Dreadful Edibles and other ScaryTreats

Happy Halloween, my sweets! Yay! I finally got the last of my coffin boxes tied up in twine and now I'm ready to enjoy an evening of haunting....Muahahaha!
Been wanting to make coffin boxes for Halloween for the longest time, ever since I saw the ones made up by Kelli over at Squishy-Cute Designs. She shares a free printable template for her coffin boxes on her blog together with some instructions on how she cut her brownies to fit into the boxes. But since I wanted to use my Silhouette Cameo to cut my boxes, I chose to use the free svg template created and shared by Bird of Bird's Cards. For my brownies, I used a neat Wilton's shaped dessert shell pan which bakes up 6 coffin shaped brownies at a time. It's a good thing I started experimenting with this early because I soon learned that not all coffins are created equal...I had to do some re-shaping and re-sizing on the original template so my coffin brownies would fit. (So if you're in need of an svg file for coffin boxes to fit the Wilton coffin shells please email me.)

Here's what the brownies looked like after I piped in skeletons with some royal icing. It took a bit of practicing....LOL, yeah, they look kind of goofy but oh well...at least they look sorta like skeletons. Sealed them in cellophane bags and they fit nicely into their coffins.

Lined the coffins on the inside with some cute Halloweenie papers from My Little Shoebox.

For me, decorating the outside of the box was the funnest part. Inspired by cute way Mandie from Mandie's Scrappin' had done up her boxes, I used the bats from Cricut's Happy Haunting cartridge and gave them some googly eyes. Used a Quickutz Chandelier Font All On One die for the lettering and purple adhesive backed rhinestones for a little bling. "Death by Chocolate" tags are computer generated using Gothic 57 font and I used a tag die from a Sizzix Sizzlets tag set to cut them out. Put together a little over a dozen coffins for my trick or treating ghoul friends.

Didn't think the "older" ghouls would care much for brownies, so for them I mixed up a batch of "Dreadful Edibles" It's actually a snack mix of cheese puffs, wonton pi chips and furikake tossed with butter flavored popcorn oil. Ohhhhh....GROSS! I know, it really  looks and sounds awful, but wait till you taste it....if you dare!

Scooped the mix into jars wrapped with tissue and added a fun spooky label...

Computer generated labels (Gothic 57 and A850-Deco fonts) were cut using Spellbinders Nestabilities Oval dies and topped with a skull and crossbones cutfile from Miss Kate Cuttables.

Of course I couldn't forget our furbaby's doggie pals! Filled these decorated doggie bags with fun Halloween toys and treats.

Cutfiles for this adorable puppy comes from Too Cute By Jessica. Used the Boo Pup from the Halloween Puppies file and dressed her up in the devil costume from the Halloween Doggies file. Added a border of Halloween tape for a cute finishing touch.
Hope everyone has a fun and safe Halloween! It's so nice that if falls on Friday this year...we can stay up late and celebrate all weekend long!

You Color My World!

Three days after hubby's birthday, we celebrate our wedding anniversary. This year was number 34 for us...wow, time flies when you're having fun, right? This year for my anniversary card for hubby I decided to do a "blast from the past"... and bring back a really old stamping/cardmaking technique I learned many, many years ago called the Magic Color Card.

Instead of using a stamped image, I chose to use a coloring book image of a classic and one of my favorite Disney couples, Lady and the Tramp. Printed the image twice; once on acetate and a second on white cardstock. Colored the one on cardstock using my Copics. Used Spellbinders Nestabilities round dies to cut the window, and the circular word border was created in Microsoft Word 2010 using Expose font. Struggled a bit with this, but found a pretty good tutorial over at Online PC Learning  which helped a lot.

For the construction of this card, I used a Splitcoast Stampers tutorial by Beate Johns, changing the dimensions to suit my card. Pulling up on the tab on the top of the card moves the image out of the window and "voila!"... the sentiment and a colored image "magically" emerges...

The concept for this card may be old...and though it's really just a simple slider card, even after all these years, it still manages to deliver the wow effect to its recipients.

I enjoyed re-learning how to make the magic color card again. Best part is that hubby really seemed to have fun with it...sliding it back and forth repeatedly to see the "magic"...."Neat! How'd you do that?!!!"... LOL, that's why I LOVE him SO MUCH!

Golfing with Mickey

We celebrated hubby's birthday earlier this month and for his card I decided to stick to his favorite golf theme again. This time I used a side step style card and a coloring book image found online of Mickey at the tee. Used Make the Cut to render golfing Mickey into a paper piecing cut file and the Silhouette Cameo to cut him out.

The golf and putting greens, tee, hole and flag were hand cut. Cloud cuts are a free digital cutfile from Bird's Cards. This creative lady comes up with some of the best and useful cutting files, and always generously shares them at no cost! Grassy borders were cut using a die from Dienamics. I attached the golf ball to strip of acetate and onto the card to try to make it look like it was in flight after Mickey's swing.

Here's what the card looks like on the inside...

Lined the panels with more of the same BoBunny Double Dot cardstock I had used on the front of the card. added my sentiment together with  more grass. clouds and a golf bag with clubs.

The golf bag and clubs is also a freebie cutfile created and generously shared by Vicki on her blog, Vicki's Creative Crafting Corner. Love the design of the golf bag and the detailing on the clubs!
Hubby seemed pretty happy with his golf card, although I'm starting to feel like all the golf themed cards I've been making for him recently all look basically same. LOL...I think of "golf" as pretty boring and I'm afraid  it's beginning to show in my cards too. But if hubby likes 'em, guess I'll keep on  making 'em!

Coffee, Anyone?

About a week before my dear friend Heather celebrated her birthday last month, I found myself in a creative slump and at a loss for any good ideas for a card. That's when I decided to chuck the idea of a card and go with a fun papercraft gift instead. Heather's a fan of caffeine, so I wanted to give her a Starbucks gift card and I thought this mini coffee maker and mug would be a fun addition.

The cutting file for this comes from SVG Cutting Files...definitely a favorite place to go for the most  unique, creative and one of a kind cutting files! This one is called "Cuppa Joe". The coffee maker was a breeze to put together; the mug a little trickier because of it's rounded shape.

The personalized logo on the cup is a freebie file, which I picked up from a past SVG Cutting Files blog hop. Filled the mug with candy...See's Caffe Latte, of course! But after adding the candy to the mug, I found that the weight of the candies was a bit much so I decided to reinforce the back panel of the coffee maker by adding another layer of cardstock. I also sandwiched a thin metal plate in between an additional layer of cardstock on the "burner" and glued a little magnet inside the mug so that it would sit nicely in place.
All in all, quite a fun project to put together and a nice change in pace from the usual birthday card!

Cricut Club Card Swap 2014

Are you ready for this? Got twelve fabulous cards, created by the amazingly talented ladies in our Cricut Club for our annual swap to share today.

First up, two cards featuring everyone's favorite Create A Critter panda...

The sweet black 'n white building blocks card with panda on a bridge (Pagoda cartridge) was created by Kelli. Love how she added the bright red shadowed sentiment (Hello Kitty Font cartridge)..."You Make Miso Happy"! Adorable center step card with panda wearing his cute rice paddy hat on a bamboo embossed backdrop was created by Michele C.

More cuteness from the Create A Critter cartridge used by Bonnie and Aileen to create these two cards! Bonnie used the sandcastle and little crab from Create A Critter to make her delightful shaped card, together with a sand bucket from Lifes A Beach. Don't you just love those googly eyes! Dalmation, bone and smiling sun cuts on Aileen's also from Create A Critter.

She used a Stampin Up Thinlits Circle Card die for her card base, changing the orientation of the card to turn it into a top fold card...very cool!

Three more fun cards....from left to right, sweet Tinkerbell card from Laura, pop out cake card from Kris and a blocks card from Sharon. Laura used the Art Philosophy cartridge to create her unique shaped card base and did a fabulous job of embellishing with Tinkerbell, a strip of rhinestones and coordinating ribbons.

Once again, Kris wowed us all with another amazing interactive card. Pulling up on the tab reveals a Happy Birthday sentiment as the candles pop out to peek out from the card...neat-o!

Here's a top and backside view of Sharon's fancy blocks card. Lookit all those little cupcakes! Large cupcake on the front is from Sweet Treats cartridge and she used punches to create her mini strawberries and cupcakes...wow, so much detail!

Next up...an elegant trio of fancy cards from Pat, Jean and Cheryl! Pat created her beautiful ivory tone on tone sympathy card using the very intricate Memory Box Peony Outline die. "With Sympathy" was cut in Silhouette Design studio and she added strips of shimmery paper to frame her card front. Jean used the Sizzix Princess Dress die for her lovely shaped card. Dress was embossed using Stampin Up's Manhattan Rose folder and she added a sweet vellum rosette and bow from Flower Shoppe and Life's A Party cartridges. Love that pink lining on the inside of the card...simple and understated elegance perfect for a wedding or bridal shower. Cheryl used the Anna Griffin Winter Wonderland cartridge for her intricate poinsettia flower...so beautiful! Love the colors she chose and the fancy pearls and rhinestones added for the flower center and holly. Cheryl used Mpress Retro Swirls embossing folder as a backdrop for her poinsettia and she stamped and heat embossed her "Merry Christmas" sentiment in gold.

The final two cards are these unique and very original gift card holders made by Ev and Michele F.
Ev's pretty flowery gift card holder features a framed cherry blossom from the Picturesque cartridge with a creative string tie closure made from flower shaped brads and bakers twine. Michele's adorable Pooh card holder images comes from the Winnie the Pooh and Friends cartridge.

On the inside, Ev's gift card holder opens to "pop" the gift card up at the fold, while the gift card "slides up" from its pocket together with the sentiment on Michele's super fun card. Either would surely put a smile onto any recipient's face.
So there you have it...twelve absolutely fabulous and wonderfully creative cards, each designed and put together with a lot of love by our Cricut Club ladies for our card swap. I never cease to be amazed by how talented everyone is, and am constantly being inspired by all the creative ideas everyone always has to share.