Spring Choir

In January Ty came to me to ask if he could join the school choir. I was completely taken by surprise. He had never shown much interest in singing before and had a difficult time singing in key! However his music teacher at his new school is a very fun and sweet lady that Ty has really come to love. She has made music and singing something that Ty really loves now and I'm so glad she convinced him to join the choir! Amazing the difference a good teacher can make in how much a child will love something! 

All spring Ty went to early morning practices and had several performances. We loved going to all of them and were so proud of Ty's hard work and improvement. Ty is very excited to start choir up again in the fall!

So here is my layout about it. It uses my new favorite Basic Grey line PB&J!

There are also several Echo Park Stickers and some American Crafts Letters on this layout. 

The journaling reads: "It really surprised me Ty, when you announced that you wanted to join the school choir this year! I’m so glad that you did though! It has been so fun to watch you learn and enjoy this new hobby. We have loved attending your concerts and seeing you develop a love and passion for music. These photos are from your spring concerts including the children’s music festival where your choir earned a gigantic trophy that you were very proud of! Spring 2012"

Thanks for stopping by today!

A Cricut Quilted Christmas and a Stamping System Winner!

Hi everyone! Sorry for the long break, we had a family reunion last week and I thought I'd be able to sneak a couple of posts in during all the fun we were having, but things were so busy and we stayed up waaaaaay too late for me to even think about blogging! Anyhow I have a couple of things to share today and up first is a set of stocking hangers I created for the Cricut Blog with one of Cricut's newest cartridges, A Quilted Christmas.

I saw a cute idea to make stocking hangers out of 2x4s on Pinterest and thought that idea would be a perfect  base for these adorable cuts from this cartridge.

In addition to the Quilted Christmas cuts, I added some flowers to the base of each stocking holder made from the Flower Shoppe Cartridge.

I cant wait to display these along with some new stocking this Christmas--now I just have to make 4 more for the kids stockings to hang on! 

Here is a quick look at a few of the other super fun cuts on this cartridge.

Here is another project I made, a Christmas card.

I love the beautiful and elegant card feature on this cartridge. The bottom of my card shows one of these card cuts. 

The sentiment is cut from the 'Tis The Season Cartridge by Creative Memories.

The patterned papers, and ribbon for these projects are all by Chatterbox, and the Cardstock is all by Creative Memories.

And now on to the winner of the Stamping System giveaway by Creative Memories. The random winner is:

Congrats Sunnie! I hope you have a great time creating with them!

Thanks for vising today everyone!

In A Growth Spurt?

Happy Friday! Today I just have a little share of a layout I did for Scrapbook.com with some of the new Echo Park Note To Self line. It's about Spencer and his ability to fall asleep just about anywhere when he is in a growth spurt. He normally doesn't take naps, but now and then he will start a period of falling asleep in the late afternoon no matter where he is!

The journaling reads: "I can usually tell when you hit a growth spurt Spencer, not only because I see a sudden need to up-size your wardrobe, but also because you start to take little naps all over the house when I least expect it. Last fall I found you asleep on the couch many times, usually right in the middle of playing on your ipad or watching a movie. I even found you sacked out one Sunday afternoon on the couch with grandpa. It was always funny to see what position you would end up in before I carefully rearranged you. Fall 2011

Thanks for visiting...and be sure and comment on the below post by midnight (CST) tonight for a chance to win the Stamping System prize. It's a really great prize!!!!  

Have a great weekend!

Big Stamping Giveaway!

Good morning everyone! I'm really excited about my post today as I have a chance to giveaway an entire Creative Memories Stamping System  prize package and show some examples I made with it!

Stamping is something new for Creative Memories and is something I was really excited about when I first heard that they were coming out with a new stamping tool. My Creative Memories tools are always at the top of my favorite tools list because they are such high quality. They are always very thoughtfully made--and made to last! This new one is no exception. I love it!

Here are a couple of cards I recently made with it.

And here is a look at the system. It starts with their stamp positioner which make is super easy to get perfect stamped images every time--no flaws!

The stamps come in four different sets, each with a different theme.

Be Young, which matches their awesome Be Young line and new Be Young Cricut Cartridge.

Birthday Set

 For Her Set

 For Him Set

 The stamps can be used by themselves or paired with an outer ring. The stamp pads come in solid colors or in paired colors like one in blue and green to make it super easy to stamp a double color image.

Here you can see I used the stamps separately, and matched with the outer ring. These stamps are from the Birthday Set.

And here is a look at the for him set. I used one stamp all in a row for a border across my card and then a paired set on top of that, and one more at the top of the card.

Now the fun part! I have an additional set of everything pictured below--all four stamp sets and the stamper, plus four additional stamp pads (Chocolate Brown, Aqua/Cactus, Honey/Berry, and an additional Black) value of $142--to give away.

All you have to do is leave me a comment below and I'll enter each person into a random drawing for this set! This drawing will close at midnight on Friday 6/15/12.

Thanks for visiting today!

Cricut Birthday Box

Wow--the last first part of June is just flying by. We have had such a busy time--first with the end of school activities and now with settling in to a summer routine. It hasn't left much time for blogging, but I'm back today to share a project I did for the Cricut blog a little while ago. 

I had an assignment to use my Cricut to design some birthday gift wrap. This was perfect for me as it always seems that when I need to wrap something up the only type of wrapping paper I can find is Christmas or super hero themed (ah, life with 3 little boys). This assignment gave me the chance to make something far away from both those themes so next time I need more "girly" wrapping, I"m all set!

For this gift box I used one of my newest favorite cartridges, Tags, Bags, Boxes, and More 2, to cut the Pizza box. I used the pizza box as the base for my gift box. The finished size of this particular box is around 6″ square by about 1 1/2″ tall, which makes it a great box for many small gifts. To make it that large I did cut it in two pieces as opposed to the main cut which makes the box in one cut, but makes a much smaller box (this cartridge is designed with this feature to make this easy).

I wrapped the box with two bands of patterned paper which I stitched together with my sewing machine and then wrapped with white crochet thread. I cut the “Celebrate” sentiment from the Paper Lace 2 Cartridge and added it to the paper band with pop dots. A little bit of Stickles glitter on the sentiment gives it more sparkle.

Next, I cut two flowers with the Art Philosophy Cartridge and added them to the left of the sentiment. Two leaves from the Mother’s Day Bouquet Digital Cartridge are tucked behind the flowers and both the leaves and the flowers got a little brushing of the Stickels glitter for added interest.

Lastly, I decided to add a little tag to the bottom right with an additional sentiment. I cut the tags from the Art Philosophy Cartridge and the the font is from the Street Sign Digital Cartridge. I added the tag and the tag layer to the gift box with pop dots for added dimension. 

It was a very fun project to make and I can't wait to have a reason to give it away!

Thanks for visiting today!

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!