Happy Halloween From The McVey Family!

I had a little fun this morning over at JibJab making this video starring my family.

Cast:
Son-in-Law Andy as The Doctor
Daughter Taryn as Frankenstein
Son Ryan as the Werewolf
Husband Mark as Dracula
and Me as the Bride of Frankenstein

Enjoy, then go make your own!

Personalize funny videos and birthday eCards at JibJab!

New Projects on the Horizon

First, I'm happy to report that I am now stitch-free!  I had a nurse friend remove them Saturday, and I look almost human again without them.  No Frankenstein costume for me this Halloween! The black eye is now mostly yellow and red and decreasing in size every day. I was actually able to put on a little eyeliner and mascara this morning! 

In hindsight, I feel like I really was being watched over.  It could have been very serious, but just one week later, I feel great! Thank you all so much for your well wishes after my fall.  It was very special to have so many notes from all of you.

On the craft front - our current remodeling has given me a couple of ideas for home decor projects that will get me back to my Cricut.  I have three in my head so far: some framed art, an unusual jewelry holder/display, and a holiday project using the discarded wood blocks from the rubber stamps that I converted to unmounted. (If you missed the video about how to do that, see this post.)  I also realized that I never filmed and shared how I made an awesome, inexpensive ribbon rack, so that's to come as well.

I know Cricut and Gypsy are both feeling neglected, so I plan to get those projects started as soon as I can get this bathroom remodel done and clean up my craft room!  It's amazing how remodeling one room can spin the whole house into disarray. I also have to share with you that a few of my craft tools have come in very handy while working on the bathrooms.  My DH is very supportive of my crafting, but it's always good when he can see how many other ways my stuff comes in handy, know what I mean?

So, in summation, my eye is looking good, my house is looking good, and I should have some projects to post in the coming weeks. Thanks to all of you who have hung in there with me until I could get back to being creative!

Cricut Kisses and Crafty Wishes,

Enabler Alert: You WILL want the IMAGINE when you see the images!

Have you SEEN the awesome images for the new Cricut Imagine???  I've been out of the loop since its release, and I had openly said that I was not buying another machine. After all, I have the Expression, the Baby Bug, and the Gypsy. How could I possibly need another Cricut machine?

Alas, during my recent convalescence (see yesterday's post), I had plenty of time for some one-eyed viewing of videos about the Imagine, and I have to confess, I REALLY WANT THE DARN THING!  I had not expected the images to be so incredibly gorgeous!  The ones in this post are from Snow Angel, one of my favorites from the new Imagine Cartridge Collection.

My followers know that I had started working on breaking up the cartridge image sheets into smaller pictures for loading onto the Gypsy so you can see them easier - and not need your handbooks with you all the time.  (Note: If you search for videos about the Imagine on YouTube, some of the older ones will say it's not compatible with the Gypsy, but Provocraft has since updated the Gypsy software so it IS compatible!  Thanks PC!)  I still have more of the "regular" cartridges to do, and I will continue to work on those, but I confess that I've gotten totally sidetracked by the beautiful new Imagine images!  I've only gotten two done so far (click here to get them), but I'll have the rest uploaded soon, so check back here for updates.  And if you have an iPad, I'll be posting soon about how to view all the cartridge images on it, so watch for that, too.

I can't end this post without a special thanks to Robyn, The Pink Stamper for some major enabling!  When I saw her video about using RGB colors to match my Stampin' Up! paper, AND she used an old non-Imagine cartridge to print and cut images in her choice of colors, all the lightbulbs in my head went off!  Hop on over to her blog to watch a few of her awesome videos and see why you NEED the Imagine!

Cricut Kisses and Crafty Wishes,

My painting disaster

I've had to put crafting on the back burner for a while as my DH and I do some major redecorating in our 25-year-old, very dated home - stripping wallpaper, painting, replacing flooring, changing light fixtures, etc. So far we've completed the master bathroom, and we're now working on the other upstairs bath, which needed the most serious work due to mold. We have literally stripped it bare except for the major fixtures.

I was all set and excited on Monday to spend the entire day prepping and painting, having decided at the last minuted to take the day off from work just for this purpose. I made a trip to Lowe's, stopped for a bite to eat, and rushed home to get started. Not more than 30 minutes into the job, I reached for the far corner, lost my balance, and down I went! I hit my head HARD on an unopened paint can, and I fell against the wall, hitting my hip, shoulder and knee on the way down. I don't remember too much after that except slapping a washcloth against my head to stop the bleeding and telling myself to call my husband and lie down before I passed out. Luckily, I never did pass out, but oh, what a headache.

3 hours, 8 stitches and a tetanus shot later, I left the emergency room. I was home 3 days - hubby's orders - but back at the office today and back to the remodel this weekend. In the meantime, I want to give DH a BIG shoutout for taking such good care of me with hot oatmeal cookies, frozen yogurt and back rubs. On top of all that, he's almost finished with the painting in the bathroom.

The good news is, I didn't spill the paint - and I don't have to spend much time on my hair for a while since people will only see my eye!

BLOG CANDY You Don't Want To Miss!

Today I want to introduce you to a fellow crafter AND Disney addict!  If you love Disney and Disney-related crafts, you'll want to sign up to be a follower over at Disney Dreamer Designs.  Be sure to tell MELISSA(sorry about getting your name wrong the first time) how you found out about her when you visit, and leave a comment before midnight tonight for a chance to win crafty blog candy!  She's giving away a pink ATG gun, so hurry over to enter! Thanks for the candy Melissa, and congrats on over 200 followers!

By the way, I started knitting a "nothing" last night.  Read the post below to see what that's all about!

Knit One, Craft Too

I suspect that many of you are multi-media crafters, as it seems that no crafter ever really just does one thing.  If you're anything like me, you have no less than 5 or 6 projects in the works at any given time.

One of the earliest crafts I tried was crocheting, taught to me lovingly and with superhuman patience by my grandmother when I was just five years old.  Years later, I discovered sewing, largely out of necessity in order to have pants and blouses that fit me at 5'10" tall.  In middle school, I taught myself to knit.  I learned by trial and error, following pictures and diagrams and ripping out many a row until I got it just right.  By high school, I was good enough to knit sweaters for my husband and boyfriend (who is now my husband of 30 years and my biggest fan!) for Christmas.

Various crafts have come and gone through the years.  In college, I learned quilting, needlepoint, crewel and counted cross stitch.  After my daughter was born, I learned smocking and made pretty little feminine dresses for her.  When my son was born, I was a stay-at-home mom and I delved into many crafts, including basket weaving and candy making.

Most of the crafts I've tried were tried out of sheer curiosity, the desire to learn something new, and the ultimate satisfaction of being able to sit back and say, "I created that!"  Some of them were one-hit-wonders, learned just well enough to complete a particular project.  Others resulted in my own little 15 minutes of fame, like the counted cross stitch design that I entered in an international magazine contest, won third place for, received a check for 50 bucks, and had published! 

I've found some crafts that serve more as stress relievers than others, and once in a while, I just get a yearning to pick up a needle and thread or a pair of knitting needles and some soft, fuzzy yarn and find a quiet place to work, lost in my own thoughts.  For me, the best craft for stress relief is knitting.  More than once, I've been know to knit "nothing" just for the fun of it and the relief from the day that it gives me.  It's a mindless, relaxing thing that I can do while watching TV or chatting with my husband, and when I'm done, I can tear it out, roll it back up in a ball, and use it again another time. 

Recently, I called my daughter to see what she was doing on her day off.  She was crocheting a granny aquare afghan.  Surprised, I asked her how she knew how, because I had taught her basic crocheting, but never how to make granny squares. "YouTube," she answered.  "They have videos about how to do anything!"   I couldn't help but feel a little pride.  As soon as I become a grandmother, I'll teach her to smock!

For those of you who knit, want to learn to knit, or know someone who knits, check out this great link with knitting-related gift items: Cafe Press, Knitting Gifts

Yes, I'm OK!

I've started getting emails from some of you asking if I'm OK, so I thought I better check in just to say hi. I've been on a much-needed vacation in Hilton Head, SC with DH and DS this week, doing as little as possible and totally enjoying it!

I haven't even cracked open the laptop this whole week, though I have been using my new iPad to the max! I'm totally in love with this thing - in fact I'm writing this post on it. All I have to do now is get all my Cricut images loaded on it, and I've figured out how!

Anyway, I haven't disappeared again. Just took a week off! DH is headed to Paris without me next week, so I should have some creative time. We're leaving very early in the morning, so I'll be home soon!

Cricut Kisses and Crafty Wishes!

Images for a DOZEN cartridges newly uploaded!

A Garden Of Words
A Word Party
Base Camp
Billionaire
Cuttin' Up
Gypsy Font
Makin' The Grade
Mickey Font
Old West
Picturesque
Tear Drop
Wall Decor and More

Click the link below my header to go to the whole library!

Gypsies, and iPhones and Blackberries...OH MY!

I've been wide awake until the wee hours of the morning lately, and my brain always refuses to turn itself off when that happens. With all the work I've been doing on the cartridge images lately, I guess it's no surprise that my thoughts turned to them, and I found myself wishing I had an iPhone so I could load all the images on it like I've heard some of you are doing with the handbook PDFs. Suddenly I had a lightbulb moment! I could put my images on my Blackberry!!! So, at 1:43 AM, I was out of bed looking in the dark for my purse with my Berry in it and booting up the laptop.

I have the Blackberry Curve 8530, and I use an 8G micro SD card in it, so I knew I had plenty of memory. With the memory card in my laptop, I created a file especially for the image files and put all the cartridge images in it (above). Notice the search box at the top of the screen in the photo below. This lets me search for the cartridge I want since each file is named by the cartridge name, ie "create_a_critter_01.jpg" in the photo. For example, to find Create A Critter, I just have to start typing "create" and the images will be pulled up for that cartridge.

Now I can enlarge them to fit the screen and scroll through them one image at a time (above). What I didn't think of was that I was going to be able to zoom in on the images to see the details better (below). Can I just tell you how excited I am?!?! Just last night I was in Wal-mart trying to decide between 2 of the new Lite carts, and I couldn't see the tiny images on the back without my reading glasses well enough to decide which one to get. If I'd only had them on my Berry already, I could have easily browsed them! I'm also thrilled that I can zoom in to see layers and colors better - something that you can't do with them on the Gypsy. I know you can also zoom on the iPhone, and they will be even bigger on it than they are on my Blackberry.

I can zoom in on one specific image in each .jpg to see the detail

I LOVE being able to carry all the images with me on my phone so I always have them with me to browse when an idea hits me! I hope some of you out there will be just as excited about it, too! Please do leave a comment if you use them this way. I'd love to have an idea of how many iPhone and Blackberry users there are out there making use of them! And tell me if you've used them on other devices, too. Your comments make my day!

Cricut Kisses and Crafty Wishes!

AnnS...You were the winner!

AnnS, it's been a week since the drawing and YOU WON!  Please contact me so I can send your Everyday Paper Dolls cartridge to you!  I couldn't find a way to contact you on your profile or your blog.   Where are you???

Images Uploaded for 10 More Cartridges

Basketball
Block Party
Cupcake Wrappers
Dude!
Hoot 'n Holler
Lacy Labels
Lovely Floral
Potpourri Basket
Sesame Street Font
Soccer

As usual, the link is just below my blog header that will take you to the library of all the cartridge images I've uploaded so far.  This group makes 101!

If you missed the video tutorial showing how to unzip them and load them on to your Gypsy, there's a link above for that, too.  Enjoy!

Cricut Kisses and Crafty Wishes!

Images For 10 More Cartridges Uploaded!

3 Birds On Parade
Carousel
Celebrate With Flourish
H2O
Locker Talk
My World
Rock Princess
Pumpkin Carving
Savory
Slumber Party

Link just below my blog header to the whole library -
91 cartridges available so far!

New Cricut Product??? Look what I found!!

I don't usually post twice in one day, but this was just too exciting NOT to share!  Could this be the new product they're promising us?  A new Cricut that cuts AND PRINTS!!  I know what I'm putting on my Christmas wish list.  Oh, my wallet is groaning already!!

Check it out on Linda's blog, Just A Scrappin'

And, I am a subscriber to Linda's blog, but I JUST realized that she is the owner of the Cricut Cheat Sheets group.  If you don't know about her Cheat Sheets, click on the link at the top of her page to find out how to join.  I have to confess that I rarely have time to look at them when she releases new ones, but it sure is nice to know they're there on the group page as a resource!   Thank you Linda!

If you've tried to contact me and I haven't responded...

...please give me a few more days. As you know, I was away from blogging and crafting for a while, and I was also away from the computer for the most part at home. I work on a computer almost all day, and I'm currently answering about 20-30 emails a day at work, so I've been pretty much avoiding the computer at home except for working on the Cricut cartridge images for the Gypsy Photo App. Last night I decided I better check my personal email, and HOLY COW! I had 643 emails! It took me almost 45 minutes just to weed out the junk mail, and I was still left with over 100 "real" ones. So, if you've emailed me and I haven't answered you yet, please be patient with me and I will.

Most of you have emailed with questions about how to use the .zip files or how to upload the images to your Gypsy, and if you need help with that, please see the video tutorial that I posted Monday. It will walk you through the whole process, step by step. I start with how to create a special folder on your desktop for the files, then show you how to download to that folder and unzip - extract the image files using WinZip - and finally, how to use Gyspy Sync to load the images on to your Gypsy.  I think it will answer all your questions so you can use my image files.

Thank you so much to all of you who have left messages and thank yous.  It is much appreciated and keeps me inspired to do more!

Cricut Kisses and Crafty Wishes!

Most Recent Uploaded Cartridge Images For Gypsy

I uploaded some new files last night and tonight.  Click on the link just below my header above to get to the full library, and sort the list by date to find the new ones!

Carousel
Celebrate With Flourish
Country Life
Graphically Speaking
Locker Talk
My World
Slumber Party
Speaking of Fall
Speaking of School
Speaking of Winter
Sports Mania

The Winner Is...

Post #62, AnnS!
Ann said...

"Here's my story: Every time I went to a crop I would use Base Camp. I love the font. After one crop I decided to go on ebay and bid on it. I couldn't wait for the auction to end.I started going through my carts to make room for my new Base Camp and what do I find....a brand new, unopened Base Camp. I bought it and forgot all about it. Now I couldn't wait for the auction to end and I prayed I didn't win it...I didn't. lol"

Congratulations Ann, and thanks for sharing your story. Your Every Day Paperdolls cartridge will be on the way to you as soon as you send me an address.  Enjoy!

TUTORIAL! How To Download My Cartridge Image Files and Load Them Onto Your Gypsy

If you don't have WinZip installed on your computer, you will need it to unzip the files before you load them on to your Gyspy.  Click here to dowload the free program.

Here is the video tutorial- I hope it helps!
Or click here to watch it larger on my Tutorials Page.

Images for 10 More Cartridges!

Here are today's uploads:
Baseball
Going Places
Hello Kitty Font
Indie Art
October 31st
Pooh and Friends
Pooh Font
Sesame Street Friends
Simply Charmed
Wedding

Click on the link in my header above to find them all!

Today's New Images For Gypsy Photo App

A Child's Year
Batman
Beyond Birthdays
Campout
Everyday Paperdolls - UPDATED
Freshly Picked
Life Is A Beach - UPDATED
My Community - UPDATED
Superman
Winter Frolic
Zoo Balloo

Click here to download these and images from 55 other cartridges.

Still time to enter to win BLOG CANDYand I PROMISE I'll do a TUTORIAL soon!

If you haven't entered yet, please scroll down to my post from July 13 and find out how!  I'm drawing a lucky winner on Monday, so be sure to enter today!

I promised you all a video tutorial on how to use the images I've been working on for Gypsy.  My husband got home Thursday night from being out of town, so I didn't go anywhere near the computer the last two evenings, but I will get one made this weekend to show you how to download, unzip, and load onto your Gypsy.  I am finding them SO useful for finding the images I want, and for visualizing the colors I need to cut the layered designs.  It's been a big undertaking, and I'm not nearly finished with all of them, but I have to say that it's making me love my Gypsy even more!  If you haven't downloaded any yet, you can click here for the whole list of ones I've completed to date.  I'm adding more every day, so if your favorite isn't there, check back often.  I'll post here as I upload them, so if you're a follower, you'll be alerted when there's one you want.

By the way, no one has asked me about how much space these images take up yet, but I anticipate that someone will eventually.  I'm not sure how to look at exactly how much space there is left on your Gypsy (if anyone knows, please let me know), but I can tell you that when I uploaded my last set of images, Gypsy Sync said I still have 94% memory left.  That's with the images for 57 cartridges loaded, so I'm not worrying about running out of room!

If you're downloading and enjoying the images, please do leave me a comment.  It is very much appreicated!

Cricut Kisses and Crafty Wishes!