Summer Pinwheels and Card~

~Happy Sunday.. hope you are enjoying your day. It is a bright sunny day here, really beautiful with a nice breeze.. my favorite kind of day! My husband and I went for a drive yesterday and along the way I asked him to stop me at a craft store I spotted, I ALWAYS have my eyes out for a new craft place nearby. I actually didn't find much but at the register area, I found a set of five templates, including one for these pinwheels. You can always find the template somewhere on the internet, but I was so thrilled to find these. It gives you the option to make it in three different sizes, these are the large and the small in the pic. Besides the template for the pinwheels were templates for a large pillow box, a bunch of flowers and a chinese take out box and a couple more, all for $2.50, what a bargain!! I thought I would try the pinwheels first since they are so cute!! I was practicing with this left over paper and they actually came out and I love the bright summer colors. I added the brads and the flowers in the middle of each and then I found a little vase for displaying.. I thought hmm, now I need a card to go with them, so here it all is. Oh, the sticks are kabob sticks I bought at Crate and Barrell last summer. Well, enjoy your day.. back to work tomorrow, ugggh!!

Birthday Wishes~

~Good Evening to you.. Awww, so glad the Monday workday is over, long day it seemed like today, and always so happy to get home when I have a project to post. I have loved this owl since I saw it among the hostess sets way back when. It is from the hand drawn bundle rub-ons that came with the set. It's not too late to get this hostess set! You can stock up on retired sets and accessories and get this one too, it is just adorable and I have hoarded them for forever, so I guess it was finally time to use them. The happy birthday paper in the background is also included with this set. The owl is just the sweetest thing and do you love the sparkly eye? That was a last minute decision after I kept looking at it thinking it needed just one more thing. I paired it with baja breeze textured paper and alternated each layout a bit, actually I goofed on the one on the right by stamping the sentiment crooked, so since I didn't want to waste the paper, I flipped the layout around and it still came out, so I am happy!! I never have enough birthday cards on hand, so a couple more for my card pile! I hope you have a great rest of the week! Have a great night. Oh, and one more thing, catalogs... THEY ARE COMING.. very very soon. If you would like one, please let me know and I will reserve a copy for you.. Thanks so much.

Dad's Day Rocks!

~Happy Sunday and Happy Father's Day.. gosh, I don't know about you, but I seem to have such a hard time trying to make masculine cards. I think it is because I love to add cute stuff to all of my cards and it is hard to keep it under control when making a card for a guy! hahaha, but of course I had to make one for my hubby for dad's day. He loves to play guitar and when I saw this set, I knew it was perfect for him. I paired it with some background paper from the rock star paper pad from DCWV. I wanted to give it a bit of an antiqued look by distressing it a bit and sponging some chocolate chip ink around the edges and to the front. The stars are from the same set. the inside says "You rock!" which is perfect because he does! Happy Father's Day my sweet.. Have a great rest of the day! I have another post for tomorrow, whoo hoo!! See you soon.

Brother and Sister~

Hi there.. my mom asked me to put this together for her to send to her brother for his upcoming birthday on Monday. She was so happy to have him come visit her not too long ago and it was so great to spend time with him.. Happy Birthday Uncle Gary!

Inspire ~

~Here is the full project with the card on the side to match... I love these colors, I think I may need to use them again for another card or something.. Thank you Paper Crafts for all of the great ideas!!

Happy Day ~

~Hello.. both of these projects are straight from one of the latest Paper Crafts volumes and I just loved the card and the project. My very good friend gave the magazine to me and pointed out these projects and I thought they were beautiful and didn't need to change much at all. She recently graduated with her masters degree on Sunday (go Kate!!) so I wanted to make these for her after both seeing it in the magazine.. First of all, trying to find all of the tools and accessories for this project is never as easy as it describes in the magazine but I managed to find everything. I bought the cricut cartridge called "decor elements" to create the lettering and the beautiful butterflies. I hadn't used my cricut in a while, so it was great to pull that out and now I have been using it bunches since.. I cut a bunch until I got the size I wanted and I already had the background paper and the cardstock.. I love the baja breeze paired with the kiwi kiss. I am going to miss those in colors soooo much, but I know I will love the new ones too! I bought a 12 x 12 frame and then had the frame shop cut a mat for me that I picked to go in the frame. I then just started assembling.. and soon it was complete. The card is the same butterfly with the background paper and layered onto going gray cardstock. I used baja breeze striped ribbon and a kiwi kiss button. I used my scallop punch to make the white scallops to attach to the side of the card. I used a rub on for the sentiment and there you have it.. I thought this would be perfect for her first office! Well, thanks for looking and have a super week! I get to spend the day in my garden, yippppeee! My corn is growing and I am thrilled. It's my first time growing corn so I constantly peek out to see if it looks any bigger, I know corny, huh!! hahahahha... pun fun... Bye for now..

Dad's Day ~

Hello!! I wanted to share a father's day card I made for a workshop a couple of weeks ago.. I love the colors with the pop of the red bird. I also thought this might make a nice sympathy card too. I used SU! Branch Out and silver hodgepodge hardware. The "dad" stamp is non SU! but I liked that size for the hardware. I forgot there is a father in the flexible phrases kit that probably would fit as well. I know I have been a bit MIA lately, but of course I still have been stamping. I am excited since I have two posts tonight. Okay, onto the next one.... be right back...

Queen Mom~

~Hello, here is the card I made for each of our moms for Mother's Day. I saw a card similar to this at Impress while I was up at Impress in Seattle this week and thought it would be perfect for our moms. I love the crown with all of the little rhinestones. The background paper is from Making Memories and the crown is a punch from Martha Stewart. I used my SU! punch for the bottom of the card and used some pretty in pink ribbon around the bottom as well. The ink is Fresh Ink and I used SU! pretty in pink and very vanilla papers. I hope you enjoy the rest of your mother's day. I got a mom's day card from my yorkie Oliver today.. he even signed it with his paw print. I love that little boy! See you soon...

Happy Mother's Day~

~Well, hello and Happy Mother's Day to all of you moms. We just spent the afternoon with our two favorite ladies, and we had a great time hanging out with them. I had to share this picture of them while they were at the house today (aren't they cute!!) We had a great brunch and then watched some old home movies my uncle put on a CD for my mom for her birthday. It was great fun seeing my mom running around as a little girl. It was so neat to see how much of myself I see when watching my mom as a young girl and even now. We hope you had a great day too and spent some time with YOUR favorite mom. Love you moms!

Bluebird Hello~

~Good Sunday Afternoon... I was working on some projects last night and after I had all of my stuff put away for the night, I started looking through some items I purchased at the scrapbook convention a couple of weeks ago and found this little bird stamp that I just thought was so cute! I love birds (as you can probably tell)! I bought this along with a pack of coordinating papers that have this same image on the papers and wanted to match the colors. I have never tried Copic markers before, but I knew this big open bird needed some color, so while attending the convention I went to the Copic booth and bought the colors I thought would match this paper. This is my first try at Copics, and I have to say I really love them. I have bought several in the past but just used them for outlining and such, never really colored any images in with them, so here is my attempt using a few of the colors and the blender pen of course! I need practice for sure, but the colors turned out as I was hoping they would, so I was happy with that. This just reminded me of spring that is JUST around the corner, yay!! I paper pierced around the image and used the new SU border punch on the peachy cardstock and threw on a few coordinating buttons I had. Have a great rest of the weekend.. be back soon with some Easter cards I've been working on. Thanks so much for taking a look...

Just Branch Out~

~Hi there.. hope you are enjoying your Sunday like we are.. staying home and doing a little stamping and a little laundry too! I had a great time on Friday night. My friend Kate and I had a stamping night just us girls, just listening to tunes. munching on Girl Scout cookies and relaxing.. Kate wanted to make a gift set of cards for her mom's upcoming birthday so that is what we worked on. Her mom loves birds, and cardinals are her favorite so we had to have a red bird in the tree for her.. We cased this card from the catalog but changed it up a bit with the colors and I added some hardware to my sample. This is the SU! Branch out set and I have to say, I LOVE this set.. and didn't really think I would until I started using it.. This isn't the usual style of card I would typically make, so this was a great challenge for me and we think they turned out pretty cute... We used mellow moss, so saffron, almost artichoke and vanilla papers. For the ink we used mellow moss, so saffron (butterflies), close to cocoa (tree trunk) and almost artichoke for the tree leaves. The sentiment I added is from Paper Trey Ink (mixed messages) then punched it out with my small oval punch and tucked inside the vanilla hodgepodge hardware frame and some vanilla taffeta ribbon. For Kate's set, we made five cards with matching stamped envelopes, then tucked those inside a clear acetate box and finished it with a paper belly band and some so saffron ribbon tied in a bow to the front of the box. I hope Kate's momma enjoys! Oh, one more thing, I added a link at the right on the sidebar for some new easter/spring sets you can preorder now out of the new Occasions Mini that begins April 1st. SU! wants to give customers the opportunity to get a headstart in ordering some of these really cute easter sets before the Occasions Mini begins. Let me know if you have any questions. You can view all of the sets by clicking on the link I have on the sidebar. Thanks! Have a great rest of the weekend.

Valentine Treats~

~Good Evening again.. I thought I would take a little bit of a better picture of the treat boxes I described in the the previous post as you may not be able to see them very well in the group picture. I was having trouble getting the right lighting for pictures tonight.. I see a light box in my future! Okay, have a great night!

Sweet Valentine~

~Hi there... well another snowy day here in the neighborhood. I came home and thought it would be a great day to get some craft room time in! I was thinking of making some Valentine's treats for the kiddos, so here they are.. They are on their way to them at the end of the week. I hope they like them. I also thought that bowl was so cute, so I put that together too and filled it with candy for a friend. The little treat boxes on each side are for our little grandkiddos. They always get a Valentine treat since they are so sweet! I covered the bottom half of a box with some Sweet Always SU! DP and then added some hearts out of coordinating paper with the trio heart punch. I filled a skinny cellophane bag with some valentine's candy and then cut some thin strips of coordinating paper and put it in the bottom of the box before I added the bag. I tied it with some SU! stitched rose red ribbon and then added the little tag with a scallop piece, stamped the hugs and kisses center then punched it and added it to the scallop piece. I also added some liquid dimension to the center heart to give it that raised glassy look. I made up some more bags with the yummy set. Gosh, I just love that set, and better yet, it is free with Sale-a-bration here. You still have time to order... through the 31st! Oh, what do you think of my updated look! Michelle did it once again and created me a super cute blog banner. I love the SU! new bird sets in the catalog, so birds it had to be. Well, my hubby and I are heading for an overnight retreat for Valentine's Day this weekend and we are looking so forward to it! I hope you have some special valentine's plans as well! Have a great week and a super sweet Valentine's Day. AI starts in 40 minutes, I better get my dishes done and get ready. Thanks for looking.

My Workspace With an Added Touch~

Hi there! I thought I would share with you my updated workspace. Well, a little update anyway. I added a couple of embellishment centers above my desk to get all of those little things in their own designated spot and I got to thinking that some Decor Elements were just what I needed to spruce it up a bit. These are the flourishes in chocolate. I don't think I am done quite yet as I may add the Always bird that is in the Decor Elements brochure to the left side of the cabinets but for now, I thought I would share with you what I have been working on. I thank my sweet husband for his help in hanging these for me. Boy, it was tougher than we thought since the cabinets are made by the same manufacturer, you would think they would have the same measurements for hanging, but apparently not! In the end, he got them hung up for me and he did a great job! Be back soon... thanks for looking. Have a great day!

It's February and Sale-a-bration is Here~

Happy Sunday! I am so excited not about it being Superbowl Sunday, but that Stampin' Up! is kicking off Sale-a-bration starting today through the end of March. For every $50.00 in merchandise, you will receive any item of your choice from the sale-a-bration catalog. If you do not have a copy, please click on the brochure on the right hand side of my page to take a look. I have to say, my most favorite stamp set this time around has got to be the "Yummy" set. I love to give treats out to my friends and family and this set is a great way to make some cutie patootie treats with! I used a stamp from this set for the top of my candy treat bag. I filled the bags with some handmade caramels and some mini brownies, yummm-o! I paired this stamp with my other new favorite paper, Raspberry Tart Designer paper. It is so bright and pretty! I first cut out my paper with my Big Shot and the top note Bigz die. I used Rose Red cardstock along with the raspberry tart DP. I stamped the image in Rose Red ink and then cut the image out. I attached it to the top note with some dimensionals then added a couple of rhinestones to finish it off and attached it to a cellophane bag. I am ready to go with some really fast and easy treats! I hope you too are excited about saleabration. Please let me know if you have any questions. Have a great rest of the weekend.