My Deer Kids

Here is the project that I finished up today for the Fantabulous Cricut Challenge Blog Crawl.  The challenge was to use as many of the featured cricut elements as possible in a single project.  As I cruised through the blog i thought that it should be fairly simple to use all the elements in a layout.  That was until I got to # 9 and glass etching.  I pondered on this for a few days until I remembered that I have been wanting to make a layout of the kids to display in my scrapbook room.  I had alrady completed most of the project at this point.  Off to Michael's I went in search of a 12x12 frame.  They no longer carry the wood frame I wanted to purchase.  i finally found a frame that would work and they only had one left in the white.  I grabbed it and went ahead with it, so you just need to imagine that the other half is framed as well.  I have already cut out the vinyl to etch it as soon as Michaels gets more in stock.

1. Angie at http://www.cokiepopaper.blogspot.com/ challenged us to use die cut flowers.  This was easy enough, I have loads of cartridges with flowers and I love to use them.  The flowers on the grass were all cut with the Give a Hoot cartridge
2.  Brenda's (http://brendasscrappyblog.blogspot.com/) challenge was to create a journaling box out if a die cut shape.  I chose this shape from the Tie the Knot cartridge that I thought also looked like clouds.  I then used my CutterBee bug paper piercer with a ruler to get the lines to write on.  I added some stickles, gems and my heartfelt thoughts to complete these boxes. 
3.  Candace at http://www.scrapadoodledee.blogspot.com/ challenged us to emboss on a die cut.  This is one of my favorite things to do, so I went to work embossing the tree trunk with the distressed stripes folder and my deers with the swiss dots folder.  The tree is from the Just Because cards cartridge and the animals are from Give a Hoot.

4.  Lori at http://livingorganizedchaos.blogspot.com/ wanted us to use the negative of a die cut.  this was the most challenging thing for me.  I am so not good at this.  The irony is that before my mom got her cricut I was always saving my negative cuts for her because I thought they would look great on pages.  So I forced myself to use one and I decided on adding it to my title.  the word "DEER" is the negative space from Storybook. 
5. Nana over at http://www.youniquereflections.blogspot.com/ asked for us to use our Gypsy.  Good thing I still have the one on loan from Provocraft that I am using to demo at the Costco Roadshow.  I completely designed my layout on the Gypsy as well as did most of my cutting from it as well. 

6.  Penny (http://lightwhimsy.blogspot.com/) asked us to use a shadow cut.  I used the shadow feature on the Gypsy wanderings Cartridge for the words "my" and "kids".
7. Robin at http://robinscreativecottage.blogspot.com/ challenged us to draw with our cricuts.  I have a set of the cricut markers and don't use them near as much as I should.  I had been curious how it would work to draw and cut on the bug from the Gypsy, so i used my markers to cut out the same words from challenge #6.

8.  The next challenge was to ink, draw or otherwise embellish a die cut and it was issued by SammyeJoe at  http://62cards.blogspot.com/.  This is another technique that I love.  this was shown in almost all of my cuts.  I added stickles and gems and chalk ink to my journal boxes, I inked the embossing and drew stitching on my tree trunk as well as stickles on the swing, I added smooch paint and liquid glass to my apples, my deer are inked up and their flowers and butterflies are addeed to, I used my Creative inspirations paints on some of the flowers.  I think that's it

9. The glass etching challenge from Sharon  http://ladybug820.blogspot.com/ was my biggest challenge.  I used my Gypsy and the heritage cartridge to create this swirl.  I can't wait until I get a second frame so this is complete. Here is a close-up of the etching
10. Tammy (http://momofthreeaddictedtopaper.blogspot.com/) wanted us to use paper piecing in the layout.  I wasn't quite sure what this was until she explained that it was basically just using layers.  Well I do this all the time.  The flowers on this page, the tree, the apples and the deer all have multiple layers.  On the larger deer I also used a hole punch near where his hooves are supposed to be to make a semi circle shape so that more of the pink would show through. 
11.  Valerie at  http://www.craftygolucky.blogspot.com/ wanted us to use a food item.  I really wanted to make an apple tree.  I do realize that the seasons may look a little mixed up (apples=fall and flowers=spring), but I really love this look.  The apple was cut from Give a Hoot in green and again in red and then I used my smooch paint in Chocolate to add the stem.

I had so much fun challenging myself.  The blogs did say that you could use these elements in different projects, but to put them all into one was the ultimate challenge for me.