It's candy time with a little bit of egg!

Easter is in two days. Here's a quick gift tag I made for my candy dispenser I'm giving to friends. I'll also show you how I packaged the dispenser for giving away!
If you haven't already, go to the Silhouette Online store, and purchase this design I made a few weeks ago:

I am making 3 tags, so I cut 3 of the plain eggs and 3 of the patterned eggs. I brushed an ink pad across the edges of the plain eggs to give them some character. (I used Versa Color in 183 Cement on white cardstock if you were wondering.)

I added the patterned eggs I cut earlier from my blue cardstock.

Then punched holes in them to make tags. I had intended to added circles to my eggs before I cut them so my Cameo could do the work, but forgot. So I just went old school and used a hole punch.

 Since these are for the candy dispensers, I made sure to mention to my friends to break the paper band off that holds the dispenser closed. 

So all I did to keep the candy dispenser closed was cut a strip off of my scraps from the box and formed it into a ring that fit around my box. I decorated the band with another strip of the accent paper. Easy peasy! 

Then I took the lid off my box, closed the dispenser bucket, and slid the band over... 

...filled it with candy, (one package of large Robin Eggs, minus 4 eggs, fills a dispenser perfectly)...

...and added my egg tag!

Have a happy Easter everyone!

Walk for Thought

We have been blessed more than we deserve, but I am so grateful for it. Two weeks ago, Brookie was able to come home from the hospital. This week, she was able to have her neck brace removed. To everyone else, she is completely recovered and back to where she was. To us, we can see the changes. But I can live with those changes. We're just glad to have our baby girl alive. Hopefully in 6 months to a year, she will have a complete recovery. Time will tell.
Thank you for your kind words. It was the scariest moment in my life. I hope none of you ever have to go through it, and I feel for those who have gone through it or something similar.
In two weeks, we will be walking in the "Walk for Thought" event put on the Brain Injury Association. We hope to raise $2,000 for this great group. We were blessed to have a positive outcome from Brookie's accident, but many are not that lucky. This group is a non-profit group that helps those not as fortunate as our family deal with their outcome. They have helped us to understand partly what Brooklynn is going through and how best to help her when she acts the way she does, and also what actions are most likely the result of her traumatic brain injury.

(This photo was taken at Disneyland the week before the accident.)

We would love to have your help in reaching our goal of $2,000. If you live in or near the Sacramento, California area, we'd love to have you join our team. Our team is "Brooklynn's Pink Piggies" for her favorite animal and color. Please join us Sunday, March 25th at the capitol if you are able and walk for this great cause. Just be sure to register soon. The entrance fees go up next week.
If you are not able to walk with us, we'd appreciate any donation you can afford. Every little bit helps! I also have a gift to send as a thank you for any donations of $5 or more. Just email me at modaley2(at)msn(dot)com (substituting (at) for "@" and (dot) for ".") after making a donation, and I will email a pack of cut files back to you!

To donate to Brookie's Pink Piggies for the Brain Injury Association of California, click here.

To join our team click here.

Please spread the word to anyone you think might be willing to help us out.  Thank you!

Now, for a group of designs that are waiting in Silhouette's queue. These and more should be added to the store some time this week! For those who have or know a firefighter. Or for those photos of your kids dressed up as these great people:

3D Steg Assembly Tutorial

So I thought I had done a 3D Steg tutorial before but can not find it. So here it is again. This dino was released last year and would be a great addition to any dino party or decor. 

These are the shapes you should have cut. I will refer to each shape by the number shown in the image below.

To give you an overall idea of how these will go together, 5&6 will fit together, then 3&4. After that, we'll slide the pair 3-4 with the pair 5-6. Lastly, we'll add shapes 1&2. 1 & 2 are actually the exact same shape.

Okay, so to start, grab shapes 5&6 and slide together as shown. 

*To be sure that the legs end up in the correct position, be sure that the lower portion 6 (that the legs are connected too) is behind the lower portion of 5 as shown below.

Next, slide 3&4 together as shown. 

*Again, be sure that the lower portion of 4 (that the legs are connected too) is behind the lower portion of 5 as shown below.

This is what you should now have. I'm going to call the one with the dino head and tail 3-4 since it is made up of 3 and 4 and the other I'll call 5-6.  

It's now time to slide 3-4 and 5-6 together. 

The lower portion of 3-4 should be behind the lower portion of 5-6.  

To place the rings (1 & 2) on the body, you will want to be sure that the slots shown below line up.  

Slide one of the rings over the spikes on the tail and fit any of the slots on the ring into the lower tail slot.  

Should like the photo below. 

Now pull the ring up and over until the slot on the ring the opposite the one you already used is settled into the top tail slot. 

This photo below shows that we're using slots that are opposite from each other. 

Repeat the last couple steps with the last ring fitting it into the slots near at the head end. 

Now comes the tricky part. Carefully tug on the ring while gripping two layers of shapes. Our goal here is to nudge them around the ring to their own slots.  

I like to work one side of a layer and then the next and also work one ring and then the other so there isn't too much pulling on the rings.  

The photo below shows what I meant above by working on one ring and then the other, and then back to the other to reduce pull on the rings.

Once you've accomplished the task of filling each slot of the rings, you're almost done! You could leave your stegosaurus as is, but I think his stance is a bit wide for my liking. 

To fix this, simply bend the legs in a little, and your done! 

As always, if you have questions about any of this, leave a comment and I'll try to answer it best I can as soon as I see it. 

Photo Ornament Assembly Tutorial

This tutorial is for the photo ornament that first arrived in the Silhouette Online Store in November or December of 2010.

These are the shapes you should have cut.

Shapes above will be numbered as follows:
top row (Left to Right)- 1 & 2;
bottom row (left to right)- 3, 4, & 5.

I find it easiest to attach you photo before getting started. Just be sure you do not cover up the slots. Also, if you don't want your photo's edge showing on the back or you want the photo to be on both sides, you could cut double of shape #3 and sandwich them around your photo. Just be sure that they have been well glued or taped to each other.

First we're going to work with shape 3 and 5. Slip the bottom slot of 3 into the bottom-inner slot of 5 as shown below.

 Repeat for the top slots. (The top slot of 3 fits in the inner-top slot of 5)

This is what it should look like.

Next, we're going to slide the top slot of 4 into the top slot of our combined 3 & 5 as shown below:

Repeat with bottom slots. (slide bottom slot of 4 into bottom slot of 4&5)

This is what it will look like:

Next step is to place shape 1&2 on our 3-4-5 combo.  Take 1 (1 and 2 are the exact same shape) and slide the top side piece of the 3-4-5 combo into any slot of 1.

Next, slide the 3-4-5 combo's opposite top slot into 1's slot that is directly across from the slot you already used. It should look like this when done with this step:

Repeat with #2 and your bottom slots of the 3-4-5 combo. Once you do, it should look like this:

Now we just need to move 3, 4, or 5 into the empty slots. To do this, I find it easiest to move one side at a time as shown:

Then move the opposite side into place with it looking like this when done:

And now follow that last step with whichever shape is closest to your empty slots and your done!

I hope that made sense. If you have any questions, leave a comment and I'll answer it as soon as I see it. Have fun!