Baby Shower Album Keepsake: CIRCUS PARTY TRAIN ALBUM—POCKET CAR by Carina Gardner Design ID #88862, #88865, #88874, #89243, #89246, #89249, #89252, #89255. Free SVG mini album file “BABY”

With the theme of the party being “Circus” I was very lucky to find a mini circus album on The Silhouette Store. The bonus for me: there was a video tutorial, (yeah!!!!!!) . I viewed the video first and then bought the files. In total there are 8 files. I was lucky and got it on sale at $0.50 each so my total cost was $4.00. It is on sale right now, but it is $0.74 …still a great deal and worth the money. The files consists of a rectangle album piece with and without pockets that can be used for photos, journaling, keepsakes etc and an accordion pull out circus train that has room for some of the mentioned activities. you can cut as many or as few of these pieces to customize your album. The evaluation still came out low at 43 out of 48 due to the cost of all the files, and the higher material cost in paper. I would do this album for a special person as it is time consuming so not just anyone will get this from me!

This is a photo taken from Carina Gardners’ blog site which has all the files and components:

When I viewed the tutorial, it was so straight forward and simple that I thought it was a no brainer…easy as pie!

Reality check: To finish this album there are A LOT of pieces to cut, lots of paper to change on and off your cutting mat, and lots of gluing to be done so you need to take your time, be patient. I cut and glued each file before moving on to the next, but if you are super organized, you can cut all the same colour pieces from all the files and do a mass assembly at the end. As I write this blog, I am finishing up the last cutting and gluing and its day 4. I took a break in between, did 1 to 2 of the files a day, as there is only so much glueing I can handle!

The good news it that it is a very cute album and turns out splendid even if you don’t follow the exact placement of items. I left pockets out and left some pages totally blank.

Below are the links to the individual files on The Silhouette Design Store.

CIRCUS PARTY TRAIN ALBUM—POCKET CAR by Carina Gardner Design ID  #88862, #88865, #88874, #89243, #89246, #89249, #89252, #89255.

Note to self: this album was so adorable.. do a blog post on how to make an accordion fold album from scratch using the Silhouette CAMEO® But for now here is a free file for a mini album that spells out BABY both SVG and Studio3

My finished product for the Circus Party Train (adding some bling as I write)

 

Lots of templates on Not so clever people Pinterest board Mini Albums

1.  Price of downloading the file

• Free to $.99
• $.99 to $2.99
• $2.99 to $4.99
• $4.99 to $6. 99
• $6.99 to $8.99
• $8.99  0r more

This file was on sale when I purchased it  a score of  4 out of 6 

2. Open file

• Layout when opened was super simple and I knew what to do
• Looked at layout and was confused so visited blog, video, website
• Looked at file, had no idea what I was seeing, no information to be found to help!

 Layout when opened was super simple and I knew what to do. Files were grouped  and needed to be ungrouped, but they were all large items, easy to place and cut.        This got a 6 out of 6 for open file category.

3. Cutting the file

• Had no difficulties cutting this file
• Had some difficulties cutting this file
• Had tons of headache cutting this file

Had no difficulties cutting this file “cutting the file” step  gets a 6 out of 6

4. Easy to construct?

• so easy a young kid can do this
• medium difficulty if you and not too crafty you can still achieve a good result
• Hard: you need to really know what you are doing and have been crafting most of your life.

So easy a young kid can do this..The cutting needs to be done by an adult but the glueing is straight forward.  I give this a easy  rating of 6 out of 6. 

5. Needed extra items

• I had to add extra items to finish this project for example string, grommets, rhinestones  etc.
• I could add if I wanted to.
• did not have to add anything other than the paper

Yo need to add something like ribbon or metal rings to bind the album  “I had to add extra items to finish this project for example string, grommets, rhinestones  etc.”  a  5 out of 6

6. Finished product

• looked exactly like the photo online
• sort of looked the same
• No Way did this turn out the same.

Looked exactly like the photo except where I decided to change. This gets a 6 out of 6

7. Recommend the file/ designer

• I would recommend this file and designer to anyone
• I would not recommend the file or designer to anyone
• I would recommend the file
• I would recommend the designer

I will recommend this file and designer to anyone as there are many tutorials for her files to help you through the assembly. I give this   a 6 out of 6.

8. The overall cost for the project was

• Under $5.00
• Under $10
• Over $10

I give “the overall cost for the project” a  4 out of 6  since it was under $10.00 to complete this project: I lost track of how many sheets of each below. The most sheet used was for the base of all the cut files in beige and that was about 12 to 13.

•   8.5 in x 11 in beige  Cardstock paper
•  8.5 in. x 11 in. white cardstock
• 8.5 in. x 11 in. red cardstock
• 8.5 in. x 11 in. light blue  cardstock
• 8.5 in. x 11 in. dark blue  cardstock
• 8.5 in. x 11 in. orange  cardstock
• 8.5 in. x 11 in. yellow cardstock
• 8.5 in. x 11 in. gray cardstock
• 8.5 in. x 11 in. black cardstock
• Ribbon and gems
• Glue
• My Silhouette CAMEO® machine.

My over all score for this project is  43 out of 48.

Carolyn

On behalf of Not So Clever People