Crafting WITH my kids

On Sunday we had a party put on by the Military Family Resource Center to celebrate the half way point of the HMCS Toronto deployment. I had volunteered to do crafts with the kids for this.

My kids were using my eBosser by Craftwell to help me make card bases for the other families of the deployed members of the HMCS Toronto to use for our craft at the half way deployment party I figured we'd make a video. Of course one video turned into 2 since one child is not to be outdone by the other. :) 

Before you go watch the videos would you like to see some pictures from the Half-Way Deployment party?

Of course you do right?!

Here are the cards that resulted from the videos they made (see below for the videos). These are the ones Michael made.

Here are some fun things the kids made to send to their deployed loved ones... with the exception of that picture in the bottom left of this group... that would be a picture of a chunk of Samantha's hair and the piece of paper she was trying to cut her hand prints out of when her pigtail go in the way resulting in cut hair.

The top pics of this group are a mail-able hug and if you click on the picture to enlarge it you can probably even read it. I used the poem from the book "The Paper Hug". Basically it's the kids hand prints cut out and attached with a length of ribbon that was measured to be the length of their outstretched arms. The poem was added to the middle of the ribbon.

The bottom right is Reindeer poop aka Halloween smarties that we bought on clearance with a poem printed/cut out, ribbon looped through and laid across the smarties box  and then a return address mailing label that I whipped up stuck on to hold the ribbon in place and cover the side of the box that has Halloween pictures on it.

After crafting the Military Family Resource Center (MFRC) aka our second home lately had given all the kids tickets that they then used to "purchase" a loot bag and a bag of popcorn that they could have while watching The Croods movie. All of the kids (and moms) had a great time.

Watch as Michael, my 4 (and a half) year old demonstrates how to use the Craftwell eBosser to emboss a card.





Still don't believe it's that easy?? Watch my other video of my 2 year old using it.



DISCLAIMER: I am in NO way affiliated with Craftwell or the eBosser in any way.. just a product I love!

Christmas in November

Welcome to our Christmas in November Blog Hop where we are showcasing the exclusive Art Philosophy Cricut cartridge which can be purchased exclusively through a Close to My Heart Independent Consultant.

It's hard to believe that it's already November and that the US Thanksgiving is less than a week away. And well, that means, it's almost Christmas! We have created Christmas themed projects for you and hope to inspire you to get started on YOUR Christmas creations.

If you just happened to come to this blog, you should start at the beginning at Lucy's blog - Love 2 Create. If you came here from Lucy's blog - Love 2 Create, then you're in the right place!


I decided to keep it simple with this one and made gift tags for a few special presents I will give out at Christmas.

Love that this will actually "rock" if you give it a little tap. :)

I used the card feature from page 69 in the Art Philosophy handbook cut at 3" from Cranberry cardstock for my card base. I used cricut craft room to alter the layer feature from this same page hiding one of the cut lines so it became a solid semi circle instead of a frame and I did change the dimensions on it a bit as well making it a height of 1.194" and width 2.625" and cut it from White Daisy cardstock. I then stamped the rocking horse image from the Christmas Delights stamp set in chocolate ink on white daisy card and used my watercolour pencils to colour it in. I love that this image can be Christmas themed by making it Christmas colours and using it on a Christmas project OR it can be coloured completely differently and used for any other occasion be it a baby shower, birthday, etc. Fussy cut my image (you don't have to cut the section out between the bottom of the horse and top of the rocker piece since your layer from behind would show through here anyways.

I will probably put a little loop of ribbon on these to attach them to presents but I left it off for now as I might not want it for some and it's a lot easier to add it if I want it then it is to take it off. 

Here's a look at the stamp set I used, it is by far one of my absolute favourites!

The next stop on your blog hop fun is Diana ~ Diana's Free Moments.

Products Used:

Here's the entire blog hop lineup in case you get lost along the way:

Lucy ~ Love 2 Create 
Darla ~ Caution: Crafting is Contagious
Diana ~ Diana's Free Moments
Carolyn ~ Nuts 4 Scrappin'
Kindred Hearts ~ It Makes Total Cents
Tammy ~ Closer 2 My Heart
Arlene ~ Arlene's Creative Space
Traci ~ Paper Crafting 101


If you do not already have a Close To My Heart consultant and would like to purchase any of the products or want more info I would be happy to help you out. You can visit my CTMH website to see all of the wonderful products and you will find all of my contact info there as well as a link to find a consultant that may be in your area if you wish to have someone local to you.

September ARTISTE Blog Hop

Welcome to our September ARTISTE Blog Hop! Each month we are showcasing the amazing, exclusive ARTISTE Cricut cartridge which can be only purchased through a Close to My Heart Independent Consultant.

We don't want to scare you but Halloween is a little over a month away and we know you have to be thinking about what YOU are going to create for this spooky holiday! We decided to show you all the creative projects you can make using our exclusive Artiste Cricut cartridge. You will be hopping along our haunted trail of creativity - you never know what you will see next!

If you just happened to come to this blog, you should start at the beginning at Lucy's blog

Also, to help you get ready to start making your own Halloween projects Lucy has some blog candy for you! She is giving away a Moonlight Complements Dimensional Elements pack! That's two (2) sheets of Printed Dimensional Elements that you can use to create your own Halloween project! There is a picture of the blog candy on her blog. All you have to do to be eligible to win is to leave a comment on everyone's blog AND become a follower of Lucy's blog. (If you are already a follower, just let her know in your comment.)

Okay.. first I need to apologize. If you came to visit my blog earlier blogger apparently did not keep all the updates I did to my post so all you saw was a Christmas themed project. I'm sure you all had thought I lost my mind! 

The truth is I was working away on my project for this hop and looking through the handbook I got excited to try the holder you will see below and I wanted a bunch of cards to put in it so I pulled out my Pear & Partridge Workshop On The Go Cardmaking Kit and got working on the cards. I also didn't like the plain squares so as you will see below I switched it out for a shape from the Artiste cartridge as well.

Now.. 2 days ago I was going through the hop write up and editing my post for you all when I realized that I had completely ignored the hop theme "Halloween" so a complete re-do was in order! I edited the whole thing and re-scheduled it to post but apparently blogger really liked my Chrsitmas project as it reverted the whole post back to that. Good new is now I'm going to show you both today instead of saving the Christmas one for tomorrow like I was going to had blogger cooperated. :)

I decided I still wanted to use the same concept.. so I switched out the Pear & Partridge B&T for the Moonlight B&T. I embossed my card base and ran my cocoa ink pad over the embossing to highlight it and instead of using stamps I cut the phrase "Eek!" from page 76 of the Artiste handbook and I also added the spider (accent 4 with shift on page 77) cut from more of the same left over cocoa cardstock from the Pear & Partridge Workshop On The Go Cardmaking Kit, seriously I wonder how many more projects I can make from this kit?? I added some color ready seam binding that I died with the Olive stamp pad and eur"eek"a a Halloween themed project to share for you.

Here are some pictures of my Halloween theme card and holder set:

Now for more details on the shapes and to see what the Christmas themed one looks like and how easy it was to switch just scroll down and you can see my post that anyone that came this morning saw as well as you will find the hop lineup and your next stop at the end.

Let me know which one do you like best??

If you don't want to see the Christmas one and just want to be on your way to the next stop.. The next stop on the haunted trail is Diana - Dianas Free Moments and you're going to love what she has for you.

Today I used the Pear & Partridge Workshop On The Go Cardmaking Kit and essentially used the projects exactly as the workshop instructions that come in the kit say to.. except I found the plain squares for the focal images boring so I used the Accent 3 shape from page 61 of the Artiste Cricut Cartridge for 2 out of the 3 card designs in the kit.

 

I also added a little holder for all the cards using the paper left in the package after making all 15 of these cards, yep... you heard me.. there was paper left over and actually still is a bit left after making the holder.

For the holder I cut the Accent 3 shape on page 47 of the Artiste Cartridge from my left over Pear & Partridge B&T from this kit and the Accent 3 with the shift key on page 47 of the Artiste Cartridge from the left over Cocoa cardstock from the kit. I think I will embellish the holder a bit more... maybe add some ribbon and bling! :) What do you think?

I used the Cranberry marker to ink the "A MERRY LITTLE" on this card instead of cutting out a seperate piece and masking it and inking in the cranberry ink I just found this went faster.

I just love the stamp set that came in the Pear & Partridge Cardmaking Kit as well. It's so cute and versatile! It has 6 sentiments (one being that lovely one with the birds and filigree on it to be used as a focal image), 3 different present, 3 different ornaments, the string for the ornament, 2 partridge birds and a branch. I can see myself grabbing this set a lot.


Products Used:


The next stop on the haunted trail is Diana - Dianas Free Moments

Here's the entire blog hop lineup in case you get spooked along the way:

1. Lucy - Love 2 Create  Previous
2. Darla - Caution Crafting is Contagious You are here
3. Diana - Dianas Free Moments Go here next
4. Carolyn - Nuts 4 Scrappin'
5. Julia Hammond - You Can Create 
6. Wendy Kessler - My Scrapbooking Blog
7. Pam Stewart - I Candy Scraps
8. Carolyn Mendoza - Crafting With Carolyn 
9. Jennifer Kramer - 4 Hearts Scrapbooking 
10. Maria Woodworth - Maria's Paper Craft Place 
11. Kindred Hearts - It Makes TOTAL Cents
12. Ginger Morriello - Ginger's Creative Cottage 

Thanks for stopping by for some Halloween fun -- hope we didn't scare the creativity out of you! Muah-ha-ha!

July Art Philosophy Blog Hop

Welcome to our July Art Philosophy Blog Hop! Each month we will showcase a feature of the amazing Art Philosophy Cricut cartridge which can be purchased exclusively through a Close to My Heart Independent Consultant.
We're so excited to be doing this hop and we have a fabulous lineup with some very talented ladies. There will be lots of fun projects AND some blog candy!!!

Lucy Kelleher, our hostess and fellow CTMH Consultant, will be giving away a stamp set! She is giving away a prior Stamp of the Month set that can no longer be purchased called "You Are ...". (This stamp set has a $17.95 retail value). You will find a picture of the stamp set on her blog. To enter to win, you will need to leave a comment on her blog and on every stop of the blog hop. If you also become a follower of Lucy's blog, she will give you another entry .

This month we will be showcasing the "Card" feature of the cartridge. Did you know there are 100 different card shapes you can make with this cartridge? You heard me correctly -- 100!!! Now we won't be able to show you ALL 100 card options, but we will show you as many as we can.

If you just happened to come to this blog, you should start at the beginning at Lucy's blog - http://www.love2createitall.com/.

My project today uses the card feature key on page 47 (without the shift key) which is the 3rd row down 7th key over (going left to right) of the white image keys on your keypad.

First.. a close up of the glittery goodness!! :)

Here's what the whole card looks like from the front:

Now.. just to show you that this really was the card shape which has a cutout window in the middle of the front panel and not just a plain card with this stuck on it (and because I thought the picture looked really neat)... here's a shot of my card open in front of a window so you can see that you can see through it. :)

Here's how I achieved this look.
First I made my file in Cricut Craft Room so all the pieces would line up and cut in the correct spot as well as I was able to play with the colours to decide which ones I wanted to use.

Next I loaded my silver paper (the paper I used was Reflections cardstock from Michaels) and cut the card shape @ 5.5" using CCR. Then I took a piece of acetate which I had applied a piece of Scortape to first and with the mat still loaded in the machine i carefully lifted the cut card shape up on the side with the cutout and ligned up my piece of acetate with the acetate side on the mat and the tape backing facing up so that it would cut the pieces in middle of my acetate 9yes I could have just cut a bigger piece and put t in approximately the right spot since CCR shows you where on the mat it will cut but this way I knew exactly how much edge I would have on the acetate around my shape). I cut all oth the layers for the ornament and the label shape like the opening in the card front with my setting on 4 speed, 4 pressure, 4 blade depth and a mulitcut of 2 since the kind I used was BCT tape which has a very thick backing on the tape.

Now I had my card shape cut from the silver card and a solid square of acetate with adhesive on it and all the pieces cut out of the tape backing.

I removed the tape backing on the outer edge leaving all of the part you can see through the window cut opening of the card covered. and lined it up with my card from behind and stuck it on. now i just removed one section of backing at a time and applied my glitter to the exposed adhesive rubbing it on really well with my fingers and then using a shaving brush to brush away all the excess glitter.

I used my Say it in Style stamps (which is no longer available as of August 1 so make sure you order ASAP if you want this amazing set of sentiments) to stamp the sentiment in versamark ink and heat emboss with red tinsel embossing powder.

The next stop on your blog hop fun is Gloria Shirr so hop on over and see what wonderful project she has to share with you today! :)


Here is the list of all the talented consultants who are participating in this months blog hop:

1. Lucy ~ Love2Create
2. Darla ~ Caution: Crafting is Contagious!
3. Gloria Shirr - Purpleglo Creations
4. Laura Wolff- Scrappinsweetie's Escape
5. Eva-For the Love of Creating
6. Danielle ~ Little Bit of Scrap
7. Connie ~ Connie's Crafty Closet
8. Wendy ~ My Scrapbooking Blog
9. Joanne - Josie's Joy
10. Laura Charko - Koala Designs
11. Carolyn Heniges - Nuts 4 Scrappin'
12. Kindred Hearts (Penny) - It Makes Total Cents
13. Stephanie Feist- The Quilted Scrapper
14. Julia Hammond You Can Create

Thanks so much for stopping by and hopping with us - we hope you LOVE all the projects we created!

July 100 Cricut Cartridge Blog Hop

For my card today I chose to use Fancy Frames, Heritage and Trim The Tree cricut cartridges.

I made an embossing folder with the Fancy Frames cartridge (the 3rd row 4th column button) at 5" Real Dial Size. If you're local and would like to learn how to make your own embossing folders I teach classes on how to do this, you can contact me for my class schedule.

I also cut the backing for this frame (4th row, 4th column) and embossed it with my homemade folder. After I dry embossed it I ran my gold inkpad over the embossing to highlight the embossing. I also used my gold Sakura pen to edge both the outside and inside of this frame and my card base (both inside and out). I attached thie embossed panel with foam tape for added dimension.

I used Trim the Tree and Cricut Craft Room to cut my ornaments out of some gold sticker paper (I used CCR because I wanted to take the guess work out completely of what size I wanted them and this allowed me to line everything up how I liked it and then cut.


I took this screen shot for you so you can see what I mean.

I also used the Heritage cartidge to cut the label for my sentiment. I stamped my sentiment from A1115 A Holiday CTMH stamp set in gold encore ink as well as distressed the edges of my label with the same gold ink. I attached the label with a couple star brads I had in my stash from years ago.
Here's a close up of the dimension the embossing gives this as well as the shine!

Next you should go to Miranda's blog: http://www.nanasscrapspot.com

If you get lost along the way here is the entire line up

Start http://mycricutcraftroom.blogspot.com

Heather Lynn http://heathernovinger.blogspot.com/

Lisa Carrier http://ourcraftingcorner.blogspot.com

Darla http://www.stampingunderdoctorsorders.blogspot.ca/ YOU ARE HERE

Miranda http://www.nanasscrapspot.com  GO HERE NEXT

Erica's Project http://ericasprojects.blogspot.com

Yvette http://gammascreativecorner.blogspot.com/

Christina http://cema1cema.blogspot.com

Jessica S http://jessicascraftshaque.blogspot.com

Candice http://stampinpearls.blogspot.com

Lucy http://www.love2createitall.com

Blog Candy http://ericasblogcandy.blogspot.com

Right from the idea book.. With a little twist

You can actually see this exact design in the idea book so why did I make it and am posting it right??
Well.... The big difference between mine and the one in the idea book is that mine is entirely done with the cricut cartridge whereas the one in the idea book uses the bought shaped cards.

I like that you can duplicate this without having to spend money on costly shaped cards! Heck you could even use a different shaped card if you wanted I just wanted to see if I could duplicate the one from the idea book and... You can!!
You can order this cartridge and lots of other coordinating stamps (like that holly leaf and the label stamp) here: https://darlah.myctmh.com

Look at my post http://stampingunderdoctorsorders.blogspot.com/2011/10/art-philosophy-coordinating-stamps.html from yesterday to learn all about the cheat sheets that I make just for my customers!!

Glitter card fix??

So I wasn't totally happy with my glitter card since the I didn't stick the diecut down very good so some glitter got under the left edge and lifted the diecut so I stamped this snowman and layered it on top.... still not sure I like it but oh well!!

Glitter card

This was done for a challenge on the PCP website for back to basics with stampendous. It is all glitter for the background and it was supposed to be stickers but I used a die cut I made with my craft robo a few years ago that I had laying around.