Posts Tagged ‘Cricut’
Birthday Princess
October 17th, 2008
I am having a lot of fun with my Copic Markers! This is my eldest daughter’s birthday card. I used the brand new card sized paper pack, “Urban Prairie” from Basic Grey as my inspiration for color choices.
The “doorway” is a Cricut cut from the Happily Ever After cartridge. I cut it on a heavy white cardstock and colored it with markers. Then I accented the jeweled areas with Icicle Stickles.
The stamp is by Hampton Art, I picked it up at Michaels. It actually says “Birthday Princess” at the bottom but I didn’t want to cut off the ornamental bottom on the doorway so I did not ink that part of the stamp. After I colored the princess I applied Icicle Stickles to the apron part of the dress. It worked perfectly, not bleeding my inks at all! The star on the magic wand and center of the butterfly are yellow stickles. The ribbon on the wand, the crown and the bird are all Liquid Pearls. I smeared Liquid Pearls around the edges on the background for the perfect magical finishing touch.
The ”6? is cut at 2.75 inches from Alphalicious. First I colored it a light pink, going over different areas to achieve a mottled look. Then I did the edges in a darker pink and blended it in with the light pink, working my way around alternating colors. Next I tried a trick I learned from Marianne in the Copic class. I colored a (just out) Inkadinkado stamp with a dark pink Copic Marker, going over it several times so it had a lot of color applied. Then I spritzed it with my Ranger mister, filled with water and stamped in on the six. Next I shaded a few select areas with a very light blue and warm grey. I finished the “6? off by applying the rasberry Liquid Pearl, more heavily on the edges.
The butterfly was cut and embossed with Spellbinders Shapabilities. After coloring it in yellows and pinks I applied the gold Liquid pearls to the ouside edges and the yellow Stickles to the middle. The accents on the wings have a little bit of Icicle Stickles too.
This card was a lot of fun to do, I’m loving using the Cricut with the Copics! We bought Danielle a huge wooden briefcase with crayons, pastels, watercolors, pencils, and tons of MARKERS. You’ll never believe what she is doing…she is putting them in order, “you know like your markers Mommy, I’m organizing them in special places with the colors together.” She has been coveting Mommy’s markers, so I thought if I got her a spectacular set of her own that she’d leave mine alone!
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It’s Great to Bee Three!
October 14th, 2008
This card is for my youngest daugher Raeleigh who is turning three soon. I’ve been working on this card a while and just finished it up last night.
I started by cutting a 5 x 7 card base and folding it so it would fit in my Cuttlebug. Then I used square Nestabilities to cut a scalloped hole in the front of the card. Next I cut a 5 x 7 piece of glitter stock and backed the inside front of the card. I then stamped the Disney stamp with black ink on a nice heavyweight paper from Bristol. After coloring the image with Copic markers I cut it out and embossed it with the next size down.
I’ve noticed that some people are thinking the baby/stork card I did was done with patterned paper. So, I want to be clear, the “3? was cut on the same white Bristol paper with Alphalicious at 3 inches. I stamped the three with a variety of flower stamps, leaving room for the bee. While coloring the “3? I emphasized pinks/purples since the card is for a girl and picked up the same colors from the Disney stamp.
The bee is cut at 1 inch from Walk in My Garden. First I colored the black areas with Copic’s pigment ink multiliner. Because I used pigment ink I could color the yellow stripes without being afraid it would bleed. This pen is also good for touching up a stamp that didn’t quite stamp well. I used Icicle Stickles for the wings and Black Diamond for the antenaes and tail.
I used 3D Zots to adhere everything, giving it a nice dimensional look, especially with the bee.
I had a lot of fun doing this card because most of the time cricut cuts are done in layers of colored paper. I think the idea of cutting things in white and coloring it like this opens all kinds of new creative possibilities!
Wedding Anniversary Card Using Cricut Storybook Cartridge
August 20th, 2008
My In-Law’s anniversary is just a couple of days before ours. All my energy went into their 45th anniversary party, so all my dh got was this little card!
The silver title was done with Cricut’s Base Camp cartridge. I hit “apply” on kerning without changing the number then nudged a few of the letters to the left, selecting “weld.” After cutting it out on silver from DCWV’s glitter stack I snipped between each letter almost to the edge, leaving about 1/8 of an inch intact. The cut-out letters didn’t pop enough so I backed each letter with scrap paper from creating the chocolate brown card (DCWV cardstock stack.) A glue pen makes this process a breeze.
The rest of the cuts were made with the new Cricut Storybook cartridge. Even with the “wish” theme, my husband thought the dandelion pod was fireworks! So I’ll be interested to know what everyone else thinks it is! The dandelion mat and icon’s shadow were cut on a copper sheet from Wausau Paper’s Metallics Cardstock. And, I thought the green scrolly flower print from Basic Grey complimented the silver/brown/copper palette perfectly. The green velvet rick-rack ribbon, also from Basic Grey, was a little tricky to adhere. I used Zots ultrathin clear adhesive lines, applying an inch or so of the adhesive at a time, laying the ribbon down on top.
I distressed all the edges with vintage photo ink and stamped several “eights”, “xoxoxo”, and a heart with the same ink. All the stamps were from Studio G sets. My white gell pen came in handy to add highlights to the copper sentiment, otherwise it doesn’t pop on the brown paper.
I applied a manilla tag to the inside, as a nice finishing touch for the sentiment. The rosebud charm from “Paper Bliss” brought the silver accent over to the inside. I had to explain to dh though that {brackets} mean “hugs” in internet speak! Somehow I figured he wouldn’t know that since the only internet community he hangs out on is for UFC!
If any of you have as hard of a time as I do coming up with card designs for the male loved ones in our lives I thought you might appreciate the .cut file: “ With You My Wish Came True ,” but you have to right click on it, then choose “save-as” and type “.cut” after the file name. It should then open right up in Cricut Design Studio software.
Update: Thanks to Cricut for selecting this card for the Newsletter on 8/25th!
Man’s Best Friend Says Happy Birthday
August 1st, 2008
My brother-in-law has a beautiful (and huge) white dog that is half wolf and half Alaskan Husky, he dwarfs his German Shepherd work dog! I really struggled coming up with a manly birthday card, it is just so much easier to make girly cards, isn’t it?! I wanted to use the Adirondack Paint Dabbers that I got from Tim Holtz’s class. I started with the Basic Grey blue/green circles paper as my inspiration and decided Eric would like an outdoorsy theme.
While at CHA I was drawn to all of the designs using butcher block paper, so I used that as my base and mimicked the circles by blotting my Hero Arts “watercolor circle” stamp with the Adirondack “Aqua” paint dabber and “Lettuce” Earthtones dye ink.
Next I picked up on the vertical lines in the Basic Grey print by embossing a velum rectangle with the new Cuttlebug forest branches folder. And stamped one side of my background with the Tim Holtz catails stamp in copper embossing powder.
The dog is from Cricut’s Paper Pups cartridge and the happy birthday, grill and beer bucket stamps are all from Studio G. They look great in the copper embossing powder on the velum. The finishing touch was the dog’s collar which I colored with the Versamark pen before embossing and his party hat, also Studio G from the recent January pack.
All of the pieces were distressed first with Tim Holtz’s Vintage Photo distress ink and followed up with Black Soot on the very edges.
The card itself is made from the new “Heritage” fall colored 8.5 x 11 DCWV card stock. I am really looking forward to giving this to Eric and hope he does not see it on my blog first!
Adhering Cardstock and Ribbon-Whole New Ballgame
July 28th, 2008
I’m fairly new to card-making, I started doing it when I bought my Cricut last fall. I actually used to use Prismacolors to make cards for people in college, but that was way long ago!
I think sometimes us newbies have some “ah-has” that might seem a little “duh” as time goes on. And they are easy to forget, so I thought I’d capture one here. This is one of the very first cards I made with my Cricut machine. It was for my niece who stayed in college so many years we stopped counting. Ha, just kidding you Emily! She was a music major, which explains it to those of you who know.
Sunday’s CHA Make and Take
July 22nd, 2008
Another make and take with the Hello Kitty cart. (The “K” is Plantain Schoolbook, a Storybook letter with your own initial might look cool!) I think it is a great size to hold embossing folders in, however I think I have too tall of a stack!
The top is embossed with the new Gratitude background and sentiments combo. And the side strips are embossed with the new Border with Love set.
The Provo Craft/Cricut Booth was Prize Central
July 18th, 2008
Cricut was giving away bags every hour on the hour to the first twelve people in line. Lisa and I got bags at 2:00. We were number 2 and 3 in line. There were four pink bags, obviously the most popular choice because the first 4 people in line chose them. Each bag has a number on it and during the course of the show people wear the big number somewhere visible. If you find the person with a number matching yours then you can go back to their booth together and draw for a prize. At 2:00 they gave away a baby bug and at 4:00 an Expression. We didn’t win.
Although BrensDesigns has already posted pictures of most of the new product on the Cricut board I’m still going to post a selection of pictures because some of my readers come from other places.
I love the butterfly on the new Tinkerbell cartridge, I cannot wait to see what other extras are on this cart! I asked when it would be released and I was told probably the fall, I believe September was mentioned. The new character cartridges will have all have 50 shapes plus 6 features. Only Hello Kitty and Sesame will have coordinating font cartridges, the Cars and Tinkerbell carts do not. Hello Kitty will have poses, phrases, accessories, and icons.
Cricut is doing the CUTEST make and takes of the show that I’ve seen! I stumbled upon Cricut Dan (Scrapbook Top 50) at the Tinkerbell picture frame make and take! I enjoyed meeting you Dan and hope to continue our discussion!
Lisa and I hope to do the Cuttlebug storage make and take on Sunday, if we understand it correctly. And I want to do the Hello Kitty one in the morning. I stood in line for the Tinkerbell one for about 45 minutes, but had to leave to meet Lisa.
For my readers that don’t know what a Cricut is, here he is, the green bug. He is the mascot for Cricut products which includes thier anchor products the die-cut machines and the equally popular Cuttlebug, an embossing machine. The purple bug is for the kiddy version of the embossing machine called Cuttle Kids.
At this show they announced new materials and a blade for using the machine to create your own embossing plates, magnets, or even stamps. With their Design Studio software you can use any of their cartridges to weld together your own custom designs! There is an independent entrepreneur that has been marketing stamp materials, he is sure to be disappointed that they’ve come out with their own.
Cricut is doing the CUTEST make and takes of the show that I’ve seen! I stumbled upon Cricut Dan (Scrapbook Top 50) at the Tinkerbell picture frame make and take! I enjoyed meeting you Dan and hope to continue our discussion!
Lisa and I hope to do the Cuttlebug storage make and take on Sunday, if we understand it correctly. And I want to do the Hello Kitty one in the morning. I stood in line for the Tinkerbell one for about 45 minutes, but had to leave to meet Lisa.
For my readers that don’t know what a Cricut is, here he is, the green bug. He is the mascot for Cricut products which includes thier anchor products the die-cut machines and the equally popular Cuttlebug, an embossing machine. The purple bug is for the kiddy version of the embossing machine called Cuttle Kids.
At this show they announced new materials and a blade for using the machine to create your own embossing plates, magnets, or even stamps. With their Design Studio software you can use any of their cartridges to weld together your own custom designs! There is an independent entrepreneur that has been marketing stamp materials, he is sure to be disappointed that they’ve come out with their own.
Holly’s CHA Pick of the Day
July 18th, 2008
My most favorite product of the day was from Hero Arts. They have come out with new TWELVE INCH clear stamp borders! This one is called “Birds and Branches”, it is my personal favorite. There are 16 different designs in 8 different sets.
Here is their catalog in case you want to see them all.
My sister Lisa is going to order some tomorrow. So if you know you want some let us know!
This was the make and take in the Hero Arts booth today. I’d never done a slider card. It was so easy and cute. Very cool how the ribbon just disapears when you push in the card, then it looks so cute just tied on the end!
Holly
Tim Holtz Class at CHA
July 18th, 2008
For those that don’t know, Tim Holtz is an designer and educator for Ranger Industries. He taught two classes today at CHA, it was very difficult to get into the classes. Lisa and I were a couple of lucky and excited gals.
The class was super fast paced and Tim was very entertaining. When we got there we had a huge bag of product waiting for us. Plus, thanks to Stampers Anonymous we also got one of Tim’s brand new stamp sets!!!
Tim packed eight techniques into two hours, each tag was made with a different technique. Each of us had different color samples as you can see in this picture showing both of our tag sets. Mine is in the ring provided and Lisa’s is spread out so you can see them better.
I’ll bold some Tim-isms that I captured, hoping to share a bit of his larger than life personality along with a few of his tips.
- You can use the paint daubers on any surface. You need to prime it properly the first use by pressing down on the head and at the same time squeezing the paint. Don’t bang it on the table trying to get the paint flowing, they are not hammer paints!
- Die inks are translucent while pigment inks are opaque which means you can layer pigment inks. But they dry very quickly, so never throw away the plastic vapor barrier. Yes, you can emboss with dye inks, IF you are like Indiana Jones!
- Ink the stamp before you stamp the ink. Contrary to common belief you do NOT have to store ink pads upside down because ink pads are a suspended medium. If you press the stamp into the pad it will put ink in recessed areas. Just, “tap, tap, tap and you’ll never have any weird little whoies.”
- On using the pigment pens, they are pigment so they also dry quickly. You have to work fast, scribble, blend, scribble, blend. Don’t just scribble, scribble, scribble, scribble and think hmmm, maybe I should blend this. It will already be dry. We smeared it on the back of a transparency to highlight some words.
- On working with the color washes. First emboss your image, then spray a couple of colors, one dark and one light. Then you press it with a craft iron (2 x hotter than normal irons), between some newspaper, until you see the stamped image. When it is done the newspaper will come right off. So, don’t think it is like a Band-aid and that if you rip it really quick it will be ok. It won’t. Just iron it some more until you see the pattern soak into the newspaper.
- Glossy paper behind a vellum accent acts like a light box, it just makes the image pop. You can glue vellum on glossy paper. BUT, put the glue on the paper, not on the vellum. And we’re not stuccoing a house, so if the glue clumps, thats too much!
- Helllllo Captain OBvious! I can’t remember why he said this, but it made me LOL!
Daily CHA Blog Drawing!
July 15th, 2008
Hi everyone! To celebrate my first trip to CHA and that I met my own deadline, with my new logo and blog banner design, I’m giving away blog candy every day for a week!
First of all I want to say a BIG thank-you to Alice Grey Trainor who brought my Scrapallier vision to life! She literally carted sketchpads and watercolors across the globe several times while she was working on the original drawing for my concept! It couldn’t have turned out better and I’ll be forever grateful! And, thank you to Chris Lo for the wonderful logo and business card designs. I am posting a link to his website here in case anyone gets their hands on my business cards and just has to be a copycat! His printing process is top secret, only he and his double secret printer know how to do it!
And very special thanks to my very dear husband Neal, who patiently gave me his feedback every step of the way.
Anyway, formalities aside, here is an example of the daily prize package:
Each day’s prize has approximately a $20 retail value! The color or style of the item will vary slightly from day to day. But each package has:
- Prima Sweet and Sassy Jar: cute multi-color/pattern flowers
- WeR Memory Keepers Designer Eyelets & Snaps: baby girl, baby boy or travel
- Studio G Series 14 “scrapbook” stamps
- Prima Flowers: bra, panties, purse or large flowers w/ chipboard center
- Jumbo brads
- Basic Grey rub-on accents
There will be one drawing for each day’s comments from 7/18 thru 7/24. I’ll be posting each night from CHA 7/17 thru 7/20 and for a few days when I return. I’m sure I’ll have a lot to share. If you happen to post on the evening of the 17th after I post about my TIM HOLTZ class then your comments will be thrown into the drawing for the 18th, I just want to give everyone at least 24 hours to post each day.
There is one catch, I don’t think I’ll have a way to print the comments from my hotel and cut them up for the drawing. So, all 7 drawings will be on 7/25.
But, you have not heard the best part….there will be a grand prize drawing for a Cricut Storybook cartridge! This is a $60 retail value, so if the winner is a friend without a Cricut then you’ll be able to choose something of equal retail value. Special thanks to my sister Lisa Ziriax, owner of Seriously Scrappin, because if it were not for the deep sister discount I would not be able to afford such nice blog candy!
Please try out my scrapbook search engine and give me some feedback. I explained what it is on my “About” page, but basically vertical search is for searching the narrow scrapbook niche versus searching the entire World Wide Web. If you put your blog address in the blog search engine and nothing comes up then just write a comment there requesting that I add your site.
Please bookmark Scrapallier so that next time you are trying to remember what Cricut messageboard member created that special .cut file you can search Scrapallier! HINT: after you seach your term look for the links at the top of the search results. Clicking on them will narrow the search even further, to a messageboard or to published scrappers for example.
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