Happy Easter Charger Plate Wall Decor

I've made another charger plate:

I attached a metal picture hanger using LePage Extreme Repair Adhesive to the back of the charger plate for this to be hung on a wall.

Supplies Used: 

Cricut Expression & Cricut CraftRoom Application

Cricut Walk In My Garden Cartridge (daisies)

Cricut Celebrate With Flourish Cartridge (Chick)

Cricut Holiday Cakes Cartridge (“Happy Easter”)

Pink Cricut Vinyl

White Con-Tact Paper

Yellow Outdoor Grade Vinyl (scraps from a sign company)

Green Oracel 631 Vinyl

Googly Eye

Hot Glue

Charger Plate

LePage Extreme Repair Adhesive

Sawtooth Picture Hanger

I’m entering this in the Cricut Circle March Monthly Challenge: Creative Sharing Challenge.  The challenge is to create a piece of wall art (canvas, art board, sign, vinyl directly on wall, framed art, shadow box, etc.) and use at least three colorscolors and two Cricut image cuts.  Since this is a seasonal piece of wall art, I think it qualifies. 

Thanks for looking.

Bright Birthday Card

Here's the second of two cards that I made 14 of for an online Cricut Circle Canadian Members all occasion card swap (which was open to US residents as well):

I started with an A2 card base and scored and folded the front of the card in half.  I added and additional piece that started at about  five inches wide but scored and folded it to fit into the flap that was created by scoring the card base.   This second piece became the front of the card. 

 When you open the front, there is the second layer:

Finally, you open that and there is the inside of the card:

Supplies Used: 

Cricut Expression & Cricut CraftRoom Application

Cricut Beyond Birthdays  (“Happy Birthday”)

Cricut Celebrations Cartridge (balloons)

Cricut Walk in My Garden Cartridge (flower)

Martha Stewart Scoring Pad

Cuttlebug Moroccan Screen Embossing Folder 

Embroidery Floss (balloon strings)

Zig Opaque Writer (doodling on balloon and letters)

White Inkssentials Enamel Accents (flowers centres)

Studio G “Celebrate” Stamp

Craftsmart Embossing Pad 

Stampendous Embossing Powder (opaque white)

Zing Embossing Powder (neon pink)

Hampton Art “Fabulous” Stamp

Patterned Paper: Costco 

Solid Cardstock Recollections

Studio G chalk ink (shading on balloons)

Glue stick

Decorative accents (skittles)

I hope the card will be well received by the swap participants. I know neon pink and green are not everyone’s cup of tea, but what can I say - I’m grew up in the eighties.  Thanks for looking.

Monkey Card

Here's the first of two cards that I made for an online Cricut Circle Canadian Members all occasion card swap (which was open to US residents as well):

There weren’t many criteria for the swap cards beyond a size requirement [rectangular A2 cards (4.25” x 5.5”) or any shape up to 5.5” x 5.5”] and that we had to make 14 of each of two designs to swap. We did have to advise as to the types of cards we would be making.  This is my “general purpose card” that I said I would create.  It’s blank inside, so I really think it could be used as a Birthday card, a Thank You card, an I Love You card, etc. just by adding the appropriate sentiment to the inside of the card.

The monkey is flocked and mounted on a homemade wobble spring (so the monkey does actually swing a little).  

Supplies Used: 

Cricut Expression

Cricut Life’s a Party Cartridge (Monkey cut)

Googly Eyes

Recollections Flocking Powder

Xyron 900

Florist wire (for wobble spring)

Crochet Cotton Thread

Brads

Patterned Paper: Martha Stewart Travel Multimedia Pad

Solid Card Stock Recollections

Fiskars Corner Squeeze Punch 

Sentiment – MS Word

Copic Markers and Inkadinkado Blending Chalks (inking the card stock)

Hot glue and glue stick.

Thanks for looking.

Sandblasting Glass Part II

I thought I'd elaborate on my previous post and supply a little more information on the sandblasting.

Firstly, the title of this post and the preceding one are a little bit of a misnomer (though technically correct) as no sand is involved.  Sandblasting using sand (i.e., silica sand) is a method of etching glass, but not the one I used.  I used aluminium oxide (an alternative abrasive to sand) to etch my glass.  [As an aside, did you know that sandpaper is usually made from aluminium oxide and not sand?]

Why did I choose to use aluminium oxide over silica sand?  Well, the research I did on the types of abrasive that could be used indicated that silica dust particles generated during blasting with sand are small enough to be inhaled into the lungs. This inhalation can cause a number of health problems, including silicosis and lung cancer (both of which can be fatal).  If you are using silica sand, you must take precautions so that you don't breath in ANY of the dust. For example, by using fully enclosed cabinet held under negative pressure that filters out the air discharged from the cabinet.  These types of cabinets allow you stand at a safe distance from the abrasive and manipulate equipment and items in the cabinet with the arms and hands in sealed gloved armholes.   The make-shift cabinet I pictured in my previous post would not qualify as it is neither fully enclosed nor under negative pressure.


Aluminum oxide is an alternative abrasive that doesn't contain silica and therefore is a safer option than silica sand.  You should still wear respiratory protection and take other appropriate precautions when working with aluminum oxide because it does generates dust.  Eye protection is also important because the abrasive particles can cause serious injury if they strike your eyes.  Despite having the box that contained a lot of the dust (and allowed me to collect the aluminum oxide for reuse), I still did my blasting outdoors, wearing thick rubber gloves, a dust mask and eye protection.


OK, lecture over - time for a project.  A wine glass I etched with a beaver (the official emblem of Canada) as a present for a friend's birthday (she's going to be mad at me because we are not supposed to exchange gifts). First, here's a picture of  glass covered with the vinyl stencil that I cut using my Cricut Expresssion, extra vinyl and masking tape added to protect the areas on the glass that I didn't want etched:

Here's the wine glass after it was blasted and the vinyl and masking tape was removed:




I am very happy with the details that showed up after the blasting:

Supplies Used:

Cricut Expression & Cricut CraftRoom Application

Go Canada Cartridge (beaver)

Sans Serif Cartridge (stretched # for beaver's tail)

Outdoor grade vinyl (scraps from a sign shop) 

Wine glass

Masking tape

Sandblaster

Aluminium oxide.

Sandblasting Glass

So Denubug from the Cricut Circle Forum posted about a great deal on compressors that could be used with Copic markers for airbrushing.  Well, I managed to get a compressor, but instead of using it for airbrushing, I picked up a sandblasting gun.  This is my first project etching glass by sandblasting:

I used the Sans Serif cartridge to cut out "DIANE" from some outdoor grade vinyl, weeded out the letters and applied the remaining vinyl to the jar.   I taped around the vinyl on the jar to protect a greater area and I then blasted the jar with the using the sandblasting gun filled with  Aluminium Oxide sand.  I am impressed with how much deeper of a etch I got using the sandblasting gun over etching cream.


Here's the type of sandblasting gun I used and a picture of the homemade blast cabinet I made from a plastic storage box:





Finally, here's another picture of the jar filled with some peanut butter cups:



Thanks for looking!