Valentine Card - I Hope You See

 Hi everyone, Maria here from Stamp, Cut, Create! Today I'm sharing another Valentine I made along with a mini tutorial on using UTEE (Ultra Thick Embossing Enamel). My card was inspired by an Inkadinkado stamp that resembled an eye chart. I don't have the stamp, but instead created the image using Word and then printing it out. The red frame is from the Art Philosophy cartridge and I used the Gypsy to tweek the size, adjusting the height and width so it would just fit around the printed image. I then added some doodling with a white Gelly Roll pen.
The glasses are from the Forever Young cartridge. I wanted them to look like shiny plastic frames, and that's where the UTEE comes in. Like any embossing powder, the first step is use a medium that will make it stick to the surface you are heat embossing. For this, I use Versamark. When I'm covering an entire image, I simply place it directly on the pad and tamp it down to completely coat it with the Versamark.

This is what the piece should look like with a good, wet covering of the Versamark.

The next step is to coat the piece with the UTEE. I store my UTEE along with a plastic spoon in a plastic container with a lid. (Not my original idea, but a good one!) I hold the piece with tweezers over the container and sprinkle the UTEE on it until it's completely covered.

 Then I tap the piece until all the excess UTEE falls off. There will be a small space where the tweezers were, but you can simply dip that corner in the tub and again tap off the excess.

The next step is to use the heat gun to melt the UTEE. I have a ZAP! by American Crafts and so far have been very happy with it. Start applying the heat and in a few seconds you will see the UTEE begin to melt, keep moving the heat source along the entire piece until it is all melted. I use long tweezers for this step, because it does get hot and I've burned my fingers on more than one occasion! Don't keep the heat on too long or the UTEE will turn white.

After the first coat your image will sometimes look bumpy like this. Not to worry though, simply repeat the process of  Versamark, UTEE, then heat and it should come out like this:

Doesn't that look like a plastic eye glass frame? I think so! You can actually continue to add coats of UTEE until the piece is your desired thickness. Another nice thing, if you end up with a blemish on it, you can simply re-apply the heat and melt it out.

Here are the completed glasses with all the layers put together. I  added some bling with Swarovski heat set crystals and adhered it to the card with foam tape.
The heart paper is from SEI's With All My Heart Collection. It's mounted on a slightly larger piece of Hollyhock paper from CTMH. I machine stitched the edges with a silver metallic thread by Sulky. Finally, I added some adhesive rhinestones to the bottom of the card.
Thanks again for stopping by today. I hope you enjoyed the card and the mini tutorial. I also hope you all have a very happy Valentine's Day!
Maria

A Quick Valentine's Note and Gift

Hey everyone! It's Angie from AngiesPaperPassion with a couple of quick projects for those last minute Valentine's Day gifts. The first one is a simple note card:

I cut the cardstock at 3x6 to make this into a 3x3 card and added a 3x3 piece of patterned paper to the front. The scalloped border is from my 'old faithful' cart - Plantin Schoolbook! Even with all of the newer carts around this one still is a wonderful cart with so many great images. I cut out about 10 borders in cardstock at 0.5". I also used Accent Essentials to cut out the heart in glitter paper at 2.25". After inking the edges of the scallops, I adhered them to the card by staggering the borders, added a piece of ribbon with glue dots, and the heart with small pop dots. Once finished I decided that it needed one more thing so I punched out a tag shape and stamped a Valentine's sentiment on it and adhered it to the heart with a tiny red brad. Then I was satisfied that it was finally finished!

Next is a Tag Treat Holder:

Again, I used Plantin Schoolbook. This image is on page 71 (shift/Italic). It's one of those images that I often don't pay attention to and skip over but it makes a cute little treat holder by scoring it in the middle and folding in half. It was cut at 8" with the Fit to Length feature turned on with my Expression and scored at 3.75" and again at 4.5". I added two little hearts cut with the shift/Tall Ball feature (found on the same page) at 2.5", adhered them on to the tag, and tied it together with some twine. This would be great to give to someone with a piece of chocolate inside (think Ghirardelli chocolate squares! Yum!)

I think I will put both of these little gifts into this gift bag that was made with Plantin Schoolbook (see, I told you it was still a great cart!):

Whatever you give (and receive) this Thursday, I hope that all of you have a sweet and happy Valentine's Day! Thanks for visiting and until next time, Happy Crafting!

Angela

Info and Supplies Used

Designed By: Angela Cromwell

Project Type: Gifts

Project Theme: Valentine's

Cricut Cartridges: Plantin Schoolbook, Accent Essentials

Cricut Machines: Expression

Sew Many Aprons / Suburbia Cartridge

Hi Meg here from PeacockPaperie .This was such a fun lay out to make! There is so much great content on the Suburbia cart- It has this fun retro font, I love the little ladies shillouettes, and I love how the aprons turned out when cut w/ tiny little prints.Even the sewing machine was on the cart too.

Valentine Riddle

Hello to all the fantastic Cricut FANatics.  It's Melody your designer for today, aka kauaimelody on the cricut board and cricutmelody on my blog.  Can you believe it is almost time for Valentine's day? Time to put all things frosty away and dream of  romance, love, and Valentine Crafts of course. 

Well, I decided to put you in the mood, by sharing pics with you today, of lots of little details that will hopefully inspire you to get all lovey dovey and make something romantic for a loved one. Do I see you blushing???  Well let's get started with a  riddle. . .

VALENTINE RIDDLE:

WHAT DO YOU GET WHEN YOU PUT RIBBONS, BLING, HEARTS, DESIGNER PAPER,CALLIGRAPHY, EMBELLISHMENTS, LOTS OF LOVE
 AND A BOX, A TAG AND A CARD TOGETHER?

Here are a whole kaboodle of details you can check out in the picture gallery to help you solve the riddle.  If you are a Serial Lookie Loo, who likes to see a bunch of pics, rather than read a bunch of words, than this blog could be just perfect for you.

CLUES TO VALENTINE RIDDLE/A PICTURE GALLERY WITH LOTS OF DETAIL

 

 

 

 

 

VALENTINE RIDDLE SOLVED: Here is what you get. You get a . . .



A Valentine Box to tuck a surprise inside to show you care-

A Valentine Card for sharing loving sentiments-

And a Valentine Tag to Place on your Valentine Box after it is all wrapped up

 

 

The coordinated Valentine Set -

HAVE A HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY EVERYONE AND THINK OF THIS BLOG TODAY , AS MY CRAFT VALENTINE TO YOU. . .

Joyful Crafting Always,
Melody

Designer:   Melody
Machines:  Cuttlebug  (hearts)
Materials:   Ribbon, gems, lace, embellishments, designer paper, smart phone box, ranger tag

                                                         

Valentine Treats Layout

Hello!  Michele here from www.michelegreen.com.  I'm happy to be posting today!  I tend to scrapbook about a year behind so today's layout is of the preparations for last year's Valentine's Day.  My daughter really wanted to create homemade valentines so we opted to make "sour cream containers" filled with candy.  (Personally, I have no idea why these are called sour cream containers.  I have never seen sour cream like this.  I HAVE however seen juice popsicles like this.  In fact, we were always served those as a treat with our hot lunch when I was in elementary school.  Sour cream...) Anyway... :)

The layout:

I had one little hiccup in this process. I can't find the printed photos!  So here's one that will be printed and put into one of those two big open white spaces:

(Yes, that's me there on the left.)

Here is the layout I have created.  This one was pretty simple to do.  It started because I had a ton of leftover strips from making the containers.  What a perfect way to remember them by including those strips in the layout! I arranged them any old way across a plain white piece of cardstock.

From there, I added my Cricut cuts which were all from the Phrase keys of the Create A Critter 2 cart.
Valentine - 3.5"
Treat - 2.5" (The s is off another phrase so the font matched)
Hearts are all from the owl cut - ranging between 3" and 11"

Here is a close up of the journaling for you:

It was a really fun evening spent with my daughter and niece getting their valentine's ready.  Happy Valentine's Day to all of you reading this!

Cricut Crafty Challenge #5- Be Mine Valentine

Hi Everybody,

It's Becka here today from Creations with Becka. Today I am bringing you all another Cricut Crafty challenge. This month the challenge is to make something special for you Valentine.

I made this Itty Bitty Mini Album for mine.

I used Tags, Boxes and More and Sophiscated cartridges for this project. I have a video posted on my blog.

Challenge Guidelines:

• Ok you have until February 26th to enter the challenge, you must use at least 3 cricut cuts. You can made anything you would like.
• Please link you projects below.
• I will post the winner on the 27th. The winner will win something very cool- still working out the details and will be announced soon

Thrift Store Valentine

I found this wooden tray near the toy section of my local thrift store. The tray had a few magnetic dress-up bear pieces in it. The thrift store clerk gave me the tray because there were so many missing pieces. 

• I painted the tray a reddish pink color using paint pens and glued various scraps paper from my stash into the try spaces.
• I used Home Accents for the love sentiment, Gypsy Wanderings with shadows for the hearts. I cut the swans using Splish Splash.
• I cut one of the swans regularly and flipped the other swan using my gypsy. I folded a piece of cardstock to form a box to "pop" the love sentiment from the frame.
• I added a sticker to the heart on the top right and hung it from the top of the tray using fishing line. The heart at the top center are white and red foamies. I poured clear melted UTEE into an old bottled cap then sprinkled some melted red embossing powder top of the clear embossing powder.
• The large heart at the center left is from gypsy wandering cut with matching shadow.
• The figure at the bottom left is from my dd's Lego set.
• I added jewels using my I-Rock to the bottom pattern-paper strip.

I think this is one of my favorite projects!!

 

A Chain Of Hearts~

Hi, this is Sara from www.sarawandrews.com

With Valentine's Day approaching I thought I would make a cute little heart banner.

My original plan was to cut the hearts, emboss them and then run them through the sewing machine.

Quick, simple and easy.

Of course, nothing ever goes as planned.

My banner~

The hearts cut at 3" and 2.4" high are from Cricut Craft Room Basics.

They ended up being a little bigger than I expected and the reason I changed plans.

I used several of my favorite embossing folders to add texture.

I then decided I would layer several of the hearts by stapling them together using my Tim Holtz Tiny Attacher.

If you do not have a Tim Holtz Tiny Attacher RUN now to your local craft store and buy one. 
It is that wonderful!

Instead of the sewing machine I used ribbon to string my hearts, and it was around this point that I decided to add pictures to them.

Luckily I had a bunch of pictures from a family photo session that I quickly printed in a contact sheet size in Photoshop.

And if you add photos, you have to add some embellishments. Right?

Hmmm...this sounds an awful lot like a certain mouse and a cookie.

I used~
DCWV Be Mine Stack
Crate Paper Fourteen Chipboard, Celebrate It Ribbon
Tim Holtz Tiny Attacher and Gem Clips
Scarlet Lime Kit Contents: Crate Paper Fourteen Accent Stickers
CCR and Cricut Craft Room Basics for the Hearts and Scalloped Hearts cut at 3" and 2.4" high
Cuttlebug Folders D'vine Swirl, Script and Wood Grain

Chalk Board Technique with the Cricut

Hi, this is Lori from the Singing Shell blog.  My husband is a no frills kind of guy so I needed a Valentine's Day card that was simple.  Enter the chalkboard technique.  I had been seeing this trend all over the internet and thought: Hey!  I bet I could do that with the Cricut!  The added bonus is that my husband is teacher so the chalkboard technique is something I have been itching to try.  This video by Tammy White was really helpful in teaching how to do the chalkboard technique.  I just adapted it for use with the Cricut instead of stamps.


1.  For this card, I used Carousel for the ticket diecut and Martha Stewart Elegant Cakes for the Dinner at 8 Uppercase font.

2.  The ticket diecut was cut at 3.5 x 5.75.  The letters were cut at 1.5.

3.  Before laying the letters on the ticket, I used a white pencil to create a border.  Then, I pasted the letter onto the ticket.

4.  Next,  I added the hearts and numbers with a white pencil.  One heart is done with a pink pencil for the color chalk effect.

5.  I added some talcum powder randomly on the ticket and shook off the excess.  The video shows the Embossing Buddy. With a new baby in the house, baby powder is much more accessible :)

6.  Finally, I added some more little hearts and 021413 on the sides of the ticket to represent Valentine's Day.

Here is close-up so you can see the chalkboard effect:

So there it is!  It is not just for stampers.  You can do the chalkboard technique with the Cricut, too!

Have a great day :)


Designer: Lori Sjogren
Machines: Cricut Create
Supplies: Black cardstock - Recollections

               Pencils - Reeves
               Heart paper clip - American Crafts With Love Collection

Hey ya'll this is Trinity from trinityscraftingcreation.blogspot.com and today I have a valentines project that I had found on pintrest and wanted to remake it for a friend of mine for valentines day.
This was easier then I though it would be to bring it all together. I bought a 4 pack of those Starbucks coffee drinks that you can get at the grocery store and then got my hubby all wired up cause he had to drink all of them because I don't like cold coffee lol. I took some white spray paint and painted the carrier and the lids to the bottles and then when it all dried I used some of my valentines paper  from K&Company that I found at Michaels and cut 4 squares out at 3.5x5 and then cut 4 more smaller squares out at 3x4.5 but used the wavy blade on my trimmer to give it different affect. Then I took some plan pink cardstock and used my loop punch from Martha Stewart and made a boarder that I put around the box. I had to do 2 different pieces for that. I then cut out 2 hearts from CAC 2 from page 30 that were the accessory to the kola bear and those were cut at 2.5" and pop dotted those where the paper had meet each other so you couldn't see it. I also took some pink and red ribbon that I had and tied it up at the handle. Then I took some of her fav. candy and filled the bottles full and you would be amazed on just how much candy those little bottles hold...good thing I had bought the big bags lol. I appolize for the color...my lighting wasn't to good when I took these pictures, they are alot brighter colors in person.

Thank you so much for stoping by and looking. Hope you have a great weekend!

Pennants!

I am in love with pennants! One, two, ten! They are so versatile and easy to layer. The pennant can be fun or elegant. I think this is a trend that will stay for a while.

For my first layout, I used muted colors from the My Mind'sEye Lost and Found II collection. I used various pennant shapes and sizes. I picked out several papers that complemented each other. Next, I adhered the paper to my mat. Using CCR, I picked out different pennants using the Pretty Pennants cartridge. I cut about 20 pennants. Once I was finished with cutting. I took the pennants and layered until I achieved the look I wanted.

The second layout, I used Create a Critter cartridge for the giraffe. For the pennants, I used PP cart again. I used the same procedure. I just played around with the page until, I liked it. I might have went a little crazy colorful on this one. Thanks for looking! God bless-Christel aka scrapworm

ANNOUNCEMENT - Change is GOOD and a FREEBIE

SPECIAL ADMIN ANNOUNCEMENT - We have really enjoyed providing the Cricut FANatics Blog to all of you the past few months.  And we sincerely appreciate all the support of our Cricut Guest Designers who inspire us each and every day !

Some of you voiced your concerns about why the admins have been so quiet about the blog lately, we have all had some personal issues that re-directed our attention the past couple of months but we want to assure you we plan on continuing the CRICUT FANATICS BLOG !

We have been evaluating how to improve and continue the blog based on feedback from you and our own observations so we are making the following changes effective IMMEDIATELY:

 

• SUBSCRIPTION CHANGE -  Please re-sign up to follow this blog using the new SUBSCRIBE box on the right.  This change will allow us to provide you:
•  a WEEKLY BLOG BROADCAST sent on Saturday mornings with snip its from the past week so you can easily catch up (this will replace the daily feed now being sent)
• a COMMUNICATION PATH for Admins to remind you of the Monthly Challenges and any special announcements we have about the blog...don't worry, we won't flood your email box with messages...these will be sporadic. Its so hard for everyone to see these when we post on the message board so we hope this helps
        NOTE: You have until February 28th to re-sign up before we delete our
       current feed.  It's better to do it now while you are thinking about it :)

• FEATURE CHANGES -
• We are no longer able to offer a Special Guest Designer Monthly...unfortunately it has just proven to be too hard to find and receive the projects from these celebrities every month.  However, we will still provide occassional special guest to spice things up
• We will continue to offer the two Monthly Challenges - Cricut Images and Sketch. However, we NEED to see more participation to continue these...our admins spend a lot of time planning these for you based on feedback that you still enjoy the challenges. Our hope is by reminding you through the blog broadcast message will help see an increase in participation. 
• We are ADDING A NEW FEATURE based on your suggestions...TECHNIQUE TUTORIAL DAY...on the first of every month this feature will be focused on showing you tips on how to make your Cricut die cut images even more special !
•  We are asking our Cricut FANatic Designers to continue creating amazing projects to share, however, we know you want to see more Layouts, 3D Projects, Mini Albums and even more masculine card projects plus more. Keep sending us ideas, we want to hear them !

As a SPECIAL THANK YOU for taking the time to re-subscribe, we are offering YOU a PDF List of INSPIRING WAYS TO ENHANCE DIE CUTS for you to use as an inspiration starting point when you create with your Cricut. You will get this in your confirmation email when you subscribe.  It list THIRTY great ideas for you to consider ! NOTE: check your spam folder if you don't see your confirmation right away...add Cricutfanatics.blogspot.com to your "safe sender" list.

Change is GOOD...it helps us keep the Cricut FANatics Blog one of the best resources for Cricut project inspiration.  And please don't forget to show our Cricut FANatic Designers some love by leaving them a comment on their post...it inspires them to continue creating awesome projects for you to enjoy !

Contact Us at CricutFanaticsOwner@gmail.com if you have questions or comments (we fixed the address, finally).  Or leave a comment on this post.  We truly appreciate your feedback and support !

Admins:  Debbie O'Neal, Amy Sgro, Rebecca Maddux

TECHNIQUE TUTORIAL DAY - INKING

Greetings Everyone !  Welcome to our new feature TECHNIQUE TUTORIAL DAY by Debbie O'Neal of Scrap Me Quick Designs.  There are so many wonderful ways to enhance die cuts to give them that WOW factor !   On the first day of each month I am going to share with  you a different tip to help you grow your technique skills when working with any die cut images. 

Today I am starting with the most basic of tips, Die Cut Technique Tip #1: INKING

Before you get started: When using ink, I like to have a few basic supplies on hand. 1). A craft mat such as the one made by Inkessentials shown below that you can purchase online or at local craft stores OR you can use an oven splat mat from the kitchen department. 2.) Wet Wipes and paper towels for cleaning up my hands and my craft mat. 3). Ink and ink applicators.

INKS:  I prefer to use either Cats Eye Ink pads or a Ranger Distress Pad with applicator for greater control when applying the ink to my die cut shapes. Many other inks work just as well: Stampin Up, Hero Arts, Close To My Heart, Color Box, etc.  You can use dye, chalk or even pigment inks. Each gives you a slightly differnt look so it is a matter of preference. Play around and see which type you like to use most. MY TIP: You can use the Ranger applicator with any ink pad OR a foam make up sponge too.

 

Inking Technique # 1 - You can create shadowing by adding lighter or darker colors to your die images. If you use a distress ink and applicator, lay the die cut image on the mat, ink up the applicators and in circular motions start adding ink to your image. MY TIP: Use your hand or a tool such as a tweezers to hold the image in place while you do this.

 

 

Here I used the same color of distress ink and the applicator, and just kept layering the color on the die cut leaf until I had created some shadows to the image. MY TIP: Remember, there is no right or wrong here...keep adding ink until YOU like the way it looks.

 

Inking Technique #2 - You can add more than one color of ink to your image to add even more depth.

 

Here I used the Color Box Cats Eye Inks in two different colors. I started with the lighter color to create a shadow, then added the darker brown on the edges.

 

 

You can see that by adding two colors you get a much richer look to your die cut image.

 

Inking Technique #3 - Don't be afraid to add even more colors to your die cuts. Here I used three different colors of Distress inks, starting with the lighter brown, then adding the green, then using the darker brown around the edges to get this wonderful layering of colors. MY TIP: You can really get a realistic look on many of your die cut images by using colors that would be found naturally on the real images.

 

So there you have it, some INKING tips to add some pizzaz to your die cut images. I challenge you to give it a try and see what you like best.

 

My TIP: Practice makes perfect. Cut out a few die cut images out of scrap paper and practice applying ink to it until you get used to this method. Try different types of ink to get the look you prefer.

Stay tuned for other die cut tips next month ! I am working on how to video tape future tutorials to share with you. Post questions in the comment section and I will respond back to you.

Cricut Info & Supplies Used:

Designer :  Debbie O'Neal

Cricut Images: Leaf - Destinations Cartridge

Other Supplies Used: Inkessentials Craft Mat, Ranger Distress Inks and Applicators, Color Box Cats Eye Ink Pads, wet wipes and paper towels