A Glittery Feathered Friend

    
     Good morning from the Cricut Diva Mary! I trust you are finally enjoying some Springtime weather. I didn't think Winter would ever end, lol. Today a have a wonderful card to share with you using the French Manor cartridge and my Expression machine. I used the Cricut Craft Room to design this card for my Mom's 88th birthday. She loves birds so I thought I'd make a real fancy one: a peacock.


   
 I used the peacock image cut @ 4" from page 46 in the booklet and then inked the edges a bit. I cut the layer 2 times. One was cut using blue, the other in green. I like to ink my edges while it is still on the mat. It makes it easier to ink all edges with the paper still around the image. I remove the excess card stock after it is inked.


    
The base is from the same cart but on page 35 with the feature Card 2. I cut it @ 5.50". I used CCR in order to make sure the peacock fit in the frame. CCR is an awesome program. Even though I have the Gypsy, I like the fact that it is on a larger screen in the CCR, so it is easier to see that your placement is correct. I do use the mat feature so the card is on one layer and I just go to my second mat for the Peacock.



     After building the layers, it was now time to decorate it up. This is nice but not outstanding, yet. Just a tip for you: when gluing small pieces like the feather tips, I use a quickie glue pen by Sakura. It has a ball point tip so it is easy to apply the glue without getting it all over the place.



     Can you tell I love Liquid Pearls and Stickles? Now this peacock is styling!!! I also added a bow from 3girlsjam, some pearls and an angel stick pin from Pinque Peacock Shop. Be on the lookout for a wreath for Mom following this same theme.
     I hope you have enjoyed my card today. I have already given this to my Mom and I am happy to report she loved it!!!!

We Just Click

Get $100 OFF the Reconditioned Cricut Expression Machine!

     
     Good morning fellow crafters! I hope you all have warmed up a bit. I don't know about you but, here in the Northeast we have been gripped by a cold snap, brrrr!
     Today Erica asked the Design Team to create a project using a CCR exclusive cart. Provo Craft is sending the circle members (Yup I am one, lol) a new cart called Animal Antics. So we could get a chance to play before they send the cart out, they have been kind enough to add it to the CCR so today I decided to make a card using one of the images. I chose to use the penguin. Here it is....

     Isn't this just the cutest penguin you ever saw? I really love how jolly he looks and how about that camera? Let's start with the phrase. I chose the phrase feature for "We Just Click". I used the phrase feature + shift as well as the phrase shadow.

     The shadow was cut with red card stock, the phrase shift from silver and the phrase itself from black. This was all done @ 2.5" and went together really easy.Now for the cuteset penguin. Can you tell I love this little guy, lol?

     I think the part I love the best is the camera around his neck.This is just so cute with the phrase. All layers were cut @ 3.5". This was particularly helpful for the lens and flash on the camera. I added some liquid pearls for the "beak" and a metallic marker for the trim on the hat. This would be so cute as a birthday, friend or even Valentines' Day card.
     I thought I'd show you a screen shot from my CCR project:

This was from one layer. The left is the silver layer, right shadow layer in  red and the  lower right layer in black

This is what I started with before I decided to add another layer and cut things out separately. I like to see what the layers are for the cut before I move them around on my mat to place my colors. I hope this makes sense!

   Well that's it for today guys. Hope you enjoyed my little guy. I can see future projects with this cart!Be sure to head back over to My Cricut Craft Room and see what the rest of the team has to share with you today.

Cricut Expression 2 Blogger Bundle

Bat Mitzvah Card

     Hello Monday. Wow, these days are just flying by!!! Fall is really in the air around New England. Here at  My Cricut Craft Room, Erica has given us the option to use the CCR Exclusive carts so I decided to use the Jewish Icons. One of the reasons I love being on Ericas' Design Team is the opportunity to think outside of the box as well as to learn something new. I always have been curious about some of the practices of the Jewish faith. We all know about Christmas, however, about the same time, our Jewish friends celebrate the Festival Of Lights called Chanukah. I will be participating in the Chanukah Hop in December so I wanted to get my feet wet on starting some projects. Since I am Catholic, I turned to several of my Jewish friends to help me on the road to better understanding. I have had the opportunity to attend a Bat Mitzvah and was in awe of the tremendous job the young man did.
     In many Christian religions we have a Confirmation where the young adult learns more about their faith and receive the blessing from their Bishop in the form of a Sacrament. In the Jewish faith the young adults read in Hebrew from the Torah. Boys have their Bar Mitzvah when they are 13 years old but girls have their Bat Mitzvah a year earlier at age 12. This ceremony marks their rise in their religious standing. I decided to try my hand at a card for a Jewish girl on the occasion of her Bat Mitzvah. With the exception of the banner, this card can easily be made for a young man for his Bar Mitzvah.

     I started with a 4.25" x 5.50" white card stock base and added a layer of blue, gold and green striped paper. This reminds me of a "tallit" (prayer shawl). For the Torah I used the following measurements:

Torah: 3.5", shadow: 2.819w by 3.694, pages of the Torah; 1.403x 1.917. I stamped the pages with a script stamp by Recollections with Versamark Vintage Sepia.

     The edges were inked with Rusty Hinge distress ink and I added some gold Stickles to add a little bling. For the Hebrew lettering I cut this @ 1.417"x 1.944".

     I cut the Star Of David for the both main star and background @ 1" and again inked the edges with Rusty Hinge. I decided to add some gold stickles to these as well. I cut a total of 4 stars with all layers. 

     I wanted to add something "girlie" to the card so I pulled out some paper ribbon I had from K&Company and I was so pleased how well it matched the background paper. Lastly I put some pop dots on the back of the Torah before I adhered it to the card.

     I hope you have enjoyed my tutorial on this card. You can always find great supplies like the ink and stickles I have used here, at Erica's Store. Now be sure to head back over to the blog and see what great projects my Design Team Sisters have to share with you. @ My Cricut Craft Room.

Altered Card Box

     Good Morning on this beautiful Memorial Day! I hope you all are enjoying beautiful weather and are not too stuffed from all the cookouts, lol. Today the Erica's  DT has some beautiful projects to share with you so I hope you will take a moment to see what we have been working on.

     I have been exploring the CCR and had just purchased the Banners digital download so I thought I would show you what I came up with. Of course I also used my Imagine!!

     I found these plain boxes @ Michaels' and thought they would be perfect to hold some handmade cards of mine. The boxes are about the size of a cigar box and are ready to paint, decoupage, stamp etc. I didn't take pictures as I went along so let's just jump into the details.

      First I painted the edges with a gold dauber and then used gel medium to decoupage my paper on the box. The sides and bottom have a faux wood looking paper. This gave me the idea to make the banner wood looking also. I started by making the banner at 5" long out of a cream card stock in the CCR. By adding another mat in the CCR, I was able to add the "Cards" font by using Divine Wedding cart at .75". I used the separate layers feature to print the font first and then cut the banner.
     I cut 3 banners and then adhered them together before I inked the edges. Once the ink was dry I applied some paper glaze to give it a little protection. Would you like to see the finished project?

     I told you you could paint, stamp and decoupage these boxes so I did all three, lol. I even added a braided ribbon and some Tim Holtz adornments to the corners. I'll show you a few more pics of the details.

     I used some Zing copper embossing powder and some Imaginisce bling for the top and bottom right hand corners.

     I have so many left over beads that I made a hanging charm to peek out of a corner of the flowers.

     Speaking of flowers I love how these turned out. I used distress inks and found I had some that even matched my paper. I even love how the leaves turned out.
   Erica is so generous with her DT that she sends us some really neat stuff to try for our projects. In one of my orders she had sent me some cuttlebug dies that had these great leaf dies. They are 2 pieces sort of like a blackout and the top part of the leaf. They look beautiful with a chalk glimmer. You can find all sort of supplies at Erica's Store and she has fabulous prices as well.
     I hope this project inspires you just a little. Please check out my team members projects back at Erica's Blog and see what else they have to help your mojo.Happy Memorial Day and thank you to all who gave their lives to keep us safe.

    

A Very Special Birthday Card

     Aloha My Friends. I am so happy you decide to stop by today. Yup, I am still in Hawaii. I'll let you all know how things are going when I get back home over the week end.
     Well it is Monday so that means another day with the wonderful Imagine machine. I think by now you know how much I love this machine by Provo Craft, lol. I also am getting so much more comfortable with the Cricut Craft Room (CCR).  Last week I showed you the wonderful Vintage Box I made for my friend so I just had to make a card to match.

     First I chose the three paneled window card from Imagine More Cards on page 14. I sized this @ 5.5" and kept the colors the same. Next I used the image found on page 31 for the roses and cut them @ 1.5". I cut out 4 of these, 2 to position on the card and 2 to embellish and pop up. For the bling I used Diamond Glaze and Donna Salassar's Pixie Dust. This is such a sparkly glitter I just love it!
     Now it was time to use the CCR. I wanted to print the Happy Birthday sentiment from Martha Stewarts' Elegant Cakes because this Font is so pretty. I also wanted to add a butterfly for a little something to compliment the card as well as the greeting.

     First I started by placing the card image on my mat. I copied, pasted and then flipped the design. This was so that the oval would be on the right side of the mat for me to print my saying. I wanted to show you what I meant so after taking this pic I deleted the top image and slid my image to the top.

     Now it was time to ungroup the images and move them apart.( I cut the third panel). After choosing my HB greeting on page 47 in Elegant Cakes@ 1" I added the butterfly @ .5" from page 48 and welded the 2 together. I love how easy it is to weld in the CCR compared to the Cricut Design Studio. Now comes the tricky part. I placed the 2 panels side by side making note of where the + was on the panels and placing them on the same line. This was after I had placed my HB where I wanted it to fall on the oval. I did it this way because I wanted to just cut the solid panel and not cut out the oval. The oval is where I wanted to just print.

     When you go to work with your images you want to be sure you saved them on different mats. This way I was able to chose to work on each layer separately. The layer was printed first with the Birthday on velum and then I cut the solid panel by itself. (I used velum but wanted to show you the single layer I cut. I hope this is clearer than mud!!

     Here you can see all the mats I used, lol.

     I used some liquid Pearls to accentuate the oval and colored the butterfly wings with Spica glitter pens.

     You can see the dimension by popping up the flowers. I used the velum to cover the window since I wanted the beautiful printed paper on this card to show through.

     There you have it, a beautiful card for my friend. I also want to wish our top Leader Erica a very Happy Birthday tomorrow. Thanks Erica for allowing me to share my project with all of you. Now check out what the rest of the Team has to share with you over at http://mycricutcraftroom.blogspot.com/. I'll be back in MA by Sunday. Until then, happy crafting!~Mary

Thank You Card

     Good morning ladies. I hope you all had a wonderful and productive weekend, I know I did. Mondays at My Cricut Craft Room the Design Team shows you projects made with either The Imagine, E2 or CCR. This week I used the CCR and my Imagine to create this simple Thank You card.

     I used the new Greeting Cards Inside Out cartridge for the Imagine. The base is from My Minds Eye "Out & About" premade cards. I bought this pack several years ago and hadn't found a project to use them on until now.

     I used the image on page 25 and opened it in the CCR. I chose the ribbon @ 5.25 wide so it would automatically fit on my 5.5" base and sized the circle Thanks @ 2"" high. This way I was able to center the image where I wanted it on the "ribbon" and then welded the two together.Let me show you how I did this:

     The top image is the preset with the Thank you circle on the end. When I selected this one I clicked on the edit group and at the top chose to not weld. This separated my two images. Now I was able to change the size of the ribbon and circle as well as the color. I was then able to place the circle where I wanted it. You could also rotate the circle  180 degrees if you wanted to place the image vertically rather than horizontally.

Once I had my 2 images centered where I wanted them I just welded them together.

     Now I just grabbed a doily I had hanging around but thought the new image was rather lost so I used the scalloped circle on the Image and filled with the same color but sized it @ 2.5". After a little inking I just glued everything together and tried out some Candi bling I just got in. These little gems are awesome! Believe it or not they are made of paper which makes them really light so easier on the postage but they truly are beautiful. You can purchase them through Erica @ http://www.shop.ericascraftroom.com/

     Well that's it for today. Be sure to checkout what the rest of the Design Team has to show you over at: 

 http://mycricutcraftroom.blogspot.com/. I hope you have a great week.

Elmo Birthday Tags

     Happy Monday! Today is Imagination Monday and for this weeks project I used the CCR to design my project and the Imagine to print and cut. We have 2 grand nephews that turned 1 year old several weeks apart so I needed to make something to go on the presents. I decided to make tags rather than cards (they have a hard enough time opening gifts with out throwing an envelope at them,lol). I had just gotten my Elmo's Party cart in so thought this would be the perfect project to break in it,  plus the paper I used had Elmo in fire trucks. I love to buy my paper at the Dollar Store and then coordinate the card or tag to go with it!

     First I cut a tag @ 6" using the Imagine cart Nursery Tails and the tag on page 23. When selecting the image I separated the layers and only used the single layer. For the other layers, when you choose edit, you select the color box with the white square and the red line through it. This will make that image "invisible".
     Next I turned to the CCR to layout my Elmos.

     I selected all my layers and edited them to add my own colors. I used All Wrapped Up for my color palette but added the RGB codes that are specific for Elmo. I had Googled "RGB Codes For Sesame Street" and these are the codes I used but you may find other codes out there that are slightly different: Fur Color R238,G64, B53-Nose Color: R244, G 152, B41. The black was from the basic color pallette.

     Above you will find the color wheel where you put the codes in. This is what it looks like before you change the codes.

     Next I worked on the names. You will notice that you can select T for text and a box will pop up. This is awesome! You add all you letters at once and this groups them together for you to work with.

   On the left side of your mat there is all the features you need to play with your text. This is where you change the size and the spacing. One thing I love about this is that it shows you right away when they are welded. In the CDS and Gypsy you would have to show preview and then go back and forth until you got it right. With CCR you see it as you are playing with the spacing. So cool!!!

      The only problem I ran into was selecting the wrong cart (one I did not have,lol). I thought wow this is so cute they even have Elmo's hand in the font. When I went to print and cut in the Imagine it kept telling me to insert 3 Birds On Parade. I was so confused thinking why is it asking for this cart I didn't use it? Then I looked at the cart that came up and yes, I was wrong, it wasn't Elmos hand but a bird, so I switched to Base Camp. It really would have been cute with the other font, lol.

     Finally, for the birthday sentiment, I used the image on page 65 for caketop-s. I sized the whole image to get the Happy Birthday the size I wanted and then used the edit button to hide Elmo by clicking on him. Then I was able to pick a color with the Imagine and voila I instantly had 2 tags done. This was so easy to design and complete.

      I did cut 2 tags of each and glue together for stability. Of course, being me, I added some perfect pearls in white to add some sheen and used a metallic pen to do some faux stitching around the outside edge.

     The dot for the eye was so small that I lost it, lol. So Collin got a little bling. Here are the presents ready to go after adding a few stickles to the tag.

     Be sure to check back over to http://mycricutcraftroom.blogspot.com/ to see what the rest of the design Team has to show you. Before you go though I would love if you would leave me a comment and say hi to Elmo, lol.~Mary

Happy Valentines' Day!

     Happy Monday! You know what that means, it's time to use either your Imagine, E2 or the Cricut Craft Room. Well, since my husband gave me a HUGE Valentines' Day project to do, I used both my Imagine and the CCR.
     My husband is a tool salesman and is in and out of garages all day long. He wanted to offer a package his customers could give their wives, mothers or girl friends for Luv Day. All I had to do was make a simple card and tag to package them up with. No problem I say until he told me he needed 50 of them! Are you serious, 50, in less than a week? I'm a floral designer, my busiest day. How on earth am I going to pull this off you say?
     Easy, with a little help from my Imagine and the CCR.

     He wanted something very simple, nothing cutesy so we decided on Kraft card stock for the base. I used Art Philosophy and the card feature on page 69 @ 5.50". I used a 12x12" sheet of paper so I was able to cut 2 cards on the same page. Then I cut the solid heart out of red @ 2.75 and the layer in cream @ 2.5. They were so easy to put together since I just traced the open heart with a pencil and adhered the heart in place. I used the score marks on the card to lace some ribbon through and tie in a bow.
     I thought it would be too time consuming to use a stamp on all those tags so I turned to the CCR. I first chose the V-Day sentiment from MS Seasonal Cake Art and placed it on the screen. I added a second mat layer to place a tag from Fabulous Finds. This made it easy to size the sentiment in just the right place on the mat. After some copy and pasting, I was able to fit 18 tags on an 8 1/2 x 11" pieces of red card stock.

     I am so glad I used separate layers. You can combine them on the same page however, I discovered that by using them separate I could chose whether to cut, print or both. The first time I chose cut and it was not too successful since it cut everything. The red sentiment was usable but since I did not weld the tag was not.

     Above you see where I used one mat and printed out the sentiment.

     After they were printed I went back and chose the label mat I had made and so I was able to just cut the label. This was helpful so I could also cut more labels to glue my cut sentiments to. (Waste not want not, lol).

     This is the printed label. I just went back and added some faux stitching with a white pen.

     I also cut a 3" heart tag on the same page on Art Philosophy. One cut was with the heart and the red base on solid card stock. Added just a cute heart charm and they were done! I actually wound up doing 60! Bet you would love to see what is inside:

   That's right ladies: pink socks, folding scissors and a chocolate rose pop! Don't laugh, the socks are really comfortable. They got 1 pair each of the low, crew and mid calf socks. I would have loved to make a frilly card but these guys are down to earth and really didn't want to spend a fortune on flowers. They are really practical guys!!!
     I really hope you will try the Cricut Craft Room (CCR). I was intimidated at first but found it a real time saver to finish this project. Now please go back to http://mycricutcraftroom.blogspot.com/ and see what the rest of the design Team has to show you.