Libby's Little Addiction

Just chickin' in!

2012-01-29T14:20:00.007-05:00

Howdy! I'm back as promised with a second card for the latest Catered Crop Recipe Swap, this time playing with some fun stamps for the sponsor of the current challenge, Texana Designs!

We're playing with print for this Recipe Swap, so I had more fun with my old book pages. I think the Texana Jam'n Chicken looks pretty darn cute paper-pieced in print!
The card sketch is the latest Mojo Monday challenge, flipped on its side:

Thanks for stopping by!

Stamps: Jam'n Chicken, Just chickin' in from Texana Designs
Paper: Red, Black cardstock (Stampin' Up), Kraft cardstock (Recollections), old book page
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Copic marker (E31)
Other: American Crafts twine, paper tape (Smash Book line), paper crimper, scallop edge punch, heart buttons

My Ode to CNN...

2012-01-28T03:14:00.010-05:00

Today's card is all about the news!

It's one of my creations for the current Catered Crop Recipe Swap. Linda has us playing with print! When she first told us it would be print, I thought about newsprint. And that made me think of this cute Newscaster image from the Hambo Stamps Digishop - I had to play with him!! I also had to give him some lovely silver hair. But more on that in a moment... First some more about the challenge!!
Linda is creating the most gorgeous Pinterest boards for her challenges, I just love them! Here's her summary inspiration board, but also click on over to her Pinterest board for the current challenge for even more inspiration. It's gorgeous!!

So all you have to do to play along is create a card that incorporates some sort of print! Even though I was thinking about "newsprint" for my card, I actually used a page from an old book I keep in my stamp room just for using on projects. But any sort of print will do! One of my favorite companies - Texana Designs - is this week's sponsor!! YEEHAW! :-) I plan to be back tomorrow with another Recipe Swap card featuring Texana stamps, yay!

For linking up YOUR creation, and all the other deets, visit Linda's blog!

I also played along with this month's Sketch For You To Try (SFYTT) for my card layout. Jen always has the best sketches!!

Ok now back to my love of news. I am a certified (certifiable?) CNN junkie. I have it on a lot, mostly for background noise. And I am a huge Anderson Cooper fan!! I just love him. Especially when he giggles. I live in the Atlanta area now. Home of CNN! Of course Anderson doesn't work from Atlanta, boo hoo! But I still like to visit CNN Center. And drag my kids along. They have a foodcourt there so it's a good place to go for lunch. The kids can have nuggets and mom can have her CNN fix. Here's some photos from our last visit.

Courtney with the big logo as you enter.

Courtney saying "Look mommy, it's that man you love!"

Yes Courtney, Anderson is someone you can look up to. Hee hee.

I also love CNN's weather guy, Rob Marciano. Because, um, he knows so much about the weather.... yah, that's it...

I sent him a tweet on Twitter the other day and OMG HE REPLIED TO ME!!! Cheap thrills.

Ok I better stop now, I'm embarrassing myself a bit with this post. Time to go fold some laundry. And turn on CNN... ;-)

Happy Stamping!

Stamps: Newscaster digi image from Hambo Stamps
Paper: Bazzill cardstock (blue), Flourishes paper (ivory), October Afternoon DP, book page
Ink: Momento Tuxedo Black, Copic markers
Other: Spellbinders die (circle), PTI die (scallop), brads

Hambo Blog Hop!

2012-01-27T08:00:00.003-05:00

Welcome to "Green Eggs and ......Hambo" sponsored by Hambo Stamps! Today Hambo customers and the Bacon Bits Design Team are bringing you fun creations that depict book titles! It might be our favorite book, or just one that was fun to design. If you arrived here from Andrea's blog you are in the right place! If not, you might want to start back at the beginning at the Hambo blog to make sure you are eligible for the hopper prize!

A prize will be awarded to one participant whose book-themed creation tickles the Bacon Bits’ fancy in a hammin’ jammin’ way! Another prize will be awarded randomly to a hopper who comments on all the blogs along the way. The winners will be announced on the Hoedown blog, as well as on the Hambo company blog, Talk to the Ham, on Wednesday, February 1.

So I was chatting with my friend Leslie about what to make for the hop, and she mentioned this book - but she didn't own a stamp to make it happen. But woohoo, I did!! And she said I could borrow her book title. Can you guess what it is?

How about a closer look. There is real duct tape on the mouths of the "lambs"...

That's right - SILENCE OF THE LAMBS!! hee hee hee!! I used the Hambo Party Sheep, but masked out the party hat & noise maker when I stamped the image. Then I cut some teeny tiny pieces of duct tape to put over their mouths. Which I'll have you know was NOT easy. Turns out duct tape is super sticky. (That's your newsflash of the hop. HA!) I decided after the card was complete to add a little Liquid Applique to the sheep for fuzzy wool texture. Another thing about duct tape - it sorta shrinks and melts when you hit it with a heat gun. Who knew?? Oops.

For the card layout, I decided to play along with the CPS #252 sketch challenge. Thanks for the inspiration, CPS!

And just in case any of you are doubting me, I want to assure you that Silence of the Lambs really is a book. Not just a movie. The book is even better than the movie, if you can imagine! Ok I'm fibbing right now, I've never actually read the book. I just read that the book is fantastic. As was the movie. SUCH a great movie!!

I was the final stop on the blog hop today. I do recommend that you head back to the Hambo Stamps blog one more time, though, and let Monica know how much you enjoyed this hop! Because Monica is awesome, as are Hambo Stamps!

Until next time,

Stamps: Party Sheep - 3202 from Hambo Stamps
Paper: Stampin' Up cardstock, Echo Park patterned paper
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Copic markers
Other: Swiss Dots embossing folder (Cuttlebug), circle die (Spellbinders), Corner Chomper (We R Memory Keepers), ribbon (American Crafts), twine (American Crafts), Liquid Applique, duct tape

Texas Tuesday + some more DT news!!

2012-01-17T00:52:00.008-05:00

So you all know I just *love* creating Texas-inspired cards, right? Well I am over the moon excited to share some news! My dear friend Jimmye Sue Mitchell, owner of Texana Designs, has invited me to be a part of her very first design team! Yeehaw!! And today I have my first "official" design team card for you! We're getting into the Valentine's spirit - Texas style!

Isn't this Barbed Wire Heart fabulous? Thinking about barbed wire made me think metal, and metal made me think of a technique I learned many moons ago - faux metal! Have you ever tried it?

You just add layer upon layer of embossing powder (I used some old copper EP from my stash!) and then, finally, press your stamp into the still-warm-and-melty EP to get your image. Fun! Just make sure you have Versamark ink on your stamp before you press it into the warm EP, it keeps your stamp from getting all gunked up.

So I'm curious - I'm thinking about doing some technique videos, just for fun. Would you want to see something like this? Or is it such an old & well-known technique, it would be silly to film it? I just have no feel for what would or would not be interesting. So let me know what you think!! Is there anything else you'd like to see?

I want to extend a huge Texas-sized THANK YOU to Jimmye Sue for allowing me to be a part of her team. I am extremely honored! Be sure to head on over to the Texana blog & become a follower! And also go ahead and "LIKE" the Texana Facebook page! :-)

Happy Trails,

Stamps: Jam'n Barbed Wire Heart & Jam'n Love ya with all my Texas heart from Texana Designs
Paper: Teal & white cardstock, polka dot DP
Ink: Versamark, Memento Tuxedo Black
Other: Copper embossing powder, scallop edge punch, copper brads, teal grosgrain ribbon, white stitching

Back on the Recipe Swap Design Team!! YAY!!

2012-01-14T22:55:00.005-05:00

Here's some exciting news for me - I've returned to my sweet friend Linda McClain's Catered Crop Recipe Swap design team!! Yay! I love this challenge, and I love the changes Linda has made to make it even better! Woohoo!

This week we are playing with buttons...

If you squint, you'll see that I included one teeny tiny little button. LOL!!

The image is A-D-O-R-A-B-L-E and it's from this week's sponsor, JellyPark digital stamps. I colored this cutie with my Copics.

And the change I mentioned - Linda has started creating beautiful inspiration boards for her challenges, I love the one this time for buttons!! And even better, she created an entire Pinterest board with all the inspiration (and more!) featured here. So cool!

I really hope you'll play along with us this week! You have until Saturday, January 21 at 8pm EST and all you have to do is make a card and use buttons! Or even just a single button, like I did! I know you can do that! And when you link up your creation, be sure to tell Linda that I convinced you to play along, so she knows I'm earning my keep on the team... :-)

Thanks for stopping by!

Stamps: Digital image from Jellypark
Paper: Stampin Up & Georgia Pacific cardstock, Little Yellow Bicycle & Lily Bee DP
Ink: Copic markers, white gel pen
Other: MFT snowflake die, American Crafts twine, Diamond Stickles, button

A Tour of my Stamp Room...

2012-01-12T22:33:00.003-05:00

It's January 12 (almost 13th!) and I still haven't stamped a single thing this year. So sad!! The main reason is that my desk in inaccessible! It's such a mess. I'm in the process of cleaning it TONIGHT - but in the mean time I took a little "before" video, to show you what I'm dealing with. And hey, what the heck - most people show off their stamp rooms when they are neat and clean and perfect. I believe in keeping it real... ;-) I may do another tour once it's clean, if anyone is interested - I could share more detail about some of my storage ideas. Yes??

I do need to apologize about the quality of this - I just filmed it with my phone, I didn't edit it and I made it at 10 o'clock at night so the lighting is not so super. Guess I won't be getting an Academy Award for this one...

Until next time...

More Make a State-ment Cards

2012-01-10T14:17:00.003-05:00

Today Melanie Muenchinger is sharing a couple more of my Make a State-ment cards, featuring Melanie's fabby set she created for Gina K Designs. Here's a peek at one of them:

Head on over the Melanie's blog to see the full cards. And huge thanks again to Melanie for the opportunity to play with this wonderful set!

By the way, did you hear the exciting news that Melanie has published her first book?? My copy of "A Year of Flowers" is on the way to my mailbox, yay! I know you'll want to order one for yourself!

Carter's Bowling Birthday!

2012-01-09T23:33:00.005-05:00

Well our Christmas vacation is finally coming to an end - tomorrow Carter heads back to kindergarten, and Courtney returns to preschool on Wednesday! And with this comes a return to our routine. I have big plans for adding regular craft time back into my own routine!

My cardmaking has been pretty much nonexistent for weeks now, but I thought I'd share the one crafty thing I did do! Carter turned 6 over the holidays, and this past Saturday we had his birthday party with friends. We did a bowling them, so I just had to decorate a shirt for him to wear!!

This was completely inspired by this awesome shirt I found on Etsy. I picked up the jersey t-shirt at Sports Authority for $7.99. Perhaps a better deal could be found elsewhere, but of course, as always, I decided to do this last minute, so there was no time to shop around. :-) And I just cut out everything for the bowling pin from my stash of felt - it always feels so good to actually USE the stash! I added stitching around everything after I took the photo above, and of course you can't see the detail below. Ah well, you get the idea! When I showed Carter the shirt, he said "I don't like it mom, I LOVE IT!" Yay!!

Here's a little montage of photos from the party. My boy was so happy to see his friends after missing them over Christmas break!

The bowling cake was from Kroger - they did a really great job with it! And I pulled together some fun bowling-themed favors! I found these mini bowling sets (which the kids LOVED, by the way!), wrapped them and then cut out the little bowling pins with my Silhouette. The "thanks" was stamped, a hole was punched and voila! Bowling pin tags. :-)

Now it's time to shift gears - Courtney's birthday is in a few weeks and she's requested a repeat of last year's princess party theme! I love birthday parties. :-)

Tomorrow Melanie is sharing more of my guest design cards, I'll link you up then!

2011 in Cards

2012-01-01T07:00:00.000-05:00

For the past couple years, I've done an end of year post sharing my favorite cards I created over the past year. This year, with our move from Austin to Atlanta, the pool to choose from was quite small, but I decided to continue my little tradition anyway! So without further ado...

January

February

March

April

May

June

July

August

September

October

November

December

Happy New Year! Wishing you lots of happiness and stampiness in 2012!

Guest Designing with Melanie's Stamps!!

2011-12-31T09:00:00.000-05:00

Hi everyone! I'm so excited to share some happy news today - the fabulous Melanie Muenchinger, illustrator for Gina K. Designs and all-around sweet and talented stamper, asked me to do a guest design spot for one of her latest sets, Make a State-ment!! It's such a FUN FUN FUN set for people like me who love to roadtrip across the country, I completely squealed when I saw it!
I have a bunch more ideas for this set, but Melanie is featuring a few of my designs starting today, so head on over to her blog, Hands, Head, Heart, and take a peek! Thanks so much for inviting me, Melanie!

Some Photos from Christmas

2011-12-30T12:00:00.003-05:00

As the new year approaches, I've been thinking about what I want to do with my blog. And one thing I'd like to do, even though it's not what all you stampers care to see, is share a weekly update of what the kids have been up to, both as my own little digital scrapbook so *I* will remember, and also to share with family. So in that spirit, today I'm going to share a look back at Christmas...

I will begin with a confession. For us, the Christmas season begins on the day after Thanksgiving. And this year I was one of those crazy people in line at Target at midnight Thanksgiving night. I have sworn I will not do it again next year. Any bets on whether I'll remember that when November rolls around again? :-)

We also get our tree up Thanksgiving weekend, and this year was our first with an artificial tree. I don't love it nearly as much as a real tree, but I did very much enjoy not having to water and also having no needles to clean up! In this photo Carter is reading a Christmas story to Courtney by the tree. So proud of my boy and his reading!

Carter made a gingerbread house at school. I suggested it be a decoration, but Carter thought it was that night's dinner!

For our first holiday season in Atlanta, we decided to take in one of the local events - the lights at the botanical garden! It was beautiful.

Courtney was in a cute little Christmas program at her preschool. She did such a good job singing with her class!

I attempted to get a nice Christmas photo of the kids in front of the tree, but this is what I ended up with. My crazy kids!!

This one on the front porch is better - I love the way Courtney is looking at Carter!

Of course we also had to get a photo with Santa!

Once school was out, we headed up to Michigan to spend Christmas with family. The kids were so excited that we actually got some snow!!

Here they are on Christmas Eve in front of Grammy's tree - they each got to open one present that night.

Here's a couple from Christmas morning - you can tell we are a Disney-loving family! Carter loved his stuffed Simba...

And Courtney was ecstatic to get not only a Rapunzel dress, but also Rapunzel HAIR from Grammy!!

The next day we got to go to Aunt Lori's for another Christmas celebration. Carter had a ton of fun playing with cousins Gina & Jeff's new Kinect!

And finally, to round out the holidays, a trip to Crossroads Village. So many pretty lights!

A wonderful Christmas for us.

Thanks for stopping by!

Just Because

2011-12-29T16:14:00.003-05:00

I found a card I made a few months ago and forgot to post. So I thought I'd post it now. Just because.

The stamps are from Stampotique. And the poodle is pink and glittery. As all poodles should be. I painted the chipboard heart with acrylic paints and then attempted to dry it with my heat gun, which accidentally caused the paint to bubble up a bit. But now I'm declaring it a cool, texture-adding technique rather than an accident. Because I'm awesome like that. ;-)

Until next time,

Fall color... in December...

2011-12-19T07:00:00.001-05:00

So... I'm a wee teeny tiny bit late posting this card. We're a week from Christmas and I'm forcing you to step back in time to a nice fall day. Because that's when I meant to make and post this card! Just humor me...

You see, it was my first fall here in Georgia. I grew up in Michigan where there are seasons and the trees know how to be trees. In Austin, not so much. But I didn't realize just how much I missed fall color until I spent fall here, and saw the leaves. Oh the glorious leaves!! I was in a constant state of awe for weeks. It was so wonderful!! I got it in my head that I had to use some of those leaves on a card! And then I saw Amy share an idea on Twitter to use Mod Podge to preserve leaves (although I can't find the blog post, darn it!)! What fun!

The main problem is that I had this idea. Then days and days went by and finally I collected some leaves, no longer quite at their peek. Then for weeks (!) I left those leaves sitting on my desk, waiting for me to use them! Ack. Finally, Thanksgiving weekend, I attempted to Mod Podge the fairly brittle leaves into submission, as I called it. I stamped a background using Distress inks and some of my favorite Hero Arts stamps - La Lettre and Three Winter Trees. And I got out the Mod Podge. It worked! It looked fab!! Another week or two passed and FINALLY I got around to adding the panel onto a card. And when I rolled my mono adhesive along the back of the cardstock - HEARTBREAK - it created bubbles in my gorgeous leaves. Sigh. Ah well, I love the card regardless. :-)

And now I have to share just a few of the many many MANY photos I took this fall with my phone. I couldn't help it, I was mesmerized by those leaves, in my very own neighborhood, so I had to keep capturing them. Sigh. These photos don't even truly capture the color since they are just crappy phone photos.

And my babies enjoyed the fabulous fall leaves, too!

Happy Stamping,

Stamps: K5344 La Lettre, K5255 Three Winter Trees, ST509 Hooray (message) from Hero Arts
Paper: Orange, kraft, white cardstock
Ink: Distress Inks (Rusty Hinge, Wild Honey, Gathered Twigs, Fired Brick, Vintage Photo)
Other: Mod Podge, Leaves, Twine, Spellbinders die

Merry Texmas!

2011-12-13T09:29:00.004-05:00

After my trip to Archivers this past weekend, I was in quite the stamping mood so I surfed on over to Splitcoaststampers, where a VSN (Virtual Stamp Night) was underway! During VSN, oodles of fabby stampers host different challenges. A new challenge goes live every hour, and you have to complete your project from start to finish in 45 minutes. Yep, that's right - 45 MINUTES!! It's pure madness, and so much fun! When I saw DebDeb's challenge at 4pm on Saturday - to use an "alternative" image that works for a Christmas card in the south - I thought right away of one of my favorite stamps from Texana Designs - this fun Merry Texmas cactus Snowglobe!!

I want to get back in the habit of posting Texas Tuesday cards, so this is perfect timing! The card is pretty straight forward - just added a bit of Picket Fence Distress Stickles for a touch of snow in my snowglobe. I'm just happy it came together in 45 mintues. I decided to add the stitching with about three minutes to go, LOL!!

Thank for stopping by, and Merry Christmas, y'all! ;-)

Stamps: Snowglobe from Texana Designs
Paper: Hero Arts Kraft & Pine, GP white, DCWV Christmas matstack (plaid)
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Copic markers
Other: Crimping tool, May Arts ribbon, American Crafts twine, Ranger Distress Stickles, stitching

New Hero Arts Goodies!!

2011-12-12T07:53:00.006-05:00

Happy Monday! Did everyone have a wonderful, HeroArts-alicious weekend? New goodies hit the stores, you know. Like this fabbbbulous Newspaper Eiffel Tower background stamp THAT I ADORE!

I decided to dig out my Ranger alcohol inks and some glossy paper for this one - a technique that I don't play with nearly as often as I should, because the results are always stunning! The background stamp is embossed in black. I embossed the tower itself a second time, cut it out and popped it up.

I definitely see this background being combined with bike stamps in my future. I know this will be a big shock to some of you, but I happen to kinda enjoy bike races and le Tour de France. No, really!! ;-)

So being the good Hero Arts fanatic that I am, I headed over to Archivers on Saturday, so I could look at all the new goodies in person. I had already poured over the catalog oodles of times, but something about seeing them in person - perhaps fondling them just a little - is so much more fun.

The display of Clings nearly made me faint, I loved it so much...

And the woodblocks, oh the glorious woodblocks!!

I really love this one, hee hee. It's a real, functioning QR code!

As I was at the counter paying, I saw another woman come in, dragging her hubby with her. She had such a grin on her face as the clerk handed her a new catalog and she excitedly started thumbing through it. Her hubby didn't look nearly as excited, haha! But she saw me and we gave each other knowing smiles. WE knew what an exciting day it was!!

I tried to get a self-portrait of me with the stamps, but they all turned out horrid (think: way too many chins!). I guess I should have just asked someone to take one for me, but I felt silly. Not sure why, it's perfectly NORMAL to take your photo with stamps!!! At least in my world it is, hee hee! So instead I'll share this one of a happy girl in her car right after, still feeling the glow of all the fabulous new rubber. Sigh.

In case you missed it this weekend, Hero Arts shared a fantastic blog hop on Friday - so much inspiration, with lots of the new stamps in action, you don't want to miss it. AND - if you make it out to visit the new stamps, take your own photos. You could WIN LOTS OF STUFF!!

Thanks for stopping by,

Stamps: CG417 Newspaper Eiffel Tower from Hero Arts
Paper: Glossy cardstock, Hero Arts Aubergine
Ink: Versamark, Memento Sweet Plum, Ranger Adirondack alcohol inks (Eggplant, Stream, Meadow)
Other: Blending tool, Maya Road trim, Hero Arts pearls, black embossing powder, black Glaze pen (on Amour), Fiskars tag punch, May Arts satin ribbon

Sweet Little Fox

2011-12-11T16:30:00.006-05:00

Well hello there! Long time, no blog! You've heard that a lot from me, haven't you? WELL! I've been on a bit of a cardmaking roll this weekend, so I'll be here blogging at least a few times this week!! Which means I'll probably lose some more followers. Whenever I actually blog after a long break, a bunch of people unsubscribe. It's like "oh yeah, I forgot about her, I should delete her!" Nice. HAHAHA! Oh well. But please do consider keeping me around, because I actually have a few fun stampy things coming soon - a guest design spot - a return to a design team I love - yup, that's right, I hope to rejoin the stamping world in 2012! WOOT!

But enough blah blah blah, let's get to today's card, shall we?

I tried out such a FUN technique for this card!! My genius friend Lydia shared it a little while back. I stamped the sweet little Hero Arts Sleepy Fox in black ink, then set it on a light box with another paper on top of it. I used the lines as a guide as I colored with Copics. The result - my sweet little fox is pure Copic, it doesn't have a black line!!! It looks almost like a painting! So much fun!!

I also turned to one of my all-time favorite blog challenges for this card - Mojo Monday!! It's been way too long since their awesome sketches got my mojo flowing!

Thanks for stopping by, I so appreciate all of you who have stuck with me through the thick & thin!!

Stamps: E5466 Sleepy Fox, CL272 All Occasion Messages from Hero Arts
Paper: White & pink cardstock, Echo Park Dots & Stripes DP
Ink: Copic markers, Memento tuxedo black
Other: Tiny Attacher (staples), pink ribbon (May Arts from Hambo Stamps), green scallop ribbon from stash, Spellbinders die, white heart button

A Splash of Poppies!

2011-11-15T21:58:00.004-05:00

I made another card! Yay! And it's a challenge two-fer!!

First of all, I played along with some of my favorite challenge peeps - the talented ladies over at The Play Date Cafe! This week was a color splash, so I splashed with an orange poppy!

And I'm so excited about the second challenge I played, because it's actually my very first time joining them! Ever! I KNOW!! What can I say - it's CAS-ual Fridays, and I'm just not usually a clean & simple kinda gal.

The poppies I used are from one of my all-time favorite clear sets from Hero Arts. So so pretty! I decided to color just one little blossom for my color splash, and pop it up on a tag for CAS-ual Fridays. I wanted to dull the base poppy a bit, so I went over the panel with Picket Fence Distress Stain. The poppy center has a touch of Midnight Black Stickles, and Hero pearls finish it all off.

Thanks so much for stopping by!

Stamps: CL449 Delicate Blossoms from Hero Arts, message from Taylored Expressions
Paper: Black, white
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black
Other: Prismacolor pencils, gamsol, Hero Arts tag (Silhouette), Cuttlebug embossing folder (Swiss Dots), Hero Arts pearls, Ranger Distress Stain (Picket Fence), Stickles (Midnight Black), twine, machine stitching

Texas Tuesday!

2011-11-15T10:10:00.007-05:00

Something truly horrible happened a couple days ago. My son was reading a book for school about people who wear glasses. He was reading along... "Moms wear glasses. Doctors wear glasses. Mail carriers wear glasses." Whatever. Then the page said "Cowboys wear glasses." And his response to that... are you sitting down???... "But mom, there is no such thing as real cowboys!" ***GASP*** ***THUD*** Did my child really just say that?? We clearly took that boy out of Texas much too soon!!

So, in my own warped little way of righting this incredibly horrific situation, I feel the need to start doing Texas Tuesday posts again, STAT!! I cannot let my family forget their Texas past! Because me making and posting Texas-themed cards makes such a difference in their lives... HA! So last night I played with one of my favorite symbols of Texas, the bluebonnet...

I broke out my Prismacolor pencils for this one. I really need to do that more often, I just love them! The background is from a page in a book I bought used just to sacrifice for cards. Can anyone tell what classic novel it is by scanning this bit of text? I would be very impressed!! (and fyi it has NOTHING to do with Texas!) :-)

But mostly I was playing along with this week's Catered Crop Follow The Recipe challenge!! My friend Linda invited me back this week as a Top Chef Emeritus! WOOT!
Here are the elements I chose to borrow from the featured recipe:

Papers: Kraft
Colors: kraft, black, cream
Ink: pencils, distress ink
Tools: embossing folder, die cuts, circle punch
Miscellaneous: ribbon, pearls
Techniques: dry embossing, distressing

The gorgeous bluebonnet stamp is from my dear friend Jimmye Sue and Texana Designs! She is the sponsor of this week's challenge. I do hope you'll play along, because I know you'd just love to own some Texana goodness for yourself!

I have to steal from Linda for a minute and share this photo that she has on her blog today! It's me, Linda & Jimmye Sue from a little while back. Oh how I miss my Texas friends!

And one more little announcement before I go!! I've set up a new Etsy shop called COWBOY CARDS!! I will be posting all of my Texas Tuesday cards in there, if you're at all interested. And sorry that the shop doesn't look pretty yet - I just set it up today and I still need a banner! :-)

Happy stampin', y'all!

Stamps: Texana Designs
Paper: Hero Arts Kraft, Eggshell, Text is a book page
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black
Other: Prismacolor Pencils, Hero Arts pearls, American Crafts twine, Spellbinders die, Cuttlebug folder (Swiss Dots), circle punch, ribbon

Queen for the Day

2011-11-09T16:33:00.006-05:00

So... did you see the Hero Arts blog today?? Did you see who was mentioned on it. That's right, little ol' me!! Woohoo!! I feel like Queen for the Day. HA! I made some tags:

Lisa took this photo (which is why it's way better than the photos I typically post, HA!) after she added my tags to her boxes for her A-M-A-Z-I-N-G advent calendar project. Be sure to hop on over there and check out her finished project. It is simply gorgeous! She has totally inspired me to get my hands on one of those advent calendars for myself! If you want one too, hurry and get it this week, and use the promo code HERO for $10 off!

I used a ton of Silhouette cuts on my little tags. I am soooooo in love with my Silhouette these days. I have big plans to jump back into scrapbooking - BIG PLANS - so I even subscribed to the Silhouette store. It's such a great deal if I actually start USING my Silhouette regularly!

Oh and by the way, we were getting all tagalicious this week because it's one of the themes for the Hero Arts monthly contest. I hope you'll play along - they offer really wonderful prizes!! (And if you win I get to talk to you via email - bonus for me!!) ;-)

And Lisa - thank you thank you thank you for inviting me to help out a bit with your project. You're the best and I miss you soooooo much!

Thanks for stopping by. And sharing in my joy. I feel so special. I'll be signing autographs later. Right after I make dinner, do the laundry and clean the toilets... hahaha

Happy Birthday Timbo!!

2011-11-08T08:00:00.002-05:00

Today I am here to wish a very happy birthday to Timbo, the creative genius who draws all of the ADORABLE images for Hambo Stamps!! The Bacon Bits are surprising Tim with a little birthday blog hop!! Won't you join us? If you arrived here from Michele's blog, fantastic!! If you just happened by, be sure to start at Karin's blog for the whole story and to have a chance at winning the birthday prize!

Some of Tim's favorite images he's drawn are all the cute Farm Animals. So all of the animals are heading to a big ol' party at the farm to celebrate with Tim!! This cute little chicken is setting off from here in Marietta, Georgia...

Chicken had to stop and ask for directions in Marietta. In Marietta, all directions are given referencing the... wait for it... Big Chicken! Chicken was told to take a left at the Big Chicken, then head north to Richmond.

So chicken headed toward the Big Chicken. But silly, silly chicken, he decided to take a peek inside. You would not believe what he found!! It was horrifying!!

EEEEEEEEEEEEEEEKKKK!!!! He hightailed it out of there and continued on as quickly as he could to join his fellow animals at the farmyard party!!

Now off to Melissa's blog, where you can see what happens next at Timbo's Birthday Bash! If you get lost, here is the order of birthday fun:
Karin
Stephanie
Jessica
Michele
Libby
Melissa
Andrea
Judy
Talk to the Ham

Thanks for stopping by to help celebrate Tim's birthday! Don't forget to comment for a chance at the goodies!!

Happy Stamping,

Stamps: Farm Chicken Digital Image, Goes Without Saying - 4113 from Hambo Stamps
Paper: Hero Arts Kraft, SU black, red, turquoise, GP white, green gingham DP from stash
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Copic markers
Other: Cloud die (Lil' Inker), circle dies (Spellbinders), fringe scissors (Martha Stewart), embossing folder (Cuttlebug Swiss Dots), gingham ribbon

Happy Halloween!

2011-10-31T10:06:00.005-04:00

Happy Halloween!!!

Today I'm honored to be featured over on Michelle Liimatainen's blog, Page Master Designs! She's been featuring AMAZING Halloween projects all month from some of my stamping idols. Not really sure I can hang with those peeps, but I'm flattered that I get to try! Head on over the Michelle's blog for the full card, but here's a little peek...

I will be back soon with some more cards - I haven't posted all my Hope You Can Cling To creations, and the deadline is approaching!! I hope you've all been participating in this fabby card drive!

Happy Stamping,

I've got the holiday spirit...

2011-10-27T08:46:00.005-04:00

...except, perhaps, the wrong holiday!??! HAHA! But really, aren't you in the mood for a little St. Patrick's Day?

Well there's a very good reason I'm sharing this adorable little leprechaun with you today! He's part of the NEW RELEASE AT HAMBO STAMPS!! And I think he's stinkin' adorable, right down to his shamrock balloon! And the new sentiment to go with him - GO GREEN - how awesome is that? I'm picturing lots of Earth Day cards in my future. ;-) But the biggest reason I love that GO GREEN sentiment??? Because I am a MICHIGAN STATE SPARTAN so of course that's the first thing I think of when I see GO GREEN! Woohooo! Go Spartans! Go Green! Go White!! Ok, I'm done. Just had to get that out of my system... How about another card?

This time I paired him with one of my all-time favorite Hambo Fractured Funnies - "Irish Luck". The inside of the card reads "Well, except for that potato famine thingie..." HAHAHA! Maybe that message shouldn't make me giggle so much - so many suffered to make that funny sentiment possible - but I can't help it, it's too funny!! Oh how I love Hambo silliness!

If you want to get ahold of some of the new rubber - and trust me, you do! - there's a little added bonus this weekend! Here's the scoop from Monica:

To help celebrate HOGtoberfest and this new rubber release, we have a little goodie for you: Include any of the new rubber designs or sayings on your Hambo order -- thru Oct. 31 -- and a free stamp will be included in your order. The free stamp will be one of our current designs - no retirees here!

Check out all the new designs on the Hambo website (there's some adorable new winter images if you aren't quite ready for St. Patty's Day... ;-) ) and also visit Talk to the Ham for links to card samples from the Bacon Bits!!

Happy Stamping!

Stamps: Leprechaun - 4717, Go Green! - 4706, Irish Luck - 0812 from Hambo Stamps
Paper: Hero Arts Kraft & green, other DP
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Copic markers
Other: Cloud dies (Lil' Inker Designs), Labels die (Spellbinders), baker's twine (The Twinery), gold brads

Come Paint with Me!!

2011-10-17T09:17:00.003-04:00

I'm SO EXCITED today!! Guess who's hosting a challenge on the greatest stampy website on the planet, Splitcoaststampers?!!? That's right, ME!! I feel like such an important stamper. HA! But what I really am is just stamping for an important cause! All month long, SCS has been hosting a Hope You Can Cling To forum, with daily challenges as the kickoff for inspiration to make & send cards to MD Anderson Cancer Center, for visitors to share with patients battling breast cancer. Check out my challenge here, I'm asking everyone to play with PAINT! And here's one of the samples I made for the challenge:

I played with my very favorite paint - Claudine Hellmuth's Studio Paint! Something about that luscious paint, it kicks me into creative mode even when my mojo has completely gone on hiatus. I got out painterly pink, dash of red and blank canvas, and just played around and mixed them and dabbed them onto heavy cardstock until I got something I liked for a background!

Since it pained me to completely cover up the gorgeous paint, I opted for a big vellum flower on this card. I embossed the Hero Arts Stencil Flower, and filled the center with seed beads. I love attaching the flower with just a dot of Glossy Accents - it makes the edges curl up slightly, giving the card some dimension.

I was inspired by my grandma to choose PAINT as my challenge - she is an amazing artist, and also a breast cancer survivor.

I do hope you'll play along with me! You have until November 7 to get your card uploaded on Splitcoast - oh, did I mention - there are PRIZES!! All of the details, including the address to send you card off to MD Anderson, are included in my challenge thread.

Happy stamping, and happy painting!

Stamps: CG194 Stencil Flower, CL272 All Occasion Messages
Paper: heavy white cardstock, pink cardstock, vellum
Ink: Black Stazon, ColorBox Frost White
Other: Claudine Hellmuth Studio Paint (painterly pink, dash of red, blank canvas), Martha Stewart glitter, white EP, pink seed beads

Operation Julie's Smile!

2011-10-07T08:00:00.007-04:00

Hello!! And welcome to the Operation Julie's Smile blog hop!! You should have arrived here by way of Fiona's wonderful blog. If you didn't, you really should consider going back to the very beginning at the Sweet Stamp Shop blog. There are about 120 designers participating in this blog hop! Yowza!! TONS of fabby inspiration!! And... tons of fabby prizes!!

As many of you know, I've had the honor & pleasure of being a member of Julie Ranae's Play Date Cafe team. I'm thankful our creative paths crossed and I'm happy to call her a friend. So when I heard about the struggles she is facing, of course I wanted to participate!! I'll tell you more about it in a moment, but first, here's the card I'm sharing today!

I stamped a couple Hero Arts Jewel Daisies, colored them with Copics, cut them out, and then loaded the centers with beads. Oh how I love beaded flower centers!!

The background paper says "strength courage determination" - it's from a wonderful pad of breast cancer awareness paper I picked up at Michael's. I was inspired by this HYCCT challenge on Splitcoast - but I thought those words also describe Julie. Here is her story:

The creative blogging community is coming together this weekend to help one of our friends, Julie Ranae. You may know her as the Design Team Coordinator for many wonderful companies from bakers twine, die cuts, rubber stamps and more. What many people don’t know about Julie Ranae is that she has had some pretty major dental surgeries in her lifetime due to medication she had to take as a child. It was in her plans to think about having all of her teeth replaced at some point in the next 5 years, a decision that was pretty easy to plan out. But then it happened…she chipped her front teeth on a weekend a month ago. The dentist told her there was no way to save them & that it was his recommendation that she give in and have them all her teeth removed soon, but for that day, they needed to get her front teeth done so her gums could begin to heal. He said he would 'work out payments with her to have ALL this work done...but when she called to make her appt for the first step of impressions, they told her the amount of money that was needed and that the 'payments' applied only to the two teeth that were extracted that day. Her husband Paul was with her & that too, was his understanding as well. So this is how she has found herself in this situation…Needing at least $4000 to get started and another $3000 to finish the process…a total of $7000.

Nicole Rixon, owner of Sweet Stamp Shop put together this benefit after finding out about this situation and before Julie Ranae knew it, it took flight! Because she is an event organizer by trade, she has taken on the job of organizing all of the blogs in this hop as her way of ‘working overtime’ for what she needs, the same as if she were able to work overtime at an outside job to pay for the work to be done. It is the goal of all of these generous friends & sponsors to help make this situation more do-able for our friend so that she can share a brand new smile with all of us soon. If there is anything you can do to help with a financial donation, there is a donation button ready for you to click. Any amount is appreciated and ALL DONATIONS will be eligible for prizes from our sponsor pool of over $2500.

And speaking of all those amazing sponsors, Hero Arts has generously donated several goodies to the pot. You don't want to miss out on a chance to win!! So please be sure to click on the "donate" button up there on my sidebar to the right, and do what you can to help Julie out. Prize winners will be drawn from blog hop comments, the Paypal donation list and from blop hop hosts.

And now it's time to hop on to the next blog along the line, Tami Mayberry!! And just a reminder, there are ~120 hoppers or so in this massive blog hop, so there is a chance there may be a broken link or two. Just head on back to the Sweet Stamp Shop blog if you get stuck, there will be a master list there. And by the way, you have all weekend, until Sunday October 9 at 11:59 EST, to make your way through the hop!!

Thanks so much for stopping by today, and for supporting Julie!

PDCC + Stampotique = Fun!

2011-10-06T13:18:00.005-04:00

Today's card combines three of my favorite things - The Play Date Cafe Challenge, Stampotique stamps, and a color story with purple and green! YAY!!

My friend Kim came over to stamp with me, and brought her big binder full of Stampotique stamps with her!! I felt like a kid in a candy store! I had to use this sweet image called Mela.

I had just cleaned up my room to make *space* for Kim to stamp with me (geez what a mess I can create in there!!) so I was looking through all my various "collection" of supplies and embellishments. I saw these little mini canvases that I just had to have, but once I did have, had no clue what to do with - figured it was time I used them! I kinda like how it all came together!

Here's the fabby color story:

And speaking of Wicked... guess who's going to see Wicked tonight??? MEEEEEE!!! So excited.

Thanks for stopping by today,

Brighter Day

2011-10-04T12:10:00.003-04:00

Here's another card I made this past Saturday.

I finally got to use the ADORABLE Lil' Inker Designs rainbow and cloud dies! Love them!

I played along with Beate's HYCCT challenge on Splitcoast - to make a circle card. Fun!

Thanks for stopping by,

Stamps: Lil' Inker Designs
Paper: Hero Arts Kraft, SU turquoise, GP white
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black
Other: Lil' Inker Designs dies, Spellbinders dies, fuzzy heart brad

Cruising Through Life...

2011-10-03T13:25:00.005-04:00

Hello and Happy Monday! Did everyone have a nice WCMD? I did! I was a stamping fool!! I made more cards than I've made in ages. Woohoo!! Here's the first of them, playing with some Lawn Fawn goodness...

You *know* I *needed* this Cruising Through Life set as soon as I saw it!! It has an adorable BIKE! Thank you Kelly Marie for being so awesome! ;-) I made this card for a couple challenges - first, it's the WCMD challenge on the Lawn Fawn blog. We were to make a "thank you" card - although this doesn't exactly say "thank you" - to me it's a "thank you for spending your life with me" card, so hopefully it counts. :-)

I also played with Lori Craig's challenge over in the Hope You Can Cling To forum on Splitcoaststampers. She asked us to use BLING! Um, ok! Not a problem! :-) Check out the challenges if you haven't already. They are posting a new one every single day this month, and the cards will benefit the MD Anderson Cancer Center. I'm going to play along with as many as I can!! AND!!! I will be HOSTING ONE soon... SQUEAL! So be sure to check it out!! Oh, and by the way, there are prizes!!!! :-)

Thanks for stopping by,

Stamps: Cruising Through Life from Lawn Fawn
Paper: white & pink cardstock
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Copie markers, white gel pen
Other: Crafter's Workshop cloud template, Hero Arts gems, Star Dust Stickles

World Card Making Day!!

2011-10-01T01:05:00.003-04:00

Well hello there! Long time, no blog! Sorry I've been mostly MIA for so long now. One of these days my life will get back into a rhythm. Someday...! But in the mean time, I had to stop in today!! It's the biggest holiday for My People. You know - my stampy people! That's right, it's World Card Making Day!! People across the globe are hoping to set aside a chunk of time in their craft spaces today to do a little creating. I'm hoping to have a stampy playdate with some friends later tonight - both IRL and virtually. YAY! But until then, here's a little card I whipped up...

I used one of my favorite Hero Arts holiday sets, Get Merry! To create the blue rectangular background, I used a technique that I first learned from my friend Sally and love so much - inking up an acrylic block (here, with Broken China Distress Ink!) and stamping directly with that. What fun!

So my friends... go forth... be stampy... and have a fabby World Card Making Day! And if you need some inspiration, hop along through this awesome Blog Tour! Woot!

Happy Stamping,

Stamps: CL463 Get Merry!, CG125 Friend Definition
Paper: Hero Arts Kraft, Cerulean, Eggshell, Grenadine
Ink: Distress Ink (Vintage Photo, Antique Linen, Broken China, Crushed Olive), Versamark
Other: Hero Arts Cream Adhesive Lace, scallop edge punch, wooden button, red twine, machine stitching

Hambo's Sing Your Art Out Blog Hop!!

2011-09-16T08:00:00.001-04:00

Hello and welcome to Hambo Stamps' SING YOUR ART OUT blog hop!!! This time around the Bacon Bits and friends of Hambo Stamps are hopping with creations inspired by SONGS!! What fun!! You should have arrived here by way of Karen's blog. If not, go back to the beginning and start with Hambo's blog, Talk to the Ham!! You don't want to miss a note!

Now let's get down to business, here is my card:

Any idea what song?? I'm actually quite sure you'll never guess it, LOL! I was inspired by my fave singer, Pink!! This is her song "Perfect". Because really, if you're a Ballerina Hippo and you're confident enough to be dancing around in a leotard & tutu, you TOTALLY get what Pink is singing about! :-) (Disclaimer: I cannot watch this video without getting a little teary...)

I chose the "Rock My World" sentiment mostly because Pink rocks my world. I adore her. LOL! I also had to bling up the ballerina's tutu a bit. Just cuz.

The color scheme was inspired by my beloved Play Date Cafe challenge. *sniff* I can't believe the challenge went on without me this week! (Ok, yes I can, but it still is hard to see the sidebar over there without my mugshot anymore. Waaaaah!) But aren't these colors fabby??

Ok, now it's time to get hoppin'!! Dance on over to Carla's blog and check out what she's singing. And be sure to visit ALL the blogs and leave lots of love, because rumor has it there will be a prize for one lucky hopper who leaves comments on all the blogs!

Thanks for stopping by today!

Stamps: Ballerina Hippo - 1722 and Rock My World - 2910 from Hambo Stamps
Paper: Bazzill cardstock, DP from my stash, GP white
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Copic markers
Other: Hero Arts gems, American Crafts ribbons, Martha Stewart glitter, machine stitching

The Play Date Cafe Challenge #98

2011-09-07T23:50:00.004-04:00

For this week's Play Date Cafe post, I made a card for Texas.

No, I don't live there anymore. But I did until two months ago, and before that for sixteen years. Seeing Texas in distress makes me realize I still consider it home. My heart is aching for Texas this week. And for my old neighborhood. One of the fires in Austin was in the subdivision we used to live in. The fire came within about three blocks of our house. Unbelievable!! I heard from the new owner (she's a fellow stamper and super sweet) - what they went through the past few days sounded absolutely terrifying, but thankfully they made it through ok. They were some of the lucky ones.

This week's challenge is sponsored by DRS Designs, and naturally I chose their Cowboy Silhouette image to work with. Little did I know how much I'd be thinking about Texas when the time for the challenge rolled around! I thought this week's colors could sorta give the effect of cowboys riding (and roping!) off into the sunset...

Also a bit ironic that I talk about anyone riding off into the sunset, as I'm very sad to report that this is my final post as a member of the Play Date Cafe design team. As you have probably gathered from the amount of posting on my blog (not much!!), I just haven't had much time for stamping lately. We have a lot of life stuff going on around here - getting settled in our new home & community, my son starting kindergarten, etc. It's been a struggle to juggle it all, so I decided it would be best not to have stamping commitments until I get back into a groove. I am forever thankful to Julie Ranae for giving me this opportunity, and honored to have served on this team with this wonderful group of ladies. They are truly THE BEST.

Thanks for stopping by today and reading my sad post!!

Stamps: Cowboy Silhouette from DRS Designs, alphabet stamps (unknown)
Paper: Watercolor paper, SU cardstock
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Chipped Sapphire & Vintage Photo Distress Ink
Other: Watercolor crayons, string, staples, scallop edge die

Fall Fun Blog Hop!

2011-09-05T09:00:00.000-04:00

Hello and welcome to the Fall Fun Blog Hop! You should have arrived here from the fabulous Lydia Fiedler's blog! If you didn't, head on over there, you don't want to miss what our fearless leader came up with! So... a group of online buddies decided the holiday weekend in the US would be a GREAT time to get inky together, and so we've put together a fall themed blog hop to inspire you as the autumn approaches. As you meet our stampy bloggers today, you may discover that some have goodies for you, so be sure and visit everyone on the list. We have hoppers from all over the globe today, and they are amazing artists.

Thanks for visiting us - grab yourself a nice fall beverage and enjoy!

Here is the full list of our blog hoppers today:

Lydia Fiedler * Libby Hickson * Kim Williams * Michelle Single * Lee Murphy * Sara Henton * Yapha Mason * Lisa Adametz * Jimmi Mayo * Jeanne Streiff * Bev Gerard * Shannon * Dana Keith * Joan Ervin * Maren Benedict * Teresa Kline * Hannah Clark * Dina Kowal * Wanda Cullen * Korin Sutherland * Taylor Usry * Monika Davis * Harriet Skelly * Kim Schofield * Cathy McCauley * Mary Marsh * Julia Aston * Bridget Finlay * Alison Habetler * Leslie Hanna * Sue Farrant * Michelle Hanway * Misti Oblander * Judy Rozema * Jenna Barber * Tammy Hershberger * Eva Dobilas * Kerri Michaud * Cheryl Navarrete * Neva McMullen * Marianne * Samantha * Cindy Wallach

And now for my card! I was having a bit of stamper's block, so I turned to my stash of embellies for the main elements on the card!

I've had both that cute little tree and the background canvas flower for a while now. They both moved with me from Texas to Georgia. Kinda nice to actually use some things I've had hanging on my wall, taunting me. :-) And since I claim to be a stamper, I did do a wee bit of actual stamping too, pulling out the Hero Arts Cling Dots for the background. I chose the sentiment from a Thanksgiving-themed set, I figured it was kinda perfect since so many of my good stampy peeps are doing this hop, and I'm so very thankful for all of them!

Alrighty, now head on over to my friend Kim's blog and see what she's come up with!

Happy Stamping,

Stamps: CG139 Cling Dots, CL466 So Thankful from Hero Arts
Paper: Pumpkin cardstock
Ink: Versamark, Memento Rich Cocoa
Other: Tree from Pebbles, Canvas Flower from Jillibean Soup, Spellbinders die

The Play Date Cafe Challenge #97

2011-09-01T00:01:00.000-04:00

Well last week I said "life sucks", and today I'm "feelin' crabby"!! Geesh, guess I need an attitude adjustment??

Well I couldn't help it, I was playing with this cute set from Trade Fish Designs, who happens to be sponsoring this week's Play Date Cafe challenge! And, it's a color splash - black & white with a splash of RED! Nice, bold, CRABBY red! :-)

I hope you'll play along, Trade Fish Designs has wonderful stamps - I know I wish *I* could win more of them!Happy (not crabby!) Stamping,

Stamps: Pass the Sunblock from Trade Fish Designs
Paper: Cardstock from Stampin' Up, DP from Canvas Corp
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Copic markers
Accessories: Star Dust Stickles, machine stitching

The Play Date Cafe Challenge #96

2011-08-25T00:01:00.000-04:00

I'm having a bit of a tough week, so I'll be sending this card to myself, thankyouverymuch.

HAHAHA! And now I'm cheered up after receiving this card made with the ADORABLE Gone Campin' set from Market Street Stamps. Loooove it! Market Street Stamps happens to be sponsoring this week's Play Date Cafe challenge. You know you want to win some of that, so play along with these fabby colors:

Happy Stampin',

Stamps: Gone Campin' from Market Street Stamps
Paper: PTI cardstock, My Mind's Eye DP
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black
Accessories: Prismacolor pencils, circle punch, Memory Box Loop Border die, Spellbinders die, ribbon, button (from Linda!)

New Release at Hambo Stamps!!

2011-08-24T10:07:00.002-04:00

Attention Stampers!! Have you heard the good news??

Hambo Stamps has released some brand spankin' new stamp designs!! There are some more adorable images, and funny sayings!! I'll be sharing some cards with the new designs very soon, but in the mean time - CHECK OUT THE NEW HAMBO ARRIVALS HERE!! And when you place your order, tell Monica I said hi. :-)

The Play Date Cafe Challenge #95

2011-08-18T00:01:00.000-04:00

This week's Play Date Cafe card is all about me and my little green bike.

See that quote? I love my bike. LOVE IT. But I haven't been out riding in years. Literally, years. I feel too old and unfit to be a bike rider. Seriously. Cyclists are the skinniest people on earth, and me squeezed into bike shorts is rather scary. So I stayed at home, didn't find a way to get out there. Isn't the quote on this card PERFECT? It's a Tim Holtz stamp and I love it something fierce. Here's the happy news - this week, I sent my son off to kindergarten, and celebrated this milestone by getting back on my bike!

Happy happy happy!

The card of course uses this week's Play Date Cafe colors...

I was also inspired by this fabby photo that my friend Sally Traidman took of a street in Stockholm. Sally inspired me to get out my watercolors and make a fun, splotchy background!

Now head on over to the Play Date Cafe blog and join the color challenge! The sponsor this week is Avocado Arts - I just KNOW you want a chance at winning some fabby goodies from them!

Happy stamping,

Stamps: Tim Holtz
Paper: Watercolor paper, SU cardstock
Ink: Hero Arts, Memento
Accessories: Watercolor paint, machine stitching

What's Cookin' Wednesday + a TE blog hop!

2011-08-17T10:17:00.008-04:00

Helllllooooo! Today I'm sharing this month's Taylored Expressions Blast from the Past Blog Hop! Yay! The theme is "Collectors Anonymous", and we are supposed to include those crafty things we seem to COLLECT more then USE! Well lately for me, it seems I COLLECT nearly everything, including stamps! I have so many stamps that haven't even seen ink - craziness. But I just loooooove them, and have to owwwwwn them, and life has been too hectic lately to USE them!! That's actually part of the reason I sign up for hops like this, it gets me actually in here stamping. Without deadlines I don't know if I'd ever stamp, yikes! So anywho, in keeping with my What's Cookin' Wednesday theme, here's my card:

I was going to use the wonderful sketch that sweet Sankari provided for us, but then I created this "background paper" using my What's Cookin' set, and I couldn't bring myself to cover up any of it! LOL! I just love my own stand mixer so much - so I think this stamp is super fabby! I decided this mixer had a clear glass bowl, so I shined it up with some Glossy Accents:

I used more of the My Mind's Eye Stella and Rose line - love love love that paper! And another thing I have a vast COLLECTION of - silver brads! I don't mind "sacrificing" a whole long line of them, because for whatever reason I seem to own a lifetime supply! LOL!

Since it's Wednesday and I've been Cookin' some good stuff lately, I thought I'd go ahead and share a quick, easy & healthy What's Cookin' Wednesday recipe with you! Well I say "quick" - it does take some time in the oven, but it's quick to throw together! It's from Prevention magazine, and my hubs gave it the seal of approval too!

Fish with Artichokes & Tomatoes

Ingredients

2 large red onions, cut into 1/4" wedges
1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
1 package (10 ounces) frozen artichoke hearts, thawed (about 2 cups)
1 cup small cherry or grape tomatoes
2 tablespoons chopped parsley
1 teaspoon freshly grated orange zest
1 clove garlic, minced
4 skinless tilapia or flounder fillets (1 1/2 pounds total)

Directions

Preheat the oven to 400°F.
In a 13" by 9" baking dish, combine the onions and oil. Toss and then spread in an even layer.
Roast for about 35 minutes, or until the onions are golden. Remove from the oven and stir in the artichokes and tomatoes.
In a small bowl, mix the parsley, orange zest, and garlic. Set aside.
Increase the oven temperature to 450°F. Push the vegetables to one side of the dish and add the flounder. Arrange the fish evenly in the pan. Spoon the vegetables over the fish and sprinkle with the parsley mixture.
Return the baking dish to the oven and roast until the fish flakes easily with a fork (about 5 minutes for thin fillets and 10 to 12 minutes for thicker fillets). Place the fillets on 4 plates.

One note about this - it's from Prevention and they like to limit sodium intake, so there is no salt in the recipe. It was a little bland before adding salt & pepper at the table, but totally yummy after adding just a touch of it.

Now without further ado...

Thanks for stopping by today!!

Stamps: What's Cookin' from Taylored Expressions
Paper: SU cardstock, GP white, My Mind's Eye DP
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Copic markers
Accessories: PTI scallop edge die, machine stitching, SU brads, glossy accents, heart brad

First Day of Kindergarten!!

2011-08-16T09:28:00.006-04:00

Ok who out there can believe my sweet little boy Carter - are you ready for this - STARTED KINDERGARTEN YESTERDAY!?!?! Where oh where has the time gone?? It seems like just yesterday I was blogging photos like this. *sniff* My baby is growing up too fast!!

Because I have school and new teachers and school supplies and PTA and bus rides on the brain, I decided to pull out my MFT Teacher's Pet set to play. I'm confident we'll eventually think his new teacher is the Best Teacher Ever...

I used my Crate Paper School Spirit pad to paper piece this, which I also happened to get from MFT a while back. The wooden button was a Renegade Craft Fair find:

And since there was all this MFT product going on, why not play along with the MFT sketch challenge over at Splitcoast?? It was a nice & easy one, good for a rusty stamper like me!

And now... some photos of my sweet boy from yesterday! Here he is, getting on the bus:

Big smiles in the afternoon:

And big hugs for mom!

I love this boy, and I am so incredibly proud of him!

Thanks for stopping by!

Stamps: Teacher's Pet from My Favorite Things
Paper: Hero Arts Kraft, Crate Paper School Spirit 6x6 pad
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Copic markers
Accessories: Machine stitching, 1" circle punch, wooden apple button, American Crafts twine - scarlet, PTI scallop edge die

Catered Crop Follow the Recipe #18!

2011-08-14T00:28:00.006-04:00

Today I have a Quickfire Challenge to share with you! I just love saying that. I feel all Top Chef-like! But what I'm actually referring to is the design team Quickfire over at Linda's Follow the Recipe challenge! Here's my card for this week...

I decided to break out my Real Leaves set from Hero Arts. I'm ready for some fall weather! I have no idea what fall is like here in Georgia, but I'm anxious to find out. I am *not* a fan of the heat! I also chose the leaves because one the ingredients from our recipe was "anything that grows from a seed" - leaves grow from a seed, yes? Sort of? Another recipe item was "notebook paper" - so I used the MFT Notebook Edge die on some cork, but decided to use the "leftovers" from the die cut instead.

Now for the rest of the ingredients I chose to use from the recipe...

Colors – primary colors like red, yellow, and a little brown (kraft)
Stamps and Stickers – anything that grows from a seed
Patterns – checked/gingham, notebook paper
Color Mediums – stamping ink
Embellishments – ribbon
Tools – die cut shapes

Now head on over to Linda's blog and FOLLOW THE RECIPE! :-)

Take care,

Stamps: CL457 Real Leaves, CL489 Yummy Treats (message) from Hero Arts
Paper: Hero Arts Kraft, My Mind's Eye DP
Ink: Hero Hues Punch, Latte chalk ink
Accessories: Cork, MFT Die-namics Notebook Edge, American Crafts gingham ribbon

Happy Happy Birthday to Monica!!

2011-08-12T08:00:00.002-04:00

Tomorrow is Monica's birthday and we're having a surprise blog hop to celebrate! Yay!! Monica is the owner of Hambo Stamps, one of my favorite stamp companies on the planet. She is kind and generous and funny and gave me my very first design team opportunity many moons ago and has put up with me all these years. She's THE BEST and I am so very grateful that she was born! Happy Birthday Monica, this card is 4 Ewe!

I used one of my favorite Hambo stamps, Party Sheep! I also played along with this week's Hambo Hoedown, which happens to be a sketch challenge. So much fun!

As for the hop, you should have arrived here by way of another great, funny, creative friend of mine, Leslie. If you just arrived on my blog by blind luck, make sure and start back to the beginning at Jenn's blog. And to continue on, hop on over to another one of my very favorite peeps, Dina! Be sure and leave comments along the way - there will be a special Hambo Birthday surprise to one lucky, random hopper! The winner will be announced at the Hambo Hoedown on Wednesday, August 17.

Thanks for stopping by!

Stamps: Party Sheep - 3202 and 4 Ewe - 3205
Paper: Kraft from HA, Pink from SU, BoBunny & My Mind's Eye DP, white
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Copic markers
Accessories: Spellbinders die, PTI scallop die, Fiskars stamp-edge scissors, SU oval punch, Michael's ribbon

The Play Date Cafe Challenge #94

2011-08-11T00:01:00.001-04:00

It's Play Date Cafe time! And I am seriously diggin' this week's colors!

This week we're sponsored by Practicing Creativity - I'm also diggin' this fun Carved Love set I got to play with!

The colors from Jax this week are totally fabby:

I cut out the hearts from my Carved Love set and then coated then with Crackle Accents. I love that stuff. LOVE IT!! I also did some intentionally-messy-sewing, which always makes me smile as I do it. It's a sewing free for all!!

I thought the staple and brad at the bottom looked a little bit like an X & O, as in hugs & kisses. hee hee

Be sure to stop by The Play Date Cafe blog - to check out what my amazing teammates came up with, and to play along!!

XOXOXO to YOU!

Stamps: Carved Love from Practicing Creativity
Paper: Stampin' Up cardstock
Ink: Memento Rich Cocoa, ColorBox Frost White
Accessories: Ranger Crackle Accents, stitching, staples, brad

A visit to Michigan...

2011-08-07T21:43:00.008-04:00

Hi friends! I'm back from a family roadtrip - we took a somewhat-spur-of-the-moment drive from our new home here in Atlanta up to Michigan, to visit family & friends. Between the breathtaking Smoky Mountains, and the gorgeous white horse farm fences, the scenery along the way in Tennessee and Kentucky was absolutely beautiful. It's so nice having Michigan within relatively easy driving distance now!

The kids had tons of fun in Michigan! They played at the lake...

Went fishing with Papa in Great Grampa Harmon's pond...

Enjoyed s'mores around the campfire...

Listened to their Great Uncle Bruce sing & play guitar, along with our old family friend Jeff...

Carter went to a Tigers game with Daddy...

And they both got lots of hugs from Grammy!

All in all, a very nice vacation. Now back to reality!

Thanks for stopping by,

My Little Stamper...

2011-08-05T01:45:00.005-04:00

Today my three year old did a little stamping! That just warms her mama's heart...

She was covered in ink by the time she was finished! Love it. :-)

Thanks for stopping by,

The Play Date Cafe Challenge #93

2011-08-04T00:00:00.002-04:00

Woohoo, it's time for another Play Date Cafe challenge! I've been absent from the team for the past month or so, due to our move. But I'm mostly settled, the new term starts today and I'm BACK, baby!! Yayayayayayay!!

This week I played with some fun, fun stamps from Pink Persimmon called Vintage Cupcake. Want a chance to win some Pink Persimmon goodness of your very own? Then I highly suggest you go over and check out the Play Date Cafe blog post, hint hint! And while you're there, play along with this week's color story!

It's a fun day at the PDCC - we have our NEW designers joining us today!! They are completely fabby and I'm honored to get to design with them this term! A big welcome to Denise & Julie! Be sure to check out what they came up with, as well as my other teammates, at the Play Date Cafe! :-)

Thanks for stopping by,

Yell for Cadel!!

2011-07-23T17:01:00.007-04:00

So... have you heard I'm a bit of a cycling fan? :-) It's true, I am. I've been glued to my tv ever since we got U-verse hooked up in this new house of ours, cheering for my favorite Australian cyclist, Cadel Evans. Today was the day that decided who would win this year's Tour de France. I made this card inspired by Cadel last night, crossing my fingers like mad that if I posted it today, it would make sense. And woohoo, it does!! For Cadel, this is the best day EVER!!

I used some of my favorite Hero Arts bicycle stamps, and a really cool sentiment stamp I picked up sometime back from Hampton Art. I chose the black and red color scheme for a couple reasons - first and foremost, because they are Cadel's team colors. But also because I'm playing along with this week's color splash at The Play Date Cafe - I made a black & white card with a SPLASH of red!

Have any of you read my blog long enough to remember WHY this Australian is my favorite cyclist these days? Well back in 2009 during the tour, I did this post inspired by him and shared it on Twitter. In reply, he sent me this tweet.

For me, that was one of the best days ever! I COULD NOT BELIEVE he said that, such a thrill for a cycling dork like me. So today, I'm so freakin' happy that he has achieved his dream, and cannot wait to see him on the podium in Paris tomorrow. YELL FOR CADEL!!

I'm so excited I'm dancing. Like this:

HAHAHAHAHA!!!

Happy Stamping,

Stamps: S5502 Bicycle Pattern, LP202 3 Bikes from Hero Arts, PS0358 Best Day from Hampton Art
Paper: Black & white cardstock
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Versamark, red Copic
Accessories: Red embossing powder, Nestabilities dies, wide red grosgrain ribbon (DeNami Design), machine stitching

July Blast From the Past Blog Hop!

2011-07-20T11:00:00.007-04:00

Today I'm playing along with the Taylored Expressions customer blog hop, aka the Blast from the Past Blog Hop! The theme this month is "Sending You Sunshine," so I decided to make a sunny, happy card featuring the thing that makes *ME* happiest in July - a bicycle!

The bike and sentiment are from one of my favorite TE sets, In the Park. The layout was inspired by Taylor's Sketch Challenge #142.

For a bit of extra fun, I added some glitter pen to the seat and handlebars, and glaze pen to the tires!

So are you wondering why bicycles make me especially happy in July? If you know me at all, you know I'm a bit of a Tour de France fanatic. I've had to miss the majority of the first two weeks of racing this year due to our move. This is the final week of le Tour, and I am savoring it. :-)

Thanks for stopping by!

Stamps: In the Park from Taylored Expressions
Paper: SU Cool Carribean, My Mind's Eye Stella Rose
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Copic Markers, Black Glaze Pen, Copic Spica Pen
Accessories: The Twinery twine

Follow the Recipe #16

2011-07-17T11:36:00.007-04:00

Oh my goodness, it's been over a month since I've played along with Linda's Follow the Recipe challenge!! That is just way too long. But... the good news is, I've unpacked the majority of my stamp room, and last night I broke it in with my very first card! I'M BACK, BABY!!! And, I followed the recipe! :-)

I *had to* play along this week, the sponsor is one of my very favorite stamp companies, Deadbeat Designs! But I have to admit, going through my drawer of Texas stamps, figuring out what to use, made me a wee bit sad that I'm no longer actually a Texan! *sniff* I guess it only makes sense that I created this card as I was feeling blue...! Other than the color choice, I did a pretty decent job of following the recipe...

Inspired by Christine's darling card, I chose to incorporate:

Stamps – flowers
Patterns – circles, checked/gingham
Color Mediums – markers
Embellishments – banners
Tools – border bunches
Techniques – faux stitching, doodling/drawing (I "drew" the greeting myself...)
Theme – birthday

I hope you'll play along this week too, you could win some Deadbeat Designs goodness!

Mark has a lot of great stamps of all different themes, but of course I happen to love the Texas stamps the most. And last night as I was digging through them, I found that I own more than I realized!

Aren't they FUN?

Hey by the way, want to see my in-progress stamp room? I took this yesterday before opening a lot of boxes. It's still not settled, but here's a little preview... I am beyond thrilled about all the table space I have. And a window!! No more stamp cave for me!! :-)

Thanks for stopping by, and happy stamping!!

Stamps: F-346 Medium Bluebonnet from Deadbeat Designs
Paper: Hero Arts Kraft, Archiver's blue, GP white, gingham DP from stash
Ink: Memento markers (Bahama Blue, Bamboo Leaves) from Hero Arts, black Copic multiliner, SU Crumb Cake marker
Accessories: Cuttlebug Swiss Dots, Spellbinders circle die, SU ribbon, SU border punch

The Play Date Cafe Challenge #89

2011-07-07T01:00:00.000-04:00

Hello! I have a card for you today! YAY!! It's Play Date Cafe time...

The colors Jax chose this week are soft and gorgeous. Maybe I took mine a little brighter than the color story indicates, oops! Hopefully Jax will forgive me. ;-)

This week the challenge is sponsored by The Craft's Meow, and they sent me this beautiful Celebrating You set to work with. Gorgeous!!!

Head over the The Play Date Cafe site and find out more about the sponsor (prize!!!) and this week's wonderful guest designer - and also check out the creations of my fabulous teammates!

Take care,

PS... I'm still in the thick of my move - my stamp room is a sea of boxes. Yikes! I hope to be back in stamping mode soon, though!! Bare with me!

We made it!!

2011-07-06T15:47:00.003-04:00

We've made it to Georgia! The moving company delivered all of our belongings yesterday, so the unpacking has begun! Ugh, so much to do still...!!

Thought I'd share a little of our journey to our new home. First stop was in Houston, where we visited the Johnson Space Center. YAY NASA!! Here the kids are with the ginormous Saturn V rocket, which was used during Apollo missions.

After an overnight pitstop in Baton Rouge, we continued across Louisiana, Mississippi, Alabama and finally on to Florida, where we spent a couple days at the beach in Destin. So so so beautiful - I had no idea the Gulf of Mexico could look like that. Paradise!

Finally we made it to our new home. Here we are, sitting on our new doorstep. :-)

More soon - and I'll be back tomorrow with a PDCC card, yay!!

Quick Update...

2011-06-25T22:54:00.003-04:00

Well, this is what my stamp room looks like right now.... yikes!

Everything in our house was packed up on Friday - now we're hanging out here this weekend until the moving company comes Monday morning to load everything into the truck! We hit the road for Atlanta on Tuesday morning, and we'll be making a little vacation of it with a stop in Florida along the way.

Friday was also a special day - my son graduated from preschool! I can't believe Carter will be starting kindergarten soon, where has the time gone??

Thanks for sticking with me here while I'm without my stamps...!!

Take care,

The Play Date Cafe Challenge #87

2011-06-23T00:00:00.000-04:00

Hi there! Would you believe I stamped? To be honest, I can't. HA! Movers come on Friday and as of Wednesday night, I still haven't figured out what I'm letting them pack vs what I'm packing myself. Oops! (*Can anyone say PROCRASTINATION??*) But anyway, this week's Play Date Cafe colors were too lovely and the goodies from Stampendous too wonderful not to find some time to stamp!!

I was primarily inspired by the image in the lower left corner of Jax's fabby color story when making this card. I got out my beloved Claudine Hellmuth Studio Paints and played with the background. Have I mentioned lately how much I adore those paints??? Well I do. I used a gorgeous Dragonfly Vine image from Stampendous, but sadly it's sooooo hard to get a decent photo of it. I embossed it in glitter EP and it just doesn't want to play nice with my camera! Here's a close-up, but still hard to see...

Jax's color story this week could also make for a fantastic July 4th card, I'm thinkin'!

A huge thanks to Stampendous for sponsoring this week's challenge!

Now head on over to the Play Date Cafe blog to check out what my teammates created with these colors, meet our guest designer, see last week's winner list and find out about this week's fabby prize!!

Thanks for stopping by today!

And the winner is...

2011-06-21T16:22:00.002-04:00

A great big huge thanks to all of you who left fantastic packing & moving tips for me - I appreciate it so much!! I'm still in the thick of it - the movers arrive this Friday, yikes!

As for the goodies... I just used random.org and had something happen that I've never had happen before... it actually came back with #1! Which was Mary Dawn, yay! MD, I'll get your goodies in the mail to you asap.

Thanks everyone,

Moving! Purging! GIVING STUFF AWAY!

2011-06-14T15:06:00.003-04:00

Hi friends! I just realized that as of today I am only TEN DAYS away from having a moving company pack up my entire house!! EEEK! We've been planning this move for so long, it hasn't felt real. Now it feels VERY real. I need to start organizing and packing my stamp cave soon! And to help with that effort, I need to purge some things that won't be making the trip with me to Atlanta, like these...

Want this stuff??? If so, just leave me a comment and I'll put your name in the hat. If you've ever packed up and moved your crafting supplies in the past, I'd love to hear any tips you may have! I'll be pulling the winner on Sunday night, June 19, at 9pm CST.

And... as I mentioned, we are Atlanta-bound. Is anyone out there in the Atlanta area? I am looking for people to craft with! :-)

Trying not to panic or stress out in Texas,

Guest Designing with All Things Unity!!

2011-06-11T23:48:00.004-04:00

I'm so excited and honored to be spending June as a guest of the All Things Unity blog! Yay!! I whipped up this sweet little card for Dad for my first project...

The theme for ATU#33 is to Get Manly! Break out your Unity stamps and create a card for one of the guys in your life!

I don't own a ton of manly Unity stamps, but I thought this sweet dad & son image would make a great Father's Day card from Carter. I used a Unity woodgrain background as well - first I painted some green paint from Plaid on the cardstock, then covered the stamp itself with blue paint and stamped. Why paint, you ask? Because Plaid is sponsoring the challenge this week! These AWESOME goodies will go to the winner!!

So head on over to the All Things Unity blog and play along with us!! I cannot wait to see what you create! And a HUGE thanks to Sara for inviting me to join them this month!

Carter Getting Crafty - Children's Challenge #22

2011-06-06T21:36:00.005-04:00

Yesterday Carter was hanging out in my room while I was stamping, and wanted to work on a project too. He mentioned wanting to make a card with bugs on it, and then he remembered the Children's Challenge Corner, which he had played in the past. So we hopped on over there for a look, and would you believe - the challenge this week is insects?!?! How crazy is that??? So of course Carter had to make a card!

I have a set of bug stamps that would have been perfect, but alas they are packed away. Instead, Carter chose to draw some bugs of his own. Which I have to admit, I prefer anyway. I love his drawings. :-) The spider he drew is of course the cutest spider I've ever seen - and how about that orange head on that ladybug (who has about a zillion legs) - love it!!

Here's my boy hard at work, sitting on the floor next to my desk...

And proud of his finished work.

Thank you to Emma, Anna, Ethan, Aaron and Owen for another fun challenge!

And thanks for stopping by today!

Follow the Recipe #13!

2011-06-05T18:23:00.005-04:00

Today is the day Linda posts her Top Chef Quickfire for the Follow the Recipe challenge, and as usual, I am a bit late! Eep! Good thing Linda is the nicest stamper on the planet and puts up with me!! (I promise it will be better once we move, Linda! Really!!) Ok now that my apologies are out of the way, here's what I made:

Don't bicycles just equal happy summer?? In my book they do! And I've been wanting to play with my sweet little Three Bikes set from Hero Arts - I just love ALL of their bike stamps, yay! I used some cloud paper from American Crafts in the background, although I covered it quite a bit. But this card just makes me want to ride a bike on a sunshiny summer day!

You know who else likes riding her bike on a sunshiny day? My sweet little girl. She got her very first big girl bike this past week!

Look at her go!

For my card, I was inspired by several things from our fabby recipe from Jessica.

Colors – red, blue, and yellow
Color Mediums – stamp ink
Embellishments – twine/hemp rope, buttons
Tools – distress tools
Techniques – distressing
Theme – summer

Have you ever played the Follow the Recipe challenge? It's easy peasy, here's a rundown of the rules, copied from Linda's blog:

Use any of the ingredients (themes, colors, techniques, shapes, etc.) in Jessica's recipe to make your project. Just pick a few ingredients and then add your own spices to cook up something uniquely yours.
Add your project using the InLinz (froggy) button and join the party.
Be sure to list your recipe or tell us what ingredient you used from the sample recipe.
Don't forget to link back to this post or include the "I Followed the Recipe" button on your blog (see the side bar to the right).

I hope you'll play along with us this week! There's still a few days to get in on the action! Entries are accepted until Thursday June 9 at 8pm CST. Visit the challenge here!

Happy Stamping!

Stamps: LP202 Three Bikes, CL492 Typewriter Letters from Hero Arts
Paper: SU Yoyo Yellow, American Crafts (clouds) & Jillibean Soup (red)
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Copic markers
Accessories: staples, button, twine, scissors for distressing edges

Just for fun - our Irish dinner!

2011-06-05T15:55:00.005-04:00

On Friday Joel and I had a rare kid-free night out at a place we'd never been - The Emerald Restaurant. It's a tiny little Irish restaurant, run by the sweetest family. Joel and I got to relive a little bit of our trip to Ireland back in 2005, when I was pregnant with Carter. Actually, here's a little known fact - Carter's middle name is Sean. We wanted him to have an Irish middle name, since he traveled there "with" us. :-)

The restaurant may make actual Irish people groan - the decorations were rather stereotypical with shamrocks and leprechauns and whatnot, but it was fun nonetheless. I mean just look at it, isn't it cute?

The restaurant is in a house that was built quite far from downtown Austin back in the 1920s. The family turned it into a restaurant in 1984. The interior is small and cozy, with wood beams on the ceilings and creaky floors and everything. And Irish lace. LOTS of Irish lace!

We were sitting near the harp. Would you believe we heard him play a little Metallica? ON A HARP?

Dinner was something else - the owner brought out a **ginormous** tray of food and divided it tableside onto our plates. Here's the description of our dinner from their website:

You will start out with a basket of Irish Soda Bread and strawberry butter which is followed by our creamy Irish Potato Soup. Then a fresh Garden House Salad which has our Homemade Irish Red Dressing upon it. Then your server will present your Chateaubriand Beef Tenderloin to you and your guest which is accompanied by an assortment of fresh vegetables. For your desert, you will have our Irish Whiskey Cake.

And our Chateaubriand course. Just one plate was enough for two!

Dessert was a super moist and super sweet whiskey cake.

Look how they packaged up the leftovers, too sweet!

This isn't a place we'd probably ever go more than once, it was quite expensive and we only tried it thanks to a Groupon. But it was fun to visit, and to reminisce about our trip. If you're at all curious, I did a scrapbook about our trip a while back which can be viewed here.

And before I go - a photo of me from 2005, at one of the most beautiful places I've ever been, the Cliffs of Moher, on the western coast of Ireland. **sigh**

I'm secretly hoping the next time I eat an "authentic" Irish dinner, it's in the dining room of my friend Heather's house! Hmm, I wonder if she knows that... hee hee

Thanks for stopping by today. (and humoring me!) :-)

The Play Date Cafe Challenge #84

2011-06-01T23:42:00.005-04:00

Sweet Ruby came up with a really pretty color story this week for the Play Date Cafe Challenge! I pulled out some Hero Arts goodness to play with it...

I used my favorite CG134 Large Flower (aka the big ass flower, heh!) and colored it in with Copics. I couldn't resist adding Stickles and beads!

Here's Ruby's color story. So pretty!

This week's fabby sponsor at the Cafe is Mark's Finest Papers!

Be sure and stop by the Play Date Cafe site for all the contest details, and to see what my wonderful teammates came up with! They are so mega-talented, I love them to pieces!

Thanks for stopping by today!

Stamps: CG134 Large Flower, CG286 Three Leaves, CL489 Yummy Treats from Hero Arts
Paper: SU gray, GP white, My Mind's Eye DP
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Copic markers
Accessories: Star Dust Stickles, pink beads, machine stitching

What's Cookin' Wednesday - Banana Muffins!

2011-06-01T12:12:00.005-04:00

Remember when I used to post recipes on Wednesdays? Thought it was about time I post another one! But first, a card...

I thought this Wee Henry Cuppie digi image from Hambo Stamps was perfect, because the recipe I'm about to post is one that Carter and I whipped up together yesterday afternoon! It's so much fun cooking with my kids, they get so excited about the simplest things. Like "I get to dump the flour into the bowl?? WOOHOO!!". Wouldn't it be nice to still find such joy in the little things?

Speaking of joyful things - today the new Hambo Stamps design team, aka the Bacon Bits, are being introduced on Monica's blog. AND, they have their debut on the Hambo Hoedown, sharing some *adorable* new digi images. Make sure & check it out! My card today's fits this week's Hoedown challenge too - I used a button!

And now on to the recipe - this is one I doctored to make a bit more healthy. Next time I make them I'm going to try subbing the refined sugar with honey - do you ever bake with honey? Do you have any other suggestions to up the health-factor in these muffins? The kids love them as-is, and they are the pickiest eaters on the planet so I have to be a little careful. But maybe I'll add some sort of veggie puree next time too. Maybe sweet potato! :-)

BANANA MUFFINS
---------------------
1 c wheat flour
1 Tbsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/8 tsp salt
3 very ripe bananas, mashed
1/4 c sugar
1 large egg
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1/4 c unsweetened applesauce
1/2 tsp cinnamon
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease muffin pan.

In medium bowl combine flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. In separate bowl combine banana, sugar, egg, vanilla, applesauce and cinnamon. Mix well. Slowly add dry mixture to banana mixture. Mix well.

Scoop batter into prepared muffin pan. Bake 15-20 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool.

Makes 12 muffins.

I plugged this recipe into My Fitness Pal, and it says each muffin has 84 calories, 1g fat, 19g carbs and 2g protein.

Happy stamping, AND baking! :-)

Farmers Market Fun

2011-05-28T16:31:00.006-04:00

Wow I've completely fallen off the wagon when it comes to sharing family photos! Not that most of you stampy friends miss them much, but I'm sure my family isn't thrilled with my performance! Oops! I'll try to get back on the Project 365-ish schedule this weekend, but today I thought I'd share what we did today to "kick off" our Memorial Day weekend - a trip to the farmers market!

I asked Courtney this morning if she wanted braids in her hair. I meant two braids. She said "Yes, five braids! If Rapunzel saw me with five braids, she'd say 'Courtney that's so cool!'" So, alas, my sweet girl was sportin' the Bo Derek look at the market...

We were only a few stalls into the market when we came upon a sweet little petting zoo! The kids loooooved it. They got to pet ducklings...

And sweet little bunnies...

Courtney wasn't quite sure what to make of this painted dragon.

Ok, he was a nice lizard afterall.

Here Courtney has a turtle, and Carter has a CHINCHILLA! Very cool.

Once the petting was done, Mommy got to have her veggie fix. Oh how I love farmers markets! I can't help it, I have to show you a few gratuitous vegetable photos...

Carrots, "Yellow Taxi" tomatoes, and beets. Just lovely. I ended up buying lettuce, cucumbers and a couple of those yellow tomatoes to make a salad for dinner tonight. Plus two stalks of gorgeous green garlic - I'll be making a tasty stir fry tomorrow!

After the market, we went to the mall for a fun Lego store visit, then had a picnic with some cheese we bought at the market, among other things. Then Daddy and Carter kicked the soccer ball around a bit before heading home. A good start to the weekend!

Thanks for stopping by!

The Play Date Cafe Challenge #83

2011-05-26T00:00:00.001-04:00

Hello and welcome to another Play Date Cafe Challenge! This week we are bidding farewell to our friend and teammate Sarah Anderson - it's a sad day for us, but also a celebration full of joy as Sarah has such exciting things happening! I made this card for sweet Sarah:

Our sponsor this week is Stepping Stones Design, and I chose to work with their set Funny Coffee Vol. #1. It's full of hilarious messages, but I chose this one to say THANK YOU to Sarah for all she's done for this challenge. She helped to get the challenge up and running with Julie all those many moons ago. Sarah has created many beautiful color stories for us to work with over the months, but her own favorite are the color splash weeks, so we are using one of those this week during our tribute to Sarah:

Isn't this fabulous? I *love* the image that Julie put together. Remember that for a color splash, your card should be black and white with just a "splash" of a certain color - this week, green.

One of the many things I love about Sarah is that her art really looks like ART - not just boring cards like I make. So many of her creations have amazing texture, it makes me wish I could reach out and touch them! Here's an example from her blog:

So fabby. I'll miss seeing them every week in the PDCC posts, but I'll just have to frequent her blog for my Sarah-fix. :-)

The rest of my teammates are doing tribute posts for Sarah today too, so be sure and visit them. We're doing it up blog-hop style! Hop on over to Colleen's blog from here! And leave a comment on every blog for a chance at another prize from the PDCC menu...

**Andrea
**Libby <-- you are here
**Colleen
**Jaclyn
**Michele
**Jinny
**Savannah
**Tracey
**Fiona
**Ruby
**Julie Ranae

And of course visit Sarah's wonderful blog, she played along with the color splash as well!

Thanks for stopping by today, and I hope to see you playing along with this week's colors splash! Visit the Play Date Cafe Challenge blog for all the details!

Follow the Recipe #12!

2011-05-22T00:59:00.006-04:00

Hello! Guess what, I stamped again! Yay! :-) And this time I played along with the Top Chef Quickfire for the Follow the Recipe #12 challenge! I also got to ink up my *gorgeous* Guiding Light set from WPlus9 - love!

Did I mention I loooove this set? So many gorgeous stamps to work with! I want to give a HUGE thanks to WPlus9 for this set, it's truly beautiful. Some of my caramel stamping didn't really photograph well, so here's another angle...

The inspiration card for FTR#12 is a real beauty from Grace Nywening.

I focused on several elements from her recipe, including:

Colors – brown, blue
Stamps and Stickers – nautical, light house, sentiment
Color Mediums – stamp ink
Embellishments – twine/hemp rope
Tools – die cuts (tags)
Techniques – make a scene
Theme – masculine, Father's Day

The FTR challenge is so much fun - and so easy to play along! I hope you'll join us this week!

For the design of the card, I also played along with Tiff's Sketchy Sunday! I really love her tag inspiration.

Thanks for stopping by today!

Stamps: Guiding Light from WPlus9, message from Flourishes
Paper: Hero Arts kraft, My Mind's Eye Stella Rose DP
Ink: Stampin' Up Craft inks (Creamy Caremel, Taken with Teal, So Saffron), Vintage Photo Distress ink, Memento Tuxedo Black, white gel pen
Accessories: Twine, staples, machine stitching

Hamming It Up at the Movies! - a blog hop

2011-05-20T08:00:00.001-04:00

Hello and welcome to Hambo Stamps' first ever customer blog hop!! Woohoo!! Today Hambo customers and the Bacon Bits Design Team are bringing you fun creations inspired by the movies! If you arrived here from Paula's sweet blog, you are in the right place! If not, you might want to start back at the beginning at the Hambo blog to make sure you are eligible for the hopper prize! A prize will be awarded randomly to a hopper who comments on all the blogs along the way. The winner will be announced on the Hoedown blog, as well as on the Hambo company blog, Talk to the Ham, on Wednesday, May 25.

For my movie creations, I decided to create a little tribute to my favorite decade, the 80's! I'm a total child of the 80's - I'd show you what I looked like back then with my two-toned hair and gummy bracelets galore, but oh darn, my photos are all packed away in anticipation of our move... ;-) I've mentioned before my love for 80's music - well there are plenty of great 80's movies too! Let's get to it, shall we?

This whole idea started when I saw the new Amish digi. As soon as I saw Monica (or Tim?) post it on Facebook, I had to have it, it's just too cute & funny. I wanted to use it immediately. Then it occurred to me - hellloooooo, Witness! Ahhh, classic Harrison Ford. *swoon*

Then I started thinking about other movies I loved in my youth. One of my all time favorites was Pretty in Pink. The girl from this Dress Up stamp is rather pretty in pink, wouldn't you say? And I thought this sentiment was perfect, because in the end Andie's sweet adorable friend Duckie did indeed make it better. (Favorite line: "This is an incredibly romantic moment, and you're ruining it for me!")

Next up, one of my all-time favorites. Are you ready for it? The Lost Boys!! (I know I've shocked you in the past with my confessions about loving vampires, long before they were sparkly...) I had to mask off the pumpkin in Vampire Pig's hands to make this card non-Halloweeny. And I created my own sentiment using a line from the movie. And if you're wondering, the answer is NO, I have absolutely no idea who I'd ever actually send this card to with that sentiment. LOL!! Just being silly...

And finally - Weird Science. It's impossible to own the Mad Scientist digi and not make a Weird Science card for this hop. In my book anyway.

I haven't been stamping much lately so I'm super duper rusty - I needed to lean on a sketch challenge to get my creative juices flowing. All of these cards were inspired by this week's Mojo Monday sketch, turned on it's side.

Ok I've kept you here for FAR too long. Now I'd like to send you on your way, over to Heather's fabulous blog!!

Happy Hopping!!

The Play Date Cafe Challenge #82

2011-05-18T23:22:00.005-04:00

I really love this week's Play Date Cafe colors. Really really. Here's what I did with them:

And here are the fabby colors in Ruby's color story:

The trunks in the image are very old-timey, and made me think to pull out my Hero Arts typewriter set My Type. For a little added fun I popped up the paper in the typewriter, and used a notebook paper-edge punch and crinkled it up a bit.

This week's sponsor at the Cafe is Discount Cardstock!

And the fabby guest designer is none other than Laura Davis - wowza! Be sure to head over to the Play Date Cafe site to check out what she made, as well as my PDCC teammates - and check out this week's fabby prize!

Happy Stamping!

A Game + A Hop!

2011-05-18T08:40:00.004-04:00

Hi there! No card from me today - I've been up to my eyeballs still in house stuff, but hopefully it will calm down very soon, I'll be back to regular stamping and you'll have stuck with me...!! I'm so ready to be settled, but we still have a little ways to go.

In the meantime I wanted to give you a head's up about a couple FUN Hambo happenings! Today at the Hambo Hoedown blog there is a little guessing game going on!! The fabby samples from the Bacon Bits are just numbered - think you can figure out who made what? :-)

The prize is a card from each of the Bacon Bits! I didn't make a card for the game, but I will be sending out a card to the winner. Fun!!

And... on Friday is the Hambo Customer Blog Hop!! It's going to be funnnnnnnnnn!!! I hope to see you then - I *will* have a card posted on Friday!!

Oh and tomorrow I'll be here too with my Play Date Cafe Challenge card. Woot!

Thanks for stopping by! And for putting up with me! :-)

The Play Date Cafe Challenge #81

2011-05-11T22:10:00.000-04:00

This week's Play Date Cafe Challenge is sponsored by a company I loooooove - Stampotique!! YAY!! Just look at this adorable little guy...

I love how unique their stamps are, their site is just FULL of fun stuff. I want it all. I need to win the lottery. :-)

The colors this week are awesome. Look at my blog banner - now look at the colors - yep, of course I love purple and green!!

I had to make a sparkly green heart just because I love sparkly green hearts!

Be sure and hop on over to the Play Date Cafe blog - there's info there about the PRIZE from Stampotique (I wish I could win it!!!) and our fabby guest designer R. Maria Sabina! And of course the gorgeous samples from the rest of my wonderful teammates.

Happy Stamping,

Play Date Cafe Challenge #80

2011-05-04T23:40:00.004-04:00

It's time for another Play Date Cafe Challenge! This time I saw orange in the inspiration photo, so I pulled out my adorable Hero Arts fox!

Isn't he sassy? Love him! The cute little message is from Lawn Fawn. Not sure who I will send this to... hmm, maybe one of my foxy stamping friends? :-)

They colors of the card were inspired by this week's Play Date Cafe color story:

Of course I nearly made a flowery card - it was hard not to since the flowers in this photo are so pretty! I may have to make another card this week - we shall see if that happens...!

This week's sponsor at the PDCC is none other than Paper Smooches!!! Love this new stamp company, the images are ADoRABLE! Which of course is no surprise since they are designed by the mega-talented Kim Hughes, former Go-to Gal for PaperCrafts Magazine and creative genius. AND, our guest designer at the PDCC this week, woohoo!!

So head over to the Play Date Cafe blog for all the details - to see what my teammates came up with - and to hear about the fabby PRIZE this week! I hope you'll join us!

Have a Magical Day!

2011-04-29T16:48:00.008-04:00

I have a little girl. My little girl loves princesses. One day her big brother tried to tell her that princesses are just pretend. No, no, no big brother, I said. There are REAL princesses! And that is how I got my kids interested in watching the Royal Wedding, LOL! But more on that in a minute, first I have to show you a little fairy princess card I made:

I created the little castle by cutting strips of patterned paper and simply gluing them to a scrap of white cardstock in a castle-y shape. The little fairy princess is from the Hero Arts Magical Castle set, isn't she sweet?

I decorated the castle with some little punched out squares, and used my MFT Banner Day die to make the tower tops. Of course I had to bling those up a bit, too!

Once I had all the pieces in place on the white cardstock, I cut around the whole thing. Then I traced it onto another bit of cardstock, cut out and scored the top before gluing it on as a card back.

Just a fun little card on this magical princess day. :-) And speaking of that... yup, we surely watched the wedding this morning! My kids woke up just before The Kiss(es). They plopped down together and waited for the prince and princess (I prefer to call them that, Duke & Duchess just isn't as much fun!) came out on the balcony. Note the Cinderella dress on my little princess. Yup, she slept in it!

After The Kiss, we sat down for some scones and then colored this fun little princess kiss coloring page. :-)

I can't help it, I'm totally smitten with this happy couple. They are just magical!

Have a nice weekend!

The Play Date Cafe Challenge #79

2011-04-27T23:42:00.008-04:00

I'm so excited about this week's Play Date Cafe Challenge - my favorite company, Hero Arts, is our sponsor!! YAY!! So of course I used some Hero goodness on my card:

I thought the pattern on Big Cup sort of resembled the design on our inspiration piece:

The entire cup is coated with Glossy Accents for added shine & dimension IRL. Love that stuff!

We also have a wonderful guest designer this week - the sweet and fabulous Kelly Rasmussen from the Hero Arts design team! YAY! I love everything she creates, so I can't wait to see how she used this week's colors!

I also can't wait to see what my fellow PDCC teammates came up with using their Hero Arts stamps!

Julie Ranae * Sarah Anderson * Savannah O'Gwynn * Ruby 2 Shoes * Andrew Ewen * Fiona Shultz * Jaclyn Miller * Jinny Newlin * Michele Gross * Tracey Kuzniak * Colleen Dietrich

There's a great prize up for grabs for this week's winner - a $25 Hero Arts shopping spree! Fun!

I cannot wait to see what YOU will create! Check out the challenge at the Play Date Cafe site!

I made this card during a fun afternoon of stamping with friends at Archivers! Lucky me, I got to hang out with Lydia, Dana and Kim. Loved every minute of it!

Me and my Lydia:

My fabulous new friend Kim and sweet, hilarious Dana:

Me sewing away on today's card! (YES, I brought my sewing machine to Archivers! Of course!)

Lydia working her magic!

Thanks Dana for sharing your photos! And thanks friends for a fun stampy day!

Happy Stamping!

Catered Crop Follow the Recipe #10!

2011-04-25T12:35:00.005-04:00

Hi everyone! Today I'm sharing a card that highlights one of my very favorite things about spring - purple martins coming home to their house in my backyard! They come back year after year, and I just love them!

I love this Tall Birdhouse stamp from Hero Arts, too! And the buttons - I had been wanting the new Maya Road alterable wood buttons and finally scored some at Archiver's, yay! I colored the wood with my Copics, love how it looks.

I've been a rotten cardmaker & blogger lately, too much going on at home! I made this card for this week's Follow the Recipe challenge but failed to blog it before Linda's Top Chef Quickfire post yesterday! Oops!! Make sure and check out the post - my teammates created some GORGEOUS cards!!
And it's not too late at all for YOU to play along! All you have to do is check out the inspiration card and follow one or more elements from her recipe! Easy peasy! This week Bugaboo Stamps is the sponsor, and they are offering up seven free digital images!

As for me, here's how I was inspired:

Pattern Paper – stripes, miniprints
Colors – pastels
Color Mediums – Copic markers
Embellishments – twine, buttons
Theme – Spring

I hope to see you playing along with us this week!

Project 365-ish: Week 16

2011-04-25T00:04:00.009-04:00

Happy Easter if you celebrate Easter! We've had another fun week, with a few things going on - but I'm going to focus on our weekend with this post. We decided to take a little weekend trip to the Gulf - to say goodbye before we leave Texas. We spent the weekend in Corpus Christi, enjoying the ocean, the sea birds, the fish & chips...

We made the ~3.5hr drive over to Corpus after the kids got out of preschool on Friday. We didn't have time to do a whole lot once we got there that night, but we did go out for dinner - even at the restaurant, Courtney was ready to swim!

Next door to the restaurant we spied a comic book store - right away Carter noticed the neon signs and wondered what it was!

Carter couldn't believe there was so much superhero stuff all in one place!

After dinner we settled into the hotel, where the kids shared the sofa bed. They goofed around for quite a while, but in the end they settled down & slept - yay!

We began Saturday with a view of the USS Lexington, which is now a museum. We didn't visit but Carter thought it was pretty cool!

We did visit the aquarium, though!

At the aquarium, the kids enjoyed a dolphin show...

Touching stingrays...

And getting up close & personal with a sea turtle!

The aquarium was fun, but even better was the beach!!

Thankfully we avoided sharks. Mostly...

And before leaving, we hit the beach again in the early morning hours, this time combing the beach for shells...

Hurray for a fun weekend by the sea!

The Play Date Cafe Challenge #78

2011-04-20T23:48:00.004-04:00

This week's Play Date Cafe colors are really fun - so I had to make a fun little card to go with them.

I was stamping with my friend Lydia when I made this card - she suggested I paper-piece the cloud paper into the car windows. Because she's a genius. Love it! I also added a little gloss to the tires.

Aren't these colors fun & fabby??

I wonder what my awesome PDCC friends made this week! Let's go find out, shall we?

Julie Ranae * Sarah Anderson * Savannah O'Gwynn * Ruby 2 Shoes * Andrew Ewen * Fiona Shultz * Jaclyn Miller * Jinny Newlin * Michele Gross * Tracey Kuzniak * Colleen Dietrich

We also have a wonderful guest this week, Hannah Craner! Oh my word do I love her blog Sherbet Blossom, it's so beautiful.

The sponsor this time around is Market Street Stamps. They are offering a free stamp set to this week's winner. Nice!

I hope you get a chance to play this week, can't wait to see what you make!

Stamps: CL478 Going, CL272 All Occasion Messages from Hero Arts
Paper: Bazzill cardstock, cloud DP (Craft n Craftin'), polka dot DP (Bazzill? BoBunny?)
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black
Other: Ric-rac, Glossy Accents (Ranger)

i pine for you.

2011-04-20T15:07:00.005-04:00

Here's a simple little card.

I pine for you. Heee! I just love that. As soon as I saw that greeting, along with the pine tree, in the Critters in the Forest set from Lawn Fawn, I had to have it. Nevermind that the critters themselves are ADORABLE too. It was this greeting that put me over the edge. So cute!

Tomorrow is Play Date Cafe day, see you then!

Project 365-ish: Weeks 14 & 15

2011-04-17T10:00:00.000-04:00

Today's family update post is lonnnnggggg. I didn't get a chance to do one last week, so this one includes two weeks of photos. I apologize to those of you on dial-up. ;-) Here we go...

First and foremost - our house is FINALLY officially for sale!

Now that we are DONE getting ready, there is more time for fun things! Plus, I am trying to keep the kids out of the house as much as possible, to reduce the amount of cleaning required for each showing. :-)

A favorite place to spend our time is the community pool. It's nice that we can go to the pool in April - but it's still a bit chilly when we get out!

This isn't Courtney heading to the pool - this is Courtney heading home from Target! We decided we needed some goggles, arm floaties and kickboards, and Courtney was so excited she had to put them on in the car!

We've spent time at the library, where we had a bit of a milestone - Carter is now checking out chapter books, and we're reading one or two chapters each night. My baby is growing up!

(And yes, he's totally stylin' in his orange socks and soccer sandals!) :-)

Carter and I like to watch Dancing with the Stars together. Can't you tell he loves it from his enthusiastic face?

One issue with letting your five year old watch DWTS with you - "Mommy what does sexy mean?"

Courtney is such a big helper at the grocery store! She wanted to push the big cart, even though she could barely reach it.

Carter and I got to have a morning together, just the two of us! We went to the garden center and bought a couple veggies to plant...

Looked at some books at Barnes & Noble...

And had lunch at Kerbey Lane, where Carter ate nearly ALL of these pancakes!! Wow.

Visiting Petsmart can be dangerous... we came close to adopting this sweet kitty! Wonder what Daddy would have thought of that...

We had a fun time last week visiting a new-to-us bouncy place!

One relatively mess-free thing to do at home is coloring - here they were making cards! Sigh. My babies, making mama proud!

One afternoon I found Courtney reading books in her room. Sitting in the bin that normally holds her dress-up clothes. Silly girl!

And finally - more warming up after a dip in the pool. :-)

Until next time,

The Play Date Cafe Challenge #77

2011-04-14T00:00:00.002-04:00

I'm so happy to be playing along with The Play Date Cafe this week, I've missed it sooooo much the past two times when I've been up to my eyeballs in house selling madness. And I'm back just in time because this week the sponsor is The Greeting Farm, yay!! Check out this ADORABLE "Cheeky Shooter" - just perfect for this Texas girl to end up with, wouldn't ya say?

I just love her. I combined her with a Deadbeat Designs greeting. I've had that fringe in my ribbon stash for ages, just waiting for the perfect image to use it with. Today was the day!! :-) I also made a rolled ribbon flower. I have a die to do that, but I was too lazy to pull out my Big Shot so I just cut it by hand. Guess what - it worked just fine.

These are the fabby PDCC colors I was using as inspiration - LOVE the green and kraft!

This week we are completely honored to have the amazing, talented and all-around wonderful Jessica Diedrich guest designing with us. I love her to pieces!! And speaking of loving people to pieces - be sure to check out what my fabulous PDCC sisters created this week!

Julie Ranae * Savannah O'Gwynn * Ruby 2 Shoes * Andrew Ewen * Fiona Shultz * Jaclyn Miller * Jinny Newlin * Michele Gross * Tracey Kuzniak * Colleen Dietrich

This week's prize is a $25 gift certificate to The Greeting Farm. I know you won't want to miss that!! Head on over to The Play Date Cafe Challenge site and get your crafty on! :-)

Happy Stamping,

Stamps: Cheeky Stamper from The Greeting Farm, Deadbeat Designs greeting
Paper: BoBunny (green DP), Jillibean Soup (rope DP), SU brown, GP white
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Copic markers
Accessories: fringe ribbon, green felt, Bazzill gingham ribbon, American Crafts twine, Tim Holtz memo pin

DeNami Design Blog Hop - really this time!

2011-04-10T22:08:00.005-04:00

It's time for another DeNami Design blog hop and this month they've gone monochromatic - what fun!! If you've been hopping along, you should have found me by way of the incredibly talented Andrea Ewen. Otherwise, head on back to the DeNami Design blog and start from the beginning!

I chose to play with blues for my card...

I inked up one of my favorite DeNami stamps, Scrapbook Girls, and embossed these lovely crafty chicks in white. I gave their blouses a little sparkle with a Stardust gel pen, which is of course hard to photograph...!

I never - or at least, very rarely - put my main image on a colored sheet of cardstock, so this was fun to try!

Now hop on over and check out what Amy Smidebush created, it's gorgeous! And if you're feeling inspired to make your own monochromatic card now, link it up on the DeNami blog - they are giving away a spot in the next hop plus few stamps to a lucky stamper who plays along!!

And thanks for stopping by. If you came by earlier, my sincere apologies. Today has been a comedy of errors as far as getting a card posted. Guess it had been too long, I forgot how! HA! (actually, in all my house purging and packing, I *completely* misplaced the USB cable to get my photos from camera to computer - doh! Then when I finally found it, I realized that since I just got my hard drive replaced on my laptop, I no longer have photoshop, so I messed around searching for my photoshop disks and finally threw in the towel and downloaded Gimp. Good times!)

As I was saying - thanks for stopping by. :-)

Stamps: TR25 Let's Get Together, N117 Scrapbook Girls from DeNami Design
Paper: SU Bashful Blue, The Paper Studio polka dot DP, Bazzill edge strip
Ink: Versamark, Sakura glitter pen, Tumbled Glass Distress Ink (message)
Accessories: Spellbinders die, DeNami Design ribbon, white embossing powder, machine stitching

DeNami Design Monochromatic Blog Hop!!

2011-04-10T09:54:00.003-04:00

Today is DeNami Design's monthly blog hop and this time around it's MONOCHROMATIC!! What fun!

I am having some technical difficulties with my post - huge apologies to all - I will be back SOON with my card, I hope - but in the mean time, please hop on over to Amy's blog and see the beauty she's created!!

WINNER WINNER PIGGIE DINNER!!!

2011-04-07T13:58:00.006-04:00

Gah, I cannot believe I *completely* forgot about picking my winner from the Hambo blog hop!! Huge apologies to all of you who've been hanging on the edge of your seats, wondering if you won. Because I just *know* my blog is that important in your lives... hahahaha!

So without further ado (or silliness)... the winner is... #4!! Ayana, come on down! You are the lucky winner of a hilarious Hambo sentiment!! Woohoo!! Please send me your address and I'll get it right out to you!

And truly sorry about my forgetfulness - I have been SO SWAMPED!! This is why:

Yup, our house is officially for sale now! It went on the market late yesterday afternoon, and we had our first prospective buyers come by this morning. Please keep your fingers crossed for us, I really hope this doesn't drag on for ages. Keeping a house tidy for showing with two preschoolers in the house is NO FUN AT ALL!! My master plan is to keep them out of the house as much as possible, but guess what? Carter woke up this morning with crud gluing his eyes shut, so we went to the doctor and sure enough - pink eye! And as an added bonus, an unexpected positive test for strep throat. Never a dull moment around here! Now I'm just hoping like mad that the rest of the family (including ME!) doesn't catch any of this.

So anyway... someday I'll be back to stamping and blogging... someday.....!!! Hope you bear with me once again. Sigh.

Project 365-ish: Week 13

2011-04-03T09:00:00.000-04:00

Last week was another busy busy busy week for us!! I had a little medical drama including a visit to the MRI - but I'm happy to report all is completely fine. Our house is mostly decluttered, and will be officially for sale by the next update. EEK! Mixed emotions on that, let me tell ya! But despite all the craziness, I did manage to snap a few photos of the kids throughout the week...

Monday afternoon was Sportball. Carter had fun at his baseball skills class - he's happy to have one of his good buddies from preschool playing baseball with him, too!

Courtney was so excited to start her first Sportball class - she's doing the multisport. Will my little ballerina prefer sports to dancing? Stay tuned...

Mid-week my sweetpea posed for a photo with her mama...

My boy was not so cooperative with the photos...

Saturday was Carter's soccer game - here's the team doing their huddle... gooooo North Mexico!

And our own #52 in action...

And here's #52's little sister in action - throwing a fabulous tantrum on the sidelines.

Her mood improved tremendously with post-game snowcones...

We spent the rest of the weekend doing house work. Courtney loved sweeping the driveway.

Such a sweet little helper!

Until next time,

Go Ahead, Laugh At Us! blog hop

2011-04-01T08:00:00.001-04:00

Hi there!! Welcome to the "Go Ahead, Laught At Us!" Hambo Stamps blog hop!! If you know Hambo Stamps, you know they like funny - so it's only fitting they choose April Fools Day for the Bacon Bits to gather together for our very first blog hop!! If you've been hopping along, you should have found me by way of my friend Joy's blog. Otherwise, make sure at head back to the Hambo blog, Talk to the Ham, so you don't miss out on any of the fun!

A little surprise is hiding on one of the blogs today, so be sure to leave some comment love as you “hoof it” around the hop. One lucky commenter on the mystery hop spot will be in hog heaven and win a $15 gift certificate to Hambo Stamps!

And now onto my card - we're here to make you LAUGH OUT LOUD during this hop, so I chose one of my very favorite Hambo Fractured Funnies. Which, let me tell you, was no easy task since I love them all!!

Awwww. Isn't that sweet? And now the inside of the card... wait for it...

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!! Yup. Totally awesome. This Fractured Funny is called Favorite Child and it makes me giggle big time. I paired it with their adorable Flower Pot Girl, which I've always claimed is actually ME - even though there's absolutely no truth to that statement. But I see the resemblance... even if nobody else does... hee hee! Oh and that fabby ribbon that I used - it's also available on the Hambo site. Yup, Hambo sells ribbon too!! Lots of yummy, wonderful May Arts ribbon. The one I used is 3/8" Sheer Pinstripe in Dark Red. Love it so much!

And now some GOOD NEWS - I am giving away this Favorite Child set to one lucky commenter right here on my blog!! They are red rubber, mounted on cling cushion. You will love it. :-) So leave me some comment love!! And guess what - hop through to all the blogs because not only do you get a chance for the $15 Hambo prize, you can also win something fabby on each and every blog!! And we're a small team so just do it - it won't take you very long. :-)

The wonderful and talented Judy is your next stop on the piggie tour, so oink on over to her blog. But before you do, I just have to show you some piggie cuteness... :-)

I sorta want a piglet now. Just sayin'.

We love comments anytime, but the deadline for prize entries is Tuesday, April 5.

Thanks for stopping by!

Stamps: Favorite Child - 0804 and Flower Pot Girl - 2715 from Hambo Stamps
Paper: SU cardstock, Memory Box DP
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Copic markers
Accessories: Hambo Item #WS14 May Arts 3/8" Sheer Pinstripe Ribbon - Dark Red, Spellbinders die, machine stitching

The Play Date Cafe Challenge #75

2011-03-31T09:57:00.004-04:00

I'm sitting out this week - well ok, I'm barely sitting at all! I'm deep in the middle of house cleaning & purging & packing - we plan to have our house for sale by this time next week! Between all of that, plus a bit of medical yuckiness, I just didn't have time to play along this week. BUT, my wonderful PDCC sisters sure did - check out The Play Date Cafe post - and all of the individual blogs too...

Julie Ranae * Sarah Anderson * Savannah O'Gwynn * Ruby 2 Shoes * Andrew Ewen * Fiona Shultz * Jaclyn Miller * Jinny Newlin * Michele Gross * Tracey Kuzniak * Colleen Dietrich

The latest color story is lots of fun...

And the sponsor is FABULOUS!!!

Have you ever checked out Wplus9 Design Studio?? I wasn't familiar with them until I started hearing my PDCC teammate Jinny rave about them, so I went in for a look - LOVE their stamps!!! And for this week's prize they are letting the winner choose whichever set they'd like! NICE!!! They generously sent me this gorgeous set to play with:

I feel bad that I don't have a card made with it today, but I'll be back with a Wplus9 creation just as soon as I can, I assure you!

The owner of Wplus9, Dawn Woleslagle, is this week's guest designer! Check out her gorgeous creation at the Wplus9 Design Blog.

Thanks for stopping by today!

Project 365-ish: Week 12

2011-03-27T23:05:00.006-04:00

I don't have a whole lot to say about this past week. Let's see... Carter started his first baseball skills class in the neighborhood.

My sister Laura and I went to see Rick Springfield live at the rodeo. We had never watched a concert in a venue quite like this before (we had to watch calf ropin', barrel racin' and bull ridin' before the show!), but it was really cool. He was my first preteen rockstar crush back in the day...

Carter also had his first soccer game with his new team, North Mexico. Colors are green and red. Go Carter!

And that's all I took photos of (and none very good!) because I was up to my eyeballs this week with this...!

We are about a week away from getting our house on the market. Next Saturday is the garage sale when hopefully a bunch of this will be sold, and what isn't will end up at Goodwill. Believe it or not, this horrible garage is actually in a state of organized chaos... there is a method to my madness... :-)

I may not be around on the blog much the next couple weeks, so I'll see ya when I see ya!

Totally overwhelmed in Austin,

Guest Designing with the EIC #132!

2011-03-26T03:00:00.003-04:00

I'm sad to say that this is my final post as March guest designer for the Etsy Inspired Challenge! *sniff* I've had such a fun time playing along. I want to thank my sweet friend Ashley for inviting me, De for helping me figure out what's what and the rest of the team for making me feel welcome. You ladies ROCK and this challenge is so much fun!! So without further ado, let's get on to today's card...

The shop this week, Fresh Metal Jewelry, is really gorgeous - beautiful jewelry, most with fabulous fabric flowers. I chose this piece for inspiration:

I loved the pink and brown combo. I was going to use a more chocolaty-brown on my card, but the ink I had was lighter. I still like the combination, though! I pulled out one of my favorite Hero Arts backgrounds - Antique Flower - and also more of the rose ribbon that I adore. I had thought about making my own fabric flowers but I suppose I got lazy when I saw this yummy ribbon just sitting there on my shelf! I added a little light blue scallop border, which sort of mimics the stone the necklace is sitting on in the photo.

Now make sure and head on over to the Etsy Inspired Challenge blog and check out the full contest details - including the prize info!! And also visit the rest of the fabulous EIC team:

Ashley * Anji * Carole * De * Emily * Jackie * Joy * Kerry * Ruby * Savannah * Sherry * Virginia

Thanks for stopping by today!

Stamps: S5264 Antique Flower Background, CL497 Find Joy from Hero Arts
Paper: Hero Arts brown & blue, GP white
Ink: Hero Hues Latte chalk ink, Palette Noir
Accessories: CH214 Earth Mixed Accents, American Crafts Rose Ribbon - Blush, SU slit punch

The Play Date Cafe Challenge #74

2011-03-24T00:00:00.000-04:00

It's a fun week at the Play Date Cafe - I got to play with some Lizzie Anne Designs stamps for the first time, woohoo!! They are our fabulous sponsor this time around. I love these sweet butterflies:

I also loooooove this color story from Ruby!! Purple and turquoise?? Hello!!! Libby Heaven.

The cute little butterfly stamp is of four butterflies, so I just stamped it four times. I added yummy sparkle to all the blue butterflies. :-)

This week our guest designer is the sweet and talented Taylor Usry! Yay! I love her to pieces and I'm so happy to have her joining us!! After you check out her blog, make sure and see what my PDCC sisters were up to:

Julie Ranae * Sarah Anderson * Savannah O'Gwynn * Ruby 2 Shoes * Andrew Ewen * Fiona Shultz * Jaclyn Miller * Jinny Newlin * Michele Gross * Tracey Kuzniak * Colleen Dietrich

And play along with us over at The Cafe - you don't want to miss your chance at a prize from Lizzie Anne Designs valued at $39.95!! Wowza!

Thanks for stopping by today!

Stamps: Lizzie Anne Designs
Paper: Hero Arts Kraft, SU turquoise, GP white
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Copic markers
Accessories: Star Dust Stickles, The Twinery lilac twine, SU scallop edge punch

Blast from the Past Blog Hop!

2011-03-23T10:34:00.006-04:00

It's been a while since I've been able to play along with the Taylored Expressions blog hops! They are often on Thursdays, and I have other commitments on Thursdays. So when I saw this month's hop was happening on a Wednesday, I jumped on it! The theme is spring - what does spring mean to me? Well... here's my somewhat odd card for that theme...

Are you puzzled? :-) Well here's the deal - this spring, for me, is about getting healthy. I've been trying hard to eat well, drink more water (and less diet coke!), exercise... we're moving to Atlanta soon, and if I'm going to fit in with those real housewives out there (hahahahaha) I need to get my act together. Or more seriously - if I want to keep up with my kids, I need to make some changes. :-) AND... spring is also about veggies - the farmer's markets have some delicious veggies these days, which makes me very happy. And we've planted our own little veggie patch out in the garden! So I pulled out my Weigh to Go! set and got to work. The veggies are from the set, it's not patterned paper - if you look closely you can tell because I went out of the lines about a zillion times while coloring them!

My sweet friend Sankari provided an optional sketch for us hoppers, which of course I used!

Have fun hopping around, and thanks for stopping by today!

Stamps: Weigh to Go! from Taylored Expressions
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Copic markers
Paper: Hero Arts Kraft, GP white, SU Pink Pirouette, AMuse DP
Accessories: SU scallop circle punch, Mark Richards metals, gingham ribbon, machine stitching

Project 365-ish: Week 11

2011-03-20T10:00:00.000-04:00

We've had another fun week here in Texas! First of all, it was spring break for the kids from preschool. Daddy decided to take a couple days off from work, and we went on a little mini overnight adventure to San Antonio! There's lots more photos here if you'd like to check them out, but here's one of the highlights - a visit to a cave! Fun!

We went to a restaurant for dinner that was featured on Diners, Drive-ins & Dives on the Food Network. Joel had this bison burger and sweet potato fries - does it look Guy Fieri-worthy? :-)

We sat outside at the restaurant and the weather was wonderful - here's me and my sweet girl waiting for the food to arrive.

We also celebrated St. Patrick's Day this week with a fish & chip dinner, Guinness (for the adults!) and some shamrock-shaped cookies. As is the case for most holidays, I printed off some coloring pages for the kids... :-)

Courtney wore this funky green ensemble from Grandma, who's visiting from Arizona with Grandpa, too!

I've been pulling out a lot of the kids' baby things and putting them for sale on craigslist. I had Courtney's crib bedding laid out on the bed for a photo, and Courtney came in and decided she needed to snuggle in it one last time.

Courtney's becoming such a big girl, she decided she wanted to go for a spin on Carter's big boy bike. Guess we need to get her a big girl bike now!!

Daddy and the kids went on a picnic at the park with Grandma & Grandpa, while I stayed home and did more cleaning & purging & craigslisting. Carter found a good climbing tree at the park!

And finally, the most exciting thing this week happened just tonight - Carter lost his first tooth!!! Sigh, my baby is getting so big. There's more photos here, but this is his new toothless grin. :-)

Thanks for stopping by!

Guest Designing with Etsy Inspired #131

2011-03-19T03:00:00.000-04:00

Once again I'm thrilled to be guest designing with the Etsy Inspired Challenge! Today I played with some owls...

I couldn't resist busting out some Hero Arts owls when I saw this adorable bag in the DollBirdies shop on Etsy!

Isn't this fabric fun? The shop is full of bags made with adorable fabrics - so much card inspiration there!!

Now make sure and head on over to the Etsy Inspired Challenge blog and check out the full contest details - including the prize info!! And also visit the rest of the fabulous EIC team:

Ashley * Anji * Carole * De * Emily * Jackie * Joy * Kerry * Ruby * Savannah * Sherry * Virginia

Thanks for stopping by today!

Stamps: Hero Arts
Paper: white, black, light blue cardstock
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Versamark
Accessories: White embossing powder, Spellbinders die, Hero Arts heart pearls, SU scallop edge punch, Webster's Page Bloomers, machine stitching

The Play Date Cafe Challenge #73

2011-03-17T00:00:00.000-04:00

This week's Play Date Cafe challenge is sponsored by DeNami Design, so once again I'm playing with my adorable little elephant! Doesn't he look smashing in this week's colors?

I stamped him on three different polka dot papers, then cut them out and popped them up. The hearts were punched out, and the little cloud around the message was just cut freehand. I went just a bit bolder with my interpretation of the colors, they are a wee bit softer in Julie's color story:

I mentioned above that DeNami Design is our sponsor this week - they are offering up a $25 gift certificate - yay!!

The wonderful & talented Paulina Nakamura from DeNami Design is our guest designer! Make sure and check out her blog, Pretty Pink Posh! The DeNami Design team is also playing along this week over at the DeNami blog, so pay them a visit too!! And of course, check out what my PDCC sister came up with this week:

Julie Ranae * Sarah Anderson * Savannah O'Gwynn * Ruby 2 Shoes * Andrew Ewen * Fiona Shultz * Jaclyn Miller * Jinny Newlin * Michele Gross * Tracey Kuzniak * Colleen Dietrich

Thanks for stopping by today!

Stamps: G152 Elephant and E142 Stomping By from DeNami Design
Paper: PTI cardstock, PTI DP, Hero Arts Kraft, GP white
Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black
Accessories: SU heart punch, SU slit punch, Cuttlebug Swiss Dots, American Crafts caramel twine