Epic

Happy Tuesday to you! I have some photos of my husband's zipline adventure from our Costa Rica trip. While we were hiking canopy trails, he took to the air on a zipline tour. There were around 20 different stops along the way, with some significant distances. The last leg was 3/4 of a mile long and you have to double up so you have the weight to get all the way to the finish platform and not stuck in the middle. They had a photographer along and he got the CD.

The Boys Rule file was just perfect for these photos. I also added some things from Graffiti Greetings and Let's Make Music.

Stop by the shop and find something to help you tell your story today!

In The Clouds

I'm back with another Costa Rica layout! One of the really cool things we did was hike a couple of canopy trails. These trails are like normal hiking trails, until you get to a gully, then you walk on a long suspension bridge that goes right out over the tops of the trees. It's a really unique look, but more on that in a future layout. These forests are high up in the mountains. Cost Rica is pretty narrow, only 76 miles at the most narrow point, and is divided by a mountain range that tops out at 12,500 feet. Monteverde, where we went hiking is about 5000 feet. It is a cloud magnet, trapping the cloud cover that blows in from either the Carri bean or the Pacific, depending on which way the wind is blowing, enveloping the forest in a blanket of warm moisture.

For my layout I started by cutting a matte from A Walk In The Clouds. I left this white and placed on blue scripty paper. Next I cut the clouds from Happy Clouds in both vellum and white card stock. I used distress ink to color the card stock clouds in dreamy blues. For my title I used the last 3 words in Child @ Heart.

 

 

Be sure to come by the shop and find a cut file to help tell your story! See you next time

Feel The Love Blog Hop WINNER!

Good morning. Random.org has chosen Tiffanis Scraps for the winner of the Plus Infinity file! Be sure to email thecutshoppe@yahoo.com to claim your prize. Congrats!

Everyday Should Be Caterday

I've been fighting the flu this week. I've felt awful and not like doing much, but I've had this snuggle buddy to keep me company and warm. I saw the adorable kitty printables in the shop and knew the Caturday one would be purrrfect to use for this photo I took for my daughter to show how good her kitty was treating me. I found this seriously cute heart paper that complimented my printed card quite nicely, that I stitched down, then grabbed love heart from Notebook Doodles for my main embellishment and the heart from Hello Kitty to add with my wood veneer hearts. A pile of string and sprinkling of sequins finished off the piece.

 

Try some of the cute printables from the shop today. See you next time!

Feel The Love

Hi and welcome to The Cut Shoppe's Feel The Love blog hop! You should have arrived here via Michelle's blog. If you just wandered here or get lost at any time, just head over to The Cut Shoppe's blog for a complete list.

I chose to do make a card that I will give to the hubby on Valentine's Day. I used the Feel The Love file, Love Letters, and Plus Infinity file. I use Plus Infinity to cut out a stencil, in 6x6 size, then applied gel medium onto my card base. I used 2 bright colors of distress ink to water color, letting the gelled symbols act as a resist. I also outlined the symbols to give definition and to tie in with the black letters, which are cut from the Love Letters file. Next I cut out the heart, from the Feel The Love file, from white card stock and colored with Festive Berries and Persimmon distress inks, spritzing to give some texture, and outlined the heart with black pen.

Be sure to leave me a comment on this blog. One lucky commenter will receive the Plus Infinity file! Next up is Madeline. Be sure to check out what she made.

Beautiful

Happy Tuesday! I am bringing you another little taste of paradise your way. One of the days, on my Costa Rican adventure, we went kayaking in a mangrove estuary. There was just a sliver of mangrove trees separating this channel from the ocean. I live in the Pacific Northwest and LOVE the coast! It is often cold, windy, rainy and the water turns your toes numb in a few minutes. This was a different section of the Pacific, for sure! The water was so warm and the sand dark and silky. There wasn't much wind and, as you can see, thunderstorms were brewing, which means it was really humid. Whilst waiting for our kayaks to be prepared, we strolled over to the beach to take a look. It was so beautiful!

I decided that making a mosaic using Quirky Quilt was the perfect background for this scene. It's a great cut because it comes with 3 versions, the full cut and 2 cuts with just some of the patterns. I used the full cut with white cardstock and that became my frame. I laid it down on a piece of nice patterned paper, then I cut the blue from one of the 2 partial pattern files and used foam tape to add them into their places inside the frame. Hint: try to remove just the frame from this step, leaving the patterns still on the mat. Then lay your mat close to the frame you'll be filling, so you can tell where each piece goes without a lot of thought. I added the pieces in whilst watching tv and had no trouble.

I used the waves from Make A Splash and Life's A Beach to add in both color and a relevant embellishment. I cut them from plain white card stock and misted them with some shimmer mist, then sprinkled some of the same mist to the background. A few beach themed bit here and there and a super fun wood title completed the piece.

Stop by the shop and pick up these cut files today! I love all three and use them a lot. Thanks for stopping by.

Photo Shoot

If you hadn't heard, my husband and I got to go on a photo adventure tour in Costa Rica last month. It was so amazing and this was pretty much the scene everywhere we went. There were 10 of us on the tour (my mom and step dad lead them) and we were taken to the most incredible places to shoot really amazing things. In this photo (photo cred goes to Pat Lassarde) we were shooting a quetzal in a nearby tree. The guy looking off in the other direction is a guide and he is looking for more birds. They really are incredible birds.

I recently ordered a pen holder for my Silhouette and thought these whimsical cameras, from the Snap To It set, would make a fun background. I arranged the files on my design page, changed the cut function to sketch, placed my Micron pen in the holder, and sent to my machine. I then got out an assortment of distress inks, smooshed them onto my splat mat, and watercolored the cameras. I cut out one camera, slight larger than the rest, inked it up, and added a penned border so it would match the background cameras. The camera paper was pretty bright, so I through a piece of deli paper on top to mute it. The saying was perfect for my title and I decided to cut it in black and used black spray for my splatters, to add that graphic feel.

This is the bird we were shooting

Head over to the shop and pick up this file for all of your photo needs, it is so versatile!