Here Comes the Sun

Ah, Spring! Here comes the sun, along with:
COMMUNITY on Thursday
SPRING BREAK on Friday
TEMPS IN THE 80s this week. 

Not only that, but I actually spent part of last weekend MAKING A CARD.


And I say 
It's all right.

I have not made a real honest-to-goodness card for about 2 months (I had some occasions where a card was required, but I just sort of limped along and/or CASEd myself).  And then I was tasked with making a baby card for a coworker whose nursery theme is owls. 

This was a Silhouette file; don't you love the (Amuse) gingham bellies?  I'm sure you do, but you're also wondering how this is a baby card?  Oh, just you wait....

Oh, yeah, that card just pulled out to reveal a baby owl.  That just happened.  I used the same idea as my "I love you this much" card (I actually had to use my own tutorial to refresh my memory on it, so I'm glad I made it, if only for myself to use).

Thanks to everyone that dropped in to say 'ello during my blogging break (I wish I had a better excuse other than lack of mojo)--I hope to get back to commenting during Spring Break, and maybe even make another card or two!

Happy Gnome and "I love you this much" tutorial

Yes, turns out I can make a card without my Silhouette:

Ok, if you say so, gnome, I'll be happy, but only because you're so cute!  This My Mind's Eye Darling Dear paper seemed to be very gnome-y, and I must admit I'm kind of in love with all the border strips that MME has for their kraft line.  The "happy" is from A*muse (I bought this set when the website was going out of business. I think it is on the retirement list for the new A*muse, which is kind of sad, not happy.)  The gnome is from There She Goes "My Little Friend," colored with prismacolor pencils (man, it's been a long time since I've had those out!).

As requested and promised, here's a quick-and-dirty tutorial of my "I love you this much" slider card, first seen in this post.

I'll try to upload my Silhouette files tonight, but it would also be easy to make in Word.  The main cover (left) is 4x8 1/4 (I forgot the 1/4 on my "diagram) and the slider portion is 3 1/4 x 8 1/4.  Make sure the text is centered vertically in both boxes, and you should be good to go.  You'll also need a 3 x 1/2 scrap.

Now it's time to make the base.  I made mine 8 1/4 x 8 so it could fit in a business size envelope and still have some mitten overhang.  Score at 4 inches.  Make your slider notches 1 inch from the top and bottom of the front of your card, about 3/4 inches in from the left and ending about 4 3/4 inches in.  Make sure your cuts end evenly or else it will make your slider be wonky at the end.

Slip your 3 inch scrap into the slits you've made and put some glue on the exposed ends.  This is where your slider will attach.  You may also want to go ahead and put some Scor-tape on the top and bottom of your card for adhering the big front portion.  I just used my ATG gun and tried to be careful.

Slide your slider into the slit in the front panel (that's what she said).

Now comes the tricky part in both picture-taking and action.  You want to attach your slider portion to the two glued tabs of your scrap piece, while at the same time not bending the front portion too much.  Then adhere the top and bottom of the front portion to the card base (this is where scor-tape would be helpful since you can wait until this step to reveal the stickiness).  If you notice, I have two 1/2 inch strips decorating my card at the top and bottom. I did plan on those, but they also had the added bonus of hiding any crease marks I got from bending the front piece while attaching. 

My hint: make a quick-and-dirty prototype with just some plain copy paper so you can understand the idea in person.  It really is one of those hard-to-describe-easy-to-do things. 

Hope it makes you happy!  :)

How much do I love you?

Is it this much:

or this much:

This was Mr Corgi's Christmas card, although I think it would work as a Valentine as well by changing the papers.  It starts off as a 4 1/2 x 8 1/2 card, then expands to be 11 1/2 inches long (hence the difficulty of getting a good picture). I designed it in the Silhouette Studio using the Print and Cut feature, which made it easy to make sure everything would line up and to get nice straight cut lines.  Then I used steps 6 & 7 from the Splitcoast Slider Tutorial to make the slider portion.  I used small glue dots cut into thirds to hold down the loops of the twine, making sure I had a loop at the slider cut since I thought that would give me a bit more wiggle room for matching up the twine on the slider portion (and it worked!). 

I know there is someone out there who'd like to win a Silhouette vinyl hook just for trying out one of my Silhouette files, so I'm going to extend the giveaway on this post until next Sunday, January 8th.

And now it's time for my final book reviews of 2011:

Book #50:  The Buddha in the Attic is a book Amazon kept recommending for me, so I finally downloaded it from the library.  It is a short book about Japanese women who come to America as mail order brides for Japanese-American men.  It is beautifully written in the first person plural, which I'm not sure would work for a longer book, but is wonderful here. 

Book #51: Next to Love was another Amazon recommendation, but they didn't hit it out of the park with this one.  The story of three friends from WWII to 1965 and how the war affected their lives throughout that time.  I started off being intrigued by the three separate stories, but at the end it had the effect of making me not care about any of them very much at all.  It does have quite a lot of good reviews on Amazon, so maybe I'm just an outlier.

Book #52: Daring Young Men was loaned to us by my dad for the drive home from Thanksgiving.  It is the story of the Berlin Airlift, of which I knew absolutely zero.  The first half was a thrilling tale of these daring young men joining together to keep West Berlin alive, the second half was a not-so-thrilling tale of the politics of keeping it afloat.  If you know a history buff (or are one yourself), I would recommend it.

Book #53: I'd been struggling to find a really, really good book to read over vacation and when the local librarian declared The Language of Flowers as her favorite book of the year, I thought I should give it a try, and it was exactly the book I was looking for.  About a foster child named Victoria, it tells the story of her transition out of foster care at 18, with alternating chapters of her life with her foster mother at 10.  Oh, and also throws in using flowers to communicate.  Recommended!

There you have it, a book for each week of the year, plus one to grow on.  Here's another year of good reads and fun crafts!

A Case of the CASEs

I've been doing a lot of CASEing around here recently...I love it when my blog peeps do all the heavy lifting of creating a card and I just copy it in my own way!
First, a birthday card for my dad:

based on this card by Lindsey of Bashful Blogging (see her post here).

Of course, I had to use that same Echo Park paper because it is awesome, and I also used the reverse side for the red and white stripe border.  I used a Silhouette file for my airplane.  I also notice that Lindsey is way better at taking pictures of long cards than I am. 

I also cased two cards recently from Emily of Art from the Heart, starting with a New Year's card

based on this card (see her post here).

When I commented that I needed that skyline die immediately, Emily was kind enough to tell me it was on sale this week, but the $10 price tag was a bit too steep for me, so the Silhouette came to the rescue.  I found a good image of the Birmingham skyline with lots of contrast between the sky and the buildings, then traced it in the Studio.  I added some squares for windows using the duplicate and space vertically/horizontally functions (added bonus: instant confetti!).  I embossed the Market Street sentiment onto some black shimmer paper.  The best part?  The little heart bling is the building (and floor) where we had our wedding reception.  Awwww! 

The second card that I cased from Emily was a thank you card for one of my students who gave me a de minimus gift (because, yes, the new Alabama ethics rule says you cannot give teachers a gift that is worth anything, because couldn't a teacher be bribed into giving a good grade if they got a cruise for Christmas from one of their students?  Could someone please tell me what school district is having parents give cruises at Christmas, and do they need any math teachers there?)

based on this card (see her post here).

I feel somewhat bonded to Emily's card, since I helped Em make the logos on the Silhouette.  I kept mostly the same layout, but added the Market Street Vintage Notepad in blue because I thought it made it look more high schooler-y.  The "thanks" is an old Cuttlebug die, and I used a Martha Stewart border punch on the ends.

So what are you doing New Year's Eve?  Mr Corgi and I have a nice grilled steak dinner planned and hopefully some good crafting time (well, for me, anyway.  Mr Corgi will probably get some good X Planing time!).  Stay safe out there, kids!

Silhouette Freebies!

I finally got around to sprucing up my original Silhouette files and uploading them to box.net.  I've made a page with a photo, original post link, and file link for each card that you can get to by clicking "free silhouette files" at the top of my blog (or just go here).  In cases where I did use some Silhouette downloads, I deleted those from the file and told you which images to buy from the store.  It's the first time I've tried sharing Silhouette files, so if you find something that doesn't work, let me know.  I'll try to keep it up to date as I make new files.  Let me know if you use them, too, I'd love to see what you create!

In other Silhouette news, they are offering 20% off online subscriptions with code YEAREND until 11:59pm December 31st, which means you can get $25 worth of downloads for $8 a month, i.e. each download will cost you about 32 cents instead of a dollar.

In other other Silhouette news, the Silhouette Santa was good to me and bought me a Silhouette hook for weeding vinyl.  He also bought me some starter kits (fabric ink and heat transfer) that each came with a weeding hook, which means I have 2 more hooks than needed.  So I will give them away to "beta testers" who download one of my silhouette files and try it out.  Let me know which one you tried and if it worked in the comments by 11:59 December 31st ETA: extended to 11:59 January 8th and I'll use random.org to pick 2 winners. 

In other other other Silhouette news, I can now attest to the awesomeness of glass etching with Etch-All.  Check out the mug I made for my brother- and sister-in-law:

Yeah, I know it's not a great picture, but you try taking a picture of a glass!

I admit I was a bit scared by the "may cause burns that are not immediately painful or visible," but I just wore some rubber gloves and tried to be careful.  I just used a paintbrush to apply it and to remove it (you can put it back in the jar to reuse it again and again), and don't really think the squeegee is necessary.  I was also a bit worried about getting the vinyl to behave on the round concave mug, but it worked like a charm!  I used a frame image from the Silhouette store, then added the stars, which is the Bailey family crest (thanks, Interwebs!).  And what couple gift is not complete without a "est." date on it (although next time I will be doing EST. because that little part in the middle of the "e" was the most frustrating thing in the whole process!)?   Here's a close-up:

Of course, they just loved 'em.
Total cost for a complete set of 4 personalized mugs: ($2.99/mug x 4 mugs) + (1/2 foot of vinyl at 40% off) + (4.99 etching cream * 40% off) = 11.96 + .25 + 2.99 = $15.20 (plus I can reuse the etching cream)  When compared with buying personalized mugs online, I'd almost consider them a freebie, too!

Down to the wire...

Is everything checked off your list?  I have about 4 more cards to make, plus some boxes to cut with my Silhouette, plus stalking email tracking to see if my gift to Mr Corgi will make it in time...eek!  But I do have some more cards to share!
First, a couple more Eat Cake Graphics Christmas cards:

Oh, how I love A Scarf for Ferguson!  Especially with that awesome October Afternoon night sky paper and some Waltzingmouse stamps, too.

As much as I love Ferguson, I do have a special love for Zero, and for putting different hats on him.  I almost went with my Santa hat theme, but then these antlers from Paper Smooches just called out to me.  The doghouse with lights is a Silhouette file.  I colored Zero with prismacolor pencils to look like my sister's dog, Molly. 

Can you name the movie?  Hint: It starts with e, ends with f, and has a l in the middle.  When one of my friends mentioned it was one of her favorite Christmas movies, I hopped right on the computer to start making it with some tracing and a pair of elf legs from the Silhouette store. I had to use this sweet candy patterned paper, and the Paper Smooches sentiment was just perfect for it, too.

This last card is the result of Mr Corgi deciding on Sunday afternoon that he did want to send cards to all his coworkers (15 of them).  

Fortunately, I never have to look far for a theme for his cards. I know what you're thinking, how in the world does an airplane qualify for a Christmas image, but if you take a look at our mantle, you'd be surprised to learn that yes, any and all airplanes are suitable for the holidays.  This was a Silhouette file, and I was able to cut out all 15 planes using only two sheets of shimmer paper and a few scraps.  The stamp is from Amuse (I love the shadow font effect), stamped in SU Cherry Cobbler.  And, yes, they were all finished and in the mailbox by Monday morning! 

Now it's time for this elf to get back to work!

Find a theme and stick with it

In making Christmas cards this year, I started getting a little bit carried away with the theme of "put a Santa hat on it!"  Then I went a little crazy during Silhouette's latest online sale and bought all sorts of Christmas images, but it turns out this one was the best deal of all, just for the Merry Christmas circle, which I then paired with my Santa hat obsession.

Exhibit A:  Angry Bird with a Santa hat

Exhibit B: Panda with a Santa hat

Exhibit C: Mickey with a Santa hat

We still have three more days to go, so who knows where Santa's hat will end up next!  (Also, as much as I'm loving this Amuse candy cane paper, it is impossible to take a photo of it without it looking all wonky, so I hope you didn't get any vertigo from today's photos.)

I'm also waaaaay behind on my books read list, aren't I?  Can I reach my goal of 52 for the year?

Book #45: Boomerang by Michael Lewis was the most recent book I've been reading to Ian in the car.  I love most all of Lewis's books and this one was no exception.  I just love his humor and I always feel smarter after I finish.  I'm not saying I'm an expert on the European financial crisis, but I can certainly follow the news better now.  Cheapie alert: after I bought this, I found out that it is a collection of articles Lewis wrote for Vanity Fair.  You can find the links here.

"Book" #45.5: Speaking of longform.org, I just found this site and am loving it.  It has links to some of the more interesting articles and essays on the web, with a super easy "read it later" button to send to your kindle or other electronic reading device.

Book #46: The Passage was recommended by quite a few people, so even though I was a bit put off by the page length (785?  Seriously?), I'm glad I read it and am looking forward to the next book in the series.  It's a vampire apocalypse book, but it's definitely more apocalypse than vampire.  I think he could have edited out about 200 pages in the middle where he introduced about 50 gabillion characters (I certainly hope he doesn't expect me to remember all 50 gabillion when I read the next one), but that's just my opinion.  It also reminded me a lot of the Coen brothers' movie True Grit, if that give you any indication of whether you would like it or not.

Book #47: The Gap Year was a novel told by a mother and daughter about the daughter's last year of high school.  It kept me turning the pages, and I like how Sarah Bird writes, but the end just seemed a little too wrapped up with a bow, if you know what I mean.  I certainly didn't think "oh I have to recommend this one," but I didn't think it should go in the burn bin, either.

Book #48: What Alice Forgot is a breezy novel about a woman who has a concussion and has forgotten the last ten years of her life.  She finds out she's one of those women who goes to the gym for hours a day and is the head of every committee at her children's school, and she's not sure if she likes being that woman.  If you're looking for a quick book to read on the plane, you'd probably enjoy this.

Book #49: The Worst Hard Time I've had this about the Dust Bowl on my "to read" list for about 3 years, so when it was offered a free book in the Amazon Kindle Lending Library, I thought I should probably get around to reading it.  I'm so glad I did--it was absolutely fascinating.  I knew the basics that everyone knows about the Dust Bowl, but I didn't realize just how many times they got knocked down and got back up again.  The writing was superb as well, it felt like your grandfather was telling you the story after dinner one night.

Well, I think I better get to working on some last minute Christmas gifts!  Is everything ready and wrapped at your household?  Or are you just going to give up and go read a good book?

Dear Santa (from the dog)

Now that this doggy has Santa cornered, I wonder what she would like to ask him...

Oh, sweet little doggy, I'm sure you made the "good" list!  I had so much fun paper piecing "Santa's doggy welcome" from Eat Cake Graphics that I may have gone a little overboard, as in, yes, I paper pieced Santa's glasses and doggy's tongue.  The sentiment was cut on shimmery paper (the very definition of "good") using Chowderhead font.  The background paper is "Twas the Night Before Christmas" paper from Amuse.

Speaking of Eat Cake Graphics, my "four month" design team gig there is finally drawing to a close.  Holly has been so laid back and easy to work with.  I'm forever grateful that she chose me to be on her design team, especially since it was my very first one!  ECG images make me so happy, so you certainly haven't seen the last of them.  If you love them too, Holly is looking for a few good stampers for her next team.  See all the details here and don't hesitate to apply--I would love to see one of y'all on there!

In other design team news, I am also stepping down from Market Street Stamps.  This week is the end of my six-month term, and although Angelica was nice enough to invite everyone back, she has such big plans for the next year that I wasn't sure I could keep up.  Angelica and Steph have been such fun to work with and I can't wait to see Market Street really take off to new heights this year!

As much fun as these design teams have been, I'm looking forward to starting the next year with absolutely no commitments but to enjoy my stamping.  I've gotten a little caught up in the howmanycardspublished/designteams/followers race and it's starting to take the joy out of crafting. I'm even debating about giving up blogging for a bit in the new year, but that does seem kind of drastic.  I do hope to have a nice big purge and clean up of my stamping room, then start the new year off with a fresh clean crafting slate.  That would be splendid!

You are such a dorg!

My blogger friend Jessi mentioned a while back that her kids loved the word "dorg," which Mr Corgi uses to describe Addison when she's being a dork.  So of course I had to make her a dorg card, right?

Man, that dorg still cracks me up, and Jessi said her kids got quite the kick out of it, too, which I'm glad to hear.  I used a silhouette file for the dorg and another one for the glasses, then printed the definition using word (hint: I just copied and pasted the pronunciation from google).

So in the exciting world of teaching, I gave my final tests today and now just have a couple days left of crowd control next week.  Yippee!  Have I mentioned the farthest we're traveling over the holidays is to Atlanta?  I'm so excited to spend Christmas at home.  What's kind of funny is that Mr Corgi bought me a Charlie Brown Christmas tree since I've been wanting one, but they are always sold out.  I got to open it when it came about a couple weeks ago and we put it on the dining room table.  Then both of us said at the same time, "That's a good enough tree for me!"  So yes, the one year we're home to enjoy our tree and we're being lazy scrooges.  At least I bought Mr Corgi the Hallmark airplane ornament, so now there are two ornaments on our Charlie Brown tree.  And it makes me happy every morning, and isn't that what a Christmas tree is supposed to do?

Best Comment Ever + Paper Sparks Challenge

I have been totally remiss in awarding my Official Best Comment of the Year Award, which was not really an award category until I saw Jenny's comment on my post about Maria's birthday card. The card read "Happy 39th* Birthday (*plus shipping and handling).  Here is Jenny's comment:

Totally awesome.  I wish I knew a nine-year-old stamper for whom I could make that birthday card. Jenny, email me your address so I can send you a fabulous prize package!

In other news, I finally got around this weekend to playing in the Paper Smooches Sparks Challenge.  Here is the inspiration picture:

And here is my card:

Oh, shiny paper, how I love thee!

I arranged the snowflakes in the Silhouette Studio to mimic the plates, then cut them out of that gorgeous DCWV metallic paper, then layered some Aspire Petalics paper behind it.  I wanted to use Mr Mouse's cheese for that pop of yellow, but it just didn't seem to work.  So instead Mr Mouse (from Santa Paws) is staring up in awe of those huge snowflakes (which, as an added bonus, I have cut out to use on other cards).  I cut Mr Mouse out of grey cardstock, and I love how his tail got a little 3D curl to it while I was cutting it out, don't you?

Subway Art and Christmas Gifts

For my parent's anniversary (in June), I offered to make them a piece of subway art and, after showing them what subway art is, they decided on one showing all the places they've lived.  Of course, did I work on it in the summer when it was nice and warm?  Or on one of those nice fall days?  Nope, I waited until about two weeks before we were going to drive over there for Thanksgiving to get started on it.  But I did get it done and it was on the wall about 5 seconds after I gave it to them:

(I edited their full last name and their current city, but I think you still get the idea.)  I must admit it turned out pretty darn cool even if it was A HUGE PAIN IN THE BOOTY to make.  All of those "oh, it's so easy!" tutorials?  LIES AND DECEPTION.   "Just put on your vinyl stencil [that doesn't stick to canvas], spray paint a base layer so the top coat doesn't bleed under [which it will anyway], then just touch up a few parts [which will somehow just make the mistakes look worse]."  The good news is, unless you are 6 inches away from the canvas, you really can't notice the mistakes.  Since this one, I've tried making two others and they have been a disaster.  So I think I may just stick with vinyl letters (I made sure to stock up during the Silhouette Black Friday sale) and not try to get all fancy-pants-painty, because crafting is supposed to be about having fun, not feeling like a failure, right?

Speaking of not feeling like a failure, I thought I'd share a few gift ideas that would definitely not make you a failure on Christmas morning, because if everyone else on the interwebs can have a gift guide, why can't I?  These are all items that are readily available, but I did link up the amazon page for each one.

Friday Night Lights

For: Anyone, any age (well, not for the wee ones, of course)

Price: $15 per season, $75 for the complete series

Why: "Clear eyes, full hearts, ..., well, we're work on that tomorrow."

Logitech Portable Lapdesk

For: The relative who surfs in bed

Price: $20 (white or black) to $25 (pink, blue, "vintage wallpaper"), often on sale at Target

Why: Because you can't do anything using a trackpad, slim and light enough to slip in a laptop bag.

If you're feeling generous, throw in a nice wireless mouse.

Justified

For: The hard-to-buy-for brother

Price: $20

Why: "That's a ten-gallon hat on a twenty-gallon head."

Crazy Stupid Love

For: Your husband, but secretly it's for you!

Price: $10-25

Why:  "You deserve better than the Gap."

Riding Rockets

For: Anyone who misses the Space Shuttle

Price: $6

Why: They will laugh, they will cry, and then they will share it with everyone they know.  I know this from experience with the last 3 copies we've bought (and that does not include the copy we originally read from the library).  

Open It

For: Anyone, but especially parents of young children

Price: $8

Why: Give this to parents as the first present of the day.  It can cut open plastic blister packs without endangering major veins, snip open those evil twist ties that are on children's toys, and has a screwdriver for opening those little battery compartments.  Added bonus: a bottle opener because don't you deserve it after assembling those 27 parts?

Snap Circuits SC-300

For: Science Whizzes age 8+
Price: $40
Why: I bought this for one of my nephews last year since he was enthralled when Mr Corgi showed him how to build a computer from scratch.  I wasn't sure if it would be a hit or not, but this year he asked for the expansion set, so I guess it was!  

Every Thing On It
For: Your favorite child.
Price: $12-20
Why: Two words: Shel.  Silverstein.

Etsy Finds

For: Moms, Sisters, Girlfriends
Price: Cheap, cheap to seriously?
Why: Support entrepreneurs, give gifts they won't already have, and find some nice stuff for you in the process!  I usually just search around, but to get you started, the above three items I've purchased and love: jersey scarf from Sweet Harvey; frog necklace from My Sweet November; bird necklace from Dreamy Vintage,

Do you have any awesome gift suggestions?  What is on your wishlist this year?