Valentine Cards

Happy Valentine's Day!

This post is a "just in time" post.  I hope your Valentine's were done on time!

Mine made it to the grandkids and great-grands with time to spare!

I ran out of time due to creating the recent birthday invitations for our friends and our great grandsons (see my crafting blog), so I ended up totally casing a card from Maureen O'Sullivan. 

It was so cute -- and with the heartstrings paper pack I was able to whip out 12 cards with no problem whatsoever!   Although, due to time constraints & a minor surgical procedure, dear hubby even helped a little bit with the inside stamps and the back stamp.

I prepped all the pieces and then commenced assembly.  You can see the pieces laid out on my work area here.

 

Out of grandsons and granddaughters, and nieces and nephews...we only have 2 girls so for group cards, I try to select "unisex" designs. And everyone gets the same basic card.

The card I cased used a different doily shape.  This one was cut from the CTMH Exclusive Cricut Artiste Cartridge. On the left of my workspace, the little pile of pieces is hearts from the intricate doily cuts, which I used as flat embellishments.

The circle is from Doodled Designs. The small M-stamps fit perfectly inside and it is so versatile. In fact, I stamped Happy Valentine's Day instead of Hugs and Kisses on a couple. The glitter trim in silver and blue was perfect!  

On one of the cards you can see in the picture of all, I used the paper zip strip instead of the scalloped border in White Daisy, but decided I liked the white better.

I hope you enjoyed these cards. The design is not really mine, and all credit goes to Maureen O'Sullivan. I just changed it up a little with what I had!

Thank you for looking!

Products
Heartstrings paper - X7193B

Mini Valentine - M1052

XOXO - M1054 

Doodled Designs - A1170
Artiste Cricut cartridge - Z1790
Glitter tape - silver and blue

CTMH Inks - Lagoon, Cranberry

CTMH Paper - Cranberry, Whisper, Hollyhock, Lagoon 

CTMH Hearts embossing folder - Z3018

Scallop border punch

 

Snowhaven

32 Cards from the Snowhaven WOTG

32 cards. I made 32 cards. Wow!

The Snowhaven Workshop on the Go Cardmaking kit has enough materials to make 15 cards -- Plus  -- by adding some sheets of coordinating solid papers, I used up every scrap of the B&T Snowhaven paper. 

It would have been very easy for me to use additional sheets of Snowhaven from another pack, but I limited myself to extra solids and what came in the kit. 

I made 17 extra cards with this method by only adding 2 and a half sheets of black, 2 Glacier and 1 White Daisy and extended the life of my scraps.

Snowhaven Workshop on the Go

Snowhaven Workshop Card Examples

I started with the 15 cards in the workshop.

Scandinavian Wishes

Card #1

Card #1

Santa Claus

The first card substituted Warm Winter Wishes,  from the Frosted Cardmaking workshop set and highlighted it with a silver-embossed frame from Scandinavian Wishes. Shown on the right is the workshop sketch, and on the left was another card in portrait with a few extra border stamps. The borders were from Scandinavian Wishes and Santa Claus. 


I switched up the banner stamps, too, as I was using them for post-Christmas Thank You cards. 

Card #2

Card #2

The second card was exactly as the workshop showed. Love it!  

The main image is in Glacier ink on White Daisy then, I hand-trimmed the "love" oval after stamping it with Cranberry ink and using CTMH clear embossing powder. The entire image is layered with Whisper cardstock. The snowflakes were stamped with Slate ink.  

The hardest part about this card was the angled trim, part Cranberry paper, part Silver Glitter Trim (part of the Workshop materials).

Card #3

Card #3

I didn't care for the sentiment on the oval stamp, so I substituted with an Evergreen from the Always Grateful set. I stamped it in Glacier Ink on White Daisy. Heat-embossing it with some non-CTMH glitter embossing powder really made it stand out, as well as backing it with black. 

The scalloped oval was made using a Spellbinders die. The glitter trim was also used differently, but it worked.

Always Grateful

The heart stamp in Cranberry was hand-trimmed, as well as Be Merry, Be Warm,  and the heart embellishments added the last touch.

Always Grateful is almost like having the SU Lovely as a Tree set...so many ideas to use it that I haven't explored yet.




After finishing the main cards, I challenged myself to use the rest of the Workshop materials. 

Using Up the Paper Pack

I tried the scalloped oval Spellbinder die on Cranberry to back the Christmas Tree on Card #3, but it was too big for that card. So I re-purposed it and stamped the Good Cheer stamp using Versamark and CTMH White Embossing powder. Loved how that turned out!

I then heat embossed the middle banner in Silver and trimmed it very closely by hand and adhered it over the white part. It looks much better in person.

The heart was left over from my attempts to make Slate hearts for card#3, and I put it to good use here.





Even after making 4 of this card, I still found myself with a LOT of scraps.

 
But...I had another card already in mind. I had picked up some snowy doilies while out Christmas shopping, and I had them stashed with this workshop because the colors matched so well.

My next 5 cards focused on using these gorgeous doilies, along with strips of the Snowhaven paper that were leftover.  I layered Glacier, then Black, whcih was embossed with a snowflake pattern (one of my winter favs - and non-CTMH). 

I cut the Snowflake from Art Philosophy.  It was very thin in some areas, and I ruined a few, but I ended up with enough. The blue ribbon is also non-CTMH -- Michael's dollar bins adhesive trim -- but the color matched so well.



The next one (left) used up some more snowflakes - 2 are cut from Artiste -- with white embossed sentiment on the bottom right. To do that, I only embossed the top part of the black layer.


Of course, I now found myself with a few banners and snowflakes and embossed sentiments left over.  


The scraps were dwindling, but I still had more.


 




I had tried a different embossing folder on Glacier for a background, and layered black, then Glacier on the next card. 

I used the last "big" pieces of Snowhaven under the sentiment and layered it with a black scrap. The silver glitter trim added the bling!


and still, I had scraps!!

It was killing me not to use them.

I used up the last of the patterned paper scraps on this next card.  

A layer of Whisper, then Glacier, and the sentiment layered on a small Whisper scrap, then very short banners - LOL.


 









I realized I still had all the little triangles from cutting the banners.  I had used a square punch, so they were all pretty uniform. And, viola!! Another card, and I managed to use that last heat embossed LOVE.

I added the arrow and banner from the January Stamp of the Month - This Moment. 
The banner is stamped in Cranberry ink, and heat-embossed with Clear.
 


I used a couple of other hearts that were still lying on my worktable. It's hard to see, but the Glacier background layer is embossed using the CTMH Heart Embossing Folder.

Finally, I had almost nothing left but 1 snowflake and Warm Winter Wishes and some layers of paper.

For this final card I broke out a banner stamp from the Artiste collection and embossed it in silver and layered it with Glacier.  It used up one of the last layers of black and I backed the snowflake center with cranberry and added a heart from the workshop.

At long last, I could say I have used an ENTIRE Workshop on the Go, with just a few additions from my CTMH stash and my stash in general.

I hope you enjoyed reading my SCRAP-TIFIC journey using every last bit of this fabulous paper.


Links to the products are below:

PRODUCT LIST


Snowhaven WOTG - G1085
Always Grateful - C1559
CTMH Cardstock: Black, Cranberry, Glacier, Whisper, White Daisy
CTMH Inks:  Cranberry, Slate, Glacier

Scandinavian Wishes (Oct 2013 SOTM)
This Moment (Jan 2015 SOTM)
Frosted WOTG (retired)
Santa Claus- C1567
CTMH clear embossing powder - Z2088
CTMH white embossing powder - Z2068
Silver Glitter Trim - Z1799
Cricut Art Philosophy - Z1686
Cricut Artiste - Z1790
CTMH Heart embossing folder - Z3018

 

Parisian Birthday

Hi everyone! Im catching up my last few months of projects! Enjoy!

In late November, I finally ordered the Artfully Sent Cricut cartridge and had a chance to play with it for my sister-in-law's birthday. She loves all things Paris, and this design fit perfectly. 

I cut the card design from the retired "For Always" and combined it with Slate. On the Artfully Sent cartridge, I used the "sleeve" setting, then hand cut it to size for the card. 

For a little texture interest, I dry-embossed the slate layer using the new CTMH Damask embossing folder. Black cardstock is the background layer.

The tag is from the For Always My Stickease and I used a stamp from the Artfully Sent Bundle,  {Just to Say...}, with Slate ink.

A strip of glitter tape (For Always Workshop on the Go) and a couple of flower accents made it shine!

Inside I used a belated birthday sentiment from the Belated Birthday stamp set (which I find very useful).

I was pleased to create a completely CTMH card using a wide variety of products.

PRODUCT LIST:

Artfully Sent - Z3017

Slate Exclusive ink - Z2173

Black Cardstock - 1386

Slate Cardstock - X5930

Damask Embossing Folder - Z1927

For Always paper (retired)

For Always My Stickease (retired)

Black Shimmer Trim - Z1809

Just to Say... stamp set (Artfully Sent bundle)

Belated Birthday stamp set - B1442

Fast and Furious Baby Shower

I've been absent from blogging again, so I'll be catching up on my projects today! 

I've been busy crafting but not blogging and I've missed y'all!

In September, before our friend's baby shower I was fast and furiously making cupcake decorations and invitations. The final invitation is here. 

I used Fast and Furious stamps and cut the gear using the Artiste cartridge.  It really is my favorite Cricut cartridge.

 

I was inspired by the gears to make cupcake decor. I cut some additional gears and used a non-CTMH stamp [TPC Studio,  Beautiful Baby Boy]. 

The stamp was on Outdoor Denim on Pear cardstock, but it looked so plain I punched some stars out of White Daisy and added them on top which really made them pop. 

I punched out the circles from Outdoor Denim in 2 sizes and then found the perfect use for my heretofore unused 2.5" Xyron. Running all the little pieces through to add adhesive helped streamline assembly so much! 

The finished cupcake display was so adorable! And the shower welcomed a new baby to our friend's family.

DEAL OF THE DECADE!!!

Deal of the Decade

 $10 Size D Stamps 

This year marks the 10-year anniversary of Close To My Heart’s revolutionary My Acrylix^® clear polymer stamps—and it's time to celebrate! 

With a qualifying purchase of $50 during the month of December, you will be eligible to purchase ANY C- or D-size stamps from the Annual Inspirations 2014–2015 idea book for only $10. 

That’s up to $7.95 USD of savings on a single stamp set! 

Plus, once you achieve the qualifying order total, there is no limit to the number of eligible stamp sets you can purchase at this discounted price. 

Remember, a purchase of $50 will also qualify you to receive the December Stamp of the Month for only $5, so if you purchase both the discounted Stamp of the Month and additional stamps at this special campaign pricing your savings will compound! It is truly the deal of the decade.

COMBINE THIS WITH YOUR CYBER MONDAY CRICUT DEAL and REALLY SAVE!

Seasonal Supplement is released!

Seasonal Expressions Catalog 

IT'S HERE!

The new supplement to the Annual Inspirations Catalog, Seasonal Expressions,  is here! 

Please note on the bottom of page 1,  the seasonal product icon identifies items that will only be available for the live dates of Seasonal Expressions  — December 1, 2014 through March 31, 2015.

The items flagged with this icon include the new My Reflections™ paper packets and their coordinating accessories, as well as the new Cut Above™ kits.

Contact me for your very own copy!

ATTENTION: CTMH CYBER MONDAY SALE!

NEW!  Artfully Sent Collection

AMAZING NEWS!!!

Cyber Monday Only: 20% Off All Cricut® Collections!

Artbooking Collection

For the first time ever, Close To My Heart is offering a Cyber Monday Sale ONLY on Monday, December 1, 2014.

It's the best time to buy Close To My Heart’s exclusive Cricut® Collections for 20% off the retail price.

These exclusive Cricut® collections make the perfect addition to any craft room because they are so versatile and work for scrapbooks and cardmaking alike! 

Each Collection contains the Cricut Cartridge and Cutting layouts, 3 stamp sets and accessories such as chipboard shapes!

The sale starts at MIDNIGHT (MST) on December 1 and ends at 11:59 pm Monday night. 

Share the news about this sale with all your crafty friends and family, too!

Enjoy extra savings on Close To My Heart's exclusive Cricut® collections this Cyber Monday!


CLICK HERE to GO SHOPPING!

Art Philosophy Collection

I have all 4 sets, and just started playing with Artfully Sent last week, and recipient hasn't received the card yet...so it will be posted soon...but a lot of my cards in this blog use shapes cut from CTMH cartridges.  

Artiste Collection

I absolutely love them all! 


Look through the blog to see perfect examples like below.






















This cute owl card is using the shapes cut from Lollydoodle paper.










 The gears are cut from the Artiste cartridge and the  LaterSk8tr paper.










These shapes were both cut for a matching stamp.

With over 700 shapes on each cartridge there are also plenty of extra projects, including 3-D cards and scrapbooking overlays to keep you busy crafting for a looonnnnng time!

So take advantage of this terrific Cyber Sale!