Cute and Foxy

I am slowly learning how to use my Cricut Explore Air 2...very slowly.

Luckily for me, there are a lot of crafters posting tutorials, tips and tricks and (best of all!) free SVG files for Cricut. I was immediately enchanted by this adorable fox design and was inspired to put it to use on at least two cards. The one above is the card I made for my eighth aunt's baby shower. I just modified the size make the fox cub. I also put together an engagement card for a distant cousin.

I love using paint chips for the variety of colours that they offer and the fact they come in small swatches so I am not wasting a large sheet each time.

Hopefully, when I am more comfortable using the design program, I can start designing my own images to share!

Is it not a beautiful piece of technology? ;) 

Bear-y Cute Cards

I was cleaning up my basement the other day when I stumbled upon an old sheet of adorable bear stickers. The glue had lost most of its stickiness but the colours were not faded and the images were still incredibly cute. I decided to whip together this quick set of baby cards.

I used the pre-cut cards from Card Smith as a base. Each one had their own envelope which made for a nice set. 

I love the ombre you get from paint chips! I picked colours which match my patterned card.

I cut out squares/rectangles with a utility knife.

I played around with a few different arrangements but I liked this one best.

I mounted each square on a small piece of craft foam to achieve a 3D effect.

The final product was simple, clean and adorable!

I'm all ready for my next 3 baby showers!

More Babies!

I had almost forgotten about this card. A family friend had a baby boy while I was neck deep studying for my exams. A simple card was all I could manage at the time but it was a nice break from memorizing genes and biochemical pathways. :)

Showers, showers and more showers...

The advantage to being a crafting pack rat is that if you need to throw something together at the last minute, you almost always have everything you need right on hand. (Provided that you organize your supplies of course - which I do.) 

My co-worker had a baby shower last Sunday and I was in charge of purchasing and packaging the gift. Unfortunately, I didn't have time for the packaging part until just before the shower. The only wrapping paper designs I had on hand were Christmas ones and I thought that Santas and reindeer would look a little odd on a gift given in July. That's when punches and stickers came to the rescue! And newsprint. Oh, by the way, did you know that the Ottawa Citizen gives away the end rolls for free? Yep. All you need to do is call them and ask. I carted away three:

That's probably a good few hundred feet of paper right there. They are pretty heavy - I had to use a trolley to get them to my car. 

I wrapped the present in newsprint (it was The Original Baby Bullet in case you were wondering) and then pulled out my gel pens and coloured papers and got to work. As part of the Sizzix set I bought at that garage sale a few months back, I got die of a foot. I punched a whole bunch of them in bright printer paper and glued them in pairs on the corners of the present. I had thought of making a more random scattering of feet all over but I just couldn't arrange them to my satisfaction. 

Okay, not my best pictures but I was in a rush.

The card was just a strip of cardstock with a sticker on it and piece of white paper inside. The bow was made of strips of white paper with "Congratulations Tugce & Yener!" written over and over on them. A little tape, a little glue and I was done and ready to go!

It's a Girl!

Having already made an It's a Boy! card, naturally, I needed to make an It's a Girl! version. This one is for some friends whose daughter was just born two weeks ago. I got the chance to play with my Sizzix for the first time and I love it! I'm already making a list of all the new dies and folders that I want to get for it. (Yes, cardmaking is an expensive hobby if you really get into it...which I have.)

I decided to take some in-progress shots while making this card so you can follow along. The design is pretty simple so it only took me an hour to complete.

I started with an envelope. I have a whole shoebox of random envelopes which my mother has amassed over the years. Pack-rat tendencies are inherited :)

I then measure out a piece of cardstock to fit the envelope.

I try to maximize any piece of cardstock I use to reduce waste. (I also want to have as much space to work with as possible.)

I scored along the centre fold with the tip of an empty mechanical pencil. When you are using cardstock, scoring is an important technique to make sure that your fold is as accurate as possible. 

The sheet was then cut down to size. 

I folded along the scored centre line. For thick card, I recommend wetting the score line slightly so that the paper does not fray or crack when folded. Use only the tiniest bit of water though - you don't want your paper to warp.

I used a Martha Stewart Classic Butterfly punch to create ombre pink butterflies from paint chips.

1 paint chip = 17 butterflies :)

Out came the Sizzix! I punched out some trendy letters with one of my many letter dies set. This machine was such a bargain! 

I positioned all of the elements onto the cardstock and then sketched in the rest of my design. I borrowed the image from one of the sticker packs I bought from Dollarama.

With everything glued down and my doodle drawn in black fine liner, here is the final result!

I actually made this card a few weeks ago and it has been proudly sitting in my display case for the last little while. The choice of pink was deliberate since my sister has already purchased a cute pink jacket for the baby. So far, all our baby shower gifts have been accompanied by a coordinating card and I really didn't want to break that trend.

Of course, I need to add my signature.

I liked the design so much and it was so quick and easy to make that I threw together a purple version as well.

I used a smaller paintchip which is why there aren't as many butterflies. 

I have another friend who is now pregnant (it's like an epidemic :P) but she wants the sex of the baby to be a surprise. I guess my next card is just going to have to say "It's a Baby!" :)

It's a Boy!

Now I'm sure you've all been waiting with baited breath to find out what I made during our Sunday of crafting back in November. Here it is!

Worth the wait? Okay, probably not but my last post had been getting a little long and I had wanted to save some crafts to post this year.

One of the residents in my program is pregnant and so I made a card for her baby shower (which I assume she will be having...I'm actually not sure...). She's not due for months but I had this idea floating around in my head at the time and I wanted to catch that inspiration. Overall, the design is very simple but I like the whimsy of it.

While wandering through Dollarama one day, I caved in and bought these sticker letter sets. At last I actually use them.

I thought about just using pen to draw in the strings but I thought, 'What the heck! Let's go all out and actually tie a string to each balloon.' A tad tricky but do-able. 

I've got another friend who is also pregnant but with a girl this time. Time to start on another card!

Baby Showers! So Cute...

Two weeks ago, a friend had a baby shower. My sister and I bought her a plush giraffe with a matching blanket. We found out from my friend’s sister-in-law that the gift would match their nursery which had a large giraffe sticker on the wall. Well, to make it a complete matching set,  of course I had to make a giraffe card to go with it!

I copied the giraffe from a baby shower card I saw on the internet. Animals and pastel colours are the staple of baby-related paraphernalia. I can see why: the combination is so adorable!  The next time I draw a cartoon for a card though, I'll be sure to use a thicker pen for the outlines. I used a thin line sharpie the first time and then tried to thicken things with a brush pen. I have mixed feelings about the result. I coloured the giraffe in with coloured pencil and keenly felt my lack of practise. The finished image was not as smooth as I would have liked however, I do like the blended colours. Overall, I am quite pleased with how cute he is. I added a stamped sprig of leaves to balance things out.

I used Disney font for the words and freehanded them. If I had planned things out a little better, I would have left a wider yellow strip on the left. Luckily, I could still get everything to fit properly on the card. Lesson learned: plan out card before gluing any of the elements down.

I am fond of cards that open horizontally. 

A stamped element inside the card livens things up doesn't it?

The previous two pictures were scanned but these two were taken by my camera.

I think my card looks a little better in the photos than the scans because you cannot see the subtle imperfections. (Ah, the wonders of a little lack of clarity ; P)

Materials: Pastel yellow cardstock, white cardstock, green with white polka dots acid free paper from the amy tangerine® American Crafts™ paper pad,

Tools:  scissors, ruler, Exacto knife, Recollections™ clear stamps, coloured pencils, Martha Stewart Crafts™ stamps

Time to Make: 2.5 hours

I had not pulled out my card making supplies in a while and so I was a little surprised to see how much I had. I really should not be since I bought it all *grin*. Clearly, this is a sign I really need to craft more to bring down my stash.