2019 December Daily

Hi all,

Today I am putting together my plan for my 2019 December Daily Album.  I tried a couple of times before to complete a December Daily Album and failed.  My biggest problem was the fact that unlike other ladies, I can't seem to scrap without pictures. This year I took a different approach to my December Daily. No list, no script, just real life.  Each day I took a picture and posted it up on Facebook with the date and one sentence captioning the photo.  Yes, there were some days where I put more than 1 photo up but my goal was to keep it simple.

Why try again when I failed twice before?  Well, I had the supplies.  I am using White Pines items (circa 2015) as the base of my album. Here is what I have on hand for my December Daily album.

All of these items are retired.

1. Z3176 - White Pine Scrapbooking Program : PML cards with dates on them
2. X7200C - White Pines Complements (x2)
3. Z3077 - White Pines Assortmant (x2) 
4. Z4038 - Beary Christmas Dots (circa 2017, colors are Cranberry, New England Ivy, and Silver)
5.  Z3105 Fundamental Assortment Gold
6. Z3101 Fundamental Assortment Cranberry

I am using current supplies for my album and page protectors.

1.  Z4219 - Black 6" x 8" Everyday Life™ Album 
2.  Z3252 - 6" x 8" Memory Protectors™
3. Z3191 - 6" x8" Memory Protectors™ Design 2
4. Z3192 - 6" x8" Memory Protectors™ Design 1

Wish me luck.

More adventures living on the edge or die cutting on the edge that is!!

Hi all,
Back with more adventures of die cutting on the edge. Of course since I am a go big or go home girl, I needed to make design for all 5 of the ornaments in the Ornaments Digital Art and each of them had to be a little different, well because I never do anything the easy way 😃.

The next card used the next ornament with the snowflake.  Whenever I think of snowflakes I think blue. I would have loved to make a card using sapphire cardstock but I didn't have any on hand.  Next choice glacier Cardstock not just because I had in on hand from my Holly Jolly project but because it reminded my of Alaska. Yes I am in the middle of 3 projects at once!!!

1. Die cutting on the edge Christmas Cards
2. Holly Jolly workshop
3. Alaskan Cruise 20 layout Album

and many more unfinished on the shelf.  These are just my active projects. Maybe I should have titled my space "Creativeness Run Wild"?

Back to the Die cutting on the edge Christmas Cards.  The first card took 6 1/2 hours to create.  I will admit, the first 4 1/2 were spend trying to do a swing fold card in design space.  I did not get up from my chair the whole 4 hours.

After sleeping on it, I decided to approach the task using the same steps it takes to make a physical card and things went much smoother.  This next card only took 3 1/2 hours mainly because I was going slower and trying to avoid the missteps I had using the pen instead of the scoring blade, etc.  Let me tell you the message to insert the scoring blade flew right by me and I had to back it up to check. Before I forget, one more lesson I learned was put the scoring blade or pen in before you insert the cutting mat.  yeah, for some reason I went into a mad panic and just tried to change the pen to the scoring blade. Yep black mark on only sheet of glacier Cardstock I had.

So 10 hours into the challenge I had a 2nd card made.

I nearly forgot that I why this card took such a long time.  I tried to cut the Merry Christmas saying out and it was a hot mess in the ~1 inch size.  Of course, it was meant to be cut out much larger but I had to give it a try.

Back to the drawing board making the inside of the card.  First I tried a second saying which was also a hot mess when it was cut.  Actually I tired creating the insides of both yesterdays card and today's card at the same time.  Big sigh, I was so many hours into this project with nothing finished so I had to figure something out.  I took a leap of faith and changed the saying to "draw" from cut.  As I mentioned yesterday, I had never used this feature before. Love, love, love it!

With this saying I switched to the Cricut metallic marker.  The "Merry Christmas" saying from CTMH City Sidewalks cartridge is an outline so I colored it in using the Cricut marker.

Products used

Z3605 Ornaments Digital Art

Z3366 Silver Foil Paper

Z3293 Clear Shimmer Brush

1385 White Daisy Cardstock

X6047 Black Cardstock

Cricut Silver Mettalic marker from Cricut Explore™ Metallic Pen Set

Saying "Merry Christmas" from CTMH City Sidewalks

I just got my clear shimmer brush and I am also in love with it.  Using it on the snowflakes was the easiest step in this project, lol.


Have a wonderfully crafty day and check back tomorrow for another installment of die cutting on the edge.
T

Living on the edge Or at least die cutting on the edge

Hi all,

My next attempt at die cutting on the edge involved the Cricut.

This is what die cutting on the edge (partial die cutting) is really supposed to look like.

I thought about how I would make the card with a physical die cutting machine then I applied the same steps to making a digital die cut on the edge.

I started with the measurement a standard card 8.5 in wide by 5.5 inches high.  Then I look at the ornament size and cut the width in half.  Next I subtracted that amount off the width of the card. I made my rectangle that size.  Lastly I welded the the ornament to the rectangle, similar to the way you would place a physical die on the paper using the washi tape and make the cut.

Unexpectedly the hardest part was the score line.  My first try I simply put the score line on top of the card base & grouped it together.  All my scores lines ended up in the corner of the 12x12 paper.  This was not at what I expected so I canceled the cut.  Next I welded the score line to the card base.  That did not work.  In the end I figured out that I needed to "attach" the score line to the base.  Just when I thought I had it right, I put the pen in the instead of the embossing stylis (scoring blade) in the "a" holder. Sigh, so I had to score by hand on the black pen line.

Here is my finished card. Thought I would love the red & green.  I wasn't so hot on the color scheme but I am in love writing using the Cricut.  I have never used this feature before. Love, love, love it!

I wanted to try silver & blue or red and gold or silver and gold; so on to the next attempt.

Products used:

Z3605 Ornaments Digital Art

Z3563 Diamond Stickles™ Glitter Gel

Z4224 Black Shimmer Brush

1385 White Daisy Cardstock

X6038 Candy Apple Cardstock

Z4224 Black Shimmer Brush

X6040 Clover Cardstock

Saying "Merry Christmas to You" from CTMH Season of Joy cartridge.

Have a wonderfully crafty day and check back tomorrow for another installment of die cutting on the edge.
T 

Living on the edge Or at least die cutting on the edge

Hi all,

Since I don't own that many dies, I decided to try die cutting on the edge with the mistletoe die that came with the nutcracker set (item # Z3535 Cedar & Pine—Cardmaking Stamp + Thin).

In the past I have tried die cutting first then stamping but my eyes are just not sharp enough for this method.  I find I am most successful if I stamp and then die cut.  Knowing this, I stamped the mistletoe along the edge of a white card base.  Then I partial die cut the mistletoe 1 at a time.

This left an edge of white paper that had to be carefully but off using an exacto knife.  I use a Cricut® TrueControl Knife™because I like the comfort grip.  I have never been good with an exact knife so I have been working with my TrueControl Knife™ since September to try to perfect my skills.  I have found that having a comfortable grip on the knife, a really good metal edge ruler (I use Tim Holtz) and a cleaning cutting mat are all key.  In addition to getting a new knife, I bought myself a new cutting mat Z2179 VersaMat™ as the mat I owned is a 20 years old, very stained, and glue covered.  I feel like I went hog wild treating myself to a new knife, a new cutting mat, and buying dies with the stamp.  LOL  The I thought if they last me 20 years like the last set, I don't need to feel guilty about my splurge.

I was really happy with the way the partial die cut turned out.  You can see from the picture that there is one place I die cut too far in.  One the 3rd mistletoe, I cut around the berries. Overall, pretty good really.

I hadn't thought about anything other than die cutting on the edge before starting so now I was looking at a pretty much blank card.  I wanted to make the hard work pop so I added the Candy apple cardstock behind the edge and of stamped the Merry Christmas saying from the Cedar & Pine—Cardmaking Stamp + Thin.  I was really liking the Candy apple red and green color combo. At the same time I was thinking it still looked at little bland so I added some Christmas Red Stickles™ Glitter Gel,  Ah, much better.  I really like the Christmas Red stickles.  I have owned them for a while but this is the first time I have used them.

I don't usually do challenges because I am easily distracted.  I dove in deep to this one.  Between the Nutcracker cards featured on the last blog and the Mistletoe card featured here, spend 5 hours messing around. Yes, that included watching 2 YouTube videos showing hot to die cut on the edge.  Darn those videos, they make it look so easy.  I am hoping reading this help help someone else cut some time out of the experiment phase and so straight to the success phase. :-)

Have a wonderfully crafty day and check back tomorrow for another installment of die cutting on the edge.

T

Living on the edge Or at least die cutting on the edge

Hi all,

I can't believe it's been a whole week since I posted.  I have been crazy busy trying to finish up my first workshop.  I wasn't happy with the fact that my layouts were so "bland" so I focused on pulling together the cutting instructions, welcome letter, and other workshop elements while waiting for a couple of "bling" items to be delivered.  That said, I have to admit I got sidetracked the last 3 days working on a die cutting on the edge / partial die cutting challenge.

Hmm, why did it take 3 days to complete this challenge??  The trick is to put the top plate on the portion of the die you want to cut.  In this case I was trying to cut the nutcracker on the outside edge of the card so the right hand side.  After I took the pic I discovered I couldn't get the plate/sandwich to go thru the machine this way.  Instead I had to put the side I was cutting first so all the plates are going thru, so the top plate is only covering half the nutcracker that entered the machine first.

Turns out cutting the nutcracker and the hat at the same time wasn't such a good idea.  First the hat was floating above the nutcracker so I just ended up cutting it off.  Second I bent the hat die.  SO, definitely a bad idea.

Looks ok from the front but not really attached well and doesn't look so nice from the inside.

Take, 2. I decided I would cut the nutcracker, then cut the hat separately.  Results were better but not stellar.  The left most picture shows how I put the plates thru the machine.  If you look real close at the middle picture you will see the there is a overlap of the cuts such that the bottom of the hat cut below the top of the nutcracker so there is a silver of paper that had to be glued down.   

The die cutting worked better but I wasn't happy with the stability due to the over lapping cuts.

I wouldn't be giving these cards out to anyone.  They were good experiments in that I gave both die cutting on the edge and coloring with my new Spectrum Noir markers a try.

Spoiler Alert - I have 6 more partial die cut / die cut on the edge cards that I completed in the past 3 days.  Each one better than the last.  Practice pays off, Keep reading each day to see them all.

Have a wonderfully crafty day and check back tomorrow for another installment of die cutting on the edge.

T

24 Hour FLASH sale!! - come & get it

Shop, shop, shop....

Grab all the the fun things up!

Hop Hop Hop....

Onto the line!

Flash, Flash, Flash....

The real good deals won’t last!

Hurry, Hurry, Hurry!

Be sure to set your clock!! 

#flashsale #ctmh #scrapbooking #stamping #cardmaking #cricut #diy #EmptyNestScrapin www.emptnestscrapin.closetomyheart.com 

Holly Jolly Project 3 - Choosing the Tree

Hi all,

As promised, today we have another installment in the Holly Jolly layout project series.  My third project is called "Choosing the Tree".  Every year we go to the same tree lot and spend our time wandering while visiting until we finally pick a tree.  We always go the day after Thanksgiving.  It is our tradition.

I love love pairing the PML (Project My Life) cards with the paper packet plus sticker sheet to make my layouts.  I am years behind in my scrapbooking so I am looking for projects that take less than 30 minutes to complete.  I choose the PML cards that reminded me of tree hunting, then flipped thru the idea book, picked a layout and 20 minutes later was ready to add the stickers.

When we get to the end of the week, I will post all of the "easy peasy, lemon squeezy" layouts, then we will add some sparkle & bling to all of them at the same time. :-)    I can hardly wait to add pictures.

Items used:

Holly Jolly Paper Packet + Sticker Sheet

X7250S

Holly Jolly Picture My Life™ Cards
X7250E

Holly Jolly Coordinating Cardstock
X7250D

Have a wonderfully crafty day and check back tomorrow for another installment of the Holly Jolly project series.

T

Holly Jolly Project 2 - Merry and Bright

Hi all,

As promised, today we have another installment in the Holly Jolly layout project series.  My second project is called "Merry & Bright".  This project took less than 10 minutes to complete.

TStanczak - Merry & Bright

Another easy, peasy lemon squeezy layout.  I plan on adding pictures of our family tree trimming party from 2018. My daughter was wearing a pink sweatshirt, almost like it was planned, lol.  I know the layout looks plain right now.  I like to layout all of my "bases", then sprinkle the stickers along with shimmer and sequins and whatever other glitter I can find over all of the layouts at the same time.  That way every layout will get a bit of bling. 

Items used:

Holly Jolly Paper Packet + Sticker SheetX7250S

Holly Jolly Picture My Life™ Cards
X7250E

Holly Jolly Coordinating Cardstock
X7250D

Smoothie Cardstock
X5985

Have a wonderfully crafty day and check back tomorrow for another installment of the Holly Jolly project series.

T

Holly Jolly Project 1 - Dear Santa

Hi all,

As promised, today we start the Holly Jolly layout project series.  My first project is called "Dear Santa".  This project took less than 10 minutes to complete.

I love how easy this layout was.  I plan on adding pictures of my nephew with Santa. I am planning on taking him to a Santa pancake breakfast.  I may try to have him write his wish list himself.  He is only 5 so not sure this will work.....it will be super cute either way. 

Items used:

Holly Jolly Paper Packet + Sticker Sheet
X7250S

Holly Jolly Picture My Life™ Cards
X7250E

Black Cardstock
X6047

Have a wonderfully crafty day and check back tomorrow for another installment of the Holly Jolly project series.

T

Completed Gift tags and Ornaments

Hi all,

Today I am sharing some completed gift tags and ornaments with you.  Sorry that I have been ghosting this past week.  I had my first workshop over the weekend so spent the whole week prepping for the workshop. 

No worries, I will be sharing a layout a day for the next 5 or 6 days, plus some Christmas Cards using the Holly Jolly paper packet with stickers and the Holly Jolly PML cards.  First the gift tag and ornament samples.

Items used:

Holiday Cheer Ornament Kit

CC101916

Traditional Holiday

CC101912

Clear Shimmer Brush
Z3293

Black Shimmer Brush
Z4224

Gold Foil Paper
Z3365

And my Cricut to cut the shaker top.  Order any item from my CTMH shop and I will email you the DS file for the shaker top.

Have a wonderfully crafty day and check back tomorrow for the Holly Jolly project series.

T

Hi all,

Christmas came early! 🎄 All of our Christmas products are now available on my website for you start your holiday crafting. 

View the catalog online at

EmptynestScrapin

In love with the Holly Jolly scrapbooking, card making, and stamp sets.  Can't wait to start my projects.

I will have some Holly Jolly samples available at the Holiday Cheer Open House this weekend.

Hope to see you soon!

Unboxing Workspace Wonder

Hi all,
Along with all of my Christmas Goodies I ordered a number of Workspace Wonder products.  I have included an un-boxing video along with pictures of my setup that I have using since Saturday.

I ordered
Z5110 - Workspace Wonder™ Medium Stack
Z5109 - Workspace Wonder™ Ribbon Organizer
Z5106 - Workspace Wonder™ Medium Tray
Z5104 - Workspace Wonder™ Stamp Pad Stack
Z5103 - Workspace Wonder™ Marker Stack QTY 2

I am really happy with my setup, mainly because my bits and pieces are not all over the table and I can complete projects more quickly with everything at my fingertips.

Technically speaking, the stamp pad stack and marker stacks should be inside the medium tray but as long as I am not moving them, they are stable.  The ribbon organizer is inside the medium stack with the medium tray on top. Next quarter I plan on ordering another medium tray and a couple of paper trays.

I am so looking forward to showing off my space at the Holiday Cheer open house on Saturday and Sunday.

Have a wonderful evening!!

Christmas Goodies Unboxing

Hi all,

This was meant to be Friday's post ....yes, it is Sunday.  I took on a little more than I could chew in that I did a box opening video.  Yeah, my first video.  There were a couple of pauses so I had to figure out how to stitch the 5 videos into one.

So here goes, view all the Christmas goodies!!

To recap;

Workshop Wonder storage/desktop organization

Christmas projects 1:    Christmas Gift tags

Christmas projects 2:    Sparkly Ornaments

Christmas projects 3:    Nutcracker Gift card Christmas card

Christmas projects 4:    Custom Christmas Album Cover

Christmas projects 5:    Holly Jolly Christmas Cards

Christmas projects 6:    Easy Peasy Holly Jolly Christmas Album

Project 7:                      Alaskan Cruise Album

Wow! Seven weeks of projects in one box!!

Looking forward to all of the WOW!

Talk to you again soon!

Are you having a SPOOKTACULAR October?

Hi everyone,
Are you having a SPOOKTACULAR October? When it comes to celebrating Halloween, don’t settle for simply spooky when you can make it truly Spooktacular! From now through October 31, you can get the exclusive Spooktacular paper packet and coordinating cardstock, as well as the exclusive Frightful Friends stamp set and its coordinating Thin Cuts! Best of all, you can save 20% when you purchase a workshop kit that includes the papers, cardstock, stamp set, and Thin Cuts together with additional supplies for creating the simply Spooktacular artwork you see here! Available September 9 – October 31 while supplies last.

Tonight, you can view a video featuring the CTMH Spooktacular papers, stickers, stamps and cardstock. Simply visit my EMPTYNEST SCRAPIN facebook group

Have a wonderful night!!

Christmas Gift Tags and Ornaments

Today I wanted to talk a little more about the Christmas Gift Tags and Ornaments we will be making at the Christmas project open house!!

I plan on dressing up  my Christmas tree and presents to the nines this year with beautiful, handcrafted ornaments and gift tags from the Holiday Cheer special! My shipment will be here tomorrow, and I am so excited that I am doing a happy dance!!  I hope to do a little un-boxing video to show the goodies.

With a few fun bundle options—including various papers, complements, special digital art files, and exclusive stamp sets—both you and I can customize our ornaments and gift tags to spread holiday cheer! As an added perk, CTMH is offering these kits at a 30% discount when you purchase them together! Don’t miss out on this opportunity to capture your favorite Christmas memories. Available October 1–November 30, while supplies last. Item numbers given below.  And yes, as soon as I get some samples made, I will post up some pics.

Holiday Cheer Tag & Ornament Kit Bundle includes
Holiday Cheer Ornament Die-cuts,
Holiday Cheer Tag Die-cuts,
White Daisy cardstock Ornament Die-cuts,
White Daisy cardstock Tags Die-cuts,
the Holiday Cheer Tags Digital Art File,
the Holiday Cheer Ornaments Digital Art File,
Gold Embellishing Thread (Z4054),
Gold Glitter Paper, White Daisy cardstock,
Shaker Window Foam & Acetate (Z4310),
Gold Loose Sequins (Z4235),
Holiday Loose Sequins (Z3565),
the My Acrylix® Whimsical Holiday Stamp Set (CC101911),
and the My Acrylix® Traditional Holiday Stamp Set (CC101912).
Retail Price: $84.49
Discounted Price: $58.95 CC101915

All items order-able at: Shop EMPTYNEST SCRAPIN

If you are local to Chicago, contact me to "try before you buy" at the 2019 Christmas project open house.

Welcome to my Creative Space

Hi all! 

I have never written a blog before so I guess I will start with introducing myself.  I live a life full of family, caffeine, karate, travel, and a love of paper.  I enjoy paper crafting and karate equally, as well as sharing my knowledge of both.  On the evenings and weekends when I am not doing a karate class I am designing on my Cricut Explore Air.  Recently, I decided to become a Close to My Heart consultant and a Cricut affiliate. I would love to show you how to use Close to My Heart products to create something memorable, including customized home decor. I goal is to post pictures of new projects every week. I would love to teach you how to use your machine through local classes, project instructions and Facebook live. Join my Facebook Group "Emptynest Scrapin" and learn something new this week. I can't wait to see what you create!

To launch my new business, I will be hosting a Christmas project open house with make & take projects including

- Christmas Gift Tags,
- Christmas Ornament, and 
- Christmas Nutcracker gift card holders.

Shop:

Close To My Heart https://emptynestscrapin.closetomyheart.com/

Cricut:  SHOP CRICUT

Happy creating!  :)