GRAD word books

I've been working on a couple of word books for each of Amanda's grandmothers. I did two books, but they are basically the same, so I am only posting pictures of the one for my mom. These are the first word books that I have ever done. You can cut your own word book with the Cricut, but I just bought mine. It was a more difficult process than I thought it would be. The biggest mistake that I made was covering over the holes and thinking that they would be easy to find later and punch out.
I also bought 3 different sizes of rings before I got the right size. I used the 1" book rings.
Amanda graduated from high school back in June, the book says GRAD:
I positioned the picture on the R page so that she could be seen through the G when the book was closed.

Amanda was in band all 4 years, so there had to be a picture of her playing her French horn. The picture on the A page is my favorite picture of her, taken out at TMS the day she drove a racecar. (Yes, she went 150 mph!)

On the last two pages, I put a picture of my Mom with Amanda the day after she was born and then a picture of my parents with her at dinner the night that she graduated from high school.

Card Sketch Challenge

This is a card that I made for the card sketch over at FCTSC. It was my week to do the card sketch! I used a mixture of paper, Stampin Up and Creative Memories. The stamp is Close To My Heart and it is my first attempt at using the SU aqua painters and Lyra watercrayons. I'm not an artist, so shading is not my thing, but I tried! (Actually, this is my 4th attempt at getting one that looked right! LOL!)

Hello Kitty

I'm not a big Hello Kitty fan, but this cartridge has some cute images like the butterfly, cupcake and cherries, so I bought it. The HK images are really cute! Shelly needed me to make her one for a project, so I thought I'd share the image with you.

Win a Gypsy

I found a new blog called The Gyspy Spot and they will have Gypsy challenges every week, but right now they are giving away a FREE Gypsy! You should check it out!

A quick card

Travis was invited to a birthday party today and when I got up this morning, I realized that I needed to make a card. I decided that I'd use this card from the Wild Card cartridge. When making a card using WC the first thing you need to cut is the envelope. I did this using the fit to page button and a thinner piece of cardstock. Thick cardstock will not work as well for an envelope. You also need to make sure that you use a strong adhesive, especially if you are mailing it! I used Zip Dry glue. Then I cut my card and the layers. The phrase for this card is #1 Teacher, but I wanted it to say #1 friend. I used my Gypsy for this. I measured the circle in middle and selected that same size circle as an image on my Gypsy. I then took the # sign and the 1 from Alphalicious and the friend from Graphically Speaking. I could then over lay these images onto the circle to see exactly what size to cut them! It was super easy, no guessing at what size would fit!! Once everything was cut, I used mono adhesive to put it all together! Oh, another GREAT thing about this card is that other than the sheet that the envelope was cut from, all the rest were from my scrap box!

Scrapbook Stores

I went with Shelly and Jannina yesterday to a couple of scrapbook stores in the HEB area. First, we stopped at Anthologies. This store is at 129 W Harwood Rd. in Hurst. It was their winter preview and they were having a big day! We did a make & take and got class schedules. Oh, did I mention that I won a door prize! A $20 gift card which I made the most of! It is a small store, but they intend to expand as soon as the space next door is vacated. They had a nice paper selection as well as Stickles, Chalk inks, and Copics!

From there we went over to North Richland Hills to Scrapper's Boutique. This was a lovely store! Small, but very organized. They had a nice selction of Cosmo Cricket paper along with Bo Bunny and others. They are located at 6714 Smithfield Rd. Suite 2. They will be having a big Black Friday celebration next week with make & takes and door prizes.

If you live in this area, you should check out these two great stores!

Blog Candy

Lori over at Pink Cloud Scrappers is offering blog candy on her site. She is a Close To My Heart (CTMH) consultant and this is her blog. At the beginning of each month, she is in a blog hop that shows the stamp of the month from CTMH. You should check it out!

Rock A Blocks

I got some new toys yesterday! They are called Rock A Blocks by Crafters Companion. They are blocks to mount your acrylic stamps to. They are curved so that you get a better image with your stamps! They "roll" the image onto the paper making sure that every part of image touches the paper. I am fairly new to stamping and I have a real issue with this, there is always part of my image that is not a dark as the rest and I have tried everything, sanding, washing, erasers, nothing had worked-until now! I ordered mine from a local scrapbook store, but I know that PaperTreyInk also carries them. They sell for about $20 for the set of 4. The packaging says something about RockABlock adhesive, but my CTMH stamps stuck to the surface just fine.

Here is a close up of one of the blocks. See how the surface is curved and there is a little lip on each edge, so that only the image touches the paper.

Card Sketch Challenge

Here is the card that I did this morning for the Wednesday Card Sketch challenge over on FCTSC. I used my Gypsy for this one!

Thanksgiving Layout

I did this layout for the Color Challenge over at FCTSC. The colors that we were to use were orange and green. I got the idea from Cherish by Jeanette R Lynton. I used my Gypsy and the Lyrical Letters Cartridge to make the title and date. (I distorted the faces of the children that are not mine.)

Saturday's Crop

On Saturday I went to a crop with my friends Nancy and Shelly. We always have a good time together! I got 9 pages done! (I know, I'm slow.) I thought I'd share a couple of the pages that I did. Keep in mind that I am still scrapbooking the year 2006, so these pictures are old!

Gotta Day

Halloween: I used some of the Core'dinations Black Magic paper with this layout. I ran one side through the Cuttlebug using the Swiss Dots folder and the other side I antiqued. I then used a new sanding toy of Shelly's to get the orange to pop up through the black!

Stampin' Up Thankful Card

I went to a Stampin' Up 4 for $5 class on Friday and we made this card. This is not my design and I'm not sure where my SU Demo got it. It was made using all Stampin' Up products!

I Miss You Card

I made this card for the Tuesday Color Challenge over on FCTSC. I used my new watercolor crayons and a blender pen to color the flower.

The Next Kyle Busch!

We took Travis to the Nascar Nationwide Race on Saturday. It was his first EVER race to attend! He has this thing about loud noises, so we did not know how well he would do. We have headsets to cover out ears and allow us to talk to one another; about 1/3 into the race he pushed his talk button and looked at his Dad and said "This is cool! Can I come tomorrow?" Now, he is truly a member of our family! LOL!

Gotcha Day!

Today is Gotcha Day at our house! We celebrate it just like you would a birthday, only without the cake! Here is the card that I made for Travis. This card was also my first attempt at doing a card sketch for a message board. I will be doing the Wednesday Card sketch every third week (along with two other wonderful ladies) at From C to Shining C. You should check it out!

Thinking of You card using Gypsy

Here is the card that I made today using my Gypsy! It is for a neighbor who is going through a rough patch. I got the sketch from the Mojo Monday-Blog a few weeks ago. I learned today that with the Gypsy you can cut in any size. You are not limited by the quarter inch increments like your are on the Cricut. The scallop circle is cut at 2.35!

My 1st Project with the Gypsy

I just got my Gypsy on Tuesday! I just had to make a project using it! I made a Thanksgiving card using Paper Doll Dress Up. Here is my first project using my Gypsy:

Something New

I decided to try something new and start a blog. It will mostly be for posting my latest crafts, but you never know what you'll find!