In Honor Of

In honor of the aforementioned awesome freebies as it were, I am offering people the chance to rummage through the new free bag and take what they think they can use.(this means YOU!) Just contact me and I'll let you know if I can just hand it over or if I have to ship it off somewhere. (Pictures will be coming soon?).

This is going along with my whole contentment theory, its funny the more I give away and share this awesome loot, the happier and more craft juices start flowing.

I love my daily blog hop with my rss feeds, those women are incredible, they sew cards, put buttons on them. Its with both sadness and fondness that I have to acknowledge I'm on my way to that level of dedication.

We'll graduate in December and then the sky is the limit. Though being a SAHM is probably not within my immediate future, due to both myself and the economy, it is one day within my future and then I can put forth the dedication these hobbies require.

I have determined an awesome location for my crafts, its a half closet that with a high enough stool/chair and the right storage equipment will become my craft nook.

I'm excited with this new venture, and makes the apartment not nearly so cramping for my hobbies. I'm envisioning a permanent location for the cricut which may mean that I will actually use it!

Alas, this isn't so for Ryan, he tried to have a Jam session there and the neighbors called and complained. Rightfully so, and I'm glad I wasn't there for the loud drumming.

But I'm ok with where I am, I just have to constantly remind myself that I am super young, though friends have condos and houses, it is in my future, just not the current one, and priorities for everyone are always different and thats ok.

Spoiled without Lifting a Finger

So I've newly discovered that I am spoiled. This became evident as I meandered my way through my inspiring blogs and what to my wondering eyes did I find? I found that I had received free paper that had not yet been released to the public just yet! Aside from giggling inside all over I'm in a little bit of shock. You see I have a connection at a paper recycling facility and I get "reject" paper from her with some flaw or other. Except that I'd already made gorgeous birthday cards with My Minds Eye new papers for 2009.

This is not the first time I have noticed this. I discovered from various pictures of CHA that what women were going ga-ga over I already had.

I didn't notice any flaws in particular on the papers and now I am just wondering how the paper landed in my lap, or better yet at the Paper Recycling center?

Done back in October, but I really liked how it came together. Paper is My Big Idea Fall Stack, used Cuttlebug "Swiss Dots" folder, and Cricut "Beyond Birthdays" and Cricut "George and Basic Shapes"

Heart to Heart in Honor of World Alzheimer's Day

This is an Incredible Heart to Heart by Cammie over at myblogbycammie.blogspot.com .
Cammie has $1,000 dollars worth of Blog Candy being given away for one lucky person who participates in the Heart to Heart in honor of World Alzheimer’s Day last Sunday Sept 21.

This is a card that will be sent to my friend who worked in an old folks home. She started working their when we were in High School and she's always been willing to help others. What an incredible person, she makes me want to do more service to those in need.

A personal note: This is something I will likely develop when I am older. For now life is amazing and wonderful but I can't help but dread the day that I can't remember who I am or any part of my life. I've seen the fear and worry of this disease take away happiness from people who would otherwise be happy. I don't want to let the eventuality of this eat at me, because thats too much of my life gone. I pray modern medicine is able to make leaps and bounds as concerned with this disease.

The paper is a basic black embossed with the "twigs" folder on the cuttlebug. The Ribbon is self adheisive by...! The paper is from "My Big Idea"s Fall Stack and the Letters are by the same person as the ribbon, I'll have to investigate who is the genius behind self adhesive embellishments, cause I'm officially a fan. I rubbed a silver crayon over the embossing to make it pop and colored a few of the branches with red and gold for hope, thought the pics don't seem to emphasize this. Small side note: I'd like it better if it was gold...
apologies for all the pics, the metal embellishment made it hard to get one nice shot, and knowing me the best one is crooked.

Because I Like to Make Cards!

I guess I should explain, well I was really quite pleased with these cards and decided to upload them back in July, and now its September. Anyway, here they are regardless. The first card is just cutting out paper, a stamp and then some sticker buttons, officially one of the greatest creations ever! DCWV Mat Stack Neutrals, DCWV Mat Stack Just for Girls, Rock Star set by DCWV?
Second card, really easy as well, cutting paper a stamp and a few sticker embellishments, told you I loved them. Paper DCWV Mat Stack Neutrals, RockStar by DCWV?
Third Card, Bon Voyage was cut out with the Cricut, Beyond Birthdays Cartridge, Paper DCWV Stack 5 and SBW Mega Pack.
Words ZooBaloo Cricut Cartridge, Castle Use Your Imagination, paper DCWV Stack5
Flourish Cricut Use Your Imagination.

Spoilage

DH temporarily revoked my craft store grounding, not that I blame him for grounding me in the first place, and let me get a few items with some Birthday money and gift cards. New favorite thing in the world, gift cards to craft stores, someone was a genius.

Anyway, the new acquirements included a fall paper stack, a Cuttlebug and a few embossing templates and a few embellishments. Officially, I am spoiled, and I both don’t have room and don’t want any more things for a while. Ah the fall binge, its coded into my brain as one of the best times to go shopping, not for sales, but for new quantity. Poor Ryan, but when I started playing with the Cuttlebug he was pretty fascinated by the machine too, and I’ve been really impressed so far, its been super easy to use, and the parts are fairly economical.

So my versus,
Cricut vs.

Amazing yes but, the mats are 10.00 for new ones and wear out after major cutting projects.
Extensive youtube videos have convinced me that the cricut is very versatile.
Of the many things you can make with it are:
Stamps
ChipBoard
a ton of varieted dies
metal imprinting
vinyl lettering
it draws if you get the markers

So one of my favorite things it isn’t able to do is texturize, and that is pretty unfortunate in my eyes.

Cuttlebug, (cricut minus design studio)

Affordable
None of the parts seem really able to wear out
only imprints one size, don’t get me wrong, its awesome, and the cricut has spoiled me with my seemingly limitless choice selections.
I think one could do metal imprinting
really makes the paper pop


So how dare I compare two incredibly awesome machines? But one can’t help it, for instance, why would a poor starving college student get two machines that did pretty much the same thing? So of course I have to rationalize, and dream of a day when I have time to work on my many imagined projects…

And the reason for the delay in getting Design Studio, it only works on PC’s, which last time I checked, most of the artistic world has converted to Mac’s, so I’m boycotting until it is available for the Mac, call it will power, but it seems silly for a program to be PC capable and not Mac, simply for the versatility and creative capability of the Machine.

I was explaining to someone once, the difference between a PC and a Mac, its simple

PC’s are for people who have a cluttered desktop, can’t think outside of the box and are uninventive, i.e. most of corporate America

Mac’s are for people who like clean desktops, infinite possibilities, and are very creative i.e. artists and people who would use that capability.

So, how does Provocraft justify not having Design Studio, a program that would fully benefit from the many possibilities, not compatable with something created to make the creative process easier.

Cricut Consuming

So I was the cricut’s able bodied assistant again last night, but I am a peculiar card maker, I like giving my card’s personality. That makes the card match up with the person better and then that makes me feel like I made a quality card. Last night was a scrapbook crop, which was a lot of fun, but I don’t have any current projects that I am working on, and unused cards can only take up so much space. So being designated the cricut worker was fun, and I love to help people use it, it makes the machine more enjoyable and useful to me.

I was in a home with more stamps than I could ever fathom and even more paper, I felt like I was in a scrapbooking store, it was awesome. What was even cooler was that it was all organized. She had a book of all of her stampin’ up stamps so that she can see at a moments notice what all she has. It is definitely a genius idea and I am tempted to make something similar for the cricut, because its so hard to know what all you have without really seeing it, I might even go so far as to cut them out in all different shapes and functions. That would be a lot of paper, but I can see it being very worth it, and that binder would be priceless.

I keep seeing more things and I have to pace myself, at first all I had was a basket, then drawers and a basket and now drawers and the cricut case, must pace self…