Congratulations to My Fellow Team Mates at The Robin's Nest

I am so excited to make the design team at The Robin's Nest for a second term! Congratulations to all of my team mates on design team for this term! The are: Terri Sproul, Carole Lassak, Becky Conley, Erika Taylor, Peg Rounds, Irit Shalom , Kristi Parker Van Doren, Amanda Marks, and Michelle Cummins.

I'd also like to wish the previous design team members a fond farewell and thank them for all the wonderful things they shared with me and taught me! I will miss you on The Chattering Robin's blog Gini Williams Cagle, Jan Holland Hennings, Tenny D. Kusuma and Kristin Keller!

Last Minute Christmas Crafting!

I have a confession to make: I am a last minute Christmas crafter! This year, I have set myself an ambitious goal: an Advent calendar for my sisters. I have six sisters and I am making one for a sister in law for a total of seven. Along with the goal of an advent calendar, I have set the following goals:

1) Spend no more than $5.00 on each Advent Calendar! This is a family rule we came up with long ago to keep Christmas affordable and it has become a challenge to see who can give the best gift for $5.00!

2) Make it using the Cricut Craft Room software. I really want to learn how to use it and I learn best by doing!

3) Make it with the Snow Angel cart and my existing Cricut cartridges (I'm not confessing how many I have).

4) Get the best use of my paper! When I worked in fashion design, I made markers for cutting clothing. These are the patterns for cutting the garment pieces from the fabric used by the digital cutters. The goal was to use 80% off the fabric. I think that it is a great idea to use the most of my 12 x 12 sheet! Now some of the items don't take a whole page, and some take more than one page. I am just making it a goal!

5) Create CCR files and share them for others to make the same or similar calendar.

6) Finish on time. So, I think I will need to make 5 days at a time.

7) Not run out of ink! So, I will be supplementing my Imagine images with some of my scraps and some internet free printouts!

8) Pack myself day kits to work on while I have down time. So, for each day I print and cut the items and packed them in freezer size baggies. I brought them with me to work on in the school pick up line and out to crops. I even had a girl friend offer to help me and because I had them packed with one sample made, we got through 35 items in an hour! Thanks so much Tina!

So, are you with me? Well maybe you don't have six sisters, but at this price, you can make one for yourself, the teachers, and your relatives! Maybe you can save these and use them next year!

Supply List

White canvas 16" x 20" (Michael's with a coupon) Price $3.80 each

Red Wire Price per calendar $0.95

Staple gun and staples

White 12 x 12 Cardstock

Cricut Imagine

Snow Angel Cartridge

Cricut Art Philosophy Cartridge

Cricut Doodlecharms Cartridge

Cricut Winter Woodland Cartridge

Cricut Martha Stewart Seasonal Cakes Cartridge

Pop Dots and your favorite glues

Prepare the Canvas

Begin the calendar by preparing the canvas. You can paint the canvas, or distress it with some distress ink. If you plan on using white items on your calendar as I did, you will want to have some color on the canvas before you start adding your wire. Divide the length of my canvas (20") into 4 sections and mark it with a pencil along both sides. Then drape the red wire across the top width of the canvas, and at every one of the marks, stapling them in place. Leave a bit of excess on the edges and curl around a pencil to make it cute!

Calendar Row One: Day's 1-5

For my calendar, I planned the following for each line: One bible verse, one pocket and or box, one blue item, one green item, one red item, one brown item, and one Christmas themed shape or die from a cartridge. A decided to make most of my numbers up at the end of the project in case I want to move an item or two. However, I did decide to make up day one and Christmas day first and then work from there. So, my file for day one will have a number in it. FIND ALL OF THE CCR FILES AT THIS POST ON THE CRICUT MESSAGE BOARD.

Day one is made with Martha Stewart Seasonal Cake cart, but if you don't have this just do a search of the CCR for a postage stamp! I think there are over 8 cartridges with postage stamps you can use! I also used Snow Angel for the pattern and used the CCR to make the pattern bigger. I can't tell you how exciting this feature is to my CAD minded brain! I used Microsoft Word to make the verse bubble. Just insert a round text box and type your verse choice! I changed the color to the green default in Microsoft word and printed it on and HP printer. I think the color matches well! I then punched the circle using my Creative Memories circle punch 1 1/4". The scalloped circle is from Art Philosophy and is cut at 1 1/2". Use pop dots for the # one layer. Punch a hole in the top of the stamp tag portion to hang on the calendar. Here is the CCR file for you to use. Day one requires one piece of card stock.

Christmas Tree Day two: Just use some of your printed carstock at home that coordinates with Snow Angel and cut the tree with Art Philosopy. After I cut the tree I mated it on white cardstock and hand cut, but you can add your own layer to the CCR file.

Snowglobe Day 3: Alright, confession here...you will have to create this snow globe in several steps. For some reason, Imagine images on my machine have a color border that the machine cuts around when I try and WELD an Imagine image to a standard cartridge image. It is not the same color as the image, and so stands out. Since I wanted my girl in the snowglobe to not have this border, I took the time to print only! Then created a cut only globe file cut file. Now, there should be a method to make this all one file, but despite watching the video three times I can't get the layers to work correctly to make this one file. And I'm under a deadline here people, so be gracious! You will need Snow Angel and Doodlecharms.

Pocket Skate Box Day 4: Just a brown box cut with solid card stock and Tags, Bags, Boxes and More. Here is the CCR file for the box. Get your reading glasses out to score this one ladies as the smaller box has smaller score lines! I love that this has slots of ribbon as I have a ribbon habit. Now, the skates here are stickers, but I have to keep this on budget, so I will cut the rest with Winter Woodland.

Warm Woolen Mittens Day 5: You will just need Snow Angel for this project. And here is my switch up for you and new feature to try on CCR: change your pattern! If you look at the cart the mittens are green, but I wanted blue to balance my colors. So I swapped it out! LOVE, LOVE, LOVE this CCR feature! I also used the separate layers feature so I could add a little embellishment under my mitten cuff. Attach your choice of trip and pop dot the cuff to acomodate the bulk of the trim. I used some rubons and bling from the stash to ad a detail too!

Souvenir Keepsake with The Robin's Nest

I love to make gifts for the people I love! This year, I worked made a souvenir box/mini album purse using The Robin's Nest products. The purse is made with a vintage wooden handbag I picked up at a garage sale over the summer.

Above you can see before pictures of the purse, inside and outside. To make the purse into a mini album/souvenir box, I notched a doll rod with a saw and added round binder clips. I then nailed it to the inside of the purse. I created three pages one for each country visited using Italy Stickers,

Germany Stickers, and France Stickers. For the papers I used Ocean colored Fleur (on Germany page), on the Italy page, and for the France page.

On both sides of the purse, I lined the insides with Calamity Jane Stripe. I cut my lining a bit off on the left side, but added a bit of the paper, some ribbon and some Lullaby Tear Drops to make a faux beaded trim. I then sandwhiched a bit of organza between the side of the purse and the paper on one side. On the other side, I lined the purse with more paper, and added some adhesive hook and loop tape. To the organza I sewed some more of the paper and the other side of the hook and loop tape. The idea is for this side to hold some souvenirs such as ticket stubs, Eurail passes, loose foreign change, etc.

On the outide of the purse, I used the Ocean Fleurs striped side and pleated it to look like ribbon. I sewed it on to some ribbon that I think is by Anna Griffin and hot glued the ribbon onto the sides of the purse. I created a label using Glitter Gold Journaling, and Glitter Gold Letters. I hand cut around the journaling block and matted it on more of the brown paper.

I cut some flowers using the Ocean Fleur, and love paper using My Favorite Things Mini Rolled Rose and Rolled Rose dies, the leaves are just fussy cut from the brown paper. The tag I made with the Robin's Nest Veranda Love Stripe paper, and my Microsoft word on my computer, was used to print "Europe." I love that I can change my ink color to match my project!

Yes, I Do Do Windows!

Just had to try another window project with the Heartfelt Creations die! These are the only windows I do, but I do do windows! The stripe paper is Pink Paisley, the pillow box is Cricut Easter 2010, with the bunny hidden. The flowers are sequins from Michaels and the branch is made with an EK Sucess punch. Snow is SU, glue is Art Glitter Dries Clear Adhesive. I scavenged the wreath off of some Christmas wrapping from last year! I made this as part of the design team try out for Pink Paisley!

Celebrating Hobbies & A Birthday with Moxie

When I saw the Basic Grey Weekly Challenge (back on Nov 18) to use punches, I knew what I wanted to do for my sister's birthday card! She is to quilting what I am to scrap booking: obsessed! I knew that this card would be perfect for the Moxie Fab World Celebrating Hobbies Challenge! We have both been in love with the Cathedral Window block since childhood and both the Basic Grey page and my card was inspired by a quilt block called Cathedral Window. But, I wanted to challenge my self to use the Cricut Craft Room software to make this card and NOT use punches!

So, to get this look:

1) Open and Create a new CCR file

2) Plug the Accent Essentials Cricut Cartridge on one side of the Imagine and the Audrey Imagine Cartridge on the other.

3) Create a circle using this image from Accent Essentials

4) Use the Hide Select Contour to hide the middle scallop shape

5) Copy the circle and paste two times. You will notice that the copies appear in the same line just below the orignal!

6) Now select the three circles and copy and paste two times. And YES, they line up just to the right to form the grid of 3 by 3!

7) Select and Copy all 9 circles

8) Paste them and move them to the right of the orignal 9. I adjusted these to fit an A2 card size.

9) Fill all the original 9 circles on the left with assorted black patterns from Audrey

10) Fill all the copied 9 circles on the right with assorted color patterns from Audrey

11) Save and PRINT ONLY these images!

12) Allow the Paper to dry completely and flip this over on the mat!

13) Edit the original circles using the Hide select contour to show the middle scallop and HIDE the outside circle.

14) Set the color to white on all the remaining scallop shapes

15) Save your file

16) Leaving your original paper that you printed before ON the mat, send the white scallop shapes in the PRINT & CUT mode to the Imagine. Since the Imagine assumes your paper is white it will only cut the center shape from the original black circles.

Now trim the paper to the A2 card size and you will have two of these cards! I added a bit of ribbon from Michaels and an SU buckle. I stamped the sentiment with CTMH celebrations set that matches Art Philosophy!

Winner of Here We Come a Caroling is...

I used Random.org and picked a winner from the sweet comments you all left, and the winner of the Here We Come a Caroling Blog hop prize is: Kristan!

Kristan's comment was: very pretty!! thanks for the tip with the printer!

Kristan Getting Cricky Jr. DTM

Kristan, I will send you an email, but sometimes my prize winner's email filters block emails with prizes in the title. If you have any problems receiving your notice just email be using the contact button on this blog!

I am always afraid to be the first commenter on blogs with contests, but as you can see it can happen! Random.org really picks a random winner!

Clare's Entry for Case Study Challenge # 68

I saw the current challenge at Case Study and loved the colors! I knew that I wanted to get out The Robin's Nest Ocean Fleur and make up a little thank you card for Nancy H. over at Just About the Details for the Cricut Cartridge I won from her blog. I tried black with the teal and orange combo and thought it too dark, but I often used a dark chocolate brown instead of black. So, here I used The Robin's Nest Witch Accessories paper. I won Lovely Floral and had to use it in her than you card! I cut the circle in The Robin's Nest Distressed Honeycomb paper and inked the edges. I then welded the Thank You and the flourished circle together with my Gypsy. I hand stitched a detail around the circle to add a bit of white and then punched the butterflies with a Creative Memories punch. I added a few dots to my cut with the white Signo pen.