Hello

Been very busy, working, family stuff and Poor Milo hasnt been well so been popping to vets too :(

A bit of wall art made for boys bedroom made with Mini Monsters Cricut cartridge.  The middle section was hand cut as I wanted to add more to it.  The teeth are hand cut too.  Boys love it!

Here is a picture of Harvey next to our little veggie patch and our sweetcorn that is growing just like Harvey, taller everyday.

I am just about to place a Stampin Up! order and I have THREE prizes to give away to the FIRST THREE people to send me an order.  Email caiden@sky.com

There is a whole pack of COTTAGE GARDEN paper, one roll of razzleberry spotted ribbon and one razzleberry ink pad.  First person will get first pick, second the second and third the remaining item.  So what are you waiting for, order NOW!

Robots taking over...

I made this card for one of Harveys school friends who has just celebrated his 7th birthday and is
having a go-carting birthday party today.  I used my Robotz cartridge to make the main image.  I used a new cuttlebug folder that has just come into work and I thought perfect for this cartridge.  On my cricut I have design Studio but I also have Sure cuts alot and I managed to find the cogs to cut out and stick on.  The 7 is from the Robotz cartridge which also has a lovely font, a nice big chunky one.

Caiden has his party this afternoon, I am out this morning so its a busy day.

Cazx

Who stole the cheese

Just a quicky as I really need to get kids ready for school and me work.  I made this with the Create a Critter cartridge the other day.

Toooooo Cute!

Here are a few photos from our Beaver Family Day to a local wildlife place called "Beaver Waterworld"  a small rescue place where they rescue reptiles and also have beavers there too.

Great to handle these Monitor Lizards and snakes!!

Creating Critters

Been having fun creating critters this weekend (between work and family time)

Here are two cards made with these ADORABLE cut outs.

Owl is cute!  not sure about the card though... bit boring!

Harvey asked me to make a bug for him and then promptly went off and left me making it.  So I used it
to make this card.

I hope you had a nice weekend?

Cazx

Me again..

Hi there

Well I have done quiet well with my magazine work, shame I cant show you, or maybe I might sneak a tiny snippet in for ya! without giving too much away but part of a stamped and coloured image wont tell you too much. I am halfway through the comission so thats encouraging. I have been playing with my bellas (boy I have missed using those) from First Class Crafts and the cute Lily and Milo stamps from The Glitter Pot. Talking of First Class Crafts I am pleased to say that I have once again joined their design team and look forward to showing off their wonderful goodies. They have a BIG selection of Stamping Bella stamp including the super duper cute new designs Johnny Depster the pirate, Fabby, All Punked up and nowhere to go and the other one who's name escapes me! Cards to follow soon as I am DYING to play with these lovelies.

Yesterday went well. I had a class with the Cricut and Cuttlebug and it was nice to play with the Cricut again. Had a bit of a crisis first thing in that the store didnt have the cricut mats and had to go on a mad dash to get the mats and I had prepped both cards with both machines so I had to just make up a cuttlebug card when the class started. It went well considering. I forgot to take photos of my cards but in the afternoon we basically made the same cuttlebug card as I had done in the morning but with different colours. So we all made the elements using the cuttlebug cutters and embossing folders and then everyone designed these elements into their cards and WOW they were all very different and they did a great job.

You cant see the lovely colours or embossing on them, they looked lovely in real life.

Here is a lovely picture of my boys - it was taken at my Mums on the steps outside the french doors. It was funny as I had taken a photo and was trying to take another without Caiden's hand in his mouth, anyway I blew a raspberry to get Caiden to look and he ended up blowing one back.. not quiet what I had planned!

I know a while back I said I was pondering Copics, well I have decided I want to get some, but they are expensive to buy so something has to go I am afraid... I have cleared out my craft area and decided I have far too many Cricut Cartridges sitting unused - I have MICKEY FONT, ACCENT ESSENTIALS, FABULOUS FINDS, CHRISTMAS CHEER, PRINTING PRESS, ALL MIXED UP and MINI MONOGRAMES not sure on price.. make me an offer. All lightly used - some of them will have had the other language pages pulled out to make it easier to find the info you want rather than flick through the excess pages.

10pm, was thinking of going to my Palace but I have had a bath and am nice and warm so dont fancy going outside in the chilly air. Will have to send Darren out to lock it.

Expression Tutorial

OK, this is a bad tutorial, but I was in such a rush for a few reasons, 1/ both boys were asleep and 2/ my camera batteries about to die!

Paula (see UK blog list) showed me the other day how to make a 6 x 6 envelope using the Cricut Expression machine using a piece of 12 x 12 card and the 12 x 24 mat. Ordinarily you can not make a 6 x 6 out of a 12 x 12 but with this clever paper placement you can.

You will need

1/ Expressions Machine - Crafts U Love is a great place for them

2/ 12 x 24 Mat - Again you can get these from Crafts U Love

3/ Piece of 12 x 24 paper if possible

4/ 12 x 12 paper

5/ Plantin Schoolbook cartridge that came with your expression.

OK for starters Paula suggests cutting the envelope on the big mat with a piece of 12 x 24 - this just helps with the placement of the paper, but you should be able to judge the placement even from these bad photos.

So here I have cut the envelope. 12 x 24 mat must be selection, FIT TO PAGE, ROLY POLY function - here we have a 6 x 6 (just over) envelope

Take the green away. You can either now use the outside of the cut out as a guide for the paper or as I did I looked at the mat where the image has just scratched the outline of the envelope and place the paper. I will draw some lines with a permanent pen to show me where I place the paper for next time, not across the whole mat, just the very top and the side bits where it is not sticky.

Now you need to cut the side that are overlapping away. I very crudely did it in the next picture and I stuck the mat in the machine.

Now remember to tell your machine you have 12 x 24 mat in there and let it assume there is a full sheet of paper. FIT TO PAGE, ROLY POLY. and you will get a 6 x 6 or very close (slightly bigger) envelope.

Thanks to Paula for experimenting with, I would have never thought to do this but am so pleased she did as 6x6 is my preferred card size. BTW Paula your directions home were fab, lot more straight forward than they way I got there!! :0) Hope the boys didnt leave you with too much tidying and WOW your studio is lovely, no scrap that, your house is lovely!

Another wall frame made yesterday

After finishing my coaster hanging I was inspired to decorate a frame that I have had hanging about for ages. I have one of these on the wall with pictures of Harvey and his name in chipboard it much more simple. This one I went to town on, lots of bits and bobs used to make it. This frame is BIG, to get an idea the size the background paper is 12 x 12, yep, a full sheet! and then there is another 6" to the left of the paper.

OK here is what I used : Cricut Plantin Schoolbook card for words, Doodlecharms for bugs, 12 x 12 paper and card. The photo is 8 x 10 I believe, Prima flowers and Doodlebug Jewels used for the centres of flowers (who says boys cant have flowers?) Zoomz on the bugs shells.

I love it, its something like a memory page but better still you can see it all the time :) I am definately going to spend more time on making things like this :)

I hope you are liking my "out of my box" creations. Its fun to try different things sometimes.

I am pondering on adding the words either "forever" or "always" to the bottom of the frame in the opposites attract font.... might look cute :)

UK Cricuters

I have zooballoo, jasmine and Printing 101 for sale for a good price. Paypal only.

email me

Thanks

Disney take 2

It took forever to decide what to make next after Minnie, so I thought Chip and Dale were mega cute and they didnt look too hard. I didnt have the right brown for Chip, he is a darker brown and as learnt off the cricut newsletter has a "brown chocolate chip nose" and dale has a pink nose (tee hee a silly little fact I am somewhat and strangely proud of - the fact I know which is which) anyway enough of the strange workings of my mind..... back to the card, yep I decide Dale would be cute, not too hard... well is wasnt hard but it was a BIG frustration as he just kept tearing, changed the settings slightly one way, slightly the next and FINALLY got one that was OK, not perfect by any means but OK.... I think Cricut need to provide paper packs in disney colours that will cut without stress! It took me an hour to cut and piece this one Dale. The card I put together this morning and it is WINDING THE HECK OUT OF ME with the wonky ribbon but when I tried to undo the card I tore a little of the paper so I will just have to learn to love my wonky (artisticly wonky of course) ribbon! And if I cant live with it, I'll have to RAK someone with it!

Great day... too bad for the powercut

Well that was fun.... a 12 hour + powercut so no crafting and certainly no cricuting. Thankfully most of it was during the night, it started at 9:15pm last night and power came on sometime after 11am this morning. Hmmm I am so thankful for my gas hob.

Great mail day, the mouse and Bellas have landed so I am in for a fun night, power permitting. First job is to make a thank you card for my special friend in USA who helped me out. (again)