CTMH Australasian Stamp of the Month Blog Hop - September 2014 - Family is Forever

Hello and welcome aboard our Close to My Heart Australasian Stamp of the month Blog Hop. If you have arrived here from Margaret's Blog, Stamps n' Cards, then you are in the right place. If you landed here by accident, no problem, please join in by following the link at the end of this post.

Today I would like to share with you a couple of special projects that feature the September Stamp of the Month - Family is Forever, available exclusively throughout September for $27 or for just $5 when you spend $75.

The tree image is very prominent on this stamp set, and further down a share a little project I made at my recent craft retreat, making it into a 3 dimensional tree. I thought many consultants would use the tree in their projects, so I wanted to do something a little different with other components of the set.

But first, my card features two of the sentiments "mashed" together, and the die cut heart from the Artiste Cricut cartridge.

 

 

I inked only the is Forever from the Family is Forever sentiment, by masking off the first word while I inked up the rest with Slate ink, then removed the mask and stamped near the bottom right corner. I then inked up the Love with Pixie ink, and "rock and rolled" the edges in Cotton Candy ink to get the two-tone effect.

 

The die cut hearts were stamped one each with Pixie and Cotton Candy and mounted with foam tape. I really love this new Pixie colour, it is a lovely soft pink and goes great with Cotton Candy. I thought the card needed a touch more Slate to balance it out, so I took the cluster of 3 small hearts and stamped it in the top left corner. Then I rounded the two opposite corners of the White Daisy card to give it a different shape.



Are you ready for my 3D project?

The craft retreat is run by a dear friend of mine in mid August, and this is the third time it has run here in QLD (she also runs one in March in NSW). Each year, she gives us a "challenge" item at the start of camp, that we have to do something crafty with, and on the Sunday morning, each camper gets to vote on their favourite entry. For some very strange reason, my creation seemed to be a favourite :-)

 

 

 

The challenge item was the golf tee, that I have coloured green with our Shinhan alcohol markers, and attached some branches, turning it into a tee tree :-) I made a little open fire, using rolled brown cardstock (well, orange, actually, sponged with Chocolate ink) and the flames are Orange Fruit burst wrappers - gotta use what you have, right?

 

 

 

After that, the tent, the billy, the logs and the 3D Family tree came together quite quickly. I also used a stamp from the Timberline WOTG kit to put the tyre tracks onto the background stamped green cardstock base. It was great fun to make, and as we love to camp and 4WD, its a great representation of our family as well.

 

If you follow me on Facebook or Instagram, you may have seen this project "staged" with a gummy bear, a lolly snake and a little lolly man sitting on the log watching the fire, There was also a caption that read - Welcome to the Australian Bush. Please look out for Drop Bears and Hoop Snakes. 

 

 

S1409 Family is Forever is only available until 30 September 2014 from your CTMH consultant.

I'd love you to leave a comment before heading off to the next stop,  Jenny Gilbert's Blog, Jen's Creative Classroom.

Yours in Craft,
Monika

Explore the Artiste cartridge - part 1 - numbers 1 to 5

Hi All

over the coming weeks I will be exploring the Cricut Artiste cartridge, exclusive to Close to My Heart (CTMH), making a project from each key. This post is for the numbers 1 to 5 keys.

This is such a versatile cartridge, with over 700 images on it , as well as coordinating stamps and chipboard elements from CTMH.

1.
I used the 3D object key to cut this little bag, and the Accent 1 to cut  the green doily decoration. The handle is just a strip of 12" cardstock cut to the width of the top of the bag. You could use Velcro or a magnetic closure to seal the bag.

2.
This is going to be a sign on my eldest daughters door - can you guess what colours she likes?
I used the Accent 2 and the Accent 2 <shift> to cut this out, I cut the plaque first at fit to page then measured the inside dimensions and sized the frame to match, in Cricut Craft room (CCR).

3.
I used Accent 3 to cut this plaque for the main focus on this card, and cut at 4" to make sure it would fit on the front of a standard card, then stamped and sponged with Lagoon exclusive ink and mounted it onto a piece of Sarita B&T papers. You could also cut this larger and use for a title block on a scrapbook page.

4.
I used 3D object to cut this cute pyramid topped little box, and Accent 2 and the Accent 2 <shift> for the keyhole embellishment on it. Afterwards I thought that if I had done this in CCR and hidden the contours on the dark blue backing, it would have been easier :-)
the 4 holes in the top are tied together with ribbon, but I have left the bottom flap unsealed so you can open it that way.

5.
I used the Card and the Card <shift> key for this gate fold card and matching envelope, and cut from one sheet of B&T paper. This is a great way to feature those double sided papers. The circle on the front to highlight the flower was punched, but you could also use the CCR to match a circle size to the flowers, as I did in the Laughing Lola sample.

 

That's it for today's explore session, come back soon for the other keys.

If you would like to purchase the Cricut Artiste cartridge, you can do so on my website here.

If you would like to attend my Cricut Club and use this and other cartridges in a friendly crop environment, contact me.

Yours in craft,
Monika