What is it with Boys and Bugs?

I don't know that I'll ever understand why tiny icky little creatures are just so fascinating to boys! From worms to rolly-pollys, to caterpillars and other insects, boys just seem to love them! Case in point--this layout about Blake with a caterpillar he made friends with on our vacation to California last summer.

This is more of the very fun Note To Self collection by Echo Park. The letter stickers are by American Crafts and Rhinestones by Queen and Company.

The journaling reads: "It is true what they saw about boys and bugs. Boy are just naturally drawn to and intrigued by them. Blake, you found this fuzzy caterpillar on our vacation to California and had a grand time playing with him one afternoon. You thought it was so funny to feel him walk on your arm and to watch all his little legs move in unison. I loved watching you be so fascinated by him! July 2011"

Thanks for visiting today!

My Brand New KitchenAid (Named Spencer)

Today I have a new layout I did for scrapbook.com using the new Echo Park, Note To Self collection. It's about Spencer's new love for helping me in the kitchen :)

The journaling reads: " Yes Spencer, you are my new “KitchenAid!” You have recently developed an interest in helping me cook and you can frequently be seen pulling up a chair to the counter so that you can help me mix, stir, and bake our meals! Spring 2012"

I just loved the colors and the element stickers in this collection. I actually made three layouts with it recently, not just this one. 

The large alphabet letters on this layout come from the Basic Grey PB&J collection and the baker's twine is by Queen and Company. Everything else is by Echo Park.

Thanks for stopping by today!

More Cricut Favors!

I loved the way that the shower favors turned out so much that I decided to do a birthday version of them as well, since that is the theme for the week over at the Cricut blog. 

All the details of this project, additional photos, and supply lists (as well as a downloadable Cricut Craft Room Cut file), can be found on today's post over on the Cricut Blog.

Have  a great Monday everyone!

Cricut Baby Shower Thank You Favors

**Update**
This project has been re-posted after being published in the Cricut November 2012 magazine. All the images are back. If you are having trouble seeing the images try refreshing your page and/or clearing your cookies.



Last week some super sweet friends of mine had a baby shower for me. It was a really fun shower and I was positively spoiled with fabulous girly gifts! Considering the lack of anything pink around here until recently this was extremely helpful! I wanted to have a special thank you favor from me to the guests at the shower so I made these little boxes to give to each guest.

The cute onsie box comes from the new Tags, Bags, Boxes, and More 2 Cricut Cartridge--a new favorite of mine! 

The cute little lady bug shape is from the Walk In My Garden Cartridge. 

This elephant and the zebra as well as the scalloped circle behind the animals is from the Creative Memories Stork's Delivery Cartridge. The papers were printed on my Imagine using mostly the Hey Diddle Diddle Cartridge.

The onsies were embossed using my Cuttlebug and the Juli's Garden embossing folder, and the tiny white tag is from the Art Philosophy Cartridge. The Rhinestones and Baker's Twine are by Queen and Company.

These were really fun and easy to make--even large numbers of them! I'm currently helping my mom make a large number of graduation boxes also from then Tags, Bags, Boxes, and More 2 Cartridge and I think I'm loving this cartridge more every time I use it!

Thanks for visiting today!

Headed To The National Stationary Show In New York

Well, I'm not personally headed there, but several of my card designs are! I recently made this set of 10 cards to feature Queen and Company's new Baker's Twine, Washi Tape (Trendy tape), and Goosebumps Rhinestones. 

I had a great time trying to come up with different ways to use the Washi Tape and Baker's Twine! Here I folded the tape in half and cut them into various banner shapes and layered them on top of each other.

Here there are more banner shapes, simple sets of matching strips of the tape, flowers made from strips of the tape, and flower stems made from the tape. I also crocheted a flower from the baker's twine and tied bows and hung banners with more of the twine.

Lots of the same things going on with these, as well as lots of punched shapes made by covering cardstock in Washi Tape and them punching my shapes. 

And on this last one I folded the tape in half lengthwise and then wound the tape into a flower shape. Another flower from twine sits on top and the centers are all glued down under a flower brad and button. All the papers on these are also made by Queen and Company as well as the other embellishments (brads, buttons, chipboard, felt, etc.)  I really enjoyed making these and I hope they do great at the show!

Thanks for stopping by to take a look at them today!

And P.S. I'm still waiting to hear from the Cricut Cartridge giveaway winner from the last post. So send me an email (gingerwilliamsphotography at gmail.com) Donna and I'll send out your cartridge! If I don't hear from her by next week I'll draw another winner.

Have a great Wednesday everyone!

Cartridge Winner and a Teen Scene Layout!

Sorry for the delay in posting this, blogger still seems to not like posting pre-scheduled posts and I just didn't have time to correct it yesterday....anyhow, we do have a winner for the Elmo and Friends Holiday cartridge! 

Congrats Donna! If you will just drop me an email at gingerwilliamsphotography (at) gmail.com I'll get that off in the mail to you! Have fun with it!

And just to make this post a little more interesting, I have a layout to share using one of the newer Cricut Cartridges, Paper Doll Teen Scene.

I did this layout for the Cricut Blog when this cartridge was released and it seems about time to show it here!  One of the things I love about this cartridge is that the designer remembered that many of us have boys! There are lots of great boy cuts on this cartridge in addition to the wonderful girl cuts. One of my favorites is the soccer player. Perfect for some of my photos from Ty's fall season of soccer last year

The title comes from the Phrases Cartridge, another favorite of mine. The papers are by Bella Blvd, buttons by American Crafts and Basic Grey, and the brads are by Queen and Company.

Thanks for visiting today and have a happy Thursday!

Happy National Scrapbook Day, and a Cricut Cartridge Giveaway!

Good morning everyone! It is very rare that I do a weekend post, but today is national scrapbook day and I have a giveaway to share in honor of it! Most of you know by now that I design for Cricut and occasionally that means I have a cartridge I can giveaway. Today I have that giveaway as well as a share of some work I did with one of their brand new cartridges, Paper Play. 

These nesting dolls are just one of the fun 3D projects on the Paper Play Cartridge. There are many others and all of them would be a lot of fun to make either for or with a child. One of the cuts is a 3D car that Blake has been having a great time racing around the house!

These dolls were made with the new PB&J line from Basic Grey. I loved how the colors and patterns really bring this cut to life.

The dolls really do nest well and are fun to stack together! I might just have to make one or two more smaller ones to fit inside!

Here is a look at some of the other cuts on this cartridge.

There were four other fabulous cartridges released as well as Paper Play, including one of my new favorites, Over The Hill. It has some really fun cuts on it for those "big" birthdays--and I think it would also be great for Halloween! You can see all the new cartridges and some amazing project examples from the other designers by clicking over to the Cricut blog here.

Anyhow, now on to my National Scrapbook Day Giveaway. I have an extra copy of the Sesame Street Elmo and Friends Holiday cartridge to give away! This is a really fun cartridge for anyone who is a fan of Elmo or Sesame Street, or even someone who isn't as in addition to the very cute character cuts, it also includes a bunch of wonderful titles for just about any holiday you can imagine. These would be very versatile for both card making and layouts. There are also several 3D bags and boxes on it that are fun to make!

Here are a few examples of some Cricut Valentine's projects I made with this cartridge.

I loved this purse cut from this cartridge! There is also a fun basket, some boxes, a star shaped bag, some glasses, and tags!

To win this fun cartridge all you have to do is become a follower of my blog and leave me a comment on this post telling me that you did so. If you are already a follower, then just leave me a comment letting me know you already follow! I'll pick a random winner from the comments on Tuesday night and announce the winner on Wednesday. Internationals are welcome to participate but will have to pay shipping if you win.

Happy National Scrapbook Day everyone!

First Beds

All week long I've been trying to find the time to get a morning post up, however, the mornings around here have been crazy lately and that had just not happened! So even though it's Friday afternoon, I do have a quick post for today. I'm sharing another layout made with the Baby Boy line from Bella Blvd. The hexagons and stars were made with the My Quiet Book Cricut Cartridge and the large letters are by American Crafts. Rhinestones and twine are by Queen and Company, border punch by Creative Memories, and tiny letters by Lilly Bee. 

This layout has a hospital photo of each of my boys. We didn't plan to take a photo so similar of each one of them, but it turned out that we did! I thought it would be fun to have them all in one place on the same layout so I could compare them.

The journaling reads: "We didn't make a conscious decision to take a photo of each of you three boys in your hospital bassinets, but I’m so glad we did! It is fun to look back and compare each of you on your very first nights, in your very first beds. I see many similarities and many differences too, but mainly I remember the feelings of love and awe I had for each one of you during our first nights together."

In particular I remember the first night in the hospital with Ty. Being a new mom I thought at bed time I'd just lie him in his hospital bassinet and he'd just go to sleep there until his first feeding! Ha! I ended up spending that first night as a new mom with him in my arms the entire time. He loved being held and would fuss when I put him down. I didn't really mind as I was so excited to have him and to finally hold him, but I did end up pretty tired from it. Eventually he learned to be a good bassinet sleeper, but in the hospital he really didn't spend much time in there! I knew better what to expect with the other two so the memories aren't as strong, but I do remember looking at them in their hospital beds and just being overwhelmed with love and awe. I have always loved those first few days of getting to know each other!

Thanks for visiting today and have a wonderful weekend!