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.

Dress your bug

The magazine challenge for the Cricut Circle is to dress up one or more of the little collectible guys. I have two of the buggers, blue for the Expression and red for the Cake. I also have two sons(18 yrs., and 21 yrs.) and they are both planning on joining the Army. To honor my boys, I decided to dress my little Cricut figures as Army dudes and the first item to make was the "brain bucket" helmet. Most cuts are from the Stand and Salute cart. The dog tags used for the banner on the truck were done with the gypsy, I hide the image on the dog tag then added the font from Cake Basics. The patriotic hat is from Over the Hill cart, cut with white card stock and then I colored it with ink (red-festive berries,TH, and the blue LePlume marker). The truck is cut from some adhesive backed 12" x 24" paper from DCWV and the canvas layer (light brown) is paper from my scrap stash. The weapon in the red bug's hands is also cut from the DCWV dark brown card stock. The camo background paper are two pages I have waiting to use in DH's Army scrapbook that I have horded for a few years, hummm maybe I'll just save it now for the boys!

Billy the Kid layout

The circle monthly challenge is to do a layout of a recent event...well without a specific definition for recent I decided to do my son's 3rd birthday...it sure seems like only a few months ago he celebrated his 3rd birthday! The journal writing on the page tells the story of how he felt when being called "cowboy" during the family party. It was fun the first 5 minutes but then he wasn't sure if people knew who he really was...so after Grandma Barb (the gift giver of the cowboy get up) called him cowboy (the umpteenth person to do so!), he said in no uncertain terms - "I'm Billy -- the kid!"

So what did I use for the layout... lots of scraps and the back ground paper is from crate paper and I splattered it with Adirondack color wash - Espresso. The cuts I did on my Cricut E2. "Billy" and "the" are from the Making the Grade cart, "Kid" is cut from Old West as well as the cowboy hat and bandana. I jazzed up the cowboy hat with Viva pearl pen -chrome silver. The white accents on the cuts are with the white gelly roll pen and the journal-ling was written with Bic Mark-It ultra fine - woodsy brown (love my set of Bic mark-it pens I won from Joy's Life - thanks again Joy!!) The journal-ling block is border punched with Fiskars border punch, notebook.

My Cat in the Hat

I just purchased the Over the Hill cartridge and when I saw the top hat (3-D!) I just had to make it. I played around with some cheap white card stock and it took me three hats to finally get it right...of course each hat was a different size so I could get a feel for the ratio to finished size. While working in my nice cool basement crafting cave, my attention starved (not!) cat had to visit. I decided to make her a special napping place while in the craft cave, in hopes it will save my projects from her furry fluff sticking to the adhesives. She adored her blanket lined crate and I just couldn't resit putting one of my sample hats on her head. Of course the first thing to pop into my head...The Cat in the Hat!

Art Inspiration Challenge

While riding in the car for a couple hours this weekend I designed a layout with inspiration from some framed art. The Cricut Circle blog had posted the picture of a rose with some interesting blocking around the edges so I used the blocking/layout as my inspiration. I also use the butterfly boarder idea and some vertical lines from the art piece and incorporated that into the layout. It was fun to have my gypsy with me in the car to play with shapes and ideas and I was pretty sure what photo I wanted to use in the layout.

Of course we had to use at least 3 Cricut Image cuts and mine were: butterfly boarder from Paper Trimmings; blue patterned cut out back ground from Ornamental Iron 2; and Spring from Gypsy Wanderings. The stripes turned out to be more of plaid paper but I love how everything coordinates. The paper was from piggy tales except for the spring image which was cut from bazzle paper.

Recipe Challenge

This weekend was national scrapbook day on Sat but I wasn't able to play all the much. We attended a first communion service and celebration but that didn't stop me from creating...party means gift which means I get to make a card! I did a quick peek on the Cricut Circle blog and found a challenge I could do while still making a card for my niece. The challenge was to use at least three Cricut Image cuts (cross from Indie Art, banner out of vellum from Christmas, butterfly from Gypsy Wandering);

use three patterned papers (check out the layers on the cross!); stitching...used the machine around the edge; and the color yellow (on the cross and butterfly) Gypsy font was used to make the sentiment "blessed day" with the letters welded.

Cricut Craft Room Challenge

The Cricut Circle blog has some challenges and I have been sneaking off to my craft room trying to create. Here is a layout I made that used the Cricut Craft Room Basics cart and and exclusive craft room cart - Germany.

The challenge was to only use the craft room to do the project. Recently I purchased the Germany cart to make some layouts of my son's trip last summer (and daughter's from a couple year's ago!) This was just the challenge to get me started on Bill's Germany pages! The blank white paper is just a place holder for the pictures to be added after I get the bunch of photos back from my DS (he's been sharing in his German class). The blank center cut on the bottom is ready for Bill to journal about his trip and include info about how he celebrated his 17th birthday while over seas, hence the cupcake with the moth and date on it.

and the winner is...

I put all the comments from March 18 through March 31 into a hat and pulled two winners!

The winner of the fabulous My Memories digital software is Gramjak.
Blogger Gramjak said...

I Love your words with shapes (both of them are clever and creative! Cute idea!

Thanks for the opportunity to win (perhaps!) as I'm never lucky enough to be part of the blog candy give-away!

I will be sending Gramjak an email with the details! Congrats!
and I have another give away to announce - the winner of the Imagine More cartridge...Congratulations to Melody Lane Designs!

Blogger Melody Lane Designs said...

Happy Happy Birthday! I'm turning 41 next week! Enjoy your 30's! Thanks for the Great giveaway!

I will email Melodylanedesigns with the details :)

Have a wonderful week bloggy friends!

cool giftie

I spent the past weekend at a swarm and crashed at my brother's house. He and my SIL gave me a birthday present and I just love it!

Big bro. made a shelf for my I and E2 and I just know my SIL prompted him to get it done before my arrival for the crafty weekend. I couldn't find a better way to spend my b-day, with my good friend/SIL crafting the day away with our Cricuts!
And remember, in celebration of my anniversary of turning 30, leave a comment on the birthday post for a chance to win an Imagine More cartridge (works on the E2 and I) and if you want to enter for a chance to win the My Memories digital scrapbooking software leave a comment on the My Memories Digital Scrapbooking post.

My Memories Suite give away and discount code

Don't forget to comment on my original post here for a chance to win My Memories Suite! Meanwhile, have a gander at this youtube video while waiting for the end of March when the drawing will occur.

http://youtu.be/sq1nXI8k7Pc

Can't wait for the drawing? Buy your own My Memories Suite by clicking on the link on my side bar and enter the code: STMMMS23271 for a $10 discount!

Two give aways

For the My Memories Digital Scrapbook giveaway clink on this link

For the Imagine More cartridge clink on this link

Birthday giveaway

Today is my birthday and all week I have been feeling the need to give a gift in celebration of my 29 plus years (lots of pluses but don't ya know it's impolite to ask a lady her age?!) on the planet. I am currently running a give away for My Memories Digital Scrapbooking Software, details can be found here, but now, today, the anniversary of my birth, I want to give away a special gift to my bloggy friends, just for commenting on today's post... How about the cartridge Imagine More, an Imagine art cartridge that can be used with the Cricut Imagine machine or the Cricut E2 ?! How to win? Just comment on this post sharing your favorite way to celebrate your birthday! I will draw a winner at the end of the day on March 31, 2012.
Oh, and that sweet little strawberry cupcake was baked by my DD. I made the cupcake wrapper and topper from Lori's Garden and the Cricut Imagine.

Have a scrappy day!

Wall Decor - Not a nail in sight!

The monthly challenge on the Cricut Circle blog is to create some wall decor with 2 or more images and at least three colors. Well I had some vinyl laying around (that I bought and horded) and decided it could be put to use. My son is graduating high school this Spring and I want to get a jump start on the open house preparations. I have several framed pictures but I didn't want to punch any more holes in the entry way wall of my house. I decided vinyl is a great way to decorate without damage to the walls! But I also wanted to hang both grad. pictures of my son so I thought perhaps I could make my own frames with the vinyl to hold the pictures up on the wall.

The wall art has been up for most of the day and hasn't fallen so I am claiming my vinyl frames as success!
I chose a frame from the French Manor cart and cut it out of black vinyl and the layers from silver paper. I made sure the cut was just the right size for my DS 4 x 5 graduation pictures. I didn't want to have to trim the photos as they will be gifted to grandparents after the graduation open house this Spring. Next up for cutting was the year, the numbers are from Art Nouveau, vinyl scroll part from red and the numbers from (red and blue are the school colors) shiny blue paper in my stash...I believe that's four different colors and if you count layers, 4 diff. cuts - don't count layers that's two different cuts (assuming numbers count as one). I think I met the criteria for the challenge but more importantly I made an awesome removable wall decoration for my son's graduation open house!

Another My Memories Suite page

I created a whole album using the My Memories Suite. I couldn't resist playing with the winter layouts and using the recent downhill ski pictures I took a couple weeks ago. My family was fairly tolerant of me and my camera (I get lots of moans and eye-rolls when I take it out) so I was able to make several pages of a one day excursion to the local ski hill. This past weekend was my first time with digital scrapbooking and I used my newly downloaded My Memories scrapbooking software. I found it easy to use (I consider myself an average computer user) and my favorite feature was the ability to spell check my journal writing!

Visit the My Memories software website and tell me your favorite feature in a comment on the original post here to be entered in the drawing for your very own My Memories Suite software! Of course my banner is on the side for all of you who can't wait until the end of March (when the drawing happens!) for your own copy of the scrapbooking software. Just remember to use the coupon code STMMMS23271 for $10 off!! Okay, so if you comment on the original post, that's one entry to win the software, now if you go and like the My Memories Facebook page and comment on this post, telling my you liked it, that will give you another entry for a chance to win the scrapbook software!
Have a scrappy day!

Cricut project-weekly challenge

I was looking around on the Cricut Circle blog and decided to do the weekly challenge. The weekly challenge was to create something with a word and replace a letter with a shape. I had an empty giant cheese ball container I saved to use as cat food storage. We have two cats and buy the really big bags of food but I hate trying to scoop cat food from the bag. So I always put it into ice-cream pails...it usually take 5 pails to store all the food. Well when my DS and I decided to have a junk food-movie night I saw the container and knew it had kitty food written all over it. (and eating the cheese balls wasn't too hard either!) And now it literally says Jack food and Willow food! Jack and Willow are the names of our 2 cats.

I replaced the 'a' in Jack with a cat from Meow cartridge and the 'oo' in food with fish from Paperdoll dress-up.

All the letters (both Jack's and Willow's) are from Mickey Font. To add color on the welded words (love my gypsy!) I first printed some rectangles of pattern - blue for Jack and pink for Willow on my imagine using the blossoms pattern cart, all on printable vinyl for easy adhesion to the plastic container.

For Willow's sign on the other side of the container, I used fish for the 'll' from Meow cartridge and in Food the 'oo' is a cut from Pumpkin Carvings.
I hope you feel moved to leave a comment and become a follower but neither is a requirement - I just like to hear from bloggy friends :) But I have to add that March is my birthday month and I kinda feel a give away coming on..plus, earlier this week I posted a give away - If you want a chance at winning your very own copy of My Memories Suite you need to leave a comment here.

Have a scrappy day!

Digital Scrapping with a give away!!

I have acquired the My Memories digital scrap-booking software and have delved into the unknown! At least for me it is unknown and quite a departure because of my love of paper. I have been wanting to give digital scrapping a try and finally took the leap. I did a bit of checking to decide what program would be best and discovered that My Memories suite is rated number 1 and it certainly looked like something I could play with and explore without getting too frustrated. I have been creating with it all weekend and so far I give it two thumbs up. Now if you are interested in the fun creative, easy to use software, just click Here to visit the website and take a look around. After you have taken a look-see, come back to my blog and post a comment sharing what your favorite feature of My Memories digital scrapbooking software is - is it the ability to edit embellishments one by one, or as a group; maybe you like the zoom-ability feature (I loved using that when adding photos!); spell-check built in the text feature(MY Fav!); or could it be you like the adjust colors on the items...take a look at My Memories and see all the great features! Now just for sharing your fav feature and the excitement about this software, I am going to randomly select a blogger commenter to win their very own copy of the My Memories software! Wahoo! Leave a comment with your fav. feature of the software by March 31 to be eligible to win.
Now if you are totally in love with the software and just have to have it now (or you want it even if you don't win it!!) click on the blinky in my side bar - and use the coupon code: STMMMS23271 for $10 off. Well now, doesn't everyone feel like a winner when they can have the easiest to use My Memories scrapbooking software?!

And to show what fun I have been having - here is a layout from an album I plan to have printed this week! It was easy to insert the picture in the preplanned page and manipulate the photo right in the My Memories software.

a quick birthday gift

A wonderful friend had a birthday celebration today and I put together a little gift for her.
I found the gift bag with the "Make yourself at home..." sentiment a few months back and instantly thought of Marie so I was hoping for an opportunity to present her with a gift :) The invite for the b-day bash specified no gifts so of course I had to make her one! I used greenbean's crafterole idea of hand scrub and found another body scrub recipe (brown sugar scrub) and voila - two yummy spa treats for the birthday girl! I made the card using the Cricut Imagine and two carts - Letter Envy

for the monogram and inside bracket shape; and Audrey for the colors of the monogram layers and inside bracket-sentiment shape (I adhered it after snapping the photo). I ran the top layer of the card through the cuttlebug using the Moroccan Screen folder and then lightly inked the design with a studioG chalk ink pad and brayer. I used a happy birthday stamp and my Stampin Up chocolate chip ink pad for the sentiment and a brown sharpie to sign the card. I adhered the inside bracket piece with repositional adhesive so Marie can use the card as fancy stationary - kind of like two for the price of one!

fun give away on Royal Things blog

I just like the fun question/ fill in the blank request for a chance to win a MS cake cartridge. Visit Royal Things blog for the entry but peek around for some inspiration!

crafty resolutions

I made a lovely layout to hang in my craft room to remind myself of the goals and resolutions for the 2012 year. I know I will get side tracked many times but this will be a great reminder to get back on track!

The back cut lace and shape shadow is from Cindy Loo cart (cut at 10.5 inches) and the daisy flowers are from gypsy wanderings cut at 1.2. I printed the resolutions on my home printer and cut them apart using my trusty Fiskars trimmer. Each purple flower had a small dot of lilac pearl pen for the center.