30th Birthday Card

Hello All,

One of my very close friends turned 30 yesterday and this is the story of her birthday card.  Lynsey is a brilliant triathlete so I knew I wanted to add a bike to her card but I made it super girly.

To make the base card I used the Cindy Loo cartridge on my Gypsy.  I welded the 3 and 0 together, made a copy and flipped it to weld at the top.  I cut out on plain white card and then embossed with the M-Bossabilities Splendid folder using my Grand Calibur.

The bike image came from the Just A Note cartridge which was pre-installed onto my Cricut Expression 2 when I bought it.  I used Basic Grey patterned paper and purple pearlescent card.

Lynsey loved her card and I was thrilled.  Hope you've been using your Circut too.

Happy Cricutting,
Rachel x

Baby Noah Barker

I'm back!  I've got a baby card for you this time.  It's actually for the brand new grandson of the greyhound card recipient!  Noah Murray Barker was born on 18 July and he measured a whopping 22" long!  At 10lb 8oz he was certainly ready to make his appearance into the world!

My backing paper is from a huge bundle that I bought from eBay ages ago.  It's the DCWV brand and there are loads of great patterns.  Once I saw this paper I knew I'd found The One!  I attached with double sided sticky tape.  The safety pin stamp around the edge was free from Create and Craft as part of my Club Membership.  I was really impressed with the quality as it stamped perfectly every time.  To be honest it really was a fluke that they matched up at the end!  I cut the yellow star with the George and Basics Shapes cartridge at 8" and attached using a tape pen.

The babygro is made from Cor'dinations cardstock in teal, light blue and yellow.  Using the Wrap It Up cartridge I cut the Onesie shapes at 6" and then ran the teal cardstock through my Cuttlebug with a starry embossing folder.  I then sanded back to highlight the design.  I made up the topper using a tape pen and attached with foam pads.  The letters were cut using the Paper Lace 2 cartridge at 1.25". 

For the blue stars I used my X-Cut dies and the sentiment stamp was part of the same set from Create and Craft.

Happy Cricutting,
Rachel x

Art Deco Birthday

I'm back!  This time I have a new card from a new cartridge to share with you.  The Art Deco cartridge is a must for anyone who is a fan of the era or would like a great range of transport and girly images all on one cartridge.

Apologies for the awful quality of the photo.  I really will have to find somewhere better to take my photos. 

I started with some Create and Craft glitter cardstock and was a little worried that the glitter might interfere with my Cricut but it worked like a dream.  I probably wouldn't cut it every day on the Cricut but once in a while is fine.  The red layers are Cor'dinations.  Then I cut the hair, shoes, scarf layer (just seen at the collar) and cuffs in brown pearlescent cardstock.  Finally I cut the top scarf layer and hat border with a mushroom cardstock. 

The greyhound was cut with the same brown pearlescent cardstock and a textured lighter brown paper.  I'll be honest and say that I forgot to cut his collar so I just improvised and cut a piece of the cardstock to fit.  I'm sure Cricut would do a much better job though!

I mat and layered with the same cardstock for the base and then added a hand-drawn lead.  The sentiment was from Create and Craft as part of the free Club Members gift from a while back.  I used a Papermania brown inkpad to mach the image.

I hope that the recipient loved it as much as I loved making it!

Happy Cricutting,

Rachel x

Let's Eat Cake!

First of all I have to confess - technically I didn't make this cake!  My sister-in-law baked the sponges and my brother decorated it using my new Cricut Cake.  I did supply the icing and equipment though!  My brother will be the first to tell you that I was of little help to him that night as I was busy making a card with my Cricut Expression 2!  Anyway, our Mam was delighted with it when we produced it at her birthday party at the end of February.

I have decorated a couple of things using the Cricut Cake (no pics though and they are long eaten!) and I have found that getting the icing to fit the entire size of the matt can be a little tricky.  I saw Sarah on Create and Craft (Cricut Cake guru!) using a sheet of mesh that normally holds rugs in place to keep the matt from sliding on the worktop.  I think I'll have to give this a go.  I'm hoping to try some baking tomorrow so there may be more pictures soon.  In the meantime, here is a lovely pic of my brother and his fiance at my cousin's wedding last August.

Have a great weekend everyone.

Rachel x

Feeling Froggy!

Well, it has been a while!  My apologies for the length of my absence.  I have been busy crafting but just not as much with my Cricut as I would have liked.  I have made a couple of things though and want to share them with you today and tomorrow.  Just to keep you in suspense a little bit longer! 

My first project was a froggy themed card for our Leap into Action challenge over on the Fab'n'Funky Challenges Blog.  I joined the DT back in December and have loved every challenge.  Do check it out, as a brand new challenge launched today. 

I try to do something new and different on every challenge card and this was the first using my Cricut. 

I chose this image from the Paisley cartridge and was delighted to find this green card as it makes a great frog skin!  I started by placing the spotty backing paper onto my square card blank, leaving a quarter inch for the matting and layering technique.  I coloured the American Seambinding with my Big and Juicy inkpad in Waterfall.  This made my hands bright blue so I would recommend wearing gloves if you are going to give it a go!

To achieve the water effect, I crumpled up a piece of copy paper, inked up my softball brayer with the Big and Juicy and ran it over the paper.  This meant that the pattern transferred to the brayer and it was just a case of running the brayer over the plain cardstock.  I placed the top of the cardstock inside the "Happy Birthday" embossing folder and then ran this through my Cuttlebug.  I mounted the topper and little froggy with foam tape.  I think this makes a great man's card.

Happy cricutting,
Rachel x

Hmmm!

I think I've let my blogging slip a little.  Had a virus on my computer so that didn't help but I'm back up and running now. 

Here is a little taster of the first 12 x 12 cut that I created on my Gypsy and used with my Cricut Expression 2.  The paper has a faint croc skin print but I've used it here to cut a range of embellishments.  The frame in the top left hand corner has been made by welding four corners together, although I'll explain this in more detail in another post.  This is also how I have acheived the border embellishment in the bottom of the photo.

Gypsy

No creations tonight but instead a very quick introduction to the Cricut Gypsy.  Although I've only had this nifty little gadget for a couple of weeks it is one of the best purchases I've ever made.  There are so many features that I've only managed to try out a handful of them so far.  The best has to be the weld feature which lets you merge images together into one whole image before cutting.  This is how I achieved the borders in the last post.  The weld feature can also be used to make shaped cards.

When you are designing your cutting layout by placing images onto the cutting mat, it is really useful to be able to position each image individually.  This will help to maximise your paper.