Sweet lil Lulu

Little Lulu came out to play! How fun is that. I made a card with her the other day and while it was ok, it wasn't my favorite. I decided to play with her again, and I love how this one came out. As many of you know, I love working with brown somewhere in my work. This one was no exception. I love pink and brown together. On this card I started with a sahara sand base and layered chocolate chip and Stampin'Up! designer paper on top. I used my sewing machine to do the straight and zig zag stitching. My trusty create-a-cut was used for the scallop edges. On the chocolate chip layer, I used my scissors to rough up the edges. I used some of Stampin'Up!'s yummy chocolate ribbon from the last mini catalog behind the kitty. Nestability oval dies and my cuttlebug were used to do the Lulu layer. I water colored Lulu with my aqua painter and when she was dry, sponged some ink around the edges. I used my chocolate chip marker to do the doodling. The birthday wishes layer was done using my cuttlebug die (stamps) and the outer part was inked with chocolate chip. The stamp is from Papertrey ink's mixed messages and the oval dots from borders and corners oval. The brads are making memories copper brads and then as a finishing touch I added a couple of prima flowers.

President Hinckley

My daughter sent me a link to this video.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MC0W0ZVI9ak

This dear sweet man has given the world so much. He has worked tirelessly for his whole life for God. The world has so many new beautiful temples because of his diligence. It is so exciting to see them dot the earth. The newest one just 20 minutes from our home was supposed to be dedicated this Sunday. They have pushed it back a week to allow the for the funeral and the new prophet is chosen. It amazes me to see someone so committed. I can just see him holding hands with his sweet wife and stealing a kiss every now and then. They were absolutely adorable together. These pics have been saved in my picture program since the day I found them. I love them. They capture exactly the essence of President Hinckley and his dear sweet bride. Thank you President Hinckley for all you have done to help God's work roll forward. We love you! May we all stand a little taller.

You really wanna know how bad my addiction to cool caribbean is?

Ya, so I just read that one of my sisters is down to 2 packs of cool caribbean. I have a pack with all the colors from that in color selection, 1 pack of just cool caribbean that is open, and 11 packs of just cool caribbean unopened! Guess I should stop hoarding it and use it! ;) I really like soft sky too, but in a different way. I am so glad I stocked up on caribbean. I also had a few people ask if it was ok to case. Heck ya case away. Please give me the credit for the idea. I am glad you enjoy my work. Sometimes I get these little thoughts in my head that no one notices. There is so much incredible talent out there that I am not even close. I just want to be like those girls someday! ;) (Hello, Debbie Olson!, my stamping wanna be just like her when I grow up idol!) I have a couple other cards, but I am not totally happy with them so I am going to hold off showing them at this time. I will try and get something new on here by tonight. My granddaughter is coming to see me in a few and I have to play with her. ;) She called last night and misses me. (I think she misses her toys just as much) Yesterday was awful weather day and she didn't get to come play because Mommy and Daddy work outside. Wind gusts of up to 50 m.p.h. are not the best to wash windows in. Have a great day and enjoy the possibilities!

Finally a card as promised

Sorry, I have been cleaning and organizing the stamp room and that is all I did today. I am getting there and am lot's happier with my space. Stay tuned for some pics of the new space. It is going to be one of those things that takes place in stages. I love what I have done so far, but it isn't quite finished and I couldn't go out today to get what I need. The weather has been nasty. I am not willing to drive on icy roads for a few things to hang stuff on the walls if ya know what I mean.

Here are the details of card 1. I am hooked on Embrace life. I hope you aren't getting sick of it. I am one of those crazy people who stocked up on cool caribbean big time. Hee hee. I think I have enough to last through the rest of my life! ;) I was sitting in church yesterday and all of a sudden (maybe I wasn't paying attention) I thought to myself, self you should do a card with cool caribbean, black and white. I started with the cool caribbean base and stamped the circles (from seeing spots) in cool caribbean and white craft. I layered black, white and cool caribbean designer paper from Stampin'Up! The scallops were done with my create-a-cut. I sewed some straight stitching on the dp with my sewing machine. The flowers were stamped in basic black and water colored with my aqua painter. When it was dry I added black stickles and stardust stickles, then cut each flower out. The little circle for birthday wishes is from Polka dots and Petals and then the words are papertrey ink mixed messages. I used a piece of wide organdy ribbon to tie the bow. I love this ribbon. I wish Stampin'Up! would bring it back. In the centers of the flowers I glued swarovski crystals with crystal effects. Can you believe I didn't even use my cuttlebug?

President Hinckley dies at age 97

The prophet of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter- Day Saints has died. My heart is sad and at the same time, I am happy for him that he is with his wife again. He adored her. You can find more information here:
http://newsroom.lds.org/ldsnewsroom/eng/news-releases-stories/beloved-church-president-gordon-b-hinckley-dies-at-97

Eye candy!

About a year ago, I left you all some eye candy! Well I got more! I actually have been stamping and have 3 cards, but it is darkish outside because of a snow storm and my pics aren't turning out as good as I wanted. Stay tuned......Til then Brad Paisley is going to have to do! ;) My hubby and I went to Salt Lake City this week to see Brad Paisley. This is the fourth concert of his we have been to and he gets better and better. Enjoy the candy and check back tomorrow for cards.

Can we say cold?

Ya, so I wake up this morning and no school. No it's not a snow day. It is so cold outside you would freeze in minutes! When I woke up it was -16 out but with the windchill it was -35!!!!!!!!!!! Needless to say I haven't been out the door today. It is a whopping 4 degrees right now at almost 4:00 pm. I went to bed with a nasty headache and woke up with it this morning. It took half the day to get rid of it. I did stamp some. Nothing fancy, just one more of my hubby's many cards he requested. This one is for a guy though. For some reason masculine and I don't get along well. Give me flower stamps and I can go wild. I got this cute Papertrey Ink set for Valentines and thought it would be a cute Birthday stamp. It's called My Punny Valentine. I started with a creamy caramel base. The designer paper is from Stampin'Up! Sorry, I am being dumb and can't remember the name. I distressed the edges and then sewed it on. I did a layer of close to cocoa on the top and paper pierced around the edge. The sage shadow layer was put through my birthday folder in my cuttlebug. I used some caramel ink to sponge it a bit and make it stand out more. I used my nestabilities square dies to do the squirrel on. I inked him up in creamy caramel and then rolled the stamp in chocolate chip. I sewed around the edges of the square with my sewing machine. I added jute twine and pewter jumbo eyelets. Hope you like him.

Embrace life Birthday

My husband needs some cards for work. He asked if he could have his favorite demonstrator make cards for all his employee's. What was he thinking? I have a hard enough time getting cards done for the people I need to be doing them for. He thinks I sit around eating bon bons or something. Hee hee. This is the first one. I wanted a simple design, but something pretty. I hope this works for him. I started with a piece of papertrey white cs as my base and stamped my polka dot bg stamp on it in groovy guava. I sponged the edges with the guava as well. I got the guava piece on a clearance rack at Michael's for 1$ (one of Martha Stewarts fun things) I stamped groovy guava and my paisley bg stamp on it and then layered it with a piece of black to make it stand out. The happy birthday is from papertrey inks papertray set. I stamped my flower on papertrey white cs and water colored with my aqua painter and guava ink. I curled up the edges when I put it on the card and added black stickles and then stardust stickles on the lighter areas of the blossom. I used my nestabilities square dies and my cuttlebug on the bottom right. The enjoy from Stampin'Up!'s new lovely labels set was stamped in guava. I found a piece of black polka dot ribbon from Michael's and some making memories brads to finish it off. Since I have to do a bunch of cards I will probably make a few of each design. I get bored stamping the same thing over and over though, so we will see how long that one lasts. Enjoy!

Playing with my toys!

Pretty sad when an adult feels the need to play with their toys everyday! Stamping toys are the best! I wandered over to SCS and found the sketch for today. It is simply gawjus and I had to play with Embrace life again. I still haven't had much time to play with it and it was screaming at me to give it a little attention. This ginger blossom paper is so pretty. I started with a 5 1/4" square card base in river rock. I embossed the top of it with my textile embossing folder and my trusty cuttlebug. I sponged more river rock on the embossing to help it stand out a bit. The ginger blossom layer was glued down with my atg gun and then zig zagged on my sewing machine. Easy peasy! The next layers groovy guava and white where cut using my nestabilites rectangle dies. I stamped the blossom flowers in basic black and then used my prisma pencils and gamsol to blend in the color. I stamped a layer of linen bg stamp in groovy guava over the top of that. I then added stickles to the blossoms to give them a little sparkle. I sewed around the edge with a straight stitch and added a piece of groovy guava stitched ribbon to finish it. The flowers were stamped in basic black and then I colored them with my prismacolor pencils and gamsol. I carefully cut them out and then put pearls from Ellen Hutson's store on them. These pearls have adhesive on them, but I used crystal effects cause I don't want them falling off. The circle layer was cut from river rock and my scallop circle nestabilities die. I paper pierced the scallops to give it some texture. Thank you is from my purty new lovely labels set. The second I saw this set, I knew it would be awesome with the nestabilites dies. I added a few pearls and decided it looked fabulous the way it is. What a fun way to spend my afternoon. I hope you like it! I am not sure why the pics came out so small, but if you click on them you can view them bigger so you can see the detail better.

Made my day!

Michelle gave me an award! You can find her blog here: http://princessmatildalovestostamp.blogspot.com/2008/01/you-make-my-day-award.html

I am supposed to send this on to 10 others. I will be back!

She also tagged me.

Busy weekend

We got a room at the Little America (in the towers) in Salt Lake City for Christmas from my husband's boss. He took us, his wife and two other employee's and their wives on Friday. We had a super nice dinner with the Coremark people. They took us to a place called Flemings. I had crab and shrimp scampi! It was to die for. We then went for a walk and enjoyed the sights before going back to our room. We got up late on Saturday and had a yummy breakfast. They wanted us to see a place called Tai -Pan Trading. It is an import, lot of stuff to decorate your home with place. I went in with no intentions of buying anything til I came to the back of this huge warehouse place. I found that all the Christmas tree's were 75% off. I found a really tall pencil tree that was 180 bucks. I figured for around 40 bucks I wanted it. Well I went through checkout and it was actually 90% off. All Christmas was 90%, it just didn't say that on the trees. I got a 179$ tree for 17.99!!!!!!! We are working on making another stand for it and my hubby cut off the bottom so it will fit in my living room. Wish I had taller ceilings. What a steal huh? Next these ladies introduced me to Ikea!!!!!!!!!!!!! I have heard lots of ladies talking about this place at SCS but alas we don't have one here. I am so in love with this place. We are going back in a couple of weeks as I have Brad Paisley tickets. I gotta get my stamp room cleaned out and the old stuff on e-bay this week cause I am going to get this awesome cabinet. (e-bay money is going to pay for it) It is actually a kitchen workspace, but I love the drawers and storage room. I am going to put my cuttlebug and paper cutter's on top of it. I got one of those metal boards to hang above it. The little clear lid tins with magnets on the back are going all over it with my eyelets and primas in them. I got two wood shelves to put my bottled primas and a few other things in. I am going to get that room organized this year. Woo hoo! Can we say excited? Ok, because of the being out of town for the weekend not much stamping happened but I hope to have some new stuff up soon! Have a great day and enjoy the possibilities!

Can we just say fun?

I have been wanting a bind it all for like forever. I finally got one and I knew I just had to use up some of those chipboard coasters and play. I used the just retired fall designer paper from Stampin'Up!, apple cider. I haven't been to particularly keen on the wild wasabi color til now. I took these pics of my Granddaughter just before Christmas. She was wearing this cute Christmas outfit and had her hair all done up curly. I handed her the baby Jesus from her fisher-price nativity and stuck her in front of Grandma's tree. These pics I ended up with will be treasured forever! I love the way they turned out. I used a couple of medium weight chipboard coasters and adhered my designer paper, then sanded the edges. I changed my pics to black and white, because Mykl's green shirt clashed with the wasabi. The ribbon and scalloped card stock are cranberry crisp. The adorable little acrylic frame came from Papertrey Ink! Cute huh? I stamped the memories circle (from the new set Sweet Celebrations) in chocolate chip craft and heat set it. When it was dry I stamped the adorable little heart with cranberry crisp. I used my nestabilites circle and scallop circle dies to cut these out. The lace snow flake is off my tree and is hand tatted by me! I am trying to figure out how to cut it up and then adhere it to the piece. If you will notice in the pic behind her, you can see the snowflakes on the tree. I may just make part of one so I can permanently attach it to the frame. How cute is this? I think it would be a perfect gift and cheap. Oh, I used 1/4" wire to bind it, but I think I will get some bigger stuff as the chipboard kinda runs into itself. Thanks for looking and have a great weekend!

I am so stinking excited!

I just started a new blog to keep all of my son Jacob's mission stuff on. I have been using dearelder.com, but I was frustrated because I was limited to how much I could put on it. I think this will work out tons better for us. Check back often as I am in the process of putting all his letters from the last 5 months on there. It seems he has a tough time with spelling and punctuation though so I am having to edit everything so it is more reader friendly. You can find his blog at www.elderjacobrapp.blogspot.com I hope you all enjoy it! Don't forget to click on the you tube video. It is very inspiring. I like to turn it on while I am reading through his letters. I love my missionary! Also he sent me a cd of pictures he has taken so far. I am going to add a few at a time so I have something new to put on there. His washing machine cracks me up! Haa haaa! Hysterical!

Embrace life

Thanks to Debbie Olson I caved and bought Embrace Life while it was still available to the demonstrators at a discount. Sigh..... Thanks Debbie! I started with a sahara sand cs base and stamped my paisley bg stamp with sahara sand ink. Next I put a layer of groovy guava and a piece of retired designer paper with stitching on the top and the bottom. I used a piece of my chocolate chip ribbon and tucked the edges under so just the knot shows. The river rock, groovy guava and sahara sand pieces were cut with my nestabilities square dies. I stamped the flower with basic grey and masked it and put the leaves behind it. I water colored with groovy guava and mellow moss. I used some so saffron around the edges. When it was all dry, I put stickles on the stamens and then used crystal effects on the darker part of the flower. I used my white signo gel pen around the square to faux stitch it as it needed just a little extra zing. This set is so elegant and I can't wait to go play with my Ginger Blossom paper and this set! This card is soft and would be really great for a sympathy card. Thanks for looking!

one more

I have one more card using the cute little birdies. I made a mistake yesterday and said they would be released tonight. It was last night. Anyway they are available now so check them out at http://www.allthatscraps.com/ She has lots of other fun stuff at her store and great shipping. I used sahara sand as my base. The designer paper is from We R Memory Keepers. I love the colors in this paper! Yummmy. I distressed the paper and then sewed it with my sewing machine. The ribbon is groovy guava from Stampin'Up! I kept the design simple on this one, but added three copper brads at the top. I hope you like it. Oh, I realized after this was done and photographed I should have put 're at the end of your. Oh well, it is still cute. Enjoy the possibilities! I got my tiny Stampin'Up! order yesterday. Gotta finish getting the stamps together and then I can stamp some more!

My little funny bunny

Here is another design for C.C.Designs. This stamp set will be released at midnight tonight! Go to http://www.allthatscraps.com/ for more information! This one was really fun to do. It seems I can't just crank out something fast, I have to play and spend hours to get it right. I am liking this one better than some of the others. I did get some new designer paper last night and am going to go play with that in a while. I also have a tiny Stampin'Up! order coming any minute! Woo hoo!

I started with a piece of white cardstock from Papertreyink. This stuff is heavier and works better for the base of a card. I put it through my cuttlebug swirl folder. The pink is retired chalk ink from Stampin'Up!. I wish I had some reinkers for these. I used a piece of burgundy designer paper as a layer behind my striped designer paper. I can't remember what paper it is though. It was left over scraps from last year. I scalloped the bottom with my create-a-cut. (this tool should have paid for itself by now!) I then zigzagged the top and bottom with my sewing machine. Gotta use your sewing machine for something right? ;) The ribbon is a velvet ribbon from Michael's. The bunny was done with my nestabilities. (Gotta make them pay for themselves as well!) I used some leftover fabriano note card for the bunny part and stamped the bunny with my basic grey Stampin'Up! pad. I water colored with my aquapainter and Stampin'Up! ink. When all this was dry I used my pearl ex and an aquapainter with future floor wax to highlight the bunnies ears, nose and tummy. Her tail was filled in with it too. I stamped the hearts with the chalk ink and then used crystal effects to give them shine. After everything was dry, I used the chalk inks around the edges of the ovals. My little funny bunny was stamped with basic grey on a piece of fabriano note card and punched with my oval punch. I added a little flower and brad. I hope you like the little bunny. I think she is sweet! ;)

Just wanted to share

I took this pic the other night when we were getting tons of snow. My son who is in Brazil is begging for snow instead of humidity and heat. Poor boy! Ya I saw the pic by the palm tree! Anyway I took a few pics to send him. Enjoy. I hope to have another sneak peek up later today! Have a great day!