VALENTINES CARDS

Some of my earliest memories of Valentine's Day are of the elementary school card and goodie exchanges. My siblings and I took great care to decorate our individual mailboxes as lovely as possible in an effort to win the class prize of "Best Valentine Mailbox". After the school day was over, we would count all of the Valentine cards and candy we had been given and daydream about who liked us the most.

It is estimated that over one billion Valentine cards (commercial and handmade) are exchanged during this grand holiday of love. That seems simply staggering doesn’t it? Family, friends, classmates, and lovesick saps alike all participate in giving and receiving Valentine greetings. Valentine’s day is just around the corner. As long as the kiddos are helping you bake all those cookies, don’t forget to include your kids in the card creating process as well.

Be sure to check out Crafty Kimber's excellent exploration of the Victorian Romance Cartridge in today’s Chirp. You’ll also find a quick tip for new crafters and glean great crafting ideas from Cricut message board members in this week’s newsletter.

As always, I wish you success in your crafting adventures!

Lonna Joy Smoot - Editor, Cricut^® CHIRP!

ANNOUNCEMENTS

TIPS TREASURE CHEST

Today?s helpful tips come from message board members legalbeagle and scrapalette.

Q: What does inking the edges really mean? I have seen this on instructions for several projects and have no clue. Thanks in advance for the explanation!

A1: I'm still kind of new myself, but my understanding of this is when you take your project, be it the edges of a card or the the item you just cut out and applying ink all around the edges. I have seen it explained as brushing the edge of your project along an ink pad or using a dauber with ink on it to go around the edges. I'm sure you'll be able to find a You Tube video that will show you the technique.

A2: That's exactly what it means and it just adds a definition to the edges. Sometimes, you ink all over the project to make it look aged.

CUSTOMER SPOTLIGHT

Name: Renee Cooper

About Me: I am a stay at home mother that loves to craft with my Cricut in my spare time. I maintain a crafting blog to share my projects created from my Cricut machines and Cuttlebug.

Instructions:

1. Using your Art Philosophy cartridge, cut the following images:
   • Banner3: decorative layer @ 5.514" H x 6
   • Banner3: decorative layer @ 2.0" H x 6
   • LOVE Font letters @ 2.389" H
   • LOVE Font Layer letters @ 2.389" H
   • Bird @ 2.514" H
   • Bird Layer @ 1.0" H x 2
   • Branch2 @ 2.014" H x 5
   • Branch Layer @ 1.806" H x 5
   • Heart3 @ 3.653" H
   • Heart3 Layer @ 3.653" H
2. Ink the edges of your cuts in brown.
3. Next, emboss and distress any images you would like and adhere the layers together.
4. Use brown ribbon to string the banner pieces together.
5. Add any additional embellishments as desired.
6. To create the box to hold the banner, I used the Cricut Craft Room to modify the square box and its lid from Sweet Tooth Boxes.
7. I also added a rectangle opening to the lid so that the banner could show through.
8. I used a leftover Cricut cartridge shell to create the window covering and embellished the box to coordinate with the banner. I created this and two other Valentine banners, each with a distinct look. Sweet Tooth Boxes has become my go to cartridge to create boxes and holders. If you think "outside the box", there are so many container possibilities to it! For easy re-creation, I have included the Cricut^® Craft Room and Gypsy files on my blog. Enjoy!

Cartridges Used: Art Philosophy, Sweet Tooth Boxes

MESSAGE BOARD HIGHLIGHTS

This week’s highlighted threads are:

• Dino-Mite! Boy Card
• You're Purr-fect!
• Love You...
• Valentine for my Mom
• We Woof You Valentine's Day Card
• Puppy Love Card

CARTRIDGE EXPLORATION

This week I finally dug out the Valentines decorations and started decorating my house for the month of February. After I was done decorating I realized I need to create a few more home d?cor items to fill in some decorating holes. I love creating projects that I can display in my house and I find it very relaxing to create with my Cricut. This week I explored Victorian Romance which is part of the Seasonal collection and the art is all about Valentine’s Day.

I couldn’t wait to get a hold of a copy of this cartridge so I could start exploring it. Yes, it is a smaller cartridge but the designs are so fabulous and fun to create with. Some examples of the artwork that you get with this cartridge are hearts, a heart shaped locket, four 3-D boxes, an arrow, male and female silhouettes, a hot air balloon, two old fashioned keys, a lock, two styles of cupids, heart banner, a clown, one cupcake holder with shadow, and four ballroom dancers. You can also cut out a few phrases: “love”, “true”, and “Be My Valentine”. I used the hearts to make some hanging chandlers. I created a “14 days countdown to Valentine’s Day” using the scalloped heart and the heart with two slits on the inside as my basic pattern. I used Cricut Font and Basic Shapes for the numbers and then cut more hearts for the back so the numbers would pop. I used an 8.5 x 11 frame, placed paper over the glass and found some light weight metal to add some dimension to my project. I decided to leave the glass in the frame and glued my paper to the glass so I didn’t have to cut up any cardboard. I pulled twine through each of the hearts then glued the back hot pink heart in place. I used 2 inches of twine and rolled up quotes on a 2-inch strip of paper and tied them to the heart before I glued the hearts in place. I really love this idea and thought you would all in joy it as well, so I’ve include a cut file for Cricut^® Craft Room ? just unzip the file after you download it and click the Import butt`on, it's the button located to the left of the New button in Cricut Craft Room after you login, to open the cut file.

A few other ideas that you can do with this cartridge are cut out the 3-D boxes and fill them with candy and give them away as Valentine’s Day gifts to friends and neighbors. I used Cricut Craft Room and added three small hearts to the candy box, then cut out a strip of a Cricut mat to cover up the hearts so my candy wouldn’t fall out. Use the “Be my Valentine” on the front of a card or any of the “Love” phrases. Use one of the silhouettes on the front of a card to create a Victorian card, make sure to add some lace to give it that extra touch. I have few other tips on this cartridge ? make sure to check out the back of the cartridge for tips on what sizes to cut images out at. For example on the banners the tip is cut out at 5” or larger and use the “fit to page” function. Another tip on the heart box, because it is a 3-D candy box Provo Craft is recommending it to be cut at 8.7” or larger.

If you don’t have this cartridge yet make sure to pick up a physical or digital copy at www.cricut.com and use it with Cricut Craft Room. Happy Cricuting!

Crafty Kimber

HELP FROM THE EXPERTS

Need some help? Provo Craft Customer Support is here for you! Never hesitate to call in (1-888-922-4725 or 1-888-92ccircle for Cricut Circle questions); we have people ready to help you! We are currently open Monday through Friday 7am to 6pm Mountain Time. If these hours do not work with your schedule, please send an email to support@provocraft.com.

Have a great week!
Customer Support

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

“When love is not madness, it is not love.”
- Pedro Calderon de la Barca