23 Mobile Things - Thing 1

It's time to dust off this blog and start sharing and learning. I am finally beginning my 23 mobile thing learning journey and boy I sure hope I learn how to use my smartphone beyond taking a picture, sending texts, and phone calls! Well of course I need to improve my tablet skills in regards to the library classroom and maybe I'll be able to choose a table for my personal life. I currently have an iPad issued by the school but the Chrome book sure sounds intriguing.

Cookie Page

I joined a recipe swap on the Cricut message board. We had to make 20 pages of a Christmas cookie recipe. Here is what my final project looked like. The recipe is called Chocolate Mint Cookies and I used the Cricut Imagine to print and cut the background and the charms. Used some vellum to make the pocket and did some ribbon ties with the charms and a bit of viva decor pen on the background for extra pizazz. This second photo is of two pages, one all together and the other what can be seen when the recipe cards are removed from the pocket. The recipe card has a backside full of instructions and then the frosting is just on the front side of the card.

Please Vote!

My beautiful daughter is engaged and planning a fall wedding in 2014. She and hubby-to-be, Mike, have entered a video contest to win a wedding at Pine Peaks in Crosslake MN. Please help out by voting here and share the link with any and everyone that can vote! Thank you so much!!

Thank you cards

I made a dozen thank you cards to gift to a co-worker tomorrow at her shower. I used the cricut cartridge Something to Remember to create the wedding couple on the front of the card folder (folder was inspired by a circlet). The card holder/folder directions are on Caroly'ns blog here and I modified it to fit the 12 cards and envelopes. The cards were created using a Thank You stamp and embossing powder from Stampin' Up and Fiskar's XL Seal of Approval squeeze punch. Background texture was created with the Cuttlebug and Perfectly Paisley folder.

Valentine layout

I made an 8 x 8 layout with plans to add picts of myself and hubby. I used my new Martha Stewart Seasonal cake art cart for the lacy heart background. The hot pink heart is from the card I made DH using the Wild Card Cricut cartridge. The sentiment is from the MS Season cake and the red frame from Wild Card. I used a little washi tape to jazz things up with the red polka dots and paperclip flag.

Fiskateer time

The Fiskateer blog hosts an online event during CHA and this past weekend there were lots of challenges to take part in. I was only able to complete two so far and wanted to share them on my blog. One challenge was to make a wedding card. I made a 4x4 inch card using my Fiskar trimmer, bubbles border punch, Jenni Bowlin squeeze punch-flight, and the sentiment is also Fiskars - When's the Big Day stamp set.

The other challenge I was able to finish was to make a project with a flower using a Fiskar tool. I made a simple card using two squeeze punches - XL Oops a Daisiy and L oops a daisy. The sentiment is also a Fiskars stamp from the Oodles of Doodles set. The petal is also from a Fiskars squeeze punch but I don't know the name of it! It really is supposed to be a rain drop but I use it for lots of different things, mostly petals and leaves.

camo cupcakes

My youngest is leaving for Army basic training on Monday so his sister wanted to make a special treat. DD found this idea on pintrest and quickly make some yummy camo cupcakes. The first part was to make the batter, divide in three parts.

Add cocoa powder to one part for the brown, green and a hint of brown coloring for the dark green and leave the third mix part cream colored (we started with yellow cake mix). Em (DD) just globbed the three diff. colors in the cupcake liners instead of piping them in as the original directions stated. Bake per directions on the box of cake mix

Em likes to make her frosting from scratch and lucky for us I had some whipping cream on hand (that's her secret for extra yummy frosting) and then divided the frosting into three parts to color, one stayed white, the second turned green with coloring and a bit of cocoa powder, and the brown frosting had cocoa added. We tried three different sandwich bags inside a frosting bag with one big tip but in the end it just made a big mess because the frosting bag wasn't big enough to accommodate all the little bags. Em finished up the dozen plus 3 cupcakes by carefully putting the three diff color frosting

in the bag. By the end it was quite messy but we had fun in the kitchen and Bill (the soldier) was impressed! And best of all - Yummy treats for everyone!!

Elf donuts

Tomorrow I will introduce Skoob, the shelf elf, to first grade students in the library. Skoob is a character in the book, The Shelf Elf by Jackie Mims Hopkins. In years past when I have read the story, the students enjoyed writing letters to Skoob and they were always on the look-out to find him but I explained that he only came out when it was quiet and dark. Well, to have a bit of fun this year, I made elf donuts to share with the students, I think there will be some library magic when the book and donuts are discovered. Here are the donuts I made with a bit of help from my daughter (and she's the one who found them on the internet and shared the idea with me!)

I made the box for the donuts with my Cricut E2 and the Tags, Bags, Boxes and More cartridge. And the donuts...they are really Cheerios with chocolate and sprinkles, powdered sugared Cheerios, and sugar-cinnamon covered Cheerios. Here's a picture with a penny next to a cheerio/donut to show scale, and the final picture is of all the boxes, and each box contains 2 dozen donuts-just enough for each first grade student!

Unity Sketch Challenge

Another Unity stamp project...

Unity Stamps and WCMD

In celebration of World Card Making Day, Unity Stamp Co. has issued challenges to make cards, link the cards and you're entered to win some scrumptious prizes. Of course, I just couldn't pick one or two of the card challenges, I tried all 8 of them...and it was a challenge because you can only use Unity stamps. I have a very limited supply of Unity stamps but would love to increase my stash! Here is a brief challenge recap and my eight cards...




 Challenge 1 - Make a shaped card. There is a little iRock action on the snowflakes. White embossing powder with the stamp "Winter Wonderland"




 



Challenge 2 - Use at least 2 different textures. Three different texture folders, embossed maple leaf stamp, and fuzzy orange yarn give lots of texture to this card! The "strength in adversity" stamped paper went on the inside of the card for the sentiment.








Challenge 3 - Emboss a stamp image. I love the "Winter Wonderland" stamp so it was embossed with silver then framed with various paper and a sparkly red background with a few snowflake punch-outs.





 







Challenge 4 - Use the sketch. I had the blue flower ribbon for a while just waiting for the perfect project and thought it was a great pairing with the stamp "So very very very very very beautiful" and some MME paper. I even plan to send the card to a special niece (well, they all are special so I guess I'll be making more cards!).











Challenge 5 - Make a Fall card. A texture folder for the wood-grain background and a business size base is perfect for three autumn embossed leaf stamp images.







Challenge 6 - make a border with a non-border stamp.
I used two different stamps, one for the "thank you" and the other made the branchy boarder, it's a fun element that I stamped multiple times using Stampin Up Lucky Limeaid ink.












Challenge 7 - Color a stamped image.
 I used colored pencils and gamasol to color the stamped image and background. I used a marker to write "Emily" as I plan to use this card on DD's birthday gift in a few months.











 Challenge 8 - Use the colors Cream, Brown, Olive and Pumpkin
 I used a Unity stamp and various inks to stamp the floral background on the cream paper and layered the stamped sentiment "Blessings brighten when you count them". Add a bit of rustic twine and some stripped paper for a fun fall card.

Mom's challenge 5

My mother loved the cart and just had to make the finger puppets. Here is Barb G's cat and dog finger puppets from the Cricut Paper Play cart.

challenge 5 for Cropped Event

Here is the final challenge for the Cropped Event. The challenge was to use only paper and adhesive, no ink, buttons, stamping etc. I haven't used my Paper Play cart so this was the perfect opportunity to plug that cart in and create something fun!

Cropped Event challenges

Here are a few projects... we were asked to share what we are working on, and I am making a book with pictures from DH and me when we visited Arizona

Challenge #4 use 7 circles (or more) and the color teal

For the group challenge we had to make something with a heart....we decided to make a giant heart and each of us had to make a heart for each other person. On the heart we wrote things that we love about her. Participants: Mary Gulbrandson Tina Voss, Emily Voss, Barb Gulbrandson, Deb Doeden, and as a special guest Amber Doeden.

Challenge 3 for the Cropped Event Make some subway art.. I used a quote from The Tale of Despereaux by Kate DiCamillo and when I return home (scrapping at my SIL) will be made into a plaque for my library.

Cropped Event

This weekend I am participating in the mystery box/cropped event created by Megan Elizabeth at Above Rubies Studio and Craft-e-Corner. Several friends and I are going to gather this weekend and have our own little swarm and participate in the online challenges and classes. When we received our mystery boxes there were two challenges for us to do prior to the event starting. Challenge #1 - Create a card inspired by the "Sunset Card" from the 123 Stamp DVD Challenge #2 - Use 9 blocks from Paper Layerz paper to create 9 mini scrapbook layouts. Here are two photos of each challenge...one created by me (Chignon, aka Tina) and another done by my DD (Darling Daughter) Emily. We each are participating in the Cropped Event and will be using my blog to post our entries. Challenge #1 - Tina's card

Challenge #1 - Emily's card

Challenge #2 - Tina's layout

Background on my layout...I wanted to do a page about me, and the challenge was to make mini pages on each block so I decided to make it about things I love and what makes me, me. I am a teacher librarian who loves to read, craft and I love my family to pieces, so I have a librarian, books (with apple for the teacher) photos of my loved ones and scissors. The alphabet stamps are from Megan Elizabeth (something from my mystery box)and the ink is silver StazOn metallic.The scallop squares behind my children's Sr. pictures is a Megan Elizabeth pink nesting die and teh scissor shapes are made with a Fiskars squeeze punch. The other cut outs were done with my cricut (Family was done on the Imagine) Carts used: My community, French Manor, and Out of Character. Challenge #2 - Emily's layout

A little background to Emily's layout...she is making an ABC scrapbook for her boyfriend as a Christmas gift. The two of them enjoy playing a computer game called Mindcraft, so M is for Mindcraft and some silly sayings and various characters/items from the games. The alpha stickers were part of the mystery box contents as well as the paper layerz 9 square 12 x 12 paper.

September is Library Card Sign-Up Month

Looks like Fun!

decorating with my daughter

My daughter loves to decorate cakes (and cupcakes) and today we decided to do a project together. I was messing around in the Cricut Craft Room while Emily was adding fondant to a small square cake. We soon hooked the computer up to the Cricut Cake mini and began cutting on some candy clay.

I was inspired to try the candy clay after a post on the Cricut Circle blog by Cindy where she shared decorating cookies with candy clay. I learned quite a lot today while working with the candy clay...use lots of powder sugar to thicken it, at least on a warm summer day. We took to freezing the clay on the mats before cutting then freezing after cutting and freezing after removing the extra material around the cuts. And work fast to transfer the images. The cuts were from Create a Critter (sun shape) and Cricut Decals (scuba diver) and Crciut Craftroom Basics (letters FUN) I used the hide contour tool on the scuba diver to remove some of the finer details knowing it would be impossible to maintain the cuts with the candy clay, in fact we had to reattach the arms because they were so skinny they wouldn't stay connected!

Over all I am quite pleased with my first use of candy clay and DD (darling daughter), Emily added her piped frosting for a nice finished touch!

Happy B-Day USA

I wanted to make some fun jewelery to wear to my SIL's 4th of July party so I pulled out some printable shrink plastic, turned on the Imagine and started designing on my gypsy. I used three stars in two sizes (3" and 4.5") and the buccaneer Imagine cartridge for some patterns - blue stripes and red polka dots. I fill each star with pattern, the 3" with blue stripes and the center 4.5" with the red dots. Cut the shrink plastic used my crop-a-dile to make holes in the arms of the stars for jump rings then used my embossing heat gun to shrink. The stars shrunk to about 1" and 2". I used some large gold colored jump rings my DD had in her stash of beading materials, along with a few gold colored beads for a little extra flair. I wanted the necklace to be "light" in that the focus would be on the stars and stripes in honor of Independence day - Happy Birthday to the United States!!

I didn't have any chain to attach my star "charms" but I had some pretty gauzy-type ribbon that was just right for the look I was attempting. In all I like the necklace, it was a fun project to have something festive for the fun day. This is the first time I have used printable shrink plastic and was very happy with the results. The only thing I need to adjust is the depth of cutting, perhaps use multi-cut for a better cut.

Another circle weekly challenge

This week's challenge was to use a sun cut out and the word summer in the project. I used the gypsy wanderings sun and used my gypsy to hide the inside swirl to the sun so it was a solid image. I used the sun image three times, one for the background of a second one for journalling. I also used the sun with the number 17 (numbers cut from Cricut Alphabet) to indicate the birthday year. My youngest son has a summer birthday - in fact, it is on the first day of summer! Last year I snapped the photos of our celebration and the happy feeling of them gave me the idea to say "summer birthday's rock" The only bummer of the layout is that I don't have DD in the pics because she was working at the time of the party. The word summer was cut from Stretch Your Imagination and the border on the top left photo is from Paper Trimmings (two images welded together). The chipboard letters and all the paper are by PiggyTales.