Christmas In July Week 1

 Ho! Ho! Ho! Merry Christmas in July to all my friends and fellow crafters! Welcome to the first weekend of our Christmas in July Blog Hop!Each week we are having a different theme. Today's theme is Christmas Cardholders.

Paulette, our hostess, is offering some great prizes on her blog. She is offering a different cartridge as a prize each week and will have a grand prize drawing on July 31st of a rare brand new Christmas (Noel) Cartridge! You can earn entries into the drawings by following and leaving comments on the blogs in the hop. Here are Paulette's prizes for the hop.

Week 1~July 6~Christmas Gift Card Holders:
Prize is a Gingerbread Cart & winner drawn July 12
Week 2~July 13~Christmas Cards:
Prize is a Christmas Cards Cart & winner drawn July 19
Week 3~July 20~Christmas Ornaments:
Prize is a Trim The Tree Cart and winner drawn July 26
Week 4~July 27~Christmas Anything Goes:
Prize is a Christmas Village Cart and winner drawn July 31st

Here are the blogs for today's hop. You won't want to miss any of the great projects, so if you have just fell off Santa's Sleigh and landed here first, why not go back and start at the beginning! 

1~Paulette: http://scrapalette.blogspot.com/
2~L.B: http://www.coolbeansbylb.blogspot.com/
3~FranTimme: http://lovebugtimme.blogspot.com/
4~gonescrappin'; http://scrappycol.blogspot.com/ You Are Here!
5~scrapsbygracie: http://scrapsbygracie.blogspot.com/
6~SeaSwan:  http://seaswancreations.blogspot.com/
7~BetsyBoo:  http://betsymcreates.blogspot.com/

I chose to create a bottle or door hanger gift card holder. It was fun and super easy to create.
I used my Art Philosophy Cartridge - page 25/keypad button 5 and using my Cricut Mini, I cut it at 7.45 width by 10.80 height. 

Then I used December 25th Seasonal to cut Merry Christmas at 2.27 width by 1.25 height for my sentiment. 

Finally, I used a Cricut Craft Room Basic Accent from the bottom row on the basic tab and cut it at 3.375 width by 2.5 height. 

Decorating it was a cinch. I took the accent mat and ran it through my Cuttlebug using the Reflected Damask Embossing Folder by Anna Griffin. I used Gathered Twigs Distress Ink on the mat, then took an old wet toothbrush and dipped it in white acrylic paint, and ran my finger across the bristles to splatter the paint on to the mat. 

 

I decorated the hanger before I put it together and added some ribbon from Webster's Pages to the top.

 

I had a couple of left over tags that I made with Santa's Village using my Imagine last year, so I used one of the tags to add some interest to the center of the hanger. It just looked a little "bare" to me. 

Then I added a fun green and red wired bow with a Santa Charm attached to the top. 

I thought it looked cute as a bottle hanger, but I would leave the top bare if you want to use it that way.

Here I hung it off a Winter Candy Apple Soap from Bath and Body Works.

I also thought it would nice hanging off a larger bottle like wine. I didn't have any wine in the house, so I tried hanging it off my shampoo bottle. LOL! 

I love to give Gift cards as presents. It's so much fun to use my Cricut and dress them up in fun unique ways. I really enjoyed sharing a Christmas in July project with you today. Your next stop on the hop is the wonderfully, talented Scraps By Gracie. I know you will enjoy her project!

Finally, how about some blog candy? Leave me a comment before July12th to be entered into a drawing for a $10.00 Michaels Gift Card. 

Thanks for stopping by my blog today!

Happy Crafting!

Colleen

A Very Special Birthday Banner

Hi friends and fellow crafters!

One of my best friends, who is more like my sister, was celebrating her father in law's 90th birthday and asked me to make a banner for him. Tony is a wonderful man, and having known him for well over 24 years, I couldn't have been happier to create something special for him. My friend, Elaine asked me to do a red and white theme for Tony as he is originally from Poland. He also loves flowers and loves to garden, so I wanted to incorporate that passion into his banner as well. I was trying to keep the banner from looking too feminine, so I decided to use my Cuttlebug and Anna Griffin Embossing folders for the mats of the pennants. I used the Poppy Folder because that it what we all call him. Elaine also asked if I could make a Polish flag for the banner so I used them for the ends of his name. It all came together nicely. When I was making the embellishments, I originally started with primary colors. I quickly changed my mind on them as they made the banner look childish. I switched out to silver and gold embellishments and preferred them much more.

To create the banner, I used the Cricut Craft Room. I am trying to use it more since the Gypsy was discontinued. I am getting more comfortable with it, but I find it works better with my Mini machine as opposed to my E2. I guess because it's not a wireless communication, but who knows...
Anyway, here are some close ups of the banner.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I used Letter Envy for the letters and mats, the pennants are from Pretty Pennants, the balloons are from MS Cake Art and the presents and party hats are from Doodlecharms.

 

Tony loved the banner and enjoyed his special day.

 

Thanks for stopping by my blog today!

 

Happy Crafting!

Colleen

 

Coming Soon! A Christmas in July Celebration!

Join us every weekend in July for a new Christmas in July project. Click on the link at the side of my blog for more details!

Fairy Splendor with Tiddly Inks

Hi Friends and Fellow Crafters! This past weekend we celebrated my nephew's future baby girl with a fun Baby Shower. Along with the owls, I made two pictures using Fairy Sunny Day and Fairy Happy Day from Tiddly Inks for the baby's nursery. I have been practicing coloring with my copics and I have learned some great coloring techniques from Alyce at Kit and Clowder and from her You Tube Channel. Talk about talented! I have been a  follower for awhile, but only recently had the nerve to attempt her coloring techniques. Here are my pictures.

I love Tiddly Inks. The images are so sweet and just perfect for a baby's room. I used most of the same colors that Alyce recommends on her Copic Speed Coloring Technique video for my pictures. I changed a few colors around just to keep it personal, and I used a distress ink cloud technique for the background. I learned it from a tag swap we are doing at the Circut Circle. The video can be found here if you are interested. It is very simple, I used a cloud formation cut that I found on Paper Pups. I cut it with the Cricut Craft Room and my Mini.  I placed it against my image and just sponged some color on my paper working upward from the cloud stencil I created.  It looks really nice on the picture.

 

I started by printing out a 4.5 x 6.5 copy of my digi stamps on to Papertrey Ink White Cardstock. I like the basic white cardstock because it holds the color nicely and doesn't bleed. I did the skin first using E000, E00, E11, E21, E04, and R20. I colored their hair with E13, E15, E18, and then I used E29 for the darkest parts. I tried to make the dresses similar to the way Alyce made the dress on her tutorial, but I couldn't quite get the folds. I did ok with mine. I used BG000, BG13, BG49 and I also added in BG01. I blended with BG0000. I lost track of all the colors I used on the mushroom. I started with Y35, Y38, E15, E18, then I added YR31, YR68, and YR000 to blend the colors. I

used E40, E41, E42, E43, E44 and E47 on the stump and dots. I followed the colors Alyce used for the purples. They were V000, V01, V04, V06 and V09. I also used them for the shoes. I used many of the same Y colors for the flowers. I also used RV000, RV02 and RV04 for the flower in her hair. The grass was done in G21, YG03, G94, G99 and a couple of greens that I can't remember. LOL!

 

I used a mixture of the V's and BG's for the wings, I tried to do them similar to the way the Alyce did them on the video. Mine turned out different, but still pretty.  Once the fairies were done, I added the sky to the background. I also used stickles on a couple of flowers and the wings. I just couldn't resist!

 

Here is Fairy Sunny Day. She was done with the same colors as Fairy Happy Day.

 

 

 

I picked up the frames in Michaels. They fit so nicely in them. I am really proud of these. I owe a big thanks to Alyce at Kit and Clowder for the tutorial and inspiration.

I still have a couple more Fairy Digi's to make for my Great Niece's nursery. I hope to have them done in a couple of weeks. Here is one more look at my beautiful little fairies.

Thank you so much for stopping by my blog today!

 

Happy Crafting!

Colleen

You're A Hoot!

Hi friends and fellow crafters! I am the guest designer today at the Cricut FANatics blog, and I thought I would share my post here too.

 I am going to be a Great Aunt in August and I am beyond thrilled about this baby. Even more exciting is that we will be welcoming a little girl into our family! This is a big deal because I have a son and my brother has 4 sons, so little girls are in short supply in our family. LOL!

The theme for the baby's nursery is forest animals, owls are the focus. I ordered the crib set and curtains that were on the baby's registry, but decided to make the wall art with my Cricut. There are many owls to choose from on the cartridges I own, but I wanted to make the art as close to the pictures from the registry as I could. The owls are from Taggies and this is what they look like.

So these owls were kind of expensive and that gave me the idea to fire up my Cricut and make my own version for the baby's room. I looked for a match to the background in the craft stores, but couldn't find any. A Circle member suggested that I use my Imagine to re-create the paper, and that is what I did. I actually used the CCR with my Imagine to make the paper. I used Creative Memories Holiday Tags and Frames for the circles and colored them with colors from Wrap It Up. It turned out great!

I chose the owl from Create A Critter for my owls. I wanted my owls to look as close to the Taggies owls, so I used the hide contour in the CCR and hid the markings on the owl's belly. I replaced them with flowers from Art Philosophy and Create A Critter. I also hid the sleepy eyes and replaced them with the flower from the Zebra layer on Create A Critter. I cut 2 extra white shadows of the owl and trimmed away most of the owl so that I would have white eyes. After I did that, I realized I could have just cut two pieces of white scrap paper and got the same result. LOL! I also cut an extra blue top layer and a pale green shadow layer. I cut away the body from the blue layer and the head from the pale green layer. Here is how the blue layer looked trimmed. In my haste to piece the owl together, I forgot to take a picture of the light green section.

 

I layered them over the bright pink shadow and added the eyes, feet and beak. Then I went to work on the branch. I found a branch I liked on Wall Décor and More. It comes from the owl cut on that cartridge. I cut the leaves away and added hearts that I cut from Doodle Charms. I inked the hearts and branches with Stampin' Up inks.

 

I got a couple of frames in Michaels to frame my owls. They are shadow box frames, but they give you an option of how far back you would like to place your art. Since the picture was flat, I used all three spacers that came with the frame. Here are my owls.

 

 

The pictures didn't come out very good. I think I should have taken a couple before I framed them. Here are a couple of close ups of the owls.

 

 

I really hope that the baby enjoys the owls from Aunt Colleen. It was so much fun making all the baby things for the Baby Shower today. I will be posting more of my baby room décor that I created, plus a card and tags later this week. Thanks for stopping by my blog today!

 

Happy Crafting!

Colleen

 

 

Designed By: Colleen McCauley

Designed With CCR 

Machine Used: Cricut Expression AE2 and Imagine

Carts: Wall Décor and More, Doodlecharms, Art Philosophy, Create A Critter.

Imagine Carts: Wrap It Up for Circle Colors and Creative Memories Holiday Tags and Frames for Circles.

Extras: Stampin' Up Inks and Adhesives.