Cricut Circle Monthly Challenge - A Couple Of Valentine Treats

Hi Friends and Fellow Crafters! Happy Valentine's Day to you all! Today I am sharing the treat bags and a fun lollipop arrangement I made for my son's class. I got this idea from Jillian Deiling Cassity's January 23rd post at the Cricut Circle Blog. If you aren't a Circle Member you can still check out her personal blog. I am entering this into the Cricut Circle blog's monthly challenge. This is the challenge info.

FEBRUARY MONTHLY CHALLENGE: Share the Love Challenge!

February is the month of LOVE. What better way to share your love with someone else than to take the time to create a handmade gift for them?! We challenge you to do just that!
The WINNER of this challenge will receive a $150 Credit to Cricut.com!

The Challenge: Create a handmade gift for a loved one using your Cricut machine(s).
Rules and Guidelines: Circle Blog Challenges are open to Cricut Circle Members only. Your project must be newly created for this challenge and include atleast 2 Cricut Image Cuts. You must submit a project to be entered into the Challenge Prize Drawing.
How to Enter: Submit your entry using the InLinkz tool found at the bottom of this post. Please post your full name along with your entry. Entries are due by 9:00 pm MST on Wednesday, February 29th, 2012.
Prize: This month the winner will receive $150.00 in credit to Cricut.com.
Winner: The winner will be selected randomly from qualifying entries using www.random.org and will be announced on the Cricut Circle Blog on Thursday, March 1st, 2012.

My son got a real kick out of this and his teacher loved it. It is so simple to make and it only cost about $2.00! LOL! The pail is a dollar find in Target and the Lollipops were 99 cents! Everything else was from my stash.
So I said it was simple and I wasn't kidding. I cut a flower from Flower Shoppe at 2 inches, used my Crop A Dile Big bite to punch a 1/8 hole in the center of the cuts. I went with the small hole because I didn't want to mess with glue. The hole was a just a bit smaller than the lollipop stick, so the flower stayed nicely without any adhesives. I did have to work the lollipop stick a bit through the hole, but it was easy. So the lollipop flowers were done in a flash. Here's a close up of them in the container.

The heart pick is from Smiley Cards, the digital cartridge that I got with my Gypsy ages ago. I have never used it prior to Saturday, but I think I'll investigate it further now. I am pretty sure I didn't fit the tongue in the correct spot, but it's cute in a goofy sort of way.

The two Robots are from one of my all time favorite cartridges, Robotz. I adore the cuts on this cart and have used it for so many different projects for my son's classes. They were cut at 4 inches height for the Robot and 4.67 height for the Robot Dog.

When I made my cuts, I made sure to have the cricut cut 2 shadows. I took a bamboo skewer and hot glued it between the two shadows so that they looked finished in the arrangement. Here's a shot of them from the side.

How do I love Robotz? Let me count the ways....
At least 6 more ways! LOL! I made a 5 inch tag using Tags, Bags, Boxes and More and another Robot cut a 4.5 inches for the Valentine Goody Bag. Using my computer, I printed out Greetings Valentine. I think the font is called Earwig Factory, funny right? I used lots of Distress Inks and Ranger Perfect Pearls on the edges of the tags. I dressed up the Robots with Viva Decor Perfect Pearl Pens in Black and Silver and made sure to add some stickles on each of them for some sparkle.
Here they are in progress. I had to look all over my table for one of the Robot's missing shoe. :-) It turned up eventually. It is a lesson for me to never walk away from the table unless all the pieces are adhered on to wear they are supposed to be!

Here they are finished. I filled the cello bags with some candy for my son's friends. There's one missing because it was in the fridge, one of his classmates cannot eat solid foods, so I always make sure to include a couple of yogurts for him. I just never remember to take them out for pics.

Thanks for stopping by the blog today!

Happy Crafting!

Colleen

 

Cricut Birthdays Winner!

Thank you all so much for the sweet comments on my blog! The winner of the Cricut Birthdays Book is Queen Bee who said:

Queen Bee Feb 1, 2012 04:06 PM

Gorgeousness! Thanks for the opportunity to win a great book-I've had my eye on it for a while:)

I hope you are going to love the book!

I don't have a post today because I don't want prying eyes to see what I have been working on! : -)

They will eventually be posted, but later!

Happy Crafting!

Colleen

Happy Birthday Cupcake! and Blog Candy Winner!

Hi Friends and Fellow Crafters! I just want to express my sincerest gratitude for all the wonderful comments on my Heart Topiary. It meant so much to me to read all of them.
Now for the winner of my blog candy.

Sara who said:

This is wonderful!

Thank you Sara! Let me know which gift card you prefer and I'll get it in the mail to you!

My Mom has a wonderful friend who is celebrating her 89th birthday tomorrow. She is an amazing woman who is still independent and sharp as a tack. I will admit that I totally idolize her. I hope I can live to 89 and be just like her. We gave her a gift card to her favorite store, but I wanted to give her a little something extra. The Heart Topiary was out since my Mom laid claim to it, so I needed something else for Rosalie. I remembered that I wanted to recreate this adorable cupcake that was featured in Northridge Publishing's Cricut Birthdays Book. It is on page 114 and was created by one of my favorite DT members, Michele Kovack. I don't think she posted it on her blog, I wish she had so you could see how fabulous her card and cupcake are!

Here are the details:

Cricut Anniversary E-2 and Gypsy

Carts Used:

Cupcake - Flower Shoppe, Cindy Loo, Gypsy Wanderings and

Tags, Bags, Boxes and More

Card - Birthday Bash

Other Materials:

Styrofoam Ball

DecoArt Snow-Tex

Martha Stewart Glitter - Coarse and Fine Crystal

Tim Holtz Distress Ink - Tea Dye

Tim Holtz Distress Stain - Tea Dye

Stampin' Up Stampin' Pad - Melon Mambo

Viva Decor Pearl Pen - Cream

Happy Birthday Stamp from Stampin' Up

Ribbon

Prima Tulle Flower

Skittles

Birthday Candle

K&Company Papers

Glossy Accents

Hot Glue Gun

Martha Stewart Decoupage Glue and Sealer

First I made the "cupcake". I know the Snow-Tex has a tendency to take a long time to dry. I brushed the Snow-Tex on the Styrofoam ball and set it to dry. I used a jar to sit it in while it was drying. While it was still wet, I sprinkled it with Martha Stewart Fine Crystal Glitter.

Once half of it was dry, I repeated the process to cover the whole ball.
I cut the Butterfly Cupcake Wrapper on Cindy Loo at 3.20 Height. Then I used the hide contour feature to create a shadow base for the wrapper. Sorry, I forgot to get a picture of it. I took Distress Stain Tea Dye and dyed a ribbon with it. I brushed the ribbon with Martha Stewart Decoupage Glue and Sealer and sprinkled the MS Course Crystal Glitter on it. Once that was dry, I used some red tape to adhere it to the inside edge of the cupcake wrapper.

Sorry, the last picture doesn't show the shadow cut. I forgot to take a picture of it yesterday, so I "recreated" it for the blog today with a spare ribbon and wrapper. LOL! Once everything was dry, I hot glued the ball into the wrapper and decorated it.

For the wrapper, I cut a flower from Flower Shoppe at 2.12 inches width. and inked the edges. I bent the leaves and when I liked how they looked, I cut the edges of the leaves for interest. I used Glossy accents on the flower to adhere more MS Coarse Glitter.  I had an extra center cut from another flower, so I used that as an accent. I added a twine bow and thought it looked sweet!

I added the candle and glued some pink and pearl skittles on the cupcake. I found a couple of butterflies that I had cut from Gypsy Wanderings when I made a Topiary last year in my stash, so I decided to put them to good use and decorate the cupcake with them. Michele Kovack used butterflies cut from the cupcake wrapper for her cupcake. Here's how it turned out.

And one final look at the cupcake

The card was a piece of cake to make! LOL! I used K&Company papers, lots of distress ink and MS Coarse Glitter. The card was cut from Birthday Bash at 6.50 inches high. I cut 4 of all the layers so that I could decorate the inside and the back of the card. I cut a small tag from Tags Bags Boxes and More and stamped it using Melon Mambo and a Stampin Up Birthday stamp. I decorated the bottom of the tag with some small pearls that were laying on my table. The inside sentiment is my own that I used my computer to print. For the front of the card, I used some lace and a beautiful tulle Prima flower from my stash to decorate it. I wrapped some twine around the candle for fun.

Inside of card

Back of card

 This was a fun card to create and I really love how it turned out. It's similar to the one Michele Kovack created, but has my own touches on it. If you don't own the Cricut Birthdays magazine, it is a treasure trove of fun ideas. It's one of the Cricut Ideas Books I would recommend to my fellow Cricut crafters.

Thank you again for all your support and the wonderful comments you leave. They really make my day! I have ordered a copy of the Cricut Magazine for blog candy. Please leave a comment to be entered. I will be drawing a winner next Friday. I'm hoping it will arrive by then!

One final look at my version of Michele Kovack's Birthday set.

Thanks for stopping by my blog today!

Happy Crafting!
Colleen