Shopping list? I don't think so!

Hi! I am so glad you are here!  I'm not sure exactly what I should call today's creation, but one thing it is NOT is a shopping list holder!  Let me elaborate.  One of the things I set out to accomplish is getting some of my older Paper Pumpkin kits put together.  Today's kit was supposed to make a shopping list holder.  It even has a roll of lined paper that was to be attached at the top.  Don't get me wrong, I like shopping lists.  They are essential to me actually getting real food in the house instead of all of the impulse buys I would otherwise make.  But I already have a system.  We have a magnetic list on the fridge and the theory is that when someone uses the last of something, it goes on the list.  It works about 60% of the time with the other people in the house, but I use it 99% of the time so I call it a success.

So there I was, looking at a kit that I knew I really did not want to make, when I started thinking the lined paper would make a wonderful journaling strip for scrapbooking.  Then I studied the thick woodgrain embossed base...way too nice not to use for something... I'm still not sure exactly what to call this, but it will probably have a photo placed on it in the future.  Let's call it a wall hanging!  The only thing from the kit that I did not repurpose was the extra wide rubber band that was supposed to hold the paper at the bottom.  I still have it, but it will likely end up with a more practical purpose rather than decorative.

I also added lots of goodies from the artisan kit and even used up a

skinny strip of leftover dsp to make a rolled 'thing'.  It's not exactly

a flower, but it still looked pretty good with the other embellishments.

As I was making this, I was thinking about a fellow blog friend

who is going through a very rough time and decided

to use this sentiment from the Trust God stamp set.

I'm pretty sure everything but the punches, very vanilla cardstock, and soft suede ink are retired.  Felt good to use up a bit more of the older goodies!  

Thanks so much for stopping by and I hope you have a wonderful day!

Project Recipe: Stamp Set-Trust God, Punches-decorative label, 1 3/4" circle, Accessories-paper pumpkin kit, linen thread, victorian crochet trim, artisan kit, inka gold metallic rub

WAHOO! It's summer!!

I am so glad you stopped in today! I am officially on summer break and can not wait to get in some late night crafting!  Of course, morning and middle of the day crafting is good too!  I managed to find my table after a little cleaning yesterday and couldn't resist going there with my morning coffee this morning.  I had a Paper Pumpkin kit on my shelf that was waiting to be put together for quite some time.  I thought the WAHOO stamp was so fun and perfect for a graduation card I will be needing. **Confession time-I made 3 graduation cards earlier but completely forgot to take pictures before giving them away.  They were pretty cute too...**  The kit came with supplies to make four cards, but I didn't need four graduation cards so I changed the 'you did it' to 'happy birthday'.  I can always use more of those!

After I finished the cards, I was thinking how perfect the cheer was for scrapbook pages of the girls' sports.  So I'm sure you will be seeing more of 'wahoo' in the future!  

Speaking of sports, both girls are finished with school sponsored sports for the summer.  DD#1's softball team made it to the second round of Sectional before being defeated 1-0.  They are a very young team (only 1 senior), and we were very proud of their efforts.  DD#2, our tennis pro in training, completed her first year with only two losses.  She played doubles this year, but has been approached about playing singles next year.  I see a lot of summer days at the courts for us...

My summer taxi service hasn't completely shut down; DD#2 is playing softball for the community recreation league, and DD#1 is still taking voice lessons.  But it is much easier to only have two things to worry about instead of school, softball, tennis, choir, voice lessons, etc...

Well, it is almost time for a ballgame so I will sign off for now and be back soon with more paper goodies to share with you!  Thanks so much for stopping by!!

A little crafty break!

Hi!  I finally managed to squeeze a few minutes from my week to get something posted!  Our spring has been so much more busy than I had ever imagined!

DD1 decided this year that she wanted to go back to playing softball and found herself as the starting right fielder of the varsity softball team.  She is so committed to keeping that position and has not missed a practice, and they practice 6 days a week! DD2 started playing tennis this spring and has been doing really well for her first year.  She has practices 5 days a week.  Add to this DD1's weekly voice lesson and my job, and there is very little free time for Mama...  I am really looking forward to summer vacation!

Earlier this month, I did manage to sneak away from my responsibilities to attend a Relay for Life sponsored crop.  It was so nice to have a morning and afternoon to create and visit with other crafty people and OH MY WORD-the FOOD!!!  They even came around with snacks every so often so we didn't have to leave our spots!!  I felt very spoiled!

I was in desperate need of birthday cards so I managed to get quite a few made.  Since I was at a crop, I only had a few different designs so I wouldn't have to bring all of my goodies along.  I made 8 of this design...

  

Unfortunately, I did not list my supplies and didn't have time to pull things back out and look so I don't have the name of the sentiment stamp.  The cardstock is pool party and everything else is retired product.

I also took along a Paper Pumpkin kit I kept meaning to put together.  I made four of these...

While I am really enjoying watching my girls (they will be gone before I know it...), I am a little sad that I'm not able to visit all of my wonderful blog friends.  I am looking forward to summer vacation when I can stay up til the wee hours of the morning catching up on everything!  Thanks so much for stopping by and I hope to see you (or at least your blog) soon!!

Day 8-Cozy Christmas Card

Hi!  I am so glad you stopped by today!  I have been stuck in my cozy home for the past two days due to the snow and ice.  So what is a crafty girl to do?  Why, make things of course!  And since it's so frigid outside, I decided to make a warm and cozy Christmas card.  I saw a card on Pinterest that used the postage stamp punch and it reminded me of a quilt.  So I pulled out some of my retired Christmas paper and got busy making my own version of a Christmas quilt card.

This came together fairly quickly once I decided which patterns to place where!  I ended up with four of these to add to my pile.  So I'm a little closer to crossing another thing off of my list!

As you know, we had quite a winter storm starting Thursday night that continued through Friday.  I'm beginning to wonder if we will have school tomorrow... The roads are still really slick and I know many of the rural roads haven't been cleared yet.  I might have another day to play...

Thanks so much for visiting and I hope you have a most wonderful week!

Card Recipe: Paper-real red, soft suede, whisper white, Christmas Cocoa (ret), Ink-soft suede, Stamp Set- from a Paper Pumpkin kit, Accessories-postage stamp punch

Not a Scrooge, but quite stingy all the same! -Day 4

Hello! So glad you're here!  As promised, I've got something I checked off of my list today!  I'm still in desperate need of Christmas cards, and today I am sharing a card I made with the newest Paper Pumpkin kit.  It has the most wonderful star garland and the directions called for wrapping the garland around the tag three times.  Three times????  But that means that a lot of that gorgeous garland will be hidden behind the tag!!  Can't have that!  So being my frugal self, I trimmed the garland into two shorter strips and managed to make four cards and still have lots of that pretty garland left for another project! SCORE!  I have decided that while this could be viewed as slightly stingy, I am definitely not a scrooge since it is a Merry Christmas card...  Maybe we'll just change stingy to frugal and then it's not a bad thing at all!  Yes...let's do that instead...

Enough of my silly banter!  Here is the card-

I have to admit that the stripes gave me a little vertigo until I had the large tag attached, but I think it's quite festive!  This kit made four wonderful cards, so now I'm a little closer to being finished with my cards!

Well, I'm off to work on more Christmas preparations!  I hope you are having a wonderful week and find some time to do something crafty as well!

Paper Pumpkin- Lovin' those hexagons!!

Hello! Just a quick post and a simple card today.  You may look at this and question how simple it was, but this was another of the wonderful Paper Pumpkin kits.  I didn't even have to punch the holes!!  I really like the hexagons and it was fun filling in the spaces with the cardstock stickers and pop dotting the stamped hexagons.  I even used the heart stamp to decorate the inside of the card!!

I was almost giddy that there were left overs that I can use on another card!!

Thanks so much for stopping by for a visit and I hope you find some time to get all inky and stampy too!

Dusting off the cobwebs...

Good grief!  Did you think I disappeared?!  I had to dust the virtual cobwebs off of my blog last weekend when I posted my project for ABAC, and honestly hadn't realized it had been THAT long since I posted anything, and here I am a week later, finally posting again!

My new job is going great and both girls are adjusting well to their new schools, and DH is being incredibly patient with my complete lack of organization at the moment-hence the neglected blog.  I have been doing a few (hundred) crafty things for my nephew's upcoming wedding, but I didn't want to post those yet.  Other than that, my life has been one big battle to keep the laundry from suffocating family members in an avalanche, and wrangling the girls into keeping enough clean dishes for our meals.  It has been so busy that when I did finally sit down on the couch, Shadow took the opportunity to play lap dog and tried to keep me there.  Some nights I did let him win! :)

I thought the last weekend would offer me a complete day without any obligations, and while DH slept (worked nights) and the girls vegged out in front of the tv, I could manage to squeeze in some much needed crafting time.  Instead, my Mom called me at 9 am and asked if I still wanted the volunteer trees that were growing in their landscaping.  My brother was there doing some yard work and was going to get rid of them, so instead of crafting, I played arborist and dug up 5 trees and about 15 bushes.  This was followed by an afternoon of replanting them, and since I was already sweaty and very dirty, I mowed the lawn.  This weekend was a local festival and we spent most of the weekend enjoying the food, games, visiting, parade, and even a 5K (I walked it...).

Sunday, after the parade, the clouds decided they were holding all the water they could stand and it started raining.  This put an end to our last trip through the booths and watching the closing events.  Instead, we came back home and I spent the afternoon getting crafty!

I am so far behind on my Christmas card goal, and really needed to make a few cards, and we won't even talk about my scrapbooking...did I do any of that?? No...  I spent over an hour just organizing and clearing off my table, and then I finished up some cards that were all but done.  I decided to work on two different Paper Pumpkin kits and I think the simplicity of the kits was just what I needed to get my mojo going.  Today I came home from work and made a scrapbook page that will be posted later on.

But I'm sure you didn't just come here to read about my very interesting time :)  So here is one of the PP kit cards that I made.

The four cards from this kit came together so quickly and I even did a little stamping on the envelope to make it all matchy!

Well, I am still doing battle with the laundry and the family would really like to have clean clothes to wear tomorrow, so I will leave you with a thank you for sticking with me and a wish that you are finding plenty of time to play and be inky!

More Stamp Camping

Hello! I'm back with another creation from my stamping while camping day.  Today's card was quite possibly the easiest and fastest card I have ever made! So how did this miraculous card come about?  With a little help from a new product line from Stampin' UP called Paper Pumpkin!  This is like a club in that you can receive a new Paper Pumpkin kit at your door every month, however, you have the option to stop at any given time.  This kit contains everything you need to make the enclosed project with the exception of adhesive and a scissors to trim ends if needed.  Your first kit even comes with a clear block, and each kit contains ink and embellishments as well!

I have to admit that when this first released, I did not think this would be something I would personally use, but I signed up so I could show it to friends and customers.  I also thought they might make great give aways too!  Since I hadn't used them, I had several of these cute kits sitting on my shelf.  I decided to take one of the kits camping with me... just in case...  I am LOVIN' this concept now!  It was so amazingly easy to put the cards together and I love the fun sentiments! The third one (not shown) says 'love your guts'!  The quality is fantastic and I love that everything is precut.  These would also be so easy to modify to different designs if you didn't like the original or just didn't feel like making them all the same.  Plus at only $19.95 (shipping included in this price) it's a great deal too!  If you are interested in learning more about Paper Pumpkin you can go here to read all about it and you can even sign up at this site!  Just be sure to list me as your demonstrator!!

Have a wonderful rest of the week and happy crafting!

Card Recipe: All supplies from Paper Pumpkin kit