Last month I went home to a friends wedding. It was a great wedding with a beautiful backdrop and a shining bride. I collected items from the wedding to use as a part of my gift for the bride.
First I started with a old shadow box of mine.
Then I used my Cricut to cut out the phrase I wanted. As you can see (if you look closely) there were a lot of edges that were twisted and lifted. Jasmine is a really hard font to work with unless you cut it out pretty large.
So to make it tones easier to work with I used transfer tape.
Oh my word this stuff is amazing. It made my life so much simpler.
I placed the words top and bottom of the glass and then filled the shadow box with items from the wedding. For some reason it was really hard to photograph. The top is a 5×7 of the couple and two of the wrappers from their personalized water bottles. Under the pic is a napkin ring and under that is their program.
Check out this blog post of mine for a way to win some vinyl.
I would like to introduce you to a new favorite company of mine. Expressions Vinyl They sell every kind, color and size you can imagine. Just check out the assortment of 12×6 inch sheets they sent me to test out.
See those pretty blues? I’ve got a plan for those this winter. Those white pages with red lines, that right there is my new favorite thing ever. What is it? Transfer Tape. I have an arch nemesis Cricut font, Jasmine, unless you print it larger than 4 inches it tends to peel and break. Not to mention its hard to place. Using transfer tape, it was so stinking simple. Check the video.
Isn’t that slick, here is how it worked on my project.
There are many other instructional and idea videos on the site they are very helpful especially if your new to the vinyl world.
Here is the first thing I made with my stash, keep coming back this week to see what else I’ve made and for the how to for this one.
Another great feature to buying through Expressions Vinyl is that you can order whatever size you need for your Cricut style or your Silhouette. Also you can buy as much or as little as you want. Need a few more reasons? Here you go:
More colors than you can imagine. When you do your first order I highly recommended buying their sample kit which has a small swatch of each color.
They also have outdoor, heat transfer t-shirt, and specialty vinyl, specialty includes metallic, chalkboard, gloss, and an etched glass look.
They also offer rolls that can save you a lot of money on your most used colors.
If you have Sure Cuts A-lot software they have free files for you to download and cut out.
Fun for all:
From now until October 31st use the code PUMPKIN in the check out for 10% off your order.
Fun for one:
Win a $25.00 Gift Card to Expressions Vinyl.
Leave a SEPARATE comment for each entry if you post one comment for all of these questions it will only count as 1 entry. ~*~ Open to USA Residents only, sorry.~*~
Let me know what your favorite vinyl color is on their web page. (1 Entry)
Tweet or Facebook about this giveaway I just entered to win a GC from @expressionsvinyl and @lifelovegreen http://tinyurl.com/23e34zd (1 time)
Follow me on Google Friend Connect
As always, I don’t want to ever force anyone to follow me and that is why its just an additional entry but the fact is, in order to keep getting these great giveaways I need to show companies that I have people reading my blog. Thanks for understanding.
*~*Giveaway winner will be drawn at Noon CST on 10/29/10~*~
Bamboo is starting to get more publicity as a green alternative to many things, cotton, flooring, and so on. Its been showing up in clothing, sheets, towels, and even some strange things like laptops and a microsope. The main reason its being touted as ‘green’ is its rapid regrowth. A soft would tree takes anywhere between 10-20 years before it can be harvested, bamboo on the other hand takes only 3-5 years. However there is still the issue of importing it from China, the manufacturing process and for some items sustainability.
Importing~There is some debate about this area. Apartment Therapy says “The shipping alone can negate any carbon savings you were hoping to get. When looking at flooring sometimes a locally and sustainably harvested hard wood has a less negative impact on the environment than bamboo.” But PlanetGreen.com disagrees saying “Not necessarily so. Transport by ship is very fuel efficient; trucking wood any distance could burn a lot more fuel.” (See this artical for both quotes.)
So as always that one ends in-unsure.
Manufacturing~From what I’ve read most business that manufacture bamboo products do not use green methods. A lot of water is wasted and a lot of chemicals used throughout the process. There are some companies who use greener methods of manufacturing. For flooring specifically here are the top 5 as ranked by Planetgreen.com.
I guess this one ends with -depends
Sustainability~The sustainability of bamboo as flooring is still debatable. However that being said it is growing in popularity so there should be some more definitive tests soon. From personal experience I’ve been quite happy with my bamboo sheets and towels. They have held up just fine if not better than some of their cotton counterparts. In fact the towels seem to be holding up better, they are still so soft, almost 18 months later.
So the same as the last one- depends
So I guess this all just comes down to a judgment call. I like the bamboo products I have but I’m not sure how much greener they are. What do you have to say about the subject?
I’m a sign language interpreter, and as such I do a lot of reading into peoples facial expressions and voice tones to understand the full meaning of what they are saying.
Sometimes at home this ‘skill’ backfires. For some reason I seem to misunderstand Mac’s tone alot when he is tired. I just seem to think he is correcting me. The problem with this is I tend to be snippy back and we end up annoyed with each other about something that never really happened…
We need to give our spouse the benefit of the doubt and realize that generally they are trying to help not hurt us.
Well I really wanted to show you a pretty view looking down my street, but here in the midwest trees turn and then fall quickly and all I got was this.
So then I hit up the mailbox, since its brown I thought it would be a great fall color contrast for my orange objects.
Ha, you thought it was going to be my shoe didn’t you?
OK there it is!
As I started waling down the street looking for places to photograph the orange items I had I found one tree with some gorgeous leaves.
Then I made it to the park and had a little fun with my shoe. I really like the depth of this shot. I’m thinking this may be a good place for a family pic, what do you think?
Last but not least there was a train stopped on the tracks behind the park so I got this shot.
I don’t know how many more days we will have for outdoor shoots so I have to take them as they come.
I'm just a simple girl who is working on my life, love and being green. Here you will find info about being green, improving your life, my life happenings and all sorts of crafty things. Hope you like it!
