Memory Book for a great teacher!

Not a great picture. :(

 This year is a very sad end to the school year. My G who is in second grade, is not just moving onto third grade, but also changing to a new teacher after two years in the same classroom. No, she didn't repeat, but the teacher did! She "looped" with her class when they all made a change to the next grade which meant she taught my daughter for two of her most important years,  first and second grade. Mrs. Daniels has been so amazing in dealing with all the personalities of the kids and I can tell she has a teachers heart through and through. She truly loves to teach and loves all her students. I love her too!

As a result I wanted to be sure her kids all got a chance to let her know how loved she is. I went into the school and Mrs. Daniels kindly arranged her schedule so I could "secretly" take photos of the kids and give them these sheets for to add their own thoughts.

The pages were printed onto cardstock after I used a graphic set and from Lettering Delights and put in some text and lines using Photoshop. Be sure to offset the image so you can leave space for binding BTW.

With a bit of prompting they came up with some really cute things to add to the book. After these were filled in I put it all together with a fun cover and presented it to her with some flowers and such at an end of the year picnic. I was so choked up and sad and she gave me a hug. :(

The kids filled these all in with their own thoughts....

 In addition to these pages I included some photos of some special events and some additional blank sheets of her own. The covers were chipboard covered with cardstock and bound using my "Bind it All" from Zutter. Love that thing!!

The front cover was decorated using my Cricut Expression and the Car Decals and Wrap it up cartridges. Of course I was in such a hurry I didn't get a good pic but a ribbon around the middle and it was a simple gift.


 *Note: This is a rewrite of my original post which got accidentally deleted. It won't be as good a tale as the original but I still wanted to share this with my readers. Thanks for stopping by!

Better Together

As part of another Challenge for the Cricut Circle Blog, we were tasked to create something using inspiration from the Magazine. It was full of amazing projects which made it tough to decide which one inspired me the most, but this project found me....My oldest just turned 13 and wanted a address/memory book for the last few days of school. I loved this projects since it was simple and yet gave me an opportunity to create something together with my daughter...precious times now that she is officially a teen! 

Crafting is even better together and I used the Imagine "Better Together" cartridge for this entire project. The cover was created with scraps (from another album for my younger daughter's teacher which I will add next week). It was a 4X8 scrap so it was easy to use one of the pre-programmed shapes on the Imagine. I used the rectangle with the aspect ratio of 1:2, and then flood fill it with the pattern I wanted. It was a perfect fit.

In order to use the internal shapes, simply navigate from the start up menu by selecting the "print and cut icon" in the upper left, then look on the very lower left corner of the screen...you'll see three icons in a row which represent the standard cartridge, then in the center the internal shapes, and next the imagine cartridge. Selecting the center icon will show a selection of shapes that you can cut or print and cut....if you want to fill it with a pattern, select to edit it then scroll through the patterns of any Imagine cartridge inserted. Or you can just cut it without printing.

I cheated and used my Epson printer to create some fake notebook paper and just trimmed it to fit within the book.  Then, it was ready to embellish.

After filling a 12X12 sheet and then another half sheet full of images with the Beta program of Cricut Craft Room, I printed and cut. Then, my daughter and I simply embellished the inside page by page. Some glue and a few punches with my Cropadile III- big bite, and some binding rings finished it all off...but then of course it needed just a bit of ribbon! :)

If you have an Imagine, you'll love the Cricut Craft Room software when it's released! One thing it can do is break apart an image and then reassemble it for you before you cut! I wanted everything flat since it was going in and out of  my daughters backpack all day, and the CCR was just the thing to make a few edits!

A Whole mat full of cuts from my Imagine!

As you can see on the lower right I have an image from "Better Together" which normally has a spoon and some wording. Instead, after dragging it to the mat, it was easy to select the "edit group" icon that appears with the image. After this, the other images become faded and you only work with the selected image. At the top right you can select to toggle between combine and separate. This comes in handy if you only want a portion of the image (like I did with the red phone)...or even if you'd like to make a change to a layer.

Layers can be deleted and even changed by flood filling a portion. You can select the different elements of the image and either delete or change them. Then after you make any changes you can re-assemble the image by selecting combine. The new image will remain with the changes made.

The final important step is to select "exit" which is at the top left in green so you can move on to editing and adding things to the entire mat....If my flip ever decides to let me download my videos I'd very gladly demonstrate. I can't wait to see if I can change a dress on a figure or something I've wanted to do in the past...looks likely and I am very impressed with the new software, even though it is in Beta mode. It is very promising!!

Thanks for visiting!