"Five Minute" Birthday Card

Can you really finish a card in five minutes??  Maybe you can, but I have yet to accomplish that feat, although this birthday card from the Five Minute Cards SVG Kit (from SVGCuts.com) I made for my mother comes close.  Usually the longest part of the creative process for me is choosing the paper to use.  Once my paper was chosen for this card, there were only five cuts to make, but I wasn't done yet!

This card is only four layers and went together quickly, if you don't count the time I spent obsessively applying foam tape to the back of the flower cut out layer.  You can see what I mean here:

Just a little bit of foam tape!

Once the foam tape was on, it really did take five minutes to put together!

For the inside sentiment I used my Silhouette sketch pens and wrote with the Cameo.  I haven't used my thin fonts from Lettering Delights nearly enough, so I was happy for the chance.

 

Being able to write with your cutting machine comes in real handy when you don't want to stamp or when your printers are out of ink (both are the case for me).  I thought putting the candles on the bottom was also a cute idea, but I'm not sure my mother will appreciate them!  I really enjoyed putting this card together, now all I have to do is get it in the mail!

Supplies Used:

Make The Cut* 

Silhouette Cameo

Silhouette Sketch Pen

DCWV Playtime Stack

Core'dinations Cardstock

Five Minute Cards SVG Kit

LDT Cursive

LDT Cutesie Doodles

Hope you Have A Crafty Day!

*I'm an affiliate for Make The Cut because I LOVE it and you will too! 

  

Teacher Appreciation Gift

So this past week was teacher appreciation week.  I may get some flack for this, but I usually don't participate in this event.  I find it more appropriate to thank my childrens' teachers at the end of the year and according to my desire to do so.  I guess you could say I don't like being told what to do.  That being said,  when I learned my daughter's teacher was a Washington Nationals fan, I decided I had to make this baseball cap and card for her, and I didn't want to wait until the end of the year.  I had the crafting itch, and I was desperate to make something with the purpose of giving it away.  Check it out, I'm pretty happy with the outcome.

Hit it right out of the park!

This project is an example of using something I thought I never would.  I'm not a baseball fan, in fact, sports just aren't my thing, and thankfully my husband and kids aren't sports lovers either.  So I never thought I'd use this file from the Fun and Games SVG Kit at SVGCuts.com, but it's really hard not to buy their files (let's just say I'm a little addicted, ok?).  How happy I was when I got to put it to good use!  I have to remember crafting isn't only about making things I like, it's about making things for others to bring them some joy, whether or not I like them!  (Well, duh!)  Plus, I had a lot of fun making this and as it turns out, I love it! 

Using Make The Cut!, I altered the baseball in the file to add the 'Thank You' and I used a thin font from Lettering Delights and a Silhouette sketch pen for the teacher's name.  The card base is from the Cards For Moms SVG Kit also at SVGCuts.com. I cut a little of the bottom off of the card since I didn't need the extra space.

Here's the inside and back of the cap.

A few small details

I had cut out the 'W' to put on the front of the card, but when I decided not to use it I thought putting it inside the cap was a nice added touch.  While looking at the Washington Nationals caps I also noticed most of them had the major league baseball logo on the back so I decided to include it on mine.  I found all of the logos by doing a Google search.  I then traced them in Make The Cut! and did a print and cut with my Cameo.  

So that's it, a fun gift for a teacher who happens to love baseball, and chocolate, which is what I filled it with.  My daughter said her teacher loved it, and that's the joy in crafting.

Here's what I used:
Make The Cut!
Silhouette Cameo
Silhouette Red Sketch Pen
American Crafts Cardstock
Fun and Games SVG Kit
Cards For Moms SVG Kit
LD Cursive Thin Font

Go create some joy and Have A Crafty Day!

(I am an affiliate for Make The Cut! because I love it!)

A "Fishy" Card: Is It Two Lost Soles Or Sole?

Hi there.  Maybe you could help me out with a little grammar dilemma since I'm no master of the English language.  When I saw this cutting file with two fish in a fish bowl from Lettering Delights, a song started playing in my head.  You know the one, it goes like this:  "We're just two lost souls swimmin' in a fish bowl, year after year.... it's by Pink Floyd, and it's called "Wish You Were Here". I wondered, how could I make this into a punny card?  (And is "punny" even a word?).  I'd heard of sole fish, but I wanted to make sure they really existed.  I consulted google, and yes, there is a type of fish called sole (yeah, I think everybody already knew that, except me!).  I was all set.  Wait a minute, I thought, is it sole or soles when you're talking about two of these type of fish?  I didn't want any one to think I was talking about two feet, but I figured people would get it anyway, so with reckless abandon, I made this card using Silhouette Studio DE (SSDE):

Does that sound right to you?  Are we feet or fish?

I was so pleased with how it turned out, but the issue of whether or not I was making a fool of myself almost prevented me from posting it here.  So I took a risk.  Isn't that what life's about?  If anyone reading would care to offer an answer, I'd love to know, but I can't say it'd change my mind about making this card!
 
To create the front of the card I had to give dimension to the frame to make room for the beads.  To do this, I made an inset shape of the frame and cut it out six times.  I glued each shape together and then glued them to the card base:

Hey, what are those green things down there?

It didn't matter if the stacked shapes were perfectly lined up since the frame I placed over them covered them up:

Hey, this fishbowl is kinda nice, maybe we're not lost!

I used the sketch feature, set on continuous, to sketch on the frame (this was inspired by Jin's card), and then I cut a piece of acetate and glued it to the back of the frame before adhering it to the front of the card.  If you'd like you can check out the other card I made using the sketch feature in this post.

In SSDE I used print and cut to create the card base.  To align the front and inner sentiment I used center to page. I printed the front of the card, turned the paper over, put it back in my printer and printed the inside.  CAUTION: Take note of which end of the paper went into the printer first.  You MUST put the same end that went in on the first printing, in for the second time, or this will happen:  

Don't let this tragedy happen to you!!

I took the paper out of the printer and couldn't remember which way I'd put it in, so I guessed.  Oops.  I'd like to blame it on son number 3, who happened to walk in and talk to me at that very moment, but I take full responsibility, seriously, son, it's not your fault.  To prevent this in the future, I'll draw a little arrow on the paper to indicate which end I put in first (hopefully I'll remember to do that!).  Has this happened to you?  I hope not.  Now I've got to figure a nifty way to cover this up so I can give it to my husband who loves Pink Floyd as well.  Any ideas?  Leave a comment and let me know!

Supplies I used:
Silhouette Studio Designer Edition
Silhouette Cameo
Silhouette Black Sketch Pen
American Crafts White Cardstock
Green Seed Beads
Hooked on You Cut It Set
LDJ Zoodle Font

Thanks for checking out my "Two Lost Soles" card, and Have A Crafty Day!
 

3 Things To Pay Attention To When Using Your Silhouette Cameo

With Chinese New Year coming on January 31, I thought I'd make some cards for my kids using Make The Cut (MTC) and the Chinese Zodiac Cut It Set from Lettering Delights.  That would mean making four cards, with each of their zodiac signs on the front.  Because of my lack of a fully functioning brain due to being sick for the past five days, I encountered three "technical difficulties" and only succeeded at making one card.  I thought I'd share these difficulties and what I learned here, in case you encounter them.  My first problem was easy to solve.  I noticed while my Cameo was cutting the square card mats I'd created, the shapes inside the mats were way too small to cut well.  I wasted an entire sheet of cardstock, ugh!    Lesson learned, make sure to do a test cut when cutting small shapes!  I also noticed the squares had cut farther to the right on the cutting mat than they should, problem number two.  I had no idea why that was.  The only card that seemed salvageable was the snake, so I decided to press on.  I cut the top layer of the snake in vinyl, and that's when the third problem revealed itself.  The shapes weren't closed, they looked like this:

This shape didn't finish being cut!

I racked my brain over this for a while, and then it dawned on me.  While I was test cutting trying to figure out what was wrong, I had the cut window open and I noticed some unchecked boxes, which if memory served me right, had always been checked when I cut.

This could be the problem!

I then clicked on that question mark to the right of settings and discovered this little tidbit of info:

Bingo!

Shapes not closing, exactly what one of my problems was!  And, since the "using carrier mat" option was unchecked the shapes cut farther to the right on the mat.  Try checking and unchecking that box some time and see the difference, the picture will change.  I hope sharing my mistakes will prevent this from happening to you!  Now, last but not least, here is the card I managed to create:

It's far from perfect, as you can see the rough edges from where the shapes didn't cut well.  To make the red mat have only the openings of the snake I used MTC and broke apart the snake, removed the solid portion that remained and joined the inner pieces to the square.  I was then able to put the actual snake shape cut from vinyl on top.  The one success I had was writing on the card using a thin font and a Silhouette sketch pen, it turned out perfect!

No, I'm not a snake!

This is one advantage of having Make The Cut, as this is something Silhouette Studio can't do.  If you use these fonts in Silhouette Studio it must be the true type version which is a double line, and personally I don't think it looks as good.  The red layer is popped up with foam tape for dimension, here's another view:

Ssssssss!

Of course I'm not really calling my 12 year old son a snake!  He was born in the year of the snake, 2001.  Here's the inside of the card:

Doesn't really sound like a snake!

I did a little reading to find that info in a book called The Secrets of Chinese Astrology by Derek Walters.  I found the Chinese character for snake by doing a simple Google search, clipping it, and tracing it in Make The Cut.  Making this card turned out to be a learning experience for me.  I now know to pay more attention to things like unchecked boxes and the appropriate size for cutting shapes!  Have you ever had a crafting experience like this?  I mean, for a while there it felt like someone didn't want me to finish!  I feel better now that I have one card.  I plan to make larger versions of the others tomorrow.  Here's what I used to make this card:
Lots of PATIENCE!
Silhouette Cameo
Make The Cut Software
Chinese Zodiac Cut It Simple Shapes
LDThin Font Light Sans
LDB Christine's Hand (inside of card)
Black Silhouette Sketch Pen
Core'dinations Cardstock (red)
DCWV Textures & Finishes Stack (gold)
Vinyl

Hope you enjoyed this post, and Have a Crafty Day!

(I am an affiliate for Make The Cut)