Wednesday, November 6, 2013

Pastor Appreciation Bulletin Board


October is Pastor Appreciation month.  Our church actually celebrates in September.  I believe that is because that is the anniversary of when our pastor came to our church.  Regardless of when you celebrate it, it is important to let your pastor and his wife know how much they mean to you. 

This bulletin board idea came to me on the day we would be celebrating, so I had to make it in just the few hours I had between church services.  Anyone who knows me knows that I am not a quick crafter, but if I was going to make this happen I had to do this in record time. 

I cut the sheep from the Paper Doll Dress Up cartridge and colored the detail using a black Sharpie.  I discreetly passed these out to the members at the dinner following the evening service and had them each write a message to our pastor and his wife.  I even had small sheep for the children.  I wish I had thought about this earlier so I could have had more members participate, but I think our pastor and his wife really enjoyed it.

*** (I finally replaced this bulletin board with the one found HERE.) ***

Sunday, October 13, 2013

Bulletin Board: VBS - Colossal Coaster World

I'm a little embarrassed to post this because as I was taking this bulletin board down, I realized that I never actually finished it.  This was to advertise our VBS this past summer.  I intended to put the Scripture verse and maybe some other related info on the bulletin board, but I had trouble deciding exactly what else to add and then I just completely forgot about it.  I was horrified when I realized I had left off the most important part!  Well, it did get a lot of attention, so I guess it served the purpose of advertising VBS.  (But shame on me!)


The "sky" background was some wrapping paper I found on clearance.  The border is a strip of tickets from the Dollar Tree.  The fence and gate along the bottom were cut from the Everyday Paper Dolls Cricut cartridge.  I added the Colossal Coaster World logo over the gate.  I cut the Help Wanted sign using CCR basics and put it on the fence as a subtle hint to fellow church members.  ;-)  The grass in front of the fence was actually a cattails border from Everyday Paper Dolls.  I used the cattails as the flower stems.  The flowers were from a small punch.  The ticket booth, carousel, ferris wheel, waterslide, and the roller coaster on the left are all from the Carousel cartridge. 

The roller coaster on the right is from the Summer Vacation cartridge.  I created the coaster cars by combining several shapes together and manipulating them in CCR until I was satisfied it looked like a roller coaster.  The reason I added my customized cars was because I was originally going to put photos of some of the church members on the rides, but then I decided they would have been too small to notice (and I just ran out of time and motivation).

The plane ride (bottom left) is also from Summer Vacation.

The lakes and some of the trees were from the Campin' Critters cartridge.  The other trees and bushes were cut in various sizes from Everyday Paper Dolls.

Most everything was cut out of poster board since they were so large, and I chose to hand paint them rather than cut layers.  It was a lot of work, but it was fun and I was fairly pleased with the overall result.
 
(See post about the Colossal Coaster World VBS decorations HERE )

Monday, October 7, 2013

Skeleton Shower Curtain

Since I'm getting back to blog posting and Halloween is quickly approaching, I thought I'd post this project from last year.  (Yes, I am really, really behind.)  I made this skeleton shower curtain for a Cricut contest using images from A Frightful Affair/Movable Monsters cartridge.   I don't really get into the scary part of Halloween, but I have had a blast with this skeleton!  (I hope to post the other projects eventually.)

The skeleton cut is from Movable Monsters, but it is also available as an individual cut which is what I bought.  Cricut had some of the cuts (including the skeleton) for free use during the contest, but when I saw how much fun I was having with the skeleton I had to buy it.

The bats, spiders and spider webs are from the Paper Doll Dress Up cartridge.  The shower brush is from Everyday Paper Dolls.  The paper doll cartridges are among my favorites.  They have a little bit of everything.  The rubber ducky and the bubbles are from A Child's Year.








 
 

Sunday, October 6, 2013

T's Giraffe Wall Art

For T's birthday you can never go wrong with a giraffe.  Instead of making her a card, I wanted to go much bigger (now that I have the capability using my Silhouette Cameo).  As usual I had to relearn the little bit I knew.  I really need to make time to use it every few days at least for a while so maybe the info will stick in this old brain of mine.





The giraffe cut is from KaDoodle Bug Designs' Watch Me Grow set.  I was a bit disappointed that you can see through the yellow contact paper I used, but that's what I get for being cheap.   In fact, nothing really worked out as I planned.  I wanted to put it on the wall by her bed, but the contact paper wouldn't stick to the textured wallpaper.  The only place I could put it was on the closet door which is partially hidden by her wheelchair.  After I started assembling the giraffe parts, I realized I was not going to be able to position the "arms" the way I had planned.  (I wanted them outstretched a bit more.  Also, there was no room to put the tail, so I just left it off.  I was hoping to change out the banner for the different seasons/holidays.  We'll see if it even stays up there.

If she could talk, I know T would tell me she loves it anyway.  And she would laugh.  I miss her laugh.

Saturday, September 14, 2013

Card for Wanda

Since it is quite obvious that I am never going to catch up posting previous creations, I might as well start with the one from today while it is fresh in my mind.  I made this card for a friend of mine for a housewarming gift.  I was unable to make it to the actual party (over a month ago) due to being on vacation, so when she invited our Sunday School class over I thought that was as good a time as any to give her the card.  I have been working on the card off and on this whole time, trying to learn my Silhouette software.  I got very frustrated at times, but I'm glad I soldiered on and won the battle.  Most everything cut with the Silhouette Cameo would have taken MUCH less time to just cut by hand, but I was determined to learn the machine and software.  I would learn a little and then by the time I got around to it again, I had forgotten what I learned and would have to start over.  (Ugh)

After the frustrating part was over, I had great fun adding all the details.  As always, the end result was much different than my original plan, but this was one I was actually pleased with.




The door is huge for a reason.  That was the main feature in order to place a gift card behind it.  I "built" the house to fit the door.  :-)  The window design changed several times before settling on this somewhat plain one.  The shutters were from the hen house Silhouette file by Jillibean Soup.  The grass was a border punch, as was the window valance.  The kitty, wreath, flowers, and tiny butterfly were various punches.  I drew lines for siding and roofing (can't really see the roof detail).  The doorknob is a brad.  I got the inside sentiment from the internet and just printed it and added a punched heart.

The actual card is just the house.  The "sky" and "grass" were just used for photographing the card, but I really like how it looks so I might just have to recreate it as a scrapbook page.  ;-)  The card only opens at the door.  I went back and forth as to whether or not the entire house should be hinged.  I even made the back hinged, but I whacked it off when I decided it was too flimsy to open the whole house (and I didn't want to stay up any longer to add more support).  Decision-making takes way more time than any crafting I do.  (Sigh)

Friday, September 6, 2013

Example

Just posting this example of Kate's Kitchen cutting lines to help someone.

Monday, March 4, 2013

Crowns



I made these crowns (ten in all) for the 2012 Christmas cantata.  Using Cricut Craft Room I welded a long rectangle and multiples of the "crown-s" shape from the Wall Decor and More cartridge.  I cut them out of gold poster board then glittered them and added sequins.  Here is a screenshot of my CCR file.

Saturday, February 16, 2013

T's Birthday Card

I made this card for my sister's birthday.  She loves giraffes.  I cut an oval in the front of the card for the giraffe to peek out, and I stamped the front with a few different leaf stamps.  The monkey is from the Everyday Paper Dolls cartridge, and the giraffe is from Life's a Party. 




 

Cricut Create-a-Critter 2 Contest

Back in September of 2012 (yes, I am very behind) Cricut had a few cuts from the Create-a-Critter 2 cartridge to try for free and had a contest to go with it.  This was my entry.  I had a lot of fun making it.  Here is the link:  Here is the link to the contest entry.