We interrupt your regularly scheduled project post to announce ....

I hate to be a party pooper, but I will be taking a short break from posting projects as I gave birth to a beautiful baby boy on Wednesday, September 22nd!

I hope to do a layout or two with his first photos soon.

Have a great weekend,

CarrieAnne

Family Traditions

My father was huge on family traditions growing up (enter Fiddler on the Roof soundtrack here). Whether it was having custard pie for breakfast on holidays (which included his birthday :) or hanging up Christmas ornaments in a certain order - tradition was important. As a military family that moved around a lot it centered us and helped us to build strong bonds that my siblings and I still enjoy to this day.

In my married family, the Florida Gators (especially the football team - Tebow we miss you!) are a BIG deal. So each year my husband and I dress ourselves and the kids up in our Gator gear and head to a local park to take a family photo. We than take a nature walk and treat the kids to a special snack.

I love pulling out the photos and comparing them from year to year, especially as we add new family members.

I decided to scrap last year's photo for Harmonie's monthly sketch challenge. The product used is primarily Pebbles, with a bit of Chatterbox and miscellaneous stash thrown in.

The polka dot on the blue mat is done with the Swiss Dot Cuttlebug Embossing folder. I then just sanded the top a bit to get the white core of the patterned paper to show through. For those who don't want to invest in spendy two toned papers - this is a cheap fix, especially when you use remnants from your scrap box.

Thanks for looking,

CarrieAnne

Box inside of box, inside of box.

When I was a little girl my dad brought me back a set of stacking dolls from one of his many trips. I still have them to this day, and now my own girls marvel at how fun it is to open the ever tinier little dolls in the set.

Stacking dolls or matryoshkas as I learned they are called in Russian (the things Google can teach you) are also becoming quite the hit in the paper crafting world. Hero Arts, Stampin' UP!, Buzz and Bloom, and Cricut have all come out with nesting doll themed products in the past year or so.

I made this set of cards from a coloring page in one of my girl's craft stash. I simply traced the outline, and then increased or decreased the size to get the three I needed. I then used circle, heart and flower punches to add details or just sketched pieces and cut them out. Cuttlebug folders were used to add depth and interest as was Jenni Bowlin paper, pinking shears, and a paper piercer, which was used to pierce the outline around each doll.

Thanks for looking,

CarrieAnne

Whoo Loves You?

Even though my blog has only been up and running for a month or so, it is probably obvious to you by now that I LOVE shaped cards. I have had the two Disney Princess Cartridges in my possession for quite some time now, but had failed to do anything with them (Horrible - I know). So I decided that I would either have to use them or sell them at my semi-annual scrapbooking consignment sale (My personal rule is if it doesn't a least get shuffled around the scrap space once year - out the door it goes).

When I saw this cute little owl in the Sleeping Beauty section it was instant inspiration (and relief - my hoarding instinct was thrilled that I could rationalize holding onto these carts for another year!)

The "Happily Ever After" Cartridge, does not have a card making feature, so I cut the owl once and then traced it onto folded brown cardstock so the card opens from left to right. I then just cut the owl out by hand. I ran the original single layer owl through the Cuttlebug with a herringbone designed folder and cut out different sections to add dimension and depth. The stomach is created from rows of a Stampin' UP! border punch, punched from Basic Grey's "Urban Prairie Paper." The heart was cut from an old school original's Sizzix die and run through the Cuttlebug in the Swiss Dot folder.

The interior of the eyes are blue dew drops that I obtained from the Robin's Nest. Their baubles come in a variety of amazing sizes, shapes, and colors so if you are looking for something a bit different check them out.

Thanks for looking,

CarrieAnne

Tweet Heart

I know it is not a newly released product, but I love Basic Grey's "Urban Prairie" Collection and just had to share this project I made earlier in the year. I cut the two love birds out a number of times from BG's "Meadow" Patterned Paper and then layered them with glue dots for dimension. The heart inside the cage and the cage itself were cut with the Cricut. The heart is connected to the birds with adhesive and the heart is connected to the cage with a bead laden hat pin.

It is hard to see in the photo but the white paper is 110 pound white glossy which adds the structure this type of project really needs in order to be free standing and durable.

As the side view shot shows, the cage is cut and layered 6 times, with the center portion of bars removed except for the first and last layers so the birds had somewhere to hang. I plan on using this for a Valentine's Day decoration as like it to much to giveaway!

Thanks for looking,

CarrieAnne

Nothing, but Blue Skies

I am almost done scrapping our pictures from LAST year's family vacation. This means there is little hope for this year's photos with a new baby and what I am sure to be innumerable rolls of pictures of his tiny cuteness just days away. My girls are sitting on top of Stone Mountain here in Northern Georgia or rather Bella and Victoria are hopelessly attempting to keep Maddie from running off Stone Mountain while they pose for this photo.

I enjoy "fussy cutting" or cutting out shapes, images and designs from patterned paper. Lots of times when I am watching my favorite show (Yes, that would be Bones - for those who know me best) I cut out designs to be used on future layouts and cards. I hand cut all of the flowers and vines multiple times from 7Gypsies paper and then layered and adhered them with a variety of adhesives to add dimension. The fabric covered brad is also 7Gypsies, and the rub-on title from My Mind's Eye. The Birds are actually transparent stickers from Glitz Designs that I backed with transparency first and then trimmed around so they too could be popped up with a dimensional glue without risk of sticking to the page awkwardly.

In order to have it appear as though the birds in the upper left and right are actually flying I cut their wings off and reapplied them with the transparency as reinforcement behind them to add structure.

Thanks for looking,

CarrieAnne

Flutter bye-bye

The warm fragrances and temperatures of Summer are rapidly fading here in Northern Georgia. I have - through no efforts of my own - a beautiful array of hydrangeas and impatiens in my front yard and they attract the most amazing butterflies. I thought I would share this card that celebrates the last visages of spring - before we enter the Fall rainy season.

As a Northerner by birth and heritage, I refer to this time as Monsoon season, I never knew prior to moving here that the South could get so much icky, weather!

This butterfly shaped card is hinged at the top and was cut with my Cricut using the "A Child's Year" cartridge. This is one of my favorite cartridges and I find new uses for it each week. The butterfly was than embossed with a Cuttlebug flourish folder and my Big Shot.

The sentiment is from Crafty Secrets (I love their clear Vintage stamps - their images are amazing), the patterned paper is BoBunny, the pebbles are Stamping Bella and the hat pin and other various items are either embellishments I made myself or from the scrap bin.

The brown flower is actually made from a 5 petal punch in which the petals are overlapped and the bottom snipped off to provide a flat surface to apply a glue dot. I then sprayed the cardstock lightly with water to make the paper malleable and rolled the petals back with a stylus. I repeated the process for the inner flower made of patterned paper, but did not cover as many petals in the overlapping step.

Thanks for looking,

CarrieAnne

Backpack, Backpack

Okay, perhaps it was not kind of me to get that heinous refrain from Dora the Explorer roaming around in your head. One of the things I looked forward to the most each new school year was shopping for new school supplies with my parents, especially for that cool new backpack.

I designed this backpack to be life sized (to fit my 5 year old). In order to do so I had to work with a parent sheet of paper. These are jumbo sheets 26x40 inches that can sometimes be found in art stores, but most certainly can be ordered directly from paper mills. These added inches allow you to do so much more with 3dimensional art.

I used a variety of QuicKutz dies to do the flourishes, and the Stampin' UP! Flutterby embosslit for the butterflies. I also embossed the side pockets by hand using a Stampin'UP! textured plate and the border is a Stampin' UP! punch. The tiny dots are the negative circles punched out from the scalloped border. I think I counted over 500 used on this project. They, and the flourishes were glued on with Beacon Adhesive's Zip Dry and a toothpick. It took hours and hours to get those puppies on there! I wanted it to be extra special for a CHA booth though, and now I can gift it to one of the girls' teachers at the end of the year.

The front flap also opens and closes with the aid of a magnet and the rear back straps are also embellished with butterflies and scallops. I really loved this combination of colors and think I will try to do a layout with yellow, green and white in it soon.

Thanks for looking,

CarrieAnne

Back to School Inspiration

School is back in session!! I love my girls to bits, but I also think that Kindergarten and the 2nd grade are ways that the Lord shows me he loves me. It is nice to have a bit of quiet time with just my toddler Maddie in the mornings.

To honor this glorious occasion I thought I would post a few "Back to School" projects that I made this Summer for a CHA booth throughout this week.

This lunchbox actually opens and I enlarged the template considerably so I could tuck several snacks inside. I used real buckles for the top strap and doubled the cardstock on the handle so it could support the weight of the lunch box's contents. What little boy doesn't love pirates? Avery is my really good friend Wendy's son - so I hope he likes it.

The template is from Lauren Meader's fabulous website http://mytimemadeeasy.com. If you click on the website address to the left it will direct you straight to the lunchbox template. Lauren is an amazing artist and her templates are easy to follow and really fun to work with.

Thanks for looking,

CarrieAnne

Apple for the Teacher

These apple boxes were fun to make. I embossed each one with a different Cuttlebug template and inked the edges to provide depth. The stems are pieces of ribbon looped through a slot in the lid which allows you to remove the top and fill it with goodies. The leaves are flower petals I cut on my Cricut. The cute little caterpillar and lady bugs are from one of the Spring Releases by Jolee. Its rare that I use an embellishment like these, but they were just perfect for this project so I could not resist.

Because of the size of some of the pieces I had to get pretty creative to fit the paper in the Big Shot, but I am happy with the result at the end of the day.

I hope Victoria's and Bella's teachers like them.

Thanks for looking,

CarrieAnne