Wednesday Winners #32

We loved all the beautiful entries for our #32 "Falling Leaves" challenge. I hope you had a chance to view each of our participants, it's such wonderful inspiration! If not view them -HERE (at the bottom of the post). Thank you to all who joined this past week.

~This weeks Winner~
A $20 Gift Certificate from Paper Wishes
#39 Glenda -Glenda's Cards
Congratulations Glenda!!!

To claim your prize please contact Robin at...
fantabulous cricut @ yahoo .com (remove spaces)

You have two weeks to claim your prize. If anyone knows the winners of our challenge this week, please let them know they're a winner at FCCB.

Remember to grab your "FCCB Winner" blinky to display on your blog! You can find the blinky code on our right-hand sidebar.

Design Team Top 5

#3 Erika -Cricut Love
#10 Kathy -Kathy and Kids
#13 Tammy -Addicted to Paper
#17 Charlotte -A Little Bit of Detail
#26 Jenn -MyImaJENNation

Congratulations Ladies!!!

Remember to grab your "FCCB Top 5" blinky to display on your blog! You can find the blinky code on our right-hand sidebar.

Thank you to all those who played with us this week!

Come join us for this weeks "Frighten Me... or Not" challenge -HERE
Create a project using a Halloween idea... scary or not so scary it's all up to you.

Quick Tip Tuesday: Adhesives

Welcome to Quick Tip Tuesday!  I am quite certain that we all use a variety of adhesives, but I thought I would take the time to describe some of my favourites to you this week.

I absolutely LOVE my Zig 2 Way Glue fine ballpoint pen.  The tip is small and is perfect for adhering little cuts.  However, I also use it for some of my larger cuts as paper can pull off with a little bit of force if I realize I have not positioned the items straight enough for my liking (which happens more often than I care to admit).

Another adhesive that I use all the time is Scotch Quick-Dry Adhesive.  This glue dries very quickly and works with paper, metal and plastic.  The glue safe for photos and the tip is fairly fine.  I do find that this glue has no forgiveness though, so be sure you are absolutely certain on the positioning of your papers before adhering them with this glue.

For large bits of paper, I often use Staples' permanent glue tape runner.  The small dispenser fits easily in my hand - and my purse!  When using the glue tape, I can position my paper before pressing it down, and in able to make sure it is in just the right spot before pressing firmly.

I use Zots glue dots for adhering items such as buttons, plastic embellishments, etc. Zots are incredibly adhesive and hold items in place securely.  They also offer a touch of dimension.

I could not live without my Pop Dots.  I have a variety of sizes and love to use Pop Dots on the majority of my cards to raise certain images or letters higher than other elements of my project.

I also use Scotch Matte Finish Magic Tape for adhering ribbon to the backs of my projects.  This way, ribbon can be held in place but the tape is behind the project (I usually taped to the back of the mat which is then adhered to the card base) and unseen.

What adhesives do you use?  I would love to read your recommendations too.

Happy crafting!

Challenge Me Monday #33

What a wonderful October month we've had here at Fantabulous Cricut, and of course the inspiration and ideas continue. Are you ready to be frightened... well, many of our ideas are not so frightening, but very inspiring with Halloween ideas?

Challenge #33
"Frighten me"... or Not
Create a project using a Halloween idea... scary or not so scary it's all up to you.

As always there needs to be an image cut using your Cricut on your project to be eligible for the prize.

Design Team Projects

Angji
Designer Calendar, George and Basic Shapes, Pumpkin Carvings cartridges
Brenda
Paper Doll Dress Up cartridge
Jamie
Happy Hauntings cartridge
Michelle
Mini Monsters cartridge
Melin
Alphalicious, October 31st cartridges
Lori
Mini Monsters cartridge

Penny
Create A Critter, Paper Doll Dress up cartridges
Robin

Doodlecharms cartridge
Sharon
Happy Hauntings, Mini Monsters cartridges

Valerie
Paper Doll Dress Up cartridge

~This Weeks Sponsor~

$25 Gift Certificate - JoAnn's

Scrappin' Saturday: Design Your Own Background Paper!

Happy Saturday to you!

Today, I want to share with you another FANTABULOUS idea from our friend Amy Chomas with Chomas Creations...

Design your own background paper!!!
Amy used Cricut Design Studio and the George & Basic Shapes cartridge to make her own graph paper for this school-themed layout:

Instead of "cutting" the grid design, she used one of the Chomas Mini Gel Pen Holders with a blue gel pen and achieved the look of real graph paper with her Cricut!  Here's a close-up:

Amy is sharing her graph paper file for free HERE!

You could use this tecnique with any design and customize the color of the design based on your other papers and cardstock for a completely coordinated look!  Genius!!!  Head over to Amy's blog for more inspiration and ideas on how to use the gel pen and marker holders with the Cricut.

Happy Scrappin'!

Fantabulous Friday #32

Good morning my Fantabulous Friday Friends!!!,

Welcome to another Fantabulous Friday! Today I am changing gears just a bit. For the last two weeks we have been focusing on a particular cartridge.  But today, I am going to post on a particular “image” or cut. I was working on a project with a Fall-Halloween theme. I was looking for a Crow. So of course I went to my Gypsy to do a search of what cuts were available.

So here is what I came up with.

Here is a cut from October 31st Cartridge

Here is a cut from the Cupcake Wrappers Cartridge

While both of these are fine, neither was what I was looking for…so the hunt was on! I began doing a search on the net. I was looking for an SVG file that I could use to cut with my Cricut. For those of you that are unfamiliar with what an SVG is: it is a file format that allows you to use your Cricut along with a third party software to cut the file-die cut. I found a couple of freebies.

This project which features a FREE set from Deena Rutter has a couple of crows in it.

You can go HERE to download this set.  While this was also really nice, it wasn’t exactly what I was looking for.

Here is another one I found from Little Scraps of Heaven.
You can go HERE to download this.




And then one of my fellow CWC DT members designed this cute little set.

Here is a project she made using them.

You can check it out HERE.

I then decided to work on making some up: I made this cute little Crow:

You can download the FREE file HERE. 

And then I made this set, I called Crows Silly Crows.

Having the flexibility of cutting files you create or purchase along with the option of using your cartridges, makes having the Cricut a FANTABULOUS option.

Last but not least, I made this little crow using my Cricut and some of the Cricut cuts (don’t have a pattern for him…yet).

 
Sorry my project isn’t done yet…but hopefully I will get to share it with you soon . Well, I guess that’s it for today. I hope you have a wonderfully crafty weekend and now you can make some Crowliciously, Fantabulous Projects.

Melin

Thursday's Tutorials: Family Tree Frames

Happy Thursday!

This week's challenge theme is "Leaves" and what better time to display your family tree...
Here is a two-part tutorial I found by SlaterDee on YouTube:

First video:

Second video:

Aren't those adorable?  I can't wait to get started on one for my house!

Happy Crafting!

Wednesday Winners #31

We had such fun "on the wall" entries for our challenge, you are all so clever with the way you decorate!! Thank you to all who joined us.

~This weeks Winner~
$25 Gift Certificate -Cutters Creek
#11 Elsa - Cricut LVR
Congratulations Elsa!!!

To claim your prize please contact Robin at...
fantabulous cricut @ yahoo .com (remove spaces)

You have two weeks to claim your prize. If anyone knows the winners of our challenge this week, please let them know they're a winner at FCCB.

Remember to grab your "FCCB Winner" blinky to display on your blog! You can find the blinky code on our right-hand sidebar.

Design Teams Top 5

#1 Shell - Shell's Stuff
#7 Patty - Dream Cards
#8 Kelly - creative warcraft
#20 Erika - Cricut Love
#23 Chris - Love to Scrap, Love my Cat

Congratulations Ladies!!!

Remember to grab your "FCCB Top 5" blinky to display on your blog! You can find the blinky code on our right-hand sidebar.

Thank you to all those who played with us this week!

Come join us for this weeks "Falling Leaves" challenge -HERE

Quick Tip Tuesday: Cricut Cartridges

Welcome to Quick Tip Tuesday!  Today we will be discussing the types of Cricut cartridges.  There are a variety of Cricut cartridges on the market which are suitable for different needs and budgets.

Font cartridges contain the entire alphabet, along with numbers and various types of punctuation.  Often, these cartridges will contain shapes and word art as well.

Shape cartridges focus on a variety of shapes along a specific theme.  At times, these cartridges will also contain a font and word art.

Classmate cartridges are perfect for school-related projects and displays.  These cartridges have school themes and were specifically designed with classrooms in mind.  However, these cartridges are not limited to school use.

Licensed cartridges are cartridges containing characters and/or images with a registered trademark, such as Mickey Mouse, Sesame Street, and Hello Kitty, etc.

Solutions cartridges contain a limited number of designs and features but are also priced more inexpensively than other cartridges.  These cartridges are packaged without a storage binder or booklet.

Seasonal cartridges are limited edition cartridges which contain 50 images per cartridge.  These cartridges are available until initial production is depleted.  Although these cartridges do not contain creative features, they may include some special additions such as three-dimensional shapes.  Like the Solutions cartridges, Seasonal cartridges are packaged without a storage binder or booklet.

Lite cartridges are available exclusively at Wal-Mart.  Each cartridge has 200 images, which include creative features, as well as layering and shadow images.

Cake cartridges provide a number of options along a variety of themes geared toward cake decorating.

Imagine cartridges work differently than the cartridges created for the original Cricut, Expression, and Cricut Create.  Imagine Cartridges contain icons and layered images, as well as colour palettes and patterns.

To the best of my knowledge, cartridges are interchangeable within the different Cricut machines.  However, some features may not be available when cartridges are used in machines other than the ones for which they were originally intended.

Happy crafting!

Challenge Me Monday #32

I love the crisp cool air of Fall. The weather is getting cooler and leaves are falling everywhere, Fall is beautiful!

Challenge #32
Falling Leaves:
Create a project using at least one leaf.

As always there needs to be an image cut using your Cricut on your project to be eligible for the prize.

Design Team Projects

Candace
Gypsy Wanderings, Simply Charmed, Tags Bags Boxes and more cartridges

Kate

Ashlyn's Alphabet, Nursery Rhymes cartridges

Jamie
Create a Critter cartridge

Lori

Storybook cartridge

Michelle
Don Juan, Heritage, October 31st, Pumpkin Carvings, Sentimentals, Serenade, Walk in My Garden cartridges

Penny

French Manor, Stretch Your Imagination, Winter Woodlands cartridges

Sherri
Doodlecharms, George and Basic Shapes, Paper Doll Dress Up, Stretch Your Imagination cartridges

Sharon

Thanksgiving cartridge

~This Weeks Sponsor~

$20 Gift Certificate -Paper Wishes