Pumpkinly Perfect Card

Pumpkinly Perfect Fall Card
Serendipitous Scrapper

Strolling though the grocery store today, I saw mountains of beautiful orange pumpkins. The smells and colors of Fall are warm and they make me so happy that I thought I would used them with a sketch challenge from Got Sketch.

The Sketch was Challenge # 147 which can be viewed here.

I created the pumpkin embellishment by using an old Sizzix die (remember when they used to be red, yellow and green?). It was the small green pumpkin.

I cut it once from green felt, once from orange felt.

The orange was a bit bright for the muted We R Memory Keepers papers I chose, so I used one of my favorite solutions for toning things down - I covered it with lace.  Sewing along the perforations left by the die and adding a vintage button were finishing touches.

A bit of hand dyed seam binding, more lace and a few vintage buttons and voila - Fall is lovely indeed.

Hope your day is filled with happy harvesty thoughts,

CarrieAnne

InLinkz.com

We R Memory Keepers Sew Easy Review

Sew Easy Stitched cards with Sentimentals Cartridge

 If you follow my blog, you know I have a pathological fear of sewing machines. They make me nervous - most likely because they outsmart me at every turn. The only tension I associate with them has nothing to do with a bobbin and everything to do with a furrowed brow and me stressing out. With this is in mind, you can understand why I was excited to try out the We R Memory Keepers Sew Easy product line. I have a few of the different design heads, the mat and the handle. I thought I would give you a quick review and my first two projects with the tools.

We R Memory Keepers Sew Easy Stitch Piercer Tool System

 The Price Point: 
Sew Easy Stitch Piercer Tool: $9.99
Heads: 3.99
Piercing Mat: 7.99


The Concept:
The idea behind the product is pretty simple. Using the handle and the interchangeable heads, roll the tool across cardstock and pierce designs into your paper. Then use regular floss or string to stitch in your designs with the provided needle.



The Reality:
I had a difficult time getting the tool to actually pierce through the paper. I would classify this more as an embosser and even with that I would always pull the tool towards you when working. When I pushed away from myself the results were dreadful. I used the recommended mat and applied a great deal of pressure. The supplied needle was rather dull so I used the tool and then went back with my paper piercer to pierce the holes. Given that paper piercing templates are dreadfully expensive and I LOVE to make holes in stuff, I am still going to be using these tools, but I won't be buying additional heads. I will view these as embossers or pattern creators.

Grade Based on Advertised Function: B-

Card featuring Sew Easy "Banners" Design

Pros:
1. Lots of different designs to choose from

2. Love the compartment in the handle to hold the needle - no more finding it with your feet in the carpet.

3. Because this is a free hand system you can make your stitches curved, straight or use them to outline and accent something.

4. Keep your packaging because each card comes with suggestions for doing several different stitches with the same head.

5. The mat is quite large and allows you to stitch on a layouts and cards without having to readjust your paper.

Cons:
1. Needle is WAY to big which causes you to waste thread when you want to secure your ends or try to squeeze in that last stitch.

Card featuring Sew Easy "Love" Design

2. This tool is more of an embosser than a piercer as on each of the heads I tried the majority of the dots did not pierce through the paper.

3. On several of the heads key pierce points are missing on the design and don't emboss at all, because they are not even there. This was especially true for the "love" head as I kept having to look at the packaging to fill in the blanks myself.

4. I would love for the head to have a marker on it so I could know when the design begins to repeat. This would be especially nice for designs with wording. Who wants "ove" instead of "love" on their Valentine's Day card?


Please note this is an independent review, and I am in no way affiliated with We R Memory Keepers.

Thanks for stopping by,

CarrieAnne


Recipe:
Cricut Cartridge: Sentimentals
Tools: We R Memory Keepers Sew Easy Product Line
Embossing Folder: Cuttlebug: Swiss Dots
Patterned Paper: We R Memory Keepers
Cardstock: Couture Cardstock
Bakers Twine: The Twinery
Floss: DMC
Adhesive: Beacon Adhesives Zip Dry

Cuts:
White Scallop Card
"Label1" cut at 4 inches from white cardstock with the "card" function selected.

Gumball Machine Treat Box

Gumball Machine Treat Box

Have you ever visualized a project and then had it work out exactly like you pictured? It is rare that this happens for me, but with this little Gumball Machine Treat Box it did. 

I love how cute it came out. I plan on putting this idea up on my shelf till Valentine's Day and making a bunch of them for my daughters' classes. They actually come together pretty easily. The final project height is 5.25 inches and it holds about 1/2 cup of gobstoppers.


Recipe
Cartridges: Cricut (Wrap It UP, Plantin Schoolbook, Cindy Loo)
Patterned Paper: We R Memory Keepers (Be My Valentine)
Ink: ColorBox
Adhesive: Beacon Adhesives (Zip Dry), Glue Dots, Stampin' UP! (Sticky Strip)
Buttons: Favorite Findings
Scissors: Fiskars
Twine: The Twinery (Pink and White)
Brad: Queen & Co.
Transparency: Staples
Tools: Paper Piercer, Needle
Candy: Wonka (Everlasting Gobstopper)

Cuts
The Clear Globe of the Gumball Machine
"Bag" cut on page 80 of Plantin SchoolBook cut at 6.25 inches with the "Tall Ball" function selected.
** Because you are cutting transparency you need to have your pressure set to max and your blade depth set to 6**

The Red Patterned Lid of the Gumball Machine
"Bag" cut on page 80 of Plantin SchoolBook cut at 6.25 inches with the "Tall Ball" function selected.
**Be sure to return your cut settings to normal to avoid tearing the paper**

The Base of the Gumball Machine
"FlwrPtBx" cut on page 75 of Cindy Loo cut 3.5 inches.

Face of Gumball Machine (Quarter Slot, Spinner, and Candy Ejection Point)
"Gumball" cut on page 44 of Wrap It Up cat at 5 inches with the "Tag" function selected.

Best Friends

I received almost the entire "Whitewash" line from We R Memory Keepers quite some time ago, but hot pink, electric blue, and lime green are colors I rarely reach for in scrapbooking so I had to wait for the right opportunity to use these products. This picture of my 8 year old daughter and her best friend was perfect and I used the sketch from Sketchy Thursdays secret sketch challenge for inspiration. To get in on the Sketchy Thursdays challenge you will need to visit their Facebook page as they are shaking things up a bit this week by not posting the sketch on their blog and asking challenge participants to not post the sketch on our blogs.

I cut tons of the flowers out of patterned paper and layered, creased, and added dimensionals to get the look I wanted. Most of the flowers have centers made from bling, pearls, buttons, glue, or stickers.

Thanks for looking,

CarrieAnne