It's my life

Lori Whitlock Thursday Tutorial

I had a great time preparing a tutorial for Lori Whitlock's blog this week on using the Silhouette Double Sided Adhesive paper.  You can view it here.  The double sided adhesive paper is an amazing product.  I loved using it with glitter.  

You still have time to put this fun banner together for Halloween.  The cut file, available in Lori's shop and in the Silhouette store, includes every piece you see here.

Thanks for stopping by!

Lori Whitlock October Blog Hop and Sale

Welcome to my blog and Lori Whitlock's Design Team October blog hop!!  I think you are going to love what see along the hop and there is a special sale going on too!  Scroll down to see the details.  But before we get into all that, let me show you my project for the blog hop.  

I really wanted to do something a little different this month, so I decided to create a fall frame that I can place on my mantel.  I just love the new word art quotes in the store, so I picked one and decided to transfer it to a piece of canvas that would fit into a 12x12 frame that I had.

The first step in the process is to cut the saying from vinyl.  Make sure to use the vinyl setting on your Silhouette because you don't want to cut all the way through the backing.  Then I weeded out the letters and shapes and very gently pulled the negative space off the backing.  Now, I wouldn't reccomend this for the faint of heart because it took me a long time to gently transfer that large curling sheet of vinyl, but.. I didn't have any transfer paper and truthfully, I'm not sure it would have worked much easier becasue of the canvas.  But I got it stuck to the canvas and began to paint.  

I used Tim Holtz's Paint Daubers to paint in the negative areas.  They have a soft sponge on the top and you just push the paint onto the surface.  You can see that the paint gets under the vinyl a little but I wanted the words to have soft edges.

After the paint dried, I peeled the vinyl off and used a stamp to create texture and distress marks.  I also used the same ink to ink the edges of the canvas.  I had a couple of leaves saved from the vinyl that I applied to the canvas and then I also used some stickers from the Reflections Fall paper collection by Lori for Echo Park.

The flower you see in the bottom is also a die cut designed by Lori.  It is called the 3d Sunflower and you can find it in the Silhouette store and in her store very soon.  

Lori Whitlock supplies used:

• Autumn Leaves Title
• 3d sunflower Silhouette Design ID #49611
• Reflections Fall Paper Collection, designed by Lori Whitlock for Echo Park

Thank you very much for stopping by my blog today  I hope you have gotten some great fall ideas along the way.  Now for the sale information and don't forget to continue on the blog hop.

Lori Whitlock
Brigit Mann 
                                Christine Ousley    *you are here
Corri Garza 
Mendi Yoshikawa 
Natalie Graham 
Traci Penrod 
Chrissy Guido

Lori Whitlock Spotlight- Silhouette Pen Tutorial

Have you used the Silhouette pens yet?  Well I have and have found that they are so fun to use and very versatile.   Today I have a few simple examples of how you can use the pens and then a tutorial to show exactly how easy it is to create with your own set of pens.

Lori has a bunch of fun Life Cards in her shop and I so I want to show you how you can embellish or journal on these cut files with the Silhouette pens.  My first example is a 3x4 Life Card that has a speech bubble cut into it.  I simply typed a title in the space of the bubble using Lori Whitlock's cursive sketch font.  I'll explain the steps on how to draw and cut your shapes below.

My second example uses the same Life Card but this time I am demonstrating how you can use the pen to do your journaling.  No need to do print and cut.  Just use your Silhouette pens. Lori has plenty of fonts to use for your journaling and the pens come in many colors so you'll really be able to personalize your cards perfectly.

My third example is part of my tutorial.  When cut in it's original shape, the hearts are actually cut out.  In my version I show you how you can draw the hearts instead of cutting them.  This simple technique will extend the capabilities of your digital cut files tremendously.

I've put together some screen shots to show you exactly what you will do to duplicate the card above.

1.  Here is what my original Life Card looks like.  I ungrouped it from the three other cards that came with it and left it the same 3 x 4 size.

2.The first thing that you will want to do is to make sure all of the pieces in the shape are ungrouped.  For this particular file, the hearts and the card shape have been combined into a compound shape because the hearts are normally cut outs.  So before you ungroup the piece, you will first need to, click the image, then go to the top menu and select Image and then Release Compound Shape.  You will then see your shape look like the picture above.  The hearts are there, they are just underneath the card piece.  (Note:  Not all files will require you to release a compound shape.  If your shape is not a compound shape, then you can just ungroup, and move to step 4)

3.  Then select all, CTRL-A, and ungroup, CTRL-U.

4.  Now we are going to go to the Cut Style menu.  This will make it easier for you to see all of the pieces of the file.  As you can see, when the Cut Style menu is open, the lines that will be cut are outlined in dark pink.  Changing the options on each of the cut lines, is how we are going to create using the Silhouette pens.

5.  The first thing we want to do is to select the outside line of the card.  When it is selected, click on the option No Cut.  This will mean that when we replace the blade with the Silhouette pen, that outline will be ignored, or Not Cut.  The pen will only "cut" or draw the hearts.  Do not change the option for the hearts at this time.

6.  Now it is time to draw the hearts.  When you click the Silhouette Cut Settings button, your view of the card will change back and you will only see the card piece again.  Don't worry, the hearts are still there.

7.  Place your paper on your mat and load it into your machine.  Replace the blade with your selected color of Silhouette pen in the blade holder.  Make sure to close the blade holder by turning the blue piece.  Go to the menu on the screen and change the Silhouette settings to the Preset, Silhouette Sketch Pen.  Then click cut.  

When it is done, do NOT unload the mat from the machine.

8.  Now we are going to cut the card out.  Go back to the Cut Style menu.  We want to cut the outside line and not cut the hearts this time.  The easiest way to do this is to Select All, CTRL-A, and then click No Cut. 

9.  Then click the outside line of the card, and change that to Cut.

10.  Then go back to your Silhouette Cut Settings.  Take the Silhouette pen out of the blade holder and replace it with the blade.  Lock into place.  On the Cut Settings menu, select the Pre Set setting that corresponds to the type of material that you are cutting.  I was using white cardstock so I chose the Cardstock setting.  When ready, click cut.  Unload machine and take off your Life Card.

Here is one more example of the heart Life Card.  To do this, I selected certain hearts each time I sent it through the Silhouette machine to "cut/draw" and each time I switched out the color of pens to create the rainbow effect.

Lori Whitlock supplies:

3x4 Quote Cards

Life Cards  (Silhouette Store)

Cursive Sketch Font

Here & Now 6x6 paper pad by Lori Whitlock for Echo Park

Other Supplies:

White Cardstock

Silhouette Pens- original colors

Lori Whitlock Spotlight- September Blog Hop

Welcome to Lori Whitlock's September Blog Hop.  Along the way you will see some great Back to School or Fall inspired projects.

My project was created for that special teacher in mind.  An A2 tab card and a cute little purse which can double as a small treat or gift card holder, will put a smile on her first day of the school year.

Both the card and the purse were created from files that I changed just a bit to better suit my projects needs.

This cute little purse was created from the Owl Purse file.  I omitted the owl face and added some fun school themed die cuts.  

The A+ and teacher words were created by welding letters together and when I cut out the word teacher, I realized that it was flexible enough to curve around the apple.

My card has a few additions to the original file.  I added the ruler border and the pencil die cut.  The Welcome Back banner was created by taking the words from another school file and filling them in with color, then arranging them on the banner included in the card file and doing a print and cut.

Whenever I create die cuts that have multiple pieces, I always create a mat for the pieces by making a second copy and welding those pieces together.  That way, when I cut out all those little pieces, I can arrange and attach them to a base.  It makes is a lot easier to keep everything together and place your final die cut where you want it.

Supplies:

• Owl Purse Favor Box
• A2 Tab Card with Banner
• 4 School Borders
• Back to School Icons (book)
• School Titles and Icons (apple)
• Welcome Back Title (title printed on banner)
• Echo Park paper designed by Lori Whitlock from Here & Now and misc. cardstock additions

Be sure to check out all of the team member's projects.  I've had a sneak peek and they are adorable.

Lori Whitlock
Brigit Mann 
Christine Ousley   - you are here
Corri Garza 
Mendi Yoshikawa 
Traci Penrod 
Chrissy Guido
Haley Ney

Well, there's a couple more things that you will want to know about before you hop to the next design team member.  Lori has a couple of giveaways and you can learn all about them on her blog.  I am really excited about this new Silhouette Stamping material

 

 

Lori Whitlock Spotlight- Mini Books

I have to say that Lori Whitlock has some amazing mini book digital cut files.  I am showing one of them on her blog today so pop over there and see the rest of it.  It is an accordian book and each page is made up of envelopes so there are a lot of places to put journaling and pictures.  

Lori Whitlock Supplies:

• 4x4 Accordion Envelope Mini Album
• 3 borders Silhouette store Id# 11978
• Reflections Paper and Embellishment Collection by Lori Whitlock for Echo Park

 

 

Lori Whitlock Spotlight- Office Decor

I love creating pretty office decor and organizational boxes and Lori Whitlock has a bunch of files that you can use to make all kinds of pretty things for your desk and office!  Here is a sneak peek but you can find all the information on how I created it here on Lori's blog today.  I also share a tutorial with screen shots on how to take a simple label shape and turn it into a decorative border or belly band.

So stop on by Lori's blog and check out my Post it Note Cover and Pencil Cup!

Lori Whitlock August Blog Hop

So it's time for another blog hop on Lori Whitlock's blog and I am so excited to show you my project.  

 

I love organizing things and so some of my favorite digital cutting files are ones that I can use to organize my paper crafting supplies and this file may be my most favorite one yet.  The first picture sort of gives away what it is that I am storing and organizing, but just wait until you see inside!

I had a little fun decorating the outside top and sides of the box with a couple of other cutting files.  The 3d flower on top is new in Lori's store and is a beautiful rosette flower.  I love the stitching holes that are included so that assembly is a snap.  I resized the flower by 75% so that it fit better on top of the box.  I kept the circles the original size so that that top one was still visible under the brad.  I really like how it turned out.  The decorative border on the sides came from another new file that has 4 borders included.  I used the last one which is such a unique and pretty alternative to a regular scalloped border.

 And here you can see what it looks like inside!!  Look at all those fun drawers and they so sturdy!

This storage box was really easy and fast to put together too.  Lori made it easy to know where to adhere the boxes by including placement lines.  Ah, look at all those goodies that I have in there.  Echo Park brads!

This little box would also make a nice little gift container.  Chocolate or cookies or both in each compartment.  It would be a wonderful way to package small gifts.  

The top just fits on the top and keeps everything closed.

All of the decorative mats for the top and the sides are also included in the file which really gives a lot of decorative possibilities.

So, would you also like a giveaway!  No problem!  Not only do you have a chance to win at Lori's blog but you will also have a chance to win on my blog and other design team members blogs as well.  Below you will find the details on how to enter plus a list of the design members participating in this hop.  Be sure to stop by each one!

Supplies used:

• Layered Shelf Box
• 4 Borders 3
• Pinwheel with Stitching Holes 3
• Here & Now Paper Collection by Lori Whitlock for Echo Park

To be entered for the giveaway on my blog, use the Rafflecopter easy entry app below.  Then make your way through the rest of the hop.  I will be announcing the winner, which will be picked randomly from all of the comments, on Friday, Aug 9th.

Lori Whitlock
Brigit Mann 
Christine Ousley   - you are here
Corri Garza 
Mendi Yoshikawa 
Traci Penrod 
Chrissy Guido
Haley Ney

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Lori Whitlock Spotlight- Happy 21st Birthday

It just so happens that my day to share on Lori's blog is also my daughter's 21st birthday so I thought that it would be fitting to share something birthday related.  This birthday explosion box is new in Lori Whitlock's store and I had a lot of fun putting it together and adding my own personal touches.

On the top of the box, I added a bow that comes with the Birthday Box file.  Just cut a couple of strips of paper and secure with a brad.  When you lift the top off the box, the sides fall open and the cake inside is revealed.

I made the little 21 myself by typing the numbers out first and ungrouping them.  Then I drew a small rectangle the width of the numbers and welded it to the bottom of the numbers.  This created a little tab that I was able to use to attach it to the top of the box.  If I had thought about it before I cut out the box, I would have put an extra slit in the top of the box like the others have, so that I could just slide the tab in and secure it underneath.  Next time I make this, it will be easier to make it look nice.  Make sure that you can fold the number over, or the lid won't fit on the box.

I used October Afternoon's CakeWalk collection to cut out my box and added a few sticker embellishments here and there.

This way a really fun box to create.  I am excited to try it again in different colors.

So, if I may, a big Happy 21 Birthday Wish to my daughter.  I hope this day brings you joy and happiness!

Lori Whitlock Supplies used:

Birthday Cake Explosion Box

Birthday Cake Box

Lori Whitlock Spotlight- Cookie Box

I just love giving baked treats to friends and when I saw this box by Lori Whitlock, I just knew it would be something that I had to have.  Cute huh?

My project was posted on Lori's blog a couple of days ago, so I will give you a link to that post and you can see more pictures and read all about my project.  And yes, those are my famous chocolate chip cookies. :)

Lori Whitlock Spotlight- Tutorial Series: Create a Mini Book from Shapes

Stop by Lori Whitlock's blog today and check out my tutorial on welding shapes into a mini book.  I share tips on how to create tabs on the end of the row in order to make your mini book as long as you need it.

I've used Lori's Here and Now paper and embellishment collection to cut and decorate my mini book!  Love the chalkboard elements!

I also wanted to let you know about a new class that I am teaching over at My Creative Classroom starting July 17th.  

Creative Silhouette Series: Christmas Cards

There are a lot of other Christmas in July classes going on right now, so be sure to check out all of the offerings.

Thanks for stopping by and have a great day!