovered through YouTube that there are many different things that can be made with an envelope punch board. Way cool. My inspiration for this basket comes from Linda Parker. She is a Stampin' Up Demonstrator from the UK. I just recently found her channel and she has some fabulous paper crafting ideas that I plan to try soon. You can find her here: Linda Parker YouTube Channel. Actually my basket combines two of Linda's basket projects. 

The basket is a simple punch, score and glue project with a 7" square sheet of paper. If you use card stock, you only need to form the basket once but since my Easter Egg paper was light, I made another basket base out of green card stock then used that as a lining for the inside of the basket. It turns out that it's a good thing to do because it finishes the inside of the basket off as well as gives it more support. 

To decorate the basket, I made a bow out of Easter ribbon I had in my stash. The doily was made on my Cricut Explore. Once it was ready, I cut it in half and put half at each base of the handle. I cut the diamond border from a Our Memories for Life border punch. The butterfly is from a Sizzix Hero Arts Framelit set. I colored it with watercolor and Zig Wink of Stella Fine Glitter Markers. The Happy Easter sentiment is a recycled piece from a card I got several years ago. When I see something that would work great on a new card or in some decorative project, I keep it. I've had this piece for close to 10 years I think! Did I say I have a crafting hoard? Guilty!

Here's a quick list of the major components and tools I used in this project:

Sizzix Framelits # 657778

Zig Wink of Stella Fine Glitter Dust Markers

Glitzy Glitter Card Stock from DCWV

WeRMemory Keepers Envelope Punch

Our Memories for Life Border Maker - Zig Zag

I am entering a few contests this week. Please check these sites out for lots of inspiration!.

Cardz TV 3-D Challenge #4 - 3/31

The Sisterhood of Crafters-Dies or Punches - 3/22

Happy Easter Shaker Card

Finished Card Front

Card Interior

I was inspired by spring weather today to make a shaker card. I recently purchased the Cricut Explore deep cut blade and used it to cut a foam frame to hold the shaker pieces inside was a good test for it. I have a Cricut image subscription for the Explore machine. I prefer to use my iPad and the Cricut app to design a card like this. It's a series of rectangles that you import and it makes it simpler to make sure that each rectangle fits the way it's supposed to.

Here's what I did. Using the Cricut Explore subscription, find the shapes you need: grass strip, chick, rabbit and egg. You can choose any shapes you like. The smaller shapes will be the confetti along with a few sequins. A frame was designed by slicing two rectangles together to form the open interior and then one strip of grass was welded to the frame. Two single grass strips are also needed. The pieces can be seen below.

Card Parts

Once this is done, design a simple rectangle foam frame the same way as the paper frame that fits underneath the card frame. The foam frame is what forms the raised frame that holds the confetti inside the shaker card. In addition to these pieces, cut a rectangle from a transparency sheet which fits between the paper frame and the foam frame. Then cut a piece of sky printed paper and stamp the Happy Easter sentiment on it.

Shaker Card before gluing the sentiment paper on top of the foam frame

To put the card together, layer the two grass strips behind the frame to create three levels of grass. Then the transparency is glued behind the frame. The foam frame is glued to the back and then the shaker pieces were added to the interior. The sky paper with the sentiment was glued on top of the foam frame so that the sentiment would appear above the grass. A green bow is attached to the front of the card frame. This finishes the shaker. The shaker was then glued on top of the card base. Finally a rectangle of white card stock was stamped with the Wishing You a Happy Easter sentiment and bunny. It was colored with Wink of Stella Glitter markers in pink and green. A pretty pastel effect with the markers is done by writing with each marker on a craft sheet and picking it up with a damp brush. This creates a soft shimmery watercolor effect.

I have really enjoyed using my Cricut Explore machine lately. They have added many materials options in the custom cut selection and it cuts like a dream. It reliably cuts just about anything at any size I ask it to cut. It's easy to design with it and the software is getting more intuitive and simple for anyone to be successful. 

Thanks for checking our my card today. I hope I've given you a few ideas of your own.

Janet

This week's card contests:

Robyns Fetish Challenge-Easter Cards

Hiding In My Craft Room-Super Scraps Saturday