AaaaAAaaaaAH!

GUYS!! It's almost CHRISTMAS!!!

I'm so excited.  All of my shopping is done, but I haven't wrapped a darn thing. As long as I can remember, my family has always exchanged gifts on Christmas Eve.  That way we didn't have to rush through everything before heading of to grandparents' houses.  So really, tonight is our "Christmas Eve."  That means I've got to keep this post tight so I can get to wrapping!

Today's challenge at 365 Cards is to create a card using exactly three of three different items on your card.... make sense?  Here's mine:

This is "Snow Fight Kody" from Some Odd Girl, our sponsor this week.  The three items I used on my card are 3 ribbons, 3 brads and 3 pompom balls.  I like :-)

I know the rest of this week is gonna be crazy for a lot of  you, but be sure to hop on over and link up your cards!

Merry Christmas, everyone!

Deck the Card

Hey friends!  It's SUPER icy on the roads this morning, so school is canceled... can I get a "Woot, woot!?"

It's Thursday, which means I've got a card for today's challenge at 365 Cards.  All you have to do is create a detachable ornament for your card.  It doesn't necessarily have to be a Christmas ornament.  This was such a great idea and a lot of fun to make!  Here's what I did...

The ornament was pretty easy to make.  I Googled images of "paper ornaments" and got a lot of great ideas.  I found this blog with some absolutely GORGEOUS examples.  My ornament came together mostly by trial and error, since I didn't follow instructions. Hehe.  But I like how it turned out.  I used super fine gold glitter on the edges for a little sparkle.  It looks so pretty, but unfortunately I will also be sparkling for weeks to come.  My sister stopped to talk to me for, like, two seconds and even she had glitter on her. Lol. And so continues my love-hate relationship with glitter.

I used my "Accent Essentials" CC for the frame, and the "Home Decor" cartridge for the center of the ornament.  Sparkly ribbon, silver button, sticky pearl and "Voila!"

The trickiest part of this card was deciding how to attach the ornament so that it could be removed later.  I ended up just using some gold thread and tacking the bow to the top of the card.  Seems to work just fine.  To gift this, I'd probably have to figure out a way to stick the actual ornament down.  I thought some kind of re-positionable glue dot would work... I just don't have any.

I really hope you give this a try!! Since I've got plenty of unscheduled time today, I'm thinking I might have to make some more of these ;-)  Thanks for stopping by!

Let's Catch Up... or Ketchup... However You Wanna Do This

Hey there, everyone.  I can't believe I've let over two weeks go by without posting.  *facepalm*

I've got a card to show you, but first I just wanted to say "way to go!" to everyone who participated in the 365 Cards Vintage Love Blog Hop.  You all came up with some flippin' AMAZING cards.  But also, I wanted to say thanks to all of you who commented on my blog with the things that you are thankful for.  Some of the stories you shared were so touching.  I see so many of your names all across Blog-land, but it's kinda cool to learn one more little thing about the person behind the link :-)

Okay, so here's my card for the Day 284 challenge from Thursday.  The challenge was to create a card with two pockets.  You can interpret that just about any way you want, but here's what I came up with:

 

Kinda cute, huh? lol.  The stickers are from E.A.D. Designs. I actually managed to create a SVG file to cut this with my Cricut.  It needs to be tweaked a bit, but if I ever get around to it, I'll share the file with y'all.

Again, I know this is late, but you still have a little time to play along.  You have until Sunday at midnight to get your cards linked up!

We've got a bunch of fun stuff to talk about today, but first of all,

Happy Thanksgiving!

It's Thanksgiving Day in the U.S.  Which means some of us will be doing our card-making while we watch the parade (or maybe the football game) on TV :-)  I know I have so much to be thankful for, but one HUGE thing this year is that my brother arrived safely back to the states from Afghanistan last week-- He's still in California for a couple more weeks, but we're looking forward to having him here at home for Christmas! Yayyy!!

And now, on to the main event...

365 Cards Vintage Week Blog Hop

If you're just now joining us, go ahead and click on the link above to go back to the beginning.  It will take you to the 365 Cards blog where you can get the details on how to navigate through this week-long blog hop and find out all the ways you can be entered to win some fabulous Graphic 45 prizes (brought to you by our very own DT member, Gloria!).

If you've already been hopping along with us, your last stop should have been Kim's blog.

Now finally, here's my card for today:

The challenge for today, and your ninth "ingredient" for the recipe challenge on Saturday, is: A dimensional sticker.  On my card, I used the clock sticker by Jolee's.  I've had it forever.  It was nice to finally have a reason to use it :-) I really love the look of vintage-style cards, but it's always so hard for me to do!! I tend to take a "less is more" approach to my cards.  Vintage is kinda like... "more is better." Ha ha. It's been so much fun looking at what you guys have come up with so far this week.  Can't wait to see what you do for today's challenge!

One more way to earn another chance for one of the awesome prizes is by commenting on this post.  But since it's Thanksgiving and all, I'm going to make it a little more specific... Leave a comment below answering this question:

What are you thankful for?

It doesn't have to be a sappy answer :-)  I'll take cute, funny and clever, too! Haha. Tomorrow, whenever you come out of your food coma, come back and check out your next stop on the hop:

Sophie's Blog

Just Relax

So today's post revolves around something that is near and dear to my heart:  Nap time.  And I don't even mean MY nap time.  I work in a preschool, so that hour and a half (ish) is precious... assuming they actually get quiet. Lol.

For today's challenge at 365 Cards, I've created a card based on the theme "nap time."

Personally, I don't take naps.   I can't fall asleep during the day.  BUT I definitely like to get some "relaxing" time in.  For me that usually means some time at my craft table or browsing my YouTube subscriptions :-)  How do you relax?

In other fabulous news, next week at 365 Cards we're having a blog hop!  There will be some awesome prizes and all kinds of fun, so keep checking back for those details :-)

BOiNG!

Good morning, Blogger peeps :-)
I'm super excited about the cards that I get to share with you today because I think they turned out so flippin' cute!  The challenge for Day 249 at 365 Cards is to create a coil pop-up card.  For those of you who have seen this before, it's waaaay easier than it looks.  If you don't know what I'm talking about, take a look...

This is actually the second card I made, but you can see the coils easier, so I'll show you that one first:

To make the coil, all you do is start with a circle and cut it into a spiral from the outside, almost all the way to the center.  For me, the trickiest part was figuring out how big of a circle to start with and then how wide to cut the coil.  On both cards I used a 2-inch circle for the main coil.  The smaller coil on the butterfly card was made from a 1.5-inch circle.  I found that somewhere between 1/8th and 1/4th of an inch works for the width.  Too much bigger and it's not as "springy".  Too much smaller and it doesn't hold anything.

For the next card I used acetate for the coil.  I think it looks kind of cool with the leaves.  Also, I really hate when I use acetate and I can see the glue, so I usually try to cover it up.  In this case, I cut mirrored versions of the die cuts and sandwiched the coil between them.

 

I'll also mention this: In order for the card to lay flat, the coil has to line up.  To make sure mine was lined up, I glued one end on the bottom of the card, then let the coil lay flat.  Then I put glue on the end that would be attached to the top and closed the card.  When I opened it, the top end was positioned right where it needed to be.  (Hope that makes sense... :-P)

Okay, well, I think that's enough blah-blah-blah from me!  I'm telling you-- this was SO much fun.  Go give it a try and then link it up RIGHT HERE!

Wonderful Watercolors

The the challenge at 365 Cards for Day 242 is to color an image (or two) using only watercolors!  Now, I don't know about you, but the only watercolors I have around are the ones with 8 colors in that little yellow tray.  I had and idea of what I wanted it to look like, so I had to mix some of the colors to get the shade I was looking for, but this is what I ended up with:

My card base is Bazzill Swiss Dots.  I burned the edges of the brown paper for just a little extra "something."  The digi image is from Sweet 'n Sassy Stamps, our sponsor for this week.

This has to be a quickie post as I'm on my way back out to work again, but I hope you go play along with us HERE.  I'd love to stop by your blog :-)

Thanks for looking!!

Makeover!

Hey there, friends.  I tried to spruce this blog up for fall with a new background and some fall-ish colors.  Whaddya think?

I've got a new card for you today for 365 Cards' challenge.  Day 235 is a Pick 3: Three patterns, three colors and three embellishments.  Our sponsor for this week is Catherine Pooler.  <-- Click to check out her website full of fun ideas and awesome Stampin' Up products :-)  Here's what I came up with for the challenge:

Your turn!  Go take a peek at the other fabulous creations from this week and then jump in a try a challenge or two... or seven :-)

Hi everyone! I've got some serious writer's block. So while I would normally attempt at least one funny thought, I find myself at a loss for anything clever to say.  And we all know that "if you don't have anything clever to say, don't say anything at all."  Or at least, I think that's how it goes... uhh... Let's move on.

Today's challenge at 365 Cards is to create a card using two techniques:  Sponging and sanding.

For the background, I crinkled up the kraft paper, flattened it back out, then lightly "sanded" it with an emery board.  It gives it a cool suede-like texture.  I did the sponging around the edges with a wedge cut out of a kitchen sponge.  Sometimes you just gotta work with what you have, y'know?

Alright, now it's your turn!  Prickley Pear is sponsoring this week of challenges, so play along and rock those challenges ;-)

\m/_ (-_-) _\m/

Yay for Fall!

Omygosh, you guys! I love fall!!  It has been absolutely gorgeous this week.  I love jacket and sweater weather :-)  Plus, the colors of the season are awesome...

The challenge for today at 365 Cards is a DIY challenge to create your own patterned paper.  This a challenge that's been done before, but this time it's got a twist-- it has to be harvest-themed.

Here's my card:

Since I was using a digi-stamp, it was pretty easy to create the background paper.  And since I wasn't about to hand-color a bazillion little pumpkins, I went ahead and colored the image in Photoshop before duplicating it.  I rotated the image several times and then just sort of placed them where they fit.  I didn't want the pumpkins in the background to "pop" quite as much as the front image, so I adjusted the transparency just a smidge.  To finish it off, lots of distressing ink!

It's been a very, very long day, so I'm off to bed!  If you haven't already, go check out the challenges for this week, sponsored by The Character Cafe :-)

F-F-F-Fun

Hey there peeps! It's Thursday! (Well, it is as I begin to type this entry, but we'll see if I actually finish it before midnight.  Probably not.  I've already restarted this twice.  But anyway....)  Thursday means it's my turn again to show y'all what's up over at 365 Cards.

Today our challenge is to use these three "F's":  Fabric, Fringe and Floss.   This one was super challenging for me!  First of all, those are three things that I don't use very often.  And then even what I did have didn't necessarily go together.  But you know how that goes... you just keep experimenting and hope you come up with something spiffy.

Here's what I finally came up with:

I've got the red embroidery floss, some red fabric that I cut into a strip and then twisted.  For the "fringe" I just used my CutterBee scissors and veeeeery carefully cut the black paper.  I think it worked out pretty well.  I absolutely love the "Lantern Rin" stamp from Sparkle Creations-- in fact, they're all really cute, so I hope you'll go check out the other designers' cards from this week!  OH, and as a bonus, the little tag is from the Pagoda Cricut cartridge-- it means "friend." Extra "F" points!! :-)

Check me out... it's 11:58. Hehe.

Taking Care of Business

Hello, dear Blogger-friends!  I hope that this has been a pleasant, peaceful week for you. I, for one, am glad that the weekend is here.  It's been yet another busy week at school, followed up by a few hours of watching the kiddos at church tonight.

Yesterday, Pam's challenge for us was to create a business card!  The idea is to create a card with your information that you can pass along, but rather than your typical card, this can be a little more personalized by actually creating a small sample of the work that you do.  To give you all an idea of what we're talking about, this is what I came up with:

I kept the info to a minimum on this one.  Right now, my blog is the main place where I send people who want to see what I do.  I'd love to see what you would do with this challenge-- make sure to hop on over to the 365 Cards blog and play along!!

Have a fantastic weekend!

Well, all of my plans for this weekend have completely changed. Sometimes that's not such a bad thing.  I was supposed to be going on another retreat with my church's student ministry, but I've had this scratchy throat thing creeping up on me all week.  Then yesterday, when I woke up, I had almost no voice at all. Then, by the time I was greeting the kids at school, I was starting to sound a bit like Macy Gray.  By the afternoon, my Macy impression was dead-on. Lol.  It was a rough day at school, so I was just completely worn out and feeling not-so-wonderful.  I decided that if I went on the retreat, I was just going to be miserable and not much fun anyway.  And having no voice when you're in charge of a bunch of 8th grade girls is no bueno!

So instead, I got to see the family for a few minutes before going to work for a couple of hours.  I made it home early enough for a game of Apples to Apples with my cousin, aunt and momma.  It was quite fun :-)  Then I went to bed and totally crashed.  I woke up with Macy syndrome again :-( But at least I can just chill.


Okay, enough whining...  The real reason that I'm posting is to show you my card for Thursday's challenge-- we're already past the 200th day at 365 Cards!!  How crazy is that?  The challenge is to use 4 different stamps on your card, making sure that at least 2 of them are images.  Here's what I came up with:

Four stamps sounded like a lot to me at first, but once I started working on it, that really didn't seem  like too big of a deal.  The hardest part for me was to find stamps that actually looked good together. I ended up using the bird (which is from our sponsor this week, DRS Designs), the flower, the Italian background stamp, and the little, tiny "miss you."  I have a lot of stamps, but I also have a feeling that my stash looks like a handful compared to the selection that I know some of you out there have. I mean, mine fit in one box. Haha.  But thankfully these worked out pretty well :-)

Thanks for stopping by! I hope you'll hop on over and join us at 365 Cards!

Color and Dimension... and Mice in the Jam

Hello Blogger-friends!  Happy Thursday, once again.  We've survived another week!  For my friends here in the States, I hope you all had a lovely Labor Day weekend.  We had some awesome weather here.  My sisters and I lit up a bonfire in the backyard and had a couple of friends over.  It was so much fun :-) And since no one had to be at school or work the next morning, we were outside until about 3 a.m.   We even ran out of firewood!  But that didn't stop us.  Earlier that afternoon, we'd seen a stack of wood on the curb a few blocks away.  So a quick trip around 1 a.m. solved that problem. Lol.

Today I've got a card to show you for the challenge over at 365 Cards.  Click on the link to view the details!

I love coloring with markers.  Especially new markers ;-)  The ones I use on my cards, most of the time, are a set of Prismacolor permanent markers that my dad used a bajillion years ago.  They sat up in a closet for the longest time and then, a couple of years ago, I adopted them.

Another thing I did on this card was use foam squares.  I never used to do a lot of layered or dimensional stuff when I first started making cards.  But recently I find myself using them on EVERYTHING. Haha.  My only problem is that sometimes even the 1/8" squares are a little too thick for my taste.  So in some cases (like today's card) I'll split each square into two layers.  You get more "pop" for your money and the card still fits in the envelope! *clapping*

Okay peeps, I've gotta get to sleep now (cuz it's still Wednesday night as I'm typing this)!!  See y'all soon... I'm shooting for at least one more post this week!

Ad Inspired

Happy Thursday!  Thursday used to be my least favorite day of the week... now I think it's turning into my favorite.  It's the only day where I don't have anything major to do.  I don't really have anything on Mondays either, but it's the beginning of the work week, so it's tainted.

ALSO, it being Thursday means that I need to tell y'all about the challenge for today at 365 Cards!  I really enjoy ad-inspired challenges, and that's exactly what I've got for you today...

Here's our inspiration piece from Pier1:

And here's my take on it:

When I saw this ad I knew exactly what paper I was going to use.  I've had this last little piece of embossed paper by K&Company forever.  It's so pretty and now I finally knew what to do with it.  The only problem was that it was an off-white color and I needed gold.  Thankfully, I've got some metallic acrylic paints.  I just used a little bit of paint on a dry brush to cover the paper.  It took a few coats, but I didn't want to get it too soggy and mess up the embossing.  If you're able to see the large version of the photo, you can kind of see the brush strokes which gives it a little bit of an antique-y look.

Can't wait to see what you all come up with!!  Thanks for stopping by :-)

Lovely... Most of the time ;-)

Hello my friends! How are you this fine (cloudy, gray, wet) Wednesday afternoon? Hehe.

On Monday, Scrap It With a Song kicked off yet another song-inspired challenge with "Isn't She Lovely" by Stevie Wonder.  Can you believe we're on week #20 already?? It's gone by super fast and I've been so honored to be a part of the DT with a lovely group of talented ladies.  But, as I've been trying to burn into the brains of my little 4-yr-old charges, we have to share and take turns and let another fabulous group of designers take over :-) That being said, this is my last project as a member of the DT, but I think I'll definitely be playing along in the future!

After spending so much time looking through hundreds of beautiful scrapbook layouts on the Scrap It With a Song challenges, I decided to try creating my own.  I haven't made a scrapbook page in a LONG time, but this idea was in my head and I really wanted to make it! This project features my little sister, Gina Marie, as a precocious 4-year-old.  She's 16 now. Back in the day we used to call her "Gina Marie Princess."  Now we just lovingly refer to her as "turdy-head" because we're SO mature ;-) Lol.

Thanks for taking the time to stop by! Hope to see you playing along this week!!

Warm Wishes

Hellooo again, friends.  Two posts in one day!

This time I'd like to share with you my card for today's "White Space" challenge at 365 Cards.  These kinds of challenges are always a little... ummm... challenging. LOL. But they're fun! ;-)

Here's the white space sketch...

And my card...

The "warmest wishes" sentiment is from this week's sponsor, KLM Designs.  They have some super cute digi images, so make sure you check them out and then hop on over to 365 Cards and share your take on the challenge :-)

This whole 5 a.m. thing is gonna kill me...

*Yawn*

Hey guys! Didja miss me?  This week has been quite an adjustment.  Monday was the first day of school, so that means it's back to work for me.  Last year I was the aftercare person, so I only worked a few hours in the evening.  THIS year I'm working full time and I'm opening in the morning, so I have to wake up at ungodly hours.  But that's not really the tricky part.  I'm usually a night owl, and that's when I did all of my card making.  So I'm just working on rearranging my schedule ;-)

In all of the craziness leading up to the first day of school, I didn't get a chance to show you my card for the challenge at Scrap It With a Song this week.  When I first watched the video for "Summertime", I definitely LOL'd.  But you just gotta love The Fresh Prince ;-)  My card is super simple, but I just really like the green striped paper:

Your turn! You still have until Sunday at noon to upload your creations-- can't wait to see them!

Take Two

Hey everybody :-)

I am SO tired! I'm still trying to work on the aftercare room at school.  We're so close to being done, but the open house is tonight! Yikes.  I'm ready for school to start.  I need to get back on a schedule.

Anywho, it's time to show you my card for today's challenge at 365 Cards!  Here's the deal: Take a card that either you didn't finish or weren't totally happy with and redo it.  Turn "blegh" into "beautiful!"

So about this time last year, I made this card:

I didn't really love it when I made it and it's been sitting in my "salvage" shoebox ever since.  For the challenge I pulled off the sentiment, the flower and the whole dark pink layer. (I had to fight with it a little bit, but I was finally able to get it off :-)  So that left me with just the pink base.  Then I decided to recreate the glittery edges, but this time on a white layer.  That worked a LOT better for me.  With a new ribbon and this super cute bird stamp from Robyn's Fetish, it looks like a whole new project!

Okay, I gotta wrap this up before I fall asleep on my laptop... again. Lol.  I can't wait to see what you all come up with for this challenge!

Hello blogger friends!  I'm kinda proud of this card I'm sharing with you today.  I just really, really like how it turned out.  Sometimes I have a great idea but, once I get started, I end up having to tweak change my design.  But every once in a while you have that project that comes together just like it looked in your head.  And that's awesome.

It's Monday, so it's time for yet another challenge from Scrap It With a Song.  This week we're scrappin' to "Get Here" by Oleta Adams.  It's a pretty song-- I'd never heard it before this challenge.  My sentiment is straight from the lyrics of the song...

The lovely couple is cut from the "Sweethearts" Cricut cartridge (which my momma found on CLEARANCE! yay) and I absolutely love it.

Thanks for stopping by today! I hope you come on over and play along with us :-)

I tell ya, if my head wasn't attached...

*sigh* It's been one of those weeks, ya know?  I've got a few projects that I've been trying to finish up before I go back to work.  It seems like all of a sudden, the days started picking up speed!!  Plus-- and I know this never happens to anyone else-- it's one of those weeks where it seems like just when you thought you did the dumbest thing you could possibly do, you do something else that's just... dumber. Haha... oh geez.  I read this quote online and it seems to be my life motto:

""He who laughs at himself never runs out of things to laugh at."

~ Epictetus

That old greek guy had some pretty good insights.  I'm grateful that I have that sense of humor that allows me to laugh at myself.  If not in the moment, then at least in retrospect :-)

All that to say, here is my DT project for 365 Cards:

 Today we're making Artist Trading Cards!  I've seen them, but I've never made one before.  The beauty of ATC's is that they can be any style, use any medium, as long as it fits onto a 2.5" x 3.5" canvas!  I can't wait to see what everyone else has up their sleeves. I hope you'll play along-- someone's gonna be getting some fabulous goodies from Sweet 'n Sassy Stamps at the end of the week, so check it out! :-)

A Jeans and T-Shirt Kind of Girl

Hi friends!  It's Tuesday.  That means I forgot to set up a post for yesterday's Scrap It With a Song reveal. *palm face*  Better late than never.  (<--- I hate that saying. Lol.)


Okay, so this week our song of inspiration is "With You" by Jessica Simpson.  It's been a loooong time since I've listened to any of Jessica Simpson's stuff.  You'll see that my card doesn't have a sentiment, but the idea behind it is from the line "The real me is a southern girl with her Levis on..."  So the girl on this card is wearing actual Levis :-)  I had a pair that was on it's way to the trash anyway, so I saved a small piece for the card:

I have to keep this short-- I've got to go up to school and work on finishing up one of the rooms before the open house next week.  AAHHH!! It's gonna come up so fast! But I'm kind of excited :-)


Y'all have a fabulous day.  Check back on Thursday for a new project, and don't forget to upload your awesome creations at Scrap It With a Song this week!

Yay, yay, yay!

Okay guys, I've got a super fun announcement for you today! :-D

Today I get to reveal my card for my first week as member of the 365 Cards design team!! YAY! Lol... I'm kind of excited. Can you tell?  I love playing along with these ladies and getting so many ideas and inspiration from everyone who joins in.  I don't know how Pam manages to come up with a new challenge for every day of the year, but she does. And it's awesome.  And I'm so honored to be a part of it :-)

SO, without anymore rambling from me...

This is "card recipe" week, so today's ingredients are:

5x5 Card

2 3x3 Patterned Papers

Sentiment

1 Image (stamped, fussy cut, digi, whatever)

2 Buttons

Since everyone's starting to get into that "back-to-school" mode,  I chose this super cute digi stamp from Meljen's Designs.  I colored the image in Photoshop before printing.  Normally I enjoy coloring by hand but, on this occasion, my coloring was particularly atrocious. Haha.

Well, thanks for stopping by!  Can't wait to see what you come up with :-)

You Got Me Flying

Hi there, friends!  I sure hope you all have had a wonderful week.  This past week has been pretty rainy, but it took a break on Thursday night so I could go see The Sound of Music at the Muny with my sisters.  Only two more shows left! This summer has gone by so fast.

It's Monday-- and you know what that means!  (Right?) There's a new challenge over at Scrap It With a Song, and our song for this week is "This Kiss" by Faith Hill.  There are some great lyrics to work with.  Make sure you go check out the projects from the rest of the DT, too!  Here's what I did:

Obviously, this is a love song, but I have so many love-themed cards already and I just don't use them.  So this time I wanted to do something a little different.  The kite and the front cloud are on foam squares to add a little dimension.  I scored the lines on the kite, but they're a little hard to see in the photo.  The kite string is a piece of hemp cord, with some white satin ribbon tied on the tail.

Whaddya think?  If you've got an idea, come sing along with us at Scrap It With a Song!  Our sponsor for this week is...

The winner of this week's challenge will get a $20 gift certificate to the store! Click on the logo above to do some pre-shopping :-)

Scrap It With a Song reveal

So I'm a little late getting this up. Oops.

Yesterday, we kicked off yet another week of this sing-along challenge.  This time, our song is "Somewhere Over the Rainbow."  The version we're working with is by Katherine McPhee.  I remember watching her sing this on the only season of American Idol that I ever watched from beginning to end. Haha.

The lyric I chose to use on my card is "... and the dreams that you dare to dream really do come true."

I really love this song.  My goal here was to do something OTHER than a rainbow.  That was harder than I thought. Haha.

Thanks for stopping by!  Now go on and check out the Scrap It With a Song blog and join us for this week's challenge :-)

Cookin' Up Some Punny Stuff

*If you're looking for my card for 365 Cards, it's down toward the bottom!*

Hey there blogger-friends!  It's been a while since I've done a regular ol' "hey, look at this!" post.  This summer has been shaping up to be a pretty fun one so far.  I had a couple of goals that I made for myself, and I'm well on my way to meeting those!  The first one was to make cards to send in to Operation Write Home.  I picked up a medium-sized box at the post office the other day to see how close I was to actually filling it-- and I'm about half way there!

Oh, and speaking of cards (ummm... duh, what else would we be speaking about on here?), I added a couple of links over there on the sidebar.  Take a second and check out Susie's blog, where I was a featured stamper.  She has some great stuff to share! ---->>

My other goal was to see every show at the Muny this season.  Three down, four to go.  I've seen Beauty and the Beast, Titanic: The Musical and Damn Yankees.  I don't know if there's any other place like the Muny, but it's definitely one of my favorite attractions during the summer.  Because it's an outdoor theater (and because St. Louis weather is kind of ridiculous) it's a bit of a hit-or-miss situation with the rain.  This is the first year that I've gone and a show actually got rained out.  My whole family went to see Titanic a couple of weeks ago. They were predicting storms for that particular night, but we decided to go anyway, in hopes that any rain would be over with before the show was supposed to start.  Besides, we always do the free seats, so it's not like we were gonna lose money on tickets or anything.  No such luck.  It rained from the time we arrived until well into the evening when they finally canceled the show at 9:30.  Oh well :-) We had fun anyway-- This was our view from the free seats:

I ended up going a few nights later with a friend.
She had tickets.
They were really close.
It was awesome.
"Cats" is showing this week... I've never seen the show before, so I'm looking forward to it.

SO... finally, I've got a card to share with you.  This one is for today's challenge over at 365 Cards.  The challenge is to create a card with something related to the cooking of food. Well, it just so happens that I recently picked up some super cute stickers at Archivers for exactly this purpose.  I was fishing through the "hot spot" corner and I said to myself, "There's always some kind of food-related challenge and I never have anything for it... I'll buy these."  And whaddya know! Hehe.

HAHA.  I love puns. When I started making this, my original idea was that it could be used as a belated birthday card.  But it kinda works as any kind of apology card.

Also, I made this card LAST week, but never got around to posting it to the challenge...

This one was for 365 Cards' "Imagine This: Chalkboard" challenge.  It's almost back-to-school time!  I'll be back at work in almost exactly one month. *sigh* It's gonna go so fast.

Hope y'all are having a fabulous week!! Thanks for stopping by :-)

L-O-V-E

Ahh, love.  Love, love, love.

I love love.  Love is lovely.

All you need is love.  Love.  Love is all you need.

Oh wait, wrong song...

Ha.

Okay, seriously now.  Today is Monday, which means I'm still single!  No... wait... that's not right.  It means it's time for a new song challenge at Scrap it With a Song!

(Good heavens, what did I drink this morning?  I'm in a really weird mood.)

Our song of inspiration for this week is "L-O-V-E" as sung by Nat "King" Cole.  I absolutely lo... uh... extremely like this song. Lol.  Here's the card I created...

I found the "L-O-V-E" stamp in the dollar bin, and the paper on clearance at Michaels.  I love when that happens!!

I sure hope you'll come join us for this week's challenge! Our sponsor is our very own Angela aka Toucan Scraps-- check out the link below to browse her store.

It's already Monday again?

I'm not entirely sure where these days go.  As I'm sitting here, scrolling through my blog list, I realized that I completely forgot to set up a post for today's Scrap It With a Song reveal!

This week our song is "Happy Together" by The Turtles.  For my card I just decided to go with the title as my inspiration.  Also, I was itching to use the Paper Dolls Dress-Up cartridge that I got for my birthday.  Here's what I came up with:

Gotta be honest with ya here, not my favorite card ever, but I really like the paper dolls.   I added some extra stuff on the bride with a little rhinestone for her necklace and some ribbon on her dress.  I left the groom pretty much alone, except for a really thin layer of diamond glaze on his shoes.  The other tricky thing about this card is that their legs extend over the edge of the heart-shaped base, so you have to make a second set of "bottoms" for the back.  Otherwise they look a little indecent :-) Hehe.

SOoooOO... Now that you've seen what I cam up with, why don't you hop on over to check out the rest of the DT's creations and maybe even take a stab at it yourself!

Also, the winner of this weeks challenge will receive three digi-stamps from PaperMom.com at Shop Handmade.  Click the banner below to check it out!

Hope to see you there!  Peace out :)

America the Beautiful

Happy Monday, my peeps!  For those of you who have an extra day off work today, I hope you have a chance to use a part of it for some crafty time :-)

It's challenge time again at Scrap It With a Song!  Our song this week is "America the Beautiful."  Now, for those of you who are from all over the globe, never fear-- there are all kinds of things to pull from in this song!

My card is based off of the line about "purple mountains majesty."  I used chalks to draw the mountains and the sun, then I went over a few parts with an eraser to add some more detail.  I printed "Beautiful" on a sheet of acetate and mounted it over the drawing.  The picture isn't great... the chalks are pretty light and hard for the camera to really pick up, but you get the idea ;-)

I hope you'll play along with us this week! CLICK HERE to go to the challenge :-)

Well, Now that's just cool :-)

So guess what, friends! I'm done with my June craziness!!! That means I should be back into the swing of things pretty soon.  I have SO missed hanging out on the blogs with you all.

Today at 365 Cards, they're kicking off a celebration after reaching 1000+ followers.  It's also a reader appreciation week, of sorts, and the super cool thing is that they asked ME to be a part of it!!  So today, along with four other fabulously talented ladies, I got to create a card for this week's Super Sketchy Sunday:

Isn't it a fun sketch?  I'm thinking you should definitely head on over to 365 Cards and, at the very least, check out the rest of the cards from the guest designers!  And THEN, play along.  Because I said so ;-)

For those of you in these United States of America, celebrating Independence Day-- Have lovely, safe, fun and fabulous weekend!

OH yeah, and if you haven't already, make sure you go check out the "blog tour" over on the OWH Stars & Stamps blog.  I didn't ever get a chance to get a post set up for it as I'd hoped, but there's so many great cards to see!! Go check it out.  Click the button on the top right of my blog.

OH geez.

Well friends, it's Monday again... Wait. Wasn't it Monday, like, yesterday?  This past week has been WEIRD.  It's been one of those that zooms past so slowly... if you know what I mean.  I've been going non-stop since last time I posted!!  I haven't even had a chance to go through the entries from last week, but it's time for another challenge from Scrap It With a Song!

This week, our song is "I Can See Clearly Now" as recorded by Jimmy Cliff.  Here's the card I created:

For this card I stuck with simple shapes and lost of bright colors.  If you look back at some of my first cards that I posted on this blog, this is the kind of thing you'll see.  I love punching out different shapes and piecing them together to make images like these.

I hope you'll stop by and check out the other creations by the rest of the DT, and maybe play along with us!

I just have to make it through the rest of this week and then July is gonna be a blast! Can't wait :-)

Also, keep an eye out for my post this weekend for the OWH Independence Day Blog Tour!

I think that's all, folks.  I've gotta get to bed before I crash here on the kitchen table!

"I'm feelin' like a star, you can't stop my shine..."

Ahh, just what I needed:  Another song stuck in my head ;-)

**I was gonna post this yesterday, but there were some technical difficulties over at Scrap It With a Song that kept the new challenge from being posted.  I've got this set up to auto-post, so hopefully all of that has been taken care of by now and everything is there for you to see.  If not, keep checking back!**

It's Week #10 at Scrap It With a Song and we have got a catchy tune for y'all to scrap to this week! But before I tell you about that, let me invite you check out our sponsor for this week--  Our very own DT member, Angela!  Click on her logo below to check out her store:

The winner of this week's challenge will receive a pack of 6- 8x8 digital papers.

Okay, so our song for this week is "Ridin' Solo" by Jason Derulo.  Here's what I came up with:

I thought something like this might be fun for a teen who just got their license.  I drew the car myself in Illustrator since I didn't have any stamps I wanted to use.  I used a piece of acetate for the windshield, then colored the car with Prismacolor art markers.  Here's a close up, side-view to show how it's popped up from the card.  I also used some dimensional glaze on the headlights for a little extra detail.

Thanks for stopping by today!  Hope you will consider hopping on over to Scrap It With a Song and playing along with us :-)

So... ummm.... Hey Guys!

Or gals. Whichever you are.  I'm guessing mostly gals.

Anywhoodles,  I just felt like posting something, so here I am, rambling about nothing in particular.  I feel like I should let you all know that in spite of the lack of posts over the last few days, I am making stuff. I just can't show you. Cuz it's, like, top secret and stuff ;-)

Tomorrow is Father's Day.  Everyone's getting together at Grandma and Grandpa's house.  When asked what he wanted for Father's Day, my grandpa replied that he just wanted "a little burrito." Hahahahaha.  So we're having Mexican ;-)  Then I think we're taking the Pops out to a movie later in the evening... Can't wait to see The Karate Kid.  It looks like it'll be cool.

Ummm....

Oh yeah! For those of you who leave comments, I put the word verification thingy back on.  I started getting some "comments" from some "companies" whose "products" I'm sure none of us are interested in... if ya know what I mean.  So if you'll bear with me, I'll try taking it back off after a while.

Dum de dum de dumm....

How 'bout in lieu of a card, I'll just show you... umm... some pictures.

My and my cousin at her bro's baseball game.

Me... in my room... being dumb.

The "camel cricket" in our basement.  I think it's still there. Ew.

And that is all.  If I don't have anything new tomorrow, there will definitely be somethin' awesome to show you on Monday-- it will be Week #10 at Scrap It With a Song and it's gonna be fun!  Hope you all have a chance to hop on over and join us :-)

I'm A Freakin' Clearance Ninja!

"I'm a ninja!"
"No you're not."
"Did you see that?"
"See what?"
"Exactly."

I saw that on Facebook the other day and it made me actually LOL.

But ANYWAY, I was at Michael's today and they had some really cute paper on clearance.  I got 12x12 patterned cardstock for 14 cents/sheet. It was awesome.  Plus they had some great clear stamps in the dollar bins that I totally snatched up and I had a 50% off coupon which I used on a refill for my Xyron sticker maker.  Needless to say, it was a great day. Haha.

I've got a card to share with you for Day 107 challenge at 365 Cards.  The challenge was to use an argyle pattern, but the twist was that it had to represent "fabric" on the card.  I used this rocking horse from the "Paper Doll Dress Up" cart.  The idea was for it to look like one of those plushie-type rocking horses.  I added the stitching to make it look a little more fabric-y.

I wasn't sure about the sentiment.  My little sis said it looked like something for a baby card, but I liked the pun better ;-)  But then I was thinking this could be used as a baby thank you card-- you know, like after a shower or something.

Lemme know what you think!  Thanks so much for looking :-)