Our Family Christmas Card 2012

Each year I like to make our family Christmas card.  I knew I wanted to do a snowman this year because I had recently purchased some Peachy Keen snowman face stamps and I had found this cute paper pack at Michaels :)  I also wanted to do an unique fold.

Here is what I came up with.

I used my Cricut Doodlecharms cartridge for the snowman and my computer for the inside sentiment.  I also wrote a note to each person on the inside just to make it a little more personalized.  I added some pics, a twine scarf and I was done!  I had these made back in November but needed to add the pictures so I did not get them out until mid December (I am going to start in October next year :)).

Thanks for stopping by, hope you have a crafty day!

PreSchool Teacher Gifts and Class Treats 2012

So like usual I waiting until the last minute for school treats for the kids...needless to say I have been busy but still should have planned ahead more!

My youngest only has 6 kids in her class (thank goodness) so I had to hurry to get them done the last day of class before break which was very early for her school for some reason.  I used a digital print from Paper Crafting World for the cute girl elf.  I wish I had time to individually cut them out but did not, I also wish I had a machine that cut SVG's but I don't :(  So this was the best I could do in a hurry.  The Elf Girl is so cute and reminds of my Mady Moo which is why I used her :)

I also needed something quick for the teachers.  I had some Christmas themed magnetic notepads from last year and I had picked up some GIANT pens from the dollar store so I knew those would work.  I just love how easy these were and how cute they turned out.  I used the directions for the paper pad "cover" from here.

Thanks for stopping by, I hope everyone has a craft day!

Altered CD Case

Hello!  My girlfriend Stephannie made me the cutest altered CD case with a Starbucks gift card in it (you can see it here) and she also gave me some empty CD cases to use myself so when I need a gift card holder for my son's good friends birthday I new I wanted to use one!  I used Stephannie's as inspiration.

I hand cut the paper just using the case for measurement for the front and back covers (put inside the CD case), I used some sports themed paper I bought years ago from AC Moore for the football patterned paper, then I cut the football for the outside from Sports Mania Cricut Cartridge and I embossed it used my Cuttlebug.  I used My Creative Time's All Around Birthday for the Happy Birthday circle stamp and then I used the football from My Creative Time's Touchdown stamp set for the center.   I used the My Creative Time's gift card die to cut my giftcard holder for the inside and stamped it with the Happy Birthday sentiment from the Gift Card Sentiment stamp set.  I added some faux stitching with my white gelly roll pen and some more of the football themed paper.   I used a few glue dots to stick the gift card holder on and filled it with a Sports Authority gift card (it is getting hard and harder to buy for my 11 year olds friends but they all love sports!).  I hope he liked it!

Thanks for stopping by, hope you have a craft day!

Purse Explosion Box Post It Note Holder

A co-worker of mine has accepted a new position so we threw her a farewell get together.  She and I have worked together for almost 7 years so I wanted to make her a little gift.  I saw this purse explosion box at http://qbeesquest.blogspot.com/2011/01/explosion-box-purse.html and knew I wanted to try it.  Once it was made I thought it would be perfect as a post it note holder for her desk in her new office so I just added a pen and some post its.  I think it turned out cute for my first try :)

The best part is I only used 3 pieces of paper, a ribbon and velcro (to keep it closed).  One for the box, the black for the top (I used Art Philosophy to cut the topper) and accents and the pink animal print.  I love how cute it turned out and may do some in Christmas paper if I can find some cute Christmas post it pads for the teachers.  You could easily make it a gift card holder or add some candy.  So many possibilities!  I added the Thank You from a My Creative Time stamp set but you could do any sentiment here!

Thanks for stopping by!  Hope you have a crafty day!

Youth (not high) Chairs

My 3 year old has been wanting this chair that her cousin has and so I finally broke down and spent the $40 for it in hopes she will sit it in until she is 10!  Then of course my 4 year old had to have one too...another $40.  They come unfinished so I had to stain them...I have never done that before!  I bought a water based stain and finish and it turned out fine for my first time :)  Then I used my Cricut and the Artiste Cartridge to cut their names from vinyl and then I used it as a template to paint the girls names on the chairs so there is NO confusion on who's chair is who's :)  In the end it was a great idea because it puts them at the perfect height for the table (no more sitting on their knees!).

Here are the finished chairs, the only issue was my 3 year old kept asking for her white chair back (because the chairs are so light/white looking when they are not stained), she finally got used to her stained chair :)

Thanks for stopping by to see my non-paper craft but I still used my Cricut :)

I hope you have a crafty day!

PS:  I am linking this up over at Sarah Hamer Designs so feel free to stop by and link up too!  http://www.pinkcricut.com/2012/11/link-tuesday-29/

Thank You!

Last month my hubby and I wanted to go away for the night before he started chemo again.  One of my dearest friends Stephannie is best friends with a very nice lady who works at a hotel in Ocean City, MD where we wanted to go.  She got us a room and even sent us some wonderful dessert that night (strawberries and chocolate cake!).  We would have used our money to go because we wanted to go away but honestly the money we saved made a huge difference.  I wanted to make Brenda a card to thank her.  I just recently purchased the Faceless Fall 2 set from Peachy Keen Stamps and have been wanting to use it.  Why as soon as you add a Peachy Keen face to anything does it become the cutest thing ever?  I do not know!  I used my Everyday Character Assortment for the face.  I used My Creative Times All Around Everything for the thank you circle and I used a thank you sentiment from the My Teacher Rocks set for the Thank You in the middle of the circle.  I think the patterned paper is from a DCWV fall stack I had from last year.  I hope Brenda likes the card :)

Thanks for stopping by, I hope you have a craft day!

PS:  I will be entering this over at the PK Challenge so stop by and enter too!

http://peachykeenstampschallenge.blogspot.com/2012/11/peachy-keen-challenge-43-anything-goes.html

Girly Birthday Card

My niece's birthday was recently and I wanted to make her a cute card but not too little girly since she was turning the big 9! LOL.  I used the side stair step card tutorial over at Split Coasters.  I used Sweet Treats for the cuts and a cheapy $1 stamp for the happy birthday sentiment.  I added a ribbon and some bling.

Thanks for stopping by, have a craft day!

Happy Halloween!

Hello all.  I hope everyone had a great Halloween.  We just survived Hurricane Sandy.  We were very lucky here in central MD to not get much (we had worse back in July with the Derocho storm).  We actually did not lose power which is amazing for us, we usually lose it for 4 days at a time.  I think we were better prepared this time.  Unfortunately, folks to the east and north were not so lucky.  We are praying for a quick recover for them all.

This year for Halloween I made two crafts (I still need to do something for my 3 year olds preschool class but have until next week :)).  First, I made cute little bats with a fun size Hershey bar in them for my 4 year olds pre-k class because she dressed as a bat :)  I used the Artiste cartridge for the bat, a circle punch for the face and some papers I had left over from last year.  For the face, I used a Peachy Keen set called Monster Mash (I combined a mouth and eyes from different stamps in the set because I did not want my bat to look mean:)  I had my daughter write her name on the inside and I used a ribbon that can easily be slid off to keep them closed.

Here are my bats and my cute little bat (I hand cut her mask because we could not find a bat costume):

 

For my boys (9 and 11) I used this post from My Creative Time for inspiration and did some cute little cuts from Art Philosophy (I could cut 9 at a time versus using a die to cut one at a time) and put some pixie sticks through added a cute little Halloween sentiment from My Creative Times All Around Halloween set.

Here are those cute treats:

 

Lastly, for Halloween I made some costumers or parts of costumes.  For my 3 year old she wanted to be a bat and I am not a sewer so I decided to do hers out of paper.  I used the Art Philosophy for the tear drops which I then turned upside down.  I used Create a Critter for the owl which I had cut down to make into a mask and added some circles and small feathers and an elastic band to make into a mask.  She loved it and luckily it survived.  Of course she has to wear it next week to preschool because her class Halloween event was cancelled this week due to the Hurricane so I hope it makes it until then!  I also made my 9 year old sons Jayson Werth beard using a picture, some cardstock and some elastic.   Here is a picture of the two cuties:

My oldest wanted to go as the Sun Drop guy (have you seen those soda commercials, he walks around dancing which cracks my son up).  All I had to do for him was make an iron on since we did not have a Sun Drop t-shirt.  It worked ok but I did not have the iron on for dark colored shirts so it is not that visible via picture.  Here is my handsome guy:

WOW! That was a lot in a few days of work!  I guess now it is onto Thanksgiving and Christmas!  Thanks for stopping by.  I hope you have a crafty day.

PS:  I am linking up over at Sarah Hamer Designs, stop by and link up too!  http://www.pinkcricut.com/2012/10/link-tuesday-25/

Acorns!

Hello all. I had seen this idea on Pinterest a few weeks or so ago and knew I had to try it but needed the right occasion.  My daughters Pre-K class was hosting (along with the K class) Teacher Appreciation Breakfast/Lunch this week and we were doing a Fall theme so I knew these would be a perfect little treat.  You just use nutter butters (the small round ones that come in a bag), Hershey kisses, mini chocolate chips and a little peanut butter for "glue" (the original Pinterest post says to use melted chocolate but I thought the peanut butter worked just fine- http://sixinthesuburbsblog.blogspot.com/2011/10/chocolate-peanutbutter-acorns.html).  I also use the technique of decorating a paper plate with a ribbon but since the plate is white and the ribbon is white it is hard to tell but I did use some fall themed ribbons :)

Here are my acorns:

I used a stamp set from The Stamps of Life called Raccoon2love.  It was perfect for these cute little acorns :)  I hope the teachers enjoyed the little snacks.  I am planning to make some for my work later this week or next week.

Thanks for stopping by, hope you have a crafty day!

PS:  I am linking this up over at Sarah Hamer designs, hope you will stop by and link up too!  http://www.pinkcricut.com/2012/10/link-tuesday-24/

Simple Boy Baseball Birthday Card

My younger son (9) has a birthday celebration after school today because there is no school tomorrow.  This morning around 7am I realized we had no card or gift...YIKES!  Luckily it is my work from home day so I can run out at lunch and get something.  I also had time to make a QUICK card.  Did not even use my Cricut!  Just my computer for the sentiment (printed right onto red card stock), some baseball stickers that I already had leftover from another project and my white gelly roll pen!  Super easy.

Thanks for stopping by, I hope you have a craft day!

Happy 5th Birthday Little Dancer

My daughters are going to a 5th birthday party this weekend for our neighbor who also happened to be in ballet with my older (4) daughter. I knew right away I wanted to use the Twinkle Toes cartridge.  This little ballerina is just too cute!  I have to make this same card for my little ballerina when she turns 5 this January!

I used Twinkle Toes for the ballerina and Art Philosophy for the card base (I welded the two shapes together to make a card, the cut it a little smaller and cut in the middle for the patterned paper).  I used Peachy Keen Princes Faces for the face and I used My Creative Time for the All Around birthday stamp.  I used an Action Wobble to make my little dancer dance!  I used my white gelly roll pen to add the faux stitching accents.

Thanks for stopping by, hope you have a crafty day!

PS:  I am linking this up over at Sarah Hamer Designs so stop by and Link Up Too!  http://www.pinkcricut.com/2012/10/link-tuesday-23/

A Mini Album: The Sweetest Story Ever Told

As you may know from reading my posts over the last few months, my husband Ed was diagnosed with stage 4 colon cancer back in May.  He has been going through chemo and is now having surgery tomorrow. I wanted him to have something to keep at the hospital to remind him of us because he will be in there for 5 days.  I also think he can take it to chemo with him or just look at it whenever he is having a bad day to remind him how much we love him.  This may be my first "real" mini album.  I used the Cricut Artiste and the chip board that came with it.  I used some paper I had, I think from a few different stacks and I used a few different stamps from Pink by Design as well as one $1 stamp (worlds best dad).  I also had the kids each write him a note and I wrote one as well (I helped my 3 year old, she help my hand as we wrote it together). He cried when he opened it and looked through it.  So did I.

I can only pray that one day we both look back at this album and all of the worry we had and be thankful for how much it made us appreciate what we have.

Thanks for stopping by, I hope you all have a crafty and blessed day!

PS:  I will be linking this up over at Sarah Hamer Designs so stop by and link up too!  http://www.pinkcricut.com/2012/09/link-tuesday-21/