Favorite Cartridges - Wedding Sneak Peek

(click any photo to see large)

Hey-o everyone!  It's Monday and that means it is time for the weekly Bitten by the Bug 2 challenge post.  Our challenge this week was selected by our talented Design Team sister, Mayra, who's challenge is a bit.... CHALLENGING!  Mayra asked the DT members to select their favorite Cricut cartridge or Cricut cut and create a project.  Wow!  She really thought I could select only one cartridge??  Well I tried....

You know how I always say that Art Philosophy is my favorite cartridge?  Well it is one of my top favorites!  But I also LOVE Pretty Pennants and the font on CM Divine Wedding.  So I combined three of my favorites and created this banner for Bethany's wedding to use on the cake table.

I do not recall if I have shared, but Bethany's colors are pink and brown - with three shades/tints of each hue.  With her colors in mind, I designed this seven pennant banner - there are three photo pennant elements, two word element pennants, and two wedding cake pennant elements.

I used Bazzill wedding card stock for the white/ivory cuts.  I also used Close To My Heart Champagne color card stock, and Bazzill pink and brown card stock.

I love the photos that I was able to add to the photo pennants.  I chose two fun photos and one posed "couple" shot to use in the brown wrought iron cut outs.

I love the fun photos above and below.  I used three layers on these pennants - pink scalloped background, wedding ivory middle layer, and the brown iron cut on top.

You may have noticed that all of the pennant sections are trimmed in flowers.  I used CTMH Champagne card stock, white American Craft card stock and pink Bazzill card stock to cut twenty-four Art Philosophy roses.  I used the CTMH quilling tool and glue to assemble the roses.  Once dry, I glued the roses, in various combinations and colors, to the corners of the pennant sections.

I added brackets to the back of the pennant sections to run ribbon through.  I used ivory silk-like seam binding to attach the sections together.  I also used champagne colored silk-like seam binding and chocolate brown CTMH ribbon strips to embellish each corner of the pennant sections.  

I really like how the pennant came together and I think it is going to look great on the front edge of Bethany wedding cake display.

Be sure to go by Bitten By The Bug 2 and check out the fabulous projects my Design Team sisters created using their favorite cartridges/cuts!  This is such a fun challenge, the most difficult part is picking a favorite cartridge or cut, I hope that you will make time this week to join us in the challenge!!

Close To My Heart

 You will not want to miss March's Stamp of the Month, HAPPY PLACE!  I love the stamps of these darling nesting dolls!  Just look at a couple of the fun things you can create!!!

The Stamp of the Month set retails for $17.95, or with a $50 order, the stamp set can be added to your cart during check out for only $5.00!

Stenciling with Cricut Cuts

Hello friends!  Welcome to this week's Bitten by the Bug 2 challenge.  My very talented Design Team sister Maureen chose this week's challenge - Use a Cricut cut as a stencil.  I have to admit that I found this challenge to be a bit more challenging than normal!  In fact, while I was in Spartanburg at the fund raising crop, my friend Peggy had to offer ideas on how to use a cut as a stencil.  I now realize that the options are limitless and I could have done so much more!

I call this card, "You Make Me Feel Like Dancing!"  I cut three flappers from the Art Deco cartridge (a 1920's themed cartridge that is fabulous) and placed them on a stage dancing (I kept joking about adding a pole to the card, but I did not add poles).  The more I looked at the dancers, I realized that they could be in a store window as mannequins, so I decided to add off-kilter window frames, trimmed with gems, in front of the dancers!  Can't you just picture the window display workers hanging the off kilter windows in front of the dancing mannequins?

I used my stencil to create the background Broadway stage effect, utilizing a cut from the Artbooking cartridge.  I ended up coloring in the negative areas and going back and adding marker highlights to the positive areas.  I matted the stage/window area onto a wonderful chevron Graphic45 print.

I finished the bottom front of the card by adding a strip of cotton lace across the edge of the window/stage area and topping the seam with champagne color seam binding ribbon.  I love seam binding ribbon.  It has silk feel and texture, without actually being silk!

When I was formatting the Bitten by the Bug 2 blog last night I was completely in awe of the stencil projects created by my fabulous Design Team.  These ladies rock!  You are going to love the cards, layouts, and home decor projects they created using stencils.  This was such a great challenge idea and I do hope that you join us in the Stencil Challenge this week!  But first, head straight over to Bitten by the Bug 2 and checkout the fabulous Design Team projects!

Happy President's Day & A Thank You

Happy President's Day!  In honor of the Federal Holiday here in the USA, the Bitten by the Bug 2 team has been challenged by our Design Team sister, Laura, to craft a patriotic project.  I pulled out Cricut's Heritage cartridge and created this Presidential card.  Because I was not sure what to do with this card after today, I gave it to my friends Susan and Jan, who are participating in Operation Write Home.  I hoped that perhaps this might be useful to someone in the Armed Forces.

I used three Cricut Heritage cartridge cuts to create this card:  the Silhouette of my George Washington-like gentleman, the ink well and quill, and the parchment scroll.  I thought the colors and layers worked well together.

The photos above and below offer you closeup views of the card Cricut cuts.  I must thank my friends for sharing their crafting supplies with me so that I could complete this challenge.....

I was away this weekend, in Spartanburg, SC, working a fundraiser for my friend Jan's daughter.  Some of you may recall that last fall my friends and I held a fundraising crop for Jan's daughter, Terri.  Terri's medical bills and expenses continue so we planned a weekend crop at Scrapbook Creations in Spartanburg.  The event exceeded our expectations and we have not only a wonderful group of scrappers to thank for that, but also Scrapbook Creations and their generosity.

I had to transport snacks and a ton of prizes to the weekend crop, along with the supplies for the wedding crafts that were on my to-do list.  Well, I remembered all of the prizes and snacks and wedding supplies, but I completely forgot to add a selection of solid card stock  and my paper trimmer to my travel bags!  My friends Peggy, Jan, and Beth all contributed supplies to this card!  It took a village for me to complete this week's BBTB2 challenge!  Thanks friends!

Speaking of Scrapbook Creations, if any of you live within driving distance of Spartanburg, SC, you owe it to yourself to make a visit to Scrapbook Creations.  This is a scrapbooker's paradise.  There are so many wonderful scrapping tools, papers, bazzill, supplies, classes, support staff... and add to that, a great cafe and ice cream shop.  It is truly a one-stop wonder!  Once you arrive onsite, you do not have to leave until you "HAVE" to leave!  You can shop, craft, and eat all in the same store!

Thank you all for stopping by today.  If you have not already done so, please head over to BBTB2 and check out the patriotic projects the design team created for President's Day!

Happy President's Day!

Ice and Snowmageddon

Hello Friends!  Welcome to Icemageddon!  After a weekend in the 60 degree temperatures, Mother Nature has once again teamed up with Mr. Freeze (think Batman villain) and they are implementing their diabolical plan on the Southeast.  Things were so bad here that the Weather channel's Jim Cantore was in town, informing us that we are located in the epicenter of this storm.  Thanks Jim, I think we figured that out with a glance at the  map!

When you look at these photos you should be aware that it has NOT snowed yet.  We are supposed to get snow starting tonight... anytime now, actually.  The white in these photos is ice.  Everything is iced over here in Aiken.   The first three photos are from my front yard.  I am currently avoiding the back yard.  Doug told me that part of the woods came down on our azaleas.  I should have asked about my blueberry bushes, but to be honest, I am not sure that I want to know.

I ventured no further than half way down our drive way and across into our front yard.  Doug went and knocked ice off of the DirecTv dish and he went out back with the Duncan.  Not me, man.  I am cozy and warm and staying inside.

Meanwhile, facebook is full of photos of our frosted town.  The traffic circle on Lauren's Street is generally a very busy place.  Not so today, though there are some tire tracks in the ice.

Lauren's Street, the main shopping area down town, was closed today.  In fact, everything was closed today.  Aiken is officially iced over.

I hate to see this, in the photo above some of the very old magnolia trees have lost large limbs.  I have had limbs falling in my back yard as well.  When they break it sounds like an explosion.  The limbs just cannot support the weight of 1.5 inches of ice.  By the way, it was not really snowing.... Google added the snow to the photo for me.  I thought it was pretty so I kept it!

And for you golf fans (MFJ - Jayne) this is for you:  This is a photo from the Augusta Nationals today.  It is only seven weeks until the Master's tournament.  The grounds keepers are going to be busy removing fallen and broken trees and limbs, as well as clearing the debris.   But in seven weeks this same scene will be resplendent with a green carpet of grass and fabulous blooming azaleas!

Not wasting my day too much, I have been working on Valentine's for Bethany's students.  I should have plenty of time to finish them as there is not school today or tomorrow for local students and teachers.  Hopefully we will be back to normal by Friday.  I am just thankful that unlike 10 years ago during the ice storm, we have not lost power.

Creative Space Share

Hello everyone.  This week at Bitten by the Bug 2 we have decided to do something a bit different.  We thought it might be fun instead of our weekly challenge to host a scraproom/craft space share.  The design team member are sharing their creative spaces with you and it is our hope that you might share your space also.  Our DT creative spaces vary from a corner of a room to full, designer inspired craft rooms.  My own creative space is a bit of a cluttered mess.

My scrap space has grown and changed so much through the years that I have been scrapbooking.  I started scrapping storing my supplies in a box in the dining room.  I finally claimed a desk, purchased a rolling cart to hold my paper, and purchased a small hutch for the desk top.  I scrapped on that desk out of the corner of my bedroom for probably five - six year.  

When we purchased a new house in 2007 I claimed the smallest bedroom as a scraproom.  I used half of the room and had a twin bed set up in the room.  Within a year I had claimed the whole room and that bed was history!

My main work area is an L shaped desk.  I tend to do all of my cutting, stamping and assembling while seated at this desk.  My most used tools are in the three drawers pictured above, with inks, markers, stamp blocks, etc. all within arm's reach.  To the right are my favorite solid (CTMH) card stock, score board, and scraps sorted by color.

To my immediate left on the desk are my two most used cutting machine.  The Silhouette Cameo is on top of the desk, my Cricut Expression 2 is on a shelf under the desk.  Also within reach are flowers, glues, Stickles, buttons, etc.

Behind my desk chair are three different storage areas.  First are the cubes that hold so many supplies - my metal dies and matching stamps, kits, die cut machines, and stamps sorted into cases atop the cubes.  The cubes also store my Cricut cartridges, embossing tools, MORE stamps, xyron machines, etc., all  of which are stored inside the drawers.

To the left of the white cubes are smaller natural wood cubes.  These cubes store my printed card stock, sorted by them or manufacturer.  Next to the cubes is a solid color card stock tower.  And on the floor in front of the tower is a pile of card stock that needs sorted and putting away.

My craft space also houses my sewing area.  I have this heavy table with a flip up leaf that hold my embroidery machine  The table is very deep so that gives me lots of additional storage and work space.  My scrapbook travel bags are stored under the sewing area.  This room also contains a full size closet with six large shelves ceiling to floor.  I am NOT going to give you a peek into that area!

The Bitten by the Bug 2 Design Team would love for you to share your creative space with us.  It is amazing what we can learn from one another's craft spaces. It is also amazing how our craft spaces change and grow with us.  Please stop by the BBTB2 blog and check out the great craft spaces the DT has shared.  Use the linky under this week's post to share your creative space.