sincerely yours, dena

When we go to the beach we always write the date and the beach name in the sand and take a picture. That way when it comes time to scrapbook we can introduce the pages within the picture. It’s especially fun when it’s my nephew Eric’s first time on the beach.

My husband and I try to give each other thoughtful gifts rather than expensive gifts. For Christmas last year I gave this picture frame to him. It’s got a picture of the front door of every house we’ve lived in together. The last picture is of the architecture plan of our front door of our current house. Once it’s finished I will replace it with a real picture.

While drinking my tea this morning I caught myself looking at this shadow box I made 3 years ago. It’s got a pict and beach findings from our first trip to a Maine Beach with Rubbles. It was fun to compare the Rubman then to the massive beast he is now. 3 years and about 70 lbs later, he looks a little different. I’m going to go hunting for a similar shadow box and make another collage with a more recent photo.

Because I NEVER throw anything away, I save all my back issues of the 5 magazines I subscribe to. I always say I’m going to go back and look thru them but I rarely do. So I copied my friend Vanessa who copied her Mom… start ripping out what you want and recycle the rest.

Using a exacto knife, I cut out all the articles that interest or inspire me then I put them in clear protective binder sheets and organize them in a binder by subject. I’ve got a binder for decorating ideas (divided by room), a binder for holidays, a binder for recipes and a binder for crafts. The best part is getting the satisfaction of finally being able to throw something away!

In my guest goodie baskets I place a comment card for every guest to fill out prior to leaving. It’s a fun way of keeping track of visitors thru the years. Some are serious, some are not so serious. My favs are of the “not so” variety. My favorite to date is… “Favorite part of my stay: Sleeping with your husband.” I slide them all in a scrapbook for safe keeping.

Now that we officially have an address to our new home, I had to order my return address stamps from the stampin place.

Whenever we go to the beach, we always take a stick, shell or rock and write the name and date in the sand. I’ve found this makes a great introduction page to a scrapbook. It’s also fun to incorporate what you can find or make on the beach like leaves, shells or your own footprints.

Pros

• It’s awesome.
• Professional looking results.
• Super fast, it cut in the matter of seconds.
• They have cartridges for every thing and every occasion.

Cons

• It’s buggy. Like any new technology it’s got it’s problems. When I first got mine, the cutter didn’t move along the track. My brother-in-law had to take a screwdriver to it to beat it into shape. Now it works fine.
• Expensive. Everything about the machine is expensive including the cartridges.
• It’s difficult to calculate the right amount of blade pressure. Too much you rip the paper, not enough you don’t cut all the way thru. I’ve wasted a lot of paper this way.
• Delicate papers are a pain to extract from the “fly paper” strip used to support the paper being cut. It’s easy to rip and tear intricate designs on dainty paper.
• Keep the directions book handy. The dials on the machine are not labeled so I have to refer to the directions book every time I cut something new.
• My model only uses 8×11 paper so I have to first crop 1½ inches off before feeding the paper into the machine.

Tips and Tricks:
Keep an exacto knife handy when removing the paper from the sticky cutting mat. You can buy their kit but an exacto knife works just as good.

Overall Rating:

A few things I’ve made with my cricut which I lovingly named “Jiminy.”

• banner for engagement party
• kids birthday cards
• mother’s day cards
• baby showers (pictured here)

Birth announcements I helped put together for Baby Avery.