Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category

My Wordpress blog got a virus last July and I spent two months working with my then hosting provider to resolve the situation. They finally washed their hands of the situation and said I needed to get help from the Wordpress forum. Well that did not go anywhere either. So, my blog sat stagnant for the fourth quarter of 2009 while I mustered the energy to rebuild.

From September through December I was working on a contract basis doing strategic marketing for GoAnyware which left me with very little spare time. They are giving me a break in January and I expect it to pick back up in February. So, I decided January would be the month to rebuild my blog (post by post and picture by picture…ugh) and launch my website. I’ll also go ahead and backdate some posts with work I shared on Facebook during my technical difficulties.

I used a great little application called “Artisteer” to create my Wordpress theme. It was very easy. I’d highly recommend it.

I also decided to try using Joomla for my main site. Call me brave or call me naive. It has been a bit more challenging so if you go to my main domain (please don’t) then you will see a mess right now. I’ll be getting back to that next. I might even get started this afternoon!

I’m thrilled to be able to get back to blogging in 2010….Merry Christmas and Happy New Year from our house to yours…these are just mailing today!

The kit is a collaboration between Catherine Designs and Bisontine.

This was a natural product extension that leverages two Cricut products. You need to buy a blank embossing folder and a card-stock weight material with sticky backing on both sides. First you cut your image on the embossing material. Then remove the sticky backing for the negative side of your image, but do not take apart your image!  Position and adhere your image to one side of the folder and run it through the Cuttlebug. Next you remove the sticky backing for the positive side of your image only, close your folder, and run it back through the Cuttlebug again so that it adheres to the other side of the folder. Now your embossing folder is ready. Insert your paper and run it through the machine a third time.

It is brilliant, and easy to do, plus it is not very expensive because you can use the same blank embossing folder over and over! However, I have slightly mixed feelings on this product release. The resulting image is not raised very far and in the samples I saw was difficult to see. I would ink the image in order to make it pop! My first question was why didn’t you use a thicker card stock? The answer is that it isn’t the thickness of the template that produces the depth of the impression. In order to get a deeper impression you would need spacing between the positive and negative image. Say for example your image was a square. If you cut a 2 inch square with a 1 7/8” square inside the image then peeled the thin frame out before adhering your template AND you had a thicker card stock embossing material then you could get a deeper impression.

The problem is that it is not that simple, but the shadow feature may work to create the gap on simple images. So, when I get my hands on the material I’ll try using CDS to create the gap with the shadow feature and I’ll post my results. I have not read up on the Cricut website, they may have already tested this option, we’ll see.

…When the design is done.

This is a birthday card for my niece. She is a great soccer player, always making at least half the goals of the game. So, when I saw this stamp on clearance at Michael’s I picked it up thinking of her.  The background circle stamp is from Hero Arts, I picked it up in Branson at the most amazing rubber stamp store. I used a yellow cat eye then lightly hit the edges with the hot pink.

If it was for anyone other than a kid I’d be a little disappointed though. I was going to title this post, “It’s not over till it’s over” because last night I thought I was done, but couldn’t sleep because it needed some doodling around the nine to give it some umph. The doodling looked great, then I added the star w/ the green rhinestone and I was happy…I should have walked away. I could have done w/out the Perfect Pearls inside and out. It is just kind of hard to have the control you want w/ the Perfect Pearls…though I love the results most of the time.

I still think it is cute, so I thought I’d share. The font is Opposites Attract and the stamp is by Me & My Big Ideas. I used embossing powder for the stamp, though Staz-On would have been fine. The paper is Creative Memories Mod collection, just right for the “sporty cool girl” look I was after.

This is one of the stamps I bought with the 25% sale items coupon from Michael’s last week. It is “Bouquet Montage” by Stampendous. At first I didn’t think I’d buy it because I didn’t think there was enough of an area to color. But, at that price I decided it was worth it, and I’m glad I bought it.

I got the idea to use my large CM circle punch to make a large scallop border (DCWV Glitter Stack) with one scallop layered on top, from Valerie Salmon’s “Two of a Kind” layout in this month’s Scrapbooks Etc. magazine. I used “Cottage Floral”, a Close To My Heart stamp on the scallop overlay accent. Tim Holtz Milled Lavender Distress Ink and Powder were used for the polka dot flower stamp and I filled in the dots w/ a Bic Marker. It was just the perfect accent, but I apologize for my photos, they never do my cards justice. I’m seriously considering upgrading to a Digital SLR. The center of the flower is a rhinestone from Michael’s dollar bin, and two of the flowers in the stamp also have rhinestone centers.

I used my Bic Markers to color the image which was stamped with Staz-on’s Brown ink. I distressed the edges of each individual piece with the Staz-on ink pad. The teal glitter paper matched Bic’s light teal marker beautifully. And, I selected Martha Stewart’s paper because the browns coordinated nicely with the finished stamped image.

I designed this invitation for my In-Law’s 45th wedding anniversary party with a lot of input from my creative husband. Since it is their “Sapphire” anniversary we wanted to use papers with blue accents. I chose the “Pink Chablish Digital Kit.” My favorite picture from their wedding album is this one where they are walking out of the church. I read in an article recently on Jenna Bush’s wedding that more casual pictures are in vogue right now. I think that is a wonderful trend because I always favor them over the posed shots. My favorite pictures of my husband and I are of us walking out of the reception towards the car.

I used Creative Memories Storybook Creator “Plus” software to create this invitation. The software is fabulously intuitive. I went to bed at about 2:00 the night I designed this and my husband got up early, while I was still sleeping, and typed in the information. He had never used the software and did not have any problem making his tweaks.

One of the things I think Creative Memories may have hotly debated, was how open to make the software. I think they made the right decision to allow people to use digital kits from other companies. I purchased elements from two other artists at the Two Peas In a Bucket store. The “stamp” for the 45 years element was from the “Circles Make Me Dizzy-2? kit and I typed “love still stands” along the flourish element from Rhonna Farrer.

Lastly, the “inked” edge was achieved with an overlay from a free kit at Shabby Princess called “Vintage Florals.” I think it will add the perfect finish to the invitations, which will be printed on 5 x 7 photo paper for less than a dollar each.

Originally I designed this card as I was trying to do the Brayer technique per RobynStamps instructions in her video.  It just didn’t smear around and blend right. Here are the supplies I used and my embarrassing results:

I’ve posted on the Cricut board to ask Robyn, or another person who knows this technique “which part of the technique did I get wrong?” Can you not use glossy photo paper, is it that I chose pigment ink? There are soft and hard brayers, this is soft, is that the problem?

Anyway, I liked the design I’d planned out. So, I decided to use my Bic Markers and some Prismacolors.

The flowers are from two different Studio G sets and I bought the bear at a stamp store in Branson, MO the manufacturer is “Custer’s Last Stamp“. The DCWV glitter stack and the gemstones (picked up in Michael’s dollar bins this week) add just the right magical touch to my wistful scene.

I think it is a great example of a “Happy Accident!” Hopefully next time I’ll get the Brayer technique right.

UPDATE: Robyn has created a new video on this technique because several of her viewers were having the same problems as me. 1) the photo paper does not look as smooth, you can tell on the video. 2) I didn’t ink my roller right (thanks for the slow-mo demo Robyn.) 3) I didn’t have the right ink…need to look for “Spectum” pads. Her video: http://thepinkstamper.blogspot.com/2008/07/episode-58-brayer-revisited.html

This is a sympathy card for a friend who lost her mother last week. I remembered seeing an illustration of a tree with heart leaves and used it as my inspiration. The card/tree are a single cut from Stretch Your Imagination. I cut it at 5.5?, which is as big as you can cut it on a 12 x 12 sheet. Then the second cut is a frame from the same cart. I cut it at 4.5 and the window fits perfectly over the tree window. I wanted more of the dark brown to show so I trimmed 1/4 inch off of each side.

The paper is DCWV’s Old World, I used four of the page designs from this stack. Two browns, a blue and a red. The brown ribbon is from Basic Grey. It took the entire bobbin to wrap the frame.

I drew the doodle with a brown Bic marker and colored it in with a blue prismacolor pencil. I was pleased that the blue showed up on the brown background quite well.

I really dislike my handwriting, oh well, it is written first in a dusky blue Bic marker. Then I used a Martha Stewart extra fine brown marker to go back over the lettering for legibility. The effect is nice, unfortunately the picture does not quite do it justice.

Next I used gold and blue Perfect Pearl to embellish the card. The blue dots look splendid as highlights on the branches. On the opposite side of the branches I applied Tim Holtz’s Black Soot for a very fine shadow.

The second picture illustrates how I used pop up squares to adhere the frame and add dimension.

I just love how this birthday card turned out. I’ve been playing with my new Bic markers and my Prismacolor pencils. I mostly used the markers to color this stamp. I used stippling to do the shading, when the coloring was finished I carefully tore the image and then applied Tim Holz’s “old paper” distress ink to the edges of all of the elements.

The striped background paper is Basic Grey, I just love the whole Romani pack which was used for all the elements of the card.

The red flourish was cut with the Home Accents cartridge, ruby red Perfect Pearls added just the “perfect” textured touch! Just a word of advice, it needs to dry overnight so don’t add it at the last moment. I also used perfect pearls for the candles and Ice Stickles for “Happy.” I’ve actually used this Lime Ice color quite a few times, it is more versatile than I’d have imagined. If I do this card again I’ll leave off the pearled flowers, it is the only thing on this card I’d change.

Lastly, the cake is from Celebrations, and the word could be welded in CDS with any font but it was from Walk In My Garden. When I finished the card, the left and right didn’t look balanced and cohesive so I used a black marker to add shadows to all the elements. It was just what it needed to tie the whole card together.

The CHA (Craft and Hobby Association) show is the third week of July. I’m tagging along with my sister, Lisa, who has an online scrapbook store (www.seriouslyscrappin.com).

So, in honor of this exciting news I’m going to post a card I recently did for Mindy which used Tim Holtz’s distress embossing powder.

Mindy recently graduated with a doctorate in Audiology.

The tan corner stamp and background for her degree initials were stamped with Versamark and then I used distress powder, setting it with an embossing heat gun.

The flower boquet and the red stickles beaded accent add just the right feminine touch to an otherwise professionally appropriate card.

So far I’ve held back from buying any Prima flowers. I’m trying to avoid having my dining room look like a scrapbook store. But, I had a few that were in my goody bag from the two Cricut crops in Tulsa that I attended. It was such a nice finishing touch. I’m hooked now.

I made this card for the St. Jude Card drive on the Cricut messageboard, it will say “I wish I could hug your neck”. I just have not decided where and how to place the message.

Don’t you just love the DCWV glitter cardstock?! The polka dot paper is by Amy Butler, she has some great stacks of paper.