Mystery ATC

This is the last ATC that I have for a swap on Cricut.com.  I had been swapping with this great group of ladies for the last 14 months.  What a great bunch to be involved with.  For the last ATC, we had a mystery ATC challenge.  We each sent ours in with no names and then we each had to guess whose was whose.  I don't think I did a very good job, because Susan only guessed 4 correctly and we were pretty close on our answers.  It was very hard to figure out which card looked like whose.  I'm thinking we all did something radically different from what we usually do and tried to copy someone else's style.  I'm not sure. 

Mine was pretty simple.  I tried to keep it simple with just a few embellishments.  I don't know if this looks typical of what I make or not.  Well maybe the paper selection is me and well maybe the ribbon and OK probably the flower.  But, I was thinking that may throw everyone off.  Congrats to Vickie for guessing the most ATC cards out of everyone.

Heritage ATC

This was my take on "Heritage" for an ATC swap on Cricut.com. 

My aunt spent years putting together a book with our family photos and information.  It goes back to my mother's father's side to my great great grandfather, as well as my mother's mother's side.  I'm sure that my geneology buddies are going nuts.  I'm sure I'm not using the correct terminology for the ancestors, but hey.
Anyway, she had many pictures, newspaper articles, and even his Civil War information. She contacted relatives and accumulated a book at least 100 pages long.

These pictures show him in his later years.  They owned a farm with a great victorian farm house and all the out buildings you can think of. The really neat thing is that he didn't become a US citizen until he was 76 years old.  Can you imagine coming to the US when you are 14, living here, being in the army and being so patriotic and not being a citizen?  We are very lucky to have so much information and the shear number of photos is amazing.

Jewel ATC

 March's ATC theme is Jewels.  This was another quick card.  It is a cut from the Storybook cartridge sized to 2.5" x 3.5" with Design Studio.  I added the jewels for the eyes.

Sewing ATC

I almost forgot to post the ATC for February's ATC Swap on the Cricut message board.  The theme this month was "Sewing" I know it doesn't look too complicated, but I had to remember how to use my sewing machine.  It has been a few years since I did a real sewing project.  The material was leftover pieces I used to sew my Cricut dust cover with trim that I have had laying around for years.  The buttons came from my Mom's collection.  You know the collection.  Growing up, before we got rid of any clothing, we took the buttons off if they were interesting or might be able to be used for a fill-in for a lost button.  When Mom gave me her machine & cabinet the button boxes came with them.  I have two old checkbook boxes full of buttons and was glad that I was able to use 14.  Now I'm down to 500....

"Crackle" ATC

It has been a long time again.  This was my January ATC card for a swap on Cricut.com.  I was using old supplies again, so I really don't have all of the information I should have for this card.  But, I think this will just be a look at it kind of post.

The theme this month was "Crackle".  I went the easy route & used paper that looked crackled.  I have had it for years & I think it was part of a stack.  At some point I separated my stacks by color so I'm not sure where this one came from.  I used Cricut DS to design the window with the George cartridge.  I placed the window over embossed vellum on top of the same crackle paper.  Then I placed the flowers in the corner of the window & covered with another piece of the crackle paper.

The Christmas ATC

This is the traveling Christmas ATC for the Be Inspired ATC swap on the Cricut message board.  Our group did a traveling ATC where each member of the swap added a little something to the card, (one for everyone) and then we all had a card that had a little of all of us added.  You can see the progression of the card here.

Sherrie has quite a story to go along with the travels of the cards and you can see how everyone added to it.  It is amazing that we all had the same idea of where to take the design.  I added the reindeer from Christmas/Noel Cricut cartridge as my contribution.  I did cut the antlers off as they just wouldn't cut that small, so it became a doe instead of a buck.  At least that's what I was thinking.

I am going to put a jump ring on it and turn it into an ornament for my tree.  It will be stored with my 'special' ornaments.  Thanks to all the gals that were in the swap.

Final Be Inspired ATC

Well the Be Inspired ATC swap is coming to a close.  It has been a fun swap, very challenging to come up with ideas each month based on a picture.  You can see the ATCs on the Cricut Message Board here.  Most of the cards are shown on the first page & then the rest are posted on the last pages of the thread.

This is my take on the picture of the chair.   I wanted to use a technique called felting from a recent Split Coast Stampers Weekly Inkling.  The tutorial is here.  They have a great video that shows how to do the technique.  I used some old race napkins I had laying around to match the black & white in the picture.  I liked trying something new, but I have to say that it would have been a lot easier & faster to run the napkin through my Xyron instead of messing around with ironing the saran wrap.  It takes a lot for me to find the ironing board, let alone use the iron.  Anyway, when it is ironed on, it has the feel and look of printed felt.

I used a stamp from a Making Memories foam stamp set, Floral/Dingbat with Making Memories Buttercup paint.  I've had this set of stamps for a while so it was good to finally use them.

I had the red snaps in my stash & they seemed to finish off the card.  I had some problems placing the snaps until I remembered that there is a guide on my crop-a-dile to keep them all even from the edge of the paper.

I've really enjoyed this swap and all of the really creative ideas that have come through.  I will miss it.

Star ATC

Wow, two posts in one day.

I created this ATC card for a swap also on the Cricut Message Board. There are a lot of very talented, creative ladies participating in this swap. You can see all the ATC's for the month of November at  Karen's Blog.
I used Cricut Design Studio to cut the ATC with the star shape inside. The whole piece is 2.5" x 3.5" with the star cut at 2".
I actually used only paper I had in my huge collection. There are 5 different patterned papers for the star using Iris Folding. The pattern for the iris folded star was at Handcrafted Greetings. Judy Headrick has for or five different iris folding shape designs in .pdf format to download. It makes it very easy to do the folding since the shape & math is already done for you. I do have to admit that this was a very tiny pattern and I used an entire Quickie Glue Pen completing 14 ATCs, but I was very happy with they way the turned out.
I apologize for the links showing as links. I need to spend a little time experimenting with that so that it shows as a word instead.... Hummmm.