Lollipop holder

A Cricut message board member asked if I could make a .cut file for a lollipop holder so she could use as party favors. I have had several requests for the file. Since the new E isn't cutting right I am unable to cut these to give a tutorial. Well I can cut them but they look kinda odd. I am going to go ahead and post the .cut files for download. I don't have instructions or pictures.

Lollipop holder Plantin - I think this will cut 3 at a time.

Lollipop holder George - This will only cut one at a time do to the dimensions of the holder.

My Valentine gift to my readers!!

Boy do I have something I think you guys will like!! And it is my gift to you for Valentine's day! Uhh minus the chocolate of course.....well and the paper....well fine it is just a .cut file but HAPPY VALENTINES anyway! HA HA HA

I was surfin over at Splitcoast Stampers today and one of the tutorials was for the cutest little GHIRADELLI SQUARES BOX-George. It looked simple enough so I had to see if I could make a cut file for it because I thought "OOHH PEOPLE WILL LIKE THESE!!". Some reason it took longer than I thought. I did use George for the whole .cut file.

For those with an Expressions I did GHIRADELLI SQUARES BOX PS that cuts 3 at a time. Of course if you don't want to cut 3 then you can delete what you want off the mat that says base. The other pieces can be copied and pasted if you want to cut more. I was able to make the scallop pieces a welded together shape for this purpose. I hope I said that right *okie confuses herself sometimes*.

STEP 1- These are the cuts you end up with. The base is on one mat, the strip for the patterned paper is on another and then the scallops for the lid, the front and the image square is on a mat together. The scallop shapes can be copy and pasted if you want to cut more than one. I did them as adjustable to make it easier to cut mutiples. The base however is NOT adjustable *okie is still dreaming one day of a selected all feature in DS*. The little square is the perfect size for those little Studio G stamps!! But you could also cut a heart or something with the Cricut that would fit in the area.

STEP 2 - score along the lines as seen in the picture. There are score lines for the top where the lid is, otherwise just follow the pattern of lines on the corners of the cut.










STEP 3 - On the back side of the box apply your adhesive to the small tabs as show in the picture. You can click on the picture if you need a close up shot.










STEP 4 - turn your paper over and then apply adhesive to the long tabs at the bottom of the paper. I think you can see it in the picture.











STEP 5 - here you can see where the small tabs are adhered to the back of the box long tabs.












step 6 - fold the front of the box up and adhere the tabs down to the side.












STEP 7 - You will want to put your patterned paper on at this point. Of course the patterned paper is completely optional. It wraps completely around the box.










step 8 - On the back of your scallop apply mounting foam, pop dots, or any other thing you use to give dimesion to something. Make sure it is along the bottom of the scallop square.










STEP 9 - You will want to adhere the scallop along the top of the lid at this point. I forgot to take a picture *okie gives herself a V-8 smack on the forehead*. here you can see why the foam needs to go along the bottom...the lid slides under the scallop to help keep the box closed.








And then you have your finished product!! I chose to ink my pieces before getting them all together and I also doodled on the scallop square a little, just added some white dots. I think this is suppose to fit 4 of the squares but I could only get 3 in there. Maybe because I bought the filled kind or maybe because I did the measurements wrong *okie shrugs*. ANYWAY I STILL THINK IT IS JUST TOO STINKIN CUTE!!

WOW I MISSED MY BLOG BIRTHDAY!I

I can't believe I have been bloggin for a year now! I just got to thinking about it and checked. My first post was Jan 26th 2008!! Where does the time go? I guess my blog is now officially out of it's infancy HA HA HA.

Thank you to all of you readers who make blogging worth it!!

CARD CHALLENGE 1-28-09

I found some sketches of PageMaps that I really liked and used them for this week's card challenge. One reason I chose them is because they are square. I love doing square cards, not sure why, just do. I however do not like paying extra postage to mail them! *okie laughs at self because she rarely mails out cards anyway...she just keeps making them and putting them in the card box*.

Since being iced in I have been able to get my cards done. I did do 6 of each.

I don't think we can ever have enough birthday cards! For the first sketch I chose to do a cupcake card. Cupcakes are somehow a bit addictive to me but oddly enough.....I don't like eating them. I would much rather have pie..MMM PIIIEEE *okie closes her eyes and licks her lips imagining a nice coconut cream pie...opens her eyes and blinks* oh yes back to the card.

I got the cupcake from Doodlecharms and the Celebrate from Celebrations. The ribbon is lemongrass grosgrain. I did use Diamond stickles on the edge of the frosting and the dots on the lettering. It looks brown on the lettering because I used Chocolate Chip Stampin Up marker to make the dots and then added the stickles. For the flame I used red, orange and yellow stickles. On the candle I added Glossy Dimesions to give it waxy look.

The paper on the frosting of the cupcake is from DCWV Glitter Spring stack *okie is still quite impressed with herself for using some of her pretty paper*. Here are two close up shots of the card.


















For the second card I wanted something that could be used for any occasion. I can easily add Happy Birthday, Congratulations, etc to the inside when I need to. I know the colors might look odd and believe me I would have never thought about using these colors together but I SSOO TOTALLYYYY CHEATED!! Someone had posted a website on the Cricut Messageboard that helps with colors. The website is Scraptitude and I highly recommend it if you are color challenged like me! They have color combinations for Close to My Heart and Stampin Up. If you click on the link you can choose which company you want to find colors for.

I used Plantin Schoolbook for everything but the tag, it came from Tags, Bags, Boxes and More. I added the strip of brown at the bottom on my own.

The sentiment is from my hostess set I got from Stampin Up and and the dots along the top of the card are also a SU stamp. I did use my Stamp-ma-jig to line them up correctly. I JUST LOVE LOVE LOVE THE STAMP-MA-JIG!! The little swirl at the bottom of the tag and the flourish at the top of the tag are stamps are from See D's Connetion Collection.

Here are a couple of close up shots.

Paper give away!!

A poor worker at Paper Trunk was left behind while the others went to CHA! So she is being sneaky and doing a paper giveaway!! GO check it out! PAPER TRUNK PAPER GIVEAWAY!

School is out and I am being productive!!

I had some LO's that I hadn't finished because I couldn't think of titles, or emebellies etc. But today I got them done! WOOT WOOT!

One I finished a two page LO of my DD and her friend, my DD won't let me post as she is in a swim suit HA HA HA.

I finally did the journaling for a page of my grandma. This one is on my blog, but without the journaling, think I started it like last March! LOL

I finished up a 2 page LO from when we went to Sea World when DD was 2 1/2. Didn't take a picture since I wasn't too proud of it, so not posting it!

I also finished this one....it is of my mom and dad when they were dating.



So that puts me at 6 for today!! Well okay not from scratch, but still finished!!









OH and here is one I did last night. It is of my DD getting her laptop for her 16th birthday.


If I get more done I will post them later!! WISH ME LUCK!!

XOXO Valentine card

I was attempting to cut the Pocket Slider Card last night when my E broke...*okie observes a moment of silence in remembrance*. So today I finished cutting them on my baby bug. I used the pocket sliding card that I posted a few days ago and then did some adjustments.

If you would like to make this card I have versions for both bugs. The POCKET SLIDER XOXO Plantin Version is set to cut 4 cards at once, but you have to cut the card base twice. The POCKET SLIDER XOXO George version is set to cut one card at a time. You can see directions for the card HERE.

I couldn't figure out how I wanted to decorate the card so I did a couple of different versions. Here is a picture of all 3 versions I did. I used George for the base of the card and the mats, Beyond Birthdays for the heart, Alphalicious for the XOXO.








Here is what the inside card looks like. I used Mini Monograms for the scallop mat.














Here is a close up picture of the heart with the bling. I used superglue again to attach the bling. I tell ya it is my favorite stuff for adhering bling! It is easier than mini glue dots and sticks like...well like super glue! HA HA HA








Here is a picture of the charm I attached to one of the O's. I found these cute little charms at Big Lots when I was there earlier this month. There were like 16 in the little package for $1. I wish they would have had more!

OMG MY E JUST BROKE!

I was having problems with scallop circles, they were lopsided. I called PC on Friday and they are going to send me a new E. Well it is a good thing!! BECAUSE IT JUST BROKE! I don't mean it won't cut, or won't turn on, or the keys won't work, or anything like that.......


I MEAN IT BROKE!!

I was cutting some stuff for Valentines cards and was watching it like I usually watch my Cricut cut and I noticed the blade housing was kinda swaying. The more I watched it the more the housing swayed!!

So after it finishes I thought I would take out the blade housing and see if something odd was going on.....I unscrewed the little thing AND IT BROKE!! JUST CAME OFF IN MY HAND!!

This is the arm thing that swings out when you take out the blade housing.









here is a close up
When I was cutting for a LO earlier I noticed the cuts were kinda odd in some places, corners were kinda rounded instead of sharp. Guess I should have looked closer then. I just wasted a piece of my precious Mica cardstock!!

*okie sighs deeply and is very very very very sad*

Motivation Challenge 1/24

I wasn't crazy about this sketch but I guess that is why it is called a challenge! LOL I think sometimes I look at the sketches to literal and have problems seeing outside the box HA HA HA okay maybe I am the only one who thought that was funny.......*okie looks to see if anyone else is laughing..no one is...okie composes herself and continues*








Here is my LO for the challenge. I chose to use 3 pictures for the LO instead of just the two shown. So I was able to think outside the box on this one. These are pictures of my daughters first spoon feeding. I knew the date and such because when I had it in the dreaded magnetic album I had written down the date and what it was...so I was scrappin when scrappin wasn't cool! HA HA HA OKAY YOU GOTTA ADMIT THAT WAS KINDA FUNNY!! WHAT?? You don't remember Barbara Mandrel's song "I Was Country When Country Wasn't Cool"?? *okie knows she is showing her age now* But in my defense I was just a young child when that song was out....well okay...maybe a young teenager. Oh yes...I was talking about the LO wasn't I!

LAYOUT INFO -
- Title is done with Wild Card and Printing Press
- Corners are done with Storybook
- Pattern paper is K & Company, a pack...can't remember the name right off hand
- Solid cardstock is just scraps so they are a little bit of everything
- Brads in the center of the flowers K & Company, other brads are Spare Parts
- Journaling is with Stampin Up Close to Cocoa
- Inking is Cat Eye Chalk ink Chestnut Roan and Creamy Brown
- Flowers are some that someone sent me...I don't know kind they are
- double sided adhesive foam to pop the pictures

I was going to put a baby from New Arrival on the LO but I put the paper on the mat in the wrong postion so the top of the head got cut off...and to be honest...I would rather not have the top of a baby's head chopped off on one of my LOs and I was too lazy to try and cut it again.

Confidential Birthday

Is what I am calling this card! I have the .cut file for Confidential Birthday Plantin version and Confidential Birthday George version *okie didn't forget the baby bug users....since she just now got the E!*. As you can see by the picture there is a card inside the card. This is an A2 size card.

The Plantin version uses a 12x12 mat and will cut 2 cards at a time. The George version uses a 6x12 mat and cuts one card at a time.

NOW...please note there are other carts used on this card!! Basecamp for the question mark
Graphically Speaking for the words on the front of the card but you can change them to something else if you like, just highlight and delete what you can't use and replace with what you want. Also the George version doesn't have the "you're how old" since I did it in Plantin and I wasn't sure what cart to do it in for George users so you will have to do your own if you want that saying in the card.

You can see the score lines in this picture. I did make score marks for where the card folds over, but not the flaps, you just score along the line of the card. Also the version I uploaded will look different because I goofed on the tabs on the one I cut, but they are fixed in the cut file.















These are the mats you end up with. Be careful with the sizes because they are easy to confuse. I do have them labeled on the picture and also on the mat in the order they go. The slide out card mat is just a hair smaller than the front mat. If you get confused on them just compare them to the picture and it might help. One way to keep it straight is that the front card mat and the side card mat are the same length.






Here is a picture of the mat on the front of the card after being placed on the front. You will want to add any eyelets and brads at this point.













This picture shows the placement of the side mat which is seen on the front of the card when it is finally put together.













Here is a close up of trying to show the adhesive on the tabs, the picture is a little blurry, sorry about that! And also how it looks after it is adhered.














Here is the front of the card with the confidential and off the record attached. These cuts were done with Graphically Speaking.....LOVE THAT CART!!















Here is a picture of the slide out card with the mat attached and then with the words and question mark put on it.















And here is the overview of the card. I did doodle on it after this picture was taken to give it a more finished look....and because I like doodling. OOHH THAT SOUNDS KINDA DIRTY DOESN'T IT! hee hee hee

Also used a small Happy Birthday stamp under the you're how old which can be seen in the first picture in this post. I think this one would be good for a man also, I always have problems with birthday cards for men!!

Okie's bug of envy...

Well I am tired of telling people I hate them because of their talent so I made a little something that I will post in projects on the Cricut MB instead! I worked for a few hours on this thing this morning trying to get it how I wanted it...hopefully it will look okay when posted!! LOL

So if ya see this posted on a project....you know I am jealous of what a person did!! HA HA HA HA HA

Flap Fold....big enough to mail!

I made this FLAP FOLD (PS) CARD based on the version of my small one that I made sometime ago. This one is big enough to mail. I double checked it and it is within the machinable range so it won't take any extra to mail! *okie is so cheap* I did use Plantin Schoolbook for this file and it is my first file I designed after getting my Expressions. The good thing about this...It cuts 3 at a time! Well except for the envelope, it has to be cut 3 times. I used the envelope on the PS cart also, and just resized it to fit the card...so convenient!!







Here is a picture of the card folded out. I used the cuttlebug on the top mat, the distressed folder. To help keep the card closed I used a velcro dot. I also cut a scallop circle out of chipboard and then adhered the solid scallop circle on top to give it some strength.

CARD CHALLENGE 1-21-09

I forgot to post the sketch for this weeks card challenge that I posted on the Cricut messageboard!! I guess in all my excitement I over looked it.

Here is the sketch for the challenge.












Here are my interpretations of the sketches. I actually used my E for both of these!! WOOT WOOT!! For the first one I used Storybook for the leaf screen. I used the Martha Stewart butterfly punch for the butterflies. The sentimetn is from a Stampin Up set. On the second one I used Plantin schoolbook for the scallop edge, welded to a larger rectangle. The ladybug is a sticker. The sentiment is from a Stampin Up set.

THE E AS LANDED!!

The Fedex guy came today and brought me my E that everyone so graciously chipped in for! I AM JUST TOO EXCITED!! I can't even cut anything.....I just keep sitting here looking at it not believing that YOU GUYS GOT ME A CRICUT EXPRESSIONS!! WOW WOW WOW!! Okay I will try to see if I can cut something though. I did get the Design Studio firmware updated for it so it should be good to go.

Here is a pic of me and the box it came in!! No wisecracks about no makeup.....I hate wearing make up! ROTFLMAO

My daughter said "you need to crop that circle out of the picture...oh wait.....THAT'S YOUR FACE!!". Have I mentioned I DO NOT like my daughter sometimes?? *okie cracks up laughing*

Kudos to Crafter's Companion!!

I received the Crafters Companion Top Score Board and Enveloper as a RAK back last spring. I have used it often, and I guess a bit too often as my poor little scoring tool tip has been worn away. Last night I emailed Gary over at CC and inquired if I am using the tool wrong or if it is normal. This morning I got a reply from Gary and he said they are pretty durable and he would gladly send me another scoring tool!! SO KUDOS TO CRAFTERS COMPANION FOR THEIR FANTASTIC CUSTOMER SERVICE!!

Blog awards...Thank you CraftyAnny

I got these awards from CraftyAnny over at MY PAPERPLACE, and I am trying to do the awards right. I have to nominate other blogs.... So here goes.

The Lemonade Award is given by a previous winner to 5 people who have shown a great attitude or gratitude this week. Isn't this a nice way to show other bloggers how much you appreciate their work! So here's what you need to do now.

1. Put the logo on your blog or post.

2. Nominate at least 5 blogs, which show great Attitude and/or Gratitude! Be sure to link to your nominees within your post.

3. Let them know that they have received this award by commenting on their blog.

4. Share the love and link to this post and to the person from whom you received your award.

For this award I would like to nominate
Softbrn at Softbrn...Georgia's finest - the admiration I have for this woman can't even be explained she works hard takes care of her 4 kids and when life doesn't always go to her plan she picks herself up and overcomes it!
Bridget L at Bridgets World - not only is she a super fantastic crafter but she is has the most wonderful attitude about her children and their dreams in life, she is the ultimate support in their dreams!
Jason at Scrappindad's Scribbles - To know Jason is to love him and his wonderful attitude on life! And man oh man does this man have a talent with paper!!
Robyn at The Pink Stamper - she puts a lot of hard work into her videos and is just tickled pink when people show their gratitude by leaving just a comment, and she is like the most awesome mom to her 5 kids!! *which okie surely admires because if okie had 5 kids she would have traded a few off for a new car by now*.
Last but definetely not least... Bren at Brens Designs - I know she won't be able to accept the award as she is with her husband at the hospital. Bren has gone through a lot in the past year that I have been acquainted with her and yet she keeps her chin up. Please keep Bren's husband Ron in your prayers at this time.

The Kreative Award, I would say is for bloggers that you believe are creative *okie thinks to self...well DUH OKIE like they can't figure that one out* Let five people know how much their creativity inspires you.

For this award I would like to nominate

Ladybuglori at SentimentalXpressions - she has made some fanastic projects, her latest being candy pouches, be sure to go check them out!
Scraparazzi at Scraparazzi - while sometimes she doubts her creativity...I NEVER DO!! I love her pet treat sour cream containers she made!
Froggita at Froggaritaville - This little frog is the most crafty little frog I have ever seen! She has some great projects with the BIA, and I need her inspiration to use mine!
Narelle at Myfaqcricutds (Cricut Lovers guide to Design Studio) - she does some of the most awesome tutorials for DS!
Capadia at Capadia Designs - what can be said about my dear dear Cap?? She is fantastically creative with DS and has the patience of a saint to explain how her designs are done *unlike okie who posts designs and leaves people to fend for themselves*. I actually think Cap must have a degree in art welding because the stuff she does are true works of art!