A Girlfriend Gift!

Well by now the chocolates have been opened (Hubby got me my yearly treat, vegan Belgium Chocolates from Rose City Chocolates, really I didn’t think it was possible for something to taste so good!) I had an extra special valentines yesterday, not only did I have a nice relaxing day with my family but I was asked to join the About Art Accents Design Team! The owners saw the project I did with their stamp (yesterdays Fortunate Valentine) and invited me to join. How cool! OK, OK you don’t read my blog to listen to me blab so here is today’s project.

Stamp: Magenta, Die Cuts: Cricut, Felt: Queen & Co

I made this for my friend Kathy who had her birthday on Valentines day. I’m not sure If I would like that, kinda of like having your birthday on Christmas, getting the short end of the stick, you know. On the other hand it’s kinda cool too (and hubby would never forget!) Here is the card that I made to go with it. I got a bunch of Crafty Secrets stamps for Christmas that desperately needed to be inked up. I love the vintage style and they are funny too, a real plus!

Stamps: Crafty Secrets, Ribbon: American Crafts, Cardstock: The paper Co, Emb plate: Kiskars

To make the stationary box I used my Cricut Expresssion and the cartridge Tags, bags boxes and more./ I re sized it in Design Studio so it would fit my 5 1/2x 4 1/4 cards, a bit bigger to account for my envelopes.  I ‘ve had TBBM for a year but never used it much until I got the expression. The large paper I used is Strathmore 300 Series Colored Art Paper. I’ve used this for years for pastel painting and it cuts wonderfully in the cricut. It comes in 40 sheet assorted pads and is 12″x18″, larger enough for any box I want to cut and very thick and sturdy. It had a nice texture to it as well but you will want to tape it to the mat with blue painters tape because with the texture It does not stick well. I used pressure (max) and a blade depth of 3 to cut it. I think a pack of the paper is about $10, which is not bad for that many sheets but you can get it for half at Blick Art Supplies or use your coupon at AC Moore or Michel’s, call first to make sure they have it though.

I found another wonderful template sight the other day. Check out Jersgirls Computer Crafts. She has a ton of wonderful paper crafting templates. You could use her Crayon Box to make your own stationary set. You will need some way to size it up though. You could take it to a copy shop and have them make it as big as it will go an an 11×17 sheet for instance or print it at home in a legal size sheet of paper, just keep zooming in on the template when you are in your print dialogue box. Either way you will find her website a treasure!

Thanks for stopping by andtil nex time happy crafting!