Tag it or bag it

Cricut has a great cartridge called Tags, Bags, Boxes & More. This is a great cartridge with tons of options, not in in different sizes, but different shapes and other options. Many of the tags shown below can be cut in mirror images so you can fold them with a personal note inside, or you can cut a window in the tag and back it with another paper. Show below are even more tags, and a whole lot of bags and boxes. These are just a few examples of the many choices this cartridge provides. Simply cut the shapes, fold, and adhere for one-of-a-kind gift bags, party favors, labels, and scrapbook accents. Need a pretty package for a gift? Cut something just the right size out of whatever paper you want to match the theme.


There are lots of other designs available on this cartridge as well. You can check them all out here. To see the other great Cricut products we have available, check out our Web site.

Discover the Animal Kingdom

One of the funnest Cricut Cartridges we stock is the Animal Kingdom cartridge. This one has so many applications, from bookmarks, to pre-programmed words like 'Moo' and 'Roar', bookmarks, and options for borders with groupings of animals--with a little vinyl, you could decorate your child's room in anything from farm animals to jungle theme or forest dwellers.
With fifty different animals and the ability to cut different parts out of differnet colors, this cartridge could be a ball. This cartridge is a great tool to teach your children about different animals, to dress up a classroom, or to add interest to nearly any scrapbook page.
To learn more about this cartridge, or see a large variety of vinyl colors you could use with this cartridge, visit our Web site, www.hisandhertreasures.com

Make a vinyl Christmas scene

Christmas decorations are popping up everywhere and with Cricut's Paper Dolls Dress Up cartridge, you can decorate your windows and walls for the holiday.

The Paper Dolls cartridge has dozens of great outfits and ideas, from a Hula girl outfit, a princess with castle and dragon, Halloween costumes, a full Nativity, to Santa, his reindeer, sleigh and elves and so much more. This year I decided to put a Santa scene on my family room wall.

First I drew out an idea of how I wanted to set it out just on a sheet of paper. You don't have to have any real artistic ability to do this--all you're trying to do is get a feel for how you want it to look.

Next I decided on the scale I wanted to use for the people, reindeer, sleigh, and trees. To do this, I cut all of the major outlines out in plain white paper. I didn't bother cutting out clothes, because I just wanted to make sure the pieces were the right scale for the scene. I taped these pieces on the wall where I was going to stick the vinyl, that way I knew I had the right spacing between pieces, and that it was centered right on the wall. After the picture below was taken, I taped them to the wall to get a better look. Setting the pieces out like this showed me that the sleigh was a little too big in proportion to the reindeer, so I cut the sleigh out a little smaller for the final version.

Next I started cutting the pieces out. The important thing to remember with the Paper Dolls cartridge is that if you cut out a ten inch person, you keep the ten inch setting for the clothing. The cartridge automatically fits the clothing to a character that size. For Mr.s Clause, I cut a person that was nine inches tall, and her clothes at nine inches as well.

If you have the Design Studio, you can plan ahead and cut all pieces from one color of vinyl at once. This can simplify the process if you think ahead.

Finally, I applied the pieces to the wall. I was pretty happy with the way it worked out.

Cupcakes aren't just for kids anymore

Our youngest daughter was married a couple of weeks ago, and we did these fun cupcakes for refreshments at the reception. The treats ended up looking elegant and were pretty quick to put together and personalize for her. Cupcakes have become very popular lately--you could probably come up with lots of great ways to adapt this idea.















We started with a basic white cake mix for the cupcakes, filled them with a cream cheese filling, then topped them with whipped topping and decorations. The recipe for the filling will be at the end of this post.















Since the bride's colors were purple and silver, we used silver cupcake liners. We put tip #230 onto a standard sized pastry bag with a standard coupler. Then we filled the bag with the cream cheese mixture.

Insert the tip into the middle of the cupcake until you the tip touches the bottom of the loner. Make sure you do this on a hard surface as the tip can break through the bottom of the cupcake liner if you have it on a cooling rack.

Then slowly withdraw the tip as you squeeze the filling into the cupcake. Normal cupcakes are pretty dense, so you will only fill the hole the tip has created. If you want to add more filling, you can make two or three holes in the cupcake.













We froze the cupcakes for a couple of weeks until the wedding, and they defrosted just fine, including the filling. Once we reached the church where we held the reception, we pulled the cupcakes out to finish them off.
























We used Cool Whip as the topping, but any similar topping would work fine. Use Atco tip #826 or any other large open star tip in the pastry bag. We filled the bag with the whipped topping, and slowly swirled it on top.

Once the pan of cupcakes was done, we sprayed the tops with a light coating of violet color mist, then topped them with sweetheart charms.










Out on the refreshment table, we set up the cupcakes on a decorative tree.







There are lots of other colors or candies you could put on the cupcakes instead if you wanted to mix it up. There are also fun party picks available to put in the cupcakes. The picks come in holiday themed snowmen, to Disney's Tinkerbell. We stock a large selection.


Cream Cheese filling
8 oz block of cream cheese, softened
1 cup powdered sugar
1 cup of cream for whipping

Mix the cream cheese and powdered sugar until smooth. In another bowl, whip the cream until firm peaks form, then incorporate with sugar mixture. Keep refrigerated until shortly before you serve. You can add different colors or flavors to this filling too.