Happy New Years Eve!

Hey stampers! 

Sorry again for not posting.  I've been sick.  The hubs got sick right before Christmas and decided to share.  How nice :(

So I've been laying low and trying to rest.  Those with children know how easy that is to do.  Luckily, none of the kids has gotten it.......yet.  Low fever on and off for 2 days. Sore throat. Sinus. Ear ache. 

I'm feeling better today and just wanted to let you know that I've been thinking of you and I miss you.  I'm still working on stamping stuff (December Daily and my grandma's book) but haven't sat at my desk in almost a week. 

I uploaded a bunch of pics from last week and wanted to show you some:

Christmas Classics set.  Real red, crumb cake and very vanilla cardstock.  Old olive, real red and going gray (retired) markers.  Newsprint DSP, Tombow Multi glue, silver glass glitter, brights prints DSP. 

This is a little box I made for my SIL.  We got her some lottery tickets (she loves to play) and I thought a cute box would be cuter than a cute card to put them in.   I didn't get the chance to take a pic of it until we were in the car on Christmas Eve to go to my inlaws.  No, I wasn't driving ;)

The box measures 3x5x11/2.  I wrapped the Old Olive print DSP around the box to make a belly band. 

I cut 2, 1 1/2" x 8" strips of the Newsprint DSP and scored them every 1/4".  Then folded and glued the ends together.  This accordian circle thing measured out 3 1/4" in diameter when finished. 

I put the Tombow glue along the edge and poured on the glass glitter.  This glitter is so cool because in a week or 2 it will tarnish.  Kinda nifty, eh?  I also used my silver glitter gel pen to sparkle up the bell.

After our lunch of grilled burgers (yummy!), we got Grandma and Aunt Renee to help make some ornaments.   I try to have some kind of ornament making day with the kiddos every year and this year we just ran out of time.  So I brought all the supplies with us to Grandma's house.  It turned out really nice because then we could send some home with Renee and leave some with Grandma. 

These are cinnamon applesauce ornaments.  Just mix equal parts cinnamon and applesauce.  The smell is awesome!  Let dry on a wire rack and hang around the house. 

My brother in law gave my husband a toy helicopter as one of his presents.  Seriously?  You would have thought he was 10, he was so excited to get outside and play with it.  Everyone had to take a turn.  Its very hard to steer (drive?) a helicopter.

Anybody know what the heck this is? It was on the neighbor's tree hanging over the fence.  The tree was loaded with them.  Of course we had to pick it and open it up.  I forgot to take a pic of the innards but it was hard and fairly solid and didn't really have any taste.  What is it? 

I thought the medallion thingy turned out so well on her box.  I decided I would make it into an ornament.  This is the back:

Just squint and maybe you can see it clearer.  I used my silver glitter gel pen to go around the outside of the pic. 

This is the official Christmas pic that was supposed to go on the, handmade with love, Christmas cards that never got made.  Its true........I never sent out cards this year.  I KNOW!  CAN YOU BELIVE IT?  Yeah well, thats what happens when you procrastinate and then get sick. 

So what are your plans for tonight?  We are staying home.  I'm going to enjoy my Christmas tree for one last night.  Its all getting put away tomorrow.

I just put a couple of chickens in the oven and the hubs just got home from work and I can tell he won't be up past 8:30.  He still doesn't feel very well.

We do have some sparkling apple cider to bring in the new year and the latest Shrek movie to watch.  WooHoo!  Living in the fast lane.

I have also been reflecting on this past year and have lots of things I would like to work on in the new year.  But I'll bore you with that stuff later. 

I do know that I'm so thankful for you, dear reader.  Who knew this blog would make new friendships and strengthen old ones.  I so enjoy sharing things with you and love it even more when you share things with me.  Thanks so much for coming by and letting me get to know you.

Blessings and Happy New Year!  b.

Only 3 more days 'till Christmas?

Holy Cow Batman! 

Sorry again for the absence.  I'm just so tired at night that I end up just going to bed.  Which is not good!  I've been working on a little book of pics for my grandmother and I keep putting it off.  Needless to say it won't be there for Christmas.  My dad's stuff either.  Why am I such a procrastinator?  Why, why, why...............

I'm not done getting gifts either.  I am notorious for wrapping 90% of my gifts on Christmas Eve.  This year I'm going to try and get everything done by tomorrow night.  My friend Leila has a tradition in her home that I'm finally going to put into effect at my house.  Its such a great idea, ready for it? 

She has 3 children, like me, and they are crazy for checking out the gifts under the tree, like mine.  So, she wraps everyones gifts in a different pattern of paper.  So Suzy gets all her gifts wrapped in penguins.  Judy gets hers wrapped in snowflakes.  Barney gets his wrapped in reindeer.  Heres the great part, she puts them under the tree with no names on anything.  Nobody knows which gift is whose except, her.  Then on Christmas morning she tells them which pattern they get to open.  So fun!  Well, I think it'll be fun.  We'll see.

I'm also not up to date on my Daily December.  I finally installed the new ink cartridge.  Thats a step in the right direction.  I have things written down.  I just need to spend some quality time with it.  It.Will.Happen. 

I do have days 6 and 7 to show you tonight. 


Day 6 

Classic Numbers (retired).  Confetti white and real red cardstock.  Real red ink.  3/4" and 1" circle punches, dimensionals, Brights Patterned DSP.

I love Nativity sets.  When I was little we had one that went under the tree and had a place to put a bulb where the star would go.  This set goes on top of the tv.  I got this set either right before or right after the boy was born.  He loved playing with it.

Its made out of wood and has the paint all chipped.  Frankly, I'm surprised we still have all the pieces ;)

Day 7

Same supplies

I love Charlie Brown.  I can relate to him.

I got the pic off the internet.  I love all the Charlie Brown specials.  Back in the "olden days" when I was little, it was a big deal for the whole family when they came on tv. 

I found a bunch of info on Wikipedia about the history behind the Christmas special.  It was kinda neat to read.  Go check it out. 


Alrighty then, I think I've made my egg nog a little strong and better go to bed before I start getting mushy and telling you all how much I love you and everything.  I mean, not that I don't love you, I mean, I do...............well you know what I mean......right? 

Thanks for stopping by and just in case I don't get back on here before Christmas, have a wonderful and blessed Christmas.  I love you guys.

Blessings, b.

busy busy busy

Howdy stampers!  Its been another couple of busy days around here.  BUT, tomorrow is the last day of school and hopefully I'll get to take a little breather. 

I got ink today for the December Daily, so I can catch up on that this weekend hopefully. 

I wanted to show you what I made for my Secret Santa for yesterday and today.

Christmas Classics set.  Old olive and riding hood red ink.  Riding hood red cardstock.  Dotted ribbon punch, Newsprint DSP, 5/8" brad, silver glass glitter, retired ribbon and Tombow Multi Glue.

I made her a candle.  Cute eh?  Let me show you what I did.

This is a 4 oz. jelly canning jar. 

I took a votive size candle.  This one happens to be a PartyLite candle, Yuzu flavor.  I think its retired.  I love it though.  Anyway, take out the wick.......

and place it in the jar.  Place that on a cookie sheet or a pie tin.  That way you can stick it in the oven and it will sit straight.  You probably could have put it in the microwave, but I'm a chicken and didn't want the wax to boil over or anything.  The oven was slower and I could monitor it better.

Looks just like a urine sample huh? 

Sorry.

I put the oven on 275 and checked on it every 5 minutes.  After about 20 minutes I turned it up to 300.  After it all melted (another 10 minutes or so) I decided that 1 candle didn't fill it up as much as I wanted it to.  So I stuck another one in there. 

This little nub is what is left of the second one. 

After it wasn't blazing hot anymore but still liquidy, I stuck the wick back in and let it completely cool.   I have to say, it seemed like most of the smell was gone.  Did I burn it off in the oven?  I don't know.

Of course I had to make the lid cute.  Doing so probably gave my identity away but I just couldn't give her an ugly candle, could I?  I knew you'd see it my way.

I was going to try to keep it simple but you can see that didn't work.  I used the Newsprint DSP for the base.  A strip of riding hood red punch with the dotted ribbon punch on the side, old olive and riding hood red markers and a big silver brad.  I used the Tombow Multi glue to glue the lid into the lid rim. 

I put a small line of the Tombow glue around the top edge and pressed it into the glass glitter.  So pretty! 

I put sticky strip around the outside and stuck on some retired Riding hood red taffeta ribbon.  After I tied a big bow I decided it would look pretty hanging on the tree.  Just put a pic on the backside or something.  Just an idea.....

Then I needed to package it up. 

I had a white lunch sack and some kraft crinkly paper. 

I used my scalloped edge punch to pretty it up and stapled my tag to it.  TA DAH!! 

I did pretty good considering I still didn't spend any money.  This would make an excellent hostess gift or small presents for under the tree.  I think I'm going to try that ornament idea with the lid.  I'll show you if it turns out nice. 

Okay, I still have today and tomorrows gifts to show you but I'm so pooped out.  I have one last pic to show you though:

We had a cookie exchange at work today and so last night I needed to make some cookies.  That got the boy so excited.........so I told him he had to help. 


Alrighty then.  I'm going to bed.  Thanks so much for stopping by. 

Blessings, b.

secret santa

Hey there!  I've been waiting patiently for some computer time.  Its finals week and the big kids are hogging it. 

Its also the last week of school before Christmas vacation.  This year my school is trying something new, Secret Santa.  I'm giving a little somethin' somethin' every day this week.  The problem is, I'm trying not to do anything too crafty.  She'll know its me right away.  Buts it hard not to. 

Money is also a factor.  So far I haven't spent anything.  Sometimes is good to be a hoarder ;)

Here is what I gave her on Monday.

I had some of these cute little pails from the Target dollar spot from several years ago.  Is it just me or does Target not have as many cute things in the dollar spot anymore?  I can't seem to get excited about much there. 

Anyway I punched some holes with my Cropadile and weaved some non SU! ribbon and tied a big bow,  filled it with some leftover Halloween candy and there ya go! 

I know it sounds icky that I used leftover candy but I had it in the freezer.  I tested it first.  It was yummy.

Here is what I gave today.  I actually didn't go to work today.  Grace was getting an award and had to give a speech.  So I took off to go see her. 

I got these a few years ago at Michaels in their dollar spot.  Again, I found this in my stash in the garage.  Quick and easy. 

The gift I'm giving her tomorrow was a little more labor intensive and I did stamp on it (I can't help it) but it still didn't cost me a dime.  Although I'm sure it'll give me away.  Oh well........

I'll show you it tomorrow though. 

As far as the December Daily?  I'm still doing it BUT, I ran out of color ink......again.  This happened to me last year too.  So I'm even more behind.  I'm getting ink tomorrow though. 

How are you doing on yours?  Show me what you got so far. 

Thanks for stopping by and keeping the blog warm.  You make me happy.

Blessings, b.

sorry...............

Hey everyone.  I'm so sorry I've been absent.  I've thought of you every day.  Its just that lately, there have been a million important things to take care of and changes that have happened, that my head just hadn't been in a crafty mode. 

But, things are getting back on track.    I have been working on my December Daily.  Have you been working on yours?  Mine is super simple this year.  I still need my cover page but here are pages 1-5:

Day 1

Christmas Classics, Typeset alpha (retired) and Classic Numbers (retired).  Confetti White, Daffodil Delight, crumb cake and real red cardstock.  Real red and White Stazon inks.  3/4" and 1" circle punches, small heart punch, Brights Patterned DSP, dimensionals, glitter gel pen and black journaler.

I decided to go with a 6" x 8" size.  I'm behind enough that I don't have a book to put them in.  I may end up making my own binding if I can't find one.  Nothing like putting the cart before the horse, eh? 

Anyhow, Ali Edwards has these great digital overlays.  She is such a genius!  I'm not computer savvy enough to know how to use them and I just don't feel like learning how right now.  So I just drew some lines with my black journaler. 

She is also famous for using large pics in all her scrapbooking.  So I'm going a little larger this year. 


Day 2

This page uses the retired Well Worn Alphabet.  Again, I used the glitter gel pen to add some shine to the ornament.  Not a very exciting page huh? 

This pic measures 5.5" x 4".  When I was thinking of what kind of layout I was going to use, I needed something that would work with 4x6, 5x7, and wallet sizes.  I don't have Photoshop or anything like that so I'm limited in what I can do.  That being said, I'm such a dork that I didn't buy the My Digital Studio that SU! sells when it was on sale Thanksgiving week for half price.  DUH!  Then I would have been able to make them any size I want.  Oh well..................

Day 3

For this page I got the idea of inserting pics into a Word document.  That way I could size them differently and print on the same piece of paper.  Worked fairly well.  I wish I had nicer writing...........

You can see I used the glitter gel pen again on the tree. 


Day 4

You knew I had to do something with the veggies, right?  Can you believe that when we got back from New Mexico that there were still some on there?  I've left the pepper plants alone.  They are doing fine and I'll see if they just hang on until next spring.  Then I've left one tomato, two zucchini and all the green bean plants alone.  They keep growing!  Of course it was 85 degrees today.  Ah........December in Southern California. 

I used another Word document here.  Why didn't I think of inserting pics into it before to make a little collage?  So easy!  But I've always said, I'm a little slow sometimes ;)

Day 5 

They are getting so fast at putting them together, I'll have to get another one when school gets out. 

Okay, thats all thats complete so far.  I have a few more pages 1/2 way done and a bunch of pics that need to be organized.  

I'm so far behind in all kinds of things.  And, I'm such a dummy that I keep adding things.  Cookie exchange?  Sign me up!  Secret Santa?  Sign me up!  Got teacher gifts?  Oh crap!  I'm taking Tuesday off from work so we'll see if I can catch up on stuff.  

Alrighty then, thank you so much for stopping by and checking things out.  Things should be getting back to normal.

Blessings, b.

Thanksgiving story

Helloooooooo,

How is everyone today?  I hope everyone had a fabulous Thanksgiving.  We were gone the whole week visiting my dad in New Mexico.  We just got back Sunday night and I've been working at work and working on getting things back in order around here. 

Tomorrow is December 1st.  Do you have your December Daily ready to go?  Yeah, me neither.  I've been gone.  I'm a loser.  I'm a procrastinator.  I'm behind. 

BUT, I'm still forging ahead and am going to start it tomorrow.  I'll just have to do a little catching up on getting things in the book.  I'll show you how its going. 

So I have no stamping goodness to share tonight.  But, I do have pics to share with you.  Not that you really care, just indulge me, okay? 

Here is my Thanksgiving:

We started here.  Okay, we actually started on the 15 North to the 40 East. 



Here is the butt of our cute little pop up trailer.  We had to take 2 cars.  My dad got his special wheelchair and needed a van to modify.  Our friend happened to be selling one for an awesome price and we drove it back there for him.  Very nice van.  Honda Odyssey.  I liked it alot.  So the boy and Grace and I drove the van.  Actually the boy only let me drive for 2 hours.  He hogged it the rest of the way.  Its about a 12 hour drive.

Even though my dad's house is very spread out, its only a 2 bedroom house.  The extra room has a twin bed in it.  So we had planned on sleeping in the trailer the whole time.  We knew it would be super cold but the trailer has a super duper heater in it.  We left it there and will pick it up in the summer when we visit again. 

Hello Arizona!  I know, I take pics of weird stuff.

Hogger!

We ended up staying in Flagstaff to break up the drive.  This is the next morning.  See that snow in the background?  I hate driving in snow.  Makes me reeeeeeal nervous.  I'm not sure how people in snowy states do it. 

Yep, I'm a wuss.

Doesn't this look like the landscape in the movie Cars?  Yep, I'm a dork too.

Hello New Mexico!

My hubs was in his element in my dad's shop.  My dad is an architect and loves to build things.  Here the hubs is building some new ramps for the wheelchair.

The boy did lots of wood chopping.  Getting Grampa set up for a few weeks.

Being goofy, working really hard............NOT! 

My dad has ALS, Lou Gehrig's disease.  You can read about his diagnoses here. 

This is my dad's favorite spot in the house.  I should have sat in the chair and taken a few pics showing his view.  Maybe next time.

For some reason my dad wanted  the dirt/weeds mowed.  He lives on 2 acres.  Its actually kinda pretty and green in the spring/summer.  It was really cold! 

Thankgiving dinner. Yummy food!

Here is Dad using the special wheelchair for the first time to get the paper.  As you can see the driveway is really long and he wasn't able to get down there at all anymore.  This chair has big ol' knobby tires on it.  It will certainly give him a little more freedom and independence. 

This is the brick walkway we laid last spring when we were there.  Makes it easier to manuever.  Those are the devil dogs.  They rescued 2 pit bulls 11 years ago.  One is nicer and gets used to us quickly.  The other is named Sadie.  I say that is short for Sadistic.  She warms up but it takes her a few days. 

This is a shot of the house from the gate by the road.  Looooong driveway. 

Little girl climbing trees. 

So there you have it.  My Thankgiving.  I was planning on doing a special scrapbook about this trip.  But really, I think it just deserves a 2 page spread.  There just isn't enough for a whole book.  

One story I will make sure to document is the night we ran out of propane for the heater.  Our heater works really well and we had been pretty toasty.  But it ran alot because it was cold.  So the night we have no propane, us smart girls made up beds in my dad's office, which has a heater.  The unsmart men, decided to stick it out and sleep in the trailer anyway.  With about a million blankets on their sleeping bags. 

That was the coldest night we were there.  The news said it would only be 8 degrees.  It was so cold!  But clear.  Not a cloud in the sky.  Anyway, they of course froze their butts off.  But the funniest thing that had me chuckling for an hour, was that my son had taken out his contact lenses and put them in their case and left them on the table in the trailer.  Well they were frozen in the morning!  HA HA HA!  I laughed so hard.  What a numnut!  I'm easily entertained. 

Anyhow, I'm so glad we got to see my dad and help out around the house.  I wish things were different and that we lived closer but, it is what it is. 

Thanks so much for stopping by.  I hope to have some stamping goodness to show you in the next few days.  I have a list of projects to get done. 

Blessings, b.