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Thursday, August 30, 2012

Halloween State of Mind


Hi Everyone!

First I wanted to send a quick apology to everyone.  I pulled a muscle in my back early last week and was in the middle of RA training and was couch ridden when I was not at RA training.  I was sad to miss out on a couple postings and a blog hop but just couldn't stand sitting in my chair as the pain was unbearable.  I apologize for not posting in a while but please know, I'm back!  School has officially started so things are a little hectic.  It's always odd to get accustomed to a new schedule, so here I am slowly but surely getting the crafting bug back.

Today I'm being featured on Cricut is Close To My Heart blog.   My post for today is Halloween themed.  For those that know me this may come as a surprise but I have finally been thinking in advance for once.  So far in advance that my brain is already in October!  :)

I wanted to share my simple and easy project today that could easily be done in a flash.  It took me about 20 minutes from start to finish (even though I will probably add a few things here and there to it.  I used my Cricut Artiste cartridge and found the "coffin" on page 76.  I knew that this would be a perfect project because I could see myself filling these with candy for my RAs when we do a Halloween party.  I used non-Close To My Heart paper (shhh don't tell!) and it came from The Bewitched Stack.  I purchased this stack from my local Joann's.  I cut the coffin (bottom and lid) at 7.5" and this fit nicely on 12x12 cardstock.



I was surprised at how deep the coffin was - which made me even more pleased because then I knew I could definitely use it for Halloween candy.  The measurements are 7.5" long and a little under 2" deep.  2 inches?!  You can fit a lot of candy in there.  :)  All this talk of candy is making my sweet tooth sing.


Anyway, here is the finished product.  I think when I make these for my RAs, I will add the skeleton to the bottom so as they eat the candy it's a little surprise waiting for them at the end.  :)  The skeleton was cut at 6.5" as I wanted him to be smaller than the coffin.  I realized I could have cut him just a tad bigger but will remember that in a couple weeks when I start mass producing them (13 in total.  Eeek!)


Craft on,
Ian

Tuesday, August 14, 2012

Program Completion Images

Hi there,

Yesterday there I posted about the banner I made for my RAs programming board.  Below the banner was a fire pit with a grid on it.  That grid is what I use to track my RAs programs for the semester.  Each semester it's something different depending on my theme.  Since this semester I'm all about "camping", an student office worker created the fire pit that I would use to track the programs in.

So, now that I had it done, what was I going to cut out to for them to see that they completed it?  I went back and forth on a couple different ideas, but finally picked a bunch of logs on fire (otherwise known as a fire pit but I like to think of them as logs catching on fire when they are thrown in the fire).  Since I have 13 RAs, and they need to complete 5 programs this semester, I had the task of cutting 65 images.

I decided to do a couple different colors (red and orange fires) to represent the type of program they completed.  The red fires are the Social programs they need to complete.  The orange fires represent the SPEEDY model they have to follow.

What's the SPEEDY model?  SPEEDY stands for Spiritual, Physical, Educational, Environmental, Diversity, and You Choose.  Since they have to do a total of 6 SPEEDY programs, this covers each of the letters.  The You Choose is the only time they can double up on a program they have already done. I think these little fires will be so cute inside of the big fire.  :)

Now, onto how I did it.  I cut the fire pit image from the Old West Cricut cartridge.  This image was cut at 1.50" to make sure it fit in the 2" squares on the grid.  I cut them on a light brown paper and then went back and cut the shifted image on red and orange.  Once I had all of the images cut out, I was able to draw grains on the wood.  Then I adhered the "fires" to the top to finish it out.  It was funny because about 47 in, I was getting really lazy with the grain lines.  Haha!  They are finished though, and that's what matters.

Here are the pictures!



I hope you all are having a great day!

Craft on,
Ian

Monday, August 13, 2012

Exploring Cricut Challenge

Hi Campers!

Welcome to Camp Strose!  Today over at Exploring Cricut, the design team is doing a challenge using 2 Cricut cuts and 1 monogram.  I stepped it up a notch and did a whole banner.  I am using this as the banner above my RAs programming board (where I track what programs they do).  I have attached the photos below, but will explain what I did.

I used Campin Critters for the banner and Old West for the letters.  I cut the shadow, banner, and the tent covering in all different sizes.  The one thing I found tricky was that the banner was actually a sign.  I only wanted the tent covering and not the words above it so I set out to find another tent image that would do me some good.  I ended up cutting the upper layer of the tent image multiple times so that it would fit perfectly over the tent on the "sign/banner".  All of the paper I used was 8.5" x 11".  I cut the banner at 10.5" and the letters were cut at 5".  The tent covering was cut at 6.5".  It didn't fit perfectly but it was better than cutting out the whole "sign".



On the letters I took a Chocolate Close To My Heart marker and drew on the grains to each letter.  I am very happy with the results.  I hope you enjoy it too!  :)




Don't mind the messy office in the last photo.  That reminds me, I should clean that up soon!  The students will be here before I know it!

Thanks for stopping by!  Now head on out to the campfire and roast some marshmallows.  :)

Craft Camp on,
Ian

Friday, August 10, 2012


Hi Campers!

I'm being featured on Cricut is Close To My Heart today.  For those of you who don't know, I am an Area Coordinator at a small college.  An Area Coordinator is a Residence Hall Director - just a different name to it.  So I work in Residence Life.  Through this, I oversee Resident Assistants throughout the year.

This semester I have chosen to do a camping theme which includes doortags for their residence hall room door, the semesterly programming board banner and a small gift that they will receive when they move in for training.

For the gift, I decided to give them a snack to keep their energy up as the days can get quite long during training.  What screams camping more than s'mores?  I saw this idea somewhere a couple months ago and thought - YEP!  I'm going to do this for my RAs!  So here I sat, in my craft room, with the NEW Artiste cartridge.  I cut the box on page 37 of the handbook.  I used 12"x12" paper from The Green Stack by Die Cuts With a View.  I cut the box at 5.5" (which is as high as it will go with 12"x12" cardstock).

I then used wood grain paper from the same stack and grabbed my Tiny Typewriter Alphabet (D1222) and Giggle Lowercase (D1137) and stamped "s'more kit".  To take it even further, I grabbed the Happy Camper stamp set (C1457).  I stamped the camp fire and raccoon on white cardstock, and colored them with Close To My Heart's Watercolor Pencils (3505 - currently out of stock until late September) to color them in.  I cut the images out and adhered them to the s'more kit layer.  I then used pop dots to adhere it to the front of the box.  Due to the way the box folds, some of the images or words were upside down so I adhered that layer on the side that was upside down.


Inside the boxes I am putting a mixture of Golden Grahams, chocolate chips, and marshmallows, hence...the kit.  :)  I will also give them a Kool Aid bottle to wash it all down "campin' style".  :)


Check out my blog for more projects and inspiration!

Craft Camp on,
Ian

Sunday, August 5, 2012

Close To My Heart Shopping Haul

Hi there,

Here's a quick video I made of my latest Close To My Heart Shopping Haul.  There are stamp sets, ink pads, the NEW stamp scrubber, and the NEW Cricut Artiste Cartridge!  Check it out!  I will be making more videos regarding the Cricut Artiste cartridge later so stay tuned for those.

Currently I am working on a couple different projects.  Mainly trying to get ready for the RAs to come back so I have a lot going on with that.  I am also going to be doing some design team posts soon too so stay tuned!

I hope you are all doing well and taking care of yourselves.  Summer is almost over and I can't believe it!  Where did it go?!  :(

Ok, here's the video!


Craft on,
Ian

Wednesday, August 1, 2012

It's August 1st!

Hey there,

Well, it's August 1st ladies and gentlemen.  What does that mean?  It means that the NEW Close To My Heart Idea Book has come out!  Exciting stuff!

If you have a Cricut and are in love with it - then you NEED the new Cricut Artiste cartridge.  It is loaded with tons of images and is a must.  Check out the image below!



You can also find the digital handbook HERE!

The next thing to note is that if you have been considering becoming a consultant, there is no better time than right now. The new consultant kit (shown below) is $49 and comes loaded with things to start you off on the right foot.   When you join under me, you also get this amazing tote (shown below) FREE!




Whether you want to be a Consultant or hobbyist, there are two tracks designed for you!  If you would like to be a consultant, you are required to have sales of $300 each quarter, and if you would rather remain a hobbyist, you are required to have sales totaling $100 each quarter.  With the consultant status, you receive 22% off your orders and as a junior consultant (hobbyist) you receive 10% off your orders.

So, head on over to iandreger.ctmh.com and take a look at the new Idea Book and all of the fun stamps and products we have to offer!  If you have any questions, please do not hesitate to reach out to me!  :)

Craft on,
Ian