Jumbled Letter Pillow with Cricut Art Philosophy

Today's iron on pillow project was quickly and easily made using Expressions Vinyl iron on flocked vinyl and the  Cricut Close to My Heart's Art Philosophy cartridge

This cartridge has so many layers with all kinds of basic images on it, as well as some funky ones, like this jumbled letter art, which is all one piece (see above). They also have a jumbled number art that I used to make this gift bag below:

Back to the pillow:  I got the pillowcase from Ikea ($6), used one Ikea's pillow forms ($6) and then some iron-on flocking from Expressions Vinyl.  They have a great video on how to do the iron on; the only thing you have to remember is that the flocking is thicker and will require a blade of 5 and a bit higher pressure to cut through.  Also, remember always to flip your images with this type of vinyl.

Do you do any iron on projects?  I am really loving them - especially with the easy iron-on vinyl!

Have a great day!

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Happy Birthday Cricut Kate's ABC Bag

 I have been going crazy making gift bags lately!  It seems everytime I need a bag, I don't have one so I have been busy crafting up a bunch of them to have on hand.  This one was made using the Cricut Kate's ABCs cartridge and the Paper Lace cartridge (for the "Happy Birthday).  The bag came with the plaid background and the green top so I just need to add a front piece.

 For starters, this actually has four different cuts on it.  See below:

From Kate's ABCs:

From Paper Lace:

I decided to make a little scene using these cuts.  Actually, I was just going to do the flower and the "Happy Birthday" and it felt too plain.  So I started adding things.  I love the bees on this cartridge and thought they would be fun buzzing around.

 As you may have noticed, I love wiggle eyes...

 The mushrooms were actually supposed to have holes cut in them for the spots but those holes were going to be teeny tiny so I decided to skip that and just use white and black pen to make dots.

Click HERE to get the Cricut Craft Room file.
Click HERE to get the Gypsy file.

Do you make gift bags?  If so, what are your favorite cartridges to use?

I am getting ready for family to arrive for my son's First Communion tomorrow.  It's been a long road to get here as we've been teaching him the religious books at home but we're finally here.  And what's great is that he is so excited to do it.  His godparents (my brother-in-law and sister-in-law) will be arriving today from Buffalo, New York (they drove!) and we can't wait to see them.  I have just a few more errands for today and I'll be ready.

I hope you guys have a great weekend!

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Organizing My Scrapbook Room-Part 3

Just to give you an idea of where we started yesterday with the Cuttlebug area, take a look at the "before" picture:

1) This is my over the door shoe rack that I use for punches - very handy.  They just needed to be labelled.  For the Martha Stewart punch around the page sets, there is room to keep both the corner punch with the edge punch in one pocket.
2) Do I see a Big Shot AND a Cuttlebug?  Really?  Do I really need both?  I decided that I didn't and gave the Big Shot away to someone who had never embossed paper before.  She LOVES it!!
3) I got one of those Your Story packages at Christmas that they had on cricut.com for $15.  There's an old machine behind it.  I decided they were taking up too much valuable real estate so they went in the closet.
4) Why is this layout behind the bookcase partially?  Not sure...
5) What are books even doing in here?
6) This was extra stuff I was planning to alter.  I thought I would make those button trees at Christmas.  Do you know how hard that is??  So, that didn't happen.  I found room for them in a bin for altered items.
And, here's the after (for more info, see HERE):

Tomorrow, we're doing before and afters of this, which is adjacent to the desk above:

I hope you will share some before and after photos of your area!  There's nothing like the pressure of putting out a "before" photo to get you motivated!

Want to see more of my projects?
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Cuttlebug Folder Storage and GIVEAWAY!

I had been wondering what the best way to store my Cuttlebug folders was and so I asked on my facebook page and got the suggestion to make up tags that have each been embossed with a folder and then number both the tag and the folder.  That way it would be easy to really see how the different backgrounds will look on your cards and retrieval would be a cinch..  I wish I could find who suggested this because I think it's brilliant.

So, I got started by creating a file in the Cricut Craft Room using Plantin Schoolbook that cuts 12 tags on a 12" x 24" mat - they come out to be about 5" tall.  I just used plain white paper.  You could just do autofill if you want to use the cartridge alone.  Then, I numbered the tags.

Then, I numbered the folders.  I did these in groups of tens so I wouldn't mess up.

Then, I ran them through the Cuttlebug and stacked them upside down so they would stay in order.

Below is my Cuttlebug station.  (Please excuse the poor lighting - I meant to do this earlier but we had tornado warnings and sirens and black, black clouds so I couldn't do it.  We are just fine, though - relieved it's over!)  The Cuttlebug has the cozie on it and on the shelf above I have two large clearish boxes.  The pink one on the left is one of those "really useful boxes" from Staples.  It is the size that fits business sized envelopes.  On the right, I have all my dies.

Below is a close up of the Cuttlebug box.  I separate out all the Christmas folders so I don't have to keep going by them all year long.  The glue in the front is primarily a way to prop up the folders.

Below, I like to store my small dies in ziploc bags by manufacturer.  I also put those Tim Holtz Sizzix folders with their matching edges in a ziploc bag also.

Below is a side view of my messy die system.  It is easy to thumb through these, though.

I started out with my favorite Cuttlebug folders since those would be at the front of the box.  So, of course, Swiss Dots and Divine Swirl are the two first ones.  I didn't group them much beyond that, though there is a bunch that are all animal skin type folders that I put together.

So, here's the ring of tags and then a folder with it. 

I labelled the top of the folder so I could quickly find things.

And here's the ring.  I haven't finished yet so there may be a second ring.  I love the Cuttlebug and their price point is so low (with a coupon, $3) that it's like a cheap thrill getting the folders.  The folders add so much to a project, though!

Now, for a giveaway:

FOUR people will each win one of these Cricut Cuttables!  
This allows you to create your own custom Cuttlebug embossing folder.  It's very easy to do.

How can you win?
1) Leave a comment below telling me what your favorite Cuttlebug folder is and/or how you store them.
2) Subscribe or follow the blog.

Winner will be announced on Monday, April 9, 2012.  Winner has two weeks to claim prize. Allow four weeks for delivery.

Here are some of the questions I've gotten from yesterday's post about my craft room reorganization:

1) Where did you get your desk?  Ikea. I measured my space and then figured out what pieces I needed to buy to get the U shape configuration.  It took some thinking but I LOVE this desk!

2) Where did you get those pink and black containers that you put your paper in? I got those at Michaels. I don't think they have this pattern anymore but I do think they have other patterns.  I got the biggest sizes when they were on sale.

3) Did you do this in one day?  Ha ha - no!  It took like 2 weeks.

4) What are the dimensions of the cabinet that holds the ribbon, stamps, etc. that's on the wall?   31.5" tall x 25.5" wide x 3.75" deep.  I got mine at Michaels when they were 50% (they run this sale frequently). Click HERE to see the details. Their dimensions on the link seem different - you may want to go into the store to check.  I measured mine, though.

5) What happened to the bookmark feature in Cricut Craft Room?  I don't know - I will look into it.

Want to see more of my projects?
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Check out my Craft/Scrapbook Studio!

Welcome to day one of the great Spring Clean Out of my craft room!  You may remember this photo from yesterday and facebook:

Before:

After:

So, what did I do?  See the before shot again below. I've numbered the big areas that I handled:

  1) I consolidated this section of drawers down by purging.
  2) These are the Art Bin Cricut storage boxes - I'm redoing my Cricut cartridge storage due to the volume of cartridges I own (YIKES!)- that will be in another post.
  3) These were drawers full of scraps.  While I like the system of storing scraps in this way, it is taking up too much room on the desk.  I went through these drawers and cleaned out the scraps.  I got rid of scraps that were too small or of paper I just don't like.  I got rid of these drawers and replaced them with Jetmax drawers you will see farther down in the post.
  4) What is that?  It's a pink sterilite 3 drawer container.  It had contained punches and those 4.5"x6.5" DCWV paper pads.  I purged some of this and relocated a lot of the punches.  I wasn't using my punch space well.  I was able to put everything into the white 5-drawer sterlitle container next to it (more on that below).
  5) My Clip It Up with my Cricut Cartridges (more about this on THIS VIDEO).
  6) This is where my Expression was (without her little pink and white flowered cozie) and actually it is why I even decided to redo this whole desk layout of stuff.  The problem is that there is not a good place to put my computer since I'm using the Cricut Craft Room.  It's hard to put together the cuts since on the left, it is too narrow and of course, here, covered in paper.

  1) My Scotch ATG gun holder - love this!  I just picked this up at my local scrapbook store. I believe someone's hubby on the Cricut message board also makes these so you could ask over there for one. I need to alter it or paint it.
  2) The 5 drawer Sterilite container from above.  From top to bottom, drawer one has chalk inks, drawer two has stamp blocks and clear bags, drawer three has bling, wiggle eyes and twine, drawer 4 has iron on vinyl and extra ribbon and drawer 5 has those 4.5" x 6.5" paper pads.
  3) This is my cover for my Expression.  Kathy from Kathy's Cozies made this - it is quilted with two layers and very high quality.  She lets you choose exactly how you want the cozie to look.  You can see her cozies HERE and also order there.  I have covers for the E, E2, Imagine, Cuttlebug and Mini.  She makes them for all kinds of machines (including other brands like Sizzix, Silhouette, etc.).
  4) This is where I am storing my trimmer and Scor Pal (for now).
  5) These containers hold paper and paper pads relevant to the season we are in.  I change these out as the seasons change.
  6) My new funky pillow from Hobby Lobby (got it today - 50% off!). Chair from Ikea.
  7) My Clip It Up with stamp storage on it now.

Underneath my computer monitor/TV screen, I have a hook that holds my mats - very convenient!

Here is a close up of my ribbon and button storage.  Just pinning the ribbon down helped!  The plastic bottles for the buttons will not all fit nicely so I had to turn them and add a color code to the lid.  Above are my bottles of glitter and glitter glue.

I like to be able to see my stamps!  The top section works for those really large Martha Stewart punches OR her Punch Around the Page sets.

  Here, I have my full size ink pads close at hand.

And now my Clip It Up is being used for clear stamp storage.  I need to be able to see what I have and this is a quick way to thumb through them.  I should further organize these into categories at some point.

To hang the smaller stamps up, I used a few methods.  I got these sheet protectors from Staples that Martha Stewart makes (they have clear and this aqua color).  You can see more about them HERE. I like the one with two pockets as it holds two sets of clear stamps just perfectly!

The top tier holds lots of Close to My Heart stamps.  In addition, I reused some heavy duty envelopes I got at Hobby Lobby (look in the stamp storage section - these go in a black binder).

Finally, we get over to the paper and tool station (not sure what else to call it).  On the right, you can see the Jetmax drawers I got.  They are labelled with the color of scraps inside of them. Much more attractive looking. The open cardstock is easy to find.  The drawers hold adhesives, extra cuts I've made but not used, some embellishments, punches, electrical cords (gypsy, USB, etc.).  

The pink bin below holds all the 6"X6" paper pads.

I ended up donating my extra items to two of my mom's friends who are just getting into the hobby (the first one's always free...LOL!)

What do you guys think?

Check back tomorrow for the next section of the room - the Cuttlebug area!

Want to see more of my projects?
Click HERE to see my gallery!
Subscribe to Obsessed with Scrapbooking to learn more about ways to use the Cricut in your scrapbooking!