A Silhouette Halloween

The Cameo is really getting a lot of use lately.  I'm really enjoying the flexibility of buying exactly the cutting files that I want and then modifying them to suit my needs.

This year I wanted to pull out all the stops and make Halloween special for the Trick-or-Treaters that come to our door.  We have always had the reputation among the neighborhood kids as the house with the cute decorations that gives out good candy but why rest on our laurels?  Some of the decorations from previous years were just too ratty to make it through another Halloween.  C'est dommage!  I fired up the Cameo and made yard signs, but why stop there?  There are so many cute designs available.  Who can resist Lori Whitlock's Bat candy bar wrapper or Jamie Lane's Spider Web tea light holder?  Not only were these cute but they went together quickly.

Candy bar wrapper and tea light holder.

Close-up of Spider Web tea light holder.

I made the candy bar wrappers in Halloween colors-purple, green and purple.  Only one wrapper (to fit a full size candy bar) would fit on a 12x12 inch piece of card stock so I cut the wrappers out of 8 1/2x11 inch card stock resulting in less wasted paper.  The wrapper can be resized to fit smaller candy bars.

The Spider Web tea light holder was just one of those must do projects because it's so different and so cute.  I made several and placed them along the stairs in the foyer and forgot about them.  Everyone who sees them wants to know where I bought them?  When I say that I made them, the next question is what are they made from?  They really don't look like they are made from card stock.  My husband thought they were made from craft foam and my daughter thought they were plastic.  Nope, just a battery operated tea light in a card stock holder!

Assembling the tea light holder is a little tricky and Jamie Lane no longer has the tutorial on her blog.  When removing the pieces from the cutting mat there will be a long piece perforated on both edges with tabs.  Fold the edges along the perforations and glue the tabbed end to the end with no tab. This should fit around the tea light.  Next glue the large solid circle to the outside (over the tabs) of the piece that wraps around the tea light. This is the base.Now glue the other large circle to the inside bottom.  It should cover the tabs and fit on top of the piece that formed the base of the tea light holder.  Press the top tabs down and glue the large circle with the opening in it to the inside of the top.  Then glue the other large piece over the tabs and on top of the previous circle.  Finally glue the smaller circles with the openings to the top of the tea light.  Insert the battery operated tea light in the holder.  Jamie Lane does have a tutorial on a snowman tea light holder that uses a similar construction process.

Cat Cupid Valentine's Day Card

This past Christmas I realized that as much as like my Cricut Expression it was limiting me creatively. This became very obvious when I was working on the inspirational book. There was so much that I wanted to do but my beloved Cricut Expression just didn't have the capability. C'est dommage! My Cricut just didn't have the ability to to allow me to import my own designs, fonts, etc for cutting and the cartridges in my library didn't have the fonts that I was looking for and even if they did; there was no way to weld the letters into words. Although I found ways to work around this limitation, the designing and planning was time consuming. I am computer savvy and would like to use my PC to modify the images on the cartridge rather than to have to cut and piece the image on my own.

While searching the web for more information about the Cricut Explore, I came across joyslife.com.  Joy thoroughly explained several cutting machines. After reading about the Cricut Explore, I decided that even though it has a lot of impressive features it doesn't really meet my needs. I went on to read about the Silhouette Cameo. I could connect it to my PC, send the images to my printer, cut my own images and use the fonts already on my computer. I researched a little further and then jumped of the fence and ordered it from Amazon. While I am awaiting the arrival of my machine on Thursday, I downloaded some .svg cut files from Kadoodle Bug Designs.  I adored the cute "Cat In The Hat" type design. The file was only $1.00 and included three images and a title. This was my first time downloading .svg files but it was really easy. After payment for the design was received, Kadoodle Bug Designs sent a confirmation e-mail and I was able to download the files from there. The file  was sent as a zip file and when unzipped revealed an SVG, jpeg, dx and a couple of other formats.  The files are still sitting on computer awaiting the arrival of the Cameo, but I was able to print the "Cat In The Hat" cupid and cut him out to use on a Valentine's Day card.  My husband was really impressed with the quality of Kadoodle Bug's graphics-the image is crisp and clear, even when printed on card stock.

Here's the card that I made with the "Cat In The Hat" cupid design. It was hard to see the shading of the cat once he was cut out so I added some shading with  grey and pink Copic markers.

Directions for Cat Cupid Card:

Kadoodle Bug Designs Cat Cupid  image
Card stock: medium teal, pink dotted, grey and a scrap of pink
Teal satin ribbon
Self adhesive pearls
Lace trim with aqua beads
Tattered Angels Glimmer Mist Dazzling Diamonds
Sizzix Valentine's embossing folders
Sizzix Texture Boutique or other embossing machine
Teal feather
Small pink heart shaped crystal


1.  Cut a piece of teal card stock approximately 5 1/2 inches high by 3 1/2 inches wide and emboss using the hearts embossing folder in the Sizzix Valentine's embossing folder set.

2.  Download the Cupid Cat image from Kadoodle Bug Designs and print the image on white card stock at 3x5 on an inkjet printer.  Carefully cut the white background away from the image.  Lightly spray the cat with Glimmer Mist and set aside to dry.

3.  Cut a piece of pink dotted card stock (I used Martha Stewart) to approximately 4 1/2 inches wide by 6 inches high and round off the corners.  Cut two pieces of lace trim to fit across the top and bottom of the card stock and glue the edge underneath the edge of the card stock.

4.  Center the cat on the teal embossed card stock and attach him using foam dots.  Glue a small pink heart shaped crystal to the tip of the arrow and a teal feather to the end of the arrow. Place a small pearl in each corner of the teal card stock. Glue the teal card stock on top of the pink dotted card stock, centering it.

5.  Attach foam dots to the back of the pink dotted card stock and center it on the front of a card and press in place.

6.  Cut the teal ribbon 1/2 inch longer than the length of the card, tuck the ends of the ribbon under the ends of the card and glue in place.  Tie a small bow and glue in the center of the ribbon.

7.  Cut a small heart from the scrap of pink card stock. This can be cut freehand or using a die cut image. I used the Sizzix heart die.  Print BE MINE and cut away the white paper close to the words. Glue the phrase to the center of the heart. Attach a foam dot to the back of the heart and stick the heart in the upper right edge of the teal card stock.