Scraplifter!

A few weeks ago I watched Sarah, of Live, Love and Scrap's, youtube video where she made what I thought was the cutest card EVER. She used the new Scrappy Mom's Kids Incorporated set, along with the Sweet Treats cartridge, both of which I happen to have, so I knew I needed to make something similar.
Now, Sarah is amazing (if you've never watched her videos, you should) and she has a patience with her cards that I will probably never posses...so I could never duplicate it exactly. I would go nuts with all of those eensy details! So I did eliminate some of the details and make my cuts a little larger, but I love how my card turned out.

So, thank Sarah for the inspiration! I hope you continue to make videos for a long time :)

p.s. sorry for the crummy iPhone photo, apparently I've become too lazy to dig out my camera and cord lately!

New Challenge at Card Cupids

This weeks challenge at Card Cupids is anything goes, which is the easiest of all challenges! I made my card really simple, using the stamp Max by our sponsor The Stamping Boutique. The back ground paper is DCVW and the ribbon is from Target's $1 spot, the stamp is from Michael's $1 spot. I find my self using that stamp on most of my boy themed cards because you can mix and match the words "hero" "star" "guitar" "super" and "rock" for a bunch of different variations that are all boy :)
The guitar is colored in with a black spica pen and is super glittery in real life, I just love the way it turned out.

So that's it! I hope to see your name among the HUGE amount of entries at Card Cupids this week!

Buttons and Ribbon: New Card Cupids Challenge!

This week at Card Cupids our challenge is "Buttons and Ribbon". I made this simple card:
using a digi stamp from our sponsor (and one of my most favorite Digi companies!) Bugaboo. And the winner of this weeks challenge will get SEVEN free digis from Bugaboo! If you've ever browsed their store, you know this is an awesome prize :)

It's a super easy and fun challenge, so I hope you enter!

Card Cupid 3D Challenge!

The challenge this week over at Card Cupids is 3D or pop up cards, sponsored by Bugaboo Stamps. I have to admit, it was stinking hard to pick my stamp for this challenge because their stamps ARE SO CUTE! I want them all!
But, I chose this little boy with the giant adorable cupcake, and I love him :)

I made a stair step fold card. The dimensions are 10.5X5.5 and it's folded at 1 1/4, 2 1/2, 4 1/4, 6 and 8 1/4. You can find a great tutorial of how to make this card on Split Coast Stampers. Just be sure that if you are not using a scor-pal, you follow the second set of directions on where to score! I messed up the first time.
patterned papers are from my scrap stash
cupcake is from Sweet Treats, cut at 3 inches (made from all scraps)
stamp is from Michael's $1 bin
ink is Distress Ink in Black Soot
Boy is colored with Crayola markers and accented with a Spica Pen!

The winner of this challenge will get to pick SEVEN free Bugaboo images! That's an awesome prize!

Card Cupids Challenge!

This weeks challenge over at Card Cupids is almost as easy as last weeks was! All that is required is that you use your favorite embellishment. Mine is glitter glue, and it's probably hard to tell from my photo, but the entire spaceship is glittered all to death. I just love glitter glue! (as a bonus, I'm allowed to send it to the hospital because the glitter can't fall off of the card.)

The stamp is from Fresh Brewed Designs, who is generously sponsoring our challenge this week with three free digi images to the winner!

Again, I made this card Valentines day colors so that I can use it in my big batch of Valentines Cards for the two hospitals Card Cupids is sponsoring. Don't forget that Card Cupids has a big prize for the Valentine's Day Challenge and you have until Feb. 4th to submit your cards. The Prize includes Pearl Pens, a My Pink Stamper DVD and more and is worth over $100!

I've posted a few Vday cards in my last post if you're in need of a little inspiration and I look forward to seeing what you come up with!

Some Valentines Cards

I'm almost halfway to my goal of 25 Valentines cards for Card Cupids, so I thought I would share a few that I've made in the last couple of days.
The cupcake shaped card is my favorite yet, I just love it! Hopefully these inspire you to create some Valentines cards of your own!

Anything Goes Challenge

This week over at Card Cupids we're having an "Anything Goes" challenge, sponsored by Whimsy Stamps!
I chose this adorable dog holding a sign and made a 4X4 card (my first!). Of course I had to make this a brown dog because he's goofy looking and reminds me of Bill, my Chocolate Lab. Plus, he's chomping on that sign, which is totally something Bill would do! :)

If you've never joined us at Card Cupids for a Challenge, this is the one to join! It's super easy and the winner gets a $15 gift certificate to Whimsy Stamps!

Recipe:
Red Cardstock-Stampin' Up Really Red
Pattern Cardstock-DCVW stack
Red and clear Glitter Glue-Studio G (dollar spot at Michael's)
Ribbon-Target dollar spot
Rub on-Stampin' Up
Markers-Crayola Super Tips :)

oh, and I've decided to make all my challenge cards this month Valentine themed, so I can reach my goal of 25 Valentine cards to send to Card Cupids by February 4th!

My Pink Stamper Challenge/Design Team Submission

Yesterday Robyn over at Mypinkstamper.com announced that she had two spots left on her design team, and issued a challenge to use her favorite colors, Green Pink and Brown and a favorite cartridge of your choice. I was so excited to see that because Robyn is the one that got me into Cricut machines, and I would love to work with her. Of course, the more I see entries popping up in my google reader from blogs I admire and subscribe to, the more nervous I get, but I had to try! :)

This card will serve two purposes, as I will be sending it to Card Cupids as part of my valentines package (which is appropriate as My Pink Stamper is one of the Card Cupid sponsors for the Valentines challenge!). It's my goal to make 25 cards for Valentines day for Card Cupids!

Recipe:
Tree and Hearts-Simply Charmed (my favorite Cartridge!)
Green and light pink cardstock-Recollections
Dark Pink and brown textured cardstock-Stampin' Up
Ribbon-Michaels 4/$1 bin
Stamp- Hampton Art Joyous Holidays
Ink-Stampin' Up Passion Rose
Glitter Glue-Studio G
Marvey Gel Excel Gel Pen
Crayola Super tips (light pink dots and stitching)

Also, this was the first thing I've cut with my Gypsy and I love it! I hid the contour in the tree, sized the hearts, laid them out on the mat, then went into my craft room, stuck the paper to mat and cut it. Crafting doesn't get easier than that!

11th hour Christmas Cards

I didn't think I had Christmas Cards in me this year, but at the last second (meaning this morning before I left for work and tonight when I got home) I pumped out these:

yeah, so I've only made 6. And so they're going to be reciprocal cards (I'm sending them to people who've already sent us cards!) and so, they may not be there by Christmas. BUT I made them, and they're done and they'll be in the mail tomorrow!
This is one of my favorite designs from when I was making cards earlier this year, most of which I sent to Card Cupids, so I decided to re-create it. The lovely wreath is cut from the Holiday Cakes cartridge, and to save time I skipped cutting the berries and used glitter glue instead.

And, it's only 7:40 right now, so I have a few hours to make more. So I may even get to making reciprocal cards from last year, when I didn't send out cards at all.

I feel so alive! (not really.)

Christmas Cards

A few weeks ago, before I joined the Card Cupids design team, I made a generic back ground to use for all of my Christmas cards. Then, after I joined Card Cupids I learned that we would be sending Christmas Cards to 200 kids at the Children's Hospital at Legacy Emmanuel. Now, I work full time and have an additional part time job, so I thought about it for about a second, then decided to use my backgrounds for Card Cupids cards instead. My family wont notice if they don't receive another piece of mail, but that piece of mail could make some kids day. Easiest decision ever!

So, here is the batch of cards I sent off to Card Cupids last week. I love them all! I know I should be mass producing them, but I can't help but make each one different. It's a sickness.

The Rub-ons are by American Crafts, and I found them at Ross (package of 10 for $3!!)

Adding to my stash

I was so excited to pick up my package of cuttlebug folders from the post office yesterday, but unfortunately it was a crazy day at work and I didn't get to play with them. Today after work, they were the first thing I reached for!


I plan to send in a stack of plain Christmas cards to Card Cupids for the hospital, so I made this little card using the snowflake cuttlebug folder, my texture boutique, sandpaper, glitter glue, and paper embellishments.
The little trees came in a jar of paper embellishments that my mom bought me to use for the Card Cupid project :) Thanks Mama, I'm sure I'll find lots of uses for them!

Cards for Christina and Riley

These are two more cards for Card Cupids, for 3 year old Christina and 10 year old Riley.



If you look closely, you'll see that the Dog's tag even has a teeny little "R" on it :)




I hope these bring a smile to their faces! I'll be dropping my three cards in the mail, but if you're interested in submitting a card you have until November 10 for Ashlie and Christina and November 17 for Riley.

one card, three purposes

First and foremost, this card is for Ashlie. If you haven't heard of Card Cupids yet, you should check out their blog. It's a very sweet project designed to brighten sick childrens' hospital stays, and I think it's just wonderful. Normally I'd use some glitter glue on a card like this, but since I'm not sure if it would be allowed, I left it off this time.

Second, I'm entering this card in Momo's Tuesday challenge! This week's challenge was to use some sort of embossing, so I used my Sizzix texture boutique and the Sizzix tropical paisley embossing folder to add texture to my purple square.

Third, and finally, I'm entering this card into the MAG challenge! This week's challenge was to use page 45 of the Create a Critter Cartridge, and page 45 only. I was excited to see this challenge as Create a Critter is one of only 3 cartridges I own, so I could actually participate this week! YAY!

While Ashlie was the inspiration to make a card, the two challenges made me use cuts and techniques I may not have. This was a really fun way to create a card, and I really hope it does make Ashlie smile ;)

Thanksgiving Card

I made this simple little card for the Cricut Cardz Challenge, #48 which is to make a card for Thanksgiving. I have very few sentiment stamps, so I covered up part of a stamp that said "Thanks you're sweet" so that I could just have it say Thanks. Ideally, I'd have liked it to say "Give Thanks"...but I do what I can :)

The cardbase is from Plantin Schoolbook (I don't know that it's a card "feature", but a card was one of my button options. Is that the same thing?), leaves are cut from the Create a Critter at 2 3/4 inches, the brown craft paper is from my stash, the rest is from Stampin' Up. The brads are from JoAnns.

I embossed the orange leaf with my new toy:


Sizzix Texture Boutique! I love it! I only have two folders right now (8 more are in the mail!). It's not funny how quickly I'm outgrowing my craft space. There are just so many fun things out there right now.

The winniest weekend ever!

Winniest is not a word, but I think it needs to be! Last week, I entered into several blog hop contests and contests to win Pink ATG guns, and, much to my surprise I won THREE of the contests (not three ATG's :)! I haven't won anything since April, so to win three in a week was a thrill to say the least :)

The first contest was held by Scotch ATG, and I won this pink ATG gun. I've been using it for a few days, and I can't say enough good things about it. I adore it. It seems like it would be bulky, but it's really not once you get the hang of it. And you don't have to press down to release the adhesive at all (which you have to with tombo mono rollers-and it often left lines in my paper). Love.

The second contest was by Helen, over at craftingcricutmom <--click for her blog! The contest was also to win a Pink ATG, but then she decided to draw a name for a bonus gift, and that was me! I received her package today and this is what it contained: Thank you so much, Helen! Everything is so fun, and I couldn't wait to use the Christmas stamps, so today I made my first Christmas card:


I love that my stash is getting to the point where I have everything I need to make my ideas come to life, it's so fun.

The third contest was over at Scrapping Sweets By Abby <-- click for her blog! The contest was to win a Brown and pink Cricut apron, and I won! We also learned that we only live 40 minutes from each other, and Abby had taken a trip to my middle of nowhere town just a few days before the contest. What are the chances?! I'll add a picture of my apron as soon as it arrives.

so that concludes my winnigest week ever! I hope you all get a chance to check out Helen and Abby's blogs, they are both really creative ladies full of good ideas. Have a great week! (I hope it's winny too.)

3 year old birthday card

I made this sweet little card for my nephew PJ, who will be three next month. Where the heck does time go?! It seems like just yesterday I was hogging all his baby cuddles and listening to him grunt and try to figure out the world.

Everything except for the 3 is from Create a critter, the 3 is from Plantin Schoolbook. Since there was so much going on with the train I had a hard time coming up with a background, so I settled for plain blue stripes. The bear and the 3 are pop-dotted from the page.

Since PJ is only 3, I guess this card is more for his mama (my sister), who also just got her first cricut a few days before I did! They live 500 miles away but someday maybe we'll be able to have a crafty get together! A girl can dream.

I've discovered so many new wonderful blogs this week that I haven't taken the time to post on my own. I just love the cricut community I've stumbled upon, everyone is so creative and supportive. It's just so much fun.

Hope you all are having a wonderful week!

Create a Critter!

Yesterday the mailman arrived bearing gifts:


Just in time for World Card Making Day! I'm so excited about this cartridge. To say I love it would be an understatement, I'm obsessed! It really does have a cutesy critter for every holiday and event. Love!

I made the two purple and pink cards yesterday, and the turkey today. If my Cricut mat hadn't lost all of it's sticky I'd still be holed up in my room today, but alas, I'm waiting for it to dry now (and crossing my fingers it gets sticky again!)

This is the last cartridge I'll be buying for awhile, at least until 2011. I have four now and I don't think I'll ever get to use all of the images I have!

Hope you're all having a wonderful weekend! I tried to send this post using my phone, but it failed. Pretty sure someone in my area code with a phone number that spells out "BLOGGER" is going to be very annoyed with me :)

Z fold Halloween Card

a few nights ago I was trying to figure out how to make a z-fold card. I cut out my cardstock, folded it, and then got distracted by something shiny.
This morning I saw that the Cricut Cardz Challenge was to make a Halloween card in a Zfold shape, so there was motivation to finish my card.

I don't have any Halloween papers, but I did just buy the pumpkin carving cartridge, so I decided to use that, and green and purple for my colors. It's a little plain, but I think it's pretty cute and I love the non traditional Halloween colors!
Web and Trick or Treat are from Pumpkin Carvings Cartridge
Spider is from Potpourri Basket Cartridge
Ribbon is from Michaels 2 for $1 bin
Striped paper is from DCWV Summer Dream Stack (which is on major sale right now at JoAnn's! 180 sheets of cuteness for $7.97)
Purple glitter glue G company from JoAnns dollar spot

Bridal shower Card

I made this little card for D, whose shower was Saturday. I also made the cake, but realized too late that I forgot to take a picture of it! I'm waiting on the hostess-with-the-mostest, my friend Kimberly, to send me a picture she took at the party.

Anyways, I originally made this card larger, but didn't have an envelope for it, so I whipped up this one, in a A2 size, in just a few minutes using the same design. I love the veil! It's cut from a heart printed vellum paper that I've had forever and had never found a good use for.

I learned at the shower that the bride to be hates the color pink. Oops!

My Pink Stamper Challenge

Today My Pink Stamper issued a challenge: Make something with a bird in it.

Since I had no cartridge with a bird in it, I had to improvise. This little birdie is made from a pear! I cut off the leaves of the pear to make the wings, beak and feet. You can find this pear on the Potpourri basket cartridge.

What do you think, not bad, right? :)

Bird paper-Recollections "Garage Sale" line from Michaels-bird cut at 4"
Bird shadow-random cardstock cut at 4 and 1/4"
Leaves & shadow-Random cardstock cut at 2 and 3/4"
Sparkles for wings-dollar bin glitter glue from JoAnn's (Love this stuff!)
"Chirp" rub-on- miniMarks via Ross (10 packages for $3!!)