Celebrating the Day When ...

Hello
This is Pam aka The Bug Bytes

Today I am a  guest designer at Cricutolics. Thank you Liz for having me on there. I hope I have got the time difference right between UK and US and posted at the correct scheduled time frame.
 It so happens next week is our wedding anniversary - our 19th anniversary. And I thought I would make an anniversary card as the project.  I wanted to incorporate knitting into the card. I used to do lots of knitting and still love it. A great way of relaxing for me but my hubby used to think knitting was for pregnant ladies and old woman. I know - poor man needed lots of education in the way of craft! So I chose knitting as the main theme in my card. Hope when he sees it brings a smile on his face. Lol and hope I do not scare him into thinking I am pregnant but just OLD.
So here is my simple, simple card. I have not done much in the way of embellishments nor gone for bright colors as muted colors are what he likes.

I used a double sided paper from K&Company - Que Serra Serra stack.
Now before you try this technique here are a few things I found I had to pay particular attention to


1) The weight of the paper - It's definitely needs slightly heavy cardstock paper as the wool piece gets a bit heavy.
2) lol since it is heavy it's not that fun mailing!
3) Try to use real lightweight wool - I used the ones meant for babies.

So I first cut the card at 10 x 6.5 inches so that when it folds it is 5 x 6 1/2 inches. I love this size as we have the same size card and envelopes available in Hobby - Lobby . I usually get the ivory colored ones for making quick cards. And I store the same dimension in my Gypsy in a file. So when I want to make a card I open the file and add a new layer and first thing I do before I forget is to save as and give it a new project name - in this case Pam_KnitCard. This way I keep the original file and have another one for the project and I can add in new layer using the previous page as a template (provided you keep the preview eye open).
I then knitted a rectangle (simple - knit, pearl pattern) approx 5.5 inches x 4 inches. I wanted kind of scallop thingy so even though I do not crochet much - decided to some random crochet . well I do not know to talk in crochet terms too so it is abit difficult explaining what I did but I'll try. I first went around making 3 chains all around the perimeter picking up a loop in alternate stitches though I think it would have looked better if I had skipped 2 instead of one . Then in the next round just a - single crochet, double crochet and single crochet and slip right in the pillar . Lol I hope I am making sense and not completely mashing up the crochet language.
Even though I have the dimension of the card in Gypsy I do not cut the cards in cricut but in my trimmer as I have not been able to get a proper rectangle and when I fold the card I find  I have to trim to even it out . Some cartridges cut better than the others - like I prefer George compared to GW as I always mention. Here I just used a trimmer. Always know the nature of the beast is one of my favorite mottos. So helps knowing your tool to get the optimum use of it. But the dimensions are a big help in sizing the rest of the images which go on the card. Here since I wanted  the image to sit inside the wool I added a rectangle 5x 3.5 (all in inches - sorry) in the previous layer/page in G.
I just searched for keyword - Knit and chose this image. Now I was upstairs in my studio while my computer is usually downstairs and I was too lazy to pick up a booklet. So what I do is just choose the basic image add it and resize it (usually the shadow is a bit bigger so give room for that extra ). Then note the size and tap on an empty area of mat and change the cursor size to the size I noted. That way if I do not click on the real dial size button (the one that has the letter a) I can add the layers individually - very helpful when we do not want the images running out of the mat area and still keeping it all layered. When I can't get to the booklet - this way I add all possible layer combinations and ungroup and see which fit and which are the layers in an image and delete the rest. ( I do think I have shown that in one of the videos lying about in this blog ).
I chose to cut the image at 2 1/2 inches on a white cardstock and inked it. Then I cut some more rectangles and mounted the image . I used a fabric adhesive glue to hold the image label on to the wool and the wool on to the card. I had a couple of acrylic stickers which look like a frame so inserted one end of the knitted wool into it and held it down with a brad

Here's a close up of the image

And here's  the inside of the card

Here below I just wanted a funky shape tag so I used nestability and partly ran it through the cuttlebug - the area which does not need cutting had a rubber mat on top so that it does not cut through. I reinforced the hole with round tabs and pop darted  the tag on to the card.  And the other is the 2nd piece of acrylic frame that I had. The back of the brad from the front of the card also lines up nicely with these

And the sentiment part of the card - pg 3. Using a font on my computer I  just typed whatever my mind came up with in wordart and imported it into photoshop. I really liked the reflection else I could have done it all in photoshop. I also searched for some free knit fonts and added a couple of images. Used nestability to cut



So that's my simple, simple card which I hope hubby likes. He did see me knitting and made faces. Hope when he sees the card he feels a little bit guilty.

Thank you Liz once more for having me on today at Cricutolics as a guest designer.