Stamping, Crafting, Creating ...

Inky Impressions Inspiration Day!

2012-01-24T06:55:00.000-05:00

Hey hey hey! I'm feeling pretty good today! Yes...I said I'm feeling pretty good today. Some days not so much...but today...yes!
Today is my day to post over at the Inky Impressions Inspiration blog. If you haven't been over there to check it out...please do...all the DT girls put a lot of hard work into bringing you something fabulous to look at!!!
Also, Inky Impressions challenge blog has a challenge going on that you still have time to get in on it...the challenge is shaped cards, anything but square!
I have to say...I kinda like this card, I think she came out really cute and all the little "extras" on the card are cute as well. But...you know...I'm prejudice...since it is my work!!!

Here are some more of my rolled roses. I told you in my last post that I love these things! Look at all that yummy glitter!!

And this is little Lili close up!

Products Used:
Image~Inky Impressions Lili's Secret
Copics
CS~SU!
Martha Stewart border punch
Stickles
MS gems
SU! Lace
Inky's Loose pearls

Challenges Entered:
Cupcake Craft Challenges~All's you need is Love
Pile It On~#4 Add Lace
Stamp, Scrap, and Doodle Saturdays~Have a heart
TotallyPaperCrafts~Make your own flowers (my rolled flowers are handmade)

Great Impresssions Friday!

2012-01-20T18:28:00.000-05:00

Hello everyone. I hope you all had a good week. My week was....okay I guess. Kinda up and down most of the week.
Friday's are my day's to post over at the Great Impressions Blog and this was my card for the week. If you haven't been over there to check it out...you need to...there is some amazing talent and there is a new post daily!
The image I used today is called Heart Blooming Tree and it's adorable and I thought it would be perfect for a Valentine's Day card!
I made the flowers...they are those rolled flowers and they are super easy! And of course they get even better with some bling or tons of stickles on them ;-)

Products Used:
Image~Great Impressions Heart Blooming Tree
SU! Melon Mambo embossing powder and fine gold glitter
Martha Stewart border punch
CS~SU!
DP~American Crafts
half pearls
spica pens
Stickles

Challenges Entered:
Chocolate, Coffee, and Cards Challenges~#4 glitter latte
Totally PaperCrafts Challenges~Make your own flowers
Crafty Creations Challenge~#153 Valentine Theme
Pollycraft Monday Challenges~#123 Bingo (across the bottom..flowers, punches, pearls)
The Pixie Cottage~#104 embossing (I did heat embossing for my image)

Pampered Chef Caddy revamp

2012-01-19T09:00:00.001-05:00

Hey! How is everyone doing? I thought I'd share with you a caddy I redid for my son's teacher! I wish I had taken a before picture but that's okay. She had this caddy for years...a teacher of her's gave it to her and the stickers on it (yes...it had stickers on it) were a little outdated and she wanted it to be redone! Soooooo........this is what I came up with!
She loves black and white (has zebra print in her room) she loves yellow and dots (has lot's of that going on in her room as well) so I combined them and came up with this!

Each side has a different word on it to represent what Jodus' teacher is...i.e. she's giving, caring and inspiring!

And this is her initials!

I cut the letters with my cricut and then of course added stickle dots to it!

A little bling at the top!

Products used:
SU! CS
SU! striped ribbon
Cricut
Stickles
DCWV DP
(not sure where the dotted black ribbon is from)

Inky Impressions

2012-01-18T09:01:00.000-05:00

Good morning everyone! I hope everyone's week is going well so far. I'm having a "I'm so tired" kinda week. Last night my DH was snoring soooo bad I came out to the couch to sleep and could still hear him...ugh!
This is my first post for the Inky Challenges and I'm horribly disappionted in it. I have to say that mamaw skiing gave me a heck of a time. I don't know if it was because it's out of my comfort zone or what but from the image all the way through the entire card I was just uhappy with it and the thing is...that was the 3rd time I colored her and it took me hours to come up with the card so it's not like I just threw the first thing together that I did. Ugh!
But here it is anyway!

The Challenge over at Inky Impressions is Anything but a square card. So I hope you will come over and play along this week!

Products Used:
Image~Inky Impressions mamaw skiing
Cricut for circle card
SU! CS
Stickles
Copics
Random buttons

Challenges Entered:
Papertake Weekly Challenge~Buttons, Bows, Bling and Blooms

Birthday Diva

2012-01-13T08:00:00.001-05:00

It's Friday...it's Friday!!! I get to sleep in for 3 days (no school day Monday) woohooo!!! My son was out of school for 3 weeks on winter break and he just started back this week and let me tell you....I had the HARDEST time getting up this week. I got way to used to sleeping in and going to bed late.

Today is my day to post over at Great Impressions. I decided to work with Birthday Diva. She's a cute little thing huh?! I took this picture at the perfect time today, the sun was shining right in on the card....love living in N.C. where it's sunny more than gloomy (unlike Germany where you don't even know what "sun" is).

I paper pieced the presents up top...I thought it was a cute idea plus...coloring the ones on the bottom and top was a little much for me!

See...see...look at that...look how wonderfully glittery the flowers are! They are regular prima flowers that I added Ice Stickles too...have I ever told you I love things that sparkle???!!!!

Products Used:
Image~Great Impressions Birthday Diva

Sentiment~SU!

Prima Flowers

Heart Clip from Recollections

Copics

Ice Stickles

CS~SU!

SU! Ribbon

KaiserCraft Rhinestones

Challenges Entered:

DYSU Challenge Blog~#54 Pink

C.R.A.F.T Challenge~#137 Celebrations (birthday)

Kaboodle Doodles Challenge Blog~#101 fireworks or celebration (I'm going with celebration...bday)

Charisma Cardz Challenge~#1 Happy Birthday

Sassy Studio Designs~#107 Let's Celebrate

Inky Impressions Blog Hop

2012-01-11T08:30:00.000-05:00

Today is the day!!! The Inky Impressions blog hop is here! We are featuring the new release images so each of us has one of the three new images to showcase!
The new images are:
Chatterbox Lili

TuTu Cute Lili

Teary Eyed Lili (which is the image I have used)

You will have until Wednesday Jan. 18th to hop all the way through, leave comments and post the blog hop badge on your personal blog to be eligible to win a fabulous prize!
Here is the prize:

which includes the following:
~Winner's choice of 1 of the 3 New Releases (Chatterbox LiLi Rubber ~Stamp, Tu-Tu Cute LiLi Rubber Stamp, or Teary Eyed LiLi Rubber Stamp)
~Angelica's Bunny Rubber Stamp
~LiLi's Slumber Party Rubber Stamp
~3 Sentiment Rubber Stamps: My place or yours, Bring your jammies & Uh~Oh Spaghetti Oh's
~Padded Butterfly Trim in 3 colors: Bright Pink, Turquoise, & Lime Green
~4 packs of Inky Pearls in Bright Pink, Lime Green, Turquoise & Tangerine
~4 packs of silver charms- Butterflies, Flowers, Dragonflies, Cute Little purses
~1 pack of beautiful silver flower centers
~1 pack of Inky Dinky Drops in Clear
~AND 2 packs of Inky 6mm brads in Bright Pink & Light Green
WOW I told you it was an amazing prize!!!

Just in case you haven't placed the badge on your blog yet....here it is:

Here is my project! I used Teary Eyed Lili...she's looking pretty sad huh? I also used a Inky sentiment. Beautiful script isn't it? I have to say though...I really need to work on my hair coloring. UGH! That poor thing the hair coloring does not do the image justice!
To find all the details for this project just keep scrolling down!

Okay....so if you came here from
Anita's Blog~Happy Paper Craft Happenings you are right on track and you can head on over to the next stop in the hop Carrie~Carrie's Creative Cards...if not...go back to the beginning Inky Impressions Challenge Blog and start there. I wouldn't want you to miss anyone's fab creations and not be able to be entered in the drawing for the prize!

Okay...products used:
Image~Inky Impressions teary eyed Lili
CS~SU!
Martha Stewart border punch
Sentiment~Inky Impressions
SU! Ink
Copics
Stickles
DP~DCWV
Pop Dots
Prima Flower

Challenges Entered:
Cupcake Craft Challenges~Something New (the image is new...new release for blog hop)
Heart Song Inspirations~#30 border punches or torn paper (used my Martha Stewart border punch)
Paper Creations Ink~#16 die cuts and or punches (used Martha Stewart Punch)

Altered Notebook using TSB

2012-01-10T13:01:00.000-05:00

I told you I was going to getting about my posting. I have been so busy coloring, coloring and coloring some more lately. I'm sure my husband would like me to put that much effort into my cleaning...lol!
I made this altered notebook for my BFFs' daughter. It was suppose to be for her birthday...that didn't happen, so it was suppose to be for Christmas....that didn't happen either so it's a I love you Kayla gift...LOL! I hope she liked it...I think she liked it...she seemed like she liked it! I don't worry so much about my stuff if people are buying what is already made but when it comes to making thing specifically for someone....I get nervous that it's going to be what they really like.
My image is from The Stamping Boutique...it's called Emo Alice and it was actually made by her daughter Kalie....I think she got her mom's talent!!!

Products Used:
Composition Notebook
Image~TSB
Cricut (the letters)
Copics
Stickles
Cross Bones DP from SU!
Glitter DP from DCWV
Martha Stewart border punch
Rhinestones
Brad
Flowers (the ones that come in the bucket...lol)
Elmers Craft adhesive spray (to adhere the DP to the book...works great)

Challenges Entered:
Papertake Weekly Challenges~Die Cute Special (the letters were cut with my cricut)
Digital Tuesday Challenge~#142 Punch it out (border punch down seam and image is digital)
Pollycraft Monday Challenges~#122 anything but a card

Inky Impressions Blog Hop!!!!

2012-01-09T19:10:00.001-05:00

Remember yesterday I was talking about a blog hop that Inky Impressions is going to be having this week? Well....there is an A.M.A.Z.I.N.G prize to be won with this hop...I mean AMAZING....but you have to do a few things to be eligible to win this prize!!!

(for the details on what all is in this prize be sure to check out the challenge blog)

First thing is to place this badge on your blog for ALL to see then you need to join us during the hop, hop all the way through leaving comments all the way and there you go....you are entered to win this fabulous prize that Inky's owner is so graciously giving!!!

See you all Wednesday for the start of the hop!!!

First Inky Post!!!

2012-01-08T15:26:00.000-05:00

Hello, hello, hello everyone! Happy Sunday! I told you all I had something awesome to share with you in my next post and here it is! After trying two times...I made it on the Inky Impressions DT!!! Woohoo...go me..go me!!

This is what drew me to Inky like a year ago when I first applied for the DT! It's Angelica Sled...isn't she the cutest sassiest thing? I think so!

Just so you know...just a little FYI...Inky Impressions is having a blog hop on Wednesday to promote the new release and all the new DT get to show off their stuff (and the ladies that were already part of the DT) so make sure you join us for a chance to win a great prize and see what fab images Nicole has come up with!

Products Used:
Image~Inky Impressions....Angelica Lantern
DP~Bo Bunny
CS~SU!
SU! Ink
Stickles
Copics
Robin's Nest dots
Sentiment~Stamping Bella
Martha Stewart punch/snowflake
Glitter brads

Challenges Entered:
Stamp,Scrap & Doodle Saturday~Winter Something
DYSU Challenge Blog~#53 Let it Snow
Papertake Weekly challenges~Anything Goes

Great Impressions~When it Rains

2012-01-06T09:07:00.000-05:00

FINALLY....things are finally movin' and shakin' at the Great Impressions Blog! I am so excited to share with all of you the great work of the DT...they have been posting all week long so go over and have a look at their work and leave them some love. This blog is new but the company is not. Great Impressions has been around for quite some time but doing most of their business with a few online stores and then with in local craft stores and they have decided to branch out even more and open their own online website and wanted to start getting the word out over the Internet so here we are!!!

For my first weekly post I decided to use When it Rains...such a cute little saying to make a friend smile an those boots alone are just adorable!

Items Used:

Image~Great Impressions When it Rains

CS~SU!

DP~Prima

Copics

Rhinestones

SU! Ribbon

Martha Stewart border punch

Challenges Entered:

Crafty Catz Weekly Challenge~#114 New Beginnings (this post is a new beginning for me since this is my first post for Great Impressions)

Fab N Funky Challenges~#102 Something New (my Great Impressions image is new and just received right after Christmas)

Papertake Weekly~Anything Goes and new theme

Top Tip Tuesday~#67 Anything Goes

Creative Craft Challenges

2012-01-03T08:00:00.003-05:00

I know...I know...it's been a MONTH since my last post. That is horrible! BUT...I promise that dry spell is over. I have new commitments and old ones as well that need to be kept and I'll share my "new commitment" in my next post!! I know your excited to hear about it aren't you?!

Did everyone have a nice Christmas? Ours was very nice and low key this year and this year we were sitting in our comfortable home instead of a hotel room like last year and we were here in the States instead of Germany, so yes...we had a nice Christmas this year!

So....it's a new year and at Creative Craft Challenges there is a new challenge! The challenge for the next two weeks is New Years Resolutions...be sure to head over and not only play along but check out the rest of the DT's resolutions for the year.
I am not one to make resolutions, I just don't really believe in it. I think that if there are things in your life that you want changed that you shouldn't wait for a certain day to start those changes that's just me though. And I don't do NYE either. Some find that strange but my husband usually is working (he's a firefighter) and I'm not a night person, I'm usually in bed way before midnight and I just don't get the purpose of staying up late just to say "Happy New Years", maybe I'm just no fun or a Debbie Downer when it comes to that...oh well!!!

So with that all being said (I know you were just dying to hear my life story) I had a hard time with the challenge over at CCCB so I thought if I was to make a resolution it would be to get my Christmas cards for 2012 done early. I didn't even send any out this year. I have NEVER not sent out cards and I actually had people asking me where their cards were. Didn't know so many people actually cared! So I'm starting my resolution off right with a Christmas card!!!!!

Supplies Used:

Image~Bugaboo

DP~???

CS~SU!

Sentiment~SU!

Copics

Stamping Bella donuts

SU! Rhinestones~~I hate that the picture doesn't show the glitteriness of the rhinestones :-(

Challenges Entered:

Kaboodle Doodles Challenges~#100 celebrate...I'm celebrating Christmas (early or late...lol)

The Pink Elephant~#TPE129 anything goes

Pile it On~#1 anything goes

Paper Sundaes~#101 something old something new...something old is the DP (I actually grabbed it out of my leftovers) and something new is the image

The ABC challenge~ "G" is for green

Magnolia

2011-12-03T18:50:00.000-05:00

Happy Saturday everyone! I'm suppose to be cleaning for an open house I'm hosting tomorrow (I just signed up for Scentsy...wooohooo) but I am just not in the cleaning mood so instead I'm doing some blogging and other computer stuff...I'm still "working" just from the computer and not from my feet...LOL!
I got this Magnolia image a long time back in a swap and I finally pulled it out and colored it. I really love coloring Magnolias....they are sooo much easier for me unlike whiff Of Joy that I've already said are really hard for me!
I hope everyone had a nice Thanksgiving...we got to go home to Pa. and visit with family and eat some amazing food! We will be staying put here in NC for Christmas which is fine by me...I'm excited to have Christmas in our new house!

Products used:
Image~Magnolia
CS~SU!
Sentiment~SU!
Copics
Stickles
Die cut~free SVG file
half pearls

Challenges entered:
2 Sisters Challenge Blog~#68 Punches or Die Cuts
Fab N Funky Challenges~#101 anything goes
Stampin for the Weekend~#21 Friends
PaperCrafting Journey~Anything goes

Before I forget...because I normally do....The Stamping Boutique is having a blog hop Dec. 9th to Dec. 11th....it's a thrifty holiday handmade gift hop...sounds fun and hard to say right!!!! So be sure to join us and hop for your chance to win some fab images!!!

Grumpy Elf~Creative Craft Challenge Post

2011-11-22T10:36:00.000-05:00

Okay...I think I have officially lost my mind! I totally forgot today was Tuesday AGAIN!!! I still need to get The Stamping Boutique challenge up on the challenge blog and I was suppose to have this post up earlier....grrrr. I thought I was having memory issues while I was pregnant....this is getting ridiculous!

So we are heading up to Pa. tomorrow after my wonderful DH get's out of his EMT class and will be spending the holiday with family!!! I am so excited...not so much looking forward to the 9-10 hour drive but it's worth it! We'll be heading back down here to NC on Sunday so my DH and DS can get some sleep for school Monday morning. So it will be a quick...fully filled weekend!!!

Today a new challenge has started over at Creative Craft Challenges and it's a free for all challenge!! How fun and easy is that?! Be sure to head over to the challenge blog and see all the wonderful projects the girls came up with and of course join in the challenge as well..it runs for 2 weeks so lots of time to get a project in and of course you will need some crafty time after you are all nice and full from that wonderful Thanksgiving feast!!!

Products Used:

Image~MelJens

CS~SU!

Ribbon~SU!

Copics

Stickles

Sentiment~SU!

Brads~SU!

Challenges Entered:

Kaboodle Doodles Challenge Blog~#94 baby it's cold outside

Papertake Weekly~Christmas Crackers

Pollycraft Monday Challenges~#120 Christmas Fun

Pile it On~#47 anything with a P in it (pouty)

2 Sisters Challenges~#66 Let it Sparkle

The Stamping Boutique Blog Hop

2011-11-11T01:01:00.000-05:00

Welcome, welcome, welcome to my blog as part of The Stamping Boutique blog hop! I am really excited to be a part of this...it's been a long time since I have been able to join in with a blog hop!
First things first....you "should" have come here from Melissa's Blog, Smudges in Time if you didn't...start back at the beginning at Christys blog Christy's Zaney Creations and work your way through! I promise it will be worth it! I mean did you see that EACH stop along the way gives you a chance to win a free digi AND if you hop all the way through, leave your comments on each blog and a comment at the end on the challenge blog you could possibly win the ENTIRE Smoochie line of digis.

Materials used:
Image~Candle The Stamping Boutique
SU! border punch
Copics
Rhinestones
SU! CS
Stickles

Enjoy the rest of the hop...you have until Sunday to complete it! So from here you need to head over to Julia's blog Paper and Scraps Creations by Julia she's got something cute cute cute for you!!!

Breast Cancer Ribbon

2011-11-06T10:15:00.001-05:00

Good morning everyone! I hope you all remembered to turn your clocks back an hour! My kids were up at 6:20 this morning....ugh! I hope this means I won't have an issue getting them up tomorrow for school!!!
I hope you are enjoying your Sunday....my DH is laying on the couch snoring away (no...I don't enjoy it) so I'm doing a post then making my way upstairs to do some crafting!!
I have the most beautiful glittery paper EVER and if you know anything about me...you know I love anything that sparkles so this is a blinged out card don't you think? This is a very CAS card for me but it doesn't feel it...I guess because of that fab paper!!!

I almost forgot...I used an image from The Stamping Boutique today and I wanted to let you all know that we are having a blog hop this month and would LOVE to have you join us!!!

Materials used:

SU! CS

Glitter CS

SU! punches

SU! Rhinestones

Image~The Stamping Boutique

Sentiment~SU!

Copics

Challenges Entered:
Paper Sundaes~#94 rectangles
Craft Your Passion~#82 Bingo I used punches, bling, and sentiment
Crafty Catz Weekly Challenge~#107 anything goes
Creative Inspirations~#136 lashings of sparkle
Papertake Weekly Challenges~anything goes and a bit of sparkle

Happy Fall

2011-11-01T09:24:00.000-04:00

Good morning everyone! It's the 1st of Nov. in case you didn't already realize that....I remember being in my teens and being soooo impatient for time to go by and now I sit here and think it's going by wayyyy too fast!
I hope everyone had a great Halloween. It rained here in NC so the kids didn't get to go trick-or-treating. My son was disappointed (until I let him play Wii ;-) ). I'm really glad we went to the Fall Fest his school was having or those costumes would have been a total waste of money!

Well, I have a card to share today (not just my rambling). I've had it done for a bit now and figured I'd better put it up before fall is totally over!!! This card was hard for me because I'm not used to my cards being so CAS but it's okay I guess! I feel like I'm not doing Meljen's image much justice!

Materials Used:

Image~Meljen's Designs

CS~SU!

Martha Stewart circle cutter

Rhinestones

Copics

Stickles

Embossing folder

Challenges Entered:

Papertake Weekly Challenge~Anything Goes (and a little bling if you want)

Pollycraft Monday Challenges~#117~anything goes

C.R.A.F.T Challenge~##126~colour savannah

Cupcake Inspirations~#134

Paper Crafting Journey~#22~use a digi

Whiff Of Joy~Fancy Edges Challenge

2011-10-25T08:00:00.002-04:00

Good morning everyone! I hope that everyone is enjoying fall. The temps. have certainly started to drop around here. Tonight we did our pumpkins...I'll post some pictures of them later. Leila did Minnie Mouse and Jodus did some for walker thing from Star Wars and my pumpkin isn't done yet...lol...it took quite a bit of time to get the kids done. Rodney worked pretty darn hard on cutting and did a great job! Thank goodness because I can't cut to save my life.

Today over at Creative Craft Challenges there is a new challenge. The challenge is fancy edges. I hope you will all come over and join in and take a look at the fantastic work of the DT. The challenge runs for two weeks so you have plenty of time to play along!
I am actually pretty happy with this. Even though....I have the hardest time coloring my Whiff of Joy images. I love them soooo much but get so frustrated when I'm coloring them. Maybe it's just my coloring skills and I just need to keep practicing!! I am going to toot my own horn here for a second or should I say toot a horn for Martha Stewart....I just LOVE her punches/border punches....I have a ton of them and I have not been able to find any other border punches that punch as easily or cleanly (is that a word..LOL). Look how wonderful that border is and I used the same punch (the corner one) to make the little "thing" under the sentiment. So in case you didn't realize....I LOVE MARTHA STEWART BORDER PUNCHES!!

Materials Used:
Image~Whiff of Joy
CS~SU!
DP~My Mind's Eye
Rhinestones
Copics
Stickles
Sentiment~SU!
Circle punch SU!
Martha Stewart border punch

Challenges entered:
Totally Paper Crafts Friday Challenges~#89 layer upon layer
Christmas Inspirations~#35 die cuts or punches
Crafting When We Can~ almost christmas

A very Special Card

2011-10-19T16:19:00.000-04:00

I have a very special person in my life and I recently made this card for her, for her birthday, as a way of saying "I love you", and to say thanks! Her and her husband opened their home to us several months ago when we came home from Germany. We were only suppose to be home for about 2 weeks and it ended up turning into 6 weeks (long story) but none-the-less she let us basically live with them. It's a lot to take in a family of 4 and to make us feel soooo at home. She had a room done up for the kids, a room for Rodney and I and basically said "what's mine is yours". She is family Rod's cousin but she's soooo much more then that and I love her with all my heart and I am sooooooo glad that we grew so close and became the best of friends!

Materials used:

Image~Stamping Bella Lulu collection (some of my fav. images)

Martha Stewart flowers

SU! punch

copics

rhinestones

Sentiment~Stamping Bella

SU! CS

DP~DCWV

Challenges Entered:

Pollycraft Monday Challenge~#115 Girls, girls, girls

Stamptacular Sunday Challenges~#134 you choose

Sweet Stamps~#37 lots of layers

Top Tip Tuesday~#56 layer it up

Craft your Passion~#80 double up with pink

For my Mom!!

2011-10-16T09:18:00.000-04:00

My mom who is a breast cancer survivor has been asking me for a journal. I was really excited about putting this together for her. I am very proud of my mom for going through all she did to beat this horrible thing called cancer. So of course it makes me happy any time I can make something from the heart for her.
Don't you just LOVE Princess Jennifer Latte Breast Cancer image???!!! This is one of my favorite images...I say one of my favorite because if you've ever been over to The Stamping Boutique and looked at Tracey's images you'd know that all of her images are just fantastic!!!! All the links are on my sidebar if you want to have a peek!!!
BTW: my mom has received this and loves it and even took it to work to show off her the people she works with!!!

Products used:
Image~TSB
Cricut
Martha Stewart border punch
copics
stickles
ribbon
brad
adhesive spray
composition book

Challenges Entered:
Stamptacular Sunday Challenge~#134 you choose
C.R.A.F.T Challenge~#124 recipe
Pile It On~#41 just because
Stamp Insanity~SISC#77 anything but a card

Whiff Of Joy

2011-10-12T11:47:00.000-04:00

My aunt asked me to make her a few thank you cards and since it's fall (already) I thought my Wiff Of Joy Fall Willow Catching Leaves would be perfect! I tried doing blonde hair but I don't think I quite have down the technique yet.....I'm a work in progress, especially with copics since there is so much that goes into shading.

Products Used:
Image~Whiff of Joy
Sentiment~SU!
Ribbon~SU!
CS~SU!
DP~DCWV
Copics
Ink~SU! and memento black
Dots from Stamping Bella

Challenges Entered:
Fab n Funky Challenges~#94 Crazy for Color
Kaboodles Doodles Challenges~#88 Let's see those leaves
One Stop Craft Challenges~#152 Anything Goes
Stamping for the Weekend~#18 colors of autumn
ABC Challenges~A Anything Goes

Creative Craft Challenge Week

2011-10-11T08:00:00.001-04:00

Okay....so I have been having this horrible cold and Wed. will be 2 stinkin' weeks of coughing myself silly, feeling totally drained....ALL the time and just feeling like crud in general! Yes..yes...yes...I know....go to the doctor...blah blah blah. I hate the doctors. I avoid them at all costs! So instead I'm gonna complain to all of you!!! LOL!

This week over at Creative craft Challenges the theme is Congratulations! Our sponsor is MelJens...if you haven't been to Meljens before....you MUST take a look at her stuff....it's fantastic...I love and have quite a few of her images and the one I used today is also from her.
I decided to dedicate and donate my card to the hospital that Splitcoaststampers is sponsoring the month of October for Breast Cancer Awareness month. They are having a new challenge every day, have a long list of prizes to give out and all your cards go to this wonderful hospital in Texas for breast cancer patients.

Materials Used:

Image~Meljens

Dots from Stamping Bella

Copics

CS~SU!

spica pens

Stickles

Sentiment~Hanna Stamps

Punches SU!

Charm

Challenges Entered:

One Stop Craft Challenge~#152 anything goes

Totally Paper Crafts~#87 animals

Pile It On~#41 Just because

Lexi's Creations~#50 pink is for boobies

Creative Craft Challenges

2011-09-27T08:00:00.001-04:00

I am very happy to finally be able to tell all of you that I have made a spot on the Creative Craft Challenge blog!!! I am super excited to be part of this team! There are 3 new girls (one being me) so go over and check out the new girls along with the wonderful ladies that are already established over there!

For this challenge...it's a sketch! I love sketch challenges but I have to admit that I am terrible at making triangles...ugh...it took me a million cuts to finally get it right! The sponsor for this challenge is Robyn's Fetish and I have used one of her digi images; paul penguin sledding.
So...I took the pictures of the card, loaded them on the computer and then picked it up to move it AND.....dropped it face down on the floor....UGH...the stickles weren't dry yet!!! So I am really glad I had already taken the pictures but after a little damage control it actually was okay!! But I guess I need to learn to have patience and just let it set to dry before messing with it!!

Products used:
Image~Robyn's Fetish
Sentiment~SU!
Ribbon~SU!
DP~DCWV
Stickles
Martha Stewart dots (love these)
Cardstock~SU!
Copics

Challenges Enterd:
Paper Makeup Stamps~#4 Size matters
Paper Sundaes~#88 Anything Goes
Papertake Weekly~Creature Comforts
Bows and Berries~#10 Glitter
Christmas Cards All Year Round~September: use your stash

Altered Notebook

2011-09-24T20:15:00.000-04:00

I decided to try my hand at some altered composition books. What an easy project. I mean really really easy project. I loved taking those bland black and white books and turning them into this!!!!
I'm still working on my coloring skills. I asked my son how this imaged looked when it was all done (he's 6) and he say's "it's nice but I don't like the gray hair"....UGH....BTW...it's not suppose to be gray...it's suppose to be shades of black. I've been watching tutorials on the coloring but I guess I haven't quite gotten it yet!

Here is a close-up of the image which is from the greeting farms. I love having digis from them...I own a lot of the rubber but having the digi and being able to make it such a big size is great!

And side view! I popped up the letters with some dimentionals from SU! See...from this view the hair kind of looks more black right?! LOL!

Products used:
~composition notebook
~cricut (letters)
~Image: the greeting farms
~bling
~Martha Stewart border punch
~prima flowers
~copics
~stickles
~DP: DCWV

Challenges Entered:
~Stampin' for the Weekend**#17 What a cutie
~Digital Tuesday Challenge**#129 people images
~Crafts and Me**#53 Stripes
~Simon Says Stamp**dies and/or punches

You take the cake!!

2011-09-12T13:38:00.000-04:00

Hello everyone! I hope you all had a nice weekend. Yesterday we spent a great day with our wonderful friends! We had lunch and then played lot's of Wii! I have to say....I really enjoyed playing the guitar in band hero. We may need to get the kids those for Christmas ( ;-) ) This is Jodus' last week in school before his 3 week break. I have no idea what I'm going to do with him for those 3 weeks. It seems like him and Leila do nothing but fight on the weekends so all day every day....ugh! I spent the morning upstairs cleaning the playroom AGAIN....I swear those kids drive me nuts with that space up there. But it's not totally cleaned up, dusted and vacuumed. Let's see how long it stays that way!!!

The Stamping Boutique is having a month long birthday celebration and EACH day this month they are having a new challenge and a winner....so that gives you a TON of chances to win a TSB image this month! Plus...today (Monday) is a freebie day on the challenge blog as well so go grab your free image before it's gone tomorrow! And tomorrow, Tuesday, a new bi-weekly challenge begins so come join me for that!

I really really love this card. I love The Greeting Farm images and I am sooo happy they have some digi's available. I did some paper piecing to this image. I love paper piecing when it comes out right! I got the sketch over at Splitcoast!

Materials used:
Copics
Image: The Greeting Farm Freaky Flutter digi
Sentiment: SU!
Rhinestones
CS: SU!

Challenges Entered:
One Stop Craft Challenge~#148 Food and Drink
Stampin' for the Weekend~#16 Tickled Pink
Pile It On~#37 Layer It
The Crazy Challenge~#84 Birthday

Anya...never more than a thought away

2011-09-02T14:02:00.001-04:00

Happy Friday everyone! I hope that all of you have a good weekend....and yippee if you get a 3-day weekend for the holiday on Monday. We won't be doing anything, I might just work on Jodus' party stuff. His birthday isn't until 4 Oct. BUT....he has realized when his birthday is and each day has been doing a countdown...OMG he's gonna kill me before the day gets here. So I decided we might as well work on stuff for a small party...you know I'd like to do as much handmade as I can. We are going to make it Star Wars themed since he's totally into that right now. And he really wants to help (he's a creative little thing) so I'm trying hard to relinquish my need for it all to be perfect and let him help me out.
I didn't get a position for Paper Makeup DT team, I'm a bit sad and disappointed but it's okay....I'll just keep on keepin' on! Honestly, it just feels good to be able to craft again, to actually have the desire to craft really. Even once we got settled and I got my room organized I was still having problems finding the desire to go up there and make something but once I finally started it all came back to me and the desire was there again.

This is Miss Anya Dressy...I love The Greeting Farms images and this set is among my favorites.
The inside of the card reads: Your never more than a thought away!

Here she is in a close up. I feel like my coloring is getting better. Although I have to say I am having major trouble with the pinks. It's so frustrating but I love the blended look of the purples.

Products used:
Image: TGF
DP: SU!
Cardstock: SU!
Ribbon: SU!
Martha Stewart border punch
Copics
Rhinestones
Sentiment: SU!
~SU! was my theme for this card I guess...it all starts with the DP for me and I work my way around that and it just turns out that SU! "stuff" was working for this!~

Challenges Entered:
Papertake Weekly Challenge~Sketch
Stamptacular Sunday Challenge~#126 Diva-tacular
Pile It On~#35 Girls just wanna have fun
Charisma Cardz Challenge~#35 Anything goes
Cute Card Thursday~#180 A pinch and a punch

PMS DT Call

2011-08-30T09:36:00.003-04:00

Good morning everyone! I have had 2 k-cups this morning and I'm feeling pretty energetic!!! So while I have this little perk I'm going to do my post and apply for this fabulous DT team!!!

Paper Makeup Stamps is having a DT call for it's new digi line. I'm really excited about these fab images! This was a freebie on the challenge blog that we needed to use to submit a project to be entered for the call.
PMS wanted to know why I love working with digis.....well....that's easy enough, there are several reasons; 1. they are inexpensive 2. you can size them any way you want 3. digi images are the big thing right now; lots of companies that do mostly rubber or clear are now incorporating digis in their stores as well.

Products used:
Image: PMS
Ribbon: SU!
rhinestones
DP: Penny Lane
Stickles
copics

Challenges entered:
PMS~DT call
The Sweet Stop~Sketch SSS123

Wall Hangings

2011-08-25T18:16:00.000-04:00

UGH.....today and yesterday actually have been rough days. It's hard learning new things about yourself that aren't so great. It's even harder to figure out why you are that way and how you can change it. I know life isn't suppose to be easy but man....some days it's just soooo hard. I could really use some words of wisdom if anyone has some to offer!

I have some things for you that I recently made. These were sooo super easy and if I do say so myself...they are kinda cute!!!
If you are interested in these or anything else I make....you can find me on FB....Pretty Little Things
I do special orders, any idea you have I can come up with something for it...just let me know!

So how did I make these goodies:

Ikea picture frames

cricut

cricut vinyl

pretty DP

SU! buttons

SU! rhinestones

twine (for the first one)

sizzix sizzlet (cancer ribbon)

ribbon

I am in LOVE with the cricut vinyl....if I had anything to say about it....my whole house would be vinyled by now...lol!!!

Rag Balls

2011-08-20T19:15:00.000-04:00

Happy Saturday everyone! I'm quite bored today...so bored I've been playing bingo on FB and ran out of coins so I figured I'd do a blog post. The kids are sitting here watching Inspector Gadget...the first time today they have been quiet. Goodness they have been at each other today. Rodney is working 24 hours of overtime so we won't be seeing him till Monday. Of course it's good for the money but not so good to not see my husband for 3 days and the kids not see their daddy for 3 days.

So besides cards and papercrafts I have also been making a few primitive things! These are rag balls and super easy to make. They are just a bit time consuming. I love rag balls...don't know why...but they just look really great in a nice primitive or antique bowl.
I am selling these...and have them in other colors as well. I have a FB page
Pretty Little Things (my profile picture is the one with the old frame upcycled)

Jumbo Clothespins

2011-08-05T19:45:00.000-04:00

Hello everyone....it's FRIDAY!!! Thank goodness...I wasn't sure I'd get through another early morning. It's been like 3 weeks and I'm still not used to getting up early in the morning to get Jodus ready to go to school. Today was a rough day to say the least. But it would have helped if I hadn't stayed up till 11pm watching Jersey Shore! No hating please!!! I don't have many outlets and watching mindless TV show's sometimes is one of those outlets....the other outlet.....CRAFTING of course!!!

Today I have 3 jumbo clothespins to show you. Can you believe they have already sold? I decided to start a FaceBook page for my craft stuff. My lovely husband booted my idea to open a booth to sell my stuff so I'm going to try this route instead!
You can check me out and even "like" me if you want......
Pretty Little Things

So here are my lovely clothespins. These are really super simple to make. Spray paint, pretty pretty paper, embellishments and I used my cricut for the letters!

Have a good weekend everyone. I don't think we have any plans even though I wouldn't mind going down to Carolina Country Peddlers Mall (CCPM) tomorrow!!! Otherwise I will be crafting away!

Cupcake Lovers!

2011-08-03T13:01:00.000-04:00

Good afternoon everyone! Today so far has been a bit of a blah day. Not much going on....Leila plays soooo well by herself and Jodus is at school. I guess I could be cleaning up the kitchen but I am still having the worst time getting up in the morning and not being totally tired all through the day. It seems to only make me better when I have some coffee. I was really trying to not be dependant on having it every day but if it keeps me up and going........
I was going to start a seperate page for a more personal blogging area (you know....more about my life then crafting) but I decided why make it a seperate page??? I will just kind of include it right here on my craft page. I mean crafting is part of my personal life too!!! So some posts may contain only personal day kind of stuff and others will be crafty kinds of stuff! I think you all can handle that!! I promise not to bore you!
Okay....I do have a card today! This is another one that goes to a set of 5.

Products used:
SU!~Cardstock
Copics
SU!~Rhinestones
Cuttlebug embossing folder
Image~C.C. Designs
Stickles

Challenges Entered:
Papertake Weekly~anything goes
Totally Paper Crafts~Bling it up #77
Sew Many Challenges~Anything goes

I'm baaaaacccckkkkkk!

2011-08-01T18:24:00.000-04:00

No, your eye's are not deceiving you! I have a post for you today! I feel like I am finally back in the swing of things. It's been a very very long 6 months, from leaving Germany, finding a job for Rodney, finding a house, getting settled in, and FINALLY feeling like stamping again!
BUT....everything is going pretty good. Rodney had no problem finding a job; it helps to be well liked, a hard worker, and have contacts all over the country! We are living in North Carolina now and will be here for the next several years.
Jodus started school two weeks ago. He is going to year round school and he loves it. I thought it was going to be really hard to see him go (don't get me wrong, I did shed some tears) but he was soooo ready and seemed to feel so comfortable in his classroom that I left feeling really good. He loves school and has this huge heart and wants lots of girlfriends....I feel bad for the girls because I know at that age girls think boys are "icky".

Soooooo....I'm crafting again and I actually have a few posts lined up already!! Nice huh?! Did you all miss me? I'm still trying to find my confidence and mojo but it's slowly coming back to me!
My first card is of course a Bella card! Stamping Bella being my first non-SU! stamp ever!!! I actually made this a set of 5 and am going to try selling them. I'm opening up a little booth at a antique mall in Lumberton and I'm hoping it does well....I guess we shall see soon enough!
If you live in this area you really should check it out...it has EVERYTHING and ANYTHING I promise you!
Carolina Country Peddlers Mall

Image~Stamping Bella
Ribbon
Copics
Cardstock~SU!
Stickles
DP
Prima Flowers

Our Tree This Year

2011-01-27T14:28:00.000-05:00

As most of you know, this year Christmas was a little different for us. We spent it in Temp. Lodging on base. This was NOT the plan but.....it's what happened so we made it work the best we could!

Since we had no decorations and we really wanted to make sure the kids had a tree we decided to make our own. Our craft store on base didn't have much (no surprise) but what they did have we made work!

Popcicle sticks and paint...hmmmmm....what can we do with those?!

Jodus and Leila painting....Jodus did really well....Leila she tried her best...and once her little hands got paint on them it was OVER....she wanted nothing to do with the painting anymore (she's such a girl :) )

Daddy and Jodus gluing some sticks!

Pipe-cleaners and beads....hmmmmm (and yes they are colored beads...that's all they had)

He's so proud of his snowman or whatever that is (LOL)

Glitter Time....she loved that part!

This is going to be a tree!

Welp....here they are....snowflakes, sleds, santas and snowmen, tree's, beaded candy canes!

The Tree....it was only 4 1/2 feet and it was fake but it served the purpose!

Decorating

He was so happy!

FINISHED!!!

You know, this year was very trying for us and I thought it was going to totally suck not having our nice big, fresh Christmas tree and all my wonderful ornanments but what I found out was:

My kids LOVED doing this! They loved it so much that I have decided to make this part of our yearly tradition. Of course I will still have my nice big, fresh tree with MY decorations but we will also have another smaller tree that will be decorated in nothing but homemade decorations and each year we will do a new kind of ornament plus anything that someone sends us that is homemade. My friend here made me a few cricut snowflakes that came out FABULOUS and of course they will always be a part of the tree too!

We seem to always get caught up in what we THINK our kids "need" or "want" when what they really want is US, to spend time with their mom's and dad's doing something as a family. Don't get me wrong, my kids are spoiled but it was great to remember just being a family!

A month...really???

2010-12-14T17:25:00.001-05:00

Yes, it's been a month since my last post on my blog. I feel horrible. I love having my blog, love sharing my projects, love just letting you all into a tiny bit of my life. Well....my life has been a bit different the past 2 months and unfortunetly I haven't been able to be very crafty. I will show you why.....

This is where I did my Christmas cards! Okay so at least I have a table and I'm not having to work off the floor BUT...do you see that red bucket??? That is the ONLY stamp supplies I have with me (besides my copics). It's very hard to be creative when you have such a small amount of supplies but of course I thought I'd be without my stuff weeks...not MONTHS!!! And it's hard to travel with a lot of stuff sooooo.....this is why I haven't been crafting other than my Christmas cards!

Here is a picture of our family. We normally send a picture with the cards but this year I didn't have time to get a picture, get prints made and sent here and then sent out so.....Merry Christmas!!!

Just don't look at my hubby's STERN face

I promise to be back soon with some pictures of our tree this year. Yes, even though we are in TLF (temp. living facility) we still got a tree from a friend and made our decorations.

Thank you so much to all my cyber and IRL friends. You all mean so much to us and have been so thoughtful and caring and keeping us in your prayers and we really do appreciate it!

Hidden

2010-11-18T05:13:00.000-05:00

I wish I could be "hidden" right now! But Hidden is the name of this image. This image is from The Stamping Boutique's Enchatment line I am in love with pretty much anything with wings, especially fairies, angels, pixies and such so this line is sooooooo me!

I made this card for a one of my Paper Princess Sisters'. We did a little gift exchange and this is what I sent her with her gifts. I was very proud of this card and I did it while sitting in the middle of an empty room on the floor after the movers came and took all our stuff :(

Looks like fun huh??!!!

We are still in TLF on base. My husband did not pass his PT test on Tues. he should have, he could have but the stress and negative thinking got the best of him so we are still waiting. Now it's up to the wing commander to decide our future with the military if there will be any!

So....we will be spending Thanksgiving here but have made plans to spend it with some friends here which is just fine with us. We have gotten used to the military being our family so this is no different then any other holiday for us except we were SUPPOSE to be spending the holiday with our family this year.

OH OH OH.....How could I forget...have you noticed my new blog layout? It's great isn't it? I am surrounded by some really fabulous people in my life and my BF Kelly did this for me...in fact I have dubbed her my blog designer because she knows alllllll the in's and out's of this stuff she even know's what all that jibberish letters and numbers and symbols means...so Thank You Kelly!

On to the card........

Materials used:

Image: TSB

CS: SU!

DP: ?? (from my scraps)

Buttons: SU!

Sentiment: SU!

Copics

Spica pens

Challenges Entered:

Fab n Funky~#49~forget me not....I have had this image since I joined TSB and this was the first time using it.

Digital Tuesday Challenge~#85~anything with wings

Stamp Something~November Digi Day

I'm here...I'm here!!

2010-11-08T07:45:00.000-05:00

My oh my! The past week has been a whirlwind and not in a good way! We are sitting in our hotel, thinking we are going to be getting on a plane and low and behold the AF tell's us that not only will that NOT be happening but we will NOT be going to Guam either. So we are going to be here in Germany for another 30 days until my husband can PT test....the whole reason this all started...he failed his last one by 8 sit-ups. So we are kind of in limbo right now, our time in our hotel is up tomorrow morning and they STILL haven't decided if we are going to stay in the hotel or be moved off base to temp housing. Talk about STRESSSSSSSSSS!!! And since Guam has been taken from us they have picked out base stateside for us...we are now going to be going to Mountain Home Idaho...pending the outcome of my husbands PT of course.

I do have something to share with you. This is going to be my Christmas card this year...if I can get motivated to work on them...I mean it's not like I have much else to do right????

Used in this card is all SU! items:

Challenges Entered:

Paper Sundaes: #43~let it snow

Workshop

2010-10-31T10:51:00.000-04:00

HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!

AND

A SPECIAL SHOT OUT TO MY BF

HAPPY BIRTHDAY MELANIE!!!

This was my last workshop here in Germany with my friends. I love the girls I got to hang out with one last time for some stamping fun. It's just such a shame that I met them so late....4 years with them would have made my time here much more fun and bareable!!!!

Here are the projects from our fun morning!

This is a little photo holder we made. Super simple but super cute right?

Items used:

office clip

round SU! punch

oval SU! punch

SU! DP

early espresso ink

??modern punch SU!?? (is this the right name for that punch?)

wow..that picture is bad!!! We did watercoloring with this card. I hadn't done that in a LONG time and had so much fun with it. The girls did too, is super simple and so much different the using markers. All items of course are SU!

A treat bag!!! I found a tutorial on youtube for this! The folds were kind of confusing but having it on youtube I could stop, go back and replay as many times as I needed to get it right!!

This is one of the gifts I made for the workshop. I filled it with buttons and brads, ribbon and a free shipping card!!!

Another quick and easy project.....just used a frap bottle!!

My decorated table!! Do you notice a project that I didn't add to my post today???? Well come back tomorrow to see it...it's part of my post for the Critter DT!!!

Paper Princess Blog Challenge

2010-10-21T13:27:00.000-04:00

I have a fabulous group of girls in a blog group that Melanie and I put together and it's much more then just a blog group....it's a group of women that have the common interest in crafting but also in enjoying the company of other women. We have become such a close group and I love each and every one of these girls. We were doing a little challenge and this month our hostesses Melina and AnnMarie decided to do punch art. If you've never seen AnnMaries punch art...your truely missing out because she comes up with some awesome creations (with the help sometimes of other bloggers and such...that's the beauty of blogs) so for this challenge she really came through...I mean look at this poodle...hello....it's the most bling bling pooch I've ever seen! This picture is pretty crappy...doesn't do the pup much justice!!!!

I promise next week or so I will have some pictures of our empty house for you! Then maybe you all will feel bad for me...my stamping conditions are less than acceptable to my personal standards....just wait till you see...LOL!!!!

Top 5

2010-10-17T14:36:00.000-04:00

I'm a little late posting this and not because I'm not totally honored but because it's been crazy busy here! BUT....I made the top 5 over at MelJen's Designs last week.!!! Wooohoooo!!! I was so excited when she posted a comment on my blgo saying I had made it!

She is our sponsor over at The Critter Sketch Challenge blog this month so I suggest you all grab yourself some of her images...she even has freebies, join us in our challenges this month and double your chances at winning some of her FABULOUS images!!!

The Stamping Boutique Digi Day on PCP

2010-10-15T10:31:00.002-04:00

I wanted to invite all of you to our second TSB digi day on PCP! Here are the details and a link:

PCP Digi Day

Last month was our first time doing a digi image day on PCP and it went soooo well that we are doing it again, and again and again!!! We will officially be holding digi day each month on PCP. We had a great turn out and had such a blast.

This month's theme for digi day is going to be Digi's in Pink! Yep...that's right, we are going to support Breast Cancer Awareness month for our digi day this go round. I promise you will have fun, meet some new people, chat with the ones you already know, play some games, maybe get a freebie, and get to play in some great challenges for chances to win images from The Stamping Boutique.

Important Details:

~Where~The Stamping Boutique PCP forum

~When~Saturday Oct. 16th

~Time~2-4pm EST

~What to bring~fast typing fingers and your crafting mojo

Critter Monday

2010-10-04T12:13:00.000-04:00

It's a new week for the Critter Sketch Challenge Blog so of course there is a new challenge. It's also a new month for us so we have a new sponsor. Our sponsor this month is MelJens Designs. Have you ever been over to their challenge blog? If not, please take some time to check it out. She has some really great images over there, they have a new challenge each week and every week the have a new freebie...who doesn't like freebies???? I know I do!!!
The image I used today is actually from MelJens.
This week, actually all month over at the Critter Sketch Challenge Blog we are doing sketches so if you are in need of some help putting a card together, hop on over, look at the sketch, make your card or even scrapbook page and then link it to the blog for a chance to win a great prize from MelJens at the end of the month!

Materials used:
DP & CS~SU!
Image~MelJens~tutusweet
SU! Brads
Kaisercraft and Imaginance flowers
Dots from Stamping Bella
Sentiment~SU!
Copic Markers

Challenges Entered:
MelJens Designs~Monocromatic and no glitter
~MelJens is sponsoring OWH (operation write home) a wonderful organization that sends handmade cards to soldiers who are defending our freedom. I love this organization and what it stands for because I have had my husband deploy several times and have heard of some guys never receiving a single thing from anyone there entire time there....that to me is heartbreaking and I have taken it upon myself to make sure that everyone my husband is deployed with always gets a card (if not two) while he's deployed. I know what OWH cards are doing for these guys...brightening their day and making their time there a bit more bareable. So go over and check out the link and more information!
Pollycraft Monday~#64 anything goes
Stamp, scrap, and doodle Saturdays~open

Critter Monday!

2010-09-27T13:35:00.000-04:00

Happy Monday everyone! I hope that you all are having a great start to your week.
Today over at the Critter Sketch Challenge Blog there is a new weekly challenge. It's a sketch challenge this week. This is the last week for our sponsor Sew Many Cards so if you'd like a chance to win a prize from them...go over to the challenge blog and make a project with the sketch.

Materials used:
Image~Sew Many Cards
CS~SU!
SU~punch
Sentiment~SU!
brads
Kaisercraft pearls
copics

Challenges Entered:
PaperTake Weekly~animal magic
stickles

TSB baby shower cards

2010-09-25T05:47:00.000-04:00

I have been selling some of my cards on our local yardsale site for our base and I have been having a lot of requests for baby shower cards so I decided to make a few up to have on hand!
I just love this sketch!!
The image I used for these cards cand be purchased over at The Stamping Boutique store...on my sidebar!!!

Materials used:
Image~The Stamping Boutique
DP~DCWV
Copic markers
stickles
SU~ punches
CS~SU!
Sentiment~SU!
Twine SU!

Challenges Entered:
Crazy for Challenges~C4C56~BLING
The Pink Elephant~TPE84~color aqua, DP and embellishment of choice
Inspirational Card Sketches~#83~sketch....awesome sketch!!!

Workshop give-aways...and some blog candy!

2010-09-23T12:19:00.000-04:00

During my SU! workshop I had a few give-aways. I don't know what happened to the pictures of the mugs I made (rubbed-on) (wow....that doesn't sound too good huh!!! LOL) but I did make some mugs too and a few candles! But here are the other two projects I made.

Big clothes Pin
I took it apart, spray painted it with white spray paint, decopauged (sp) the two sides then layed the DP over the sides. Waited for it to dry, cut it out with an xacto knife, put it back together and added some ribbon an punched butterflies....SIMPLE!!!

These are the regular sized clothes pins I did. I made a set of them. Same process as above but I used the MS brand decopauge for these and it was crappy (sorry MS....I normally LOVE her stuff) so it didn't dry very well and when I cut them out it didn't go very well so I kind of took some brown ink around the edges to give it a distressed look since the edges of my paper looked that way anyway, added some handmade flowers and DONE!

I put them in a baggie and made this cutey little bag topper and that was it!

THE BLOG CANDY!!!
My blogging friend will be celebrating her birthday next month and is offering up some AWESOME blog candy...do you see all this? Click on the picture to get to her blog to see how YOU can be entered to win this fab prize!!!

Paper Princess Blog Group Challenge

2010-09-20T08:11:00.000-04:00

Hey everyone! I hope you all are having a good start to your week. It's 2pm here and so far so good for me! Today is the day that our blog group on splitcoast Paper Princess' all show off their cards from our monthly kit challenge! This month Colleen put our groups together. I just love this sweet little girl. I didn't end up with enough room on the front so the saying went on the inside!!! I'm not very happy with my coloring either. I put this together at a crop and I was doing more talking then working so this was the ONLY thing in 4 hours that I got accomplished!!! LOL!

Mystery Hostess Prize

2010-09-18T06:00:00.002-04:00

You have all seen the pictures from my first workshop and here is the gift I gave to the "mystery" hostess from the workshop.

I mad this purse for her and filled it with the cards below and envelopes.

The purse was super easy to make. I found a tutorial on Youtube and cut all the pieces from my cricut. I added some of the SU! rhinestones, SU! ribbon, and made the center piece from an SU! hostess set and some punches!

I can't decide if the butterfly or the bird card is my favorite. The mystery hostess LOVED it!
Don't forget today at 2pm EST TSB is having it's very first digi day on PCP. I'd love for you to hop on over and hang out for a bit, play a game, do some challenges and earn a chance to win some free digis!
http://www.papercraftplanet.com/events/the-stamping-boutique-digi

AND~~~The answer to the question about what is wrong with one of my cards from the workshop...I think someone may have answered it right, I can't remember BUT...it's the sayings, I used the "hello" stamp from that set and also the "merci" stamp thinking that merci was French for hello....drrrrr....I mean I know it doesn't, it means thank-you but for some reason since they were in there together I just wasn't thinking and someone at the workshop pointed it out to me....ugh....embarressed!!! And as you can see....I did the same thing for the hostess card!!!!

Digi Day on PCP...hosted By The Stamping Boutique...and none other than ME!!

2010-09-15T06:02:00.000-04:00

We are having our very first digi day with PCP and I would love for all of you to join in the fun. Here is the link TSB Digi Day when you go into the page on the right hand side it will ask you to RSVP...once you do that you will be able to post comments. So.....are you all coming? I hope so...you need to go over and look at some of the creations that some of the girls have put together....I know you'll want to play along then!!!

The Stamping Boutique Digi Image Day on PCP

We at the Stamping Boutique have decided to try something new here on PCP with you all...how does a digital image day sound to you? This will be our very first time doing this with PCP and are super excited, so excited that Tracey has been working hard to put together an awesome winter image release just in time for our first digi day with you all.

Think back to when you were little...what was your favorite game? I"m not talking about computer games or video games...I'm talking about good old fashion family night fun board kind of game. I ask this question because not only because this is the theme for our very first digi image day but also because the theme for the image release is Candy Land Winter. I know I have you interested now....you can't even imagine what fabulous images she has come up with so you will have to join us to see for yourself. Some lucky winner will actually win the entire release so be sure to take a look at the details below and mark your calanders. Here are the details:

The Stamping Boutique Digi Image Day

Theme: Game Night (Candy Land Winter)

Where: on PCP at The Stamping Boutique group page

When: September 18th, Saturday

Time: 2PM to 4PM

What to Bring: your crafting supplies

What will be supplied: free new release images, lots of great chatter and prizes

How to join in the fun: become a memeber of The Stamping Boutique here on PCP (and the main blog too if you want) and on the day of the digi image day I will have a discussion set up just for us to chat and get the challenges so when your there just stop by and say hello so I know your ready to play!

I am super excited about this and I hope that you all will join us for the fun. I can guarentee you are going to LOVE this new set of images from Tracey. We will be doing 3 challenges and playing 1 game...so you have 4 chances to win some awesome prizes from The Stamping Boutique

Critter Monday

2010-09-13T04:57:00.000-04:00

It's Monday which means it's Critter time! You need to join us over at the Critter Sketch Challenge Blog this week for a great challenge. The challenge this week is school...any project you want to make as long as it's school related. Our sponsor this month is Sew Many Cards which has a ton of wonderful imags and a challenge blog I'm sure they'd love for you to join.

For the challenge I decided to do a card. I thought this would be a great card for your child when he did good on a hard test or had a good report card or just finished off the school year well.

Materials used:

Image~Dustin Pike~Dragon Looking

Ribbon~random

DP~DCWV

CS~SU!

Sentiment~Stamping Bella

Copics

buttons

SU! punches

SU! ink

Challenges entered:

Sketch Saturday~#120~sketch

Pollycraft Monday~#61 autum colors

Fab N Funky Challenges~#39 whatever

9/11 Blog Hop

2010-09-11T07:44:00.000-04:00

Do you remember where you were when you heard about the towers? I do...I was in Guam. It was the middle of the night and my husband wakes me up to look at the TV and I was still half asleep not really understanding what was happening...very quickly it all became very real.
Being a military wife I am very proud to be an American and very proud of what my husband does for his country on a daily basis. I am honored to be part of this blog hop and I hope that you will continue to go through all the girls projects today and remember those that we have lost, those that are currently fighting, and those that have fought in the past.

Collette

Christy

Debbie

Genevieve

April

Stacie

Lorie

Marie

Jenn R.

Jan

Jenn M.

Amanda

The Stamping Boutique

The Stamping Boutique is doing a joint hop with OWH...please be sure to hop over there and check out their site, they do a lot of good and bring smiles to many many military members with all the fabulous donated cards that they sent to the troops. For some troops, unfortunetly, this is the only mail the may receive while being deployed fighting for your freedom!

Operation Write Home

My First Workshop

2010-09-05T09:43:00.000-04:00

Last weekend I did my very first SU! workshop EVER. I have been using SU! products for about 10 years now and began selling it or being a "hobby demo" when I got to Germany but never really had the desire to do workshops...I wouldn't say didn't have the desire...just didn't feel I had the "network" and honestly didn't want to do the work to establish one. But anyway...I decided I'd have a little workshop because I met a girl that was really into SU! (Kim ;) ) and card making so I thought at my Pampered Chef party I'd do a little workshop too.

Here are the projects we did:

Goodie Bag Topper...super simple and everyone really loved making the flowers...I was surprised by that!

Here is the first card we made....since we are in Europe and most of us have been to Paris I thought this would be a cute card to do.

And My personal favorite and it seemed to be a it with everyone else too! I just love the butterflies and the new SU! rhinestones...I can't seem to get enough of them!!!

Now that you've seen all the projects can you tell me what is wrong with one of them? I didn't even realize the mistake until someone pointed it out to me at the party...do you know how embarressed I was...OMGosh...I could have crawled under the table. So...what's the mistake???

I'll let you all know in my next post to give you all time to respond so stay tuned!!

Critter Monday

2010-08-30T09:31:00.000-04:00

Happy Monday everyone! I hope everyone had a nice weekend. Ours was good dispite all the rain! This is the rainy season in Germany even though if you ask me...it's always the rainy season in Germany!! It rains every single day forever it seems....it's been so far 2 weeks...and this week is nothing but rain also! UGH! BUT....we have just 2 short months until we leave, go back to Pa. to visit our family and friends and then head to Guam! So the countdown is definetly on!

This is the last week for our sponsor Limelight over at The Critter Challenge Blog so please go over and join our challenge this week for chance to win a prize from them! Our challenge this week is to create a fall card. Not too hard and it's certainly feeling like fall here...not only is it raining but it's freezing...I have the heat on!!!!

Materials used:

SU! CS

Image~Riley~Riley pumpkin

Copics

DP~DCWV

SU! twine

Sentiment~SU!

K&Company Brad

Challenges Entered:

The Sweet Stop~71 sketch

Totally PaperCrafts~#31~clean and simple

Fab n Funky~#37 recipe 3 papers, 2 embellishments, 1 image

Stampin for the Weekend~#45~anything goes

VOTING TIME!!!!

2010-08-23T05:09:00.000-04:00

Some of us girls in our blogging group The Paper Princess Sisters decided to enter a cute little competition on PWCO. It's called the ultimate summer challenge. Each day we were given a different challenge and had to make a project with that challenge. Now the voting has started. We would love for you to hop on over to the site and vote for us! You actually get 3 votes per catagoy so you can pick your top 3 favs in each! Here is what my group came up with for each of the challenges:

Moira~inspiration challenge

Melanie~technique Challenge

April (me)~sketch challenge

Nancy~Color challenge

Please hop over and vote for us: PWCOUSC You have until the 28th so go go go!!! Thank you!

Kit Challenge

2010-08-20T03:46:00.000-04:00

Wow...our little blog group decided, thanks to Melina, that we were going to do a little competition. We split those that wanted to participate into two groups. Each group has one of it's members each month pick a theme for that month and make kits according to that theme to send to the rest of it's group memebers. Then we all need to make cards with those kits and then post them on our blogs on a certain day...today is that day!

This month was Melanie and I's month...I can't wait to see what her group did for kits. Our theme was sizzling summer. I decided for my group to go a different route with the theme and decided to use one of my fabulous Sweet Pea stamps (that I purchased at Paper Jewels). I have had a few of these images for a while now and have been to intimidated by them to give them a try but I figured....it's time to try the image and make everyone else in my group try it too...LOL! So this is my take on sizzling summer!

Materials used:

Image~Sweet Pea~Rising Flame

Sentiment~Stamping Bella

CS~SU!

Ribbon~SU!

Copics

Stickles

SU! ink

Challenges Entered:

Totally Paper Crafts~#30~summery (my interpertation of summery...hot)

Papertake Weekly Challenge~#46 sketch

The Stamping Boutique

2010-08-18T06:59:00.000-04:00

I had so much fun making this card. Isn't KK soooo cute! She's from The Stamping Boutique and I just LOVE her! I wish my picture was better...not sure what is going on with this picture but it almost seems blurry.
The sun is finally trying to peak through the dreariness of the day. Thank goodness. I can't take another day of gloom here! I'm hoping to spend some time at my table today because I have a ton of things to get done. Next Saturday I'm doing my very first SU! workshop...I haven't even decided on my projects yet let alone figure out my goody bag/box situation.

Materials used:
Image~The Stamping Boutique
Sentiment~Stamping Bella
SU! ribbon
SU! CS and DP
MS punch
copics
spica pens
eyelets

Challenges Entered:
TSB~monthly competition
Fab n Funky~#36~flower power (flowers in DP)
The Pink Elephant~#80~ribbon and sparkles

Critter Challenge Monday

2010-08-16T09:03:00.000-04:00

I'm in the middle of cleaning my downstairs and I realized I hadn't my post yet today for The Critter Challenge Blog. So here I am taking a quick break to get my post done. This downstairs is soooo horrible that I don't mind a break..in fact this is my 2nd one...1st one was helping my son put together his new Star Wars lego spaceship thing!!!
This week's challenge over at the Critter Challenge Blog is to do a male card and to add sparkle to it. I'm not very good at male cards to begin with and then you ask me to add sparkle...ugh! Well...here is what I came up with:
My sparkle is some stickles on the spaceship and on the CS on the monkey's tails and stars and also I took a piece of tacky strip and pressed it into some gold glitter and put it across the card! So not too bad with the sparkle right?
Don't forget, you can come over and join us at The Critter Challenge blog each week to be entered into the drawing at the end of the month for the prize from our monthly sponsor. Our sponsor this month is Limelight Papercrafts and right now they are having a moving sale...here is some of their sales:
MOVING SALE!!!

Purchase the August Unity Store Kit, receive your choice of one Unity Itty Bitty Single Stamp for free! (Note which stamp you'd like free in the comments section of your order!)

*Stampendous Ice Cream Float Stamp ONLY $1!

* All Jillibean Soup 20% (or more!!) off!!

*Lawn Fawn Stamps 20% off! (Even new releases!)

*All 2010 Unity Stampin' Store Kits ONLY $25

*All 2009 Unity Stampin' Store Kits ONLY $20!

* Unity Stamps 30% (or more!) off! (New releases not included.)

*Basic Grey Capella and Max& Whiskers 40% off!

Don't forget to click on our CLEARANCE tab!

The stamp set I used for this card can be purchased at Limelight Papercrafts, it's a changito set!

Materials used:
CS~SU!
DP~DCWV
Image and Sentiment~Changito
Copics
stickles
SU! ink
glitter

Challenges entered:
Friday Sketchers~Sketch 115

Beautiful Bookmarks

2010-08-13T14:47:00.000-04:00

I called my own bookmarks beautiful...can you believe that! I don't normally say such things about my own work but I really actually do love these. I did them for a swap I was recently in. I can't wait to get the swap back and see what others came up with.
The sentiment is from SU!

I made the frame from my cricut. This was super easy to put together, some randome ribbon, stickles, flowers and brads...done!

These were just as easy, I looked at what the "normal" size of a bookmark is, cut it out, used my Martha Stewart punch for the corners, used SU! punch and sentiment for the middle piece, some SU! ribbon, and some half pearls and there you have it!

BLOG HOP TIME!!!

2010-07-31T03:51:00.000-04:00

Have I ever told you all how much I hate my computer...grrrrr....when I have things I NEED to get done the stupid thing takes FOREVER...it needs to be dumped...too much crap I think. And it doesn't help that FB always freezes it up and makes my life difficult. Well...my husband has a weekend softball tournament and I'm already late for it but I needed to get my blog hop stuff up first. I don't know what my deal is lately...I am NEVER a procrastinater and let things go till the last minute. That kind of behavior normally drives me nuts...hence the reason my husband drives me NUTS....A LOT!! Anyway.......

On to the fun stuff....a blog hop for The Stamping Boutique...yay!!! This hop is called back to school...is everyone ready for that? My son is suppose to start this year BUT....with our move taking place like a month after school should start we are going to wait and start him once we get to Guam and get settled!
This pretty little girl is...can you guess....Audrey back to school!!! Easy enough right!!! But, that's just one of the images that are floating around today for you to take a peak at. So you need to do the whole blog hop to see everyones creations...and of course leave a comment on each blog to be entered to win the prize.

So....if you came here from Amanda's blog then you are on the right track but if you didn't....start here with Aletha's blog and work your way through.

Now that you are finished with my blog move on to Ashley's blog and enjoy your weekend!

Materials used:
Image~TSB~Audrey back to school
SU! CS
SU! circle punch
SU! Letter Set
SU! ink
copics

Challenges entered:
TSB~monthly contest
OCC sketch blog~Sketch #26~flipped it
Paper Sundaes~#28 back to school

TSB~Help From a Friend

2010-07-28T06:12:00.000-04:00

Oh My Goodness...what have I been doing? It's been almost 2 weeks since my last post. I guess summer has been catching up with me! But this morning, I am sitting her with my cup of coffee getting a few posts together. I hate when my blog is neglected.
I'd like to say that I've been traveling Europe since I haven't been crafting but that just hasn't been the case! Even though I'm working on planning a trip to Amsterdam and London. We only have 3 1/2 months left in Europe so I'd like to make the best of it. Can you belive it...3 1/2 months...it's becoming real now!
Something I MUST share though because I really thought this was going to be a challenge...my little one, Leila just started potty training. She's 2 1/2 and I thought for sure she was going to give me a hard time because her brother didn't even really "train", he just started to use the potty and that was it! So Sunday we were at a friends house and I ran out of diapers so I told her she needed to wear panties, she didn't like the idea at first but once she peed like a big girl she was super excited. So here we are on Wednesday and she has done amazingly well. Yesterday I even ventured out for the afternoon/evening and not a single accident. Now this morning she had an accident but right at the potty, I just think she waited too long to go and didn't quite make it but all in all...over the past 3 days she's only had 3 accidents! I'm a proud mama today! Can you tell? We have been telling EVERYONE that Leila is peeing in the potty like a big girl now! LOL!
Okay...on to the crafty stuff....today I made a card for my The Stamping Boutique DT. This is Help from a friend....I just LOVE her...she was NOT easy to color though...lots of little parts to her. So I decided to take the easy way out and do a little paper piecing...her stockings and dress are both pieced! This is for For Fun Challenges that TSB is sponsoring this week. So go over and join them for a chance to win some TSB images!!! The challenge this week is bright colors. I know...mine don't seem toooo bright but that orange is bright for me....I don't normally work with that color but I just love the DP so this is MY version of bright!!

Materials used:
Image~TSB~Help from a friend
Copics
SU! CS
DP~K&Company
spica pens
SU! scallop oval punch
Stamping Bella dot
Kaisercraft half pearls
SU! tiny hole punch

Challenges entered:
TSB~monthly contest
For Fun Challenges~Bright colors
Digital Tuesday Challenge~#69 Dazzle Me
Sketch Saturday~#113 Sketch~flipped it
Stamp, Scrap & Doodle Saturdays~digi image

Critter Challenge Blog Monday

2010-07-19T07:28:00.000-04:00

Good Morning everyone! It's the start of a new week!! For me it's a Critter day and our challenge this week is a Christmas themed card and a sketch. This image is from Robyns Fetish which is our sponsor this month. I have to admit this image was hard for me to work with. I'm not used to using this sort of image but I did my best!
I had a full and busy weekend. Wednesday, the 14th was my birthday. It was a great birthday this year and lasted into the weekend. Saturday night my husband made a great b-day dinner and we had friends over to eat with us and play some games. Then Sunday I had a spa day with my friend. I think I'm going to have a new addiction...SPA DAYS!!! It was soooo great and relaxing! BUT...Saturday morning I had softball practice and hurt my back. Man was I in pain Saturday night. Thankfully Sunday was a little better and today is a little better than yesterday...I just can'at sit for too long of a period of time. Standing and laying are fine but not sitting! I have a game tonight...not sure if I'm gonna make it all the way through! I have a feeling it's my pinched nerve because when I was in high school pitching I got a pinched nerve and so for years I have been dealing with it and sure enough I was pitching at practice and I think I did something to it. It just makes me feel old and I don't like to feel like that.
Anyway....I'm gonna stop here because...well...my stupid stupid back is hurting!

Crafty Critter Monday and TSB!

2010-07-06T11:32:00.000-04:00

Hello everyone! I hope that you all enjoyed your holiday weekend. I'm a day late today posting for the Critter Sketch Challenge blog...the new challenge was up yesterday. The challenge this week is to use stars...a minium of 4 stars on your project. It's the start of a new month over at the Critter Sketch blog so that means we have a new sponosr and new opportunities to win the monthly prize from our sponsor. ALSO...the winner of June has been listed on the blog so go over and check it out!
The image I used for this post is from The Stamping Boutique...I just love being part of this DT team. They have started a new monthly contest so you should go over and join up for that. Each time you use a The Stamping Boutique image for your project just link it to the contest page and you'll be entered to win the end of month prize. So the more images you use and link the more chances you have to win...sounds fun right?
So what did you all (Americans that is) do for your holiday? We decided to take our kids and another couple to an amusement park. We decided to make it a 2 night thing. It was pretty fun. It was really hot but fun! In fact it had to be record breaking HOT this weekend!!!

Materials used:
Image~TSB
SU! CS
copics
SU! star punches
Stamping Bella ribbon
eyelest from The eyelet outlet
Corner rounder

Challenges entered:
TSB~Monthly Challenge
Digital Tuesday Challenge~#66 Red White and Blue
Stamp Something~Something with your flag colors

Paper Jewels Saturday~Cherry Emma

2010-07-03T01:50:00.000-04:00

Well...it's my month again at Paper Jewels...and a great month it will be...my hubby's bday is today and my birthday is on the 14th. I love my birthday...I love birthdays in general and I'm super excited for mine!
Anyone have plans for the 4th? We are taking a little 2 night trip to an amusement park. We will be heading back Monday morning and stopping to do some sightseeing. I know the kids are going to love the amusement park...it's called Movie Park.
Do you love my image? It's from the C.C Designs line and this is from the SugarPlum line called Cherry Emma. Remember I told you last month that Jenny had a ton of new images in...well....this is part of those new images. You really need to take a peak at what she has over there. And since this is my month for Paper Jewels each Saturday I will be bringing you a little more of a peak at what she has...just wait until you see the dragon image I will be using this month!!! ;)
I hope that you all have a fabulous 4th of July! Be proud to be an American...we have the best country in the World!!

Materials used:
Image~Paper Jewels~C.C Designs~SugarPlum Cherry Emma
SU! cardstock
SU! DP
Copics
spica pens
ribbon
Doodle bug brads
MS circle cutter

Challenges entered:
Creative Inspiration~#67~sketch
Craftalicious Challenges~#3~Cute
TotallyPaperCrafts~#23~One for the girls

Dr. Seuss AND........blog candy winner!!!

2010-07-02T05:52:00.000-04:00

Here is the card I recently made for a baby shower I attended. Her theme was Dr. Seuss so I scowered the internet for a stamp image...not very much luck but then I came across some free Dr. Seuss coloring pages...I took one, saved it to my desktop, resized it, printed it and colored it. Easy peasy!
I have to admit I was quite proud of myself with this card. And...one of the girls at the shower called me magical...can you believe that? I was blushing!! It's nice to be around people that aren't into crafts because they tend to give the best compliments....they don't know how much BETTER the card could have been!! LOL! But really...I was very happy with it.
Materials used:
Image~Googled and found free coloring pages
SU! cardstock
buttons~they are actually layered...the red and then a smaller white on top and then threaded with some red string
copics
Sentiment~found on the internet
MS~border punch

NOW~~~~~~The winner of the blog candy is......from random.org.....#11
PIA
Please contact me so I can get your mailing address and send you your goodies!!

First Acetate Card

2010-06-30T10:08:00.000-04:00

For our blog groups VSD weekend I hosted a challenge. My challenge was to make a card using acetate. This was the first time I had ever worked with acetate myself so it was quite an experiment. I actually am very happy with the way it came out and I asked my Bestie to pick me some more up in the States so I could do more cards!

Don't forget...today is the last day to enter for my blog candy so if you want to be entered scroll down to that post and leave a comment!!!! I will be picking the winner this weekend and sending out the package next week!

Materials used:
Acetate
Sentiment~Stamping Bella
SU! ink
Stazon Ink
Stickles
copics
Image~Magnolia~Tild with hearts

Challenges entered:
Pollycraft Monday Challenges~#50 pinkalicious
The ABC Challenge~X for xtra dimesions
Magnolia Down Under Challenges~#52 something sweet

VSD Weekend!!

2010-06-29T06:17:00.000-04:00

Wow...it was a long weekend...a good weekend but a long weekend! To top it off our little blog group had a VSD weekend....we make it a weekend because some of us are in different time zones and we all have a lot of other prioritites in our lives so this works out great for us.

VSD Challenge #2
This one was a color challenge and honestly...I had a hard time getting the more mustard color in so....it's in the hair...lol!!! And it had to be a masculine card which isn't always easy for me!

Materials used:

Image~The Greeting Farms~dressy Ed

CS~SU!

DP~SU!

copics

SU~eyelets

Sentiment~SU!

Challenges entered:

Sew Many Challenges~#19 anything goes

VSD Challenge #4

This challenge was to make a shaped card and to also use stars and stripes...didn't have to be patriotic but of course I made mine that way!!!

Materials used:

Image~House Mouse

Sentiment~SU!

Stamping Bella dots, donuts and baubles

Stickles

Spica pens

copics

SU! CS

Challenges entered:

Sew Many Challenges~#19 anything goes

AIFactory~#41 shape it up

VSD Challenge #Closing

This was a little added extra bonus challenge at the end of our VSD...a sketch challenge.

Materials used:
Image~Tiddly Inks
buttons
jewel
SU! cardstock
Stickles
Spica pens
copics
Ribbon~Rusty Pickle
Sentiment~Rusty Pickle~Princess Pirate
DP~Kaisercraft

Challenges entered:
Pollycraft Monday~#50 pinkalicious
Paper Sundaes~#24 birthday card

The Stamping Boutique Blog HOP!!!

2010-06-25T08:00:00.002-04:00

It's my very first blog hop with The Stamping Boutique and I'm super excited. This is a very talented group of girls and I hope you will hop all the way through and see what everyone has created for you today.
The theme for this hop is SEWING....wow....please don't just my stitching too harshly...I had my wonderful hubby buy me a little sewing machine when he was in the States and I thought this would be the perfect card to try my sewing on...well...as you can see...I need a lot of practice!!! But hey...I tried!!!
We have three awesome images to share with you today...all of which can be bought at The Stamping Boutique...I have used Cynthia Seamstress...how adorable is she!!! I have to admit...besides this card...I am not a seamstress in any way so the theme and image was kind of hard for me to work with but...I did my best!

Okay....so if you are on the right track you should have come here from Christy's blog Cristy's Zaney Creations and you will next go to Tink's blog Tink Time if you happen to be lost...as I know I normally am you should go back and start with the beginning of the hop at Kym's blog Nana's Keepsakes.
Have fun hopping!!!

Materials used:
Image~TSB~cynthia steamstress
copics
spica pens
stickles
sewing machine
SU! CS
Sentimenet~Stamping Bella

~~okay...I just noticed this...I made flowers for this card and totally forgot to add them to my card...ugh...they are really cute too!!!~~

TSB~Audrey with birthday cupcake

2010-06-23T15:01:00.000-04:00

I have another fabulous Stamping Boutique image for you today...this is Audrey with a birthday cupcake. She's super cute! Please don't forget about this Friday and our blog hop...it's gonna be fun!!! There are a lot of talented girls on this DT so you will want to come and check out there wonderful work!

It's Wednesday...today it actually warmed up a bit to my surprise. Maybe we will end up having a little bit of summer here in Germany this year! We are planning a little trip over the 4th of July. We were going to go camping again like we did last year but were afraid the weather would be crappy (as it has been) so instead we are doing a 2 night trip to an amusement park. Movie Theme Park in Germany to be exact. I think our kids (we are going with friends) are going to love it. It's got all their favorite TV charecters. I have started to upload our Disney pictures so I will be sure to put some on here this weekend.

Wish me luck...I'm trying to make a baby shower card and her shower is Dr. Seuss theme so I found an image and I'm going to TRY to color it in and make something out of it! We shall see...if it comes out I'll post it!!! ;)

I knew I was forgetting something yesterday about The Stamping Boutique....duh...THE BLOG CANDY! Do you see this massive blog candy she's offering...do you see those COPICS!!!!
You can enter until July 18th so go on over and check it out......TSB!

Materials used:
Image~The Stamping Boutique
SU! DP
SU! cardstock
SU! square punch
SU! scallop square punch
SU! ribbon
corner rounder
copics
stickles
SU! stamp set for sentiment
spica pens
glitter brads
prima flowers

Challenges entered:
The Stamping Boutique~monthly challenge
Crazy 4 Challenges~#42~paper flowers
ABC Challenges~X~extra dimensions
Sketch and Stash Challenges~#38~sketch~This is a fab sketch!!

TSB~Princess Jennifer Latte

2010-06-22T04:25:00.000-04:00

Wow...I have so much to share with you guys about The Stamping Boutique. I may have to save some for my post tomorrow!!
~~1~~First of all...TSB is sponsoring Craftalicious this week so go on over there and play along in their challenge which is monotone for a chance to win some images from TSB!!!

~~2~~Second thing....TSB is starting up a monthly competition....you must use a TSB image but you can enter as many times as you want for a chance to win...here are the details right from the site:
We will randomly select one winner each month to win 5 FREE images of their choice. Also the person that links up the most will win 5 FREE images of their choice. We will also be selecting our Guest Designers from these contests too. What are you waiting for, you know you want to win those FREE images and you can't if you don't enter!

~~3~~Third thing....There is this fabulous little place called the Latte Lounge that is a network through TSB and they are looking for a DT team....here is the info on that....
The Latte Lounge, a division of TSB, is currently looking for DT members. The team will be instrumental in creating a community that shares the love of crafting while supporting one another. Please realize that the expectations go beyond participation in challenges and creative projects. It is our goal to make an active community for sharing our thoughts, ideas, emotions and creative spirit.

DT Expectations

· Post several times daily in the forum and various groups at TLL. DT members will need to keep the conversations going as well as getting them started.

· Comment daily on the photos shared by members.

· Welcome new members with comments on their profile.

· Host at least one challenge per month.

· Participate in other team member challenges at least twice a month.

· Promote The Latte Lounge and our happenings on your blog 1 day/week.

· Take the responsibility for posting Question of the Day one day a week

· Post at least one new project, card, layout in the gallery at least once a week.

DT members will receive

- 3 exclusive TLL images

- 4 free digital images from The Stamping Boutique store per month

- 40% off in The Stamping Boutique store

Please send a link to your blog along with a short paragraph explaining how you can benefit The Latte Lounge and The Stamping Boutique.

The term is for 3 months. July 1- Sept. 30, 2010.

Applications will be accepted until June 25, 2010.

Please apply to Melissa Czapor at mczapor@oh.rr.com

~~4~~And the fourth thing...and then I'm done...I promise!!!! Friday the 25th TSB is having a blog hop..I hope that you all will come back on Friday and have some fun with us and take a look at the wonderful new DT teams creations.
Wow...a lot of info huh!!! Were you able to get all of that...lol!
This fine little lady is Princess Jennifer Latte...I thought it would be appropriate considering the Latte Lounge is having a DT call!! I wish I was sitting around drinking a yummy latte giving the peace sign right now!!!

Materials used:
Image~TSB
MS circle cutter
MS border punch
SU! cardstock
SU! DP
buttons
copics
spica pens
SU! ribbon

Challenges entered:
Craftalicious~ #2~monotone
TSB~ monthly contest
OCC Sketch Challenge~ #20~sketch
Paper Sundaes~ #23~pretty as a princess

Critter Challenge blog Monday~Ratiny in Cupcake

2010-06-21T04:55:00.000-04:00

Good morning everyone! It's Monday....boooooo!!! I hope you all had a nice weekend. Our's was cold...yep...not just chilly...downright cold! I'm so tired of Germany and this cold gloomy rainy weather is really taking it's toll on me! But anyway....it's Monday, the start of a new week!
This was my week with Critter Challenge Blog and our sponsor this month is Softpencil.
The sketch for this week is really great and I found this super easy pocket card tutorial on SCS so there is no reason for you not to give it a try. I also used a softpencil image...ratiny in cupcake...he's soooo cute! I love softpencil images.
Please make sure you go over and play along with us this week at The Critter Challenge Blog...the more weeks you play along the more chances you have to win at the end of the month!!!
I will be back tomorrow with something from The Stamping Boutique!!!
Also...there is still time to leave a comment under the blog candy post if you want to win my blog candy!!!

Materials used:
Image~Softpencil
copics
spica pens
MS jewels
SU! cardstock
Stamping Bella sentiments
SU! ribbon
stickles

Scrapbook Layouts for SCS Swap! AND BLOG CANDY!!!

2010-06-16T04:10:00.000-04:00

Lets start with the blog candy! I promised that once I hit 50 followers I'd have some for you all and I am now at 52...yay! The picture below shows what you can win! You will have until the 30th to enter.
So, you all have read that I'm playing softball and the other night one of the girl's husbands' was taking pictures of us and posted them on their FB page....well....have you ever NOT realized just how horrible you look until you see yourself in a picture? I mean, I know I have gained a lot of weight since being here in Germany and having my second child but holy cow....my legs look sooooo white and fat that I will now be buying a pair of pants to wear for all future softball games....and I will only be wearing shorts around the house. That's how bad I looked! So I know your wondering why I'm telling you all this.....in your post for the blog candy I want you to tell me how you have lost weight or kept weight off. I know 90% of us have struggled with our weight at some point in our lives and I could use all the help I can get right now!
UGH!!!!!

On to better things right?!!! Here is a double page layout I made for a cricut swap I recently did. I just love all these colors and the cartridge I used was Paisley. Isn't that mushroom adorable?

Here is the second set I did. I used Winter Woodland for this set. Okay...I just realized it didn't upload the second page. WTH!! Okay...there we go...both pages! I know this one is kind of simple for what I normally put together for my pages but I kind of like it! And of course you can't tell on here but there is lots of sparkle.

Mimosa Cupcake!

2010-06-15T04:48:00.000-04:00

Wow....I felt so bad my blog had been totally neglected for over a week! I think I'm back to normal now. I think...LOL! Of course my cold STILL after 10 days of antibiotics not fully gone but at least I'm feeling wayyyyyy better! I will be trying to play catch up this week with postings. So don't be surprised if I have something each day! I have been a horrible DT member for The Stamping Boutique and plan to bring you lots of goodies from there this week.
So....I'm playing softball...OMGosh...I haven't played since high school which would be 14 years ago now. I'm so out of shape and honestly hate not being a better player. I used to actually be good but feel like I've lost all of that plus need to lose some weight and work out so I don't lose my breath just running to first! It's been fun to get to know some new people on our base and just to have a good time I just wish I could find my "softbal mojo". I don't like to "feel" like the old one in the group.
Well...on to better things...Mimosa Cupcake....she's sooo cute and you can buy her at Paper Jewels...her store blinkie is on the sidebar. And of course she has many more things you can check out too!

Materials used:
Image~Mimosa cupcake
MS border punch
SU! CS
copics
spica pens
SU! ribbon
DP~my little shoebox~isn't it toooo cute!

Challenges entered:
Sketch Saturday~ #107~sketch
Stamp Something~ Happy Something

Super quick

2010-06-07T06:11:00.001-04:00

Wanted to let you all know, I'm still here! I have been really sick for about 2 1/2 weeks now and finally on Thursday got an antibiotic and started it. It's now Monday and I'm starting to feel better, not 100% but better! I promise over the next few days I will be catching up, leaving some blog love, and making a post! So just bare with me!

~~~And....I just noticed....I have 50 followers now....so you know what that means?????!!!!! BLOG CANDY!!!! I will be back with the details on that and what you need to do to be entered to win it!!!

Have a great day everyone and I hope you all enjoyed your weekend!

The Stamping Boutique~Twirling Fairy

2010-05-31T08:08:00.000-04:00

As promised....here is my very first TSB card! This little beauty is twirling fairy. I have always had a love for angels and I have been finding some amazing fairies, pixies and so forth and I've fallen in love. If you too like fairies stop by TSB store and get you some...she has a whole but and they really are just amazing!
I hope you all enjoyed your holiday weekend. It was cold and rainy here...go figure! Not that it really mattered much because I'm still sick. I can't seem to shake this stupid cold. I'm feeling terrible every day and am going through a ton of tissues!!! I've actually ran out of tissues and am now walking around with a roll to toilet paper....luckly we use soft TP!!!
One thing I forgot....I have entered this weeks challenge at Stampin for the Weekend and I encourage you all to go over and join them this week....this is actually my second entry for their challenge and the first part of the challenge is to make a card to make someone smile or cheer them up and the second part...which is totally optional is to send your card to someone from post pals. I had never heard of post pals until seeing this challenge and I will be sending both my cards to some of the children on that site. I love doing challenge but I love doing them even more when I'm doing them for a purpose and if one of my cards make a sick little boy or girl smile and feel better for just a moment...then I'm happy!!! So please go over and join them!

Materials used:
Image~The Stamping Boutique
copics
spica pens
MS flowers
SU! cardstock
DCWV DP
Sentiment~Papertrey
Ribbon~Stamping Bella

Challenges Entered:
FabNFunky~ #25~sketch
Digital Tuesday Challenges~ #60~cute people~she's pretty darn cute to me!!!
Stampin for the weekend~ #39~post pals~make someone smile or cheer them up~2nd entry

Paper Jewels Saturday~Mimo Skate

2010-05-29T06:37:00.000-04:00

MORNING Ladies!!! Happy Saturday to you! And Happy Memorial Day Weekend to you all. I hope you have something fun planned for your extended weekend and I challenge you all to say thank you to someone you know (or don't) in the Armed Forces. Just be aware of the reason for this holiday, being a military spouse I feel it's important for me to always put out there that our men and women are sacrificing every single day for the freedoms all of us enjoy in the USA!
So.....here is my card for my Paper Jewels post this week. This is my last Saturday for the month but you can always take a look at the blog every day to see a new post from a new DT gal! And I will be back in July for the month!
This is Mimo Skate...he's pretty darn cute huh! It's hard for me do to boy cards, I don't know why, I have a son and a very "guy" husband but I'm such a girly girl that it's just hard to break out of that and do something boyish. But once I got started last night it came pretty easily. My son picked out the DP to be used...he loves to craft as much as I do!
Hopefully tomorrow or Monday I will have a post for you with a TSB image....I'm so excited...it will be my first post for the new DT team! I have 3 sticky notes full of images I MUST HAVE from there!!!!

Materials used:
Image~Mimos Skate~Paper Jewels
Sentiment~SU!
SU! CS
DP~DCWV~All dressed up stack
copics
spica pens
stickles
random ribbon
SU! eyelets
silver pen

Challenges entered:
Pile It On~ #20~outside the box~making a male card is outside the box for me
Stampin for the Weekend~ #39~make someone smile or cheer them up
Sew Many Challenges~ #15 anything goes
C.R.A.F.T. Challenges~ #52~blue and green

Mimosa Sommer Flower...Paper Jewels

2010-05-26T08:11:00.000-04:00

So...I do have a card for you today BUT....have you all seen my sidebar in the past few days? Or since yesterday? Do you see anything new? I could NOT be more excited to announce that I have been chosen to be on The Stamping Boutique's DT team.......OVERLY EXCITED! I have tried for this DT team before and didn't make it and so I was even more super thrilled when I saw my name on their list of gals that made it this time. Holy cow!!! I have a list of images to the floor that I want...really I want just about all of them!! Anyway....there is that one little thing (or HUGE thing)...THEN...wouldn't you know, I joined in the Riley blog hop last week and I won a prize...ME ME ME!!! I am NEVER the winner but I won a free stamp...heck y.e.a.h...so happy about that and then I won some blog candy off my gals Jennys' blog from a blog hop she did with a company and about fell out of my chair. This has got to be my lucky month. I mean it would be nice for once to be the winner! Plus...I have had rough two weeks or so and this news is just awesome news!
AND...one more thing...I noticed I have 47 followers now...soooooooo....once I reach 50 followers...I myself will be offering up some blog candy! Maybe a little game to go along with it...we all like games right?
SO...even thought I feel like poop....majorly like poop a few things have gone my way lately and have brought some excitement to my worn down body!! LOL!

Here is beautiful Mimosa from Paper Jewels...her store is also on my side bar!
This is called Mimosa Sommer Flower

Materials used:
Sentiment~SU!
circle punch
prima flowers
Stamping Bella baubles
SU! cardstock
MS border punch
random ribbon
copics
Image~Mimosa Sommer Flower

Critter Challenge Blog Monday~Dustin Pike!

2010-05-24T06:15:00.000-04:00

Happy Monday everyone! I hope that you all had a great weekend it was very bright, sunny and warm here unfortunetly I have been under the weather and didn't get to enjoy much of it. But that's okay, hopefully this is a good sign that spring is finally here in Germany!
Today is a new challenge over at the Critter Sketch Challenge Blog. In case you haven't joined in any of the challenges over there yet let me fill you in. Each week Melanie gives you all a new challenge. Once you've done the challenge just enter with Mr. Linky. We do a drawing once a month for a winner of a fabulous give away from the sponsor of the month so if you play each week of the month with us, you have 4 chances to win the give away! And who might you ask is our sponsor this month....DUSTIN PIKE! He is so fabulous and has some of the most adorable images ever and can you believe, some of them are now RUBBER!!!
Here is my card for this week...isn't this monkey totally cute!!! It's one of Dustin's images ;)
So come on over and play along with us and be entered for a chance to win a great prize! Have a wonderful week everyone!

Materials used:
Image~Dustin Pike
CS~SU!
DP~DCWV Animal Cracker Stack
copics
MS ribbon
corner rounder
Sentiment~stampendous

Challenges entered:
Doodle Dragon Studios Challenge Blog~ Bday card
Creative Inspirations~ #61~card for a child

Paper Jewels Saturday~Mimosa with Watering Can

2010-05-22T13:53:00.000-04:00

Wow...I feel like I have forgotten my poor little old blog the past two weeks. I'm so sorry! I love my blog to death and I just love everyone that comes by to see what I have been working on and I'm trying to get myself caught up here. From being at DisneyLand Paris to having my wisdom teeth pulled on Thursday...ugh...I just can't find the steam to keep moving and keep caught up!
Today was my day to post over at Paper Jewels. I used Mimosa with Watering Can for my post today. I promise you I have ordered a TON of new goodies from Paper Jewels and as soon as I have them I will be playing with them and showing you some of the fab new things that Jenny has in her store. Wonderful new images...not that I don't love my Mimosa's!!! ;)
Now...my wonderful, dear friend and blogger group gal has been making these wonderful flowers for a bit now and I wanted to see just how easy they were to do...so thank you so much AnnMarie (you must check our her blog to see all her amazing flowers and other work too). Here is the link to the original place that AnnMarie and myself got the tutorial for these Paper Pleasing Ideas. These were TOTALLY easy to do. Just follow the tutorial and if you don't have a paper crimper...because I don't...just do all the creases by hand...I just sat for a few minutes twirling and crumbling paper between my fingers while catching up on my blogger gals chatting! Super easy and Super cute!
I tried to get a close up of the flowers but it just didn't come out very well for me.
I hope you all have a wonderful weekend. After this post is finished...I'm headed to the couch to lay down before bed...my head is KILLING me!

Materials used:
Image: mimosa with watering can~found at paper jewels
Sentiment: random
brads
SU! cardstock
SU! DP
SU! scallop punch
copics
spica pens
corner rounder
random ribbon

Challenges entered:
Stamp, Scrap, Doodle something~ sketch #41
Stamp Something~ 2 of something~my two handmade flowers
Fab and Funky Challenges~#24 make it yourself~my handmade flowers
Pollycraft Monday Challenges~ #44 Summer Blooms~my handmade flowers

Can you tell I'm proud of my handmade flowers!! LOL!

Riley Card Swap

2010-05-18T08:18:00.000-04:00

My poor poor blog! As most of you know, I was gone last week to Disneyland Paris and we had a TON of fun and I promise I will have some pictures to show all of you in the next few days but I already had a few posts ready to be released so that is what todays is...I did these cards for a riley card swap...I love my Riley and here are the two I did...SUPERMOOSE....I have had him for a while and never used him but man is he cute!! and EGGRILEY...another cute image and I just love the sentiment...love the lettering!
Again, I promise to be back in a day or two with some pictures of Disney...it has been taking me forever to get myself back to normal...I haven't even touched my craft table since we got home...it's all nice and clean...that doesn't happen much!!!
Oh, and look out...my hubby got me a sewing machine when he went stateside for a class and I finally got some thread so I will hopefully be stitching some cards soon!!!

Critter Challenge Blog Monday and Dustin Pike!

2010-05-10T08:51:00.000-04:00

Well...happy Monday everyone! I am writing this up in advance because my bestie Melanie will be dropping this for me because I will be in Disney when you all are looking at this post!! YIPPEEEEE! I am so excited to take the kids to Disney...okay...Euro Disney...but none the less Disney! So today is a new challenge over at the Critter Sketch Challenge Blog so pop on over and join us...AND...I'm soooo happy to announce that Dustin Pike is our sponsor this month....I just LOVE Dustin Pike! And if you think you can't make Dustin's images girly...well...this card is about as girly as they come and I used one of his images! I also am playing in his current challenge...a color challenge that runs till the 15th so go on over and join...you must use his images BUT...he is always giving away amazing freebies!!!
So...I hope everyone has a wonderful week and I will be home sometime on Thursday!

Materials used:
image~Dustin Pike~fairie bear
Sentiment~SU!
Cardstock~SU!
DP~Doodlebug
copics
spica pens
stickles
brads~doodlebug

Challenges entered:
Dustin Pike~ color challenge~green, pink and white
Papertake Weekly~#40~sketch

Paper Jewels Saturday~Bear With Bee

2010-05-08T15:12:00.000-04:00

This is going to be super fast today! It's about 9pm Saturday night and if it wasn't for Jenny I would have totally forgotten to release my posts for Paper Jewels and on here today! It's been a very busy hectic day around here. I used to be a very advanced kind of girl...used to pack and oraganize days in advance but not since having kids....that for some reason changes everything! So today is Saturday and we are leaving first thing in the morning and I'm just now finishing up my packing! My wonderful husband still needs to get me his clothes and I need to do shoes and the snack back...ugh! So anyway...today is my post for PaperJewels and I did Bear With Bee....I just love that little bee on top the flower sleeping away the day. I'm thinking the bee is making some snoring noises because it looks as if the bear can't sleep very well!! LOL!
I hope that you all have a wonderful weekend and enjoy your week. I will be back from Disney with some wonderful pictures to share with everyone on Thursday. My bestie Melanie will be dropping a post for me on Monday for our critter challenge blog and you MUST come back and take a look at the post because we have a new sponsor this month and I'm super excited about him!

Materials used:
copics
stickles
SU! punches
random sentiment
SU! CS
DP doodle bug

Challenges entered:
Crafty Ann's Challenge Blog~ #14 anything goes
Mojo Monday~ #137~sketch
Pollycraft Monday Challenge~ #42~Here comes the sun

Happy Mothers Day!

2010-05-05T05:14:00.000-04:00

So...Mother's Day is right around the corner...have you all made your cards and purchased or made your gifts for your wonderul mothers? I just finished up my cards last night so they could be put in the mail today hoping they will make it back to PA. in time for Mother's Day.
All of the paper I used for both of these cards are from SU!, DP and all!
I used the same sketch and recipe for both cards....the look is pretty different though huh!

This card is for my MIL

This one is for my mom!

Materials used:
SU! cardstock
SU! DP
SU! sentiment
SU! ribbon and random ribbon
mulberry flowers
glitter brads
MS circle cutter
First card: (where it differs)
jeweled brads
kaiser flowers
random ribbon

Challenges entered:
The pink Elephant~ #65~mommy I love you
Sketch Saturday~ #101~sketch
Cupcake craft challenge~ #89~recipe~3 papers, 3 ribbons, 3 flowers

CCC #26~scrapbook pages!

2010-05-04T04:13:00.000-04:00

Well...it's been...hmmmm....let's just say a very long time since I have done any scrapbooking and I am quite rusty. I'm not very happy with my pages but...the pictures are down so this is the way it will stay!!! This was for our blog challenge and my girl Moira was up to giving us a challenge this time! I think she kind of loves me...hehehehe...she mentioned me below when she was posting this on our challenge blog!! ;)
These pictures are from 2005 when my little brother graduated from basic training. The 3 photos are from the mornings run..it was really neat to be there and watch all the boys running and doing there chants...you know...like they do in the movies...they really do, do that! My baby was just 10 months old there and he's now 5. The other picture is of my brother and mom after the graduation ceremony!

So... April.. I know you've been looking for a kick in gear.. this is it... the time is now... get that first page done and I'm sure you will be flying through them in no time.

Now.. on to the challenge....

I want to see a double page layout (for those of you who are card makers - make two cards)..

Please use the following sketches...

Page 1

Page 2

I don't want to limit you to anything else.... so no other requirements...

I have wanting to use an 8x10 photo on a scrapbook page.. something I have never done - however if you don't have an 8x10 - you can either mat up a 5x7 or use two 4x6s and mat them together to make a 6x8 or whatever works best for you.

Tag Swap

2010-05-03T08:32:00.000-04:00

Please don't mind the paper under the tags...my children think it's fun to draw on my "protective" paper!
These are tags I made for a swap I was in recently. These are for the round group. So super simple to do with the cricut. Then the saying in the middle was done with an SU! stamp set and circle punch. Some pearls, eyelets and ribbon and they are all done!

Paper Jewels~Mimosa with flower basket

2010-05-01T11:02:00.001-04:00

Today is the start of my month with Paper Jewels again. If you haven't looked at her site in a while you have GOT to go over and check it out. She has got some incredible stamps in. I know I have been using all Mimosa but she is selling many more awesome stamps...have you heard of the Sweet Pea Ching-Chou Kiuks Fantasy Art Collection before? If not they are just the stamps to peak your fantasy's...in a good way! She also has these new dragon images by Sweet Pea~Lisa Victoria....they are soooo adorable...along with those she is also selling some new Mimosas and has some CC Design stamps. Please go on over and check them out...you will not be let down by the array of images she has.
Okay....it's Saturday...May 1st. Can you believe it? I can't believe how fast April went by. I hope everyone is having a good weekend. We are just kind of hanging out since it seemed like we were running all week long. I could use a bit of relaxation...away from my kids would be nice!! I love them to death but man...they can drive a person up the wall!! Hopefully it will help getting away for a week next week. We are leaving for Disney on Mothers Day...I'm super excited...never been to Disney before and I know Euro Disney is a bit different but who cares...it's a trip away from here!!! :)

Materials used:
copics
Martha Stewart flower stickers
sentiment~SU!
SU! cardstock
random ribbon
Image~ Bildmalarna~Mimosa with flower basket
cuttlebug dots embossing folder
SU! ink
DP~Bo Bunny

Challenges entered:
Tuesday Morning Sketches~Sketch #43
The ABC Challenge~T is for ~Thank you!

Critter Monday...Miss Anya

2010-04-26T03:56:00.000-04:00

Good Morning everyone...and happy Monday! I hope that you all had a great weekend and are ready to start your work week! We had a really great weekend here. The sun shined all weekend and it was warm...the first time the kids were able to get into shorts!!! I ended up getting myself a bit burnt just for hanging in the backyard and my chest is really feeling it this morning!
Today is a new week and a new Critter Sketch Challenge Blog week also...this is the last week for our sponsor My Scrapbooking Supplies so make sure you go over and play along for a chance to win a prize from them. I can't wait to tell you who is our sponsor for next month...you'll have to wait till next week to find out!!!
This week we had a sketch...a pretty great sketch! I used an image from The Greeting Farms...the Miss Anya collection. Oh my how I am in LOVE with these images. She is sooooo ME! They are cute and sassy and...ahhhh...I just love them! I have had this DP hanging around for ages and used it in a card kit swap and decided to save the last few pieces for this card. I paper pieced her little stockings..how cute huh!!! Sorry I don't normally brag about my cards but I'm in love with this one. I just love the colors, those AWESOME buttons, the image and well...everything! Oh, I almost forgot...part of the sketch was also to use 2 buttons!!

Materials used:
Buttons~man I wish I could remember who makes these
SU! twine
Stamping Bella Baubles
MS border punch
SU! cardstock
SU! sentiment
copics
spica pens

Challenges entered:
The Pink Elephant~ #64 Aqua
Stamp, Scrap, and Doodle Something~ #37 girlie
Fab N Funky Challenges~ #20 get it all out~I have had this DP for uh...YEARS!! Yikes!

Anything Goes Border Set Swap

2010-04-25T03:34:00.000-04:00

I just participated in a border swap on SCS and this is my set of stuff. I just LOVE this paper. And I punched all the way around that title box...I did that for 5 of them...my hand was hurtin after that!!! I haven't gotten my sets back yet but I can't wait I have heard the rest of the gals oooohhhh and ahhhhhh over theres.
I hope you all had a nice weekend...it was sunny and almost warm here...I actually got a bit of sun on my arms and chest yesterday. FINALLY I think spring has sprung in Germany!!!

Softpencil Thursday~Good Friends

2010-04-22T04:43:00.000-04:00

It's Thursday again...and I'm so sad...next Thursday will be my last Softpencil post...I just LOVE this group of gals and of course Elizabeth is the best person EVER...and so are her images!!
This weeks image is called good friends and the only thing we needed to do was make it a friendship card. Easy enough right? Sure!!!
I just love this paper...it's by We Are Memory Makers, I thought the colors would be great for this image.
Anyone doing anything fun this weekend? I'm just hoping for some sunshine and warmth!! We had two days of semi-warm weather and then it turned freezing again...can I say I'm ready to get out of Germany. Have I told you all where we are going from here??? No...well...we are going....to......
GUAM....yes...I so can't wait. We were stationed in Guam about 8 years ago for 2 years and really really loved it and have been blessed to go back. I can NOT WAIT!!! So you all will have to help me count down to Nov.!!!!

Materials used:
Image~Softpencil~Good Friends
DP~We Are Memory Makers
CS~SU!
Sentiment~Stamping Bella
MS border punch
stickles
copics
kaisercraft pearls

Challenges Entered:
papertake Weekly~ sketch #39

Pixie Dust Studios

2010-04-21T03:35:00.000-04:00

Morning everyone....I am sad to say we did NOT make it to the final round of TGF Royal Battle. There was some stiff competition this week. But I am so proud of our team for making to the 4th round out of 5. We did a great job and really made an awesome team. I'm just sorry we didn't get to use Marsha...she always does such fabulous stuff! But it's all good...I had fun and I think the other girls had fun too and that's what matters most....even though that stamp set would have been nice to win!!! LOL!
I am trying AGAIN for the pixie dust studios DT...the call is till the 25th I believe. So this is what I came up with. That flower at the bottom.....I balled it up and opened it again to get it to stay up like that...do you know how hard it was to actually take something you made and crush it??? It was harder than I thought it would be!!!

Materials used:
Image~Pixie Dust Studios
Sentiment~not sure
copics
spica pens
brad
ribbon
MS border punch
CS~SU!
DP~My minds eye...it has this great texture to it.

Challenges entered:
Digital Tuesday Challenges~ #55 April Showers or April Flowers
Totally Paper Crafts~ #12 Spring
Pixie Dust Studios~ #18 green as main color

Please help...voting ends tonight (Tues.) and we need more votes!!!

2010-04-19T12:38:00.001-04:00

We're BACK!!! That's right...thanks to all the wonderful gals that voted for us last week we made it through to the 4th round of TGF Royal Battle!! We are soooo excited. This week was our gal Kelly's turn and we needed to make a treat container....now how amazing is this? I just LOVE that ribbon. In case it wasn't totally obvious...Kelly's husband is in the Air Force and is a firefighter...that is how we met actually!! So please go on over and help us out and vote for us again this week. We are The Stampin Farmette's Sisters. And this week you can only vote for 1 project so make sure your vote goes to us!!! THANKS!!!
The Greeting Farms Royal Battle

CCC#25~Meljens Lion

2010-04-18T07:19:00.002-04:00

Oh my...it's Sunday afternoon and my kids have been making me want to pull my hair out since the moment they woke up. I know it's lack of sleep but dang...when you get up at the crack of dawn and don't want to go back to sleep what am I suppose to do? So in turn that makes for a cranky mommy too! My husband left today for a week to the Netherlands for work so it's just me and the kids again!
This is the card I made for our blog group challenge. The details are below! Not sure I'm liking my coloring that brown sticks out way more than I wanted it to...it looks worse in the picture! But here it is!!!

Element 1: Place a flower somewhere on your card. This can be a paper flower, prima flower, stamped flower image, flower dp, etc. As long as there is a flower on your card.

Element 2: Embossing, I want to see embossing. This can be dry embossing with your Cuttlebug or Big Shot or it can be heat embossing.

Element 3: Use SCS sketch SC273.

Materials Used:
MS circle cutter
MS flower
Image~Meljens
DP~DCWV
SU! cardstock
Sizzix embossing folder
sentiment~SU!
copics
spica pens

Challenges entered:
Meljens featured stamper~featured stamper
Meljens challenge blog~#3~3D
Stamp Something~something layered

Softpencil Thursday~Come to my Apple Home!

2010-04-15T03:23:00.000-04:00

Ahhhh....it's Thursday...almost the end of the week. Today we have to make a run to the doctors about 1.5 hours away for my husband but I wanted to get this in quick before we left. I thought for sure this image was going to be hard to work with because, it's just not my thing but once I pulled out my colors and stuff it really came together quite nicely.
This is from Softpencil and it's called~Come to my apple home!
We will be moving in Nov. and in the process of that move we will be "bunking" in Pa. with family and wonderful friends for about 2 weeks so I thought this would be a super great card for someone!

Materials used:
SU! corner punch and oval scallop punch
green jewels
ribbon~papertray ink
not sure where the DP is from
SU! cardstock
sentiment~Papertray
MS circle cutter
copics
stickles

Challenges entered:
ICS~sketch #62
ABC Challenge~S is for Sparkle

Week 3 TGF Royal Battle

2010-04-12T06:56:00.000-04:00

Well...thanks to all that voted for us last week we have moved on to the 3rd week of The Greeting Farms Royal Battle! We are so excited and as with the past 2 weeks the competition is stiff again this week and we NEED YOU VOTE! So please take a minute to go over to TGF Gallery and vote for our scrapbook page. We are The Stampin Farmettes Sisters!

This fabulous layout was done my Melanie Newby~Mnewby....isn't wonderful? Look at those two handsome little "dudes". I just love them!

You have till Tuesday night, midnight to vote so hurry on over!

Critter Monday~Thank you Bear

2010-04-12T03:22:00.000-04:00

Well...it's Monday again...all of you are getting ready to start a brand new week...well...so am I, I guess! This week for The Critter Challenge blog our challenge was a color challenge. You will have to pop on over to the site to find out what those colors were (in case it wasn't obviously from this post) and play along with us. We have a new sponsor this month, My Scrapbooking Supplies which is a great site for getting tips on your scrapbooking pages, cards, and 3D projects along with giving you the sites you can go to, to find the products you are looking for.
I hope everyone had a nice weekend. I'm writing this up on Sunday which is my catch-up day. The past few days went by in a flash and I had/have a ton of stuff to do today. It almost felt like spring here yesterday (Saturday). The sun was shining but man was it still chilly. We went for the day to a local park and I kept having to put my sweat jacket back on but at least the sun was shining which is saying a lot for Germany weather!

Materials Used:
SU! DP
SU! cardstock
MS border punch
random ribbon (from my huge stash)
Image~Meljens~Thank you Bear
copics
spica pens
doddle bug brads

Challenges Entered:
Meljen's Designs~featured stamper
Meljen's Designs~Challenge #2 girly colors
Crafty Ann's Challenges~#12~let the sunshine in
Tuesday Morning Sketches~#40~sketch

Softpencil Thursday~Hi Cupcake!!

2010-04-08T03:32:00.000-04:00

This is my second fabulous week back with the Softpencil gang. This week we are using girl on cupcake...this was one of my very first purchases from Softpencil. We had a challenge this week which was to use shades of pink and pearls. No problem here...I love pink and as you can see...I used a LOT of pearls!
I hope everyone had a nice Easter holiday. For us it was doing an egg hunt for the kids in the morning, watching them play with their new goodies and eat lots of sweets, have a really nice dinner, and sit and relax watching movies! Since we are usually NEVER with family we have to make the best of the holidays with just US! Which is okay sometimes because I know the holidays can become quite stressful when you have a million peoples homes to go to and family drama...isn't there always some drama around the holidays?

Materials Used:
SU! cardstock
SU! DP...both DP's are SU!
Image~softpencil~girl on cupcake
Pearls~kaisercraft
flowers~not sure...I think I got them at the Germany Stamping convention I went to
Ribbon~SU!
Sentiment~Inkadinkado~birthday cupcake
Stickles
smootch
pop dots
copics

Challenges Entered:
Paper Sundaes~Challenge #12~sketch
Pollycraft Monday Challenges~#38~anything goes~make sure you join up this week...lots of great giveaways!
Stamp Something~pink somethings~I've got lots of pink going on!

The Greeting Farms Royal Battle Week 2

2010-04-05T05:52:00.000-04:00

No, I did NOT make this card even though I would LOVE to take credit for it. Isn't it the most fabulous card you've ever seen? Well, I think so. I just love that flower design in the corner...it totally makes the whole card!

Thanks to all of you that voted last week we moved on to the next round....round 2 of TGF Royal Battle. So we need your help again this week. Here is the link TGF royal battle so please go over and vote for our card. We are The Stampin Farmettes Sisters also our "sisters" made it through to the next round so please make your second vote for them The Stampin Farmettes. You can give up to 3 votes.

This fabulous card was made by Jenny....if you love this you'll love her blog too!

Softpencil Thursday

2010-04-01T08:13:00.000-04:00

That's right...I am back with the gals from Softpencil for the month of April as a guest designer. I can't tell you how happy that makes me...I just love these gals and of course the images!!
This is painting eggs with Michu and Ratiny...cute image huh!! Go over to Softpencil and get you one and a few others while your at it!! ;)
Have you ever thought that some days you have great coloring day and then others your like "what on earth happened here"? Well..today was one of those "what on earth happened here" days! My coloring just doesn't match the card and even tried basing my colors off the colors of the eggs...ugh! Well...you can see all the other wonderful ladies work over at softpencil so take a look!

Materials used:
copics
Image~Softpencil~painting eggs with Michu and Ratiny
DP~American Craft
SU! cardstock
Stamping Bella donuts
random ribbon
glitter brad
SU! border punch

Challenges entered:
Tuesday Morning Sketches~sketch #39
Digital Tuesday Challenges~ #52~scrap it~my ribbon is from my scraps pile
Softpencil Challenge~Ribbons and Bows

Tiddly Inks and Challenge #24

2010-03-31T04:40:00.000-04:00

It was my turn to host our challenge for our blog group and this is what I required:

That's right...we are going to be making an easel card for this challenge. I promise you this card is super easy to make. I know it looks hard but once you see the tutorial you'll realize just how simple it is...that is why we are doing this challenge...people think something is hard then try it and realize how easy and beautiful it is!!! So....here is the tutorial......easel card

But that's not all.....we are also going to make this a recipe challenge too.....
so you will need to include on your card
1. thing that glitters
2. ribbons
3. layers (at least)...so layer that card up!!!
4. colors...colors on your image, on your DP, on the ribbon whatever...just as long as there are 4 different colors on your card!

I think the girls wanted to kill me when they saw EVERYTHING they needed to do for this challenge but hey...it's a challenge for a reason right??!! LOL! I even sweetened the pot and said I would give out 2 prizes instead of just one if everyone in our group participated!!! So we shall see if we had 100% participation!

Also......I am trying out for a new DT team with Tiddly Inks...do you see my image? She is from Tiddly Inks and she is adorable...the voting for the DT team is open to anyone soooooooooo....I would LOVE your vote if of course you think I deserve it. You can pick your top 5 choices...I'd love to be one of them! Here is the link
Tiddly Inks Challenge Blog
You can vote until the 10th of April....I hope I see lots of #11's in the comments section...#11 is the number of my card!!! ;)

Materials used:
Image~Tiddly Inks
Ribbon~SU!
Stickles
Copics
MS edge punch
SU! bracket and sentiment
MS circle cutter
SU! CS
DP~can't remember

Challenges entered:
Papertake Weekly~open challenge
Crafty Ann's Challenge Blog~make something for someone special to you~I know just who this is going to~
Pollycraft Monday Challenges~#36 sprakly things
Creative Card Crew~#46~going dotty

The Greeting Farms Battle of the DT's!!!

2010-03-30T04:48:00.000-04:00

There is a wonderful competition being hosted by The Greeting Farms that allowed us to pick teams and for the next 5 weeks we would be considered DT teams and would need to create a project each week. This week was "retro" with a color scheme. The way you get to move on to the next round is by the amount of comments/votes you have under your project so I'm asking you all to go over to this thread....register and VOTE for us! And while you are there...you can vote up to 3 times...vote for our "sisters" Our name is The Stampin Farmettes Sisters' and our "sister" team is The Stampin Farmettes....here is my project for the week....I was the first to go so please vote for me....I don't want to let our team down by being kicked out the first week!!!

http://www.thegreetingfarm.com/galleria/showgallery.php?cat=823

This post will stay at the top till Wednesday....you have till Tuesday to vote so run on over NOW!!!

Please be sure to scroll down to see other posts....Sunday and Monday!

Critters and Paper Jewels Blog hop!!

2010-03-29T05:11:00.000-04:00

Today is the BIG day everyone....today is the joined blog hop with The Critter Sketch Challenge Blog and our fabulous friend Paper Jewels!
Here are the details of the blog so pay close attention!
1. To be entered in to win the prizes you MUST participate in the entire hop AND do the sketch challenge over at the Critter Challenge Blog.
2. Make sure you hop ALL the way through and leave comments on each of the blogs
3. Be sure to "find" which blogs have an Easter egg on them...those blogs are offering blog candy
4. The hop is all day today and you will have until tomorrow, Tuesday 10am EST to link your creation to the Critter Sketch Challenge Blog to be eligible for the prizes.

Materials used:
Image~Mimosa Umbrella
SU! cardstock
SU! Dp
copics
stickles
Basic Grey half pearls
MS circle cutter
Tacky Tape
glitter
spica pens

You should have come from
Darsie Bruno – http://www.craftingwithdarsie.blogspot.com/
And you will go to
Jacquie Kerevan - http://stampingandscrapbookingadventures.blogspot.com/
IF YOU DID NOT come from Darsies page then start at the beginning
Critter Challenge - http://critterchallengeblog.blogspot.com/

Critter Challenge!

2010-03-28T05:53:00.002-04:00

We're mixing things up for you all a bit this week. We are having our challenge for the Critter Sketch Challenge Blog on Sunday instead of Monday this week because...............we will be having a wonderful blog hop for you all tomorrow!! We are partnering with Paper Jewels so please be sure to hang out with all of us and enjoy the blog hop....details will be up in the morning!
This is our last week with our fabulous sponsor Paper Jewels so stay tuned to find out who our sponsor is for the month of April! So hop on over to The Critter Blog and join us this week for our wonderful sketch challenge.
This by the way is Mimosa Cafe! Which of course can be bought at the Paper Jewels store!! So stop on by there too!

Materials used:
Image~Mimosa Cafe~Paper Jewels store
Sentiment~not sure
Copics
Kaisercraft jewels
SU! cardstock
Stickles
Brad
DP~not sure

Challenges entered:
Cupcake Craft Challenges~Food and Drink~Mimosa Cafe is perfect for this challenge!

Paper Jewels Saturday

2010-03-27T09:59:00.000-04:00

The next couple days are going to be full of projects. I have today my Paper Jewels card for you, tomorrow I will be posting my Critter card and then on Monday is the Critter/Paper Jewels blog hop! So please come by often and remember to come hop with us on Monday!
My husband came home today. Of course he's on the couch sleeping right now. He had a very long flight from Texas back here to Germany. I don't know how he can sleep with the kids yelling though!! LOL! So I am taking some time to update my blog before he wakes up and I get to spend some time with him. Oh...he bought me a mini sewing machine....I'm sooooo excited!!! Plus he found me a memento pad for coloring my images. At first I thought that the staz on was working fine until I started to use lighter shades and color the skin and then I found out that the black ink smears into the colors...like you can see on poor Mimosa's face. Digital images I have no problem with but regular images...ugh...frustrating but he got me the new pad and I'm excited about that too!!!
This by the way is Mimosa with Tulip. She is soooo darling. I have been having some coloring issues lately so I decided to do some paper piecing on her dress to make my life easier! And tulips are my favorite...I just love them and can't wait for mine to bloom out front...they are slowly coming up...I look every day to see just how tall they are getting!
I hope you all have a great weekend and I will with my husband! Thanks for stopping by!

Materials used:
Image~Mimosa with Tulip
DP~SU!
Ribbon~making memories
Sentiment~Papertrey
Brads~My Minds Eye~aren't they totally lush?? That's their name too!!!
Pearls~K&Company
circle punch
cricut
scallop punch

Challenges entered:
Fab & Funky challenges~#19 it's all about the technique~paper piecing for me
Inspirational card sketches~#59~sketch
Color Throwdown~#85

Everybody MUST see.....

2010-03-24T11:01:00.001-04:00

This is completely and totally off the mark for crafting but a friend just posted this on FB and I just had to share it! This man is totally awesome...read his blog!!! Very inspirational!! And to think he ran past our base yesterday and I didn't even know it...I would have gone up and cheered him on as he passed by!

http://pacetrek.blogspot.com/