Advent-Day 14

Day 14
Person: Samuel
Theme: The Beginning of the Kingdom
Scripture: 1 Samuel 3:1-21, 7:1-8:22, 9:15-10:9

Cartridges/Software used:
Plantin Schoolbook: circles
A Child's Year: crown

Also used:
Stickles for the jewels on the crown

Thanks for looking!

Advent-Day 13

Day 13
Person: Gideon
Theme: Unlikely Heroes
Scripture: Judges 2:6-23, 6:1-6, 11-8:28

Cartridges/Software used:
Plantin Schoolbook: circles
My World: clay pot

Thanks for looking!

Advent-Day 12

Day 12
Person: Joshua
Event: The Fall of Jericho
Scripture: Joshua 1:1-11; 6:1-20

Cartridges/Software used:
Plantin Schoolbook: circles
SCAL: trumpet
Paisley: music notes

Thanks for looking!

Advent-Day 11

Day 11
Person: God
Event: Giving the Torah at Sinai
Scripture: Exodus 19:1-20:20

Cartridges/Software used:
Plantin Schoolbook: circles
SCAL: tablets

Thanks for looking!

Advent-Day 10

Day 10
Persons: Israelites
Event: Passover and Exodus
Scripture: Exodus 12:1-14:31

Cartridges/Software used:
Plantin Schoolbook: circles
My World: Lamb

Thanks for looking!

Advent-Day 9

Day 9
Person: Moses
Theme: God's Providence
Scripture: Exodus 2:1-4:20

Cartridges/Software used:
Plantin Schoolbook: circles
SCAL: burning bush

Thanks for looking!

Advent-Day 8

Day 8
Person: Joseph
Theme: God's Providence
Scripture: Genesis 37, 39-50

Cartridges/Software used
Plantin Schoolbook: Circles
SCAL: bag of wheat

Thanks for looking!

Advent-Day 7

Day 7
Person: Jacob
Event: Assurance of the Promise
Scripture: Genesis 27:41-28:22

Cartridges/Software used:
Plantin Schoolbook: circles
Graphically Speaking: Clouds
SCAL: ladder, but this could easily be done on Design Studio as well

Thanks for looking!

Advent-Day 6

Day 6
Person: Isaac
Event: Offering of Isaac
Scripture: Genesis 22:1-19

Cartridges/Software used:
Plantin Schoolbook: Circles
SCAL: clip art ram

Thanks for looking!

Advent-Day 5

Day 5
Person: Abraham

Event: The Promise
Scripture: Genesis 12:1-9; 15:1-6

Cartridges used:
Plantin Schoolbook: circles, stars

Thanks for looking!

Advent-Day 4

Day 4
Person: Noah
Event: The Flood
Scripture: Genesis 6:11-9:17

Cartridges/software used:
Plantin Schoolbook: circles (the rainbow is made of circles of 1/4 increments)
SCAL for ark

Thanks for looking!

Advent-Day 3

Day 3
Persons: Adam and Eve
Event: Sin Enters the World
Scripture: Genesis 2:8-3:24

Cartridges used:
My World: Apple (bite cut manually)
Create a Critter: Serpent (birthday hat cut off manually)

Thanks for looking!

Advent-Day 2

Day 2
Person: God
Event: Creation
Scripture: Genesis 1:1-2:3

Cartridges used:
Plantin Schoolbook
SCAL; globe clip art

Thanks for looking!

Advent-Day 1

It's time for advent! This is the first year that we've used a Jesse Tree in our family, and I made the ornaments for it using my trusty Cricut. I got most of my information from this website but I also thought this one was helpful.
Day 1 was actually yesterday, so I'll post it along with Day 2 today.
Here is the ornament for day 1:
On the back of each ornament I've written the person(s), theme, and Scripture reading for the day (see first link above).
Theme: Introduction of the Jesse Tree
Scripture: 1 Samuel 16:1-13; Isaiah 11:1-10

Cartridges used:
Plantin Schoolbook for circles (3 1/2" and 3 1/4")
Joys of the Season for the tree (3 1/4") I trimmed the stem a little bit to fit inside the circle.

Thanks for looking!

Monogrammed card

Recently I needed a few simple, quick cards to send. I looked around in my scrapping supplies and found a nice double sided paper-a solid green on one side and a striped print on the other- that I thought could work. Here's the result.
I used my Just Rite monogram stamper (love that they are interchangeable and SO diverse) with one of the Damask borders. The circle was cut with Plantin Schoolbook and the scallop with Storybook. I embossed the green band with Cuttlebug's Swiss Dots folder and ran some white ink over the raised dots for a little more dimension. I bordered that with some grosgrain ribbon from Big Lots. The bottom border is Martha Stewart's Scallop Dot punch.
Here's a closeup of some detail:
Thanks for looking!

8

My dear hubby and I recently celebrated our 8th anniversary. I'm a blessed woman; he's so good to me, he's a wonderful father to our 3 boys, he's a willing helper around the house, he's a hard worker, and he's cute, to boot! :) I wanted to make a card for him that simply said "I love you" and this tri-shutter card is what I came up with. Here it is closed:
For you visual learners, check out this video tutorial.
The '8' is cut from Mickey Font. The oval and the scalloped oval are both from Storybook (I made the holes on the scalloped oval with an eyelet setter). I used the Cuttlebug "I Love You" folders on the 8 and for the sentiment and inked the raised images for a little more contrast. For a little more detail, I paper pieced the edges of the patterned paper, like Beate does in the video tutorial. Here's the card again:
So I usually stick just to the craft, but I had to throw in a couple pictures of our anniversary celebration. I surprised my hubby by dropping the kiddos off with a friend and picking him up from work--I told him we had 'reservations to the nicest restaurant Paris has to offer' (our town is called Paris and no it isn't THE Paris! ;) He was totally shocked because we weren't really planning anything special this year. I brought him back to our home, which had a little Louis Armstrong/Ella Fitzgerald music playing, the table set with our china and linen napkins (and this card at his place setting and the flowers he had brought me from earlier in the day), and a nice dinner for 2 being kept warm in the oven. What an enjoyable time just to sit and talk over dinner without the threat of interruption. Ahhh! :) Here's my sweetie, before dinner. Told you he's cute!!
Then, after dessert, we went out to the backyard and took a few pictures. Here's one of my favorites. :) I love him so so so so so so so much!
Thanks for looking!

Art inspired by Lois Ehlert

Greetings from our new nest in Tennessee! We are slowly but surely getting settled in and adjusting to our new and thus far very humid surroundings! It is beautiful here and all sorts of green.
With all the newness and adjustments and busyness of life, I don't anticipate being able to craft more than about once a week, if I'm lucky! That will be my goal and we'll see how that goes. However, I will be doing more crafts with my pre-schoolers, and I will be adding a new category of posts for this blog...Crafts for Kids. I hope you enjoy it!
Our first craft was inspired by art from Lois Ehlert's 'Boo to You' and is made entirely from things found in the nature of our own backyard! Jonah and I had a blast going on a nature walk and looking high and low for things to put in the bucket for our collection which we then spread out on the table and let our "imashinations" run wild!! Very easy, very fun, very quick, and great for my 4 year old.
Things you will need to complete this craft:
* various leaves, nuts, seed pods, grass, weeds, flowers, acorns, sticks...whatever you find!
* construction paper
* glue - we used Elmer's but you might need something sturdier for big sticks or other bulky items
* an imagination

Hello Kitty Card Set

Here's the group of cards I made for my son's physical and occupational therapists. They did such a great job working with him over the past couple of years and we are so thankful for the progress he has made. I used the Hello Kitty Greetings cartridge on the "card" feature for all of them. To make them thicker and to hide where the fold lines are, I also did a basic black cut to adhere to the front of each card. They are all made to fit an A2 envelope. I used stickles on all of the images except for the butterfly card.Rainbow, cut at 3 1/2"

Heart, cut at 3" and embossed with Swiss Dots

Sun, cut at 4 1/4"

Hello Kitty, cut at 5 1/4" (her whiskers need a slight trim to fit in the envie)

Cherries, cut at 4 1/2"

Flower, cut at 4 1/4"

Strawberry, cut at 5"

Butterfly, cut at 4 1/4"

and a homemade gift box to wrap them in, courtesy of Splitcoast Stampers' resource page.
Thanks for looking!

baby boy card

My husband's cousin just gave birth to a precious little guy about a week ago and this is the card that I made to congratulate her and her husband. The cut is from New Arrival. You can either weld 2 together to make a card or, if you don't have access to Design Studio, you can cut 4 blackout shapes. 2 will be for the front and back-then you will need to glue some strips of paper to those pieces to act as a hinge for the card. My hinges are where the bow is tied and at the wheel. The other 2 blackout cuts are glued to the inside of the card. They serve 2 purposes. The first is to hide the hinges. The second is to make the card sturdier.
After the card is assembled, it's time to decorate the front. You'll need to cut out another baby buggy-this time without the blackout feature selected. Your last cut will be the baby buggy with the shift on. For finishing touches, I added a string of pearls, a bow, some skittles on the wheels, and the heart above the buggy, attached with a small gauged wire that was shaped by wrapping it around a pencil.
Thanks for looking!

Ventura Beach and some exciting news!!

Here's another layout of Ventura Beach. I used a sketch from Page Maps for it. I love the clean lines of it and the balance that the squares give to the row of photos. I used SCAL to cut out the title and Life's A Beach for the sandals and dolphin.

Now...for my exciting news...thanks to Joy over at Obsessed With Scrapbooking, I have won a Cricut Gypsy!!!! Woot woot! She announced yesterday that she would give away a Gypsy when she reached 1,000 Facebook fans--which she reached and then WAAAAY surpassed yesterday and today. In fact, the last time I looked, she had over 1,500 fans! Check her out--she always has the latest and greatest in Cricut products to demo on her personal blog as well as the blog that she co-owns, Everyday Cricut. Thanks, Joy! I cannot wait to receive it and start playing!

Thanks for looking!

fire engine

Jonah had a Drive-in night at Cubbies last week, and each kid was supposed to make a car to sit in during the movie. Since he's very much into firefighting right now, (dressing up, making siren noises, and putting out fake fires all over the house) we thought we'd make him an engine that he could sit in for that night but also continue to use at home to "spark" his imagination. Scott designed, cut, assembled, and painted the entire engine but he tasked me with the job of cutting out a maltese cross with my trusty Cricut. I found the cross here, on the Quilling Patch.
It was a big hit with Jonah, and we are sure to hear plenty of siren noises throughout our house for a long time!
Thanks for looking!

Dig dig dig dig...

One of the things that Scott enjoys most about being a daddy is the excuse to do fun things because the "kids" like to do them. The truth is, Scott loves to dig. He likes to dig BIG holes. But it would look kinda funny to see a grown man dig big holes in the sand by himself. He is thrilled that the boys are at the age where they are also interested in doing things like this. When they were finished with this hole, it was big enough for 2 people to sit on beach chairs inside. I couldn't even see Jonah and Noah inside unless I was standing over the hole. I'll let you guess who had the most fun that day. :)

The journaling reads:

"Q: What do little boys* do at the beach?
*{big boys too}
A: dig dig dig dig dig
dig dig
dig dig dig dig.."

Here's a closer look at the first page:
and page 2:
The words were cut using a variety of ttf's on SCAL. The silhouette on the first page is from A Child's Year. The shovel and pail are from Life's A Beach. I used stickles for the sand and also added a little bit of "sand" to the corner of the shovel. I feel kind of silly mentioning Printing Press, but I did cut the two asterisks from it! :)

Thanks for looking!

Ventura Beach

I love how this page turned out! The pictures are actually printed in color, but with the sunset just right and the silhouettes on the beach, they looked like they were printed in black and white. I used 1 piece of shimmery paper for all of the embellishments. The charms along the side are from Life's A Beach and the letters are a ttf "traveling typewriter." It is a little hard to see, but on the arrow I used some letter stamps. It says "LOVE," pointing to my 3 favorite boys at the time. I'm so lucky now I have 4 boys to love!
Easy page. Thanks for looking!

Dad's Birthday

Monday was my Dad's birthday, and my boys got him flower seeds to plant in his garden. I whipped up a little gift basket to put the seeds in and a quick card to complete the garden look. Here are the results:

Side 1:

Side 2:Side 3:
Side 4:
I used A Child's Year on all 4 sides of the basket. Two of the images are with the icon feature selected.
The basket itself is an .svg file from SVG cuts. The basket can be found here. It's designed with a slit in the handle so you can slip a place card in there, or in this case, a birthday card, like so:

Speaking of card, have you neglected (like I did) the card feature on A Child's Year?? This card was super easy to make...no welding necessary. It is straight from the cartridge and was cut with a simple press of the button! I thought it would be cute to have the card in the shape of a butterfly so it could be fluttering above the garden scenes. I added stickles to embellish it to look somewhat like a monarch and voila! Easy gift-giving. The entire project took probably close to an hour but could be replicated in less time (except for waiting for the stickles to dry).
Thanks for looking!