claying around

Hey there!  Just a few things today.

First of all, I know my photography skills are lacking but trying to get a good pic of this card was obviously beyond me.  Lookee,

Banner Greetings and This and That Rotary stamps.  Pistachio pudding, strawberry slush and black Stazon inks.  Sahara sand, whisper white and strawberry slush cardstock.  Window frame framelits, big shot, this and that washi tape, fun flowers die, corner rounder,  vintage faceted buttons and white bakers twine.


It really does look much better in person.  It looks so washed out here.  I got this color combo off of one of the new Color Coach cards. 

The Sahara Sand cardstock is the old textured stuff.  NOW, we carry each color family in the Core-dinations cardstock which is textured.  I'm going to get me some of that..........but I don't have it yet. 

I'm improvising ;)

 Now this looks easy enough, right?  There is a little trick you need to do to ensure that the white panel is straight on the front.  Check it out,

Die cut what size window you want.  This piece is 2" x 3.5" and uses the 2nd framelit from the middle.  Now here is the trick; lay your window on the cardfront so that it is even and where you want it to be.  Use a pen or pencil to mark 2 of the points. 

Now you can lay the framelit on there and it will be placed right where you want it.  Its an extra step but will save you from pulling out your hair because you cut it and it isn't straight when you line up the holes.  I speak from experience.

Isn't that flower pretty?  I had a groovy idea for this.  I was just going to use a few layers of cardstock but I wasn't getting the effect I wanted, so I got my handy dandy forgotten brayer out and colored some plain white tissue paper. 

TaDa!  Strawberry Slush tissue paper!  The bottom layer is the Strawberry Slush cardstock, then plain white tissue and then Strawberry Slush tissue.  A Strawberry Slush flower (from the same Fun Flowers Die) and a vintage faceted button. 

You can see where the tissue wrinkled and didn't get the ink.  I thought the white streaks looked cool. 

Kind of like the gray streaks in my hair.  I keep telling myself they look cool. 

Okay, so a few weeks ago I got the new Simply Pressed Clay.  BUT the molds were on backorder.  The molds came on Monday and Grace got busy. 

Awesome!  I really do like them.  The buttons are harder to deal with but so worth it.  Grace found if she put a small amount of clay in the freezer for a few minutes she could work the button molds easier.  I put the clay in the mold first and then froze the whole thing for about 10 min and it worked great. 

I don't have many reinkers so we took a small amount of clay and just pressed it into the ink pad and worked the ink in.  Worked great! 

She got crafty and swirled inks.  This is Strawberry Slush and Crisp Cantaloupe. 

They dry pretty quickly.  Although we've had some pretty dry weather the last few days.  They recommend you let them dry for 24 hours.  We let them go about an hour.  I haven't made anything with them yet but I got ideas.

Try them out, its fun!

Today I thought I would cat-proof the cat's favorite veggie box.  During the winter when I didn't have anything in there (except pine trees) she decided it was the best place to go potty.  OY!

I had added a bunch of soil to that box and mixed it well but between that and the fact she likes to lay in there, almost all the onions I planted croaked.  So I fixed her wagon today. 

I added even more dirt and planted carrots.  I'm wondering if that is what is wrong with my tomatoes too.  The leaves are still curled.  I've tried less water but its been almost 100 everyday and the soil is dry in the evening when I check it.  So I'll have to hope the volunteer yellow pear tomatoes do well.  Darn cat! 

Okay, one last thing.  I've discovered the movie Pitch Perfect.  19 loves it.  She is forever quoting it during regular conversation.  Grace has watched it too and so I had to see what it is all about. 

Yes, I now love it too. 

Whats funny is my entire family will make fun of the fact that I like Glee (poor Cory Monteith) and really, that is what Pitch Perfect is.  Kind of.....sort of.  Who knew Anna Kendrick could sing?

Anyway its cool.  Enjoy.

Thanks so much for stopping by and sticking around.  I love that you do that. 

Blessings, b.

p.s. All you people at convention, have extra fun for me.  I will miss being there. 

please stay.....

Hey there!  How was your day?  I'm almost afraid to post something today.  The last few times I've posted I get notices that people are unsubscribing. 

Was it something I said? 

I know, I need a tougher skin.  But I really like it when you all come and hang out.  Even though I have nothing of importance to say. 

-big sigh-

Anyhow, I wanted to show you a sympathy card I needed to make. 

Blooming with Kindness and Teeny Tiny Wishes.  Whisper white and crumb cake cardstock.   White craft and Black Stazon inks.  White taffeta ribbon, vintage faceted buttons, linen thread, window frame framelits, lg. doily die, big shot.


I really had no plan when I set out to make this.  It started out one way and ended up another way.  I'm sure you all can relate.

 

Okie dokie.  I'm supposed to be working on my Artisan entries for Stampin' Up!.  "Supposed to"  are the operative words there.  The 3D items always kick my butt.  Come on inspiration!

Alrighty then, break time is over.  Thanks so much for stopping by checking in, I really appreciate it. 

Blessings, b.

thank yous and a tag

Hidey Ho!  I hope everyone is having a wonderful day.  I'm so behind on showing you stuff that I have 2......no 3..........no 4, projects to show you today.  Whew! 

You know, wait a minute.  Let me make sure I haven't shown you them already.  Hold on................

Nope, okay lets go.  

Ready?  This is a long one.

A Word for You (retiring).  Whisper white notecards, marina mist, whisper white and crumb cake cardstock.  Black Stazon and whisper white inks.  Window framelits, big shot, This and That washi tape, bitty buttons, square lattice embossing folder, sunshine and sprinkles DSP, 3/4" circle punch.

I made some quick thank yous for a baby shower.

Much better pic.  Her colors were blue and brown.  I used the new This and That washi tape.  LOVE IT! 

I used our notecards and envelopes.  Now, I know it says they are retiring but they are just being reconfigured.  The cardstock in them will be thicker.  Neat eh?

Thats the Ticket and Distressed dots (retiring).  Crumb cake and whisper white cardstock.  Marina mist and whisper white inks.  This and That washi tape, sunshine and sprinkles DSP, dotted ribbon punch, ticket punch, natural ribbon, bitty buttons, lable framelits, big shot, white bakers twine.

  I know, I'm kind of hooked on making this style tag huh?  Hey, if it works, don't fix it.

Let me know if you're interested and I'll do a tutorial on how I die cut the tag.

A Word for You (retiring).  Notecards and envelopes, very vanila and basic gray cardstock.  Black Stazon ink.  This and That washi tape, big shot, little leaves die, flower trim, basic pearls.

I already had them packed up when I took the pic.  You get the idea though.

Last week we had a bridal shower at work.  So I used the rest of the notecards and made some for the bride.  Her colors happen to be coral, gray and ivory.  Just happens to be 2 of the exact same colors in the washi tape!  How convenient is that?

Epic Day This and That washi tape # 131269  $4.95

I wanted to show you how I packaged them.  This pic does not really show how cool this box is. 

Stampin' Up! is reconfiguring the packaging for the wood stamps.  They are the same type of boxes that the clear stamps come in but they are thicker because of the wood.  I am so on board with this! 

I got my new catalog preorder and so I took the new stamps out of this box and the notecards fit perfectly! 

I'll have to order more empty boxes when the catalog goes live.  Super excited about this change.  And I don't really like change.

Here is the tag I made.  I'm so upset that the flower trim from the Spring Catalog isn't going to be in the new catalog.  What are you thinking Stampin' Up!?  I will miss the flower trim lots. 

The little box with the name on it was a special little gift for the groom-to-be.  I didn't want the bride opening it in front of our staff.  She would have died but I would have thought it was hilarious.  

You can see here that I sprayed it with the Smooch Spritz.  It shimmers.  The only reason I used the Honecomb Embossing folder is because it matched the design on the coral washi tape.  Otherwise I might have used something else......because honeycombs just don't seem real wedding material.........whatever.


Alrighty then.  some of these goodies are retiring for good.  Like the Sunshine and Sprinkles DSP (Spring catalog), bitty buttons, flower trim (spring catalog), A Word for You (what will I do for sentiments now?) and Distressed Dots background stamp (so sad about this one), so get them while you can. 

Let me know if you'd like a new catalog.

Thanks so much for stopping by and hanging out.  Oh wait!  Before you go.  Look what I got yesterday:

I got an iphone 4.  Lord help me!  I don't know how to do anything on it yet.  Grace is showing me and 18 is coming home for the summer on Friday.  She is very techy and knows everything.  So far though, I love it.  I can actually hear on it.  Thats a plus eh? 

Ok......thats all.

Blessings, b.

no directions

Merry day before the day before Christmas Eve. 

We spent the day today at my in laws celebrating Christmas.  I love my in laws.  You don't hear that very often huh?  I do though.  They are awesome people. 

So today I wanted to show you 2 of the tags we made at the meeting.  The first one was from the Ornamental Elegance kit.  It is the ornament you see on the cover of the Holiday Catalog.  You can buy all the supplies to make the ornament and then of course you have the stuff to make a million of them if you want.  The kit made 10.  I thought it would be fun to make them at the meeting. 

Except the kit came with no directions.  OY! 

Took me awhile to figure it out and then thought to check out the You Tube.  I was on target. 

So here is the kit version:

It is very pretty and pretty big.  It says Merry Christmas on the back.  I didn't think to take a pic of that. 

The kit is sold out but if you'd like to know what supplies to order to make your own, just let me know.


Here is another tag we made.  Alot more simple.

Watercolor Winter and Teeny Tiny Wishes sets.  Naturals white and soft suede cardstock.  Garden green, crumb cake and early espresso inks.  Big shot, woodgrain embossing folder, wood buttons, vanilla seam binding, window frame framelits, 2 way glue pen, dazzling diamonds and linen thread.


I really like this one.  I left the tails of the ribbon long because I thought it would look pretty on a package. 

Pretty glittery pinecones.

Again, I didn't think to take a pick of the back.  I used Fabulous Phrases to stamp the "to" and "from". 

Alrighty then, I'm pooped.  Everyone and their mother was on the road today and it took forever to get home.  Stay safe out there. 

Blessings, b.

not yet

Well, I haven't taken pics of the projects we made at the group meeting yet.  but I am caught up to date on the December Daily.  I just need to take the pictures to show you. 

So tonight I thought I'd show you another Christmas card. 

Watercolor Winter set.  Garden green, whisper white and crumb cake cardstock.  Garden green, riding hood red, whisper white and cherry cobbler inks.  Big shot, window frame framelits, sticky pearls, paper piercing guide and dimensionals.

I don't think I've shown you this one yet.  Pretty quick and easy card.  It would mail nicely too. 

Although I just remembered I used all my pearls at the group meeting.  I'll have to come up with something else. 

Watercolor Winter and woodgrain sets.  Garden gree, whisper white and crumb cake cardstock.  Garden green, whisper white, cherry cobbler and riding hood red inks.  Big shot, window frame framelits, cherry cobbler seam binding, sticky pearls and dimensionals. 

Here is another version.  I have yet to color in the poinsettia with my aquapainter.  I'll have to try that soon. 

Alrighty then.  That is all for tonight.  18 is on the train coming home for Christmas as we speak.  So excited to have her here for a whole month!  I have to get to bed because I have to get up really early to go get her. 

Thanks so much for stopping by.

Blessings, b.

winter holly

I haven't photographed the projects from our stamp group yet.  I've just been so busy the last few days.  Cross your fingers I get it done tomorrow. 

So today I have another Christmas card to show you.  When I got Watercolor Winter from the Holiday catalog I made lots of cards with it.  This is another one.

Watercolor Winter set.  Garden green, whisper white and crumb cake cardstock.  Cherry cobbler, garden green and black Stazon inks.  Cherry cobbler seam binding, wooden buttons (holiday mini) paper piercing pack, aquapainter, big shot, window framelits and linen thread.


I really like this one.  It is 4.25 x 4.25.  I think it would mail easily enough.......maybe. 

When watercoloring on the whisper white you can't have your brush too wet.  The cardstock will pill and warp.  So this was quick and easy coloring. 

Alrighty then, thats all for today.  Oh!  Did you see The Amazing Race last night?  I even stayed up late to watch it.  I'm so happy The Beekman Boys won.  They were so nice the whole time.  I would love to go to their farm.  Those twins!  UGH!  They were horrible! 

I have one more funny thing to show you:

Proverbs 31 is my favorite and when I saw this I laughed out loud (LOL!) 

Okay, thanks so much for stopping by.  You make my day.

Blessings, b.

it was the books' fault

Can it really be that long since I last posted?  Sorry about that.  I read a book.  Okay, 4 books. 

When I start to feel overwhelmed ( being too busy or thinking too much) I read.  Some people may drink or eat or smoke or exercise (smarter choice),  but I read.  I can enter someone else's world and forget about mine for awhile. 

Some may call that avoidance but I seem better able to handle things after I've zoned out for awhile. 

I pulled out the Nooker (Nook Color) and looked up FREE books because I'm cheap.  This one had very high ratings.  It is not the type of book I normally read.  I like historical fiction.  Historical fiction with some religion and romance thrown in and you got me.

This one had none of that. But because it had such good reviews I thought I'd try it.

Modern day girl security guard, danger, profanity and sex.  Totally not my cup of tea. 

But I gotta say; I digged it.  There are parts that are very sweet and laugh out loud funny.  Some parts are a stretch but not enough to make me stop reading. 

There are 4 books in the series with another coming out.  Check it out, the first book is free. 

This was another one I really liked.  Its not free now on the Barnes and Noble site....sorry.   There are more to the series but for some reason I like how this one ended just fine. 


Okay enough book talk.  I really just wanted to show you some bag tags I made. 

Jack of all Trades, Woodgrain and Fabulous Phrases sets.  Naturals white, old olive and crumb cake cardstock.  Pumpkin pie, old olive and black Stazon inks.  Window frame framelits, xl bird punch, hemp, big shot, sponges. 

I put these on the latest orders I delivered.  I wrote a little thank you on the back.  I hope they like them. 

I punched out the leafy branch from the bird punch and just used my fingers to curl up the stem and then just man-handled it to come around the stem of the pumpkin. 

Did you all have a nice Halloween?  This was the first Halloween that all my babies weren't home.  Yes, I might have teared up a little. 

We had a few extra girls over to trick or treat with us.  Did I get a pic of Grace by herself?  Nope.  So I cropped a pic because I knew you would want to see. 

I wanted her to wear ruby red slippers but they were against it.  She even wore a broom on her back.  We got LOTS of candy around here. 

Alrighty then, thanks for letting me share.  I promise to have more stampy projects coming up. 

Thanks so much for stopping by and checking things out.

Blessings, b.

halloween goodies

Hello everybody!  How was your day? 

Grace and I went shopping.  I hate shopping.  BUT we needed shampoo and stuff.  Of course we picked up a few things not on our list..........like caramel apples and.............underwear.  

We're friends right?  So I can share this with you.....right?

I've been needing some new undies for awhile now and everytime I happen to hit Target I look to see if they have what I want. 

And they never do. 

Its not like I want anything special.  Just white cotton.  (I know, I'm so boring)  Not neon.  Not nylon.  Not microfiber.  My underwear do not need space age technology!

Well today we went to the outlet mall and there was a store there that sold underthings (don't know the name of the store) and danged if they didn't have exactly what I wanted! 

I bought 2 packs.  You can never have too much underwear.

So anyway, I wanted to show you the hostess gift and door prize gift I made for that last workshop I did. 

Teeny Tiny Wishes set.  Black Stazon ink.  Tangerine tango, basic black and very vanilla cardstock.  Howlstooth and scarington DSP, neutrals buttons, hemp, 2 3/8" scallop punch, 1 3/4", 1 3/8 and 1 1/4" circle punches.

For some reason the picture will not get bigger. 

I used one of those paint cans from the $Spot @ Target.  I bought them a long time ago. 

I used my Simply Scoring tool to score the DSP every 1/4".  I really wanted black hemp because I thought it would look more like spider legs.  I punched the black cardstock with the scallop punch then punched it again lining up the points to the scallops.  Get it?

Fabulous Phrases set.  Black Stazon ink.  Naturals white and old olive cardstock.  Big shot, window frames framelits, howlstooth and scarington DSP, brights buttons, linen thread.

I made up a little door prize goodie bag with the leftover candy and put a couple of really old stamps in there too. 

You can see here where I folded the gray piece in on itself right behind the button.  Just to add a little bit of texture. 

I cut a thin strip of old olive cardstock to thread through the button and curled the top to resemble a stem. 


Alrighty then, thats it for today.  Thanks so much for stopping by. 

Blessings, b.

sour cream for everyone!

Hey there! 

On Sunday I had another workshop.  Yay me!

This time I didn't spill or ruin anything.  Yay me!

But I did forget 2 items.  Dang it! (And there was one other thing I messed up on the card we made but I'll tell you about that in a few days.  It would be so unlike me to have things go perfect.)

Lucky for me the hostess had one thing and the next door neighbor had the other thing.  So it all worked out.

Remember the sour cream containers that were so popular sooooooooooo long ago?   Well we made one.  A pumpkin one.

Jack of all Trades and Teeny Tiny Wishes set.  Tangerine tango, old olive and black Stazon inks.  Howlstooth and Scarington DSP, big shot, window frames framelits, black taffeta ribbon, word window punch, crimper and 1/8" circle punch.

Isn't it cute?  Love that crooked little smile.

Just the perfect size for some Skittles or M&M's or gummy worms or..............

I remember when I was first taught how to make one that I had never seen a sour cream container quite like this.  I guess some fast food places use this design.   I'm sure if I had a mind to I could have figured it out on my own but I though maybe some of you are like me and just don't have a mind to.  So I thought I'd do a quick little tutorial on how to make them. 

Lets begin shall we?

Mine uses a 5"x6" piece of paper.

Turn it over and lay a thin line of glue down the short end.  I used my beloved Tombow Multi glue.  This was actually too much.  A little goes a long way.

Roll it up.  You can rub the paper on the edge of your desk or bone folder to get it going in the right direction first to help you out.

One of the ladies at the workshop had the idea of using a toilet paper tube to use as a form and then you could just slide it off.

Line up your seam off to one side and stick a little glue in there and pinch closed.

Get it?

Remember your crimper?  That tool that is collecting dust in your bottom drawer?  Get it out and crimp the end just 2 or 3 clicks.

Cool eh? 

This would be the time to fill it with candy.......or jewelry......or a gift card (you might need to start out with a bigger size piece of cardstock).....or tickets......or money..............

Then squish the open end the opposite way of the closed end and lay some glue in there.......

and pinch it closed and crimp it.  Now you've got a nifty shape.

People will be in wonder at your cleverness.  Then just punch a hole in the end and tie a cute tag on and you're all good to go.

These are so easy and you can do them for any kind of occasion.  Just think, showers, wedding favors, you could make 25 of them and turn them into an Advent calendar, classroom treats......

Try using different papers too.  Vellum makes a really fancy looking one.  Its easy to make them bigger or smaller too.  Just start with a different size rectangle.


Okay, I've got one last pic to show you.  I was working in the garden........I know you've been wanting a garden update huh?.............and I saw that the top of this carrot was good size so I pulled it.  It wasn't fully grown yet but check it out:

HA!  A 3 legged carrot!  Oh my, why is it so easy for me to get a kick out of veggies.  Remember "Carrots in Love"?





Okay, I'll stop there.  Thanks so much for stopping in and hanging out.  You give me warm fuzzies........which is different and much better than the hot flashes.

Blessings, b.