Creative Teacher Gift!

Lori here from ScrappinMyStressAway with my project for the challenge ~ 3 or more cartridges.

I wanted to make something special for Tanner's kindergarten teacher.  Mrs. Stock is an awesome teacher! I wanted to personalize something for her and kept coming back to a tile.

I started with gold vinyl, but the gold seemed thin and I had some issues with it bubbling and tearing.  I was ready to scrap the whole project and started removing the gold words and decided to leave the apple.  I kept thinking that a golden apple is kind of like an academy award for teachers.....so I kept going.

Here is my screen shot.  I used several words and icons from 15 cartridges:  Cheerful Seasons, Cindy Loo, George, Graphically Speaking, Gypsy Wandering, Hannah Montana, Home Accents, Home Decor, Locker Talk, Lovely Floral, Lyrical Letters, Makin' the Grade, Elegant Cake Art, Nursery Rhyme and Plantin' Schoolbook.

I opened a 12x24 mat and put all of the words and icons on my mat.  I started with Mrs. Stock (used a heart instead of a period) in the center.  I like subway art and wanted to make this look like some.  The words I chose are: discover, create, patience, inspire, transform, direction, explore, #1 Teacher, guide, adventure, learn details energy and 2011-2012.

It took some time to move words around and size them to get my final piece.

I erased the apple from my screen and cut out the rest in black vinyl.  

When you cut vinyl, set your Cricut to 3-3-3 (speed, pressure and blade depth) for a kiss cut.  I use my Cricut pokey tool (dental tool) to weed out the extra vinyl pieces.

I usually use clear contact paper with vinyl, but I was having trouble with the amount of stick and my pieces were tearing and not clinging to the tile.  I was getting frustrated not knowing if it was the gold vinyl or the contact paper or a combination of both.  I bought the ProvoCraft transfer tape and had much better luck!

I use my scraper to burnish the vinyl to the transfer tape.

I used my E2 and set it to cut on Vinyl.  You can see here that the blade did cut through the paper backing in a couple of places.  I honestly have better luck with my E cutting vinyl, but it is a pain to dig it out for one project!!

I bought my 12x12 tile at Home Depot.

  Here is my tile with the gold apple still on it.  I set the transfer tape right over it, burnished the vinyl into the tile and peeled the tape off.

Here is my tile all finished up!  I just need to get an easel so she can display it in her room.

Thanks for having me over today Bobbi Jo!!

Blast off!

Hello everyone! Tina Gale here back with another layout for sweet sassy diva design team. This time our challenge was a Fourth of July stars theme. I usually don't like to make my layouts before I have the pictures but because of how busy I've been lately with my husbands chemo treatments I decided to get a quick page together for photos that I'm hoping to receive of my son doing the fireworks for the kids camp that he and my daughter work at. I know I'm not the only one that gets things thrown at them that can put a halt on their creative time so I decided to share how you can put together a really quick layout that still has a wow factor.

I decided I'd try and walk you through my thought process when I design a layout and hopefully it will help some of you. Like I said before I never scrap before I have photos because it never works out for me. My photos are never the right size or their the wrong direction for my mats. I also get inspired by my photos so that is where I usually begin. Obviously that's not the case this time but I did start with what I know I want my photo to be of. My children work at a kids summer camp and my son works the activities. One of his biggest thrills of the summer is getting to set off the big fireworks for them on the 4th so I immediately thought of the great silhouettes on A Child's Year. This little boy riding the rocket was perfect! It reminded me of my son and the thrill he gets doing the firework show so that was where I started.

Next I went in search of paper. I had several different patriotic looking papers but this star background was perfect for my quick layout. Sometimes it's very difficult working with patterned paper that has a finished layout look to it. It can look very flat and uninteresting as well as scare some people to cover certain elements on the background up. The key  is not to be afraid of it but use it to it's full advantage. This paper with the glittery stars and fireworks at the bottom left corner was a perfect backdrop for my layout. It brought a lot of interest to the layout without doing anything else but to really give it the 'wow' factor you don't want to stop there and with your cricut it's easy to step it up a notch.


The next element is always a great title and you don't want to forget to leave a place to journal. I chose a great title from Graphically Speaking cut with red and gray for an extra punch.

For the journalling I decided to use some white cardstock cut in 1/2" widths at various lengths to jot down some quick thoughts. It adds some great design interest to a quick layout.

The next element are your photo mats. I chose this wonderful red with silver star paper cut at 4x6 for my photos and then tied some red, white, and blue bakers twine around it for added dimension and design.

Then to tie everything together and help pull the design in I cut stars out in various sizes from 3/4" - 1 1/4" from Graphically speaking and scattered them around the layout.

I also used my bakers twine again to tie around a couple of the stars for some extra 'wow'.

Recipe for Stars for the Fourth

Paper - American collection from the $1 spot at Target

Airmail Bakers Twine - available here

Cricut Cuts:

Fourth of July 1 1/2" - Graphically Speaking - p. 43 

Stars 3/4" - 1 1/4" - Graphically Speaking - p. 43

Boy on rocket 3 1/2" - A Child's Year p. 46

I hope you enjoyed my layout and find my tips helpful the next time you want to create a quick layout. Be sure to visit me at my blog for more great projects! 

Hugz

Tina Gale

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Graphically Speaking....Me & You Together!

Hello all, this is Tina Gale and I'm thrilled to be back again with a layout for the sweet sassy diva design team. This week my challenge was to work with the Graphically Speaking cart. I love this cartridge and have used it a lot for my sons photos. It has some great phrases and cuts for teenage boys! I decided to challenge myself and use it for something other than guy stuff and I'm so happy with what I came up with. I bet most would never guess I used GS for this layout at first glance. 

These photos were taken at our church on Valentines Day weekend by friends. We had a fabulous service about marriage and then everyone renewed their wedding vows and had wedding cake after the service. It was such a great time.

I have to tell you about the huge cakes in the background as well. I've donated a cricut to our church's decorating department and all the flowers on the cake was made with it. Remember you can always click on the photos to enlarge them and get a better look. I think they did a fabulous job with their cricut and the George cart!!

A close up of the title. Together did not have a shadow but I needed it to pop off the page so I glued it to a piece of cardstock and then just trimmed around it real quick. I also pop dotted it off the page.

 The border is made from 2 1/2" squares of patterned paper matted with cardstock. I had these fabulous embellishments in my stash that I used to add some bling to the page.

I added yellow rhinestones to the antenna to help make the butterfly pop and pop dotted it off the page. I also added a tiny pink heart to the end of the swirl.
This is the first time I can remember that I did not pen and ink up my cuts but I think it works for this layout.


The sizes of all the cuts are as follows.
me & you - 2"
Together - 3/4"
flower border - pg. 33   1 3/4"
butterfly - pg. 57    2 3/4"


I hope you enjoyed my layout today and stop by my blog to see more wonderful projects.
Hugz
Tina Gale