Country Life in the Big City

moving.......

2010-10-01T17:19:00.003-05:00

Well, I've needed to do this for a really long time, because my daughter accidentally messed up my Google/Blogger log-in......so I've been using her's for a long time......and needing to move my blog to my own log-in, etc.

I'm hoping that this will inspire me to post and share more, plus give my blog a much-needed face-lift.

So please change your links to this new one and follow me there, because I sure would hate losing you all. :-)

Here is my new address:

http://countrylifemom.blogspot.com/

I hope to see you there soon and please excuse the dust as I do some cleaning.... :-)

Finally back and Frosted Banana Bars.....

2010-08-25T15:36:00.004-05:00

Well, it's been forever since I've shared anything here. Lots have happened, some not so great (actually quite terrible) and some awesome.....isn't that life? I'm hoping to get back into posting here. I'm finally getting my creativity back and have lots of projects that I'm working on.

But for now, I'll share with you a recipe for an awesome dessert bar that I made today. This is one of those recipes that copies went around of when I was working several years ago. We used to have big pot lucks for lunch a couple of times a year and these bars were made one time. They are so good and I had some bananas sitting around that desperately needed to be turned into something yummy, so this is what I made. I hope you enjoy!

One quick note......this is supposed to be baked in a 15"x10"x1" baking pan and I don't have one, so I used my baking dish that was a bit smaller. Needless to say, when the 25 minutes of cooking time was up, my bars weren't even close to being done. I ended up cooking them at least 15-20 minutes longer. So, if you are using a smaller pan, be sure to add some time and just keep watching them until they are done. :-)

Frosted Banana Bars:

1/2 cup butter, softened

1-1/2 cups sugar

2 eggs

1 cup sour cream

1 teaspoon vanilla

2 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon salt

2 ripe bananas, mashed (about 1 cup)

Frosting:

1- 8 oz. package cream cheese, softened

1/2 cup butter, softened

2 teaspoons vanilla

3-3/4 to 4 cups confectioners' sugar

In a mixing bowl, cream butter and sugar. Add eggs, sour cream and vanilla. Combine flour, baking soda and salt; gradually add the creamed mixture. Stir in bananas. Spread into a greased 15"x10"x1" baking pan. Bake at 350F degrees for 20-25 minutes or until a toothpick inserted near the center comes out clean. Cool.

For the frosting, in a mixing bowl beat cream cheese, butter, and vanilla. Gradually beat in enough confectioners' sugar to achieve desired consistency. Frost bars. Store in the refrigerator.

Yum.

Crafty Friday - beaded crosses

2010-05-14T16:25:00.004-05:00

Well, I know that I said yesterday that Friday was going to be for paper crafts, but I think that I need to change that to general crafting! :-) I have been given the honor of helping to make the gifts for my daughter's 8th grade class. She goes to a small Catholic school, so there are about 60 kids in her grade. The other day I was given the supplies to make beaded crosses that will be given to the children next week at their Graduation Breakfast. I'm not sure who came up with the idea, but these are too pretty to not share!

First of all, look at all of these beautiful beads!

I just love all of the different colors. I am afraid to work on this project, because it might get me hooked on beading and I DO NOT need another hobby! lol But, all of these colors and playing with these beads really looks like so much fun! I have to admit that I'm one of those people who has to keep certain things separated, like all of my food in it's own pile on my plate, things that are similar grouped together just so......so that's why I came up with using one of GG's plastic plates to hold all of the beads. It works perfect for the job that I'm doing!

And here is what the completed beaded cross looks like......

The cross is made from wrapping 24-guage beading wire around two toothpicks that are in the shape of a cross. I honestly haven't made any of the actual crosses, they were given to me already made. But, I was told that this is how they were made. You just keep wrapping and wrapping until all of the toothpick is completely covered with wire. Then you start wrapping more wire on and adding beads here and there and wrapping the wire around the beads to secure them into place. It's quite easy and very pretty! As I'm making them this weekend, I will snap some photos so that I can share a tutorial on how to make them. :-) I just thought that these were too pretty to not share with you all today! And, it's what's crafty at my house today.....that and more crochet washcloths! lol I am so addicted to making them. They are so easy and a great way to help me unwind after a long day.

I hope you all had a wonderful Friday....it was so beautiful here today and an absolutely perfect day for daughter's Field Day at school! Happy Friday!

A new beginning.....

2010-05-13T12:25:00.003-05:00

I've been wanting to do things different here for awhile and I think that nows the time! So, hopefully you will enjoy these changes and the information I want to share with you all.

To make things easier, I am going to start having daily themes for my posts. Things are pretty busy here right now with the end of the school year approaching. I have two children graduating this year. One from high school and one from 8th grade! So, I'm not sure that I will be able to share a post each day until things calm down a bit. But, here is what I've come up with as to what I would like to share with you and when.

Sunday- Living the Liturgy

One of the things that I really want to start doing is to incorporate the daily rhythms of the Church into our daily lives. I plan on sharing the ideas, activities and cooking that I have chosen for that week each Sunday.

Monday – Meal Plan Monday

Our weekly menu with some recipe shares and links.

Tuesday – Time with Tots

Another goal that I have is to start doing more organized and planned activities with my little 2 (almost 3!) year-old daughter, GG, so I will be sharing those ideas with you each Tuesday.

Wednesday- Sharing the wealth....

One of the ways that I de-stress at night is to surf the internet for fun blogs with craft project and recipes. I'll share my discoveries with you on Wednesdays!

Thursday- A Homemakers Tale

A time for me to share how I'm trying to make the most out of being a country girt at heart living in the city and all things homemaking!

Friday- Papercraft Projects

I'll show you any scrapbooking layouts, cards and other paper crafting projects that I've completed that week.

Saturday- Sew Wonderful

I'm trying to do more sewing (of all types!) so I keep you posted on what I'm working on and the finished product!

I hope that you enjoy these changes that I plan on making and if you like what you see, please share my link with your friends. Please let me know what you think and I look forward to sharing with you all!

a little softie bunny.....

2010-05-08T18:47:00.006-05:00

So, I stumbled upon this super, cute (and FREE!) pattern for a softie bunny and I knew I wasn't going to be happy until I sewed one up for myself. I raided my fabric scraps and found some flannel check fabric and some cute blue floral fabric and in no time I had a sweet little bunny! If you decide to make this for a baby, I would use thread and sew the eyes, like I did the nose and not use buttons or anything that could be pulled off and swallowed.

I had to give her some sort of accessory, so I decided to make a fabric yo-yo and embellished ith with a button and some "leaves" that I made from ribbon. Now we just need to think of a good name for her........any suggestions? :-)

Homemade Produce Wash

2010-04-26T17:19:00.004-05:00

I've been using this all-natural produce wash for a little while now. I made up a new batch of it today, so I took some pictures and thought I would share. It's super easy and WAY CHEAPER than the stuff that you buy at your grocery store.

Homemade Produce Wash:

1 spray bottle + one recycled jar

1 cup water

1 cup vinegar

1 tablespoon baking soda

20 drops grapefruit seed extract - (I get mine at Whole Foods)

Put the water and vinegar in a deep pitcher or big bowl. This is why...........

When you add the baking soda, cool science happens! lol The baking soda and the vinegar react and foam up like crazy. I was using an 8-cup measuring cup and it came very close to foaming over the top.

After the foam goes away, stir well. It will probably foam up again, but not as badly as the first time. Fill up your spray bottle and if you have any left over, pour it into your recycled glass jar. Be sure to label your jar, so you know what's inside!

To use, spray your produce and let it sit on your counter or in a bowl for 5 to 10 minutes. Rinse well and eat!

For small produce, like grapes and blueberries, I place the fruit in a bowl, spray the fruit real well and mix them up a bit with my fingers, spraying on more wash here and there. Then I let them sit and rinse.

I found this recipe at Recipezaar and I think it works great!

Game Face - layout

2010-04-18T11:30:00.004-05:00

First of all, I have to say this.........

GO BIG RED!!!!!!!

Okay, now that I have that out of my system....lol I also have to say that the photo of my kids on the second page (acting like the statues) is by far one of my most favorite photos of my kids ever! lol I have a copy of this on my fridge and it makes me laugh every time I look at it. It's great for those times when I'm grumpy. lol This layout covers a couple of challenges. It was my submission at Practical Scrappers for their Bling Challenge that was last week (yep, I'm late on sharing mine here on my blog!) and it's also for a sketch challenge at a great Yahoo! Group called ScrapFromYourStash. The sketch is by Shawn at Nuts About Sketches. She has tons and tons of awesome sketches, so be sure to visit her blog to see them!!!!

Things are still crazy here.....I'm averaging one page a week......which I guess is better than zero! I'm trying to pull out all of my winter clothes right now, pack them up and move in my summer clothes. I need to do that for little GG, too, so I have quite a bit of clothes to go through!

I hope to share more with you soon!

Practical Scrappers Card Sketch

2010-04-10T14:31:00.004-05:00

The current card sketch at Practical Scrappers is just awesome! I really enjoyed making this Thank You card.....(I need to mail it! I keep forgetting!). Be sure to go here to see the sketch and all of the other amazing cards that have been made following this sketch.

For my card, I chose to use a small doily for the main circle. I'm not sure if you noticed, but the scalloped-rectangle piece of paper is a scrap left over from the paper that I used on the layout I shared a few days ago. The title is stamped.....I'm embarrassed to say that I have had that Stampin'Up! stamp set for probably 8 years and I just now cut that stamp out to use on this card. For the flower, I punched out 4 different sized flowers and curled up the edges with a small, wooden skewer. Then I added fine glitter to the edges with some liquid glue and added a small rhinestone in the center. I am really having fun making these 3-dimensional flowers!

I hope you all have a wonderful, crafty day!

Markers Challenge @ Practical Scrappers

2010-04-06T09:33:00.006-05:00

Good morning! This weeks challenge at Practical Scrappers is to use your markers! I have had the full set of Stampin' Up! makers for many, many years and I must say I can't believe they still work so wonderfully. I guess that's a bad sign that I really haven't been using them that often. ;-) So, I was really excited to see this weeks challenge. I have been trying to use them more and I think that I'm actually really enjoying all of these markers for the first time since I bought them ages ago!

I really wanted to challenge myself and think of something that I hadn't done before. So, I decided to color on some thick, cotton "ribbon". I'm not sure what this stuff is called, but it's not ribbon, it's more like yarn or flat cotton twine. Anyway, I decided to use blue and pulled out three shades of blue markers. I put some Mono Adhesive on both ends of the twine and stuck it to my work surface, so it wouldn't move around while I colored on it. Then, I just started making lines of different thicknesses for each color and followed the pattern all of the way across the ribbon. Easy as pie and it matches my layout colors perfectly!!!! :-) If you click on the picture, you can see a bigger version of it....I forgot to take a close-up of the colored twine!

Obviously, this layout is about our love of Whole Foods. lol We go there a little too often.... ;-) It can be pricey, but I find that their 360 house-brand is quite reasonable. Really, all that I buy there right now is organic produce, some beauty/bath items, Keifer and organic coffee. That's my one, big splurge. Organic coffee. lol My little one loves Whole Foods, too, especially their cookies! I know that people like to call it "Whole Paycheck" but I really do find that if you buy what's on sale, use coupons, and buy their house-brand, that it's not too bad. Plus, I'd rather pay the extra for things that I know are better for me and my family.....but that's an entire different topic! ;-)

I hope you all join in on this challenge at Practical Scrappers! Please visit us there, check out all of the amazing projects and add your own to Mr. Linky!!!!! It's a wonderful place with wonderful people and a great place to get inspiration to use the supplies that you have!

The Joy of the Lord......card

2010-03-30T12:32:00.002-05:00

I made this card last month and I forgot to share it with you all. This was for a dear aunt of mine who lost her mother, who was a wonderful lady indeed.

For this card, I stamped the verse in an olive green and then I went over each letter with a blender pen that I rubbed in some olive green marker. I don't have one of those neat paper edge de-stresser tools, so I carefully rubbed an Exact-O knife along the edge of the paper and the green mat. Oh, I stamped the verse on water color paper and don't tell my husband about my dangerous use of that Exact-O knife! It scares him to watch me cut an apple, because I hold it in my hand, like my mom always did. Anyway. ;-) I used a Versamark pad and stamped the small flowers on the base of the card.

Now for the fun part. The flowers! At first I had this great idea to use my flower punch, but punches and tissue paper DO NOT MIX! lol So, I used my Big Shot and a flower die and cut out several flowers and that worked well. I did have to use my tweezers to pull the separate flowers apart, because I ran several layers through my die-cutter at once. This takes a very light hand, because the flowers are very fragile. (Does anyone else say "fra-gee-lay" when they type "fragile"? lol) After I had each flower laying out on my table, I used a liquid glue pen and carefully glued each punched flower on top of each other until the flower was a many layers as I wanted. I used my tweezers for this part, too. I made two different sized flowers, but each flower is made up of the same sized flower, if that makes any sense. ;-) I added a rhinestone in the center of each flower to finish them off.

The leaves are punched from green card stock. Then, I placed them on top of a piece of craft foam and used my embossing tool to burnish the center of the leave and to shape each leaf so that it looked more real and dimensional. I'm not sure if I can describe what I did.....maybe I should do a tutorial for you some time! I added some ribbon, because I love ribbon and this one matched my card perfectly, so I had to use it. ;-)

I've been making a lot of cards lately and it's been a great way for me to do some creative therapy.....now to work on some layouts!

Take care!

Rub-On Challenge @ Practical Scrappers!

2010-03-30T12:15:00.005-05:00

There are always lots of great things going on at Practical Scrappers and I sure do hope that you make some time to stop by to see all of the fabulous projects that are shared there!

This weeks challenge is to use Rub-On's! I don't have many and it took some rooting around in my stash to find some, but I finally stumbled upon a sheet of rub-on words that all focused on "love". So, I thought of the stamps that I have seen where the words are all fitted together to make a shape and I thought that would be a great thing to try to do with these rub-on's! I crossed my fingers and started rubbing each word on, one by one, and just hoped that it would turn out into a rectangle shape. It worked great and I'm really thrilled with my card!

For the flowers, I punched a large flower from three shades of blue, a medium flower in pink, and a small flower in light pink. I crumpled them all up and the unfolded them a bit, stacked them on top of each other and used a small, flower-shaped brad to hold them all together.

Please stop by Practical Scrappers to see all of the great inspiration there for using rub-on's! Join in on the fun and leave a link to share your projects! We sure would love to have you visit!

Crochet Laptop Cozy

2010-03-30T10:17:00.005-05:00

As soon as I saw this tutorial for a crochet laptop sleeve, I knew that I had to make one for my new Mac! This was really easy and I honestly just kind of stitched away, kept putting it on my laptop to see if it was working, and then stitched some more. I added a stitch for a few rows at the beginning, so that it widened bit by bit and fit around the bottom nicely. This was pure luck that it turned out right! lol I haven't ever done anything like that before, so like I said, I just went with it and kept putting it on my laptop to see if it was working. This is a super easy project and the only really tough part about it is that you are crocheting with THREE skeins of yarn at once, so it does get a little bulky to work with because it starts getting a little heavy and you have to sit with three skeins of yarn in front of you. I actually set mine on the floor in front of me with the ends facing up that the yarn was coming from. I used a light yellow, light pink and then a darker pink of Red Heart brand yarn. One big, Super Saver skein of each color was enough for this project.

The end is sewn together, so that you have to slip the top flap over the edge of your laptop. This is nice because it protects the edges of your laptop and just looks a lot nicer anyway. I also stitched around the edge of the flap for two rows, instead of one, because I needed that extra length so that the edges that I needed to sew together fit together well.

Then I had to embellish it, of course. lol I got the silly idea of putting my initial on it, so I tried crouching with silk ribbon. This was the first time I've ever tried this! I do like how it turned out! Then I made some yo-yo's from some scraps of fabric, added some old buttons and felt leaves. I decided to stitch around the leaves in a lighter color of green DMC floss, because I didn't like how the leaves looked plain, I think it was because the color of the felt was more of an olive tint and not green enough for this project. The light green floss adds that green color that I wanted and also gives the flowers neat dimension. I sewed all of the embellishments on with yarn.

I LOVE my cozy! lol

I hope you are all enjoying Spring! Isn't it wonderful????? :-)

Oh where, oh where have I been????

2010-03-23T09:15:00.008-05:00

Whew. Well, I've been gone for awhile, that's for sure. A lot of things have been going on, some good, some not so good..... Right now we have more sickness going through our house. I am so tired of germs! I can't wait until we can get outside and I can open up the windows and let some fresh air in. Spring is here, but here in Nebraska, Winter is fighting w/ both fists to stick around! We had more snow last Friday.....I am so tired of snow! lol

So here's a little photo journey of these past two months....

First of all......we went to Vegas! I was asked by a dear friend to take pictures at her niece's wedding, so me, my husband and our youngest flew out there on a Thursday morning and came home on Monday night. What a time that was! Wow. The wedding was beautiful and I was totally terrified because I had never done anything like that before (I'm not sure if I ever will again! So stressful! lol). I had a lot of fun playing tourist and took a ton of pictures. My favorite part was Fremont Street. Vintage Vegas is what I really wanted to see and it was something else. We also went to Red Rock Canyon and it was so beautiful! The craziest part about the whole trip was that we left home with several feet of snow and freezing temps and stepped off the plane to 50 degree weather, blue skies and green trees! Wow! That was so refreshing! We were totally covered with several feet of snow from the beginning of December until just a couple of weeks ago!

Lent had started while we were in Vegas and we couldn't wait until Friday, because Friday during Lent means: FISH FRIES!!!!

Yum! Oh boy.....this is the best fish ever....cajun spiced....all you can eat. lol We have really enjoyed going to Fish Fries every Friday during Lent this year. It's an evening full of wonderful fellowship and amazing food!

How totally fun is this cake batter? I needed to make some cupcakes for a benefit dinner at church and since St. Patrick's day was close, I decided to make these fun cupcakes. I found the recipe at Real Mom Kitchen. Oh wow! They are SO GOOD! The frosting is so yummy! These were gobbled up really quick. I had to make extra so that we could have some for ourselves. My kids always get on to me, because I bake all sorts of yummies for bake sales and such and never make extra to have at home. lol So, this time I made a double batch and kept a pan of cupcakes for ourselves.

Aren't they fun?????

Now the really fun part. lol Like I already said, we have had TONS OF SNOW! I mean, TONS! And, now we're paying the price of having our roads snow covered for 2 months. We have potholes like nothing I've ever seen before! I'm talking pot holes that are like the Grand Canyon! Look at this:

Isn't that horrible? And, it gets better. So far we have had 2 flats and a broken drive shaft from hitting a pot hole! You just can't miss them. You can try, but you will either hit another one or hit a car beside you. It's crazy! Driving is pretty stressful and you can't take your eyes off the road or you'll hit one!

So, that's pretty much what's been going on here. Well, the things that I've gotten pictures of. lol I haven't been able to do much scrapping or any crafting at all. But, I did get one fun project done and I'll share that in another post. It's a crochet laptop sleeve and it's pretty neat! I also started new sewing project last night that I'm really excited about and I'll share more about it soon.

I hope you all are doing well and that you are starting to feel the wonderful wakening of Spring! We actually have blue skies today. Something that we haven't seen much of for the past 4 months! Talk about depressing weather here! loll I'm so ready for green grass, green trees and to start getting my hands dirty in our new garden that we're planting this year.....Come on Spring!!!! ;-)

Flowers challenge at Practical Scrappers

2010-02-16T01:29:00.005-06:00

This weeks challenge at Practical Scrappers is to use flowers! I'm really sick, but wanted to quickly share two projects where I have used flowers.......

For my layout I punched out several flowers and added them around my journaling....

For my card, I added a crochet flower that I had accidentally made while trying to make a round dish cloth. lol I really messed up following the directions, but ended up with this and I knew that I had to use it on a card or layout. Silly, I know, but I think it looks kinda cute!

I hope you all are doing well......I started feeling sick yesterday and it hit me fast and hard. I tried to get some sleep tonight but just couldn't, so here I sit at 1:38 a.m. Ugh......I hate bad, head colds! Take care........ :-)

Card Sketch at Practical Scrappers

2010-02-15T13:23:00.004-06:00

Here is this weeks card sketch at Practical Scrappers!

And here is what I did with it......

I stamped the title and colored it in w/ a blender pen and markers. I hand-cut the hearts from some scraps of felt and then did a simple stitch around the edges with brown DMC floss. Kinda fun, huh? lol I think I'll try making some other shapes from felt, too.....like flowers!

We would love for you to play along and show us your creations using this sketch, so be sure to go to Practical Scrappers and post a link to your card on the Mr. Blinkie for this weeks card sketch.....you will have to scroll down a bit to get there!

Bake Sale Madness - Valentine's edition - pt 3

2010-02-10T01:06:00.000-06:00

Here is the last thing that I made for the bake sale this past weekend. Cookie Pops. These were A LOT of work! lol It took me 3 days to finish these. I made the cookies one day, decorated them the next, then packaged them on the third. These cookies need a full day to sit after the glaze has been put on them. The glace icing needs plenty of time to dry, especially if you are going to package them in bags, like I did. But, WOW!!!! Oh my gosh! These are the cookies that I drool over whenever I go to our local bakery. I always buy an iced sugar cookie. ALWAYS! lol And, now I know how to make them. It's all in the icing, I tell ya. That's what really makes these cookies taste so awesome!

I used the recipes and instructions from the Our Best Bites website. I have to tell you that this recipe site is AWESOME!!!! Be sure to sign up to get their updates! The recipes and ideas shared here are the best!

Here are the links for you:

Valentine Sugar Cookie Pops Tutorial
Sugar Cookie Recipe
Glace Recipe and Tutorial

The biggest struggle that I had with making these is PATIENCE! lol I don't have much. Actually, my Mom has always told me that I inherited all of my patience from my dad and he didn't have any. lol But, you have to be patient with the icing, make sure it's set well, etc. I wasn't patient. I went around each heart with the thicker icing and didn't wait long enough for that outline to dry well. So, when I went to fill in the cookie w/ the thinner icing, it all ran off of the edges. At first I was really upset, but then I decided to just go with it and I started drizzling pink and red icing all over the cookies and off the edges, instead of trying to have the icing perfectly on top of each cookie. The other thing that I will do next time, is to use two colors that have a high contrast in them. I used pink and red and they looked pretty, but the two colors we so similar, the cookies just didn't pop like I wanted them to. While I used up some extra icing that wasn't colored, I covered the cookies in white and then drizzled red icing on top. Now that really popped and looks so awesome!!! You can see them in the bottom left corner in the picture above. You also need space for these to sit out and dry. I am lucky enough to have a long counter top in my kitchen, because those cookies were sitting out for quiet awhile!

My kids are begging me to make more of these, because I only save a few for us to try. The rest went to the sale. They didn't like that very well! lol St. Patrick's Day is coming up........I just might have to make some shamrock cookies w/ glace icing! I hope you try these.....they really are YUMMY!!!!!!

Bake Sale Madness - Valentine's edition - pt 2

2010-02-10T01:05:00.000-06:00

How fun are these? This is another goodie that I made for the bake sale and perfect for Valentine's Day!

I found that the easiest way to press each layer into the pan was to lay a piece of wax paper on top of each mixture and then press. That way the cereal/marshmallow mixture doesn't stick to your hands. I tried buttering my hands and that didn't work as well as using wax paper.

Neapolitan Krispie Bars-

1 pkg (10 oz) large marshmallows - I just divided them up evenly into 3 piles
3 Tlbs. butter, divided
2 cups Cocoa Krispies cereal
1/2 cup miniature semisweet chocolate chips
4 cups Rice Krispies cereal, divided
1/2 cup strawberry jam
5 drops red food coloring, optional

In a large saucepan, combine a third of the marshmallows and 1 Tlbs. butter. cook and stir over medium-low heat until melted. Remove from the heat; stir in Cocoa Krispies and chocolate chips. Press into a greased 11x7 inch dish.

In a large saucepan, combine a third of the marshmallows and 1 Tlbs. butter. Cook and stir over medium-low heat until melted. Remove from the heat; stir in 2 cups of the Rice Krispies. Press into dish over chocolate layer.

In a large saucepan, combine remaining marshmallows and 1 Tlbs. butter. Cook and stir over medium-low heat until melted. Remove from heat; stir in jam and food coloring. Stir in 2 cups Rice Krispie cereal. Press into the dish. Cool. Cut into bars.

Here is how I packaged them up for the bake sale. I placed each bar on top of a square of wax paper before placing them in the bag.

Yummy!!!!

Valentine's Day Card - crystal glaze hearts

2010-02-10T01:01:00.005-06:00

Well, this photo sure doesn't do this card justice. lol I had actually stamped these hearts to use on the card with the colored brads, but it just wasn't working out how I wanted it to, so I set them aside and ended up with that card done totally different then I had planned. I really didn't like how these stamped hearts looked. My ink is starting to get a little dry and they just weren't rich, red hearts like I wanted. But, I just can't throw anything away! Yes, I have it that bad. I was determined to use those hearts because there was no way I was going to toss them. So, I ended up getting my markers out and I went to work coloring. I rubbed the brush tip of my marker on one of my acrylic blocks for my unmounted stamps. Then, I took my blender pen and picked up some ink and colored in the white areas in each heart. After that, I went around the edges with red and tried to shade the bottom of each heart in a bit. For some reason, I decided to cover each heart with some crystal glaze to make them stand out a bit. And, since I've been a glitter freak lately, I sprinkled each heart with some fine glitter. Like I said, this photo does not do this card justice! It's hard to see the areas that I colored in and the glaze looks cloudy. We actually have sunshine coming in our windows today and it's causing quite a glare on my hearts! I can't complain either because we have had almost no sunshine since the beginning December. All of these cloudy, gloomy days have really gotten me down. It is so wonderful to see blue skies right now!

Valentine's Day Card - coloring your brads

2010-02-10T01:00:00.001-06:00

Here's a card that I made for the brad challenge at Practical Scrappers. It's funny, because this card isn't anything like what my original idea was! I actually used the images that I had stamped for this card to make another card with. Crazy how that happens! lol

I have some alcohol inks that I hadn't ever used and I honestly don't know anything about them or all that they can do. But, I wanted to color my brads red! My embossing gun broke, so I couldn't cover them w/ embossing powder......I tapped them in some red Ancient Page ink, but I didn't know if that would every dry.....so then I remembered my alcohol inks! Luckily, I had some red, so I put a couple of drops on a metal lid and dipped the tops of the brads in the ink until they were covered. Then I stuck the ends in a piece of thick foam and let them dry over-night. I was so happy that it worked! lol Like I said, I don't know a think about all that these inks can do and I'm sure that a lot of you already knew that this would work. I really need to do some research on these, because I know that they are a great tool just sitting in my drawer unused. The stamped image is colored in with my Stampin'Up! markers and a blender pen.

An easy card for one of my special Valentine's!!!!! ;-)

Bake Sale Madness - Valentine's edition - pt 1

2010-02-10T00:53:00.006-06:00

Those of you who have been visiting me since October might remember my crazy bake sale frenzy. lol If not, be sure to go here to read (and see!) all about it here and here. ;-) Well, I did it again. I guess I need to just come out and say it. I'm a bake sale over-achiever. lol I just can't help it. The sale was being held to help my daughter's 8th grade class raise money for the gift that they will be giving to their school/church. So, this is a big thing and I wanted to help out as much as I could.....lol I can bake. So, boy did I ever bake! So, here we go w/ Part 1 of my Valentine edition of bake sale madness!!!!

Candy Cane Pops

I have two things to say about these. EASY and DARLING!!!!!! Oh my gosh. These were SO EASY!!!! I wish that I had more candy canes, but I only had enough stashed away to make about 14 of these. I had hidden a box of mini candy canes back in December and had forgotten about them. My little Gracie LOVES them, so I had to keep them out of her site or she would have been wanting one all of the time! lol I can tell you for sure that I will not forget about this recipe when December rolls around. I am planning on buying boxes and boxes of mini candy canes so that I can make tons of these. You could even use Christmas sprinkles and decorate them as Christmas treats! I just LOVE these!!!!! You can find out how to make them at the Pleasant Home site. I accidentally found this blog and I am in total love with it already!

So, this was the easiest thing that I made for this round of bake sale madness.....now on to Part 2! Stay with me! It keeps getting yummier and yummier!!!!

Crochet Valentine Envelope

2010-02-10T00:38:00.003-06:00

So how totally cute is this????? I made this the other night while my cookies were baking in the oven..... It is so easy and SO CUTE! You can find the free pattern at Lion Brand Yarn. You do need to be a member to see their free patterns. Just search under "envelope" and you'll see this pattern. Like I said, it's super easy! I have mine sitting on my table right now on top of a Valentine's table runner. I think it would look cute with some vintage Valentine's stuffed inside or even some flowers...... I'm new to following patterns and I didn't have any problems. I did have to look up a stitch or two when making the heart, but they have a wonderful learning center on the Lion Brand Yarns site as well!

These would be fun to fill with goodies for your children, a special friend, co-worker or even a teacher! Too sweet!!!! I just love Valentine's Day! ;-)

Easy-Peasy Valentines

2010-02-09T12:00:00.005-06:00

I wanted to share these super-easy, home-made Valentine's with you. I absolutely LOVE Valentine's Day. Well, I love all of the fun, crafty ideas out there, the reds, the pinks.....everything! lol I am so amazed w/ all of the fun projects that people are sharing all over the web. I wish that I had all of the time in the world to make them all! But, for now, I'm trying to save them and file them away in my Valentine's Day folder.

All that I did for these Valentine's was to measure the size of the wooden block that the stamp is on and I used this as my guide for cutting the card stock that the image will be stamped on. Then, I cut a mat out for each piece of card stock in red. Each image was stamped in black ink and then I used my set of Stampin' Up! chalks and a blender pen to color the images in. I have finally caved and I have started buying Copic markers and I had two shades of green, so I used them to color in the alligator. I have no idea how to use my new markers, but I fun playing with them and I'm anxious to learn all about how to properly shade. But, for now, it's okay for this fun, little alligator! I have to admit that I can do a pretty good job at shading with my set of Stampin' Up! markers and a blender pen.....and I probably really don't NEED to buy Copic markers.....but....(there's always a "but" isn't there? lol)....my 13 year old daughter is an amazing artist and she has been using my set of SU! markers. She almost always has them with her, so I guess it's time to let her use them and I'll start buying Copics here and there. So, that's how I'm justifying that. lol
Anyway. lol After I colored the images in, I adhered the colored image onto the red, card stock mat and then I used a medium-sized hole punch to punch out two holes for the sucker to slip through. Oh, before adding the sucker, I used a stamp that came with this set on the back that says, "Happy Valentine's Day! To:____________ From:_____________" This is an old Stampin'Up! set called "Animal Valentine's" that I bought years ago. I'm not sure if they still carry it in their catalog, but they might!

My daughter helped me make these one year to pass out to her class on Valentine's Day. She was in second grade and had a lot of fun coloring them it and putting the suckers on them. So, this would be a great project for your little ones!

Brad challenge at Practical Scrappers

2010-02-09T10:21:00.007-06:00

This weeks challenge at Practical Scrappers is to use brads! I had so many ideas running around in my head on how to use them for some samples, but I just didn't have the time this past week to work on much of anything crafty related. I did get one layout done, that I'm sharing with you today.

For my layout I put a brad in the top two corners of the patterned paper and then holding a strip of fabric on that's at the bottom edge of the patterned paper. I knew that I had to pep those brads up a bit, so I ended up putting a small, blue rhinestone on top of each brad to give them a bit a razzle-dazzle. lol This is a super-simple layout of my little Gracie when she had her first cold. She looked so pitiful. And, now that I'm sitting here looking at this layout, I forgot to add my journaling! I told you it's been a crazy week! lol Guess I had better go do that!
Please be sure to visit Practical Scrappers to see all of the amazing projects that are being posted by the design team and the wonderful people who submit their creations with Mr. Linky. All of the inspiration there is absolutely amazing! And please join in on the fun, too, and share your creations using brads this week!

Die-Cut Challenge @ Practical Scrappers

2010-02-02T00:40:00.005-06:00

Here is a card that I made for this weeks challenge at Practical Scrappers to use your die-cut machine or store-bought die-cuts. I used 3 different Cuttlebug dies and added some small rhinestones in the center of some of the flowers to jazz it up a bit. lol I stamped the phrase in black ink and then went over it with a light pink marker and blender pen.
I also made this bookmark that's created using the corner of an envelope. I have been wanting to share this idea for awhile, so I went ahead and did up a tutorial for you all. You can find it in the post below this one or just click here. I used a paisley die from Cuttlebug and cut out three colors of cardstock. Then, I mixed and matched the pieces to make colorful paisleys to decorate my bookmark.

I have more to share, but I'm buried under tons of Girl Scout Cookie paperwork right now! lol I need to be working on it, but I keep getting distracted by sharing new projects here and working on layouts. That's not good! So, off I go......time to work.....it's just 12:50 a.m.....eek. It's going to be a long night!

Envelope Bookmark w/ Tutorial

2010-02-01T19:46:00.006-06:00

Something on my mind....I -heart- Books

I've been wanting to share with you how to make these super-easy and totally fun bookmarks for quite awhile now. I made one for this weeks challenge at Practical Scrappers (which is using a die-cut machine of any type) so I decided to take pictures as I went along making it and now I can finally show you how to make them!

The base of the bookmark is made from the corner of an envelope. You can use any size, I have a business-sized envelope and a card-sized envelope pictured above. You can use regular-sized envelopes as well, but your bookmark will be smaller. These work the best if you know that you'll be using your bookmark in a small, paperback book. So, you might want to think about what size you need (how big or small your books are) before you start. For my bookmark, I used a business-size envelope.

Seal the envelope first. Then, make a cutting mark with pencil as shown above:

*business-size envelope mark at 3 3/4 inches at the top and at one side

*card-size envelope mark at 4 inches at the top and at one side

I'm sorry, I don't have the measurement if you use a regular envelope. Just measure the envelope and see how tall it is and make your marks about 1/8-1/4-inch smaller than your measurement.

Place the envelope in your paper cutter so that you can see the cutting mark lines. Center the lines in the center of your paper cutter and then cut the envelope. If you don't want to use a paper cutter or don't have one, simply draw a line from one pencil mark to the next and then cut. You can also draw the line and then cut it with your paper cutter. This helps if it's hard for you to see exactly where you need to cut your envelope.
You will end up with a triangle, that has one open side, like a pocket. I forgot to mention that you can sometimes make two bookmarks from one envelope, if it's long enough to cut the corners off of each side! This would also be a great recycling project. You could use junk mail envelopes, because we will be covering the envelope with paper and that would hide any printing, etc.
The next thing that I did was to figure out how I wanted to decorate my bookmark. You can do this first, of course, but I usually get my bookmark base done first and then I start pulling out things that I think I might want to use to decorate my bookmark with. Sometimes I already have an idea, but a lot of times I don't. This time I didn't, except that I knew I needed to use a die-cut for the Practical Scrappers Challenge and I was leaning towards using my paisley one. So, I pulled out my sticker binder first and started flipping through it. I knew that I wanted a word of some kind on there and I found this sticker w/ a Bible verse on it. I liked that it was about "hope" because I really need to be putting my hope and faith in God better, so that's when the rest of it came together. I started going through my paper scraps and found the paper (one pattern for the front and one for the back), then I went through my blue color drawer and found some paint swatches. I liked this one because the name of the paint was "Inner Harbor" and I thought that was pretty fitting for a bookmark about hope.....God is my Inner Harbor. Whatever you decide on, just be sure to think FLAT. You don't want to use buttons, brads, eyelets, Prima flowers, etc., because this will be too thick. You want you bookmark to be flat so that it lays nicely in your book and doesn't blemish or mark the pages of your book.
Next you need to cut your patterned paper to cover the base with. You can either measure it like you did above for the envelope, or place your base on the corner of the patterned paper and use it as a template to mark the patterned paper. Cut one triangle from each piece of patterned paper, or two of the same.....or just one for the front. You don't have to cover the back really, unless you want to! lol Adhere the patterned paper to the front and back (or just front) of the bookmark base. I use a glue runner and I run the glue all the way around all three sides, as close to the edge as I can. I don't like the paper to gap between the patterned paper and the envelope base, if that makes any sense. It also keeps it nice and smooth and stays together better....helps keep the edges nice and flat.

For this bookmark, I cut a piece of the patterned paper that I was using for the back that was about 1/2-inch thick and then cut along one edge with some scallop deco scissors. I then put it on the side of the triangle where the opening pocket is. Then, I turned it over and trimmed off the excess.

So, here is my finished bookmark. I really love how this one turned out!

Find Rest, my soul, in God alone; my hope comes from Him. - Psalm 62:5

And here are some other bookmarks that I have made as some more inspiration for you!

This is my spot
I made this one for my 13 year old daughter who has her nose in a book as much as I do....all of the time! lol

There is a time....for everything (Thomas Edison)
especially BOOKS

I hope you enjoyed this tutorial and that it all made sense! If you have any questions, please ask! I'll do my best to help! And, if you make one of these bookmarks, I would LOVE to see them! Share you link in a comment here!

Take care my friends and happy crafting!

some fun projects to share

2010-02-01T12:40:00.004-06:00

It has been so cold this winter and that means a freezing, cold mudroom for me. My scrapping area is in my mudroom and it's on a cement block. Can you say "Freezing Floor!"? lol Not to mention just freezing in there anyway. So, in order for me to not totally lose my mind (because I am one of those people who has to be creating something at all times or I go bonkers!) I've been crocheting up these way-cute wash cloths! I found the instructions at the design*sponge blog. I have made A LOT of them now and they are perfect because they are easy, fast and something that I can do while sitting on the floor while my little one plays. I even keep one in a small bag in my purse to work on while waiting in the parking lot for after-school pick-up or while GG is playing at the play area in the mall. Working on these little wash cloths have save my sanity this winter, because it's just been too cold to spend a lot of time in my scrap room working. And, these wash cloths are AWESOME to use! I absolutely LOVE mine! I have been using cotton dish cloths for awhile now that I bought from the store, but these are so much better. I switch them out every night, so that I have a clean one to use each day. My only suggestion would be to use a light-colored yarn. The first ones that I made were red and they bled in my dish water. These are made from 100% cotton so they do shrink a little and I have noticed the color fading a bit in the ones pictured here. Actually, the one on top is brand new and hasn't been washed. The rest have and you can tell that they are faded out some.
The other project that I did was this coffee cup cozy. This was my first, official knitting project! Oh my gosh. I can't tell you how hard it was for me to learn how to knit! I am totally left-handed and knitting and lefties just don't get a long. I tried and tried and tried, and just about pulled my hair out several times. I didn't have a problem understanding what I needed to do to make each stitch. My problem was getting my hands and fingers to do what they were supposed to do. It was awful! lol A friend suggested learning the "continental method" where you hold the yarn in your left hand. I found this book called "10-20-30 Minutes to Learn to Knit" by Leisure Arts at Joann Fabrics and got it because it shows how to do this method as well as the double-cast on, which I have read in several different places, is the best way to cast on your first stitches.
I found the pattern for this at Hobby Lobby in their yarn section. It was a free pamphlet from Bernat. You do have to be a member to view the pattern, but their membership is free and if you like to knit and/or crochet, they have a ton of wonderful (and free!) patterns there. This one uses their natural felting wool. It was really fun to work with. It's soft and fuzzy. lol After you finish the knitting, you have to wash it several times and let it dry to get the wool to felt. I did learn that it's a lot harder to felt wool in a high-efficiency washer because it doesn't get agitated enough to felt the wool well. So, mine isn't as felted as I would like, but I still LOVE my cozy. I keep it in my purse, so that I always have it with me. This was a great project for me to learn from, because it taught me how to knit, purl and increase.

If you make some wash cloths or a coffee cozy, please share! I'd love to see what you've created! Now I'm off to start a new cozy.....a surprise gift for a good friend and fellow coffee-lover! Happy Crafting!

Join me for some Sweet Talking!!!!

2010-02-01T11:15:00.002-06:00

We’re kicking off a month-long challenge at one of my favorite sites today … the Sweet Talk Journaling Challenge at Log Your Memory!

I hope you’ll come on over and check it out today … there will be an entire month of scrapbooking challenges with a focus on “real life” journaling, plus the chance to earn points and prizes along the way! And if you’ve never visited before, you’re in for a treat! We have a wonderful group of friendly, helpful scrapbookers just waiting to say hello and show you around!

Get started by visiting the Log Your Memory Blog HERE and get ready to journal your way to becoming a Log Your Memory Sweet Talker!

And be sure to tell them that Dianne sent you!

all right, all ready! - digi layout

2010-01-30T13:02:00.003-06:00

Here is a layout that I did today. I've had this one on my mind for quite awhile and I'm really glad that I was able to do this one today and mark it off my "things to scrap" list! I'm hoping to work on some other things today, too, but we'll see!

Journaling says:

I love the snow. Really I do, but I am so sick of snow right now, I could almost scream. Our first big snow storm started on December 8th and it snowed for days. The kids have missed 6 days of school (so far!). Little did we know, that was just the beginning. We had our next big snow storm during Christmas Break. Well, it was officially a blizzard and is now known as "The Christmas Blizzard of 2009”. I must admit, that having a huge snow storm during Christmas was pretty darn cool, especially when we were opening presents while big snowflakes were falling from the sky. But, now here we are at the end of January and we have had several more encounters with Old Man Winter and he hasn't been very polite! Joe has had to use the snowblower more than he ever has before and than goodness we have a big one! Gracie and I have been going through some serious feelings of cabin fever! She and I have made it to the mall as many times as we can, so that she can play in their play area, run around, and just be silly. It feels like we have spent every day of the past two months covered with a thick, dark cloud. The sunny days have been so rare. And, the roads are horrible! We went a long time with most roads being about half their width, so two lane roads were one and 4 lane roads were just two. There was so much snow and no place to put it all, so it came into the street for several feet on each side of the road. Now, when I hear that we are expecting more snow, I just cringe! I want to see the curbs on the street, I want to see the ground, I want to see something besides WHITE! But, like I said, I really do love the snow.....just not this much!
December 2009-January 2010

Digi supplies used:
Bundled Up! kit from Shabby Miss Jenn Designs
Frame - freebie from Joanne Brisebois Designs

The Blessing of Time - Faithfully Yours Challenge

2010-01-29T09:19:00.006-06:00

Hello and Happy Friday! I'm not sure where this week went, but it sure did go by fast! I am hoping to have a productive day today. I have a couple of projects that I need to finish up today. I have a closet in my dining room that's been turned into what I call my "craft closet" and I've been reorganizing it this week. It has most of my sewing supplies, some of my favorite cookbooks, my home organizing system (kind of like a master plan book, but it's in a file organizer.....I need to share about this, too!), my Bibles and prayer books, kid craft books and holiday books, Gracie's art supplies, and a big file crate that has all of the holiday and religious holiday activities, crafts, and recipes filed in it. Whew! That's a lot for one little closet! lol That's why I've been trying to reorganize it, so that I can use that space as best as I can.

Anyway, sorry I got off topic....lol..... I wanted to share with you my "The Blessing of Time" layout that I did for the "A Year of Blessings-2010" Challenge at Faithfully Yours. You can see the blog post talking about this theme by clicking here. It took me a little while to think of what I wanted to do for this theme until one night when I was laying in bed trying to go to sleep. I usually sit in bed and read for a couple of hours and sometimes it's hard for my brain to stop, so
that I can go to sleep. lol But, I was super tired and I think that sometimes God uses that time in me to chat. So, this popped into my head and I pretty much didn't have "a satisfied mind" (as my mom always says) until I worked on and finished the journaling for this layout. I must say, that God is pretty persistent with me and He has to be, because I am pretty stubborn. lol

Here's my layout and my journaling.....I think the journaling pretty much explains everything.... ;-)
Journaling:

Lately, it has become painfully obvious to me of how much the Lord has blessed me with the gift of time. It is painful, because I am realizing how much of this precious time I have actually wasted. I have wasted so many years......years that I should have spent with my eyes turned towards God, not my own desires and wants. Times when I let myself get caught up in the hustle and bustle of life and not willing to give up any of my “precious time” to spend talking to the Lord. I have been so selfish with this blessing of time that God has given to me. Here is the amazing part though. God’s time isn’t like mine and thank goodness for that! And, even better......God is always wanting to forgive me and to give me more time to work on my faults and short-comings when it comes to my ever-stumbling walk in faith. Well, now it is my time. My time to begin again. My time to pour my life, my love, my heart and soul towards God. It’s all that I can do. Stand back up, brush off my knees and get back on the narrow path that leads to the never-ending love and compassion that God is wanting to give to me. Oh Lord! How I need your help! I can’t do this without you. I know that now. I have failed so many times. Wasted so much time. Please help me use the blessing of time in ways that focus on You, help me remember to pray, help me remember to turn to you and scream and cry when I’m mad or upset, help me to humble myself and remember that only with your help all things are possible. I know in my heart that all of the other parts of my life will be so much better, just by spending time with you. Yes, there will still be hard times, but they will be so much easier to bear. Thank you, Lord. Thank you so much for this amazing blessing of TIME.

Humble yourselves, therefore, under God's mighty hand, that he may lift you up in due time
1 Peter 5:6

Digi supplies from:
Weeds & Wildflowers Design- Cherish Every Moment (all of layout except for the following)
paper leaf - Weeds & Wildflowers Design- A Better Me
Clock Face - Faithfully Yours

I can't even begin to tell you how much I enjoy doing faith-booking pages. My head gets so full of everything and goes a mile a minute sometimes. It can be hard for me to calm it down so that I can sit and have quality prayer time. But, when I am working on a layout, the creative-thinking part calms my mind and I am able to think so much clearer and then the idea comes t my mind and the words start to flow and before I know it, my scrapbook page has turned into my prayer and the time I spent working on it my prayer time. It's taken me quite a while to figure this out, but I know that God has known this about me since I was created because He created me this way for a reason. He blessed me with this grace of creativity and He knows that it's the best way for me to talk to Him.

And now it's time for me to be creative in a different way! lol My little one wants me to build a house out of blocks with her. lol I hope that you all have an amazing day today and are able to spend some time doing something creative and crafty!

Sneak peek of a new project!

2010-01-28T19:59:00.005-06:00

Lots of new things are happening at Faithfully Yours and I'm excited to be a part of it! For 2010, they are having a blessing challenge. Each month, they will be posting a new blessing and everyone is encouraged to create a layout about that blessing. At the end of the year, we all will have an amazing book all about our blessings!

Here is the cover to my "A Year of Blessings" book. I decided to do this project digitally, because I have a feeling that I will have a lot more journaling on these pages than photos. And, when I write, I write A LOT! lol So, this way I will be able to write like crazy and have plenty of room.

January's theme is "The Blessing of Time". Here's a sneaky, peeky of the layout that I created for this months theme. I will share the whole layout with you as soon as the newest e-zine from Faithfully Yours is released. It will be full of great layouts by other members of the Design Team at Faithfully Yours. Be sure to visit this post here at the Faithfully Yours Blog about the "A Year of Blessings 2010" Challenge. Click here to see the blog post about this months theme: TIME.

I am really looking forward to doing this challenge this year......I hope that you decide to join us, too! We all have so much to be thankful for and have received so many blessings!

Pattern Paper Challenge @ Practical Scrappers

2010-01-25T23:53:00.005-06:00

This weeks challenge at Practical Scrappers is to use 2 or more designs of patterned paper on your project. Well, I am totally addicted to patterned paper. I have tons of it. I collect it like fine china. lol I say that because a lot of it I treat like fine china! I file it away in my cabinet and leave it there, because it's so pretty, I just want to look at it all of the time....just like if it was china in my buffet. lol It's silly, I know, but true. Silly and sad! lol So, I've been trying really hard to not collect patterned paper like I used to. I only buy new patterned paper if it's for a specific project. My goal is to use up my massive stash of patterned paper that I have collected in the many, many years that I've been scrapbooking.

So, here's what I have to share:
For this layout, I used eight different squares of patterned paper. I keep all of my paper scraps organized by color in drawer units, so it was easy for me to look through my color drawers and pull out scraps of paper that worked well together for this layout. So easy and lots of fun! I've had such a scatter-brained week (more on that later!), I can't remember where I got the sketch idea for this layout from....sorry! This is my little Gracie during her first feeding of cereal. Such a cutie-a-tootie!

I'm sorry about the darkness of these next photos. I tried to take the photos at night, which wasn't too smart of an idea! The idea for this idea came from sheer desperation. lol My husband gets up a lot earlier than I do, and since I've had Gracie and I sleep in with her as long as I can, he has often left for work before I get up and moving in the mornings. So, almost every morning, I had to call him to see if my little Sophie doggie had been fed or not. Needless to say, this got really old. So I made a sign that I put on our fridge w/ a long magnet. The sign is double-sided....one side says "Sophie HAS been fed" and the other says "Sophie HAS NOT been fed". I used five different patterns of paper on this one. Another project made mostly from my scrap drawers. I also raided my ribbon box and used lots of different ribbons!

For the title, I used my Big Shot to make the letters for "Sophie" and "been fed" and my good, old-fashioned plastic letter template for "HAS" and "HAS NOT". The dog, dog house and food bowl are all stamped using an old Stampin'Up! stamp set that I've had forever. I used pastel chalks and a blender pen to color them in.

Now, before you ask, because I know your wondering......did my husband ever use this? Well. Nope. Not once! lol All of that work and it doesn't get any use at all! He just doesn't think to use it and I don't bother him about it. Oh well. It was a lot of fun to make and sure does look cute on my fridge beside her food bowl. And, I guess I do still bother him about it in a way, because every now and then I do have to call him and ask him if Sophie has been fed! lol

I totally forgot to share my projects for last weeks challenge at Practical Scrappers. It was to use embossing of any type. My daughter had her Confirmation this past weekend and all of last week was complete chaos! Let me just say that it is almost impossible to find a decent dress for a young lady to wear. One that isn't too short, too low, too sparkly, too slinky....too EVERYTHING! lol It took 3 days of shopping and going to almost every clothing store in town before we found something. But, it was so worth it! She looked absolutely beautiful and the ceremony and Mass was wonderful! I will try to share my projects from last week in a day or two.

Take care, my friends.....and happy crafting!

Practical Scrappers Blog Hop Winner!!!

2010-01-25T11:44:00.002-06:00

First of all, and most important.......I want to thank all of you who came and visited me over the weekend during the Practical Scrappers Designers Blog Hop! It was so wonderful to see so many new visitors here and to read all of your kind and wonderful comments! I really, really do appreciate you taking the time to visit and comment about my creations! Really! lol

Now, on to the fun part! I had a set of handmade cards up for grabs as a prize for commenting over the weekend on my Blog Hop post. There were 28 comments made and when I used the random number generator at random.org, it gave me this number: 24

Molly O'Bryon-Welpott said...

LOVE how unique you are with your challenges, great stuff and the towel exchange idea is something I am gonna be stealing for my BUNCO group I think:)

Congratulations Molly!!!!!!!!! Please send your mailing address to me at: diannef3@yahoo.com
I'll get your prize out to you as soon as I hear from you!

I invite you all to come back and visit me tomorrow, because I will be posting my submissions for this weeks challenge at Practical Scrappers which is to use two or more designs of patterned paper. I am quite obsessed with patterned paper, so I had no problem with this challenge! lol I also had a few people say that they would like to see how I made my bookmark that I shared in my Blog Hop post, so I am going to try really hard to get that tutorial done and shared by the end of this week. They are super easy and make great, little gifts! My daughter had fun making some for her girlfriends!

Happy Monday to you all and I hope you have a wonderful and crafty week!!!!

Toot Toot!!!! It's the Practical Scrappers Blog Hop!!!!

2010-01-22T00:08:00.003-06:00

Hi! I am so happy and excited to be a part of the Practical Scrappers Design Team Blog Hop! If this is your first time visiting me, I sure hope that you enjoy your stay here and thanks so much for stopping by. With February coming up on us very quickly, we were asked to feature a project about something that we love. So, here are some layouts about some of the things that I absolutely LOVE!!!
Coffee. Yep. I LOVE it!!!!! Just LOVE it!!!!! I try to not drink so much, but right now it's almost impossible. This cold, winter just begs for me to have my coffee pot full at all times. lol

My other true love is my iPod. I just can't live without it. I absolutely LOVE music and I always have my iPod by my side. I can't wait until I can get one that has more memory. I have so many songs and it's hard for me to pick what to have on my Pod. lol My main play list is titled "my pod rocks". lol Yep. I love my Pod!

This layout is about all of my most favorite things. I really had a blast putting this layout together, except after I was all done with it, I realized that I didn't have anything related to Coke-a-Cola. I am a tried-and-true Coke-a-Cola fan and I can't believe that I forgot to put it on this layout! There used to be all sorts of Coke scrapping products and now that I need one, I can't find them anywhere! Oh well.....guess I need to cut part of a logo off a 12-pack or something! lol

I couldn't share things that I loved without showing you this bookmark that I made. I am a book addict. Yep. I am. I totally admit it. I have books EVERYWHERE! I can't walk into any store that sells books w/o buying one. I just can't do it! I just wish that I had enough time to read them all! Maybe one day.....lol I need to do a tutorial on how to make these. They are super easy and lots of fun! Plus, they stay in your books really well!

Thank you for stopping by and visiting my blog during the Practical Scrappers Designer Blog Hop. Now here's the really fun part! I have eight cards - handmade by me- and I am giving away as a prize for the visiting me during the blog hop. I am sorry, but I am only able to ship to those of you who live in the United States. All that you need to do to qualify is this: you need to become a follower here and leave a comment on this post. I will announce the winner on Monday, January 25th so make sure to check back in! You should have arrived here from Amys' beautiful site - Paush Design. Your next stop is Joy's wonderful blog - Craftstash. If this was your first stop head over to Practical Scrappers to start at the beginning of the hop. The designers are giving away some great prizes and have some absolutely amazing projects to share - you don't want to miss your chance!

Thanks again for visiting me, please come back often and I hope you enjoy your ride on the Practical Scrappers Design Team Blog Hop!!!! Toot! Toot!!!!!

Artichoke Paremsan Dip

2010-01-16T17:10:00.003-06:00

So, this is the best artichoke cheese dip EVER! lol I made this last night and we gobbled it all up real fast. This is a recipe from Simply Recipes that I modified a little bit, but not much. I like it the best because it only has 1 cup of mayonnaise and a lot of the recipes out there have 2 cups. That is just too much mayo for me!

Artichoke Parmesan Cheese Dip

2-14 oz. cans of artichokes (packed in water, not oil)
2 cups of freshly grated Parmesan cheese
1 cup shredded mozzarella cheese
1 cup of mayonnaise
1-2 cloves garlic, minced finely
Salt and pepper

1. Drain the artichokes and coarsely chop them.

2. Combine artichokes, Parmesan and mozzarella cheeses, minced garlic and mayo in a large bowl. Stir in a pinch of salt and pepper, if desired. Put into a tart pan, or something similar, and spread into an even layer.

3. Bake in a 350F oven for 30 minutes.

4. Let cool a few minutes before eating.

Serve with tortilla chips, toasted rounds of a baguette, crackers, etc.

Yum. ;-)

Dolled Up Hand Towel

2010-01-15T12:03:00.004-06:00

Tonight I get to be the hostess for our monthly FarmGirls meeting and I can't wait! Last month, we were all given a plain hand towel and we were asked to decorate and wrap it. Tonight we are going to swap them! I was pretty stumped on how to decorate mine, until I found this super-cute idea with directions at Crafty Chica.

Here is what I came up with:

I had a hard time with my towel being black! Until I decided that nothing goes with black better than hot pink. I AM a child of the '80's! lol So, after the hard part was over, picking the colors, the rest of it came together really fast. I used a couple of my circle punches to punch out templates for the circles. I just held the circles together and sewed them in place with embroidery floss. I didn't pin or measure anything. lol After all of the circles were on, I then sewed on the buttons. I love the retro look of the ball fringe and to pull it all together, I added the pink dot ribbon along the edge of the towel.
And a close up of the circles.....I just had to add buttons......because....I just had to add buttons! lol I try to not be an over-embellisher, but sometimes it's hard! I think the buttons add a nice touch and really top off the circles.
This was a lot of fun to make and I might be making some more for my own kitchen!

Take care everyone.....I hope you're all doing well and having some time to be crafty!

Bling, bling, bling.....

2010-01-11T23:14:00.004-06:00

I'm not quite sure where this past week went, but it sure did go by....I can't say that it went by fast, but it's gone! I meant to share some things with you all here this past week, but I'm just so out of sorts lately. We have been going through so many snow storms and blizzards....I have serious cabin fever! My children just went back to school today! They were supposed to go back last Wednesday, but we ended up having snow days on Wednesday, Thursday and Friday because of snow and bitterly cold temperatures. It was -45 with the wind chill! I wasn't able to get any crafting done then because my scrap area is in our mudroom and wow, was it ever cold in there! It's on a cement base, so the floor was freezing and the window are old, so we had some major drafts. Today was actually in the low 30's and it felt like a heat wave! lol So, my little one and I spent some time in my scrap room and I was able to make a card for next weeks challenge at Practical Scrappers. I can't wait to share it, but you're just going to have to wait and see!

This weeks challenge at Practical Scrappers is to use bling! Bling of any kind - glitter, rhinestones, anything sparkly!
I needed to make a sympathy card for a dear friend of mine who lost her father on Christmas Day. So, I decided to use this lily and I added pale, yellow glitter to the flower and then a small, yellow rhinestone in the center. I stamped the image on water color paper and then went around the edges of the image with my blender pen. That created the water color look outside of the edges of the image and also colored in the centers of the leaves and flowers. I did some old-school embossing on the oval. This is something I learned ages ago before home die-cut/embossing machines were even a twinkle in any of our scrappers eyes! I didn't take any pics of how I did it, so I'll have to make up a quick tutorial on it sometime soon. It's easy and cheap and great for anyone who doesn't have a die-cut machine.

I also shared these samples at Practical Scrappers for this weeks challenge. My Gratitude Journal cover and one of my journal pages where I used glitter, plus this layout that you can see here. I've already shared those here on my blog, so I won't re-post pictures of them now.

I have been up to lots of other crafting! Crafting that I can do in my living room and no in my freezing mudroom! So, keep a look out because I'll be sharing them here soon!

I hope you're all having a wonderful and are keeping nice and warm!

Buttons, buttons, who's got the buttons? ;-)

2010-01-05T00:02:00.005-06:00

The challenge this week at Practical Scrappers is to use buttons! I love using buttons on my layouts and cards and if I ever see a jar of them at the thrift store, I buy them right up! There are so many things that you can do with them....here are some of my favorite layouts that I have used buttons on:

Use them to frame part of your photo

Embellish patterned paper-
Each of the circles in the strip of patterned paper have a white button in the center of them. And then I made a cluster of three buttons with ribbon by the heart embellishment.

Line them across the whole length of your layout

Create the center of a flower
(I absolutely LOVE the bottom photo of my then 11 year old holding her new baby sister!)

Use them as the centers for flowers

Buttons are so much fun to add to any layout! I hope you got some ideas for using buttons on your layouts!

1992 - a digi layout

2010-01-04T10:58:00.001-06:00

I had a lot of fun working on this layout last night and I was able to finish it this morning after I scanned in this self-portrait of us at the Salt Flats in Utah on 10 June 1992. I got the idea for this layout from one of the December challenge questions at Log Your Memory. The question was "What has been the best year of your life, so far"? After I read this, I immediately knew what my best year was and that I had to make a scrapbook page about it!

Here's what the journaling says:

To date, 1992 was by far the best year of my life. So many exciting and new things happened to me that year. Joe came back into my life in January & was there for me as I struggled with being in an abusive marriage. Tori & I moved back in with my parents in February. During all of that mess, Joe was there for me & we quickly fell back into love. In March, we saw each other for the first time in a couple of years. He rode in a Greyhound bus from Sacramento, CA to Springfield, Mo just to see me & to give me a promise ring. On May 20th, my divorce was finalized & I quickly began to make plans for our wedding on June 7th. Joe was still in Sacramento & wasn’t able to come back to Missouri until a week before our wedding. I also spent that month packing! We got married & on the 8th we were packing up a yellow Ryder truck with all of my belongings. The next day we were on our way to Mather Air Force Base which was neat Sacramento, CA. It took us two, long days of driving to reach the base. Tori did great and we had lots of fun. It was the first time that I had ever been past Grand Junction, CO, where Grandma & Grandpa Newton lived. We drove through Utah & stopped at the Salt Flats & I saw my first casinos as we trucked through Nevada. In August, we found out that I was pregnant with Chris! We spent our first Thanksgiving & Christmas together with Grandpa Fago & Aunt Agnes, who were living in Placerville, CA at that time. Everything was so new & exciting! The Air Force Base & learning how to be a military wife, living by a big city & all of the things to do there, traveling into the Sierra Nevada Mountains, meeting Lisa Sullivan who was our neighbor & is still a dear friend, & just finally being able to experience what true love was & how wonderful being married could be! 1992 will always be one of my most favorite years & will always hold a special place in my heart! It was the beginning of my life with my true love, Joe & we have had so many amazing years since then, too!

I picked up several fun kits on sale at OScraps by Kitty Designs and I used a couple of those new kits for this layout called "Lovey Dovey" and "Cherish". I also used one of my new templates for this layout. I LOVE using templates for digi layouts! They really help get me started, just like sketches do for traditional, paper scrapping. This Jumper Template #9 is from Crystal Livesay. I just discovered her templates and I really love all of the variety!

Well, that's it for now. I hope to share a post about my 2010 Memory Logbook. It is awesome and I think it's really going to help me keep track of those special, every day memories that are so easily forgotten!

Stay warm (it's -2F here!!!) and happy crafting!!!!!

Let's Say Thanks

2010-01-02T20:28:00.004-06:00

Please be sure to do this! It only takes a few seconds and it will mean so much to our military! My husband was in the Air Force for 10 years and it is so important to let our military personnel know how much they all mean to us!

Let's Say Thanks

Doily Snowflakes

2009-12-27T18:09:00.005-06:00

This week at Practical Scrappers the design team has been asked to share winter projects. The first thing that I thought of were the doily snowflakes that I've been making since I was a little kid. I'm not sure where the idea came from originally, but my mom taught me how to do this when I was a little girl and I've been doing it ever since! I need to ask her, because it would be fun to find out where she learned this.....not that it's anything hard or crazy! But, it would be fun to know if this was passed on from her mom to me, and now me to my children.

These are SO EASY and SO BEAUTIFUL!!!! All that you need are paper doilies. All that I had on hand were the large ones, so that's what I used. We were in the tail-end of the Christmas Blizzard that started on Tuesday. It snowed from Tuesday to Sunday! We got over 14-inches of snow and drifts that are several feet tall. We had more than plenty of snowflakes outside and it was time to have a few inside, too!
All that you do is to start cutting them into snowflake designs/shapes. I'm not really sure how to explain it the best! lol I usually start in the middle and cut out a circle shape, following along the pattern in the doily. Then set that to the side and start cutting out a circle in the next piece. You can cut out the centers of the smaller circles and use them to build snowflakes or to stick around as small snowflakes on their own.

I'm sorry for the bad photos. There is so much snow outside and it's so bright it throws off the lighting when taking a photo. These are really pretty and can be seen from the outside, too!

I hope that you all had a very wonderful and blessed Christmas!!!!! Before we know it, it will be New Year's!!!!

Christmas cookie layouts

2009-12-23T21:38:00.006-06:00

I was so excited today about using my cookie press, that I took pictures and just now did a digi layout about it. I know that's totally silly, but hey, it's those silly, little things that make special memories! Things have been so busy around here and I really haven't had much time to scrap. I think that this is the busiest that I have been in a long time during December! I had two Christmas parties to go to, lunch with friends who I used to work with and I have been on a serious baking kick. Plus, I have been crocheting bunches of wash cloths from 100% cotton. So, I have lots and lots to share and I hope to do that soon!

But for now, here are a couple of digi layouts that I have done these past couple of weeks....
This one is about our yearly, Christmas tradition of making sugar cookies. I use the same recipe that my mother used when I was a child and nothing reminds me of Christmas when I was a child more than these cookies! They are so good! We will be making some of them tomorrow (the second time this holiday season!), so I will get some good pictures and share the recipe. Yum! Everything that I used for this page is by Shabby Miss Jenn Designs.....I just LOVE her digi kits!!!!
Here is a layout that I finished this evening. My good friend made spritz cookies the other day and I reminded me that I had a cookie press lost somewhere in my cabinets. I found the press at a garage sale ages ago and I hadn't ever used it! So, today, while it was raining and sleeting outside and everything was being covered by a thick layer of ice, I decided to make spritz cookies! I knew that we wouldn't be going anywhere (and won't for several days!) and that some fresh cookies is just what we needed! We are expecting 6-10+ inches by Christmas Day! So, since this was such a huge event today......finally using this age-old cookie press that I've been carrying around with us for the past 15+ years and almost as many moves, thanks to the Air Force.....I took pictures and did a layout! Once again, everything that I used for this layout is from Shabby Miss Jenn Designs, except the template which is from Weeds & Wildflower Design Life 365 Kit and the green, circle tag and journal block which is also from Weeds & Wildflower Design.

I hope that you are all ready for Christmas and that you have a wonderful and magical day with your family and friends celebrating the birth of our Lord, Jesus Christ!

Some ornaments to share......

2009-12-14T08:43:00.007-06:00

Here are a couple of ornaments that I was able to make last week. We were totally snowed in for three days, so it was nice to have some fun projects to work on!
This little house ornament is inspired by this ornament that I found at the Orange Flower blog. My printer wasn't talking to our computer server when I decided to do this ornament, so I had to totally wing it with the pattern. I forgot that the original had windows and guessed on what size to make everything else. I still think that it turned out pretty, darn cute! The house is made from a scrap piece of white flannel and red scrap fabric that was left over from the tree skirt that I sewed last year. I embroidered on the year and I'll tell you about those flowers in a minute!
For this ornament, I used the pattern that I found at the author Jan Brett's website. I absolutely love her books! This heart ornament is made from white paper and red patterned paper. I added some rhinestones to each crossing of the paper, because I was trying to think of a way to jazz it up a bit!
Now, for the flowers, I used the tutorial that I found at Cheeky Magpie to make them. I really had a fun time making these and I can't wait to make some more! I used my Prima flowers and I just had to add some Diamond Dust to them....lol I think it kinda looks like snow on them and since we got over 12 inches of snow while I was working on these ornaments, it seemed fitting to add snow to my flowers. lol

I'm not sure if I will have time to make any more ornaments, but I hope that I can. I have started working on some 100% cotton, crocheted wash cloths for my kitchen and a couple of gifts. It's fun to be doing something different and still creative with my hands! And, we are getting more snow today and ice today. My kids missed three days of school last week! This is their last week of school before Christmas Break and I'm sure that they are hoping and praying that we have another snow storm roll through. Starting Christmas Break a few days early would really make them happy!

I do have lots more that I want to share with you all. Some favorite recipes and some great crafty links that I have found that you don't want to miss! I hope you are all doing well and keeping warm!

Recycled Can to Christmas Gift Container

2009-12-06T23:14:00.005-06:00

I am one of those people who can't throw any thing away, because I know that I'll be able to use it for something, sometime, somewhere......lol Here is a perfect example! We always pick these little cans of cashews up when we go to our local home store and I knew that I could use them for something. So, when when the design team at Practical Scrappers was challenged to create a gift wrap idea, I knew that this was the project I had to do! Everything that I used for this project was from my stash or recycled from some other source.
For this project, I used a light-weight patterned paper. I lined the bottom edge of the paper along the edge of the metal ring at the bottom of the container and made a pencil mark on the paper where the inside of the top metal ring was.
I used that line to cut along the whole length of the paper.
Next, I wrapped the paper around the can and made a pencil mark, letting the mark overlap the bottom paper about an inch or so. Then I used my paper trimmer and cut where the pencil mark was. Then, I used my glue runner and put along one of the short ends of the paper and placed the paper on the can making sure that it was centered. I then added adhesive to the top and bottom edges of the paper as I wrapped the paper around the can.
Now you can decorate the can more or leave it as it is! I found some thin strips of vellum in my paper stash and decided to cut along one edge with my scallop, deco scissors and adhered a piece to the top and bottom edge of the can. That clear, circle glob is a big, glue dot and I used to add the tag. :-)
For the tag, I stamped a candy cane in red ink and then colored it in with a red marker. Then I added some Crystal Effects over the candy cane and then sprinkled it with some Diamond Dust. After it was dry, I cut the candy cane out and added it to the tag.
For tFor the tag, I just stamped the sentiment onto a piece of watercolor paper and then went over each letter with a blender pen that I had picked up some red ink with. It is double mounted on a scrap piece of the patterned paper and then a piece of yellow paper. I rubbed the edges of the yellow paper with some course sand paper and also along the top of the star that I punched from a piece of yellow, corrugated paper. I adhered the candy cane on, added a small, red bow and topped the bow with the yellow star and then put the tag on the container using the glue dot. The finishing touch was stuffing the container with some yellow, crinkle paper that I saved from some Christmas gift boxes that we had received last year. I always save the stuffing from those boxes, because I use it all of the time for gifts that I make all of the time!

And here you go! The finished container! And, a great way to recycle!

Beary Merry Christmas card

2009-12-01T23:26:00.002-06:00

This is a card that I made for this weeks challenge to make a Christmas card at Practical Scrappers. This card didn't turn out at all like I had first planned! It's amazing how you start with one idea, but as you start creating your muse takes you off in other directions and you end up with a complete surprise! The idea for my card totally turned when I stumbled upon a small doily in my white embellishment drawer. After I decided to use that, the rest of this card came together really fast. I stamped the image from Stampin' Up! in brown ink and then colored it in with Stampin' Up! markers and a blender pen. I am trying really hard to avoid Copic markers! I WANT them really, really bad but I don't NEED them. My Stampin' Up! markers are all working totally fine and I just can't justify buying new markers at $6.50/$7.00 a piece when I have something that works just fine right now. So, maybe as my SU! markers start drying up, I'll start replacing them with Copics. Anyway, I have found that marking on an acrylic block with the brush end of my marker and then picking up the ink with a blender pen can give me almost the same results as if I had used Copics. The colors aren't as vibrant, of course, but I as I practice I have been able to do some really good shading with my SU! markers. The ribbon is from a package that we got for Christmas last year from Harry & David, or some place like that. Save those ribbons ladies, because you never know when you can use them! I LOVE to recycle things like that! Take care! :-)

Covered Jelly Jar

2009-11-30T09:42:00.006-06:00

Here is a fun and easy project for jazzing up your homemade jars of jam and jelly for Christmas gift-giving! At Practical Scrappers, they will be sharing a new Christmas project EVERY DAY, so be sure to visit often so that you don't miss all of the amazing things that will be shared there until Christmas!

We went to a local apple orchard in August and came home with a huge bag of Gala apples. I made apple butter and cinnamon-apple jelly and I thought that they would make super gifts for my neighbors this year. So, I decided to make some fabric jar covers to turn them in to festive gifts!
For this project I used a piece of fabric from my fabric stash basket and some ball-edge trim. I bought a yard of the trim, because it was only $.45 a yard.
I used a saucer to trace a circle onto the fabric. I just used an ink pen to trace with. Then, I cut the circle out and sewed on the trim. I did not turn the edges down on the fabric. I guess it would have made the back side look cleaner if I did that, but I am hoping that no one will turn this over and inspect it and say, "Wow. She should have finished this side by turning the edges under!" lol It honestly looks just fine with the edges raw and the trim covers it up anyway on the front side, and that's what's most important!
I did use one of my special feet for my sewing machine to sew the trim on. It is open on one side so that the balls on the trim had room to go by as I sewed. I didn't use any pins or anything.....I just sewed a long very slowly and adjusted the trim on top of the fabric as I sewed a long. I think that this kind of trim was the easiest, because it was easy to make the sharp curve of the circle with out bunching up or anything like that. So, I would pick out a trim that is very flexible for this project.
Here's the finished fabric piece! You can see a bit of the red fabric showing through the top in this photo. I took some sharp scissors to trim that off as close to the stitching as I could.
Now for the fun part! The circle that fits in the lid....... ;-) I traced around the outside of the metal lid onto red card stock and then used my circle cutter to cut a circle just a little bit smaller than what I had traced. This way I know it will fit inside of the lid. Then, I made another circle but out of white, watercolor paper. I made this circle so that it is about 1/8-1/4 inch smaller than the inside circle of the metal lid. I stamped the image in a chocolate-brown and colored it in with a blender pen and my Stampin' Up! markers and then I sponged red ink around the edges of the circle. I then centered the fabric circle on top of the jar, placed the red circle of card stock inside the lid and then screwed the lid ontop of the jar. Next I adhered the white circle in the center of the jar lid. I wrapped some green, gross-grain ribbon around the lid and adhered it together with some glue. I folded the ribbon over so that I was able to create a small loop of ribbon to hang the tag off of.
For the tag, I cut a rectangle from red card stock and wrote "Apple Butter - made with Honey" on one side of the card stock. Next I cut a piece of green, gross-grain ribbon, attached one end to the tag, slipped the other end through the loop on the lid and then adhered that end to the tag, so that the tag is now attached to the jar. I punched out a big snowflake and added it to the side. Then I punched a small circle, stamped the stocking on it and colored it in and then went around the edge with red ink on a sponge and placed it on top of the snowflake.

And there you have it! A cute and festive jar of preserves! I hope that all of my directions made sense. If you have any questions, please ask! And also please share if you make some of these, because I sure would love to see you're creations!

Wedding Pillow - Practical Scrappers Challenge

2009-11-26T15:59:00.003-06:00

The challenge for this week at Practical Scrappers is sewing. I was going to make something new but with it being Thanksgiving weekend, my time got a little lost doing other things! Then I remembered that I had this pillow that I made years and years ago and I thought that it worked just perfectly for this weeks challenge! The idea is from an old Family Circle or Women's Day magazine. I cut out a big heart shape from a paper sack and used that as a pattern to cut two pieces of fabric. Then, I started sewing on all sorts of goodies to the top piece. Ribbon, lace, buttons, ribbon flowers, etc. I then made a frame from some flat lace to hold the photo. I sewed the front and back together and there ya go! A fun memory pillow! The picture is of me and my husband right after we got married and one of my all-time favorite photos of us. I've had this pillow on my bed for a LONG time! lol We will be celebrating our 18th wedding anniversary this June!

I hope you're all having a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Delight in the Day - card - Practial Scrappers

2009-11-24T09:29:00.002-06:00

This weeks challenge at Practical Scrappers a sewing. For my card, I cut out several circles of patterned fabric and then used my sewing machine to sew them together in what I can best describe as a wagon wheel spokes. I added a button to the center and use adhesive to attach it to the card base.

I hope you are all having a wonderful day! I am writing out my grocery list right now and then it's off to the store! My mother is driving up and should be here later this afternoon. It's going to be a wonderful and busy week!

Sweet - layout - Practical Scrappers weekly challenge

2009-11-22T22:40:00.002-06:00

The challenge this week at Practical Scrappers is to sew and here is my layout where I used my sewing machine. I went around the edge of the circle paper twice in an uneven pattern. I really love using my sewing machine on scrapping layouts and I really need to do it more! My problem is that I don't have room to keep my sewing machine out in my scrapping area, so once I put it away, I tend to leave it there for awhile. If it was sitting out, I'm sure I'd use it more.

This is my little GG last Christmas. Once she tried a candy cane, she was hooked! I can't believe that it's already almost Christmas-time again! Where did this year go? I'm sure that I won't be able to put candy canes on our Christmas tree this year......I have a feeling that they will start to disappear one by one!

I hope that you all have a wonderful Monday! It's Thanksgiving week! I have so much to be grateful for and so many big dreams for our future that we are talking about..... :-)

Honey-bee card

2009-11-22T22:31:00.002-06:00

Here is a card that I had made for last weeks challenge at Practical Scrappers to use acrylic paints. I meant to share it before now, but having the flu last week really threw me off my groove!

I received a special package from my mom a few weeks ago and my goodie was wrapped in some bubble wrap. (It was my favorite vanilla fudge in the whole wide world from Branson!) I had been trying to think of something to do for the acrylic paint challenge and as soon as I saw that bubble wrap, I knew that I had to try using it and paint to make a background for a card or layout. I had heard of people doing it before, but had never tried it myself. Well, it was super easy and so much fun! The first thing I thought of when I looked at the bubble wrap was honey comb, so that's what I decided to do for this card. I'm not sure if anyone else picked up that I was trying to make it look like honey comb, but that's what my muse told me to do so that's what I did. lol

The flower is a wide piece of wire-edged ribbon. I pulled one of the wires to gather the ribbon into a circle and then added a small Prima flower in the center.

I am hoping to take some photos tomorrow of how to do the bubble wrap techinque, so that I can share it here with you all!

What a week.....

2009-11-18T16:40:00.004-06:00

Wow. This week has been something else. I woke had the stomach flu Saturday night through Sunday and then my little GG started throwing up at 10:30 on Monday night. I stayed up all night with her and didn't get to bed until 5 a.m. on Tuesday. I am so grateful that my husband is able to work from home, because he stayed home on Tuesday, so that I could nap awhile and to help take care of GG. She is just now starting to feel better. I felt so badly for her and even worse because I gave her the germs! I must admit that I am still not feeling great and I haven't been able to eat a meal since Saturday. Actually, the one thing that sounded good to me and the only thing that GG ate today, was some homemade potato soup. I made a batch of it last night and it really hit the spot! It's such a simple recipe, too. I'll have to share it soon. This stuff is really icky and I hope and pray that no one else gets it!

I need to get to work scrapping, too! I have next weeks focus to work on for Practical Scrappers! It's a great one, too and I'm really excited to do a layout for this one!

I hope that you all are all doing well and are staying healthy and warm. It's feeling like winter is coming here in the Heartland. I am totally shocked that next week is Thanksgiving! I have been working on my menu and pulling out some new dessert recipes to try. I will share with you all, if they turn out super yummy!

Love-Doh - layout for Practical Scrappers weekly challenge

2009-11-16T08:18:00.003-06:00

Good morning everyone. Wow. I am surprised that I can sit here. Well, I barely am. I woke up at 1:30 a.m. Sunday with the stomach flu and this is the first time that I've been out of bed and sitting up since then. It was awful! lol But, I sure am glad it's over. I just hope and pray that no one else in the house gets it. Especially my little Gracie.

The challenge this week at Practical Scrappers is to use acrylic paint. For this layout I simply dry-brushed some white acrylic paint onto the red card stock. After the paint was dry, I added all of the other elements and there you go!

I would love to write more, but I'm honestly not feeling too well!

Take care!

An awesome list of tutorials.....

2009-11-13T12:27:00.003-06:00

I stumbled upon this incredible list of sewing tutorials this morning and I wanted to share it with you. I am in total LOVE with the red, mushroom houses that are in the center photo. I have pretty much decided today that I am going to have to come up with some sort of creative-time schedule. There are just way too many things that I want to do and I'm not able to do any of them because get stuck working on just scrapbooking and do make any time for the other things that I would love to do. Right now, I'm thinking of just alternating days.....scrapbooking on one day, sewing on the next, then scrapbooking, and then sewing.....you get the idea. There are lots of things that fall into that sewing category, too. Clothes sewing for me, clothes sewing for GG, accessories and bags, softies and toys, home decor.....there are so many things that I want to do! I need to schedule my creative time somehow, because my right-sided and easily side-tracked brain isn't letting me get to all of the things that I want to. I'll let you know what I decide to do and I need to decide fast, because my stack of projects that I want to create is just getting bigger and bigger!

Anyway, here's this amazing link!

The Long Thread Top 100 Tutorials of 2008

Talk about lots and lots of super-cute goodies to make! I hope that you find something fun here to make, I know that I sure have!

Take care and happy crafting!

Pass It On - Card 3

2009-11-12T11:34:00.004-06:00

I made this card last week that I shared here and I am putting it up for grabs for this weeks Pass It On. I sure do hope that you comment below, because if you do, you could win this card that you can pass on to someone who needs some TLC!

Please read about the mission of Pass It On Ministry here and be sure to come back here to comment. I will pick a random winner on Friday and send the winner a card as soon as I get their information. So please be sure to check back on Friday or follow me. I sure don't want you to miss out on winning a card!

I hope you all have a wonderful and blessed day!

Scraproom Re-Do - organizing by color

2009-11-10T11:14:00.007-06:00

Well, I did it. I reorganized all of my scrapping embellishments by color of the weekend. It was a pretty big decision to make, too! I am a creature of habit and I've have things the same way in my scrap area for a long time, so the idea of doing this really freaked me out for a bit! lol The first time I heard of organizing your embellishments by color was by Stacy Julian. She has talked about it in some of her books and on her web site also. I always loved looking at the photos of everything all pretty in their drawers by color. I have always organized my paper by color, but everything else was by type. All the ribbons together, all of the buttons together, flowers together....etc. This was working just fine for me, but I really wanted to try something different. And, after sitting and really think about how I scrap, I actually think what color I want to use, before what type of embellishment. This is funny, too, because I thought I was the other way around. I thought that I said to myself, "I need a button. A red one." But I really think, "I need something red, how about a button?" I think that this is probably the most important thing to think about seriously before deciding to organizing your embellishments this way. If you think, "I need a button" first and then decide on a color, then I wouldn't think about touching your embellies! lol This might really mess your scrap-thinking system. But, if you're feeling a little stale and like you're not using your embellishments as much as you'd like to, then this might be a way to mix things up a bit for you. Either way, I would really sit and think about how you scrap before you consider doing this. It is a huge change! lol

So here is what my scrap area looked like before......
This is my main work area. The counter top is pretty much full of stuff, especially the two, gray drawer units. These units had all of my small embellishments in them organized by type: buttons, ribbon scraps, brads, flowers, etc. These drawers were also my little ones favorite thing to play in! And, another reason why I decided to try this way or organizing honestly. She likes to work beside me while standing on a stool and she can easily reach these drawers and pull things out. This was really starting to drive me crazy! lol More so because she was putting things back in different drawers and mixing everything up. So, I knew that these drawers had to go, because she's only going to get bigger and able to reach more drawers! lol The two, small green drawer units hold my square-punched photos and the white drawers are my category drawers. Both of these are for my Library Of Memories system of organizing photos as taught by Stacy Julian and discussed in her book, Photo Freedom. I highly recommend this book if you're looking for a change in how you scrapbook photos! It totally helped me break out of the "I can only scrap chronologically" way of mind and threw me into the "I can scrap whatever I want to, whenever I want to!" scrapping freedom! No more, "I'll never get caught up.".....sorry, it's easy for me to get excited about that system. Oh how I wish and dream that I could afford to take her on-line class, but the book is awesome, too!
I have a 2-door, tall pantry that I keep my drawer units in. The unit on the left was pretty much a mess and waste of space. The top, three drawers were full of ribbon. Some were still on their rolls and others were wrapped around plastic, floss keepers. The other three drawers were completely unorganized and just full of stuff that needed to be sorted. This was really a waste of good organizing space! The unit on the left is actually two, 6 drawer units on top of each other. These held all of my paper scraps, organized by color: red, yellow/orange, green, blue, pink, purple, brown, white, black. Then, a drawer with specility papers like vellum and mulberry paper, one with scraps of only Chatterbox patterned papers (I had aquired over 300 pieces of Chatterbox paper at a garage sale for a steal and thought I should keep all of the scrap together, so that I could use them better....I was wrong, I never remembered they were there!). On top of these units is my one, true scrapbooking shame......I'm hanging my head in shame right now as I type.....those tall stacks of paper are layouts. Completed layouts that are waiting to be put into scrapbooks. Isn't that terrible????? I don't even want to know how many are sitting there. How can anyone enjoy them all piled up there, shoved in a cabinet? Oh, woe is me.......I think that should be my next project. Putting them into albums..........

After about two days of working, I was finished.......here's how it looks now:

The unit on the left now has embellishments in it, all organized by color. I had to use two drawers in the unit on the right for embellishments also - for white/black and then metallic. The pink/purple drawer is pretty full, but I'm going to try to keep those two colors together, because I don't have any more drawers that I can use! The unit on the right still has all scraps, organized by color and a drawer for specialty paper.

Here is a peek inside some of the drawers:
I used some of the little drawers from the gray unit to help keep some things organized together, like the ribbon, the rhinestones and glitter, and then a larger drawer for paper pieces, chip board, anything like that. I have the flowers in a zip-loc baggie as well as scraps of ribbon and fabric in a baggie. I have been saving these round, metal tins for years. One of the teachers at the school I used to work at was throwing them away and I took them, because I knew that I'd be able to use them for something! You can see them the easiest in the green and pink drawer (click on the photo to see it bigger). I have two in each color drawer. One has buttons and the other brads and eyelets. I punched out a flower in coordinating paper to put on top of each tin. I also did this for the front of each drawer in the units.

Here is the biggest change in my scrap area. My counter top. Getting rid of those two, gray units really freed up a lot of space on my counter top. I added a little shelf (a piece of scrap wood sitting on top of two, recycled spaghetti jars!) because I wanted to keep the two, green units right there and to put any small odds and ends. I have a jar full of black buttons and a jar of white buttons, because I had too many to keep in my color drawers. I also have my two Design with.... calendars from Autumn Leaves there, but I might move those because I never really look at them like I should. The white basket has silly odds and ends in it. Movie tickets, labels, card board coffee sleeves, things like that. It's another idea from Stacy Julian's Photo Freedom book. It's just fun stuff that you can sift through and add to a layout. Little things from every day life go in there. This can easily be moved to free up more space, if I need it. The red and white polka dot pot is my little trash bin and the square basket next to it has photos in it that I am planning on scrapping soon. Then I have my tool turn-around that I use to hold my pens, pencils, scissors, paint brushes, erasers, glue tubes, etc. The basket next to the lamp is full of small stamps that can be used on envelopes and the back of my cards and layouts: "hand stamped by" and "scrapbook layout by"....things like that. :-)

I hope you enjoyed seeing how I have reorganized my scrap area. I honesltly haven't been able to do one bit of scrapping since I did all of this work! The rest of my weekend was very full and I just haven't had the time to play in there at all and to try out my new system. I must say that when I open up one of my color drawers, my severely right-sided brain gets so happy! lol I can't wait to put it to the test and see if this helps me use more of my embellishments that get so easily forgotten about. I also had a ton of stickers and what-not just lying around. All of those have been put into plastic page protectors with pockets and into a binder with my alphabets and other stickers.

I guess I should say that I do not have any of my stickers in my color drawers. I decided to keep them organized together. Right now, I have a binder full of alphabets that are in page protectors and organized by color and a Crop-In-Style Paper/Sticker Binder full of stickers that are organized by theme - love, flower, sports, birthday, Christmas, Halloween, spring, etc...... I don't know if I will ever add all of those to my color drawers. I do like having them by theme and I think that I'll use them the most if I keep them organized that way.

Well, I have rambled on long enough about this! If you have photos of your color drawers on your blog or if you decide to do this, please share because I would love to see what you have done!

Take care and I hope you have a wonderful day........and hopefully are able to do something creative!

Easy-Peasy Ribbon Flowers - tutorial

2009-11-10T09:41:00.005-06:00

It has been a pretty crazy and busy week for me. I have actually gotten a lot done in my scrapping area (no layouts but lots of organizing!) and I hope to share with you all what I've been up to soon! But for now, I am going to share with you how to make some easy-peasy ribbon flowers. I took these photos last week while making a flower for a layout and I'm finally able to show you how to make them. They are super cute and I hope you enjoy learning how to make them! I've made them from several different types and sizes of ribbon and they have always turned out super cute. So far, I've used them on my "Silly" layout and my "Thanks from the Heart" card.

So here we go!!!!

The first thing you need to do is pick out your ribbon and cut it. I honestly haven't been measuring them as I make them. I've just kind of been cutting the ribbon to the size that "felt" right. I know that doesn't help you much, but I'll try to explain. lol The thicker the ribbon, bigger the flower will be so you can cut the ribbon longer. Thin ribbon will make a small flower, so you need to cut it a lot smaller, like 2 inches or so. I used a 1-inch thick, organdy-type ribbon above. It's a thin material, so I knew it would gather tighter and make a nice, frilly flower so I cut the ribbon around 5 inches long. You just need to play with it and see how it's going to work, if you're not sure. You can even stitch and gather it (without cutting the ribbon) to see how it's going to look first.
With a nice, sharp needle and matching thread, run a straight sewing stitch all the way across one edge of the ribbon. For my thread, I cut a nice long piece of thread, run one end through the needle, fold the thread in half, and tie the knot about 4 inches from the end. You want the thread double, so it's strong enough to handle your pulling on it later and a long tail at the end of the knot. That way you will have extra thread to hold on to and help gather the ribbon. When you're done sewing, it will look like this:
Now pick up your ribbon and start pushing the ribbon in on both sides until you can bring the two ends together and tie once. Don't tie it in a complete knot yet! Pull the ends of the thread tightly until the ribbon has gathered together tightly in the center and has made a flower. Now you can tie the thread into a knot....or two, or three. lol I usually make a few knots, just in case. lol In the picture below, this is what it looks like after I tied my first "knot" and before I pulled the two threads to tighten the ribbon into a flower. Once you pull the two threads, the center will close of your flower. If your ribbon is thick, it won't close as tightly.
Now take a good look at your flower. See if you can tell where the two ends of the ribbon are. Sometimes the ribbon folds over it's self and hides the ends and looks just fine. Other times, you can easily tell where the ends of the ribbon are and I think it looks a lot better if you can't see the ends. lol So, with this thin ribbon, I was able to just add some Mono-Adhesive to the ends, just a bit, and then pinch the ends together to seal it up. It works great on thin, organdy ribbons. For thick ribbon, I use the same thread that I gathered the ribbon up with and run a straight-stitch down the ribbon and back up to the center to sew those two ends together. I had to do this for the flowers on my "Thanks from the Heart" card, even on those little flowers. Now you can cut off those two threads. Here's a finished ribbon flower!
Now here's the fun part where you can really play! You can add whatever you want to your little flower or leave it like it is. Here are some examples as I was trying to decide what to add to my flower for my "Silly" layout (I ended up picking the button one! lol) :
You could even add another ribbon flower that's smaller....that would look cute, too!

I hope this made sense. This is really the first tutorial that I've done and I tend to get a little wordy. lol If you have any questions, please ask and I'll help as much as I can! I have some other fun, flower ideas to share with you soon! I'd also love to see any projects that you do using these easy-peasy flowers, so please share here!

Take care everyone and I hope you all have a wonderful day!

Birthday Card - Practical Scrappers Weekly Challenge

2009-11-08T20:55:00.004-06:00

This was a fun card to make! I just recently bought a couple of Cuttlebug embossing folders and I hadn't really played with them yet. This challenge was a perfect chance for me to give them a whirl!!! I ran the green white-core card stock through the embossing folder and then I used a light-grain sand paper to lightly rub over the top of the embossed paper and along the edges as well. I free-hand-cut the cupcake pieces. The bottom part was put through my paper crimper (talk about rubbing the dust of a severly neglected scrapping tool!!!) The candles are made from pieces of ribbon and the flames were made with a tear-drop punch and rubbed with sand paper also. I also rubbed some darker yellow around the edge of the "frosting" and the edge of the orange matting paper.

This was a really fun technique to do and I can't wait to use it on some more white-core card stock!

Wishing you all a very happy Monday!

Silly - layout - Practical Scrappers Weekly Challenge

2009-11-08T20:51:00.003-06:00

Here is a layout that I did for this weeks challenge at Practical Scrappers! The challenge this week is to use white-core card stock. For this layout, I punched out three different sized hearts from three colors of white-core card stock and then I used a very rough-grain sand paper to rough up the edges and on top a bit. I added some ribbon and lace and also a paper doily. I made that blue, ribbon flower and I took pictures so that I could share with you how to make them!

Video from Detroit about Noah.....

2009-11-05T18:04:00.001-06:00

Here is a video from a local new station about 5-year old Noah and his family...........

http://www.clickondetroit.com/video/21525126/index.html

A Christmas card for Noah....

2009-11-05T10:59:00.004-06:00

This heartbreaking request was posted on Paper Crafts Magazine's Facebook page and I wanted to share it here with you all. Please follow this link to read about Noah and his family's request for people to send him Christmas Cards right now. He is at home on Hospice care fighting his last battle with cancer. He is only 5 years old and his favorite holiday is Christmas, so his family is celebrating Christmas this weekend. I know my card might not make it there in time for their special Christmas, but even if it's a day or so late, it will still be special to him! So, please take a few minutes to send little Noah a Christmas card. Even though I felt like crying the entire time I was making his card, I was blessed with the comfort and grace of God. This story makes my heart hurt. May we all say some extra prayers for Noah and his family. And, be sure to hug your loved ones extra hard today! We are all so blessed.......

Here is the address to send Noah's card to:

Noah Biorkman
c/o 99.5 WYCD
2201 Woodward Heights Blvd.
Ferndale, MI 48220-1511

Scrapbooking Idea/Journal Jar

2009-11-03T09:48:00.012-06:00

Here is a project that uses lots of different ribbons! I made this idea/journal jar awhile ago and thought that I would share it here since the challenge this week at Practical Scrappers is to use at least THREE different ribbons on a project. This is also a great way to recycle a jar.....I think this used to be a salsa jar. I wrapped this jar a little differently. Instead of totally wrapping the jar with paper, I made the paper "label" part only big enough to cover half of the jar. I matted a piece of patterned paper on it and then added the letters that I had cut out using an old, plastic letter template (I LOVE those things! lol Old-school scrapping at it's best!) All of the paper pieces/letters were rubbed with a brown ink pad to shabby them up a bit. Then, I placed an eyelet about an inch in on each corner. I threaded a piece of ribbon through one eyelet and then tied it across through the next. I did this so that there are two ribbons that wrap across the back of the jar and hold the paper "label" in place. It's not held on to the jar with any adhesive. The two tags and the flower/ribbon cluster are all tied onto or adhered the ribbon that is holding the "label" onto the jar.
Inside of the jars are little strips of paper. This is where you can decide what type of ideas you want to keep inside your pretty jar. You can put techniques to use, ideas to scrap, journaling starter ideas, anything you want! These ideas can be applied towards scrapbooking layouts or cards. Then, when you're stumped on what to scrapbook next, you can grab a slip of paper from your idea jar and see if that gets your creativity going!
Here are some ideas to keep inside your jar that I have collected from various places, including a lot from Bridge that she shared at the Yahoo! group I'm in called ScrapFromYourStash (it's a great group to help you use up your stash!!!!). This list is LONG! lol And, there might be some doubles on things.....it was hard for me to remember what I had and hadn't already typed out. lol I would suggest that you copy this list and paste it into a word document and enlarge the font to a size that's comfortable for you to read. Make sure that there is a space to two inbetween each sentence, so that you have room to cut them into strips. Print out the list and then cut into strips, fold them up and put them in your jar.
Scrap Jar Idea Starters:

Use fabric or fabric-styled paper
Make a card
Let something hang off the edge of your page (tab, ribbon, etc.) outside the page protector
Use a map on your layout
Cover a page element in Utlra-Thick Embossin Enamel or embossing powder
Use a stamp on your layout
Add flowers to your layout - silk, Prima, etc.
Journal in a shape - around a photo, inside a shape, in a shape, etc.
Use acrylic paint
Sew on your layout
Use a monogram larger than two inches on your layout
Make a heritage layout - if you don't have any photos, make the layout based on a memory about someone from your heritage
Use border punches
Make a layout with no photos
Tear the paper on your layout
Alter something - book, cd, tin, box, etc
Use your deco scissors
Use sandpaper or the edge of your scissors to distress something on your layout
Use a sketch
Scrapflift a layout from the web, idea book or magazine
Make a layout using scraps from your stash
Use a pre-made layout - i.e. from a swap, make & tak class, or store-bought layout.
Use photo corners
Dry emboss an element
Dangle something from the title
Mix template/die-cut letters for the title
Decorate the four corners of layout
Journal on a photo mat
Weave a fiber behind the title or picture
Use a photo to make letters using a template/die-cutter
Use a photo for a mat
Cut a title from a cursive font
Make a monochromatic layout
Use Magic Mesh
Chalk edges of a torn phot mat
Decorate one side of photo mat wtih eyelets
Dangle tags from photo mat
Cut graphics from pattern paper to use as emellishment
Use nothing but card stock
Use nothing but printed paper
Sew a title
Use your favorite shirt as inspiration
Turn on the TV, use the first words you hear from TV on your layout
Usu your favorite knick-knack as innspiration
Hand write your journaling
Journal using a list
Journal two points of view the the picture in your layou
Use pop-up dots
Make a shaker box
Use at least three photos on a page
Use ribbon
Use colored pencils on your title
Journal on vellum over a photo
Use buttons
Make embellishments wtih punches
Mix patterned papers
Use "wood"-looking pattern papers
Put your title down the side of the page
Journal under a "lift-up" photo
Use a shaker box in your title
Roll the edges of the paper
Use fabric flowers - easy to make by cutting circles of fabric and layer on top of each other, secure stacked circles with a brad.
Use teeny-tiny beads
Tear the edges of a picture
Print a picture on watercolor paper, tear and chalk edges
Print photo on vellum
Put title letters on individual tags
Use a one-word adjective for the title that describes the person in a picture for the title
Write a letter to the person in the layout
Pick key words in your journaling to highlight with borders, a larger font, or with color
Color-block a background
Embellish your page with a paper doll
Dot the "i"s in your title with an embellihsment
Use white as your background
Use stickers in a creative way
Use a die-cut in a creative way
Use a pre-made frame
Use a sticker border
Use a stamp you bought ages ago and haven't ever used yet
Use the last thing you bought
Use something you got in a swap
Use the name of a TV show for a title
Use the name of a song for a title
Use the name of a book for a title
Use the word "love" in the title
Use your computer to print out a title
Use letter stickers for your title
Use a hand-written title
Use die-cut/template cut letters for your title
Use the title only to explain your pictures - no journaling
Use a pre-made title
Use wire, raffia, or string
Use plaid paper
Use all pastel-colored paper
Use a black for your background - solid or printed paper
Use crumpled paper
Use all bright colors
Use metallic paper
Use suede paper
Use three different patterned papers in the same layout
Use red, white and blue on your layout
Use vellum
Use at least three shades of the SAME color
Convert an 8.5x11-inch sketch to 12x12 and make layout
Do a black and white layout
Use embossed paper
Use glittered paper
Use mulberry paper
Emboss your own background paper
Scraplift one of your own favorite layouts
Scrap a holiday in non-traditional colors
Scrap any celebration
Scrap a family tradition
Scrap an event that includes some sort of food (picnic, Thanksgviging, restaurant, etc.)
Scrap a sports event or a game
Do a layout that includes toys in some way
Do an animal layout - zoo, pets, etc.
Do a Spring layout
Do a Summer layout
Do an Autumn layout
Do a Winter layout
Do a water-themed layout - pool, beach, bathtub, rain, etc.
Use a prayer
Use a Bible verse
Use a quote
Use a song title
Use a poem
Do a mosaic on your layout
Do a page about YOU!
Do a Patriotic page
Scrap a current event
Do a vacation layout
Do a layout about a family favorite/traditional recipe
Scrap a special accomplishment by your or someone in your family
Do an "It's Broken" layout - toy, car, arm/leg, etc.
Do a "Like Father, Like Son" or "Like Mother, Like Daughter" (or any family member- grandma, grandpa, aunt, uncle, sister, brother, etc.)
Do a layout about your house
Do a layout about your career - even if your a SAHM! That's the most important career ever!
Do a layout about a school activity
Do a layout about a church activity
Do a BEFORE and AFTER layout - diet, pregnancy, dirty to clean, home improvement
Do a color-blocking layout
Do a nautical-themed layout
Do a sand layout - either in color, texture or content
Add an element that moves onto your page - pop-up journal page, something that pulls, etc.
Put memorabilia on a page
Make a quilt block from pattern paper and use on your page
Make a pocket page
Do a page about your garden
Use a paper-folded embelishment on your page
Make a scene with stickers
Use stickers for the border
Make and use a journaling square
Use a ready-made journaling square
Use computer-generated journaling
Use something from nature
Use watercolor pencils
Use colored pencils
Use markers
Use glitter or a glitter pen
Use Radiant Pearls
Use Pearl-Ex
Use speciality paints/ink - Smooches, etc.
Use beads
Make and use a paper piecing
Make and use an embelished die-cut, or use store-bought
Use ladybug theme
Use pressed flowers or leave
Use a paper-clips
Use brads
Use staples
Use stars
Use a ready-made frame
Use tag art
Use ribbon
Do quilling
Pen-stitch a border or around a photo
Use your die-cutting machine
Use chalk
Use eyelets
Use shaped eyelets
Use colored/specality brads
Use a paper crimper
Use a tool you have not used in over a year
Use a black and white photo
Use a 5x7 or larger photo
Crop a picture into a circle

You can also add journaling starters if you want. There are several places online that have lists of journaling prompts. If you google them, you will find several, so I'm not going to write any of them out here. It wasn't as easy to find a list of scrapping idea starters! lol You can easily add your own ideas, too, especially any tools that aren't listed above and even products or prdocut lines that you might have a lot of in your stash.

If you make an Scrapping Idea Jar, please let me know and share your link! I would just love to see what you create! Or, if you think of some idea starters that aren't listed above, please let me know so that I can add them. :-)

I hope you all have a wonderful and blessed day!
di

(I'm not sure where my pretty graphic went! lol I might have erased it! oops!)

Thanks from the Heart- card- Practical Scrappers Weekly Challenge

2009-11-02T14:14:00.003-06:00

I am so happy to say that I was able to play in my scrap area for awhile, with little GG right by my side, and I was able to get a card done! This one is for this weeks challenge at Practical Scrappers to use at least THREE kinds of ribbon. I saw a ribbon flower somewhere and decided that they would be fun to make and put on a card and I just so happened to have this old Stampin' Up! stamp set that worked perfectly for my idea! I also added some light blue glitter to make it look a little more like water......and well, quite honestly because I bought a few bottles of glitter a week or so ago and I am finding myself having to add glitter to each project now! lol The flowers were very easy to make and I should have taken photos as I made them. Maybe I can do that later, if you all would like to know how to make them. ;-)

Take care and I hope you have a wonderful and crafty day!

Pass It On - Card 2

2009-11-02T08:56:00.006-06:00

Good morning everyone and I hope that you all had a wonderful weekend! We had a good one here. It was busy, a little stressful, but good! The best part of my weekend, well second best part.... watching my little one play in the leaves yesterday was the highlight of my weekend....so the second best part of my weekend was working on the next card that I'm offering for the Pass It On Ministry.

The inside says:
You make each day a little brighter!

This card could be yours! All that you need to do is make a comment here and on Friday, I will pick a random winner. Then the fun part is up to you! You get to Pass It On to someone who needs a little TLC. That's the beauty of this ministry. Surprising someone with a handmade card. Someone who is in need of some uplifting words, well wishes, thanks......or just to say "Hi!". Be sure to read Kathy's vision of this ministry here. And spread the word! Be sure to check back here on Friday afternoon to see if you're the lucky winner of this card! I hope you all have a wonderful week and thank you for helping me Pass It On!

Colorful - layout - Tri-Blog Challenge @ Practical Scrappers

2009-11-02T08:37:00.003-06:00

Wow. What a weekend. It wasn't super busy. Just stressful for some reason. Maybe it was because I just wasn't able to do anything creative until late Sunday night...... I can't tell you how much it helps my stress-levels if I am able to create a little bit each day!

This layout was lots of fun to do! Practical Scrappers is having their first Tri-Blog Challenge! You could make one layout using the challenge from each of the three blogs or you could make a layout for each challenge. I chose to do one layout and use all three challenges. The challenge at Practical Scrappers this week is to use at least three ribbons. The other two challenges are to use the provided sketch at Stuck on U Sketches and from Frosted Designs to use an owl on your layout. I was a little worried about the owl, because I wasn't sure if I had any, besides some little stickers. But then I remembered that I had saved the tag from this super-cute tote bag that I had picked up from Borders awhile ago. The tote is covered with these darling owls! And, the tag was one of the owls and worked perfect for this layout. Especially since he's a little colorful himself! I think that this is probably the most busy layout I've ever done. lol But, I think it works......I hope so!
I added a little red brad and some ribbon to the owl, so he didn't have hole in his head anymore. lol Then I looked through my drawer of magnet words and found "unique". I think it's fitting!

Journaling says:

Little Miss Gracie,
You look so darn cute in these tights! They are so big and baggy and then you insisted on wearing my bunny socks, too! You are such a COLORFUL little girl and a sweetie pie, too!
Jan 2009

Pass It on Card Ministry - First Give Away!

2009-10-30T12:51:00.004-05:00

From Country Life in the Big City

I want to first thank all of you sweet ladies who said such wonderful things about the card that I made. Thank you so much! I am really feeling the blessings of this ministry already and this is my first card give away! I also want to thank Kathy again for letting me be apart of her Pass It On ministry. Plus, I have wonderful news! Kathy has had another person come forward asking to join the ranks! Please be sure to visit Janet's blog at Janet Creations and also the founder Kathy's blog at Pass It On.

Now for the fun part! I used the Random Number Generator at random.org and the random number that it picked from 1-7 was 3!!!! (I'm sorry, I don't know how to copy the generator graphic to show it to you here....) The third person to comment was Erika! Congratulations! I'll be contacting you soon to get your address and then I'll get your card in the mail to you. Then you get to do the fun part.....you get to Pass It On to someone who needs some TLC!

Thank you again, ladies, for visiting my blog, for your wonderful comments and for helping me to Pass It On!

I will be posting the next card soon, so be sure check back and to tell your friends. Be sure to visit Kathy and Janet's blogs, too!

Home Sweet Home - layout

2009-10-30T11:46:00.004-05:00

I love to surf around and get inspiration from all of the amazing blogs out there. Here is where I found the idea for my latest layout. I thought that this was the neatest idea ever and even better because the challenge this week at Practical Scrappers was to use your punches! I had also saved the fabric sample that was attached to the package that the play house came in. When I saw that tag, I knew that I had to save it and use it on a layout! I added some blue/gray ribbon to to look like smoke coming from the houses chimney. This layout also meets one of the October assignments at the Yahoo! group ScrapFromYourStash to use brads, flowers and handwritten journaling.

I'm hoping to get more scrapping done this afternoon! I hope you are able to craft today, too!

Bake Sale Madness - part 2 - Salted Nut Roll Bars

2009-10-28T16:33:00.002-05:00

Okay, so how yummy does this look? Oh wow. These are SO GOOD!!!!!! You have to totally forget about your eating-well plan when you look at these.....they are oozing with butter. lol This is the second thing that I made for my churches bake sale tomorrow. I packaged them the same way as I did the Sweet Trail Mix, except I placed each square on top of a food-safe doily to pretty it up a little bit more. This is another easy recipe and makes a lot. I usually don't cut them into pieces this big, but since it was for a bake sale, I made them larger squares. I usually cut them half this size and that's plenty because they are so rich!

Salted Nut Roll Bars-

1 package yellow cake mix
2/3 cup or 11 tablespoons butter, melted
1 egg
1 bag miniature marshmallows
2/3 cup corn syrup
12 oz. peanut butter chips
1/3 cup creamy peanut butter
1/4 cup butter
2 teaspoons vanilla
2/3 cups dry roasted peanuts

Crust-
Mix dry cake mix with the 2/3 cup of melted butter and the egg. Put into a greased jelly roll pan. ( I line my pan with parchment paper). Use your hands/fingers to press the mixture to the edges and to make as even as you can. Bake at 350F degrees for 14 minutes. It will NOT be done. Sprinkle crust with marshmallows, covering evenly. Return to the oven, bake for 8 minutes. Cool.

Combine the corn syrup, peanut butter chips, peanut butter, 1/4 cup butter and vanilla in a saucepan and cook on low/medium until melted and mixed well. Stir often. Do not over cook. Pour this mixture over the marshmallow layer evenly. Sprinkle with peanuts. Let cool and cut into bars.

Yum.

Here's how mine turned out and are all ready to go to the bake sale!

Bake Sale Madness - part 1 - Sweet Trail Mix

2009-10-28T14:19:00.006-05:00

Do you remember my talking about frantically searching for 2 recipes yesterday? Well, here's why. I wanted to make them for a bake sale at our church tomorrow. It is during a craft boutique, so I thought that this Sweet Trail Mix would be easy to snack on while walking around and looking at all of the beautiful items for sale. I put 1 1/4 cups of mix each cello-bag and I got about 22 bags per recipe. I did make two batches of this and for two reasones: 1- It is SOOO good! 2- It is SOOO easy! lol Here's the recipe:

Sweet Trail Mix-

2 sticks of butter
1 1/2 cup brown sugar
1/3 cup corn syrup

1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1 box of Crispix cereal - or generic brand - either is fine
2 cups peanuts
1 bag of M&M's - the big bags in the candy aisle - not the little ones you find by the cash register

Before starting, tear off a couple of big sheets of wax paper or aluminum foil and place them on your counter to make one big sheet. You will need this to pour the hot mixture onto so that it can cool.

1. Empty the box of Crispix and peanuts into a brown paper grocery bag. Give it a good shake to mix.

2. In a medium sauce pan, bring the first three ingredients to a boil. Boil for three minutes. Remove the pan from heat and then add the vanilla and baking soda. Stir well.

3. Pour the mixture over the cereal. fold over the bag several times and give it a good shake. Be careful, because the syrup is VERY HOT and the bag will get hot in your hands. I try to hold it by the top where its rolled up and then use my other hand to help flip the bag from side to side and upside down and back.

4. Place the bag in the microwave. Cook on high for 2 1/2 minutes.

5. Remove the bag from the microwave and shake well again.

6. Place the bag back into the microwave and cook on high for 2 1/2 minutes.

7. Remove the bag from the microwave and shake well again. Pour the mixture out onto waxed paper or foil. Use a metal spatula to spread the mixture out as much as you can and to help break it up a bit. Once it is cooled, break apart clumps with your hands. Pour into a big bowl and add the M&M's.

8. Put into an air-tight container or big Zip-loc bag. Enjoy!!!

Here is how I packaged them for the bake sale!

It's a sickness.......

2009-10-27T11:58:00.004-05:00

......it really is. I am totally addicted to collecting recipes. I admit it and here's the proof. A tub full of them, 3 binders and a file box. All of them are full of recipes. The sad thing is this.....I have thrown a lot of them away. And I do mean A LOT! And, even worse. This doesn't include any cookbooks. Those are tucked all over my house and when we moved recently, I was forced to face the fact that I had way too many of them and I ended up purging out several hundred cookbooks from my collection. It's amazing what moving into a smaller house does to your collections of "stuff". lol If you're wondering why they are all sitting on top of my table....it's because I was desperately searching for a recipe this morning. Well over an hour worth of searching, too! I was trying to find two recipes that I've had forever. I knew exactly what they looked like, what type of paper they were on and how they were printed out. Every detail. Excpet the most important one. Where they were! I am happy to report that I did finally find them. But, this has made me see that I really, really need to do something about this mess. So, this is what I'll be doing for awhile. Organizing my recipes. I have a few ideas that I'm working on and I will be sure to share.

I hope that I'm not the only person who's addicted to collecting recipes. And the crazy thing is that there is no possible way that I will ever be able to make them all. lol It sure is nice to know that I just might have that perfect recipe filed away and waiting for me to make it.....as long as I can find it first!

Fridge Raider - scrapbook layout

2009-10-26T17:07:00.004-05:00

Yeah! I was able to do a scrapbook page today and complete two different challenges! The first challenge is from a great Yahoo! group that I'm in called ScrapFromYouStash. Each month, there are 4 different challenges and the biggest and best thing about this group, is that it focuses on using up your stash. The first challenge was to use any of the sketches from the October PageMaps. The second challenge that I was able to meet with this layout was this weeks challenge at Practical Scrappers. Another totally awesome blog that is all about using up the stuff you already have. This weeks focus is Punches! I was thrilled to see that, because I have a TON of them and I do not use them as much as I should.

I'm off to do some more crafting! I hope you're all having a wonderful day as well!

Pass It on Card Ministry

2009-10-26T13:45:00.004-05:00

The Lord works in wonderful ways and I am thrilled that He has led me to meeting Kathy and her new ministry of sharing called - Pass It On. I have been asking God if there is anything else that I'm supposed to do with the grace of creativity that He has given me. I do a lot of things for myself and my family, like scrapbooking, but I still have been feeling a little empty and like I'm not using this grace to the fullest. Then I found Kathy's site and read about the ministry that she felt called to start and I knew instantly that this was an answer to my prayers! So, I wrote Kathy and asked her if I could help and be a card hostess for her ministry. I am excited to say that she accepted my request for help. I've only known Kathy for a little while, but I can tell you that she is a very kind and wonderful person and I truly believe that her ministry of sharing will help touch those in need of some love and support. Please read about Kathy's vision here and be sure to share this ministry with all of your friends and loved ones who would like to win a handmade card to share with others. Remember, that's what this is all about.....to Pass It On!

To start, I will be posting a new card on Monday morning. Leave me a comment and on Friday morning I will pick a random winner and I will mail the winner their card as soon as I receive their mailing address. Then, and this is the most important part of the whole ministry......the winner needs to send that card to someone who needs it. Someone who could use some words of support, get well wishes, of thanks.....someone you love. That's the really fun part of this whole ministry! We have all gotten so wrapped up in this world of technology that we live in and what a wonderful surprise for someone to receive a handmade card in their real mailbox! So, I hope that you tell your friends about Kathy and my blog and join in on this wonderful ministry. Let's see how many people we can bless with these cards!

Here is the card I am offering this week:

The inside of this card says:

Your kindness touches my heart.

You have until Friday morning to comment. I will be picking a random winner at noon Central time on Friday. Thank you so much for helping me Pass It On!!!

p.s.- If I have enough interest, I will offer more cards during the week for you to Pass On..... ;-)

embellished - digi layout - The Paper Cut - Challenge #2

2009-10-25T23:29:00.003-05:00

I can't even begin to share with you how busy my day was today.....whew! We were running non-stop all day long. I had a couple of volunteer jobs at church today, plus one of my daughter's was in the Science Olympics at one of the local high schools. Add on top of that a quick run to buy my son some shorts, then to Border's for a book for my daughter, and Burger King for a much-needed order of french fries, and you can see that I was really glad to finally get home this evening! I was really glad to finally get to sit down tonight and to work on this digital layout for the non-Twilight version of Challenge #2 at The Paper Cut. This challenge was to do a layout answering the question: "What kind of a scrapper are you?" So here's what I came up with:
Journaling says:

My scrappy style
is sometimes....
simple
busy
colorful
monochromatic
girly
masculine
vintage
trendy
but always.....
embellished

The other part of the challenge was to work in some of the logos of scrapping supplies that you use, but I really couldn't do that with this layout and make it look the way I wanted it to. I believe that Challenge #3 will be posted tomorrow and I can't wait to see what it is! I sure do love a fun challenge! This layout was done with the Blossom Kit by Shabby Princess, with the exception of the blue, check bow which is from the Hugs n' Kisses Kit by Weeds & Wildflowers Designs.

It's been a long and crazy weekend for me and I'm hoping that things will calm down a bit with the school week starting up again. How was your weekend?

Oh, I have some really exciting news that I will be sharing with you all this week sometime. I have been given a wonderful opportunity to help in a new ministry of sharing and I will tell you all about it soon!

in denial - digi layout - The Paper Cut - Twilight Challenge #2

2009-10-24T22:54:00.003-05:00

Well, I am really having fun doing the challenges at The Paper Cut! This layout is for Challenge #2 - to scrap what type of a Twilight fan you are. I'm going to do their non-Twilight challenge next, which is to scrap what type of a scrapper you are. Everything is pretty much from the Yours Truly Kit by Shabby Princess!

Journaling says:

I have to admit that sometimes I am a little
embarrassed that I am a bigger fan of the
Twilight books than my teenage daughters are.
There is now way that I like these books more
than they do! I’m a mom, for heavens sake!
So, I guess I will keep pretending that the
books are just okay. How can I ever admit
the truth? That maybe I wonder what it
would be like to live in Forks, what it would
be like to be Bella....to be Edward’s girlfriend.
I sound just like I was a teenage girl.....
But do I ever really wonder those things?
Things like that? Me? Never!

I hope you are all having a wonderful weekend and finding some time to be creative!

love @ first sight - digi layout - The Paper Cut Twilight Challenge

2009-10-24T02:19:00.008-05:00

I can't tell you how much fun I had doing this layout! This is for the Chapter 1 Challenge at The Paper Cut. I couldn't resist doing the non-Twilight version of the challenge. I knew that I had an awesome story to tell and that it was something that I needed to document, for sure! My poor husband was really curious when I texted him yesterday while he was at work asking him if I had the right song in my mind that he used to po-go to at the skating rink and what his DEVO t-shirt looked like. He acted like he had no idea what I was talking about! lol We were pretty crazy back then, that's for sure! Oh, the 80's......what a totally awesome time to be a teen!

It took me awhile to find the right paper to use, but once I did this layout came together to perfectly. I was at first looking at black or off-white, but it just wasn't working for me. Once I saw this notebook paper, I knew that's what I needed to. Everything is from a super-cute (and FREE!) kit called School Itty Bitty Kit from Three Paper Peonies, except the alpha for the word "first". This is from the kit called Awakening by TaylorMade Designs. I also had fun using Pea Deliah's Doodles from a font at Fonts for Peas, and I've never used doodles before! They add the right touch to my notebook paper, don't you think? I don't have any pictures from way back then, so I found some images on the internet and used them for this layout.

Journaling says:
I remember the first time that I saw Joe so well. Christine Nelson & I were at Skateport. There wasn’t really anything to do in Springfield when you were a teenager, besides go roller skating. But, that’s where I first saw Joe. He always wore his black DEVO t-shirt & gray parachute pants. Every time they played the song “Turn Around” by DEVO, Joe & his good friend, Andy Havens, would pogo around the skating rink & always during the middle of the song, they would go to the center of the rink, lay on the floor & do the jerk. Oh, I was totally in love with him right after I first laid my eyes on him! He was such a rebel & I was hooked! It took a month or so for us to actually meet & that part is kind of fuzzy but I am pretty sure that Christine had something to do with it! But, it wasn’t long before Joe & I were “going together”. We were quite an item.....and we still are! We spent many a weekend after that going to Skateport together. That was quite awhile ago, but Joe will always be my New Wave sweetie & I’ll always be his Punk Rock Girl.
We owe it all to Skateport.........oh, and probably Christine, too!

This was such a fun layout to do! I really need to do more of these about my teen years........there are so many stories that I could tell!!!

First Site - layout - Twilight Challenge @ The Paper Cut

2009-10-23T13:28:00.005-05:00

So this one I just had to do for fun. I ran across this blog, The Paper Cut, and it's all about scrapping your addiction the Twilight books. First of all, I am not addicted to these books. lol Yes, I have read them all and they are quite easy to get sucked into. So, I don't consider myself a Twilight addict, just a Twilight fan who loves a fun challenge and so I decided to join in on these challenges at The Paper Cut. I have to admit that I did start rereading the first book a few nights ago. I wanted something easy to read that I could get lost in, and for some strange reason, this book fits the bill. I don't really quite know why I like the books, but there is some odd magic about the story that really pulls you in. I'm not quite sure what it is......maybe I'll figure it out as I do these challenges each week at The Paper Cut.

Journaling says:

I resisted for a long time. I saw the book
everywhere I went. It wasn’t easy to ignore.
Then, I started seeing more & more ladies
posting on their blogs about how they were
reading the Twilight Books & how addicting
they were. So, I finally caved in & bought
the first book. Like I said, it took me awhile.
I think that Book 3 was already out when
I finally decided to go downstairs at my
favorite book store, The Bookworm, to their
children’s section, & pick up Twilight for
the first time. I really don’t know what it
is about this book that makes it so addicting.
I honestly don’t think that it’s written that
well. It is written for teenagers, & at a very
easy reading level. Lots of short sentences
make up each paragraph. But, there is
something about it. Something about the
characters. Something about Bella. Something
about Edward. So, after that I was hooked.
It only took me a couple of days to read
the first book, so I went right out & bought
the second & then the third.. I had to wait
awhile for Book 4....and then there was the
movie. I’m actually rereading Book One
right now. And quickly becoming lost in
the story of Edward & Bella the magic that is
Twilight

If you enjoy the Twilight books and are looking for something fun and different to scrap, then I highly recommend you visiting The Paper Cut blog. The really neat thing, is that even if you aren't a fan of the books or say you are but don't want to do your pages about Twilight, they have non-Twilight twists to each weeks challenge. So, anyone can play along!

Here's what their blog says:

Twilight Chapter One : {First Sight}

How did you find Twilight? Was it recommended or introduced to you by a friend? Did the cover draw you in from afar? Tell us how you came across the series and how you fell in love with it....because we know you did!

Challenge: Use a picture of yourself and/or one of the Twilight books or the Twilight DVD.

For those of you non Twilighters:

If you haven't experienced the phenomenon of Twilight, feel free to express how your found your love or fascination with something or someone. Let's elaborate on the name of Chapter One, First Sight. How did you fall in love with ______?

Non Twi Challenge: Use a picture of yourself and a picture or something that represents your "something or someone."

I hope it's okay that I copied that here! Please visit The Paper Cut if you'd like to join in on the fun there! I'm having a lot of fun looking at everyone's pages that they have done and enjoying rereading Twilight at the same time!

Family Favorite Recipe - Crock-Pot Ranch Stew

2009-10-23T12:51:00.003-05:00

We had this for dinner last night. Ranch Stew in the crock-pot. This is one of the recipes that my Mom used to make all of the time. I remember coming home from school and having the house full of the aromas of this cooking all day in the crock-pot. This is comfort food. I used to pick out the beans and pieces of tomatoes, but I don't do that any more! lol I do substitute Morningstar Farms Meal Starters Grillers Recipe Crumbles though for the ground beef and it works wonderfully in this recipe. I haven't eaten red meat since 1991 and love having these products so that I can fix my favorite childhood (and ground beef loaded) recipes in a veggie-friendly way. The canned corn, beans and tomatoes are the regular-sized cans. Not the big ones. I'm sorry, but I don't know the ounces for them. I just grab what my mom did. lol I'm guessing they are around 14 oz cans. The ones a bit bigger than a can of soup..... ;-)

Ranch Stew-

1 pound of ground beef (or the equivalent in veggie ground beef crumbles)
1 chopped onion
1 chopped green bell pepper
1 can corn- drained
1 can red beans- rinsed and drained
2 cans chopped tomatoes
1-2 teaspoons chili powder

Saute beef (or "beef" crumbles) onion, and green bell pepper in some oil in a big skillet. Meanwhile, add corn, beans, tomatoes to the crock-pot and turn to medium heat. After the meat is cooked and the onions and bell peppers are soft, add the mixture to the crock-pot along with the chili powder. Stir well. Let cook for 5 or 6 hours. You can turn your crock-pot to low and let it cook all day, if you want. Stir every now and then, if you're home. Serve on top of some cooked rice. Yum. You can also top this with some shredded cheese, if you like, but I like it just the way it is.

Leftovers are so yummy. I'm having some right now actually!
Enjoy!

Office Supply Challenge layout- Practical Scrappers

2009-10-22T17:32:00.004-05:00

Somehow I managed to get this layout done this afternoon! My little one was giving me quite a run for my money while I was working on it. lol She was having just a little bit too much fun with my scrapping goodies and figured out how to open the little containers that have all of my eyelets in them. Plus, it's just hard to work with a little one beside you, getting into everything your trying to use, and moving things on you when you're not looking! But, I persisted and look what I did! I finished the challenge at Practical Scrappers to use office supplies on your layout or card. I chose brads and used them to hold down the fabric and lace and also as centers to a couple of the flowers.
I did some surfing around last night in some of the scrapping galleries and I was definately influenced by the current trend of tearing and rolling the edges of the paper to create frames and shapes. I used a big bowl to help me make the circle and a small, wooden kabob skewer to help me roll the edges of the paper and curl it.
I also made the fabric flower from some of my fabric scraps. I frayed the edges with a razor blade and used a brad to hold the circles together. Then I cut out a few leaves from some pretty, green felt and sewed a straight stitch through the middle of each leave with some lighter green DMC floss.

All of the other flowers are Prima and I added a small rhinestone to the center of each. I also rubbed the lace with some brown ink, to antique it up a bit.

I had a lot of fun doing this challenge and I hope to work on another one soon! Maybe a card will be next!

time for some creative therapy....

2009-10-22T13:52:00.005-05:00

It's been one of those days.....

It sure doesn't help that it's been raining, again....gloomy....again....cold, again.....

So, I am going to try to make some time for some much-needed creative therapy today. Dinner is in the crock-pot, the kitchen is clean, my bed is made, laundry is going.....it's time for some fun. I plan on sharing the recipe for tonight's dinner later; after I can get a picture of it. It's Ranch Stew in the crock-pot and one of my favorite comfort foods from when I was a child.

I have some fun challenges in mind and here's what I'd like to start working on today:

Practical Scrappers - Office Supply Challenge - I think I'm going to use some brads :-)
The Paper Cut - Twilight Challenges - Chapter 1 - I want to do this totally for fun and just for me. I have read all of the books. I wouldn't say that I'm a die-hard fan, but they were fun to read and these challenges look like they'll be lots of fun. The awesome thing is that they also have a non-Twilight spin on the challenge, so you haven't read the book or have but don't want to do the Twilight-themed challenges, you can still play along!
ScrapFIT: Workout #6 - This is a new challenge blog that I recently found and this looks like a fun challenge!

Look at what I found also, while doing some blog surfing last night:
\

New album from Prima Wow! Look at those pages!
A neat way to add texture with paint from Studio Calico - I need to try this!
Look at these darling pumpkins! These would look cute on my mantle!

Okay, I know that I found more, but my free time is going fast! Before I know it, it will be dinner time. Take care and I hope you're all having a wonderful day!

Family Favorite Recipe - TGI Friday's Broccoli Cheese Soup

2009-10-19T18:02:00.002-05:00

It's been quite awhile since I've shared any recipes, so I thought that I would share one of our favorite soup recipes today. It's a copycat recipe for TGI Friday's Broccoli Cheese Soup and it is SO good!!!! I usually let this sit and simmer on low on the stove for quite awhile. At least 30 minutes or so. I ALWAYS make a double batch, too! This is so good served with a salad and some good bread. Enjoy!

TGI Friday's Broccoli Cheese Soup-

4 cups broth - veggie or chicken
1 cup water
1 cup half-and-half cream
5 slices of American cheese
1/2 cup flour
1/2 teaspoon dried onion flakes
1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
4 cups broccoli florets in bite-size pieces
1/2 cup shredded cheddar cheese (to garnish)
2 teaspoons minced parsley (to garnish)

Combine the broth, water, half and half, cheese, flour, onion and pepper in a large stock pot. Whisk to combine and to break up any lumps of flour, then turn the heat to medium/high. Bring the soup to a boil and then reduce the heat to low. Stir often. Add the broccoli to the soup and simmer for 15-20 minutes or until the broccoli is tender and the soup is thickened. Serve soup sprinkled with some cheddar cheese and fresh chopped parsley on top.

layouts from this weekend.....

2009-10-19T13:22:00.006-05:00

Gracie's Comfy Couch

Gracie got this little couch for Christmas last year and it's by far the neatest thing ever! She loves it and everyone has fun sitting in it with Gracie. It's pretty comfortable, too! We found it at Wal-Mart and I'm pretty sure that she'll get a lot of use out of it for several years to come. I'm actually kind of so-so on this layout. Maybe because I was working on it at 3 a.m. and not thinking straight. lol This morning, I took it apart and put it on the light blue card stock. It was on a coordinating floral paper and it was just too much for my eyes to handle. It does look a lot better, but I'm not loving it. I think it's the paper.....I do love the paper, but I think it's the colors that are getting to me. Oh well! I'm being silly and too picky! It's cute and most importantly, it's DONE! lol

Gracie, Our Santa Baby

I love these felt poinsettia's that I found on clearance at Archiver's!

Oh, Oh, Ohh!

This one will take a bit of explaining. lol Gracie loves music and every morning we would watch music videos on TV. She absolutely LOVED the Beyonce song "Single Ladies". And, they used to show the video A LOT, so she would dance around the living room and sing, "Oh, Oh, Oh!" a long with Beyonce. You could also watch it on-line and as soon as I showed her that we could do that, she wanted to watch it all of the time! She even sang it in the car! lol The video is black & white, so that's why I chose to do black & white for this layout. Silly, but fun! lol

Me & You

I had printed out this photo of me and my husband on New Years Eve awhile ago and the other night when I was scrapping and ran across this paper in my stash, I knew that it was perfect for this picture! The arrow ended up being pretty grundge and I wasn't meaning it to. lol I had painted it marron first and didn't like it, so I tried to then paint it light pink and it just wasn't turning out like I wanted it to. So, I tried to wipe off the pink paint and it only came off half of the arrow. So, I decided to put glue all over it and cover the whole thing in light pink glitter. You can still see the marron paint through it and I think it turned out pretty neat. A happy accident, that's for sure! The "Me & You" part that I highlighted in the circle were not colored in originally. I used a blender pen and my Stampin' Up markers to color it in, so that it stood out more.

So that's it for my productive, scrappy weekend! I hope you enjoyed looking at these, because I really had a good time scrapping them. Now, I REALLY need to sit and start putting my layouts into albums! I am embarassed to admit that I have a VERY, VERY tall stack of layouts that are not in albums.......all of this work and they are stacked up in my closet. Oh, how sad is that???? Does anyone else seem to have this problem? I really need to just start using those 40% off coupons and picking up an album every other week or so......it's a shame that we can't enjoy them because they are hidden away.

I hope you all have a blessed and beautiful Autumn day!

Our sweet, litle Grace - digi layout

2009-10-19T12:18:00.004-05:00

Wow! What a weekend I have had! My husband was away on business from Thursday through Sunday, so I have had many sleepless nights. I just dont' sleep well when he's gone. And, then our computer server went belly-up on Saturday, so I was without internet until this morning. I did spend all of Saturday night (until after 3 a.m.!) scrapping! I don't have photos of the layouts yet, so that I can share, but I did get one digital layout done and have it here for you all to see.
This is my little Gracie when she was a less than 2 months old. This is the photo that was used for her birth announcements. I remembered seeing this idea in a Martha Stewart magazine ages ago and never forgot it. I sure didn't ever think that I was going to be able to use the idea for my own baby announcement. Gracie was our surprise gift from God.....that's why we named her Grace, which means "gift from God". Her birth information was printed out onto an iron-on sheet with my computer and then ironed onto her onesie. It looks almost looks like the info was typed onto the picture in a photo editing program, but it's not. It's on her clothes. lol This is another absolutely beautiful kit that I got the other night by Shabby Miss Jenn Designs. And, it's called "Gracie's Garden". How fitting is that? Another reason why I had to buy it. lol

I'll be sharing more soon! I hope you're all having a beautiful day! We have sunshine and blue skies!!!! It is so wonderful to see after being stuck under gloomy, cloudy skies for almost 2 weeks!

Autumn - digital layout

2009-10-17T01:53:00.005-05:00

I got a couple of Autumn digi kits at Shabby Miss Jenn Designs and I just had to sit down tonight and play with them. I absolutely LOVE Autumn and everything about it and I just couldn't resist getting the beautiful kits offered there! I am a huge fan of all things vintage, so the kits offered at Shabby Miss Jenn Designs are right up my alley!!!!

A surprising visitor

2009-10-16T17:23:00.003-05:00

I had quite a shock this afternoon when I looked out our living room windows to see this huge bird sitting on the fence! I ran and grabbed my camera, but I didn't have my zoom lens on and couldn't get a good picture of him, as you can see from the bad photo above. I did get my zoom lens on my camera but by the time that I made it back into the living room, I either startled him or he finally got tired of the squirrel chirping him out from the ground in front of him. Our squirrels are VERY possessive of their front yard. Notice I said, "their" front yard! They chirp at us all of the time when we go in the yard! lol I pulled out my old bird field guide and I think that it's a Peregrine Falcon. After doing some googling, I found this page that talks a bit about them. I am surprised that this is what it might be, because it says that they are endangered. Whatever it was, it sure was a majestic-looking bird! I'm not sure if he will ever visit again, but I sure hope that he does. I have my camera ready!

family - layout - Practical Scrappers weekly challenge

2009-10-16T15:23:00.004-05:00

Here's another one for this weeks challenge at Practical Scrappers to use lace card stock. I had a lot of fun with this challenge and I'm anxious to see what next weeks challenge will be!

I had my scanner out, so I decided to use it to scan my layout. Yes, we are having yet another cloudy/rainy/gloomy day here. It is really starting to bring me down. It seems like it's been forever since we saw the sun and blue sky!

For this layout I cut a strip of the lace card stock to go across the width of the page and I also cut out a couple of extra snowflakes to use as accents. I added a few felt snowflakes and fastened them together with colored brads. For the title, I rubbed a silver Brilliance ink pad over the chipboard word and then heat set the ink with my embossing gun. Then I added a smashed bottle cap that I had added a punched circle to the center of that says "Pikes Peak, Dec ;08". I put a few pieces of red, ribbon scraps behind the bottle cap and that's about it!

I'm hoping to spend the evening scrapping and I hope that you are all able to spend some time being creative today, too!

Without You - layout - Practical Scrappers weekly challenge

2009-10-15T13:51:00.006-05:00

First of all, please, please excuse the horrible photo of my layout! We are having yet ANOTHER gloomy and rainy day here and I can't get a decent photo whatsoever. I've tried and tired, but it's just too icky and dark outside. I need some sunshine and blue skies!

Okay, so I really wanted to use some "real" lacy card stock that is the challenge for this week at Practical Scrappers. I had a sheet of semi-lacy card stock and I used it for this layout. But, I kept seeing all of these fantastic pages done with the real lacy kind and I just had to try it, too. lol I know, I know......I'm making excuses. I just needed an excuse to go out and buy some, because I didn't have any! lol
So, here's my layout using some lacy card stock. I didn't use as much of it as I originally thought that I would, but I stumbled upon this transparency sheet, because I still had them sitting out from doing an older challenge at Practical Scrappers to use transparencies. I really thought that it went great with this photo that I had of me and Joe holding hands while driving to church one Sunday morning.

The transparency says:

Without you I'd be lost
a ship without a sail
a nest without an egg
a tree without a root
a home without a heart
A soul without a mate.
I cut one strip from the lace card stock and put that underneath the photo and transparency across the bottom. I wanted to do something more and then it hit me that highlighting the words "soul" and "mate" would look really neat. So, I took some pink acrylic paint and brushed it across the back of the transparency. I really love how that turned out!
The heart is corrugated and I added all sorts of things to it. The light pink hearts were cut from the lace card stock. I wrapped it with some ribbon and I added a couple of plastic tags tied with ribbon, punched red hearts, a rhinestone and then letter stickers for our initials.

The next piece of lace card stock that I have is snowflakes and I can't wait to work on that one next! Hopefully this evening during nap time!

1st "REAL" Haircut - layout

2009-10-14T11:43:00.004-05:00

Yeah! I got a 2-page layout done yesterday and I was able to use one of my stashed away kits from The Scraproom. I haven't done a 2-page layout in quite awhile, so this was lots of fun. I tried taking a picture of the first page several times and it just doesn't want to come out nice. We are having another cold and gloomy day here, so the light coming in my window is pretty sad!

I picked up some lace card stock the other day and I am hoping to get to play with it later this afternoon.

It sure feels great to be creative! I hope that you are finding some time each day to be creative, too!

official - layout - Practical Scrappers weekly challenge

2009-10-12T14:12:00.008-05:00

I am so excited to get this layout done today! I stumbled upon the blog, Practical Scrappers, a couple of weeks ago and it's been so crazy around here.....I seem to be lucky to get the weekly challenges done before the weeks over! Not this time. The new challenge was posted last night, a day early, and it was top-priority scrapping for me today!
The challenge this week is to use lace card stock. I can't believe this, but I don't have any! Not the super, detailed kind anyway. But, I did have this sheet from Making Memories and I'm hoping that it counts as lace card stock. It does remind me of eyelet fabric. You can see the dark blue card stock peeking through the lace-like flowers in the light blue card stock. Oh, and I blurred out our last name....that's what that icky white spot is, if you're wondering....... ;-)
I actually started working on this layout last night, when I was trying to get to sleep. lol Once I get an idea in my head for a layout, it can be hard for me to finally go to sleep because I want to get up and start working on it. lol So, last night when I was in bed, I thought of the idea of making something like fabric quilt binding, but out of paper and putting that around the edge of the circle of card stock that I cut the lace paper into. So, that's what I did. I cut strips of 3/4-inch paper and adhered them together, crumbled that up in my hands real well, and then folded it in half. This idea used a ton of adhesive! I ran it across the front and back edge of the circle before putting the folded binding on. I didn't want it to come undone! Then, I added faux scallops around the edges, using 3 different patterns of paper cut with my small circle punch (and lots more adhesive! lol).
I made the flower by cutting 4 circles of patterned paper and then I took some very rough sand paper and really rubbed like crazy around the edges to wear the paper down and even tear it a bit. I stacked them up ontop of each other and there you have it, a distressed flower! Then I added one little, light blue rhinestone, just because..... ;-)

I had so much fun using that lacy card stock, I think I just might go by my local scrapping store and pick up a few more sheets! I can't wait to see what everyone else does with their lace card stock!

sweet - layout

2009-10-10T16:23:00.007-05:00

Here's one for the challenge at Practical Scrappers (my new & most favorite scrapping blog around!). If you have a stash, and even if you don't, Practical Scrappers is the place to be! The challenges are awesome and really get you using up the things that you already have. I need all the help that I can with this, because I'm ashamed to admit that I have quite the scrapping stash! This one was to use your decorative edge scissors. When I first say that challenge, I thought, oh boy....I have a TON of those darn scissors and I don't ever use them. Ever! I remember when they were the hottest scrapping tool around and you just had to have every one, or you weren't a cool scrapper! Well, I'm not so cool now. I have a bucket full of them and what are they doing? Nothing. Sitting in my cabinet. They do looking kinda pretty though, don't they? But, looking pretty isn't functional and I believe that at $5+ a pop, that's a lot of money to be just sitting there in a bucket looking pretty in my cabinet! lol
So here's what I came up with, using some of my deco scissors. Four different designs actually! Pretty good for one layout and considering that I have about 20 more in that darn bucket waiting to be used! I used one design on both edges of the blue paper and then rubbed the edges with light brown ink.

Now, for the flower, I know that I saw this idea somewhere while I was surfing around and I'm pretty sure that it was while looking through all of the other entries for using deco scissors for the Practical Scrappers challenge. So, whoever thought of this idea, THANK YOU! Because I love it! lol First, I cut out 4 circles, large to small. I used 3 different designs of scissors around the edges of the circles. I then used a small wooden skewer to help me roll up the edges around the circles. I smashed down the edges on the circles, rubbed some light brown ink on the edges and then stacked them up to make my flower. After adhering the flower together, I added a small circle that I had glued some seed beads onto. Top it off with a little piece of folded ribbon and that's it!
Now off to hopefully work on another page. And, to use some more of my deco scissors!

Winter Prison Blues - digi layout

2009-10-06T22:35:00.004-05:00

Here is a fun one in honor of my good friend, Ellen. We always whine and cry when it starts getting cold out and we have to start wearing real shoes. We are both flip-flop girls and start wearing them as soon as our little toes can each spring and then as long as we can after the winds start coming from the north and it gets too cold. She sent me a picture of her feet the other day and wrote "shoe prison" and I laughed about it all day. I felt the same way when I finally had to wiggle my little piggies into my shoes the other day. So, we are both singing the Winter Prison Blues. Shoe Prison that is for our poor feet! lol

Here's what the journaling says:

Well, I finally had to do it. Today I had to put my feet in shoe prison. It has decided to get cold early this year. It’s only the beginning of October, but we have already had some very cold nights and very chilly days. So, into shoe prison my feet went. No more flip-flops. No more bare footin’ around. It’s shoe prison until spring time. Oh, that seems so far away! It looks like until the breeze comes back from the south and the robins start to chirp, my poor feet will be singing the Winter Prison Blues..........

{ornery) -scrapbooking layout

2009-10-06T22:25:00.004-05:00

Here's a fun one that I did over the weekend. This is one of the great things about the Library of Memories System by Stacy Julian. As I was sorting through years and years of photos one day, I kept running across photos of my daughter with silly smiles and grins on her face. So, I started stacking them up and before I knew it, I had a great layout in the making! As you can see from the picture below of the large picture in the layout.......the title fits this one perfectly! How ornery of a face is that? lol

ick - scrapbooking layout - Practical Scrappers weekly challenge

2009-10-03T13:45:00.005-05:00

Here's another layout for a challenge at Practical Scrappers! I am really loving this blog! The challenge was to use a die-cut on a layout. I don't have a lot of die-cuts in my stash, because I just never really used them that much. But, as soon as I saw this challenge, I remembered that I had a couple of turkey die-cuts. That made me think of a picture of my daughter on Thanksgiving Day one year and I knew that I had to go with these for this challenge.

The first thing that I did was to color the turkey die-cut with chalks. You can see a a plain turkey and the chalked one side-by-side here to see the difference. One turkey is lighter brown card stock, but you can see how much a little chalk can pep up a plain die-cut! I dug into my stash and found some Autumn colored papers and then went to work! I really love how this one turned out and it sure was fun to do this challenge and use up an old die-cut that I've had waiting in my stash for probably over 10 years!

2nd Lost Tooth - layout - Practical Scrappers weekly challenge

2009-10-02T20:57:00.007-05:00

I am so excited to have found a great blog called, Practical Scrappers! They focus on using what you have and that's something that I really need to do. I have more than plenty scrapping supplies and now I really need to focus on using them up, not going out and buying more to add to my stash. They have awesome challenges and I am always up for a challenge! This one is for their challenge to use a transparency. I was thrilled to see this, because I bought a stack of transparencies several years ago at a yard sale and I haven't used a single one!

The page is covered by one transparency. Then, I used my Big Shot and a flower die by Spellbinders and I cut flowers out from white and pink card stock. I embossed these using the Spellbinders dies. Then I cut out the same size of flowers from a transparency sheet. I ran those flowers through a Cuttlebug embossing folder. After that, I took some pink acrylic paint and smeared it over one side of the transparency flowers. I also painted one side of the plastic frame, because it was clear and wasn't showing up well, but now that it's painted it shows up great and highlights the tooth in my daughters hand.
I decided to layer things differently, too. I put the pink flowers underneath the big transparency and then placed the white and painted transparency flowers on top of the big transparency. As well as buttons on each flower. I also placed the arrow and plastic frame on top.
I had lots of fun doing this layout and I can't wait to see what other challenges Practical Scrappers has in store!

because you have wings - digi layout

2009-10-02T20:10:00.004-05:00

This one is for the OScraps! Member Spotlight challenge. The challenge was to scrap-lift a layout from the chosen member's gallery. Here's my version of one of her amazing layouts!

rest - digi layout

2009-10-02T15:04:00.004-05:00

Here's one that I just finished (a little too late because it was for September!) for a Copy-Cat Challenge using a template at OScraps! and I used the digi kitLoveable by Kitty Designs. Be sure to visit their blog, because they have awesome challenges going on all of the time!

Gratitude Challenge - Journal page 4

2009-10-02T11:53:00.003-05:00

A simple page, just stamped with some Stampin' Up! stamps in a few different colors of ink and a colored in a little bit with markers. I rubbed around the edges with some ink on a sponge.

Gratitude Challenge - Journal page 3

2009-10-02T11:50:00.002-05:00

I'm really digging out my old Stampin' Up! sets for this journaling project! She's colored in with SU! markers and chalks. g

Heaven in my Mudroom......

2009-10-02T10:04:00.007-05:00

Wanna have a peek at my scrap area? It's in my mudroom, just off the kitchen. I love the split door that leads the way to my little bit of heaven! This is where I spend a lot of my time. I love my mud room!

This is the main counter where I work. I work best standing, so this is perfect for me. The upper cabinets are full of my LOM Storage albums, some books for inspiration, glues, alphabets in DMC floss storage boxes, and tons and tons of stamp sets from Stampin' Up!. On top of the cabinets are some baskets. One is full of ribbon, another foam alphabet stamps, tins and other boxes waiting to be altered, and tubs full of stamps. There is a tall pantry on the end. One side has 2 tall, Iris carts that has all of my paper scraps in it; one drawer per color. I also have my Paper/Sticker Binder in there that is full of stickers. The other side has an Iris cart that has ribbon and some odds and ends that need to be organized, my Big Shot Die-Cutter and dies, and binders with alphabet stickers and letter templates. The left upper cabinet has my albums and light box and the right upper cabinet has more Stampin' Up! stamp sets and my sewing box.

Another small cabinet is across from the main work area. I try to just keep things on this side that I use often, but aren't needed right by my side when I work. The cabinet above my washer has 8.5x11 paper, idea books and a couple of boxes of papers waiting to be filed. The cabinet above the dryer has cleaning supplies.

Here's another look at my main work area. The white drawer units house my 4-categories of photos using the Library Of Memories System that is explained in the book "Photo Freedom" by Stacy Julian. The cabinets directly below have more boxes full of photos and memorabilia. The gray drawer units are full of embellishments and other odds 'n ends, like buttons, ribbon scraps, paper clips and other metal accents, etc. The green drawer units are also for the LOM System. They hold my 2-inch square photos. One drawer for each child. I also have two of the Designing With calendars by Autumn Leaves sitting there for inspiration. The white basket has fun bits and scraps, like movie tickets, receipts, paint chips, and what-not (this is part of the LOM System). In the corner is a white tool-turn-around full of things that I use often, scissors, tweezers, pens, pencils, glue pens, paint brushes, stipple brushes, etc. The little basekt by the lamp is full of small stamps - including ones that say 'stamped by', 'scrapbook page made by', and other fun ones to embelish envelopes before mailing. The right-side cabinet is full of all of my 12x12 paper. The drawers hold - from left to right-
1. watercolor pencils, chalks, oil pastels
2. acrylic paints (the rest is empty, this had my Radiant Pearls and Pearl Ex inside it also, but I had to move these out of the reach of my 2 year old! She loved playing w/ these and opened one and made a huge mess!)
3. adhesives, hand-held hole punches, eyelets and eyelet setter
4. paper cutters, circle cutter, rulers, crimper, heat gun

The drawer unit here has my Radiant Pearls, Pearl Ex, ink refills, my Colorbox ink pads, embossing powders, and punches. Sitting on top of the drawers is an old CD case holder. I have my unmounted stamps in clear cases stored here, along with my box of Stampin' Up! markers and some music CD's to listen to while I'm scrapping. Then I have three cassette tape holders that hold all of my stamp pads. The cabinets are full of my canning supplies and other kitchen items that I don't use every day.

This little area ontop of my washer is new. Well, I've had the pink crate there, but beside it was a basket of fabric scraps. I decided to turn this little area into my thinking spot. I am trying to read my Bible more and do some faith-journaling. I have tried to set up a little prayer spot in other places in my house, but nowhere seemed to work well for me. I am hoping that since my scrap room is already such a creative place for me, and MY SPOT, that this will be the perfect place for me to sit and relax and pray. So, I have some my Bibles here and some prayer books. The small file box behind the books has file folders in it for the quarter. The pink file crate has file folders for the rest of the year (ones that will be moved into the small file box later) and a file folder for each month. This is a system that Dawn talks about in depth on her website. She developed this system to help her organize her homeschooling, but I have been able to modify it to work for me and managing my 4 kids (and myself!). I'll share about all of that at another time.

That's it for now. I hope you enjoyed seeing my scrap area. I hope to share more photos soon of what's behind all of those closed, cabinet doors!

Gratitude Challenge - Day 11

2009-10-01T22:19:00.003-05:00

Today I am thankful for:

1. My Bible.
2. That Honey Crisp Apples are in season! They are my favorite!
3. That I was able to spend today reorganizing my scrap room.
4. Vintage James Bond movies!
5. The pumpkin-pie latte I got today.....just heaven!

Gratitude Challenge - Day 10

2009-10-01T22:10:00.004-05:00

I actually went to be at a decent time last night, so I didn't get this posted!

I am thankful for:
1. The new Autumn wreath that I made for the front door today.
2. Joe being such a loving husband & my soul mate.
3. The last of the summer watermelons - we had one with dinner tonight!
4. My fleece blanket....it's been getting cold at night!
5. Finally being able to work on pages in my journal!