1984

1984... no, not the book by Orwell! :)
It was the year I graduated from High School, and the year I joined the Air Force.
It's now also the first year which has no photos (that I know of) left in my photo stash to scrapbook!

Before I began working on a layout, I was hunting through my photos looking for something to scrap, and I realized that the tab for "1984" was nearly empty. I'd scrapped almost everything! So I decided to do an "overview" layout and finish that year up! So this layout is the result.

I used stash, Echo Park papers and brads, and some other stuff including a Charlene's Button Box button. The shape on the right was cut with the Cricut cartridge Elegant Edges. This particular shape is very much like the outer edge of the We R Memory Keepers Lucky 8 punch named "Vine Bracket". I like punches but I can't justify the expense these days with our tighter budget. So it was nice to stumble on a cut that can be used instead of the punch.... at any size I like!

Thanks for stopping by!

Banjara

Hello everyone!Today I have for you a layout of me and my dance troupe doing a dance I created back in 2006.

This layout is for the Left of Center challenge blog I design for. This time I wanted to do the alternative challenge of using punches, so I've used a border punch that is a design similar to my "door" frame.  The punch is from EK.  The font is the Cricut cartridge Jasmine, the "door" frame is from the Cricut cartridge Disney Princesses Dreams Come True (page 70, I used the base cut but hid the cuts inside the frame with my gypsy), behind the door frame is a pattern from the cartridge Paper Lace 2. The filmstrips are cut from Mickey and Friends, sized on my gypsy to fit the mini photos I printed (printed at 2x3, 4 to a 4x6 print); these mini pics are several shots of the dance as we were doing it, lifted from the video my hubby took.

I used Basic Grey's Marrakech line of papers from several years ago, obviously from my stash. :) I also had some bling in my stash that I used. There are 6 shiny circles on the pages, those are "shisha" mirrors... tiny mirrors that have been encircled by thread. Shisha are a common clothing embellishment of costumes from India, which our costumes are based on and many of us had lots of shisha on our clothing. I had some bags of these mirrors left over from making costumes and I knew I had to use a few of them on the layout.

Thanks for stopping by!

River Ride

Hi all! I have another layout using stash! I decided to use another shape trend that's been popular lately. I haven't been so fond of the chevron patterned papers... they are often too "busy" for my eyes.

Well I was looking through my cartridges for something to cut to represent water on my layout and I could not find anything to blew my skirt up. lol... all the waves I saw were just not working for me really as they reminded me of the ocean, not the river we were on that day.  However, chevrons are stylized enough that the image is water-like yet doesn't scream "ocean" to me. Plus, they are trendy. LOL

I discovered there really aren't just chevrons to cut on the 250 some cartridges I own... I found a couple but they weren't sharp or clean chevrons... more like zig zags. However, I was paging through Letter Envy and found a square shapeish thing that was made of chevrons, though they were deeper than I wanted.

So I took that shape from Letter Envy (key 14 shift crest) and stretched it out on my gypsy to width 16.25" and height 6.25" over a 12x24 mat on the gypsy (though I cut them out on a 12x12 mat).  This made the chevrons less deep and long enough to cover 12x12 pages.  We know that cutting on a 12x12 mat, the cricut does not cut all the way to the edge of the paper.  So I had to carefully snip at the edges of the chevrons to make them fully 12 inches wide. Not a big deal, but wanted to be clear.  There were more than enough chevrons to use across 2 pages, and I had some chevrons left over.

I like to look in my cartridges for shapes I can use to fit with trends yet not have to buy anything! A little adjustment on my gypsy (or use CCR!) and I have exactly what I need.

Happy crafting!

Cricut Info and Supplies used:
Designed by Michele Donner-Ramsey
Machines used:  Expression, Gypsy
Cartridges used:  Letter Envy
Other Supplies:  KaiserCraft papers, Thickers, brads

Happy

Hello crafty friends!

I went to a scrapbooking retreat this past weekend. When I go to crops I usually try to have a simple project or a kit to do first, to help me get into that scrappy "groove". I didn't have anything like that this time, so my first page that I made is simpler than is my usual style I think... however, I like it anyway because I used a bunch of flowers and buttons from my stash. ;)

The die cut is from BoBunny. The title was cut from the cricut cartridge Out of Character.  :)

Thanks for stopping by!

Witches Rule

Hello everyone!

Today's post is my first as a Designer for a new challenge website, Left of Center Creative Challenges!  Please head over there right away to see all the other designer's projects, they are gorgeous!!!  This challenge blog specializes in steampunk, goth, dark, grunge, Halloween, mythical, anime, edgy, etc. I really love the idea of designing for it!

The challenge is sponsored by Floppy Latte, who provided the crow-on-a-branch image in the upper right corner. LOVE IT!!!

So let me tell you a little about the layout. Of course, I'm the witch in the big pointy hat! lol  This was taken at work, my co-worker here and I were the only ones in our department who dressed up in costume! Everyone else were party poopers! lol

The papers are We R Memory Keepers line from last Halloween (gifted to me!). I really wanted to use the spider web paper as the background since my co-worker is wearing a web-y cape, but the die shape just seemed to disappear on it. So I glued the die shape to some Kraft cardstock and cut around it to create a "shadow" of the die shape, so that when I glued it down to the background it would stand out more.

  I used some ephemera around the photo, and the mirror is cut from my cricut from the French Manor cartridge but this mirror does NOT have a shadow feature, so again I glued it down to Kraft cardstock and trimmed around it to create my own shadow. I used a piece of adhesive-backed metal from Ranger for the mirror part, it cut just fine on my cricut!  I hand-snipped some ribbon for the upper right corner.

The raven image from Floppy Latte was printed on adhesive-backed canvas! How cool is that? I've never tried that before but it worked super well. I think the adhesive paper backing gave it enough stiffness to go through my printer. I took an edge distresser to the edge of the canvas to get it looking distressed.

Now off with you! Head over to Left of Center Creative Challenges and see what the other designers did with the challenges and then join in!

Thanks for stopping by!

oh and PS... everything in this layout is from my stash! :)

sketchbook

Hey all. Here's another stash project. Something rather simple, but that was on purpose.

You see, I collect inspiration from magazines and the 'net. Usually when I see a layout I like, I translate it to a sketch. Sometimes I even come up with my own sketches (not so sure they are really original lol).

Well last crop I realized that the sketches that I was drawing on scrap papers and such I had been throwing out and I decided I didn't want to throw out sketches anymore, even if I'd used them. Sometimes I scraplift myself!

It occurred to me that it would be very handy to have a book of sketch "blanks" in which to draw my sketches and keep them for as long as I like. I wanted the book to be small enough to keep in my purse, yet large enough to make the sketches easy to draw. I wanted it to be "nice" looking but not too pretty since it would be rousting around in my purse and probably get a little beat up eventually. So no dimensional decorations and no expensive supplies on it that I would regret losing.

Bonus, I got to use my Bind-it-all, which I haven't used enough. :)
The finished book is 6 1/4" x 3 3/4".

Thanks for stopping by!

WARNING - this layout is a little bloody!

Don't scroll down and look if you think it might bother you!!!  (really, it isn't all that nasty, but I know some do not care for getting squeamish from a scrapbook page, so I want to warn ya)

You see, my husband likes to take all the classes put on by the police department and fire department for citizens to get to know those departments. He's taken lots of training in self defense and volunteered for a local neighborhood patrol group for a while.

So the layout below is of pictures he took of his hand when he got shot by accident with a gun loaded with a rubber bullet. I wasn't too pleased when I first heard! But his hand wasn't too badly damaged and it healed up just fine. And it really was an accident.

So here's the cricut cut I used to embellish the page. Scroll down if you want to see the whole layout, just be warned, if you are the least bit sensitive, don't look. I found this cut on the Old West cartridge. :)

Last warning! Don't look if you get squeamish!  lol

Everything on the page is from my stash! The papers are Kaiser Craft, and they just seemed perfect for this layout. Thickers and mini alphas and a rub on (daisyD's?) as well. My hubby rolled his eyes and said, "you scrapbooked that?"  Typical man. lol

Thanks for stopping by, especially if you got this far!