DCWV Challenge....American Pickers

 I was up for a challenge....when I saw this layout sketch at DCVW Diary and the page that was made I wanted to join in. I am trying to branch out the Cricut realm.

sketch savvy

I do love DCWV paper stacks (Ok lets face it I love all paper) I had this pictures from Thanksgiving a from a few years ago thought it would be perfect for this layout.

Here is the DCWV "The Guy Stack" that I used.

  (This pictures is not the greatest it looks red but it is really brown, it is raining again here in STL. Dave Murray said we are not going to see the Sun until Thursday or Friday)

Thank you DCWV for created this stack. I mainly scrap boys things (being the mother of only boys.....it hard to incorporate flowers on their pages)

 Here are all the papers that I used. I love the moustache paper, 

I also used all of these Tim Holtz Distressing inks. (Love the Distressing Inks how did I live without these for so long)

So here my page. I like it I hope you do too. I used George to cut the 4 long pieces, and Doodlecharms to make the little turkey tags
If you would like the file you can go HERE to download it.

How cute is this turkey. I cut it twice so I could pop dot the leg.

I bought another Martha Stewart border punch. IT WAS ON CLEARANCE. This is called a quilt border. I thought is wasn't too feminine  to use on this manly page. The green paper is glossy and when I used the Peeled Paint Distress Ink on it then the image really came out. Looks great. The sticker is Me and My Big Idea (oldie but goodies)


Wish me luck. I may no win but I like how it turned out and I will be using this layout again and visiting Sketch Savvy to get some more great ideas.

Picture Perfect

Inspiration comes from a lot of places when you are a scrapbooker, from a cereal box to an advertisement on TV.  Nicole Petersen Design is the queen of making something new look old and doing her make and takes all last weekend inspired me to make my own new/old 12x12 page.

There were many steps to making this page. 

First steps for the background paper

• Ink edges with Tim Holtz Distressing ink. I used green and blue colors 
• Spray the whole page with a shimmering spray.
• Dry with heat gun.
• Spray back of paper with water saturate then wad up into a ball and then flatten out.
• Iron paper flat 
• Use a light brown distressed ink over the entire page (I have to say I wasn't too keen on this out come and may skip this step next time.
• Stamp flourished images on left side of paper. I used blue distressing ink.

These flowers that I made are super easy but really hard to describe how to make you really need to see it in action. I purchased some cream voil fabric and  cut into graduating round circles (They don't have to be perfectly round circles) I sewed a button with some beads in the center and then sprayed with a blue glimmer mist and then put some green distressing ink over the top and spritzed with water. Then the magic happened. I hit it with my heat gun and the fabric melted on the edges and made these super easy and beautiful flowers.

The trim on the bottom is something I purchased from Nicole Petersen Design. 

 I stamped a beautiful label. I haven't glued everything down yet and I don't even have a pictures to put here yet. I am thinking about using Mod Podge and put it on a canvas. The pictures will come in May. I am hoping to get a good picture at an event I have planned.

I hope this has inspired you to use some or all of the techniques to create you own page.

PS......I just sold one of my Vingtage Suitcase Wedding Card Holders on Etsy and they are going to use it as a prop for a magazine cover. Excited to say the least.

Happy Day Y'all 

Incorporating Origami in a Scrapbook Layout

     While I was away on my Scrapathon. One of the girls was busy not scrapbooking but making origami. She was making all kinds of cool creations. While I was making my last page, I asked her to make me an origami tie to go on my page.

The background is from the Wild Card Cartridge. Don't I have some handsome guys!

 Isn't  the tie great. I did create a tie with my design studio, but it didn't have the depth or the realism that this origami tie did.


My youngest son and I joined an Origami Club at the library that meets once a month to try our hand at it. We made a butterfly out of dollar bill. So much fun. 

 This is not for the faint of heart. There are a lot of steps to making this butterfly and I was guided every step of the way by my friend Barb. How she could remember every step was amazing to me. How cute is this butterfly. Barb make several of these with bills and made a floral arrangement incorporating real flowers to give as a wedding present. It turned out so very cute.


It is so easy to get in a rut with your scrapbook pages so look outside the box once in a while to spice up those pages.

If you want to try your hand at making an origami tie (so easy to make) I found a blog that has a video on how to make them. Go HERE . I am going to try to make a shirt card too. Have fun!

It is Mardi Gras Time (another cut file)

Mardi Gras is a big deal here in St. Louis. We have the second largest Mardi Gras celebration in the country. I have already had a piece of King Cake and I didn't get the baby and there are beads everywhere you look. With all the celebration preparations I have fleur de lis on the brain again, so I thought I would share another layout that I used the fleur de lis medallion, but there is a bonus! I also created a fleur de lis border to go with the medallion.

 This border in the pictures is actually the bottom layer there is a top layer that has more detail that I didn't cut for this layout. The paper lace under it is a Martha Stewart border punch. You can make a lace border if you cut it on both sides. A little tricky but it can be done.

Here is the fleur de lis medallion you can look back at the previous post for the cut file.

I have  been using this butterfly a lot lately. I just love it. This is from the Cake Cartridge.


Oh, I guess you want the cut file for the fleur de lis. Here It Is. The cartridge used is Home Decor.

Happy Birthday Layout (Bubble Mesh Cut File)

Don't you just love those meshes that people create with Design Studio, but how do you incorporate them with your layout. I created this mesh I call Bubble. I have used it several different times. Here I used it for a birthday page.

The cupcake is from one of the Cricut Cake cartridges. I made this layout around 3am on a Friday morning so I am a little bleary on the details!.


I am very protective of this .cut file I just don't like to give it out without some love shown to me: but if you would like it you may leave me comment with a way to send it to you and I will be happy to do so.

This layout has been enter in amandascraftsandmore in the Scrappy Saturday's with the Bug.

 

Quilt Border (Cut file)

Here we are with another 12x12 layout. This time the cut file is from the Paper Lace Cartridge. 

  There are two parts to this cut file. First there is the quilt border then the layer behind it. The bonus is there is another cut for a card also. I have not cut the smaller card cut but you are welcome to cut it and let me know how it worked out for you.

You can see that it is very versatile. Of course I had to use some rhinestone (since I have so many). I am anxious to use border for the card, but right now everything has been put away.....till I get my scrap-room back.

To upload the file click Here.......and your welcome.

Hello Kitty (or Cleo that is)

It has almost been a year since we gotten our kitty. We named her Cleo. The funny story about naming her is that she is a tuxedo cat (black and white) and I thought I was naming her after the cat in Pinocchio, but about a month later my younger son told me that the cat in Pinocchio was named Figaro the goldfish's name was Cleo. Oh well so much for my knowledge of Disney trivia. 

This was made using the Hello Kitty Font cartridge. I plan on doing some journaling  at the bottom of the page also. Our little Cleo is just as cute as this page is!

 The Hello Kitty was easy enough to do but it helps using the booklet to see which elements to use.

Check back tomorrow. I will have another layout with a free cut file to share :) 

Snow Princess

This picture of me was taken on the first snow of the season. I was afraid we couldn't have anymore so I had my son take a pictures of me with the inflatable snowman we put on our lawn at Christmas time. Little did we all know that we would be totally sick of snow by the time winter is over. Yes, it snowed again here in STL yesterday. Yuck.

This was an easy layout to do I just use 2 of the same paper from DCWV Christmas stack. It is a 180 pieces of Christmas paper. Big mistake that is too much Christmas paper for me. I think I have 170 pieces of paper left in that pack. Anyway back to the layout. I cut out the snowman's and pop dot them on the same paper. Using 5 different colors of paper I just cut 5 different strips of paper and layered them behind the pictures. Easy, Easy, Easy. The snowflakes are from several different Cricut cartridges. I just used the keyword in Design Studio to find as many snowflakes as I could.


Now to the rhinestones on the snowflakes. My niece and I happened to be at Michael's at just the right time. They had 90% off all the left-over Christmas stuff and they had a lot of rhinestone packages for 10cents. Some were even a penny. I think I bought 50+ packages of rhinestones. I now have a lifetime supply of rhinestone to go with my Christmas paper.


Happy Scrapping and THINK SPRING!

It was quality not quantity

Well another Scrap-Away is has come and gone (way too fast) and I this time I guess I went for quality not quantity, because I just did not crank out the pages this week. Let me show you one of the maybe 6 pages that I got done this week.

I used a new technique ( to me that is ) that I learned at Archiver's a view months ago.

T

I did a clear embossing on the San Francisco tag and then using Tim Holtz Distressing Ink (Faded Blue Denim) I used his blending tool and covered the tag. Then you use a baby wipe when you are done to remove any ink from the embossing. Turns out great. This techique is so fun and I love the result. The red Golden Gate Bridge is a die that I purchased from the Scrapbook Factory in O'Fallon Il a few months back.

Keep coming back for some more layouts that I did last week. I know you won't be disappointed.

Storybook Layout

I am finally back to scrapbooking (my first <3) I have been wanting to do some layouts on my Design Studio. The great thing about Design Studio and the Gypsy is you can design your layout then make individual pages for each cut and save the file for future use. Inspiration came from this months Page Maps (love that web site).

This was done in Design Studio, but you Gypsy user know how to change the .cut files. It is done using just Storybook. Click HERE to access the file.  I would love to see your pages if you use it. I plan on putting a picture of my youngest son and my mom that was taken Labor Day weekend. They had just finished  fishing and I got them to pose for a picture by the lake.

The paper I used was from K and Company-Portabello Road (I got it at JoAnn's on clearance for $7.97) I cannot resist scrapbooking paper and I really can't resist when it is on clearance.

I embossed the green medallion with the Cuttlebug Swiss dot Embossing Folder and then used some black ink on the raised dots. Then using a blending pad with the black ink again to go around the frame for my photo. Okay then, hope you have a little time to scrapbook this weekend, I will be hunting and gathering for my up coming Scrapbooking getaway week. Yes, you read right WEEK. It is coming up in October so I am on the hunt for lots new things to take with me. Yikes I am going to need a U-Haul!

Each One Teach One......Scrapbooking that is.

I had a request from our ministers wife if I would spend some time with her daughter and do some scrapbooking with her...of course I jumped at the chance. Morgan had a few pictures and an album and her mother said she loved to do craft project so I was thrilled to be able to have her come over and share some scrapbooking time with me, as her mom and I talked Friday night, she asked how long she should have Morgan come over for I told her from 11 a.m. and pick her around 3 p.m. Leigh Ann thought that was way too long and maybe Morgan would want to do it for only a couple of hours. I agreed and said we would wing it and when she got tired of doing it I would call her and she could pick her up.

I was so excited Saturday morning I had everything prepared for her when she arrived. I had everthing a scapbooker needs to work hard on her album, glue, scissors, paper, chocolate! We arranged her pictures in the order she wanted them placed in her album and got to work.

Here was her first page. I guided her on the first page but the placement was all her.

This page was all Morgan she did a fabulous job with the design and picking the color for the paper. She told me what design she wanted and I designed it for on the cricut and cut it out for her.

If you would like Morgan Peace Signyou may email me and, Morgan gave me permission to share it with her fellow scrapbooker. It is made from the George Cartridge and is 8" in diameter.This was her favorite page that she did. 

Here we are taking a cookie break.

After 5 hours and 10 Pages I finally told her I was tired (I think she would of gone longer but it was getting to be supper time) We had such fun together and we plan to meet once a month so she can keep up with her pictures. I was honored to help Morgan and proud of the hard work she put into her album. I hope that Morgan and I can show you many more pages that she will be doing in the future.

My Favorite

This is a picture of my youngest son. We have a family joke between my oldest son and myself. He always accuses me of picking our younger son as my favorite and I always agree with him. I tell him why not he is sweet, he gives me lots of hugs and he tells me I am the best mom is the whole world. Why wouldn't he be my favorite. When I saw this picture that I took of him in the car on the way to central IL, we were sitting in the back seat together and he had just woke up. I think that some picture are just better in black and white. You don't get caught up in all the colors and the essence of the picture comes out.

The frame I created in Design Studio. Sometimes when you design thing the cut comes out way different than what you think. I didn't realize when I designed this that it would come out in two pieces (the inside frame is  seperate from the outside frame) I probably need to rework it but at the time I was in a the scrapping mode. I used the Opposite Attracts cartridge for the letters and just used a black pen to out line the letters. I used rub ons for his name on the picture itself. The paper is from Basic Grey's Urban Prairie collection. Look at the cute little bee in the corner :)

Bubble Mesh Layout

I had a very productive croppping weekend and so I am going to show you some of the fruit of my labor in my next few posts. In this layout I used the Bubble Mesh I created a few months ago. I hope this inspires you to use this mesh if you do send it to me and I will post it here.

Here is the close up of the details

Are you wondering what Dogtown is? St. Louis has alot of ethic neighborhood, the Italian section is called The Hill and the Irish section is called Dogtown (I can't remember why) they have a big parade for St.Patrick's day. It is more of a neighborhood parade but it is huge and goes on forever. Thousands of people show up for the parade and big parties. Alot of beer and bagpipes!

PS ......if you would like the mesh just leave your email in the

comments and would be happy to send it to you.

Birthday Bowling

Bowling is always a favorite activites in our home. It was no surprise that Will wanted to a bowling party for us birthday. We always make up names for ourselves and the boys had fun coming up with their own nicknames.

In this page the bowling pin is someone elses creation and I wish I knew who it was so I could give a shout out to her. I used 11 bowling pins since it was Will's 11th birthday. I have a wonderful friend who does alot of card making and designing when she cleans out her craft room I always get the leftovers (Yeah for me!!) The paper was from Maggi. It was 81/2 by 11 sheets and they were shiny. This paper was great for the bowling pins and flames above. I used my Mickey and Friends font for the saying. I love that font it is so chunky and great for title pages. If you need to buy a new cartridge for Black Friday Mickey and Friends should be on your list.

Use up those brads

In my hunting and gathering of scrapbook supplies I have accumliated many, many brads, on my recent cropathon, my scrapping buddy Ellen, came across a this page and scraplifted it for herself, well as soon as I saw it I in turn scraplifted from her. It was great to be able to use all those brads (so of course I can go and buy more) but the page turned out fantastic. I did put another piece of scrap paper behind it to protect it from the opposite page. This is a picture of my son and his two friends who graduated from high school last year.

Halloween

Last year my son was a made scientist for Halloween. We had alot of fun finding all the things for his costume.

I used my robot file I made earlier this year for this page it worked out great. Here is the file if you would like
http://www.mediafire.com/file/ay1zjvjnudz/robot.cut
Leave me a message if you download. It is the polite thing to do :) and check back often I am making some new DS files they are ultra cute.

Race for the Cure

October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month, but in STL we have the Race To The Cure in June. It is a huge event and the year I went there were 65,000 people there. Yes 65,000 people. It is usually the biggest in the countries. I went with the girls that I work with it was really hot that day but we had a blast. This page was a tribute to that day.

Snowmen

I know, I know everyone is tired of winter and ready for the warm sun to shine down on them. The past few days I have been showcasing some of my scrapbook layouts from my family album and this one I just loved (even though it is about snow) I used some yarn that I had to make the snowmen title. All I did was use my Koo Glue and wrote snowmen and laid the yarn over it and let it dry.