Wicked Wednesday: Mexican Folk Art

Hi everyone! I have some exciting news!! I was asked to join the Design Team for Wicked Wednesday ATC Challenge Blog. I have been playing along with them for a while and I have loved every theme Jenn has had. I just love the challenge of making a tiny work of art every week.

This week's challenge is Mexican Folk Art. This brought back memories of one of my friends that has since moved away. She has a Mexican heritage and had several Mexican folk art pieces in her house. I loved the colors featured in these art pieces.

The image I used is Day of the Dead Frida  from Dilly Beans. I just love her! I colored her with copics. It's hard to see but I also used Spica glitter pens in coordinating colors to give a little glitter. My base for the ATC is water color paper I  covered with wild honey distress ink and then embossed with the cuttlebug. I then inked the embossed areas with fire brick red distress ink and a little red acrylic paint. I used Lumiere halo blue gold paint along the edges. I sealed it all with a coat of mod podge.

 

Come on over and join us for this challenge. I can't wait to see what you create!

Thanks for looking!

Pocket Watch

Just a quick post tonight to share an altered TH pocket watch I made for the vintage purse swap. I love these Tim Holtz pocket watches! There are so many possibilities. This one I used a little steampunk inspiration to make the scene inside the watch face.

I used a script patterned paper as the background and layered gears, a pen nib, game piece spinner, lace, G45 butterflies and a handmade wire nest. I used glossy accents to glue all of the pieces on.  So easy!

Thanks for looking!

Exploring Cricut: Cricut Choice

Hi everyone! I hope you all had a great weekend. I am starting off the week with an Exploring Cricut Monday Challenge. This week it is Cricut Choice. We all have a cart (or two) that we have bought and haven't used yet or very rarely use. Even though I don't want to admit it, I am guilty of that with a few of my carts! One of them being Nifty Fifties. I bought this cart a little over a year ago and I could have sworn I had used it at least once. Nope! The cart still had the new sticker wrapped around it. So I set out to make something with it!

I found a cute apron cut and decided to make a mini cookbook. I was inspired by my friend's Daughter's halloween costume from last year. She made her a Diner Girl costume with a cute black and white gingham fabric that had bright red cherries on it.

I started by cutting the apron out in chipboard with the shadow cut at "fit to page" which was 4.7". The original cuts have the apron strings attached but I cut them off. I covered the chip board with black card stock cuts and then layered the ruffles, solid apron and the pockets. I didn't glue down the ruffles completely so that I could curl them slightly. I tucked a little bit of white lace into the top of the pockets. 

I did the same for the back cover but I hand cut the apron in the middle. I added gross grain ribbon along the top and a perfect bow to make it look like it was tied in the back.

The inside cover has the same patterned card stock. I cut the What's Cookin' in shadow and regular cut at 2" and assembled the layers.

For the inside pages I printed up lines on my computer on a thicker white card stock. I then cut the apron at 4.5" on shadow. Again I cut the apron strings off and assembled the entire book with rings.

I hope this inspires you to grab one of those neglected carts, dust it off and make something wonderful with it!

Thanks for looking!

Coffee?

It's Teacher Appreciation Week at Jessica's school this week. She decided she wanted to give her Teacher a Starbucks gift card. It's very convenient that there is one right next to the school and you can always find a few teachers there before or after school! Well, you know me... I just can't hand over a gift card without a cool holder! Plus her teacher rocks and she deserves something really special. So I set out to design a cool gift card holder. I saw many on the internet and this is my hybrid...

I started with cutting the coffee cup from the Love you a Latte cart at 7.5".  I cut two of the base and the top and bottom cream colored pieces. I ran the cream colored card stock through the cuttlebug. The top piece also had the lid cut attached... I cut that portion off with an exacto knife. I cut two cuts of the lid in white card stock.

I assembled the cups and added a cardboard sleeve to the middle cutting the sides to fit. Inked them all up and put them together using foam dots to give room for the gift card to slide in. I added extra foam dots to the lower portion so it would "lock " the card in and not let it slide all the way to the bottom.

I put the two lid pieces together using foam dots also. I cut them down so they went along the top and side. I then placed a removable glue dot on the GC and tucked it inside the bottom portion of the lid. Now you can slide it into the cup and place the lid over the rim of the cup.

I added a piece of twine with the #1 Teacher tag. I also cut the word Thanks from Don Juan at 2" in the regular and shadow cuts. Added them with foam dots and outlined with a white gel pen.

I was rushing to get this done and didn't take pictures during the assembly process. I will make another one and add more pictures to go along with the instructions. It turned out really cute and would be nice to have a few on hand already made for quick gifts.

Thanks for looking!

Cowboy Hugh

Happy Hump Day! I got to sit down for a little while yesterday and play. I made a card for the Anyone For Anya? challenge blog. This week was a photo inspiration challenge with this picture of a red barn. Isn't is pretty with the blue sky and green grass?

                                         

Here's what I made...

I made my very first side step card. It was a lot easier than I thought it would be!

I used The Greeting Farm "Hugh" stamp and transformed him into a cowboy. I colored his hair and face with copics. His pants and bandanna were stamped and paper pieced. I then hand cut him a nice big belt buckle with silver card stock. And what's a cowboy without a little chalked on dirt on his face and jeans?!  

The rest are all cricut cuts:

Barn: Country Life cut at 3"

Horse: Animal Kingdom cut at 1.5"

Fence and Grass: Paper Doll Dress Up cut at 1"

And the cutest thing is this tiny weather vane at the top of the silo!

Thanks for looking!

Totally Tropical

I have been so busy with end of the school year projects, dances, open houses, etc... that it's cutting into my craft time! So I am squeaking this ATC in at the last minute for the Wicked Wednesday ATC Challenge. The theme is "Totally Tropical." Every time I would see the design team's work I would think how nice it would be to be on the beach with my toes in the sand and a yummy fruity drink in my hand. If only I had the time!! So I made an ATC to reflect what I was thinking...

I started by using a hand cut cloud stencil to ink the clouds on the top half of the paper. I inked light blue below that and glued sand to the bottom.

The pineapple drink was cut with the Life's a Beach cart at 3.5". I cut two pineapple cuts. The first I used as a base and chalked the diagonal cuts in brown. The second cut I scalloped triangles to look like the little ones on real pineapples. I placed each one with a small piece of foam adhesive, inked them and added a white dot.

I cut out the orange, cherry, straw and umbrella with the layer cuts. The umbrella is two cuts layered to give the multiple colors. I also cut the "post" off of the umbrella and replaced it with a toothpick that is stuck through the cherry. I added some glossy accents and stickles and outlined with a white pen.

Thanks for looking!

Shaker Card

Hi Everyone! Today for Exploring Cricut I made a little shaker card. I haven't made a shaker in a while and thought it would be cute to make one out of a mason jar. My thoughts behind it was a "jar full of love." I just love the way it turned out!

I used Doodlecharms for the jar and hearts and Don Juan for the letter U. I started by making the shaker with 5 cuts of the mason jar. All were cut at 3.5". Two cuts from white card stock,  One from acetate, one from gray card stock, and one from mat board.

For the shaker front I used one white cut and the acetate. I measured and marked .25" from the edges of the cut and traced my markings to follow the curve of the cut and manually cut the window with an exacto knife. I then glued the two pieces together.

I then glued the mat board to the acetate piece. This gives you a little "box" to add whatever you would like to your shaker. I added microbeads and my .5" heart cuts. I then glued the solid white jar cut to the back of the shaker box to seal it all in. My last thing was to cut the lid from the gray piece and add it to the front.

I added a scalloped layered heart cut and the letter U to the bottom. They were both cut at 1.5" and used the regular and shadow features. I added some stickles outline for added sparkle.

Thanks for looking! Don't forget there are new daily projects everyday at Exploring Cricut for inspiration!

Bird Cage

I want to share another project I made for Theresa. This is a laser cut bird cage I found at M's. There were only 2 left on the shelf and I snatched them up! I altered this in a neutral color palette.

I started by painting the wood a cream color. I added a piece of G45 Olde Curiosity Shoppe to the back of the cage so it showed through the front. I added tulle, ribbon, flowers, a pearl flourish, beads and gems. There are two paper leaves and a stamped image to finish it off.

Thanks for looking!

Texture Galore!

This week over at Dilly Beans Challenge blog it's all about texture. It was so much fun seeing how much texture I could put into this one card! I started with one of the cute and creepy zombie girl digi stamp. We are huge zombie fans in my house so I had to have this digi as soon as I saw her!

I started by coloring her with copics. She originally had a big bow drawn on top of her head. I replaced that with hair. I flocked the headband and added a grosgrain ribbon. Her lips are all shiny with glossy accents. I cut out the background pieces between her and the frame to make windows. I colored the frame squares with red and added rock candy to the white squares for some more texture.

  
I started my textures on the card by layering a zebra print fabric over a red glitter card stock. I frayed the edges of the fabric just a little bit. I added a strip of flowered lace to the right side.

Thanks for looking!