Thursday, June 30, 2011

I Made Stamps!!

I bought a Teresa Collins Stampmaker a few months ago with some money I had put aside for scraping goodies. I have not had a chance to use it and so I put it on my first set of summer goals to figure it out.
FIRST: I want to say it is pretty easy to do all the steps and watching videos online really helped me out. I was super worried that I would not be able to make it work, but the step by step videos were great. My favorite one was posted by Psychomoms on You Tube and is called "Part II - Teresa Collins Stampmaker, Making the stamp." This video is in real time so I watched in once before I got started and than when I was making my stamp I played it again to watch her do the steps as I was doing them. I found it really helpful.

NEXT: You have to make sure your negative is super super super dark. My printer is a photo printer and older. It made a pretty good negative, BUT it had a light patch in the middle which was a problem and it made some of my stamps not turn out.  Here is a picture of what you want your negative to look like (this is taken from my word document and looks very dark like it should...you do not want to be able to see your finger when you print on the negative paper).
Most of these fonts are from KevinandAmanda.com
FINAL RESULTS: I tried to make all these stamps during my first try. (I am not giving step by step because I am not an expert and need much more practice to be able to do that). It is all using one pack of the goo stuff that makes the stamp (I am so technical!) Some turned out OK. They are not perfect. I think I need improvement in two areas:

1. A better negative with a more reliable printer.
2. Wash the stamp much better and more carefully before the final steps.

Here is the stamp I like best:

See the little dots by s? I think this is where I needed better washing!
I made this stamp for my brother-in-law's wedding as I am trying to make some gift tags for their favors. I am not perfectly happy with it BUT I am thinking that using those stamp markers instead of an ink pad might make it easy to avoid the flaws in the stamp. That and more practice and I think I will enjoy the machine. Stay tuned to see if I have more success.

Wednesday, June 29, 2011

Girls Rule: Imagine Card 3

Today I bring you the third card of my Imagine Cartridge exploration. Today's card uses art and patterns off the Best Friends Imagine cartridge. To be honest this is not one of my favorite carts as far as the art images go. I do not have many ideas for how I will use all  the cute little girls featured on the cart, but I love the patterns on it.
I wanted to make a simple note card so I pulled out Spring Holiday Cards for the card and envelope. This cartridge has very simple cards that you slide into different backing layers. The machine even cuts the slits for you. It offers some really fun Valentine's, St. Patrick's Day and Easter Options. I choose the backing that looks like the edges of a stamp for my card base. I picked patterns off the Best Friends Cart to fill this and the envelope in with and decided that I would just cut some card stock to slide into the slits.

This silly, but so fun "Girls Rule, Boys Drool" art on Best Friends makes me laugh so I choose that as the main image on my card. I also used the flower off another art and just changed the pattern using my Imagine.  Of course the flower need just a little bling.
I hope you have a Happy Wednesday!

Tuesday, June 28, 2011

Cup of Tea: Imagine Card 2

I am trying to explore all my Imagine carts this week and get some fun cards made so I have them on hand when I need them. This simple card uses images and patterns off the Imagine Art Cartridge Better Together.

I wanted to make a fun card with the fun little tea cup (pg 9) on the outside and the words "you are my cup of tea" (pg 10) on the inside.

I went to my different cartridges that feature cards and selected this fun square frame card from the Christmas Cards cartridge. I plugged both the Better Together and Christmas Cards cartridges into my Imagine and started to play around getting the right images and sizes onto my screen. I cut the card and the frame off the Christmas Cards cartridge at 5.3 (all cut with true size), the envelope is cut at 7.5. This is about to become my new favorite envelope. I love the simple shape if it. After I put the tea cup cut from Better Together on the mat I was able to size it by eye. I selected patterns to fill the card,frame and envelope filled them in on the cuts. It was very easy to select the patterns because  I made these simple pattern cards when I first got the machine so I just matched them with the tea cup.
I used my wonderful ATG gun and some mini Zots to put the front together. I did have to trim the card a little bit once the frame was on to make it all even. Next it was onto the inside.
I used this first layer recolored, for the back
of the main image.
I wanted to frame the "you're my cup of tea' cut with something so I selected another cut off the Better Together cartridge and after breaking it into layers recolored the background image at two different sizes to put behind the image. The two backing layers were cut at 2.5 and 3.1. The word image was cut at 1.5.

I had so much fun working with my Imagine yesterday. I made several cards that I will be sharing over the next few days. I was really trying to explore the carts and get comfortable with the Imagine as I have had it since launch but had to replace it a few times so now this summer I really am putting it to work.

Monday, June 27, 2011

You Take The Cake: Imagine Card

Thankfully after 3 days of getting some rest (and medicine) I was able to pick myself up out of bed and be fully immersed in my craft room.

I have been wanting to work with my Imagine machine for some time now. For those who do not know, I had to go through 3 machines before  I got it right. I want anyone who reads that and think "Wow..no way am I getting an Imagine now," to know the following: in one case I had a very common first shipping error and a shipping accident knocked the blade off track.  It was only the one  machine that really had an odd malfunction and Provo Craft was so amazing working with me to get the machine right and sending them 4 separate times. I would so go through it all over again for this machine.

Today, I decided that I would just play around with the different cartridges and make some cards using the images and patterns on them. I made this little note card and envelope using only the Yummy Imagine cart first, but will be making more to share with you the rest of the week.
This is a note card I am using to send some photos to my great-aunt in Kentucky.  I so did not pay attention to the measurements when I did this, but it all folded up and fits my 3 1/2 x 5 inch photos perfectly so I got lucky. The for the envelope basically filled the whole 12x12 mat.
Envelope from cart
I used the tri-fold card and envelope right off the cartridge (without changing anything) and than added the "you take the cake" and other basic  cake cuts to give my card a little more flair. The back layer of the cake on the note card is the "you take the cake" layer recolored with a different matching pattern.
Folded card with extra pieces added.
I used little Zots for this.
I am going to make some more cards with my Imagine to share with you. I am so happy to have a working Imagine.

Strep Throat Again!

The best laid plans get totally derailed by strep throat. I was going to spend the weekend making beautiful things, playing with my Imagine which has not gotten the workout it deserves and having wonderful things to share with you each and everyday this week...BUT instead I got strep throat. I woke up in the middle of the night Friday and knew it was bad so Saturday morning I made an adult choice to go to the doctor and sure enough I have strep for the second time in 2 months!!!!  AHHHHH!!!

My weekend was spent basically laying around feeling yucky. Nothing beautiful was created and it made me sad, but today...

Today I feel better and after staying in bed to finish a good book and allow myself some more rest, I am now feeling ready and I will create something that hopefully is in fact beautiful! I hope everyone had a much much better weekend than I did and will check back later today to see how I did.

Saturday, June 25, 2011

Coming Soon...It's A Wrap Blog Hop

I decided that one way I would celebrate being a blogger for a year is by having my very own blog hop. This year I started making a lot of gift bags. I had never done this before, but saw someone post one on their blog and tried it out. Now I make them all the time and it is so fun to personalize them.  Let's face it opening a present is super fun and there are all kinds of ways people can wrap them. I wanted my hop to celebrate this new fun crafting project I discovered this year. So....
For this hop each blog will present a wrapping project: gift bag, box, gift card holder or other fun idea for wrapping gifts. The only limit is imagination! Here are the details for this Hop:

It's A Wrap
Blog Hop
Saturday, July 16th
Each blog will feature a gift wrapping item they crafted or embellished.

THERE ARE still a few opening if you wish to be part of the blog hop! Send me a message so I can add you to our list! I will send you the details for our fun hop.

I hope you will visit during the hop and celebrate with me as I get closer and closer ending my first year as a blogger. It really has been so much fun. I will soon have a blinkie to post for this hop.


Friday, June 24, 2011

Thinking of You Gift Bag

This week I am getting back into the challenges posted on different blogs. I like entering the challenges because they give me great ideas for projects and often the projects use carts that I have not thought of using in awhile (or in this case..never used).
This week I am dipping my toes into three challenges.
1. Fantabulous Cricut Challenge Me Monday #65 Fun in the Sun
             (use a sun on your project)
2. The Cricut Cartridge Chaos Challenge #22 Tags, Bags, Boxes and More
3. Celebrate the Occasion Challenge #19 Celebrate Summer (must have a sun)

I have never used Tags, Bags, Boxes and More to make anything and I so wanted to try making one of the fun bags they have. I got out my 12x24 mat to make this cute little orange bag (I used Paper Studio 12x24 paper that I got on sale. I was a little worried it would not be strong enough, but it turned out perfect for this simple bag and was easy to fold.
Page 115 in the Tags, Bags, Boxes & More booklet
I, of course, made the mistake I am guessing many first time bag makers make: I put it together before putting the rest of my details on the bag.  At least now I know that it would have been easier to do this flat (silly L.B.).

I decided that because of that I could go ultra-simple on the rest. I used my Gypsy to guide me to all the different sun cuts and selected one from Celebrate with Flourish. I embossed the center piece and put it on with a large Zot so it would stick out. I selected the simple "Heart" from George & Basic shapes and added the "Thinking of You" cut as well.  Put it all together with a splash of yellow tissue paper and red ribbon and you have a simple little gift bag! Thanks for stopping by my blog! Have a wonderful weekend!

Thursday, June 23, 2011

Disney Surprise (Pre-made Page)

I saw that Liza over at Hoo's Crafty was surprising her kids with a trip to Disney World. It is just like all the fun commercials they have right now for Disney and I hoped they were able to snap some photos when they told the kids at lunch (right before they went to the airport!!) You can read her whole post by clicking on the link above.
Over on the Cricut Circle Message Board there has been a lot of talk about how hard it is to make a layout without having the photos. I decided that this was my challenge for my next project! I wanted to make a pre-made layout with out the photos. I decided I would make a "Disney Surprise" layout in honor of the Hoo's Crafty family trip.

I wanted to have a very simple page thinking that after the photos were picked out other simple elements like stickers or favorite characters could be added if desired. I laid out the letter cuts on my Gypsy, using Mickey Font, making sure I had enough room around them to cut the page down and have the black layer behind. They were cut at about a 1 1/4 inch each with the 2 Mickey heads at 1 inch. I also rotated the Mickey Heads 30 degrees to get the look I wanted.

I used the wonderful ATG to put the white layer onto of a black background and glued on the small extra pieces of the white letters using one of my new favorite tools Zig 2 Way Glue. Then I used some photos I have and made the triple layer backgrounds for the photos. I made one a 3x5 and one a 4x6. I measured with my 12-inch cutter using the blade side as my guide for getting the sides even.
I felt that it needed a few extra touches so I added on a piece of fun ribbon and a fun crystal Mickey I had from our trip last summer. I made sure when I pasted everything down that you could still add the photos underneath the layer and ribbon.
I am even more excited about this lay because in September I am surprising my daughter as well. She has no idea, but I have booked a day trip for us to the Magic Kingdom for the Not So Scary Halloween Party. We will arrive late on a Thursday and spend the whole day Friday in the Magic Kingdom. After a short rest at the hotel we will be back 7-midnight for the Halloween fun!! We will fly home Saturday afternoon. I am overjoyed with this secret and have many ideas for what I want to scrap and get ready for our trip. Now I just have to remember I made this layout.

I am linking this up to the Thursday Link Up Party at patches of Pink. Click on her button in the column to go see other fun projects or all crafty types!

Wednesday, June 22, 2011

Simply Adorable Page

I have been exploring my new carts and looking for ways to to use them on my scrapbook pages. I picked up 3 Birds on Parade yesterday to look at the fun images and I got all sorts of great ideas for cards and some pages using photos I have not yet developed, but at first nothing for the pictures I have on hand. Than I came across this cut in the booklet...
Page 33 of the 3 Birds on Parade Booklet (baby with pacifier phrase cut)
 I just loved it and had to use it on the page for baby Katelyn. Katelyn is the daughter of my daughter's Godparents and she was born in April of 2010. I just wanted a simple page to show off the photos from our first meeting with her.
All the paper is American Craft Everyday collection. I just selected two patterns that I liked and pasted them together. Hope everyone is having a great week.

Tuesday, June 21, 2011

Mommy vs. Mom Page

Okay this is a battle I have been fighting ever sense I had my daughter. I do not like being called "Mommy" by anyone except her. even when she calls me "Mommy" I do not love it. I like it better just being called "Mom." 

I know it is strange but my 8th graders explained it to me like this: Ms Budde is not a Mommy.  She is too cool to be a Mommy. She loves and adores her kid just like a Mommy does, but she is not traditional in the sense of the role. I guess that may be it, I do not think of myself as a Mommy type.  I do not think there is anything wrong with that type, but  do not feel the word fits me that well.

While I was away on my scrap weekend I made this page about being a Mom vs a Mommy. This page is for my Just 4 Me Book that has pages about random things instead of specific events in our lives. The paper is from the DCWV Grade School Stack and the lettering was done using Alphalicious.

Hope you are having a good week. I am trying to get back to posting everyday again after several weeks of only 1 post a week. Having fun in the craft room.

Monday, June 20, 2011

Almost a Year!

On July 19 I will have been blogging for one year! When I started this blog I did not really think I would be able to keep it up the way I have. I am super excited that my first year is almost over and I am overjoyed with my results.

- About 165 posts as of now and more planned and ready to post
- Almost 150 followers and I love the fun comments they leave me.
- Many great scrapbook pages, cards and other fun projects shared with people.
- One blog hop completed and hopefully more to come.
- Completed several challenges and had fun looking at all the entries.
- Getting ready to Welcome Jacob and the clip on Koala soon as part of his travels.

I am not sure how I am going to celebrate one 1 year blog anniversary so any ideas would be greatly welcomed. I know I have several things I would like to do as giveaways to celebrate and maybe create my own blog hop to celebrate??  What do you  think I should do?

Drawer Labels

For Mother's Day, my husband bought me this awesome storage piece at Jo Ann's. I was so excited to get it filled up with my crafting supplies. It has allowed me to move all my major supplies, including my stamps and Cuttlebug, into my craft room with me instead of out in the hallways dresser I was using.

I have been wanting to put labels on the drawers to remind me what was in each one. I bought some Cricut Full Adhesive-Backed Printable Vinyl and used my Imagine to create the following fun labels.
Make sure you  follow the blade depth
settings on the package!!
The top draw is where I keep my 12 inch cutters and extra blades for all my machines, so I picked this fun cut from Imagine More to put on that drawer.
The next 2 drawers hold my Your Story materials (so getting lucky finding covers and laminating tools for cheap)and my stamps and ink pads(another growing collection). I used the Cricut Everyday cartridge to make the Your Story logo and did my best to match the colors off the basic color palette on my Imagine. The white layer for the book went on so easily. I cut the letters for "stamps" using Nursery Rhymes and a pattern form Imagine More.
The final drawer is holding a few things: some paper album kits from Creative Memories, a few stacks of 4x6 paper and a collection of longer stickers and ribbon I recently used. I figured the best label for this drawers would be, Odds and Ends. I used Boys Will Be Boys font and the fun "Here" art off Imagine More Cards. 

This project took about 15 minutes and I love the simple look of my drawers now. Not to mention I played with my imagine finally and used 5 different carts. Hope you enjoy.  I have to admit the urge to put printable vinyl on everything in sight is very strong after seeing how easy this was to do. REMEMBER: Follow the blade depth (set at 2) instructions on the package!

Wednesday, June 15, 2011

Baseball Father's Day Card by Sophie

Today I get to share a project made by my guest designer Noodle (my daughter)! She wanted to make her Daddy a baseball card for Father's day and yesterday she became the the boss of my craft room for the afternoon.
We are taking my father, my husband's father and my husband to a baseball game in honor of Father's day so Sophie wanted to make a baseball card. She directed me to the right baseball (Sports Mania) and asked me to make it into a card (she said please). Than she took over. First loading the paper into the Cricut and pressing all the buttons on my Gypsy.
After the card was out of my Expression. She used my ATG gun to add the baseball layer on the top and a white layer inside so she could add her own drawing later.
Once the project was all glued together she wanted to put stickers on the front instead of cutting out letters. We found some old colorful stickers I had gotten in a dollar bin and she went to work.
The final project is 100% her and I know her daddy will make a big fuss over the card and getting to go to his first baseball game with his daughter!

Tuesday, June 14, 2011

Father's Day Layer card

Today I got a card made for my Dad for the upcoming Father's Day weekend. I know a lot of people struggle making cards for the men in their lives and I am no different. I wanted to keep this very simple and ended up with a fun card.
I started off with the navy and white card stock and when I glued the navy onto on side of the white I liked how it gave me an extra flap to lift in the front so instead of gluing the front down I decided to add another layer to my message. I like using a variety of fonts on cards so for this one I started with: Stamped for "Father", Storybook for "Pop" and Alphalicious for "Daddy".
When you lift up the navy you see the second part of my message. I cut the gold badge using Old West and the letters are from Birthday Bash. I bought this gold cardstock at Hobby Lobby right after the winter holidays. It is American Crafts Specialty paper in 81/2 x 11 sheets. This pack (Christmas Foil) came with Red, Green, Gold and Silver and had 2 different textures. I mention this because I have seen it over and over during different holidays and it always goes on a great sale right after the holiday is over and I love adding the touch of foiled paper to things. You have to use a VERY sticky mat to cut this stuff and I used pressure 4.
The final layer is a "Happy Father's Day" message cut in Billionaire. I added one more star badge to tie the whole thing together. I love the fun layers I was able to create. here is the side view of those layers:
I still need to make a card for my husband, but my daughter has asked to make some baseball shaped cards to give to dad and grandpas. She has been asking to go see a baseball game so we got tickets for our minor league team and the guys and Sophie will be attending soon after Father's Day! She wants to "play" with my Cricut so it should be fun. I will give her some blog attention once they are complete. Super Happy to have checked off one card and 6 carts in my Summer Goals list!! Have a great day!

Father's Day Link Up party

I just love going to see other blogs and something that alot of people are doing right now is taking part in Link Up Parties. I get a lot of great ideas seeing what other people create and share on these so I wanted to share this one with you.

This is a Father's day Link Up Party sponsored by Scrappin with Cricut. For more information you can link right to her post about the Link Up party. All the directions for adding the link to your blog are there and the list of projects as well. I hope to stop by all the projects and say hello! I am off to add my first project right now! Enjoy!

Monday, June 13, 2011

Note for Mom


I did not have time to make my Mom a Mother's day card this year because it was the same week that I was sick and had my own daughter's birthday party (bowling so fun). I felt bad that she did not get the attention she deserved so last week I made her a cute little card just to say hello. She liked it a lot and told me she had been disappointed that I had not made one before. She totally understood why but I get it...Moms like love!! She also said it was now okay if my Dad got a homemade card for Father's Day...silly MOM!

I made this card using Splish Splash for the scallop edges (a go to for me!) and the flowers are form Create-A-Critter. The color did not turn out the best in my photos, but you get the basics.

Saturday, June 11, 2011

Hello Kitty Birthday Bag

My daughter has a party today for one of her friends 5th birthday. We picked out the gift together and as we were checking out she looked at me and said, "So I want you to make a a Hello Kitty bag with a cupcake for this gift okay?" How could I refuse her?
Gift tag on top to meet the
Cupcake requirement.
I made the bag using Hello Kitty Greetings and Hello Kitty Font. I am sure the birthday girl will enjoy it as much as my little one did when I showed it to her. have a wonderful weekend all.

Friday, June 10, 2011

He Called Me What???

Everyone thinks that it is funny that one of the first things my husband ever did when we met is call me a SNOT! He really did!

We were both going to college is Marshall, Minnesota. I am from a suburb of Chicago and he from the Twin Cities. He was on the orientation staff at my college- helping freshman get to know the school (and totally flirt with them as far I as could tell). He was asking a group of us where we were from and I told him I was from Chicago (I found this easier than trying to explain to people where I was from as everyone asked). He asked if I was from the city or the suburbs and i explained where I was from anyways. He looked at me with the most adorable cocky smile and said, "So your a suburban snot?!" I knew than I liked him!
Now almost 15 years later I am so glad he called me a snot. Now that I have an album I am working on with pages Just 4 Me I decided to make one about this moment in our lives. I had the photo of him laying down in a box. This was taken right around the time we met and the other is him at a wedding a few years back.
I found a bunch of coordinating paper to layer on the side for this page and cut off the extra to do the lettering and layering on the page. The letters were cut using Cuttin' Up.

I am happy to be posting my projects again and working towards my Summer Goals...but this one really doesn't count because I made it during my scrapbook weekend. I just had not shared it yet! I hope you will visit often this summer while I work on my goals...which now have their own tab!

Thursday, June 9, 2011

Schools out for Summer

School is finally done! With the extra two days added on because of our super snow days earlier in the year and moving graduation to this week it felt like the year would never be over. I had to go into work the day after graduation for some planning meetings and yesterday I had a full day of dentist appointments for myself and daughter....so today if officially my first day off! 
IT IS RAINING! (HA!)

In all seriousness I am ready to start doing some scrapping again so the rain is a welcome blessing today as I get organized and start back in on fun projects! I spent the last 2 months working on other things and now I am ready to get into summer scrapping. I am going to set myself some scrapping goals and hopefully can attack them with gusto (love that word).

SUMMER GOALS #1: (deadline July 9)
- Use at least 30 cartridges during the month in some way (one cut counts)
- See  how close I can get to my August goal of using all my carts once in a year
- Finish at least 15 scrapbook layouts (double pages count as 1)
- Make 5 cards
- Make a stamp with my stampmaker
- Use my Your Story to do something

Wish me luck and please share your love with me as I finish and share projects with you.

Saturday, June 4, 2011

At the Park

The weather is finally sunny and bright and there is no rain in the forecast yeah!!  I am super excited to get outside later today with my family. My husband is mowing right now and I am finishing up a gift scrapbook for coworker and dear friend who is retiring Monday! Then we all plan on heading over to the park after lunch for some playtime.
The park by our house is a short walk and we love going there...especially when we have a nice day and visitors from Minnesota to share it with. This page is one I made a few weeks back, but the photos are from last spring when my in-laws were visiting. I picked this paper because of the outfit my daughter was wearing with the same colors.

My favorite thing about this page is that I reminded myself that I can use cuts from carts in different ways than I thought I would just by taking a part off of them using my Gypsy (if possible with the Hide contours button) or a snip of the scissors. I was looking for just the right words and found them all on Life is a Beach. The problem with the words I picked was they all has fish or other sea creatures attached to them and that was not really what I was going for. I just cut them off and added them to the pages.
I especially like the fact that the polka dot paper served as the dots to my "i" cuts because i hate gluing really small pieces so I lined it up just right to avoid that.

I hope everyone is enjoying their weekend. I have seen some amazing blog hops to take part in and hope to get to go through all of them if I have time not scrapping or playing. But if you want to check them out stop at the first stops here: (I am not part of any of these hops but I saw some great stuff and wanted to pass it on to you.)

http://bugbites411.blogspot.com/  (The Bug Bites Grillin' and Chillin')
http://www.memorieswithjen.blogspot.com/  (All About Dad's hop)
http://celebratetheoccasion.blogspot.com/ (CTO Pool Party Hop)