Art Philosophy - Great for Cardmakers!

 I hope you enjoyed the Disney/Pixar blog hop yesterday.  If you didn't have a chance to check out all of the projects you can still make the rounds today.  Just click HERE to go to the starting post for Day One.  If you did participate yesterday and can't wait for more, you are in luck - this is a two day hop!  Click HERE to start Day Two and visit another talented group of crafty bloggers.

Happy Sunday!  Today I want to share a card that I made with the Art Philosophy cartridge bundle that my friend Melanie of Courtney Lane Designs sent to me to review.  You can purchase this cartridge only through a Close To My Heart  consultant.  If you are interested in the Cricut Art Philosophy bundle click HERE to go to the proper page on Melanie's CTMH website (tell her I said "Hi"!).

The Art Philosophy cartridge is a cardmaker's dream!  I like to work with the Design Studio or the Gypsy to create shaped cards and other designs but I realize that many people prefer to have the shapes ready made on a cartridge.  This cartridge has not one but two keypad levels full of lovely shaped cards.

You could spend days and days just making up all of the various card combinations.  When you add in the possibilities of using the stamps and chipboard shapes that come with this bundle there is no limit to your creative potential.

There are three or four possible top layers for most of the cards - some of the layers can be combined with others for even more design options.

I cut  a scalloped oval card base and the corresponding layer with three tree cutouts.  I did "tweak" these a bit on the Gypsy to get exactly the size I wanted.   I also checked "weld" to eliminate the tick mark showing where to fold the card base.  I think these marking cuts look messy and I always eliminate them when I cut a card.  The green piece of cardstock was cut with a trimmer to back the tree openings.

I used some foam squares to lift the lined tree cut from the card front.

The card base is Martha Stewart red cardstock, the layer with the tree cut outs is DCWV glittered cardstock and the green layer behind the trees is embossed pearl cardstock from American Crafts.  This is a nice start but the card needs some more sparkle.

I added some small green gradient gem stickers from Creative Charms in each scallop - the card is definitely looking more festive!

Melanie is the queen of large ribbon bows so I attempted one at the top of the card.  The chocolate brown wide satin ribbon is from Anna Griffin.

I decided to put the sentiment inside and chose some of the stamps from the bundle.  I also used one of the tree cut outs from the front of the card.  I set up the sentiment on a smaller scalloped oval that I cut from the cartridge.

Then I placed a small rectangular acrylic block on top of the stamps and picked them up all at once, inked the stamps with brown ink and stamped the interior scalloped shape for the card.

I added some small red gem stickers to accent the words and the tree - they fit the "o"s in "Love, Hope and Joy" perfectly!

 The oval fits neatly inside the shaped card.  The shimmer of the card and the sparkle of the tiny gems is very pretty in person (but a bit tricky to capture in a photo!).

Here is a side view so you can see the effect of the layers.

This photo shows the finished card and a sneak peek at one of the cards I'll be posting for Creative Charms on Tuesday - be sure to check the Creative Charms Blog  next week to get all of the details!

Melanie has posted photos of the entire cartridge handbook on her blog - click HERE to go directly to that post.  You will be amazed at all that this cartridge has to offer.

You can visit Melanie's Close to My Heart website by clicking HERE.  To go directly to the page for the Cricut Art Philosophy bundle click HERE.  You will find many more sample projects and tutorials on Melanie's blog, Courtney Lane Designs, and you can contact Melanie directly with any questions at melliemel77@gmail.com (just tell her I sent you!).

I hope you are having  a great weekend - we are trying to catch up on some house projects and sorting through the things that accumulated over the summer!
 

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