Merry Christmas

This year, I decided to do formal seating for Christmas Dinner, then at the last minute I decided to make little gift boxes for each place setting after I received an email for the cut set for these One-Piece Boxes.

We had a large group, so I had a couple of tables to do. Here are my faves..... Formal Dining Room

Nook

I only used 2 of the box types available on the cut set. Lacy Box ~ This box was the easiest. I only had to mess with the size. SVGcuts recommends cutting at 11.5", but I found that it didn't fit properly on the mat. I decreased the size to 11" and was happy with the size.

Box 3 ~ I printed the paper on my Imagine from the Imagine More cartridge. I had to tweak the orientation of the box on my mat with Make the Cut, because of the pattern on the paper. I cut it at a width of 7.5" and height of 11.25" after turning the box to 90 degrees. I added a couple of punched leaves to the top of the box and black curling and gold ribbon.

Gift Card Boxes

My nieces and nephews live out of state, so gift cards are usually the easiest thing at Christmas time. I'm not thrilled with just popping them in an envelope, I think every gift should be pretty. These gift card boxes hold a gift card with plenty of room for little goodies! I stuffed mine with Reese's Christmas trees, Snickers toy soldiers, York Peppermint Patties and Hershey's Santas!

They were cut from the Cricut Close to my Heart Art Philosophy cart and Cricut Wild Card.

The boxes were cut at 8 1/2 inches from Art Philosophy. The title frames were also cut from Art Philosophy and should be sized based on how you would like to embellish them. The Merry Christmas title was cut from Wild Card.

The name tags were printed from my computer and embellished with glittered punches and handmade bows secured with brads.

I hope they enjoy receiving them as much as did making them!

Christmas Cards

This year I FINALLY did it! I started my cards in August and got them finished and in the mail last week. I'm usually scurrying to the Post Office on Christmas Eve and calling them "Holiday" Cards.





I LOVE this Tri Fold Shutter Card...it's easy and I think it really makes a statement. The tutorial can be found at Splitcoast Stampers



I used a vintage Christmas Paper Pack and Merry Christmas Sizzix Embossing Folder.



The Christmas tree was cut from the Cricut "Trim the Tree" cartridge. It was cut at 4 1/2 inches. The Garland and Toy Soldier were cut from Cricut "Joys of the Season" cartridge.

Home for Winter Break

Coming home for Winter Break, Kenji was excited to see that some Holiday traditions don't change even when you go away to College.

He woke up to find his Advent Calendar filled with goodies and awaiting his arrival.

I LOVE this Advent Calender that was made from a kit that was purchased from SVGcuts.com and cut with my Make the Cut software. The papers are from Basic Grey's Figgy Pudding and Fruitcake collections.

Kimekomi Ornaments

Okay....I guess it's time to take this blog a bit more serious. My crafting pals are putting me to shame!

I participated in 2 ornament exchanges this past weekend and here are my contributions!

When my "Colorado Crafting Circle" suggested we do a handmade ornament swap, I wanted to come with something unique. I scoured the internet and found a great post on youtube which led me to ornamentdesigns.com. This gal's work is magnificent. She uses a Japanese technique called Kimekomi. I KNEW I had to embrace my inner Asian and master this new technique. Well, let's just say it wasn't as easy as she made it look, but after spending a small fortune at Hobby Lobby to complete my project, I was determined to pull up my "big girl panties" and get 'er done!

Ornamentdesigns.com has great instructions (with video) on all her designs. I'll be visiting this site often.

I also invested in a Kimekomi tool at http://www.japanesetemari.com/kk/japanese-kimekomi.html and bought the book, Japanese Kimekomi, Fast, Fun and Fabulous Fabric Handballs by Barbara B. Seuss and Kathleen M. Hewitt for the patterns (trust me, it makes the job SO much easier).

The sequined ornament takes about 24 man-hours to complete, but it's SO worth it! The tucked ornament takes about 4 hours.

Rob wants me to make some for our tree, but in different colors. Not sure that's going to happen this Christmas, but I've got my sequins ordered from www.ccartwright.com and I'll get a jumpstart on next year!

Boogieboarding!

Here's my submission for a Circle Sketch Challenge for the weekend.

I made the title in Design Studio using George and Plantain Schoolhouse.

I love this new Creative Memories paper. It goes with the new Cricut Cart exclusive to Creative Memories call Cheerful Seasons.

Rock Princess!

I'm in LOVE with my new Cricut cartridge, Rock Princess!

Lots of layers, and it takes quite a bit of time to assemble, but the final product is SOOOO worth it!

What made this layout so much fun was remembering the blast we had playing Rock Band the night of the party!

I also used ALOT of my scraps on this layout!

Scraps, Scraps, Scraps.........

So, I went to find a piece of black cardstock in my scraps and recognized that I have a SERIOUS scrap hoarding issue. So I set forth a new scrapping declaration. I will no longer add to my scrap stash! Trust me, easier said than done.
I worked on a 2 page layout this weekend, so yesterday I took all the scraps and made 10 thank you cards! I was OBSESSED....I even used all the tiny scraps and made a mosaic!
Hopefully I can keep this up, and start to use up some of the scraps I've already accumulated (all 5 boxes of them).

Having a hard time getting inspired

It's been awhile since I've posted. I've had alot of company at the house and I've done a little traveling, so I'm loaded with a bunch of new pictures (to add to the years that I STILL haven't completed) and I sat down yesterday and stared blankly at cardstock and cartridges and realized that I didn't have ANY new ideas.
So I decided that some scraplifting might get the creative juices flowing. I was able to get one 2 page layout done, but it took 6 hours to complete! 1 hour just picking out the papers (which usually is where I'm the most challenged)!
I tried to sit down and get another layout done today, but STILL cannot find the inspiration.
Rob's leaving in a couple of days (which might explain the funk I'm in), and I'm hoping to get alot of work done on my albums in his absence. At the rate I'm going, I'll be lucky if I finish my Vegas pictures......
Oh well, I'll hit the drawing board again tomorrow morning. Hopefully I'll have better luck!

My ever growing Cricut Cart Collection

So.....I have a new addiction. Buying carts on Ebay! I didn't realize how cheap you can get carts there. For a year I have been eyeing the Spongebob Squarepants cart (all those pics of Kenji that I've yet to scrap), but I couldn't bring myself to pay $90 for it, and I NEVER saw it go on sale.
Well Monday I took a look at Ebay and saw that the bidding was in the final 2 minutes, so I put in my max bid of $20, and I actually got it for $14.60 and free shipping! Next, I thought I'd try aquiring Forever Young, and made my max bid of $22.00. I lost a couple of items before I was able to win one for $20.30. Let's just say that I'm hooked. Which led me to my next dilemna.......how to store my every increasing collection.

After my shelves took a tumble this past weekend, I'm using every square centimeter of my closet, so I'm needing to purge and make better use of my space.

I found a great idea on YouTube! So I took a standard shoebox (the booklets fit perfectly), made a cute little bag for my carts from Bags Tags and Boxes cart (shopping bag 3"), designed an index card on Design Studio (George and Basic Shapes) and dusted off my P-touch and made labels.

I made sure to write all the Serial numbers in the booklet (just in case).

I've got my next shoebox ready for all the new carts I'm sure to be buying on Ebay....

Tri Fold Shutter Card

While checking out some fellow Circlets blogs, I found this awesome Shutter card. We're going to celebrate our neighbor's daughter, Catie's, birthday tomorrow at Dave and Busters, so this find was quite timely.

If you want to make your own check the tutorial out at

http://www.splitcoaststampers.com/resources/tutorials/trishuttercard

Enjoy!

In bed with my knee....going stir crazy!!!

I did something to my knee on Monday, so I've spent the last 2 days off of my feet. Not an easy "feat" for me!!!
I finally was able to hobble down to the basement today, only to find that my shelves in my scrap closet had come down with all its contents. Kenji and I spent an hour cleaning and reorganizing. I didn't want my labor to go to waste, so I mustered up the strength to pop out a 4th of July layout using my new Cricut Lite Cart "Block Party". I LOVE this cart...with as much as Rob loves to BBQ, I'll have lots of opportunities to use this cart. Purchasing it was bittersweet for me, since I've NEVER paid full price for a cartridge, but since it's a WalMart exclusive, the chances of it going on sale are slim to none. It could show up on Ebay some day....but who wants to wait!!!

New to all this......

So I joined the Cricut Circle for the exclusive cartridges and found that I'm really enjoying the social aspect of the Circle.
I'm trying to figure all this out, so hopefully you'll have patience and not give up on my feeble attempts at blogging.
I'm also looking at this as a way to jump back into my favorite hobby.