Oh boy!

This card just makes me smile.  It's another great marriage of Cricut and Peachy Keen stamps.  In this case, the cartridge is Baby Steps and I love that cart!  So many cute babies plus loads of accessories and a fun font.  This little guy in the stroller is on page 52.  The stamp I used for his face is from the Peachy Keen Critter faces.  (I know, baby face from the critters?  It's there and I use it a LOT.)

I used a little chalk to give him rosy cheeks...too bad it doesn't show up better in my picture.  His eyes are, of course, filled in with Glossy Accents.  That makes such a huge difference!

The "oh boy" banner was made with an EK Success punch and a set of tiny alphabet stamps I got in the Michaels Dollar bin.  Just a bit of crochet thread and a couple of eyelets from my stash finish off the banner.

Hope you like this little guy as much as I do!

You can find this card at the following challenges:

Cut It Up -- Labor Day

Creative Corner -- Child's play
Craftin' Desert Divas -- Baby linky party

Kitty Bee Designs -- Babies

Little side-steppin' camper

This week at Fantabulous Cricut Challenge Blog they have a "Summer Camp" theme.  Here is the card that I made specifically for that challenge....although it may just find its way into a few others if I can manage it.

For my very first side step card, I'm pretty pleased with the results.  I really look forward to doing one with a more sophisticated look.  Loads of flowers and lace come to mind for my next attempt.


A night scene just seemed in order for this card.  I used several Cricut Cartridges along with Craft Room to manipulate the shapes and sizes of some of the cuts.  Craft Room also helped hide the contours.
*See hint below for removing contours.

The cartridges used for this card were:
Baby Steps
Create a Critter
Old West
Straight from the Nest

You can find this card in the following challenges:


Fantabulous Cricut Cuts -- Summer camp
Crafty Sentiments Designs -- Colorful
Simply Create Too -- For a child
Milk Coffee Challenge --Bon Voyage, Vacation
Sarah Hurley Challenges -- Texture and dimension
Digistamps 4 Joy -- Anything goes
ABC Challenges -- Lots of layers

If you have any questions about any of the materials used, please feel free to send me an email.  Like always, thanks for taking a look and I hope you'll leave me a quick comment!

* Hint about removing contours with Cricut Craft Room:  When trying to remove the teeny tiny contours on some cuts, I've found it so much easier to zoom in on the mat.  After hitting the "Hide Contour" button for you image, on the top task bar (just to the right of the words "My Projects") you will find 2 little magnifying glasses.  Click on the one with the plus sign until all of the littlest of the contours are more visible and them begin removing them.  You may need to chase the image around on the screen a bit using the scroll bars on the side and bottom of CCR but it's abundantly easier for me this way.  No more trying to get my cursor in just the right spot for that itty bitty line.  I hope this can help some of you.

Fantabulous Cricut Challenge Blog and 2 weeks in the top 5!

Yesterday I found out that, for the 2nd week in a row, a card I made landed in the top 5 at Fantabulous Cricut Challenge Blog!  Saying that it made my day would be a huge understatement.  The other submissions have been spectacular
and I consider myself very lucky to have been chosen.
Thank you to the Design Team!!

The wins and acknowledgements my work has received during the short few weeks that I've been participating in challenges has gotten me completely jazzed, pumped up, excited.....whatever word you want to use for this really good feeling I'm enjoying.  And motivated.  I'm really motivated to see what else I'm able to do.

I hadn't been planning on doing a card for FCCB this week because the theme is one that offered few options with the cartridges that I currently have.  Or so I thought.  (Don't get me wrong, it's a great theme.)  I just hadn't put on my thinking cap about that one.  The theme is "Cool Treats."  While I have several different ice cream cone cuts, those just didn't appeal to me.  Ironically, my very first job was at a Baskin-Robbins ice cream shop when I was 15 and I loved that job!  Not sure why I was hesitant about ice cream.  It's a natural for the challenge and has resulted in some super cute cards that have already been submitted.

Anyway, after donning said thinking cap, I decided to make a lemonade stand.  Hmmm, one little problem.  I don't have any cuts that would pass for a lemonade stand.
Enter Cricut Craft Room.  What would I do without it?

The main part of the stand and the awning stripes are from Sweet Shop.  It's the candy shop cut that has been stretched and re-sized to within an inch of its life.  The contours that can be removed were.  There are some that unfortunately remained.  For the window, I just placed a rectangle on the front layer and sized it proportionately.  The top of the building was cut off by hand after my Expression did its job.  *SEE HINT BELOW*

I cut scraps of the kraft cardstock into long narrow strips and inked all of the edges with Vintage Photo distress ink before adding them along the front of the stand for the boards.  Little "nails" were added with a brown Bic Mark-It marker.  For the chalkboard sign, I used a little scrap of black cardstock and wrote with a white gel pen and inked it up with a bit of white.

The awning was hand cut with the exception of the white stripes.    It looked too crisp and clean to go with the boards on the stand so I inked the heck outta that little sucker.  A couple of orange patches and black "stitching" completed it.  To finish off the stand, I added a ledge with a red table cloth and the pitcher of lemonade.  The pitcher was first cut using the Baby Steps cartridge.  It began it's life as the sippy cup cut at 1" then I hand trimmed it down to this shape.  It can't be seen in the photo but I layered 2 of the cups.  One is white paper that I colored with a yellow Bic Mark-It.  The other is a layer of clear acetate so the pitcher has a glossy appearance in person.
(She types as she wishes her photography skills would magically improve.)

My little sales girl also comes from the Baby Steps cartridge and Peachy Keen stamps.  Killer combination, those two!   Glossy Accents make such a huge difference in the overall effect of the eyes.  Rosy cheeks were added with a bit of chalk and freckles were done with my white gel pen.

"An easel card would really fit this design."  I thought after I had  nearly finished it, so a little alteration here and there was needed.  No biggy, though.  There are loads of tutorials on YouTube if you're not familiar with easel cards.

Okay, so after a mile long post, here's my card.

Isn't that little just as cute as can be?
I've decided to call her Lucy.  Lucy the lemonade girl.

You can find her at the following challenges:

Fantabulous Cricut Challenge -- Cool treats

A Little Bit Crafty -- Summer sun
The ABC Challenge -- T is for thank you
Card a Day Blog -- August anything goes
Digistamps 4 Joy -- Make your own embellishments
Outlawz -- Monday greeting challenge

And just because I love it so much, here are a couple more photos.

*HINT*  When re-sizing and/or altering the shape of a multiple layer cut, open all of the pieces into separate layers in Craft Room and overlap them.  Then begin re-sizing, etc.  Make sure you do this for any change you make to the dimensions and they will all match for you.  Bet you're thinking "How would she know that?"  Experience...frustrating experiences. 

If you are still reading this gi-normous posting, I REALLY want to thank you for spending so much time here today!

My Venture into Card Sketch Challenges

Today I'm trying my hand at Sketch Challenges.

This should be interesting because anyone who knows me will tell you that I'm not very good at following directions.

I much prefer to give directions!

Anywho.  Let's see what happens.  I think this is going to turn out to be really fun and should probably help me with some design issues I feel like are sometimes slowing me down.  And I think it's interesting to see how people interpret the sketches.

The first card is for CAS(E) this Sketch.  (Side note: this challenge is now closed.  I got this card submitted just under the wire.)

Next up is my card for Outlawz Wednesday Sketch Challenge.

This card is for the Super Sketchy Challenge at 365 Cards.

And my final card for the sketch challenges today is being submitted at Die Cuttin' Divas.

(How much do I love that name?  A LOT!)

This card can also be seen at 365 Cards in their earth tones challenge.

I had so much fun today working on these cards!  Sketches haven't seen the last of this girl.  If you have any questions about any of the cards or materials used, feel free to contact me.

As always thanks for the time you've spent here at

Queen Bee Paper Crafts!

Cricut Baby Steps + Peachy Keen = Too stinkin' cute!!

Already in this very young blog, I've stated just how much I love Peachy Keen face stamps.  And I'm gonna' say again...I love those cute little things!  Using those along with a white gel pen, Glossy Accents and a tiny bit of chalk makes me feel like I'm some sort of artist.

Then add in the power duo of Cricut Craft room and their Baby Steps cartridge.  And wow, baby!   (He he he, see what I did there?  Wow, baby....Get it? Baby Steps cartridge. Okay, so sometimes I amuse myself more than those around me.)  Anyway, the possibilities are truly endless.

Here's an example of some fun I had playing with these items.

In Craft Room, I welded together the cloud with the sky background and sized them to be the base of this shaped card at about 6 1/2 x 6 1/2.  I also scaled the cloud to be cut individually and the moon to fit on the base.  All of those items can be found on page 24 of the handbook.  I decided to use the baby from page 22 because I wanted her to be wide awake and ready for a Peachy Keen smile.  In order for the stamp to work properly, I hid all of the contours on the baby girl.  The balloons are from Create a Critter (but loads of cartridges have balloons.) 

I dry embossed the cloud using my Sizzix Textures and the Sizzix "Swirls" folder.  I then lightly inked the cloud with a Recollections light blue chalk ink.  The sky background is from SEI paper and was inked with Colorbox ink.  The stars are made with Liquid Pearls.  I did a little dollop in several spots and then went through each one with a bamboo skewer to make the points.  

Instead of using the flower that's included with the baby cut, I used a tiny flower punch from my stash and cut several layers from the scraps of the cut for her diaper, headband and balloons.  The edges were inked with a pink Recollections marker from the Michael's $ bin.  And it was completed with a purple brad for the eye of the flower.  We R Memory Keepers baker's twine was used for the balloon strings.

Along with the SEI paper, I also used Bazzill and Papertrey Ink papers.  And, SHOCKINGLY, I think I was able to complete this card without the use of a single Tim Holtz product.  I didn't think I could do that!

Thanks for stopping by and I hope that you have a wonderful week!

You can find me at the following challenges with this little sweetie:

Fantabulous Cricut -- Shaped card

Five Simple Things -- Inspire me Fridays

2 Creative Chicks -- Anything goes for kids

365 Cards -- Textured backgrounds

Hobby Cutz -- A card for a child