Michael's Holiday Craft Contest - Week Five

I am sorry that I have been missing this week.  I didn't feel well early in the week due to three nights in a row of "party food/rich restaurant food".  After recovering from my tummy woes, I had yet another evening out with hubby and his business associate and I had to go into my office for a day.  But... In the midst of my busy week, I have been working a couple of projects.  The larger of the projects is this wall collage in my entry way for this week's Holiday Crafting Contest at Michaels.

For those who haven't been keeping up, this is week five of a seven week contest sponsored by Michaels on Facebook - Michael's Craft Some Holiday Magic Contest.  I have entered four of the five weeks and actually won week two.  Each of the seven weekly finalist will be in a final run off to win a Cruise.  I may be calling on all of you in a couple of weeks for help and support me in my attempts to win the cruise!

Each Monday morning Michael's releases three new mystery items that must be used in that week's project.  This week the three mystery items are WIRE, PHOTO FRAME(S), and WRAPPING PAPER. 

I took ten photo frames and framed seven family Christmas photos from throughout the years.  The oldest photo is my husband and his little brother with Santa in 1966; the newest is from last Christmas.  Two of the photos are family Christmas photos and two of them are my children with Santa - 18 years ago and 7 years ago (when the older two were in high school).  I used wrapping paper as matting behind the older photo of my children with Santa, and trimmed it out with peel offs (see above).

For the remaining three frames, I used wrapping paper, cardstock stickers or Cricut cuts to create Christmas scenes to add a whimsical touch to the collage (again see above).

I embellished nine of the frames with artificial greenery, curled wire, mini-ornaments, and HO-HO-HO red ribbon.  The embellishments not only added to the overall holiday feel of the project, but they also gave me a way to incorporate the final mystery element - wire.

The final addition to the entry way wall was three vinyl words cut with the Cricut, JOY, CHRISTMAS, and PEACE.  While I truly do not expect to win the contest this week (there are some cut projects posted), I was happy that both my husband and my daughter really liked our holiday collage.

Busy, Busy Week of Designs

I have a busy week with designs posted in different places.  Today I am a guest designer at the FABULOUS Christmas With The Cricut site.  I love CWTC.  These ladies inspire me every single day!  And in addition to being great designers and awesomely creative, they are three of the nicest women you would EVER want to meet.

There are two other guest designer projects at CWTC also - when you go by, and you should go by CWTC, be sure to look at Teri's and Christina's holiday home decor ideas.

New Projects with Cut Files and Directions

Have you been by Custom Crops this week?  I had five new articles post on Monday, four are Cricut Expression cut files with directions and the fifth is a new Gypsy project using vinyl.  The first layout, picuted above, is titled Visions of Sugarplums and would perfect for your Christmas Eve photographs.

The second project, Sweethearts Laundy Room Decor, features the Nighty and Boxers from Sweethearts on a cute little door hanger for your laundry room.

The cut file and instructions for the Monster slide box and card set, Monster Mash set, are also available.

The cut file, instructions, and pdf printable file are available for A Glass of Christmas Cheer card/invitation.

My Gypsy artilce features vinyl cuts for my kitchen tile back splash.  Complete instructions are available at Custom Crops. 

Just follow the blinkie on the left side of the blog to my profile page at Custom Crops and click the names of the articles/projects that interest you. 

BBTB Monday Chandelier Challenge

Happy Monday! It is a rainy Bitten by the Bug Monday here in SC, but my scrap room is brightened by the addition of this beautiful Chandelier from the Home Decor cartridge. And while the chandelier may not be putting out huge amounts of light, it is brightening my spirits and my day!

I suspect that vinyl may not have been part of Regina's plan when she assigned the chandelier cut, but I had been hoping to add this cut to my scrap room for some time. Regina just gave me the push I needed to get started.

I used a 12.5 x 12. 5 WALL POP from Lowe's to cut the chandelier. The vinyl is slightly sticky/clingy so it attached to the wall with ease. I told my friend Kathy that if I was a woman who liked wall borders this would be adorable all the way around the room (especially with our tall ceilings).

I will add that the photos really do not do the project justice... which is often the case. And this time that is especially true.

New Vinyl Cut For My Honda Minivan

Remember some months ago when I cut the vinyl cricuts for my and my cricut loving friends vehicles? I decided to create a second vinyl cut featuring one of my other favorite things.... Hello Kitty!!


I used the Hello Kitty cartridge on the outline setting and created this cute decal... A couple of our friends and my co-workers call my minivan "the cricky-mobile". I wonder what the addition of Kitty will do to that label????

By the way - CLEARLY my cricky-mobile, the cricut cut AND Kitty need a bath... Yucky!

Still Busy with the Cricky

After completing a project for BBTB, I moved on to the practical and the inspiring. First I saw on the cricut message board that Jody P had created upside down stickles holders. So I thought to myself, I can do that! I have several sheet of acetate that one of the guys at work salvaged for me when it was about to be thrown out (Thank you Charles!), so I decided to use that for my stickles holders. I purchased four 5 x 6 inch containers for $2.00 at Hobby Lobby (I TRIED to be good while I was there). I cut 12 holes in two half sheets of acetate. I trimmed the edges and used my glue max gun to adhere the acetate to the plastic container. It is perfect. I have space for 24 colors of stickles, not that I own that many. Thanks for the idea Jody.


Then I moved on to vinyl. I have been wanting to play with my new Home Accents cartridge, so I dug through my little pile of vinyl and found a 24 inch piece which I placed on the 12 x 24 mat. I used all HA on this design. I had a bit of vinyl slippage on the cutting mat, I think maybe because the mat was SO BIG. I also realized that I have two bubbles in my cut vinyl (I'll have to climb up and do some additional smoothing). I put this over my computer/cricut desk in my scrap room (above my new Making Memories Large Embellishment Center). I know this looks small in the photo, but it is 23 inches x 5.5 inches.