I have joined the design team for Bitten by the Bug 2 found here.  Projects are made using our Cricut machines and I  am super excited.  There will be a new challenge every two weeks.  You can add your link for each challenge on their post.  The challenge for January 6 is called Tick Tock and the you must use a clock or part of a clock in the project.

The cartridge called Folk Art Festival has a cute cuckoo clock in it, so I started there.  This cartridge also has a lot of border cuts in it, so I chose one that fit with the design of the clock. and kept only one of the three layers.  I flipped it horizontally and sized it to be 4.25″ wide.  That made the height 1.2″ high. Using basic shapes, I made a card base 4.25″ x 9.8″ (11 minus 1.2)   I placed a border design from the cartridge to the bottom of the rectangle and welded the two together. I did add a score line 5.5″ down from the top, but you could also do that manually.  Placing the cuckoo clock on Design Space showed that a vertical sentiment would fit better, so that is what I did.  This same cartridge also has a font including a writing font.  (Some of the older cartridges had tons of things on them). I wrote the sentiment and then separated the letters arranging them vertically.  Design Space is also great in that you can center things like the letters and distribute them evenly. Cutting that on double sided paper by Carta Bella allows the design to show up.  I used a Cricut fine point pen to write the sentiment in dark blue. The cuckoo clock has five layers plus a base.  Putting all those layers together made the clock thick like a chipboard element and really adds dimension to the card. It allowed me to use a cartridge that I don’t normally use and it was fun. – Denise

This past August my sister-in-law’s mother turned 90. She is a very sweet lady and I helped with some decorations for her party.  One of the things I did was to make a 3D 90.

The pattern for these letters came from svgcuts.com. My Cricut Explore does a great job cutting them out. Mary is such a wonderful designer and has videos on how to put her creations together. You really need that when working with something like this. The curved letters are the most difficult and of course mine were both curved. The flowers and leaves are stamps from Heartfelt Creations and come with a die to use in my  Cuttlebug. There are dried beans inside to give it some weight to stand up correctly.  – Denise

I was looking on Pinterest for something and came across this technique called faux leather.  You take a piece of fun foam and heat it with your heat gun until it starts to curl.  You then immediately stamp it firmly with your stamp that has been inked up with Stazon ink and hold a few seconds.  Because the foam is soft from being heated, it presses the image in and makes it look like tooling.  Going over the piece with Distress Ink and a sponge applicator makes it really look like leather.  I used a couple of Unity Stamps to try out the technique and love how it looked.

The moose if from the October 2017 SMAK kit called Winter Wild and the sled is from Memories Made.  The paper is from a 6 x 6 pad by Carta Bella called Warm & Cozy.  Below is a closeup of the Moose to try and show how it looks like tooling.  It is hard to see in the pictures, but looks cool in real life.  Just search on Pinterest or Google for fun foam faux leather for some detailed videos. – Denise

The Growing in Unity artists from July and August are have a blog hop.  These are so fun and all of the artists are great so I hope you hop along and comment on all of the blogs.

I haven’t had the time I want in my craft room, but I did get a chance to do a few cards for the blog.  The first is Maple Girl.  I was inspired by another GIU post this year to use her since I hadn’t inked her up before.  She is one of the smaller Angie girls which allowed me to use several papers from the Ki Memories paper pack called Autumn Flowers.  I used some oval nesting dies to cut the background papers and the sentiment mat.  I colored her with colored pencils and Gamsol.  Some twine wrapped around it gave it something extra.

The next cards are exciting for me because I was able to use one of the new cut files offered by Unity Stamp Company.  They have a new stamp called Ember Girl and it has a matching cut file.  Ember girl was originally in the October 2017 Kit of the Month (Conspiracy of Love) which I do have.  I purchased the cut file (which is an svg file) and imported it into Design Space to work with my Cricut Explore.  The file was meant to work with the new stamp which is smaller than the original in the KOM.  I played with resizing the image until I had a cut I felt was close enough to work with the stamp.  Below is how it looks on my computer mat as well as two of the sizes.  There isn’t  much of a difference and I could probably have gone even smaller to get those lines right at the edge, but I am OK with a little white around the edges since it saves all of that fussy cutting.  The final size was 5.3 inches high for the girl and 1.5 inches high for the sentiment.  Make sure that the size ratio is locked when setting the height.  I also ungrouped the two images before sizing them.

Here is my first card using colored pencils with her.

The papers I used were Photo Play’s Dear Santa. I put a clip to hold the papers and splattered White Picket Fence Distress stain on the red paper before adding the rest.

Next I did a cut with gold velum on my Circut.  That is part of the reason I love the new cut file.  Fussy cutting velum is not always the easiest.  This cut was so smooth. I stamped with Versafine Black and used clear embossing powder on it then mounted it on paper from DCWV (Very Merry 6 x 6).  I put a gold mat behind it and used a kraft card base.

Whitney had a video to show how you put the paper on top of the stamp when using these cuts.  Here is a picture of how I did it.  I put a little repositionable tape on the back of the cut before placing it on the stamp.  I then closed my case and it stuck to the other side allowing me to ink up the stamp and close the case to stamp the cut.  I do not own a Misti, but have been using a clear jewel (DVD) case.  These are the ones that do not have a hub in the middle.  I bought 10 of these for a good price probably about four years ago and still have some I haven’t used yet.  Unless you have something large, they work great until I decide to spend the money for a Misti.

Next up is Sue.  Here is the complete hop list in case you get lost or need to start at the beginning.

1. Jennifer Mitten https://jenmitten.blogspot.com

2. Jeanie Marie Hays https://thewashihorse.blogspot.com/

3. Denise Sayers https://thecraftyledger.blog/     {{You are here}}

5. Aimee Phillips https://aimeesstampingadventures.blogspot.com/

6.Helen SMit https://helenmazengarb.blogspot.com/

8. Teresa Godines https://purplebunnypapercrafts.blogspot.com/

Be sure to leave a comment for a chance to win one of two Unity prizes.  Thanks for visiting – Denise

I was the designer for Card A Day Challenge Blog for the first week of October.  The theme was fall and the colors were fall colors of red, orange, yellow & brown.  There is a different challenge every day using those themes.  Below are my cards.  The details for them can be found on the Challenge blog here.  Just look at the posts for the first week of October.  Each week is a different designer and it is fun to see the various styles we bring to the challenges.  – Denise

 Christmas cards using the fall colors  A card that shows a scene.My favorite is this 3-D box card.  It folds flat for mailing.  A partial die cut card.    My simple card from Sunday jazzed up.

I posted these cards as part of the design team on Card A Day Challenge and posted these cards during the first week of September.  Our theme for the month was masculine cards with the colors of green, blue and metal accents.  Here are the cards I posted that week.  For more details you can visit the blog here and search for 36-2018.

I am up this week too for October with a different theme and color scheme so check it out. – Denise

Now for the fun part of being a Growing In Unity girl.  I randomly picked two people from my comments to win the Unity stamp grab bags so graciously given by Unity Stamp Company.  Without further ado they are:

Dale Sue Glass

and

Pat Ceccacci

In addition I drew another name for a prize of 3 Distress Oxide Inks.  That winner is :

Sweet April

Congratulations to the winners.  Please email me with your addresses so that your prizes can be sent your way.

Thank you to everyone for the great comments that made last week a special one for me.