Welcome to the "What it Means to Love you" Blog Hop

Happy weekend everyone.  Many of you know we are in the process of trying to adopt our grandchildren and it has been a long and sometimes stressful road.  Since the hearing is soon approaching I was looking for a way to get my mind off some of it for a bit.

What better way than to papercraft?  So I thought I would make some layouts about the current men in my life, today I am sharing with you one I made for my best friend and husband.  The picture kind of symbolizes how we live, always doing everything as a team even when it would only really need one person to complete the task.

All the papers used are DCWV, the background page comes from Spring stack 2010.  This blue and green are two of my absolute favorite colors so of course I wanted to use those, so I went with changing the photo up to black and white so it wouldn't compete with the colors from the layout.

I designed everything on DS and used the Baby Bug to cut it all out.  The flowers range from Primas, to some from the $ Store, to the large green one being part of a cheap lei I had around.  The gemstones are from Recollections.

I started with my title, I had the Cricut vinyl in my favorite colors and used this for the title since the cuts were so fine and they really do come out better in vinyl than paper.  I wanted them welded together for easier flow and also placing them on the page.  However with no "auto shadow" available to me I had to first do the saying in regular script, then weld, then I used the shadow feature and lined it up on top of the regular font to make sure the spacing was spot on, then welded the shadow.  I have added a screen shot to show how I did this.  I used JASMINE at one inch for the title and shadow.

This is how all the pieces looked when cut and "picked up" with some cheap $ store clear contact paper to use as a transfer from mat to background paper

and finally onto the background paper itself

The hummingbird in the upper left corner is cut from PAGODA at 3 inches and to me it symbolized how with Craig love and our relationship I felt like I could still flap "my wings" and also be able to stay in a safe "place" at the same time.

The cage in the lower left is also another symbol of my "freedom and safety" with Craig.  You will notice there is NO door on the cage, I am free to come and go as I please, yet it is always there waiting with open doors (aka arms) for me.  This was cut from FRENCH MANOR at 3.25 inches twice, once in white vinyl with the contours hidden and once from blue cardstock.  I only glued down the 3 horizontal lines so that the others would cast a bit of a shadow for some depth.

I cut the leaves from STRAIGHT FROM THE NEST and hid the contours as they were from a vine type thing and it had no shadow.  And the finished layout with everything glued down into place.  I used Beacon's 3 n 1 on everything as it does have some wonderful staying power.

Below is a list of the bloggers taking part of the hop, if at anytime you get lost along the way, just click on the blog button (which will be appearing later) to bring you back to here and you can find your way back to where you were headed :)

Me <------------------you are here
Roberta  http://somethingformee.blogspot.com/
Liza  http://www.hooscrafty.blogspot.com/
Vicky  http://sassysscrapinblogin.blogspot.com/
Kymberlee  http://papermidwife.blogspot.com/
Sue  http://www.lifesgr8whnbugged.blogspot.com/
Bobbi Jo  http://sweetsassydiva-gspot.blogspot.com/
Michelle  http://paperaffair.blogspot.com/
Sara  http://www.snugasabugdesigns.blogspot.com/
Misty  http://www.abusyplace.blogspot.com/
Kate  http://www.sassyandscrappykate.blogspot.com/
Liz  http://liz-lavendarandroses.blogspot.com/
Laura  http://lauras--piece--of--paradise.blogspot.com/
Michele  http://greengirlscraps.blogspot.com/
Shawn  http://shawnsfiresidecraftingroom.blogspot.com/
Mary  http://www.marebearscraps.blogspot.com/
Cindy  http://www.scrap-obsessed.blogspot.com/

I will be choosing a random winner from comments left here on this post on Monday afternoon for a $25.00 Joann gift card, so please make sure that leave a way for me to contact you.

Thanks for hopping with us.  Remember to tell that special someone that you love them today.

Spicy Valentine Treat Box

Although DH likes chocolate, he's not really the mushy kind, so for V Day I made this little box with a spicy treat for him  **************I know that spicy is spelled wrong, that was on purpose for an inside joke*****

I used TBBM at 5 1/2 inches then measured the Slim Jims and stretched the length to fit leaving the width the same.  I used Sweethearts for the undergarments and cut at 2 1/4 inches (cut twice, once in red and once in velum)  I ran the red top through the CB and snipped the velum to look like an overlay and added some bling.  I doodled on the panties.  Spicey was cut from Songbird at 1 3/8 inch and welded.

It holds 4 of the smaller slim jims.  I also made one for the doggie with small dog chews, but he did not have hands, just a rather large nose and mouth so I have to make another one and try to get a photo before he eats it again LOL

Spending Time with Grandson

This week I have been spending time with my precious little grandson.  Such a sweet and happy little man.  I think though, that I am going to have to hide the key to my scraproom when he comes to visit.   Then he wanted to cut "just 1" and now it is totally out of hand LOL.

He also helped me get ready for a job interview.  I had to iron and he wanted to know why, I explained that they don't hire "wrinkled" people, so as I was sitting down getting my shoes on, this sweet little man come up with handfuls of Johnson & Johnson lotion and proceeded to tell me "don't go wrinkled nana" and put it on my face LOL

And today he had a little bitty scratch on his ankle from the doggie so we had to "cast" it.  After being wrapped up with an Ace bandage for 1/2 hour or so, he was "ALL better".

Here's his first time cutting, not bad for a 3 year old beginner
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FT0H4SPjmNA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aruKpC1OItQ

A little bored today

so I posted on the Cricut MB for someone to give me a challenge.  BugBytes stepped in and wanted a Valentine card?  Are you serious?  Me, with lovey dovey stuff?  LOL

Anyway I gave it a shot.  Got out the Gypsy and spent an hour from start to finish on this little card.

I used Heritage, LoveStruck, Sweethearts, EDPD and George.  The gate is from Heritage as is the little photo corners that I flipped one of and welded together with some straight lines from George to make the white little garden thing (ya it's early and I can not remember the name of them).  The grass stuff is from EDPD,   Hmmm I might have to go back and look at the design again, it's possible the photo corners came from Lovestruck along with Cupid.  I used Sweethearts for the couple.

Michaels Photo Entry - Little Cowboy Clock

Michaels Photo Entry - Little Cowboy Clock

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Michaels Contest Entry

So Michaels is having a contest (see details here) and I made a clock to enter.  Just waiting to hear back from them as to if it has been accepted or not.  In the meantime here is a picture of the clock

what little guy didn't dream of being a cowboy someday?

Glitter Clock

Cartridges used:  George and Basic Shapes and A Child's Year

Cut the following items one time each from heavy chipboard:
5 1/2 inch circle from George
6 1/2 snowflake on page 55 from ACY
7.85 inch snowflake on shift from ACY

In design studio I did hide contour on the cut outs on the tips of the snowflakes.

Cut the above items again 2 times each on heavy white cardstock

And the final cut is the circle and 5 1/2 inch snowflake on glossy white cardstock
the 7.85 inch snowflake on shift cut from mirror cardstock in light blue.

adhere all like cuts together, on both snowflakes I sprayed with spray adhesive and topped with chunky glitter. 

Holding all together to get them centered for the hour points, find center of design and use Cropadile big bite to put hole in the center (you have to punch 3 holes very slightly overlapping each other)

Now put the pieces of a cheap 6 inch clock (such as the $3.88 ones from Wal-mart) in your new snowflake clock.  The clock is light enough that you do not need to adhere it to the little black battery box, but if desired you may.  I chose not to so that I can keep using the same hands for seasonal clocks.  The clock is also light enough that it will hold to the wall with a small 3M mount and remove picture hanger (sorry tossed the package and don't remember the actual name)

 

 

yes I feel in love with this little lady as soon as I heard all that she was and will become. So I just had to try to use her to see if I could design a picture of her.

Not too bad. This is a prototype made with scraps and not completely dried at the time of this photo, but I think it looks pretty close to the real thing LOL

I used GBS and Blackletter to make her on my new Gypsy

Scrapbook page of Trenton

This is one of my favorite layouts of Trenton, being all boy. I used Base Camp for the lettering and Plantin Schoolbook for the stars using the centerpoint feature. The journal tag behind the large photo also contains another photo that I just couldn't decide if I wanted on the layout or not, but to me it was too precious not to have on there somewhere.

Yikes

wow that is one big picture, now to try to make them more reasonably sized

Trying to add some photos

attempting to add photos of some of the items I have made.