Snow!

When I looked out my window this morning this was what greeted me:

I know it's not the best photo, but I wasn't going out in that until I had to so a quick shot through the window and screen will have do. Mine's the car in the middle. My honey had cleaned a lot of the snow off for me, but I still had a ways to go before I was getting out of there. It seemed like all of the snow had drifted up around my car for some reason.

The good news is that I finally got to work (3 hours late) and was able to get a couple of photos of cards that I've made over the last few days. The first is the weekly challenge from the PTI forum. Jen provided the sketch and I threw the rest together.

I used PTI colors-Lavender Moon, Plum Pudding, Raspberry Fizz, and Fresh Snow. I combined a few different stamp sets for my patterned paper and focal point-Garden of Life, Polka Dot Basics, and Honey Bees. My little white flowers are centered with Diamond Dots stickers from Stampendous and they are pretty sparkly in person.

The next card I is one I made over the weekend. I decided that my Penny Black stamp really needed to see some ink so I stamped and colored and put together this fun card. I really like the combo of PTI's True Black and Raspberry Fizz. I am SO happy that PTI finally released a black cardstock!

Thanks for stopping by my blog. I hope everyone stays safe if they're out in this lovely weather system that has been hitting so many of us. If you can, stay warm and snuggly at home--but if you do have to drive, slow down please. It's not worth risking an accident to get somewhere a few minutes earlier. Take care.

Now I understand

why some people decide to run away and get married in Las Vegas!

After our second official day of wedding planning we're almost ready to have Elvis preside over the ceremony.

Hopefully it gets better. :-)

*Edited to add: The actual wedding planning part is fun. My honey and I are happy with our choices so far. It's the other people who seem to think that it's their wedding not ours who are telling us who, what, where, when, etc. that are bothering me.*

Last Week's Challenge Card

Better late than never, right? I've been trying to keep up with the weekly challenges at the PTI forum and I'm always happy if I complete my card within the next week.

Last week's challenge was from Mary, our quilt card crafter (say that 10 times fast). We were to make a Valentine's quilt card and she had three examples ready for us. I cased her first example, changed a few things and came up with this card:

Of course I used one of my favorite color combos: Pure Poppy, Dark Chocolate, and Vintage Cream (PTI). The stamps are from Quilter's Sampler Additions, Heart Prints (PTI), and Anytime Messages (Hero Arts). The pp is from a pad from Crafty Secrets. I used my Double Ended Tags die from Spellbinders--it has to be a tie between those and the Ribbon Slide dies over which one I like best. They are both great.

Organizing my craft room must have sparked something in me because I've been on a roll ever since. Hopefully I can keep up the pace, or at least something close to it.

Thanks for stopping by. Have a great day.

Weekly Challenge Card

This is the 4th card that I made Saturday night. I used the sketch as this week's challenge over at the Papertrey Ink forum, and to make it a little more challenging I added that it should be a masculine card. I have no problems with flowers, bows, butterflies, etc., but when it comes to a manly card I usually have to work a little harder for ideas. Here is what I came up with.

Paper: Classic Kraft, Ripe Avocado, Dark Chocolate, Spring Rain (PTI)

Ink: Ripe Avocado, Dark Chocolate, Spring Rain (PTI), Tea Dye (Distress)

Stamps: Men on Life, Women of Life (PTI)

Thanks for stopping by--I hope you have a great day.

Quick Kitty Post

I just had to post this picture of how Lucy helps me stamp. Please pardon the mess on my craft/computer/kitty table. :-)

She always wants to be in the middle of whatever I'm doing and she LOVES this room since it was where she spent the first week of her new life when we brought her home from the shelter. If she wasn't so cute, she could get herself into a lot of trouble.

Valentine Season Begins

I think I've finally had enough of Christmas and snowy cards for a little while so now I'm moving on to Valentine's Day.

My first card uses some stamps that I bought from Gina K before Christmas, but had never inked up. The set is called Cuddles and Hugs and it was designed by Melanie Muenchinger. The sentiment is from a different set, but I can't remember the name off the top of my head ( I just looked it up and it's from Inkadinkado). The pp is from DCWV's Old World stack.

Next up is another card using PTI's Heart Prints set. I never thought I'd use a set of just hearts, but I love all of the patterns this one has. I got out my heat tool for a little embossing on this one and then sponged a light layer of white ink to bring out the contrast. My colors were all from PTI: Kraft, Dark Chocolate, Raspberry Fizz.

My last card for today isn't necessarily a Valentine's card, but it's still bright and cheery. This card uses PTI's Garden of Life set for the main flower image. The corners are from a Build A Frame set from Prima and the sentiment is from Hero Art's Anytime Messages set. I used Raspberry Fizz and Ripe Avocado (PTI).

I did make another card this weekend, but I'm saving it for Wednesday's weekly PTI challenge. (I had a very productive night Saturday--4 cards in one sitting!)

Thanks for stopping by and checking out my latest cards. I didn't get as detailed on the descriptions, but if you have any questions I will be happy to let you know.

Have a great rest of today.

Bright & Cheery

It's got to be some sort of record, but I finished another card last night. :-) I was inspired by all of the bright, cheery cards on Dawn McVey's blog (See "My Favorite Things" on my sidebar). Dawn has such a way with color that her blog is a must see!

I hate to admit that this the time that I've used PTI's yummy color Raspberry Fizz from last month's release. I mixed it with Dark Chocolate (PTI), and some orange paper I had in my stash. I'm not sure who made it, but it seemed to go pretty well with Spiced Marmalade distress ink and I was glad to be using some supplies that I've had for a long time.

I took the flower stem image from Women of Life (PTI) and topped it with a few of the smaller hearts from PTI's Heart Prints set. (I was glad to finally get it inked up too.)

I think the fact that I spent a little time reorganizing my craft area is helping me to be more productive. I hope to be able to post new things a little more regularly now. Thanks for stopping by. Have a great day.

A couple of challenge cards

For the first time since I made my Christmas cards I finally had time in my stamp room to catch up on the last two PTI weekly challenges.

First up was a coloring challenge from Jen. We could do whatever we wanted with the card, but it had to involve coloring of some type (markers, pencils, etc.)

I pulled out Butterfly Kisses (my very first PTI set) and my Copics and got to work. This was the result:

Next up was a color challenge from Tracy. We could design the card however we wanted as long as we used Ocean Tides, Aqua Mist, Berry Sorbet, and Sweet Blush from PTI (or whatever colors we had that were closest). Since it was cold and we had snow flurries I was inspired to go with a snowflake theme. I also thought the blues would lend themselves pretty well to snowflakes.

The only stamping was the sentiment from PTI's Merry & Bright. I used that set for my Christmas cards this year and can't seem to put it away yet.

For both cards I used my new Ribbon Slide Tags from Spellbinders. I am slowly building my collection of Spellbinders/Nestibilites and I love, love, love them! Thank you for stopping by today. I'm glad I finally had something new to post besides my cats. :-)

Organization, more organization, & a side order of stress.....

Sorry I don't have much to post lately--I decided to really get my craft area organized so I've been keeping busy with that and haven't made a card since my Christmas cards. On top of that we had been doing some ring shopping and that has been slightly overwhelming.

We found THE ring, put down a deposit, and then started to think that maybe we went a little overboard because it was more than we had originally planned to spend. I'm pretty sure it actually costs more than any car my sister has ever owned, but she's had some real hoopties. LOL!

We've been stressing out a little bit over the whole process and I've probably tried on 100 rings, but I am totally completely in love with the one we picked. I can't wait until we get everything finalized and I can have it on my hand. I promise to post pics as soon as I can.

Thanks for stopping by--I promise to have some updated cards soon.

After Christmas Blow Out!

Last week I received a gift card to Walmart for Christmas from one of my customers. I was very touched by the gesture and it gave me another excuse to do more after Christmas shopping--as if I really needed an excuse. LOL (Seriously, someone stop me before I buy another spool of $0.50 ribbon--I'm running out of room!)

While shopping I saw that all of the special Holiday Martha Stewart crafts products were 75% off. We're talking clear stamp sets (5.5" x 7.5" sheet), paper punches, and 6-packs of glitter all for $2.20 each. I was in heaven! I ended up with 2 punches, 2 stamp sets, and 2 glitter packs all for under $15. I need more Christmas stamps like I need a hole in my head, but I couldn't pass them up.

I was especially excited to find the dove paper punch that is the same as the one in the regular craft section, just in Christmas packaging so instead of $9 it was $2. I've had my eye on that particular punch ever since Annapurna showed on her blog how easy it is to crop off the bottom wing to make 2 different birds with one punch. I don't think I would've ever thought of that on my own unless I accidentally cut off a wing. :-)

I hope everyone else is having as much fun finding after holiday bargains! Thanks for visiting and have a great weekend.

Nothing Crafty Today

I haven't really finished anything new in the craft department so instead I thought I'd give you some fluff filler--fluffy kitties, that is. :-)

First up is my Sadie. She's 12 yrs old now, but I got her from a shelter when she was 5. She's definitely a handful, but she can be so sweet sometimes that it makes it all worth it. (She's very hard to photograph so this is the best I could get.)

Next up is our new addition to the family, Lucy, that I introduced a little while back. She's about 8 months old now and we got her from a shelter 2 months ago. She's the cutest little ball of fuzz who loves to snuggle, play, and has made it her mission in life to make her older sister Sadie like her. I have to admit that after only 2 months there is A LOT less hissing and growling going on so maybe there is some hope. How could you NOT like her?

I hope to be back to my regularly scheduled craftiness soon, but until then I hope you enjoyed my "fluff" photos instead. Thanks for stopping by today. I hope you have a warm, snuggly day. (It's only 4 degrees in St. Louis right now, with a high today under 20. Brrrr!)

Non traditional Christmas

The last challenge on the PTI forum (CMWC35) was to make a non-traditional Christmas card. It could be non-traditional colors or images or whatever you wanted to do. I chose the color route by choosing Dark Chocolate and Pink.

My punched snowflakes are made out of pink shimmer paper with small bling centers. The sentiment is from PTI's Believe set and the snowflakes are from Snowflake Serenade. I used a Nestabilities label die and although you can't tell in the photo I embossed the edge and sponged on some Sweet Blush ink while the paper was still in the die for a nice white edge. It looks much nicer in person.
I was finally able to attempt this challenge since I finished the last of my Christmas cards and got them ready for mailing. I am so relieved to check that off of my to do list.

Thank you for stopping by. I hope you have a great rest of today.

Christmas Remix

After I made my last post I realized that I should post a picture of my tree, not just the cute fuzzy kitty under it. So here you go:

I was so excited to put up my tree this year because it is a new one that I got after Christmas last year for an unbelievable price. It was a $300 tree that I got on clearance for $30! It's a pre-lit one that comes in only 3 pcs so it was much easier to put together than my previous tree.

Of course, this tree is larger than my last one (7.5 ft) so my previous angel tree topper looked really tiny. I went on a 3 day mission to find a new one and was elated to finally find this one. She has the prettiest feather wings and she looks perfect on top of my new tree.

I also revised the card I made in my last post using my Nesties. I ended up with my final design for my cards this year.

I had some great sparkle yarn that was the perfect accent for this card. It matches the avocado color I used on the tree so well. This is my first time using my new classic square nestabilites and I LOVE the embossing detail around the edge and the fact that you can create such a fun border by sponging ink while your paper is still in the die. I see many more nesties in my future. :-)

Thanks for stopping by today. Wish me luck finishing up all of my Christmas cards this weekend so I can get them out in the mail in time.

Cute Kitty

I wasn't sure I was going to put up my Christmas tree this year since the addition of Lucy to our family. But, I decided to try and just not put any of my "good" ornaments on the tree. It turns out Lucy is much more interested in my tree skirt (with jingle bell trim) than she is the tree.

Last night I found her curled up under the tree, sleeping on her new favorite tree skirt. I tried to get a photo, but she woke up and decided it was bath time instead.

I wish I could get a really good photo of her that captures just how darn cute she really is. My bf and I keep saying how ridiculously cute she is because of her sweet, snuggly personality. To think she was sitting at a shelter for so long--I'm glad we got her when we did. :-)

Sooooo Behind!

I am so behind on making my Christmas cards, as in, I haven't even started. So last night I made a little time in my craft room. I was not really happy with my first attempt, but my second was easy to duplicate, yet cute enough to share with friends and family. This is what I came up with.

Everything on the card is from Papertrey Ink, except for the star--I got that at Michael's. You can't really tell from the photo, but I used silver and gold paint pens to make tiny dots in the outer circles of the design. It gives it just a little added sparkle in real life.

I'd better get going on making some more of these. One down, lots more to go! Thanks for stopping by today.

I did it!

I finally took the plunge and bought my first ever set of Nestabilities. My local Hobby Lobby has started carrying them and I was able to use my 40% off coupon. I got the large scalloped squares for $14.99. They even had the tan embossing mats too. I was only able to try one square before I had to make dinner last night, but I think I'm in love. :-)

I can't wait to get more shapes and sizes. I see many trips to HL with 40% off coupons in my future. LOL

I hope everyone has a very happy Thanksgiving and gets to spend quality time with their family and friends.

Take care.

I'm still alive...

I can't believe this is only my second post for the month and November is almost over. I feel much better than I did before, but I still have a cough that I could really do without. I guess it could always be worse though. :-)

I found some very cute clear Christmas/Winter stamps at Wal-Mart for $2.97/each. I didn't buy them all, but I picked my favorite four sets.

Hopefully I'll have time to use them before Christmas gets here. Although I bought some very cute stamps from Gina K that have yet to see ink too. I need to get back in my craft room more often.

I do have one card to share. This was another challenge card from PTI. The challenge gallery can be found here. http://forum.papertreyink.com/forum/gallery2.php?g2_itemId=38915

I really enjoyed getting a chance to use my Quilter's Sampler set from PTI. It's definitely been neglected lately. I wasn't really sure where I was going with this card, but I think it all pulled together. It's a little more shimmery in person--the red bling in the center, the gold shimmer paper circle, and the liquid gold pen accents didn't photograph as well as I had hoped.

Thanks for stopping by today. Hopefully when things calm down I will have more to share. Until then, I hope you have a nice Thanksgiving filled with family and good times.

PTI Challenge Cards

I've been pretty quiet here for a few reasons: I've been sick with a sinus infection and cough for over 2 weeks, and Lucy has taken over my craft room making it pretty hard to get anything done in there when I do feel OK enough to try. Luckily I did have a few moments of peace this weekend to get caught up on my PTI weekly challenge cards.

First up is one I did based on a great sketch by Lynn. I modified it slightly, but still kept the main theme of geometric shapes. I used mostly PTI products on this card, but added a few patterned papers from Memory Box and some shiny stickers from my stash.



The next card is based on a sketch by Jen, who also did a video tutorial on how to line up your border punches to have even edges without trying to punch through the front and back at the same time. She did a great job on the video, but I still need a little work on the technique. I had a slight problem on the one side, but I still decided to finish this card.

I used all PTI products on this with the exception of a small gem and some Aqua Stickles. The stamps I used were from Snowfall, one of the 5 stamp sets that I won from a contest on Nichole Heady's blog!!!


Speaking of winning stamps on Nichole's blog, it made the whole thing even more special when Nicole included a hand made card in the box. I was stunned that she took the time from her crazy busy life to personally hand write a card to me. This photo doesn't do it justice as some of the details are lost, like the tiny paper piercing in the center of each flower and and the embossed "bee happy" sentiment in brown on brown. This is just one more reason why I am a true PTI addict, not that I needed any more reasons. :-)

I received Snowfall, Snowfall Additions, and Warm Happiness all designed by Heather Nichols. I love the look of her stamps and was more than happy to receive 3 sets!

I also won Melissa Bickford's new set called Men of Life that is being released this month at PTI. It's a great set for making cards for all of the men in your life--just as the name suggests.

Last, but not least I won a set designed by Candice that won't be released until the Summer of 2009 called Out to Sea. It has a nautical theme that will go very well with Melissa's set to expand your options for masculine cards.

I hope to get to use all of these sets soon and when I do I will be sure to update my blog. Hopefully it won't be so long next time. Thanks for stopping by today.

It must officially be Fall.....

...because I was inspired to bake my first ever apple pie. I'm not quite ready for making my pie crusts from scratch so I bought the refrigerated kind, but it turned out great. I opted for the crumb topping instead of the second crust and I think it was the right move. I had to take a picture quickly before my bf cut into it--he had been pacing around from start to finish, waiting impatiently for pie.


After a little pie a la mode, I attempted to work on this week's challenge card for PTI. My new kitty Lucy was a little better this time so it was a little easier than my last card. Kim provided us a sketch for a holiday themed card. I hadn't had a chance to play with my latest Papertrey goodies yet, so I incorporated them all into this.


Paper: Ripe Avacado, Ocean Tides, Linen Vellum (PTI), Frost (Memory Box)
Ink: Ripe Avacado, Ocean Tides, Dark Chocolate, silver paint pen
Stamps: Merry & Bright (PTI)

I just got Merry & Bright and the Additions set with this last order and I can't wait to try all of the different tree combinations. I think this is going to be my "go-to" Christmas set for a while with all of it's possibilities.

Thanks for stopping by today. I hope you have a great weekend.

Birthday Wishes

I made a birthday card last night for a friend and my new kitty Lucy "helped" me every step of the way. It's a little crooked, but I consider it a miracle that I was able to finish and that I didn't accidently cut her little inky paws off. I'm definitely going to have make sure the coast is clear next time I pull out the leaf ribbon because it is a major kitten magnet. :-)

Paper: Lavender Moon, Ripe Avacado (PTI), Sprout patterned paper (Memory Box)

Ribbon: Plum Pudding, leaf ribbon (PTI)

Misc: Plum Pudding ink (PTI), Target $1 spot flower punch, bling (sold for cell phones)

Stamp: Stampendous

Thanks for stopping by today. Wish me luck with my next crafting adventure with Lucy. She's SO helpful--Let me tell you, it's a good thing she's so cute and fuzzy. :-)