OK, so it's not exactly "STAMPING"....

It's papercrafting.  No stamps were used! Just papers and punches and stickers!  Here are the twins' birthday cards!

The paper on Abigail's card came from my stash.  Don't know who made it, sorry.  The brown on both cards is Chocolate Chip and the bases are Pretty in Pink and Soft Sky.  The paper for Gregory's card is from the Afternoon Tea DSP from Stampin' Up!.  The Stickers are Jolee's Boutique.  The brads are Gold and Aged Copper (from the Hodgepodge Hardware).  I got the idea/pattern from another blog.  Can't remember who, or I'd give her credit... SORRY! 

Back on the 8th, I helped Megan make 13 "criss-cross" birthday party invites.  If you would like directions on making a criss-cross card, there is a tutorial HERE over on Splitcoaststampers.  I didn't get a picture of the finished ones, but here is the sample that we re-created:

The invitation is printed on the white insert.  We moved the flower up more and stamped "You're Invited" from Sincere Salutations (Stampin' Up!) to show in the triangle area.  The flower is from Prima and all other materials are CTMH (Amethyst cardstock, paper is from an old wedding scrapbook kit, silver brads and organdy ribbon).  I think they turned out rather well.

And from the same papers, here is the Mother's Day card we sent to Russ' mom:

The scalloped edge is done with a Martha Stewart Embossing punch.  I didn't do the greatest job lining it up, so I covered the boo boos by adding the small Primas with little adhesive rhinestones in the centers.  The insert pulls out to a stamped (retired) Stampin' Up! "Happy Mother's Day" image that has daffodils in a mason jar vase.  I really liked that old set.  Had some GREAT images!  I'd upload the card I sent my mom, but #1, I didn't take a photo and #2, it wasn't as good as this one.....  Bad bad Lisa.....

So there's my creative "genius" for the first half of May!

I'm a horrible mom.....

I feel just TERRIBLE.  Last night, in the dark, I stepped ON Taz.  Not just stepped on her tail or her foot, but really ON her body somewhere.  And I was sleepy, so it wasn't a quick, light step either.  I "stood" on her long enough for her to scream bloody murder and bite me TWICE.  Once pretty deeply, I might add.  Of course, after THAT, I was WIDE AWAKE as I tried to calm her down and check her for any obvious injury.  I didn't get around to washing the bite out with Bactine for a good 15 minutes which, I'm sure, did not help that at all.  Ouch.

She seems to be OK this morning, although she is still walking with a little limp in the back and she is having trouble jumping down off the beds.  I have a lovely bite wound on my leg that is red and really, REALLY hurts.  I tried to stand on tiptoe earlier to get my cereal down and I almost toppled over from the pain.  I wonder if she bit all the way to the muscle?  Ouch.  Serves me right.

Last night I kept waking up and every time I did, I would go and find her and make sure she was OK.  She runs when she sees me coming now, which just breaks my heart. 

So, let's see.... I abandon her for 4 days while I go and frolic in Hawaii, then I come home and practically kill her.  Gee, how lucky is she to have such a fantastic mother?  And her birthday is Monday too.  SIGH.  I suck.

ALOHA!

I'm baaaaaack!  I'll post more detail and photos later, but we just got back last night from a trip to Hawai'i!  My first trip there.  So much to unpack!  So many photos to upload!  Plus, I've got to stamp birthday cards for Abigail and Gregory.... their first birthday is today and their party is Saturday!

I'll update when I can.... just didn't want you to think I'd dropped off the face of the earth!

Did some stamping....

...and today I will be doing more.  Last week I went to help Megan (almost 15) make a card for her cousin's upcoming wedding.  She had seen this card in an issue of Paper Crafts magazine:

 

The dress is a Jolee's Boutique 3D sticker set (but it only comes with THREE of the little bows that they used on the corners!).  Machine stitching on cardstock is not my favorite embellishment, so I gave Megan the choice of doing faux stitching (paper piercing with white gel pen "stitches" or using the Swiss Dots Cuttlebug embossing folder.   We used the Cuttlebug.  The bride's colors are sage and brown, so we used Stampin' Up Soft Sage for the embossed mat and some CTMH scrapbooking paper that was from their wedding kit a couple years ago.  I thought it went well.  We used white half pearls from the Stampin' Up Pretties kit to accent the corners.  The white is CTMH Textured cardstock to give it a little more elegance.  Here is the finished card:

We used a vellum quote on the inside and put little flat back rhinestones on the corners.  Very pretty.

Megan's birthday party is coming up at the end of May and she wants to make invites, so I will be stamping a couple of samples for her to see what she would like to do.  Then I'll cut all the supplies and head over there one Thursday after school in the next couple weeks and we will put those together.  I'll post the samples after I get them done!

In Convention news....  I decided to host an ATC swap at convention.  All 5 groups filled up in less than a week.  I also joined two swaps.  One is a "Stamp Camp Projects" swap - I'm doing 20 mini cork boards with altered push pins for that.  The other is a "WOW Cards" swap and I'm doing 20 double pocket cards for that one.  Plus doing general swaps for Convention.  Looks like I'm going to be a busy stamper! 

Cherie is coming down to Sacramento this week.  Friday night Russ and I will have dinner with her and Jeff.  I'm going to take her to IKEA on Friday - she's never been!  I don't know what else she wants to do while she's here.  I guess we'll figure that out later in the week!

The bruising on my foot is almost gone, but my toe has been bugging me a bit the past few days.  Probably healing.  All I know is that I need to get back to the gym pretty soon.  I'm starting to feel flabby already!

Ouch!

About 10 years ago, Russ broke his little toe by "kicking" the coffee table.  Actually, it may have been longer than that - Maybe 12 years.  In any case, I haven't let him forget about it.  Well, it took over a decade, but I finally did it.  Yep.  Wednesday at 2:30AM I got up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom and WHACK!  My foot found the end of the bed with my little toe.  OW! OW! OW! 

At least when *I* whacked MY toe it WAS pitch dark and I was half asleep.  Not QUITE as graceful as kicking the coffee table in a well lit room, but STILL.....  So here is what my BEAUTIFUL foot looks like this morning. 

Fortunately, it really isn't terribly painful, just enough to be a real inconvenience....  Ugh.

I did a little stamping yesterday and will finish it up today.  Hopefully I will remember to take a picture of what I did before I give it away on Friday and then I can post it this weekend!

It's here!

 

Yes, I'm excited about a MICROWAVE. 

This thing has features on top of features!  The exhaust fan on LOW is at least 5 times as powerful as the old one was on HIGH.  Makes more noise that the old fan did, but I guess that's OK.  One thing I really like is that you can set a timer on the night light feature, say on at 5 AM and off at 6AM so Russ can get his breakfast without having to turn on the big light in the kitchen.  I'll be reading the manual for the rest of the day, I think..... And putting all the cookbooks back in their cupboard above it.... and putting the stuff back that got moved off the counters...

Isn't it PRETTY?

  

It's been a long week.....

And I've done NO stamping. None. Zip. Zilch. Nada. I DID get to hang out with one of my "Spamily" for a while on Saturday, which was AWESOME! Cherie and I did a little shopping and had lunch. She was in town with her husband who was attending a conference.

Here we are at Scrapbook Station!

Tomorrow morning I *FINALLY* get my new microwave! We have a built in that came with the house and has a manufacture date of 1999 inside the door. Which doesn't fit the door opening correctly anymore. And the previous owners took the sensor probe when they moved so I've never been able to use that feature. And lately it has been "growling" at me when it starts up. My mom gave me money before Christmas towards a new one and then we got $75 in Home Depot gift cards at Christmas from Russ' family. It was just a matter of going down and BUYING the silly thing. So now it arrives tomorrow morning between 7 and 11 AM. YAY!

I *did* however, go to the gym every day I could last week (it opened on Tuesday, so I went Tues-Friday) and I went again today. I probably won't get to go tomorrow since after the microwave, I have another contractor coming at 2PM to look at something in the back yard. We'll see how that goes.

Today was errands day. I had returns at 2 stores and then I had to take the car for an oil change and then a tire rotation. Whee.....

Testing a new blog editor....

An advance apology to those of you that get this in e-mail. Please be patient with me as I tweak this new software and learn how to use it.....

I downloaded a program from Microsoft called "Windows Live Writer" that I'm told is easier to blog in than Blogger itself. The main feature I was interested in is that I'm told I can insert a photo exactly where I want instead of uploading it in blogger and then having to drag it to where I want it.

Oooo! Just like that! This is my sister's cat, Mr. Pants. Isn't he adorable?

I've also been told I can use more fonts than the 5 or 6 choices Blogger gives me... let's see.... Oooooo! If that looks on my blog like it does here, I will be a happy camper!

OK - I'm done playing.... for now.....

(OOOOO!!!! IT WORKED!!!!!!!)

I've stamped.... a little....

but I can't post it here. I am in a monthly ATC (artist trading card) swap over on Splitcoast. I signed up for 5 months. The next one I am in is October since I am not insane enough to sign up for swaps during "Convention Swap Prep Season" which now can officially start! The ATC I did for April is the same design I am using for the focal image on one of my Convention Swaps (top secret stuff, ya know!), plus it is the same design I used for a card that I sent my Secret Sis. Don't know if she reads my blog, but why chance it?

It has been a computer-challenging time lately. I had to recondition a laptop and get it shipped out at the beginning of the week and then help the recipient get it set up when she got it. Now Russ is having computer issues. The same sort of things that my old machine was doing when it started its death spiral, so yesterday we backed up his files and looked at new computers on the Dell website. Now he has to decide if he wants to upgrade to Vista (then we can buy a computer anywhere) or if he really wants to stay on XP for a while, in which case Dell is our only option. Either way, I see "tech-support-duties" in my future....

As Spring has sprung here in Northern California, I have also been spending time getting the yard up to par. I still have some plants that need re-potting, but I've got everything pruned and pulled out most of the dead stuff and got the 2 foot tall weeds pulled from the side fence area. Got the lawn fertilized and have applied the first spraying of Roundup to the fence lines and driveway. Got the patio furniture back out of the garage. After all that I decided to enjoy it one evening.

Yes, that's me and my VERY WHITE LEGS on Russ' patio chair enjoying a little fire and a glass of Shiraz. We've been BBQ-ing a lot more lately too. Mmmmm.... Yesterday I got a new table to replace the one you see in the photo. That one is just too tall for our chairs (mine matches Russ' except for the cushions). The new one is a cute little Adirondak table from Cost Plus Imports and it's a darker brown and about half the height of the old one.

So, that's been my excitement the past couple of weeks. A dear friend of mine is having surgery today in Idaho, so if you are the spiritual type, a quick prayer for successful surgery today and a speedy recovery would be greatly appreciated!

GOT to LOVE it!

So, if you've been reading my blog for a while, you've heard me mention my friends from Splitcoast that I call the "Spammies" or my "Spamily". Heck, I think that makes up half my blog readers right there....



Well, knowing my soft spot for all things SPAM, look what I got from a friend of mine, sent straight from the SPAMALOT GIFT SHOP on Broadway in New York City:

Yes, it is an ACTUAL CAN OF GOLDEN HONEY SPAM! Is this label not TO DIE FOR????!

Of course, Russ was excited about it because he thought I was going to open it up and cook it for him.... Uh, NOT! I have until May of 2009 to decide if I want to eat it and then keep the can as a pencil holder on my stamp table or something. I suppose I could remove the label and scrapbook it. Hmmmm....

Thanks a million, Judy, I just LOVE LOVE LOVE IT!!!!!

I've been bad....

I've been stamping, really. I just forget to post it. Heck, half the time I forget to scan the cards before I put them in the mail.... something to do with stamping them at the LAST FREAKIN MINUTE, I guess....

So, here's a card I made for my friend, Kristi. Funny story - I had mailed Kristi a stamp set a bit before her birthday and decided to put a birthday card in with it to save postage and all. And then I forgot that I had sent her a birthday card. So it got to a couple days before her birthday and I freaked out, thinking I had forgotten to send a card, and I did this one. This is one of those cards I forgot to take a picture of before I mailed it, so thanks to Kristi for scanning and posting in our Spam Ma'ams group album!

I had received an order in the mail from PennyWiseArts, and they always include a little freebie project and this one was a beaded slide mount, so I decided to use it for K's card! I love the sticky tape from Penny Wise and they have a great selection of sizes! And the best pricing around on both the sticky tape and the micro beads!

The yellow patterned paper is from Basic Grey's Two Scoops collection and the stamps are from the Hero Arts Cupcake set. The little rhinestones are from my stash of Swarovski Flat Back Crystals (no cheap imitations for my cards! LOL!) - the small ones are 3mm and the larger center ones are 4 or 5mm. The card is Pretty In Pink with either Purely Pomegranate or Rose Red (I forget now!) for the mats and the front of the card was embossed using the new Cuttlebug Swiss Dots Embossing folder. LOVE. THAT. FOLDER. One of the nicest things about it is that (if you have these folders you know that the design isn't big enough to actually cover a card front) this one is easy to line up and add a row of dots to finish the design. You can also just emboss a single line of dots, which is really cool. My friend, Julee did that on one of her blog cards this week..... neat, huh?

I need to do some stamping and start using up my stash of In Color stuff since it all retires at the beginning of August with the NEW CATALOG! Oh man, I can not WAIT for Convention!!!! Twenty weeks from Wednesday, for anyone counting.... That was the one thing I missed coming over to SU! from CTMH, was that they didn't release their new catalog at Convention. It was always SO EXCITING to get the catalog with a convention center full of excited women all seeing it for the first time TOGETHER! Now, the last time that happened with CTMH was when I went to Convention in Dallas which I think was the year they went to the clear stamps.... I think we had about 1400 consultants at Convention that year. I just remember running out into the hallway and calling Judy on the phone and going thru it page by page with her! LOL!

Stampin' Up is celebrating their 20th Anniversary this year and they are doing just ONE session of Convention in the NEWLY EXPANDED Salt Palace which says it can accommodate Conventions of up to TEN THOUSAND PEOPLE..... I just can't even get my brain wrapped around the idea of TEN THOUSAND demonstrators all getting the NEW CATALOG at the SAME TIME! (Note to self - bring extra earplugs!)

Well, this entry got a lot longer than I had planned! Off to read my Sunday paper! Have a great day!

Quick post to share a card!

Did a card today for a 17 year old Birthday Boy. I don't do many masculine cards, so I always have to think about them for a couple minutes.

Colors Are Bashful Blue, Ballet Blue and Brilliant Blue with Real Red Designer Paper and ribbon. The stamps are from Wonderful Words (Stampin Up) and Starlight Starbright (Verve Visual). The squares are done with a 1" punch and the ribbon is threaded thru a Hodge Podge Spiral Clip and the star is punched from the Red Designer paper and attached with a foam dimensional. (all Stampin Up) . I accented the layer strips with Diamond Stickles (Ranger). Nice and gender neutral!

A random sorta thought.....

I love those "page-a-day" calendars and I get one delivered to my e-mail every day.... It's the Corporate B.S. Definition calendar. People have asked me why I don't make my part time sales job full time.... this pretty much sums it up:

SALES: The department that ultimately pays your salary, and therefore the one it’s in your best interest to make happy, consisting of people who, like stand-up comedians, have a very high tolerance for rejection and, unlike basically everyone else in the workforce, actually thrive on it.

I take rejection very personally as a general rule, which is probably why Sales never appealed to me as a "real" job!

Hoping to actually stamp something today. I have a tech coming between 11 and 1 to do our annual maintenance and cleaning on the heater, but other than that, my day is pretty clear! Wish me luck!

And while I'm sharing photos.....

Here are a some of the Finches that have been eating me out of house and home lately (they eat about $12 a week in seed!) and their friends, the Mourning Doves..... I call them "Winged Piggies"!

And my orchid is blooming in my kitchen....

Lunar Eclipse

So they were making a big deal out of the eclipse and telling us it would be almost 3 years till another one. I guess that's about right, because when I was filing these photos on my computer, I came across the photos I took of the LAST lunar eclipse which was October 27, 2004!
So, here are some of the best shots I got tonight.... Enjoy!

I'M SO EXCITED!!!!!!!!!

I'M GOING TO HAWAII!!!!!!!!!!!

Well, actually, WE are going to Hawaii! Russ is taking me for our 15th Wedding Anniversary in May. It will be a quick trip, just 3 nights, but IT'S HAWAII!!!!!! We leave May 11th and come home on the 14th. Here's where we are staying. Apparently we had just enough timeshare points left this year for a 3 night stay with a Sunday arrival! WOO HOO!!!!!!! Or, should I say, ALOHA!!!!!!!!

Mojo 22

For Julee's Mojo Monday Sketch #22:





All supplies but the flowers are from Stampin Up!

Paper is Spring Silhouettes, Soft Sky and Wild Wasabi. The flowers are Bazzil and are dyed with Soft Sky and Wild Wasabi reinkers mixed with alcohol. The center is a green rhinestone brad from the Circle Ice brads. The sentiment is from a retired set, Butterfly Happiness.

Swaps are DONE!

I was feeling a lack of stamping desire back in January, so I decided to FORCE myself to stamp by joining two swaps. I was actually invited to join another, but it was a monthly commitment and while I really enjoy the work this particular group of ladies does, I know there are some months when I just could not dedicate the kind of time that caliber of work required. So, I joined a couple of ATC (Artist Trading Card) swaps. They are small, quick and easy to do plus they usually swap in batches of 10 as that's how many you can make from one sheet of cardstock. All supplies used are Stampin' Up! unless otherwise noted.

Cathy Bartlett's February swap theme was "In the Pink", meaning we were to use only shades of pink/red (plus white if we wanted). I had such fun doing the card from Julee's sketch challenge the other day that I decided to try and scale it down to an ATC. I was rather pleased with the outcome! The colors are Purely Pomegranate and Pretty In Pink, and I used the Berry Bliss paper. I just LOVE Clear Rhinestone brads (available in the Prettied Kit) and used them on BOTH swaps, along with silver brads. This one also used my 1" circle and Word Window punches. Stamps used are from Boho Backgrounds and Enjoy Every Moment.

Julie Reynolds' February swap theme was "My Favorite New Accessory". I couldn't choose between the new Boho Blossoms punch and the new Striped Grosgrain ribbon, so I used them both! The colors are Soft Sky, Wild Wasabi, Regal Rose and Rose Red. The stamps are Boho Backgrounds, One of a Kind and Baroque Motifs. Again, I used silver and Clear Rhinestone brads and the ribbon color is the Wild Wasabi.

So, stamping done, I am now ready to eat myself into a junk-food-induced coma and watch the Super Bowl!

Did a little stamping

Julee is having a sketch challenge over at Verve Visual which was just the excuse I needed to get in and STAMP SOMETHING today! Plus the fact that I just got this pretty paper yesterday and wanted to do something with it!

The printed paper is one of the "stack" pads from DCWV - this one is the Old World Stack which uses textured cardstock. The regular cardstock is Stampin' Up! Groovy Guava and Very Vanilla. The "tabs" were punched with the Word Window Punch. The black brads are from an assortment by Making Memories and I used my piercing tool and my distressing tool from the Crafters Tool Kit and the Cutter Kit (respectively) - both from Stampin' Up!. The center image is from One Of A kind and the sentiment is from Blossoms Abound, both available in the current Stampin' Up! catalog and both stamped in Chocolate Chip Craft Ink. I colored the flower in using a blender pen and my Groovy Guava reinker and then added Stickles over that. To give the top panel a little dimension, I used Pop Up Glue Dots. I'm kinda pleased with how it turned out!

I'm Leavin, On a Jet Plane!!!!!

I'll be home in about 5 hours! I'm sure Taz will be DELIGHTED to see me.... yeah. Right.

Flight out of Portland is scheduled for 5:23 PM Departure and a 6:45PM arrival. It is COLD here and rainy and windy at home. Should make for a bumpy landing! Oh well, at least I'll be HOME! Now I'm really glad we got to park so close to the shuttle stop!

I'll post photos later this week of my adorable furry "nephew", Mr. Pants. He is VERY cute!