Here's to New

Here we are at the end of 2011.  I'm going to avoid getting too deep and sentimental here because 1) I don't have time, 2) I'll change my mind and erase it anyway, and 3) we've got other business to take care of-- like cards and stuff :-)

I hope this year has been good to you.  I know that I have been blessed beyond what I will ever understand.  Granted, this year has brought my family challenges I never could have dreamed of, but I think, in the end, we'll only be better people for it.

I don't generally make grand resolutions.  Self-improvement is a on-going battle pursuit.  I try new things all the time.  They might be little, seemingly insignificant things, but it's fun!  The only things I'd like to do this year are get texting (yeah, i know...) and try contacts.  That's all.  Everything else is on a come-as-it-may basis.

Besides the year, here are some more new(ish) things...

Thursday's card for 365 Cards' Day 304 "Flashback Thursday" Challenge:

LAST Thursday's card for 365 Cards' Day 297 "White Space" Challenge:

I hope the end of this year finds you surrounded by the people you love most and may this next year be full of blessings!!

Happy December!

Happy December everyone :-)  It's time again for my monthly update where I recap how long it's been since I last posted.  Does life ever slow down?  Probably not.


I've got some cards to show you from the last few Thursday challenges at 365 Cards.  Let's start with the one for this week.

This is for Pam's "Recipe Challenge."  There's still plenty of time to play along, so make a card using the following "recipe" and link up your cards by Monday night at 11:59pm!

5x5 card

3 patterned Papers

6 rhinestones or pearls

1 stamp

1 sentiment

 Now, I stretched the rules just a little bit, as you can see.  I only used 1 stamp, but I stamped it three times. *wink wink*

Here are the cards from the past few challenges that I didn't get to blog about:

Day 269: Scraplifting With Hannah

Day 262: Feeling Grunge-y

 

Day 255: The 3 B's

Checking In

I'm still alive!  (In case you were wondering.)

It's been another super busy month and unfortunately a whole lot of other things to do besides blogging. Sadness.  But I finally have a few minutes and I'm just gonna show you everything I've been working on for the last few weeks.

Let's start with my card for Thursday's challenge at 365 Cards.

The challenge was to create a card with a detachable component.  With this super cute image from Robyn's Fetish , it seemed only right to make a detachable bookmark!

If you'd like to play along with the challenge, you still have a couple more days.  I'd love to see what you can come up with.

Here are the cards from the last couple 365 Cards Thursday challenges...

Day 241- Card Recipe

Day 234- Opposite Day

Day 227- Fun With Floss

"Rustic"

Hey there, everybody!  I don't know about where you are, but it has been a GORGEOUS week in the STL.  If you're the nature-y type, it's the perfect time to be out in it.  I just spent the weekend down in Ellington, MO.  It was beautiful during the day, then cold and clear at night-- just right for a hayride and bonfire!

Speaking of nature and outdoorsy things, today's challenge at 365 Cards is to create a card with a rustic theme.  As we all know, "rustic" comes from the Latin "rus," meaning "country, farm, or land" and "stic[k]" meaning... a piece of a tree. Lol. Just kidding...mostly.

But obviously, I had to go outside and get some sticks!

I found some really small, thin twigs and cut them into two-inch pieces.  Then I hot glued those together and tied on a piece of cord.  I cut the leaf with my Cricut, then sponged on a couple of colors.  Assemble all the pieces and voila!

I thought this turned out really pretty.  It's simple, but different and has a lot of great texture.   In fact, I think I have a couple more variations I'd like to try.

The Family You Choose :-)

I think it might be the understatement of the century to say that I like my friends.  They're crazy, but that's okay cuz I am too :-)  In fact, I saw a quote the other day that reminded me of our crew:

"We must hang together, or surely we will

hang separately." ~ Benjamin Franklin

Hehe. I thought it was funny.

Anyway, the card I made this week for 365 Cards' challenge #199 is inspired by some of my best friends.  For the challenge you have to pick a "year to remember,"  one that holds many special memories.  I didn't have to go back too far.  Two-thousand ten was a good year, especially the summer months.  There was one particular summer evening spent by the pool in the company of several lovely ladies... If they were reading this, they would know what I'm talking about. Haha.

If you would like to play along with the challenges for this week, there's still a little time!  As long as your creations are posted by 11:59pm tonight, they still count!  Thanks for stopping by :-)

Well, it's not like I wasn't thinkin' about it...

*sigh*  Epic blogging fail.  I thought about it.  I really did.  But it's hard to say what would really be worse:  Sleep-deprived posting or no posting at all. Haha.

The school year is actually off to a great start.  I can't really complain at all.  The kiddos are super cute, and relatively mellow compared to last year's group.  But I think my whole body is still revolting against having to wake up early every day!

I realize this is a little after the fact, but I thought I would show you my card for Thursday's color scheme challenge over at 365 Cards.

If you still want to play along, it's not too late!  You have until 11:59pm to link up your posts.

 

Here are the last few cards that I never got around to posting, for any of you who don't frequent the 365 Cards blog. (Although, you should. :-)  I believe if you click on the photo, you'll be able to see it full-size.

Is it just me or is it gettin' hot in here?

OH, I just crack myself up.

Thursday has come to us once again, which means it's my turn to take on of Pam's fabulous challenges and attempt to inspire you all to play along!  Today the challenge at 365 Cards is to use our gardens as inspiration.  "Do you have a garden?  If so, what sorts of things do you have in your garden?  If not, what would you want in your garden?  That is what should inspire your card."

That's not too crazy, right?  My family used to have a small garden in our backyard.  I don't remember everything we had in there, but I know for sure that we had chili peppers.  We can go through dried chiles like nobody's business.  I remember one time my brother convinced my little sister to take a bite out of one... It's funny now. Hahaha.   Here's my chili-inspired card:

So what's in your garden?  I'm looking forward to seeing your creations!

I'm Baa-aack!

Hey there peeps!! I'm finally back home and I'm ready to stay for a while :-)  For the last two weeks I've been away at two different camps. The first one was a five-day girls camp, here in Missouri, where my sisters and I were leading worship.  We had a great time and met a ton of super amazing people.

I was home for a Saturday, then crazy early on Sunday morning I left on a week-long mission trip to New Orleans, LA with a group of teenagers, most of whom are getting ready to go into their freshman year of highschool.  I learned a lot and had plenty of experiences that pushed me waaaay out of my comfort zone. Haha.  It was a long week and we definitely had our challenges, but I'm so glad I went!

This week I've been getting back into the regular swing of things, finishing up some projects and working on getting the classrooms ready for the kiddos at school.  That also means it's time to get back into my cards!!  The card I have to show you is for today's "Ad Inspired" challenge at 365 Cards.  All you have to do to play along is use this image as your inspiration:

Here's what I came up with:

My favorite dress form was the black one with polka dots.  I also used some of the colors from the ad, and used tulle to mimic the curtains.

Thanks for stopping by! I hope you'll play along :-)

Summer... it's Hot.

Haaaaappy Thursday!  How's your summer going?  Mine's flying right by and I'm trying to hang on :-)  I did get to spend a couple hours in the pool on Tuesday.  It was SO hot, it felt like bath water. But then it rained for a bit and cooled everything off and it turned out to be a gorgeous night, which we spent at the Muny. This is pretty much my only "free" week this month.  For the next two weeks I'll be out of town for two different summer camps.  One is a girls camp here in Missouri, the other is a mission trip with 8th graders in New Orleans.  I'll have about half a day break in between the two, but I think it'll be fun.  Then maybe I'll sleep for a week when I get back ;-)

I have a card to share with you today! This week at 365 Cards, we've been making collage cards.  I've said before that I tend to stay away from putting lots of "stuff" on my cards.  But then it's always fun to step outside the box and stretch a little bit.  For today's challenge, your collage card should include sponging, scallops and stitching.

There's plenty of sponging around the torn edges of the paper.  I didn't feel like lugging out my ridiculously heavy sewing machine, so I had to do the stitching by hand.  It turned out pretty good, I think.  For the scallops I used crepe paper ribbon.  There are so many possibilities with a challenge like this, so I hope you'll stop by and play along too!!

Quickie post!

Hey everyone!  This is gonna be a super short post because I'm quite literally on my way out the door to help with the middle school summer camp at church.  I'll be out until Sunday, so I wanted to make sure I was able to show you my cards for this week.

The challenge for today at 365 Cards is to use a sentiment that has somewhat of a crossword effect.  Our sponsor this week is Robyn's Fetish Digital Stamps and More.  Here's the card I created using an image from her collection:

But THEN, I was thinking about it and I had another idea for a completely different card, so I made two:

Fun, huh?  You should give it a try.  The post for this challenge should be up on the 365 Cards blog pretty soon, then you'll be able to link up your creations :-)  Can't wait to see them!

Just Peachy

It just so happens that I was eating a peach when I got the details for today's challenge at 365 Cards.  The actual challenge is to make peach the dominant color, but I figured that nothing goes better with peach than peaches!

I used chalks to color the fruit, then used an eraser to add highlights back in.  The sentiment is computer generated.  This one is a really simple layout, but I like the details of the peach.

I hope you all are having a fantastic summer! Thanks for stopping by :-)

Cars

I found it a little ironic that today's challenge for 365 Cards had to do with cars.  Just this week my car decided to crap out on me.  I knew it was coming but, you see, my car and I had this love-hate relationship :-)  I can't help but love a vehicle that got me wherever I needed to go, but there were a lot of things wrong with it that I wasn't about to fork out the money to fix.  My car was nice enough to hang on to life over the past several months while I saved up enough cash to replace it.  But just to get back at me, it waited until the most inconvenient moment possible (on the way to an 8 a.m. choir rehearsal) to die.

But anyway, back to the challenge...

Today is "Mega Movie Thursday."  All week we've been using movie posters from this summer's movie releases as our inspiration.  Today is no different!  I really liked the original "Cars" movie and I'm looking forward to seeing the second one.

For my card I decided to attempt to duplicate the Cars logo.  I think I got close. Haha.  Since Father's Day is right around the corner, I thought this would be a fun theme to work with.  I used watercolors to create a "road" for the background.  Super-shiny silver cardstock worked great for the "chrome" but it was a little tricky cutting the words!  Here's my final card:

You don't have to take this challenge quite as literally as I did!  I'd love to see how this movie poster inspired you, so make sure to link up your cards on the 365 blog!

Words to Inspire

Hello, friends!   It's Thursday, so I've got a card to show you for today's challenge on the 365 Cards blog.  Today we're supposed to incorporate an inspirational sentiment on our cards...

I'd love to see what inspiring words YOU would include on your card, so hop on over to 365 Cards and link up your cards!

As We Commence...

'Tis the season to be graduating.  My parents are going to an open house this afternoon, so this is a card I put together for the graduate...

I love these Basic Grey papers!  Love, love, love :-)

Thanks for checking out my blog!

B is for...

Apparently, I'm on some kind of baby card kick. Lol.  I don't know why.  I guess they're just kinda cute and fun to make.

This is my DT card for today's 365 Cards challenge, "Button Blitz."  Use at least TWENTY buttons on your card and be sure to stack at least SIX of them.

I have to admit that when I saw "20 buttons" I was a little intimidated.  As a rule I try to stay away from bulky cards, simply because they don't fit in envelopes.  But once I started looking through my stash and playing around with the placement of the buttons, it actually wasn't too bad.  This one would probably fit into a slightly oversized envelope quite nicely :-)

As always, thanks for stopping by!  Be sure to stop by the 365 Cards blog-- we'd love to have you play along!

Fun With Old Cardboard

Today I'm playing along with City Crafter Challenge Blog.  I've been following for a while, but this is my first time joining in :-)  The challenge is to use paint and recycled cardboard.

 

I have a stash of cardboard that I've saved from different packaging and boxes and whatnot, but today I had a cardboard mailing envelope sitting at the top of my wastebasket, so I decided to go with that! Haha.  I cut the star and anchor with my Cricut, then used white acrylic paint to create the distressed look.  My favorite part about this card is that rope-looking trim in the background.  I cut super thin strips from the cardboard, then carefully twisted them as tight as I could without breaking it.  Since one side of the envelope was coated white, it looked pretty cool.  I did that with several trips, then glued them side by side.  Kinda nifty, huh?  I also used a piece on the rope for the anchor.  I thought about putting a sentiment on there, but I just think it makes a great summery generic card for anytime.

Thanks for stopping by!!  Have a great day :-)

Baby Boom

I've got another baby card for today.  This one is just for fun... I don't know very many people having babies any time soon :-)

This week's challenge for Our Creative Corner is to make a baby card, including kraft paper, trim and at least one button.  I thought it worked rather nicely with the sketch for today's Mojo Monday.  I know I've said it already, but I'm so excited to have more time to play along with all of my favorite challenges now that school's out!

Thanks for stopping by! I love reading your comments :-)

Sing it, Alice!

SchooOoooOOool's out. For. Summer!


Haha.  I don't think today really counts as the first day off since it's Saturday and we wouldn't have school anyway, but I've been doing the happy dance since we put the last preschooler into their car yesterday afternoon :-) It's gonna be a great summer, I can already tell.  My brother got into St. Louis late last night (or this morning, rather) and he'll be here at least until Monday.  Dad bought a new barbecue grill.  It's red :-)

AND (drum roll please...)  I actually got a card done!  The Shabby Tea Room has a challenge this week to create a baby-themed card. This one is for a friend of mine who's having a little girl sometime around the end of June.  I know that they're decorating the nursery with pink, brown and green, so I used that color scheme on the card.

I pieced the patterned paper together for the turtles shell from 1" scraps, then added some faux stitching.  The letters are from the "Car Decal" Cricut cartridge.  I like it.  Whaddya think?

Thanks for stopping by!

In the Home Stretch

I can't believe we're already down to the last two days of the school year! It's been an interesting nine months, that's for sure. Haha. My little kiddles are moving on up to kindergarten next year, so I'll definitely miss them... I think. Juuuust kidding ;-)  But seriously...

With summer in sight, I'm looking forward to lots of fun stuff (y'know, like blogging regularly again). Some traveling, girls nights by the pool, that kind of thing.  Which brings me to the card that I want to show you today.  This is for today's challenge at 365 Cards, Day 87.  The "prompt word" for today is COOL. And what better way to stay cool than in a pool??

I had a lot of fun coloring this image. I enjoy using watercolors because you don't really have to be quite as "perfect" with it. This might be one of my favorite cards that I've made in a while.  I absolutely love this image from Sparkle Creations.  If you'd like to play along, make sure you link up your cards to 365 Cards by Monday night!

Nature Stuff

I keep sitting down to write this post and I just end up with an insane case of writer's block!  This past week was a little crazy.  We had tornadoes ripping through St. Louis like nobody's business.  You see this kind of stuff on the news, but it's a really weird feeling when it's quite literally in your backyard.  Our church (which is where we were when the storms came through) and our house missed the worst of the destruction by a matter of blocks in both cases.  It's amazing that there were no fatalities.  And the only minor injuries where at the airport.  My brother was supposed to fly in that night from San Diego, but ended up having to turn around in Phoenix.  I'm just thankful that his flight wasn't a few hours earlier! Maybe it sounds a little cliché, but it really does make you realize that your stuff isn't going with you and it's having your family and loved ones safe that truly matters the most.

And speaking of nature... Lol...

I have a card for you today.  This one is for yesterday's challenge at 365 Cards, Day 59-Feeling "Kraft"y.

The challenge is to create a nature-themed card with kraft paper.  The image I used for the branch and the background pattern is from our sponsor this week, Shannon's Sentiments.  There are some really great images, so be sure to check it out.

If you wanna get in on the fun, come on over to the 365 Cards blog! You have until Monday night to get your project uploaded :-)

Ladybug, Ladybug

Hi there, blogger friends!  Happy Saturday to you all.  I'm singing at a conference here at church today, and I'm trying to do something useful with my time until the next session.  I haven't had a chance to blog anything these past couple of weeks, so I thought I'd do that :-)

Let's flashback to Thursday.  It was Day 31 at 365 Cards.  The challenge was to use a piece of poetry on your project.  It was a little hard to start with the image and find a poem to match, rather than starting with the poem then finding an image to compliment.  So with a quick search for poems about ladybugs, and then sifting through a bazillion preschool songs, I found this poem that I thought would be perfect for a card:

"I'm sending luck and wishes

All wrapped up in a hug

Good things should come your way

With this tiny ladybug."

~Author Unknown 

The image I used is from our sponsor this week, Digi Doodle Shop.  They have some super cute things, so make sure to check out their site!  Also, it's not too late to play along with this challenge (or any of the challenges this week)-- You've got until Monday night to post the links to your cards :-)

Happy St. Patrick's Day!

I've got just enough Irish in me to get some red highlights in my hair in the summertime and to justify making a semi-big deal out of wearing green today :-)
"Leprechauns" have been visiting our preschool class every day this week, leaving green footprints everywhere.  We have a class of 18 little ones who specialize in theatrics.  One day they'll be famous, but for now they just like to drive us nuts :-)  They're totally into it.  "Mattie," "Paddy," "Looie" and "Messy" leave us notes (and a mess) when they visit, and the kids can't wait to write one back with some advice on how to clean up their messes. Lol.  The irony kills me.

Anyway, today at 365 Cards, there's and ad-inspired challenge.  Here's the ad:

And here's my ad-inspired creation:

The color of my pictures has been coming out a little funky, but you can still see the elements from the ad that I used on my card.  One of the things that really stuck out to me, for some reason, was the legs of the chair and ottoman in the photo.  I tried to mimic that on my card using puffy fabric paint.

Here's the rest of the Irish Blessing on the inside of the card:

I'd love to see you join in the challenge!  Click here to go right to it :-)

Again with the late blogging. Gah! lol

Let's just cut to the chase here.  What I have to show you today is actually Thursday's card for 365 Cards.  The challenge is to pick something that is currently trending and use it on your card.  Now, I don't necessarily focus on what's trendy (at least not on purpose), but if I spend a little time thinking about it I do notice certain things.  It seems like I've been seeing a lot of lace everywhere lately, so that's what I decided to use on my project:

I kinda like how this turned out.  There's a lot of "stuff" there on the card, but it's not overwhelming. Well, it's past my bedtime PLUS I'm losing an hour of sleep with Daylight Savings starting tomorrow. Uggggh. Lol.  Well, good night all! And don't forget, you still have until Monday night to link up your cards for this challenge-- it's not too late!

Oh, I'm such a terrible blogger!! You know those badges that everyone likes to tag other bloggers with?  Someone should come up with a "Hey, where the heck did you go?" badge.  Actually, that might not be a bad idea.  It might be encouraging, for those people who wonder if anyone is really reading their blog, to get a comment saying "Your blog hasn't shown up in my feed for a while, and I've missed it!"

But I'm just rambling now.

The card I have to show you today is for Day 3 at 365 Cards. And yes! We just started a new year of cards, so now would be the perfect time to jump in and join us!  Today's challenge is to use fabric as a tool to apply ink or paint to your card any way you'd like.

I found a piece of material that had a pretty nice texture and applied white paint directly to the fabric.  Then I flipped it over and pressed it onto the paper.  I did use a brayer to make sure it got pressed down all the way.  It was also a little less messy that way ;-)  It ended up with a pretty cool distressed look.

Now remember, you can use the fabric any way you want, so you could scrunch it, roll it, twist it-- whatever!  You've got until Monday to link up :-)

Unconventional Valentine

Happy Valentine's Day! Or Single's Awareness Day... whichever one you're celebrating today. Haha ;-)

I'm quite literally on my way out the door to work this morning, but I wanted to share this card with you first.  I've been itching to make something with the "From My Kitchen" cartridge and this is what I came up with:

Kinda fun, no?

Happy Monday to ya! :-)

Fabulous

Hey there, friends!  It's been a while.  I'm sorry. :-)

It's Day 347 at 365 Cards!  The challenge for today is to "divide your card into three parts so that none of embellishments or the sentiment overlaps from one section to another."

Here's how I did it:

The sentiment is from this week's sponsor, Digis With Attitude.  The silhouette is from the Forever Young Cricut cartridge.  It's definitely one of my favorites.  I haven't used eyelets in a while, but I finally have a Crop-a-dile tool.  I should have gotten myself one of those a loooong time ago. Lol.  It's SO much easier than that ridiculous hammer!

I'd love to see your take on the challenge, so link it up right HERE!

Peace

Happy Thursday, everyone!  I'll be celebrating with a snow day.  It started falling last night, and this morning I woke up to this:

My sister, attempting to clean off the cars... I'm not sure why.  I don't plan on going ANYWHERE today.

The patio furniture in the backyard is a pretty good indicator of how much snow actually fell...

I will be spending the rest of my day nice and warm inside the house. Lol.

But anyway, back to business...

The card I have to share with you today is for "Inspiration Week" at 365 Cards.  The word I picked for today is "Peace." This word means a lot to me right now.  It seems these last couple of months have been a little crazy.  Lots of family stuff, ridiculous stuff at work, but I feel like I've been able to maintain at least some peace in the middle of it all.  It'd like to think I'm not a person who's not easily stressed out, but I guess we all have our moments. :-) I came across this quote sort of by accident, while I was googling something else.  But I think it's absolutely perfect for today's word.

This card is made from a hodgepodge of scraps: some lace, wallpaper, a wedding invitation and the last scrap of some shimmery cardstock I've been trying to use up.  I think it's fun to make cards that way... except that it's very unlikely that it will ever be duplicated!  I guess we'll have to go for variations on a theme ;-)

Now it's your turn!  Head on over to the 365 Cards blog to check out the other words of inspiration from this week and maybe pick a few (or all of them!) to play along with.

Since I began this post, I've been informed by my sisters that I will NOT be allowed to stay inside today.  I guess I should go find something warm to wear.... ughhhh... ;-)

Busy, busy!

Well, this week has been interesting.  Started off pretty good, got a little weird toward the middle, ended a little crummy on Friday, but then got a whole lot better with taco night and some fabulous friends ;-)

Somewhere in the middle of that, I did find time to put together my card for Thursday's challenge at 365 Cards, but I'm running a little late again with posting. Oops.

The challenge was to create a photo frame card.  It's not too complicated.  The trickiest part for me was figuring out what size to make the card.  Mine ended up being 6.5 x 5 in.  I made it so that the photo slides in on the side.

That cute frog image is from Robyn's Fetish Digital Stamps and More, our sponsor for this week.  Make sure to link up all your cards for this week!  The winner gets 5 digi stamps OR 4 digi stamps and a paper set.