Spring-like Artfully Asian

This is the last of my 3 "oops" cards that each had something wrong with them. As I've mentioned, I made them for a friend that wanted some cards to make with her MIL and future SIL. I tried to keep them simple. I really like Pretty in Pink with Basic Black, and I threw in some Certainly Celery this time. It's a fun set and I hope you like the card! This one didn't have anything wrong with it so-to-speak, but I would have liked to put brads on the black strip, or ribbon somewhere, or something for some more detail. Since I wouldn't be there to show the ladies how to do stuff like that, I had to keep it super simple. I thought they would have fun crimping though - that's always a crowd-pleaser. Have a great weekend!!!!

Springy Card

This is card #2 in my trio of blundered cards. :) I had it just right - simple enough for my friend and her family to re-create at her home without me there, and then I had to go and touch it and put a big huge fingerprint/smudge right on the front!! I really like Pretty in Pink and Regal Rose with Apricot Appeal. Not necessarily both of the pinks together, but definitely with the Apricot. As a last little touch, I added some Diamond Stickles to the center butterfly (hope you can see them!) that I got at StarLitStudios - a great store! There's nothing too complicated about this card. Just some sponging, a little direct to paper inking on the outside of the Pretty in Pink square of CS, and some ribbon. That's it! I hope you like it. Thanks for looking and for your comments.

One of those days....

Have you ever had one of those days stamping, where everything you make has something wrong with it? Well, today was one of those days for me. I'm still going to share the 3 cards I made with you over the next few days because I think they're cute even though they have some flaws :)

This is my transparent Easter bunny card, with a somewhat French looking sentiment. I realized after I doodled my grass that I shouldn't have doodled in front of the bunny since I hadn't done any masking to make the bunny not show behind it. So, either the bunny is transparent, or I guess the grass could be too. Funny, huh? Another thing I did wrong was that when I was being lazy I stamped the eggs a little below the line of the basket, so I added some doodles to camouflage that mistake. Also, little Miss Sarah bumped me when I was stamping the sentiment, so not only is it crooked but the "s" has a funny little curly-cue on the bottom of it much like something I think I've seen on French c's or some other letter.

This card and the other two I will show you tomorrow and Saturday, were made so that they could be examples for a friend who wanted some cards to make with her mother-in-law and future sister-in-law because the weather had us all stuck inside this morning. I had to keep them simple because I wouldn't be there to walk them through everything and I didn't know how much stamping experience they all had. I cut all of the paper for them, and let her borrow all of the necessary stamps and ink. She paid me for the consumables which is always appreciated. As you'll see, there's very little embellishment on any of the three cards but I think they're all cute if I could just zap off the little flaws that came along with them at different points. Well, I hope you enjoy the card and get a laugh out of my mistakes. I'm sure we all make them at some point, I've just never messed up every single thing I sat down to make in one sitting before!!! LOL Take care!

How to Create Your Own Blog Roll

Ally Stamps said in a comment: I would love to put you on my blogroll but I am not sure how to do it! I tried and it came out all wrong so I have to get rid of it. Do you think you could explain to me how?

To answer her question, anyone using blogspot like me should be able to follow these directions.

After you've signed in and are viewing your blog:

1. Click in the upper right-hand corner on "customize" and then click in almost the exact same spot on "dashboard".

2. From there, make sure you're in the "page elements" section, which is a tab in the upper left-hand corner - click on it if you need to.

3. After you're there, you should see a column going down the right side of the screen with all of the items in your blog's sidebar. I guess if your sidebar is on the left when you view your blog, it might be on the left on this screen too. Mine are on the right, so that's what I see. Once you see that column, you'll notice that at the top of it is the words "Add A Page Element". Click on that, and then create a title for your blog roll like "Blog Roll" or some similar thing so people know what it is. Mine says "Blogs to Visit."

4. Now you simply fill in the blog URL and give it a title (I always fill the title of the persons blog exactly as they have it) and click the blue colored tab that says "Add Link". Here's the IMPORTANT thing to remember. Clicking on Add Link only adds the link, it doesn't save it. When you're adding multiple links, just keep adding them like you did the first.

5. When you're done adding all of the links you want, then you can click on the orange colored tab that says "Save Changes". This is what will make them stay there and appear on your blog.

When you want to add more in the future, you follow steps 1-2, skip 3, and instead of adding a page element which is step 3, you click on the blue word "Edit" that's in the box with the words describing your blog roll (whatever you decided to title it). Then you just pick back up with step 4, adding them the same way as above by typing in the URL, giving it a title, clicking add link, and saving changes when done making additions. Easy peasy??? Hopefully this helps some of you.

I'm hoping to do some stamping tomorrow morning so that tomorrow I'll have something fun to post. If you want me to add you to my blog roll, please visit this post by me and leave me your blog URL in a comment. Thanks, and take care!!!

No Artwork, But GREAT NEWS!!!!

The baby (gender still unknown, little stinker!!) is PERFECTLY FINE!!!!! The doctor said that there is a spot that a doctor can press on when doing an ultrasound that can actually cause Bradycardia (heart rate below 110 beats per minute - our little one's was 80 when all of this fuss started). She said she could show us but would rather not, and we said it was fine, we believed her :) She did a really thorough ultrasound with some fancy colors to observe the blood flow to/from the heart. Everything looked great. I am so excited about this doctor. At 36 weeks I'll get to transfer to being seen by her in hopes of a Vaginal Birth After Cesarean (VBAC). She is WONDERFUL and so optimistic and positive. I only wish I lived in San Antonio so I could start seeing her yesterday!!! Anyway, thanks for the prayers, thoughts and comments, we really appreciate them.

I would like to know if your blog links to mine but yours isn't in my "Blogs To Visit" in my sidebar. I would love to check out your blog and add a link. Even if your blog doesn't link to mine but you would like yours added to my sidebar that's fine too, so reply to this post with your blog and I'll add it to my Blog Roll.

Thanks so much and take care!!!!!

Fianlly some stamping!

A good friend of mine is being given a baby shower tomorrow after the birth of a little baby boy. They waited since the family doesn't find out what they're having. Well, I made her a bunch of thank you cards after seeing a card by Nichole Heady in the Papertrey Ink gallery. See her blog here, and see the card on Papertrey here. Below is my card. I used the Stampin' Up! Spring Showers DS paper which I love, Kraft, Whisper White and Chocolate Chip CS, Chocolate Chip Craft Ink, Bashful Blue Craft Ink, VersaMark, Pearl-Ex in Interference Green (it looks silver on the Bashful Blue) and some gold brads. That's about all. I hope you can see that I used Pearl Ex on the "stripes" on the butterfly's wings. I love this set from Papertrey called Butterfly Kisses. I just got it TODAY and actually got to use it within 24 hours!!! I hope she likes them, I made her 14 to give away.


I want to say thank you for all of the kind comments and thoughts that many of you have expressed to me over the last few days. I finally got my appointment set up in San Antonio for tomorrow, so hopefully after that we will be told it was just some weird occurrence and nothing is wrong. The range of possibilities for why the baby's heart rate was 80 bpm ranges from mere position of myself or the fetus to some kind of heart abnormality. It will be good to get answers. I feel like it's nothing because I've been paying extra close attention to the baby's movements, and it hasn't decreased it's kicks or jabs, and I've been told that the movement of a fetus is one of the strongest indicators of fetal health. As long as they're not frantic-seeming movements, of course. Who knows, maybe we'll even find out what "it" is!!! :) So, there will definitely not be anything new posted tomorrow, so take care!!

Sorry, Some Rambling....

I'm sorry you've not gotten any posts with pictures of cards and such. It turns out that what is making me feel lousy is Bronchitis, and of course you can't take a whole lot of anything when you're pregnant.

We're still dying to know 100% for sure what the baby is - I'm at 24 weeks and it's never taken this long except when Emma had her legs crossed and we only got an ultrasound at 16 and 30 weeks where I lived then. This doctor does them EVERY TIME!!! A friend of mine did an ultrasound on me (she's a nurse) and we REALLY thought we saw the family jewels several times, but when I went it for my monthly OB appointment 2 days later the doctor said he still didn't see anything there, but he didn't say "it's a girl" either. We were so excited after the ultrasound with my friend, and thought for sure the doctor would confirm it. His ultrasound machine is from the 80's though, and the place where my friend did it the machine is MUCH newer. The OB did detect a slower than normal heart rate though - I saw it clear as day too, so I have to go to San Antonio soon to be evaluated. I'm hoping that it's nothing. Both of my girls are so healthy I would be stunned to have a problem with this one. It's been kind of stressful and I'm just trying to not think about it.

We're getting ready for my parents to come to visit next week. It will be exciting and we'll celebrate Emma's birthday early with them because Emma thinks Nana (we say it more like Naw-Nuh than Nah-Nuh like most people - just not very emphatic on the "w" sound) and Baba coming means it's her birthday. :) We call my dad Baba because he is from Iran and the word for grandfather is much longer and harder to say, especially for a little one, than Baba (which means father). I don't know if it will stick when they're older but it's nice to have 4 grandparents each called something different so there's no confusion. My husband's parents are Memaw and Pepaw (no idea really how to spell those).

The hubby had to go in to work this morning because the base is getting ready for a big inspection called an Operational Readiness Inspection. When I was in the military I just happened to miss them at each base I was stationed at either by arriving there shortly after one, or moving right before one. They're pretty stressful for all involved because you don't want to be "the one" that messes up and gets called out on it for not having your paper work in line, or not knowing all of the rules and regulations of your job, etc. Since the ORI is the last week of March and the first few days of April, I'm not sure that my hubby will get to go with me to San Antonio for the appointment there to evaluate the Bradycardia.

With everything going on, I just wanted to let you know why I might be posting a lot less frequently for a while. I'm so astonished that there are so many of you who check in daily and even bother to subscribe to my feed to know when I have new posts. It gives me a warm fuzzy :) I promise that when things settle down, I will get back to having my usual "fresh" blog, with posts 5-6 days a week (never Sundays) so that you'll have something new to see every time you check in. If you're not subscribed, it might be beneficial to do that (in the right sidebar, it says subscribe with Feedblitz) so that you know when something's new and don't check each day and be disappointed. A benefit to Feedblitz is that you don't have do anything other than check your e-mail as you usually do, and you'll know if I've posted something new. Also, taking Robin Desko's advice in this post in her blog Rubber Stamped Reflections, I myself have started using Google Reader and it's AWESOME!! It does the same thing as Feedblitz, without cluttering my e-mail - you just log in and check your subscriptions that you've input in one spot. So, if you want to migrate your Feedblitz subscriptions to Google Reader instead, check out Robin's post on how to do it.

Anyway, take care everyone, and hopefully you'll hear from me next week! Have a great weekend!!!

Great Idea!

I don't scrapbook much but when I do, I'm a perfectionist about the whole process (maybe with other things in life too, but we won't talk about that!). I came across this post by Sharon Harnist on her blog Paper Fections today. It is a really great idea on how to get your photos the exact size you want without chopping off someone's head, or making the image be off-centered. Check it out along with the rest of her blog, it's a good one!

I feel pretty lousy today, so I won't be posting anything else but I didn't want to miss a day of posting because I like for the people who waste their time checking my blog to find something new every day. Take care!

Spring Mini Swap Fun #3 AND a Blogger's RAK - all from Teresa!!!

Boy, I was one lucky lady when I opened my mail yesterday. I got ANOTHER bloggers RAK!!! I was super excited, and it's from Teresa (love2Bcreative on SCS) who is in the swap group that I'm in. Since her RAK card went so well with the swap card she made, I decided to post them both today. Definitely check out her blog ...RUBBAH THOUGHTS & CREATIONS for some super cute cards she has to share. Anyway, Teresa is so thorough that I have complete recipes for you for each card, so here they are, and THANK YOU TERESA!!!


SPRING MINI SWAP CARD
Stamps: Polka Dots & Paisley, French Script BG, Linen BG, Tiny Talk
Ink: Vintage Violet, Old Olive, So Saffron, Rose Red marker, Old Olive marker
Card Stock: Marigold Morning, Vintage Violet, Old Olive, Rose Red, Naturals Ivory
Accessories: round tab punch, hodge podge hardware, Vintage Violet stitched grosgrain, Spring Moss grosgrain, sponges, slit punch, Crystal Effects (take a look at that top flower!)


BLOGGER RAK CARD
Stamps: Polka Dots & Paisley
Card Stock: Marigold Morning, Vintage Violet, Cranberry Crisp
Ink: Marigold Morning, Vintage Violet, Cranberry Crisp
Accessories: True Thyme stitched grosgrain, Ivory wide organdy, Gold cord, Stampin' dimensionals, large oval punch, ticket corner punch

Baby Name Frame

I had to get this frame done by tomorrow. My hope was to have done it this last weekend but you know how that goes :) Anyway, I used the Headline Alphabet for the letters and Chocolate Chip craft ink. Originally I was going to try to do white craft ink polka-dots on the brown letters, but when I stamped with my craft ink I got a weird texture to the letters. I decided I would just stick with that texture because it looked neat. I also stamped a little tiger cub all over the Kraft CS in VersaMark. I did this because each name frame I make for babies born into one of our squadrons here on the base (that's called the Tigers) has at least one of those tiger images stamped somewhere on the frame. The squadron commander's wife is actually the one who requests/purchases them from me for each new baby. What a cool gift, huh?!?! So, back to the frame - I used some Bashful Blue grosgrain ribbon on it that I got from Taylor's ribbon share a while back, and I used a little Chocolate Chip grosgrain too. The hardware is all Aged Copper, and that's about it! I hope she likes it. I have the hardest time getting what I see in my head down on the frame. It doesn't look quite like I pictured it, but I think it's okay. Not my favorite that I've done, unfortunately. Anyway, take care, and let me know what you think!

Happy Mail!!!

So, it's all gray and ugly here today and I have LOTS of cleaning to do from the weekend, so I didn't think I would get any stamping done today. Well, it still looks like I'm right, BUT I checked the mail and got this totally cute, happy card, from Lori (ltecler on SCS)!!!! Boy did she have good timing and the bright colors are great! The last RAK I got was back in August last year at my birthday from the RAK group on SCS, so I kind of gave up hope on being a recipient and just try to keep doing it as often as I can for other people. Anyway, her card is super cute and I love her blog Inking Aloud. She had the one of the neatest baby cards I've seen on there a few days ago - check it out!! Thanks so much Lori!!!

Hopefully....

I'm hoping to stamp today, but if I don't get to I will post one of the cards from the spring swap I was in. You've already seen two of them here and here. For now, figure out what kind of flower you are! :) Mine was perfect, as sunflowers are one of my absolute favorites. I don't really have one favorite. I saw this quiz on Allison's blog. Anyway, enjoy!

For some reason this quiz is not accompanied by a "description" of the traits people of the various flower types have. It's still cute though!

I am a Sunflower What Flower Are You?

Thinking Spring

First, Happy St. Patrick's Day! By accident I wore green today but forgot to put my girls in green, so I'll be changing their clothes if we go out again :)

I've been using a lot of dark colors lately because of my fun new Basic Grey Blush paper. So, I thought for this card I'll be using next month, I would try to stay bright and "springy." It doesn't really fit the recipient, but oh well, she'll get over it! :)

I used my Diamond Stickles on the centers of the flowers (flowers, circles and sentiment from my Paper Tray set) and also on the centers of the little flowers in the heart that's from the Simply Said SU! stamp set (the main image). The strip of Pretty in Pink patterned paper is from the Spring Mini paper pack called Petals & Paisleys. The bottom Apricot Appeal CS was stamped with the Dotted BG stamp from SU!. Obviously, the colors I used to stamp were Apricot Appeal and Pretty in Pink. My brads were the pink ones from the SU! Soft Subtles brads. The ribbon is SU!'s Apricot grosgrain. I rounded some corners with my corner rounder punch, and that's about it! I hope you enjoy it. Have a great Sunday and I'll post again on Monday. Take care.

Even if it Makes Me Lose....

At the risk of decreasing my own odds of winning, I thought I would refer you to Beate's latest blog candy. Her amazing talent has drawn us stamping folk to her blog like flies to, well, you know ;) So, go enter in her contest and feel free to send it to me if you win and don't want it (you would have to be a little on the crazy side to not want it!) and congratulate her on 50,000 hits!!!!

Blank Coasters

I've had several questions about the coasters I've used/talked about on here. If you're interested in purchasing blank coasters like I offered in this share, to make things like this, here's the link to the thread on SCS that has the contact info. I will just tell you that the prices have increased ever-so-slightly since whoever posted them in the thread. Nothing too drastic, but don't be surprised that they're different. Here's the link.

Blog candy WINNER, my NEW BANNER, plus a CARD!!

Well, little miss Emma (as you can see above) drew 2 numbers to decide the winner of my blog candy. For the first digit, I had her draw from 0-7 and for the 2nd digit it was 0-9. She drew a 2 and a 7, so lucky commenter #27 is the winner. Who was that you want to know? It was Jane (troopersma on SCS)!!!! She said: My favorite right now is Sophie. She's a shepherd/chow mix. We got her from a friend who'd rescued her from an abusive home. She has these gorgeous brown eyes that are so expressive that sometimes I swear there is a person inside her. We also have a Shih-Tzu but he's on my SHIH list because he won't quit peeing in the house since I went back to work. I think he's mad that he isn't getting as much attention.Her comment cracked me up. I just loved reading what all of you had to say. Some comments were really funny, some were touching, and some were sad. It was sad to see how many of you have a favorite pet that's no longer alive, or has recently passed away. I know it's like losing a member of the family, and I agree with Lynda when she says she's saddened to hear that people don't like pets. Allergies are one thing, or possible situations where your job takes you away too much (like in the military sometimes) to allow for a pet, but they are so wonderful. They teach unconditional love, and they teach you that there are people/animals that depend on you just to live and especially for kids that's a great lesson in responsibility. Anyway, off of my soap box. THANK YOU TO ALL WHO COMMENTED! It was a lot of fun. JANE - please e-mail me your address so I can get your blog candy sent ASAP (mcclellans@stx.rr.com).

Geez, you ask me to pick ONE pet? I have loved most all of my pets (I guess the exclusion would be some of the kids' pet critters which weren't truly mine to begin with).

 

Do you like my new blog banner?!?!?!? It was made just for me by Beth Silaika (MyPrecious on SCS). Her blog Freckled Fun Designs can give you all the info you need to get your very own custom made blog banner or watermark. She was super patient with me, and even helped me upload it onto my blog when I was having some technical difficulties. I wanted something with a "doodled" look and I told her my color preferences and what I was seeing for the font of the title, and boy did she deliver! Go check her out, you won't regret it and it's small change well spent for a little personalization.


This last picture is a card that I made the other day and I think I will use it for another Blogger's RAK that I'm part of on SCS. To be in it, you just have to be on the SCS RAK list, and then you go here on SCS to join the Blogger's RAK group. I have to pick who to send it to, and I hope they like it! I used the Doodle This set from the Spring Mini to stamp the flower image in Brow StazOn on watercolor paper. I then colored it in with my Aqua Painter using Cranberry Crisp and More Mustard re-inkers. Next, I used some of that fun Basic Grey Blush paper along with my Big Shot and the Cuttlebug Swirls (I think that's the name of it!) embossing folder to finish the look. A tiny bit of polka-dot organdy ribbon was added along with the stamped "hello" sentiment from my Paper Tray stamp set. Let me know what you think, and happy weekend!!!

********Today I enabled the setting that allows others to use blogger reader and other such programs to ping my blog to check for updates. If I understand right, previously to now you could not add my blog to your list and get updates. Either way, now we're good to go! :)

10,000 HITS BLOG CANDY, and meet Gretel !!!!!

WOW, my blog has finally reached 10,000 hits, so in lieu of a picture of a swap card, here's the blog candy announcement. I want to give a big thanks to all of you that stop in here. Reading your comments gives me warm fuzzies and makes me feel good when I know that I actually inspired someone else. I don't live around very many people that are creative in the rubber stamping way, so it's nice to have support - even if it is from people I may never meet. Thanks for all of your kind words. I don't use my comment section to reply to people's compliments, but understand that I really do appreciate them and I read every single one. If you take the time to e-mail me, I will always do my best to get back to you - unless your e-mail won't accept mine ;) Ha ha, huh, SuzieQ? Anyway, without further ado, here's the BLOG CANDY I promised followed by a picture of the newest member of our family. I will explain each photo.

The winner of this blog candy will receive a lunch box tin (fits A2-sized cards) that can be altered to hold cards, recipes, memories, etc. Also included is one of those fun $1 stamps from Michael's, 30 (2 each of 15 colors) Giga Scallop Circle punched pieces of card stock, 30 accompanying neutral colored Mega Circle punched pieces of card stock, 10 blank, 4x4, medium weight alterable coasters, some gold ribbon from Michael's, a baggie of assorted color and size Prima flowers, and lastly, a CTMH incentive stamp that I earned and have never used (it says "love" and is sitting on the coasters). What do you have to do to win this Blog Candy? Well, in honor of our newest family member, Gretel, leave a comment telling me about your favorite pet. Who it is, was, would be, something that they did, etc. If you don't have one, or perhaps don't like them, you can just leave a comment saying "enter me" or something of the sort. If you enter anonymously, you can't win, so make sure to sign in with your name. It's a silly thing to comment on, but I thought it might prove interesting. Here is a picture of Gretel, I hope the quality is okay, my father took it ;)

Gretel is a 6 week old Pug, that we got to add to our family and hopefully provide a little more companionship to Oscar (our 1 year-old Pug - see him in this post) than we are able to provide him. I find that we are far busier and out-of-the-house than I would have expected, and I don't want Oscar to feel alone. A dog isn't like a cat and they don't seem to enjoy solitude quite as much. My mom got Gretel for us in Kentucky (where I was born/lived until going to the Air Force Academy) because we couldn't find a breeder here in Texas that we liked. She's tiny still, and we'll miss the next couple of weeks with her until my parents arrive here for a visit the first week in April. Emma named Oscar (we think after Oscar the Grouch), and so fittingly, we asked her what we should name this puppy. Had we asked Sarah, it probably would have been Poo-Poo as it is, unfortunately, one of her favorite things to say right now. We didn't want to disappoint her with not using her name, nor name the puppy something awful. :) So, Emma said Gretel right away, with almost no hesitation, and Gretel it is! It's funny, as we are approaching the birth of our 3rd child, we ask the girls what we should name it if it's a boy, or a girl, and neither one of them will say anything. Ask about a puppy and there isn't even a pause!!! They do want a baby though, and Emma can't wait for it to arrive. She thinks my tummy isn't growing fast enough, but I disagree!! :)

I will leave this post up until the drawing (we'll let Emma do the honors again) on Friday at 12:00 p.m. Central Time (that's noon). It gets too annoying to have to fudge dates/times to keep a post at the top with blogspot, so you will have to bear with no posts until Friday announcing the winner and definitely with some stamped items for you to look at. Take care, and I look forward to hearing what you say!

OPEN: Spring - Themed Card Swap

I'm hosting a spring-themed card swap, and here's the info I sent to my mailing list:

Stampers,

I would like to propose a spring-themed swap. What do I mean by spring? Well, birds, flowers, Easter, cute little animals, the kinds of things that remind us all of spring. It’s a pretty flexible swap theme.

The only requirements are that you use Stampin’ Up! ink/card stock and stamps. The other embellishments you use can be from SU! or any other source you would like.

These will be card fronts only. If you wish to do a full card that is fine, but you don’t have to. A card front is a quarter-sheet of card stock, and it measures 5 ¼” x 4”. For those of you new to swaps, this means you get 4 card bases out of one sheet of card stock – it’s like cutting a card in half so that it doesn’t open/close.

I will close sign-ups for this swap on Thursday March 22^nd and they will be due in to me by Thursday April 5^th so that I can get them out to everyone on Friday April 6^th. Please deliver them in one of the larger-sized Ziploc bags so that all of the swaps you get back will fit. Sandwich-size bags are often too small and damage the cards.

If you no longer live in Del Rio (are reading this on my blog, for instance) and would like to participate, simply mail your swap in a Ziploc bag for protection, along with a SASE inside (with an extra couple of loose stamps in your baggie just in case – they will be returned if unused), and I will get them back to you ASAP.

If you would like to participate, simply reply back to this e-mail and I will keep track and let everyone know how many CARD FRONTS they have to make – it will be one card front per person that signs up. So, for example, if 12 people sign up you will have to make 12 card fronts (that’s just 3 pieces of card stock for the bases of the cards – super easy). Blog readers, please e-mail me (in my profile there is a link) to sign up and I will e-mail you back my mailing address - PLEASE honor the deadline and have your swaps in my hands by then).

I can e-mail you some “generic” card-swap instructions if you request them.

I can’t wait to see what you make!

Bind-It-All

I thought I would give you all (but specifically ) more information on the Bind-It-All. I don't have one yet, but I'm extremely interested. I've seen lots of great projects made with them. Debbie Olson uses one (Thinking Inking) and has made some super cute stuff, click on the link to see a gorgeous notebook. I know you can get one from eclectic Paperie, here. They are about 1/2 the price of a RubiCoil, and here's the product description off of eclectic Paperie:

Product Description

The Bind-It-All is a portable binding maching that can go through chipboard, CDs, and even plastic credit cards. It needs no electricity and is small enough to fit in the palm of your hand. When you are ready to bind, you simply choose your spirals and push the handle down to crimp.

So, as you can maybe tell (or maybe not), the Bind-It-All can go through much thicker items than the RubiCoil. My RubiCoil can not make it through a patterned paper covered medium weight blank coaster. I haven't tried it on one that's not covered in paper, but patterned paper is so thin I'm thinking I already know the answer. Plus, who wants to have to poke out all of the holes you cover on the coaster with paper?!!?!? Anyway, I hope this little bit of info helps you. I will let you know if/when I get a Bind-it-All. You'll have to tell me what you like about it if you have one, or if you're going to get one. I've been missing hearing from a lot of you.

Later today I'll post a pic of a swap card. Take care!

My Cards for the Troops are Off!

Well, either in today or tomorrow's mail, I will be sending FIFTY cards (with envelopes) to Debbi in support of our troops. You may remember this post telling you about this great cause that Debbi is a part of. She is a member of Operation Mom, and I hope that this little bit helps them in their efforts to support our troops. To see more info about Debbi and Operation Mom, click here. Here is a picture of the cards. I made all but 4 or 5 of them. I didn't have many swap cards sitting around to add because everyone always does card fronts. I'm kind of happy that almost all of them are cards I made. They are for all different occasions: Thank You, Mother's Day, Father's Day, In Sympathy, Thinking of You, Happy Birthday, etc. (even a couple of Halloween cards in there - heck Army troops are usually deployed for 1 year+ at a time!!!) Anyway, if you've got spare cards around, check out the info on this great cause and get them out to people who could use them!!! Thanks.

"Notes" Book

I made this little book for myself for keeping track of stuff at church. I used my RubiCoil to punch the holes in a piece of same-sized scrap paper so that I could then use my hand-held 1/8" circle punch to punch all of the holes. A pain, but the RubiCoil couldn't punch through the matboard that was covered in DS paper (if I only had a Bind It All....) I simply cut up notebook paper for the inside and the RubiCoil easily punched through that (in small stacks). It's simple, but I thought it was cute, and of course it has a matching pen. I covered 2 pieces of mat board with the Au Chocolat DS paper in the Spring Mini. I made the paper fold over onto the inside and then I reversed the polka-dot paper so that the other side of that lovely 2-sided paper was glued on the inside to cover the paper that was folded in. Make sense? I should have taken a picture of that too - oh well. I used the smaller flower from Doodle This (Spring Mini) and some of my "Flirty" ribbon left over from what I purchased from the Winter Mini. The Ruby Red has some ugly little hand-drawn doodles along it's edges. One of these days I'll get good at that! ;) I used my Paper Tray stamp set to stamp the word "note", and used another word that began with "s" to add the "s" to it. Definitely an advantage that this stamp set is clear - no Stamp-A-Ma-Jig needed to add that little "s" so it was a pretty quick add-on. I punched that out with my small oval punch and put some lovely Aged Copper hardware over the top, and I was finished!

Tomorrow will begin another round of me posting Spring Swap cards that I received because I don't see myself getting any stamping done today. The kitchen is a mess from the weekend, and I have laundry to do. I would love to have a maid if (1) we could afford that luxury, and (2) I could actually bear to LET them clean up our mess/dirt. Anyone else like that? I don't like other people cleaning up my house - especially doing laundry or cleaning bathrooms or definitely doing anything in MY bedroom! Oh well, I'll just have to start paying myself! :)

Don't forget, when I get to 10,000 hits on my blog, I will offer up my blog candy contest. I think it's a good one, especially for anyone who likes to STAMP, or ALTER THINGS, and so on.... :)

Take care!

PS - the "goof" on the address book I made for my friend (see yesterday's post), was that the "N" in Lindsey was mounted upside-down on my block, so when I stamped it, it was upside down :)

Gift for a Friend

Well, as is the "norm" in the military, I said goodbye today to a really good friend. I wanted to give her something nice in addition to this "friend" card, so I got an address book at Wal-Mart and destroyed the cover by ripping the paper off of it on the front/back and insides so that I could re-cover it with my own. I hope she enjoys it. The first picture is of the book head-on with the pen, and the second is just of the book at an angle (I like this picture better but wanted you to see the little pen too). I had the ladies that went to her farewell lunch all fill in their info with the beaded pen I made to match. I will miss Lindsey and hope to see her again. I used the Au Chocolat paper from the Spring Mini, along with the tried and true stamp set Heartfelt Thanks. The colors I used were Chocolate Chip, Ruby Red, and Very Vanilla. On the flower, it's Always Artichoke for the stem (I meant to use Old Olive - oops!). The background stamps used were Linen, Print Pattern and French Script. The brown ribbon is some that I have left from the Flirty ribbon that was in the Winter Mini (Flirty was that what it was called, right?) . For the her name, I used the Classic Alphabet stamp set, and for "friends" I used last year's Sell-A-Bration set called Noteworthy. It has a stamp that says "friend" and I added an "s." On the pen there is Vanilla, Chocolate, and brown polka-dot ribbon tied on the pen cap. Let me know what you think! Until Monday, enjoy!

PS - Does anyone see what I goofed on the book? I don't think Lindsey did. :)

Less than 500 to go!

First, REMEMBER TO SET YOUR CLOCKS ONE HOUR AHEAD TONIGHT BEFORE YOU GO TO BED!! This means my girls will be in the car, going to church at what was only 7:30 a.m. the day before!!! Sarah isn't even usually up by then, augh!!!!

As for the less than 500 to go, I'm talking about hits I need before I post my blog candy contest for reaching 10,000 posts. I have some fun things to give away and hope to get to 10,000 sometime Monday or Tuesday. Have a great weekend!

COMMENT MODERATION

I will post something creative later today, either mine or from the Spring Mini swap I was in. I just wanted to let everyone know that for various reasons, I'm switching to comment moderation on my blog. That just means you won't see your comment right away - I have to approve it. Don't let this stop your comments though! I LOVE to hear from each of you and what you think, or even little tidbits about yourselves. Thanks for supporting my blogging efforts!!!! 10,000 hits is around the corner, along with some great blog candy!!!! :)

Masculine Birthday Card

So, if you came to my blog once already this morning, no - you're not crazy! This post was not here. I "fudged" the time/date stamp on the post so that my Comment Moderation post would stay at the top. Anyway, I created this card for my father-in-law's birthday. It's on St. Patrick's Day, so I had to get it in the mail ASAP so it could get all the way to Mexico where they live right now. I tried to keep it simple. I feel like masculine cards don't usually need much embellishment. On this card, I relied on my old-faithful male stamp set, Artifacts. I used the DS paper from SU! called Treehouse. My card was a True Thyme base with Buckaroo Blue on the bottom and More Mustard behind the Very Vanilla stamped center piece. I did direct to paper inking on the edges of the Vanilla piece and stamped off my Print Pattern and Weathered BG stamps before applying them to the parts of the card that they are on. I stamped the Happy Birthday from the Warmest Regards hostess stamp set. For the "star" image, I used the rock and roll technique to roll the Buckaroo Blue inked star in the True Thyme. I hope you like it and that he does too!

Check out these BLOG CANDY contests!!!

This is another "fudged" time/date stamp post so that I can keep my Moderating Comments post at the top.


CHECK OUT THESE TWO GREAT BLOG CANDY CONTESTS!!!!!

Sharon Harnist is giving away a hard-to-find Marvy Uchida Giga Scalloped Square Punch on her blog PaperFections.

Debbie Olson is giving away a 1 1/2" circle punch - a must have to coordinate with SU!'s circle punches - on her blog Thinking Inking.

Check them out!!

Big Shot, Cuttlebug Embossing Folders and Basic Grey Paper - New Stuff to Play With!

So, long story short - I won a Big Shot on eBay. Remember how I posted that I was trying to figure out if I wanted one or not? You can see my post about that here. Well, I bid on one and never thought I'd win it since I thought my max bid of $65.00 seemed low since it was like half-price. Well, I WON! So, I got my Big Shot and after winning it I went to eclectic Paperie and bought some Cuttlebug embossing folders and when I was in San Antonio I bought the little 2 x 2 flower dies that I've seen everywhere (wanted to see them in person, but I think that eclectic Paperie does carry them). Along with the embossing folders I got at eclectic Paperie I also purchased a Basic Grey 6x6 Blush pad of paper.

I LOVE eclectic Paperie and highly recommend them. They are a great online store to do business with. I have a couple more Basic Grey pads I'm going to order from them today, along with a heart die, and I pre-ordered some CB embossing folders from them for April as well. They're going to love me!! :)

Well, the stuff I bought and have received has all been sitting here for about 2 weeks now and I decided I just had to finally dig into it. I also decided I didn't want to save the card until I was done with all of the swap cards (I may regret that later if I don't get time to stamp!) so I hope you like it!

Details on the card: I used my Cuttlebug A2 embossing folder called Bloom Dots on the piece of Sage Shadow CS. That is mounted on Blush Blossom CS because the A2 folders emboss at a size slightly smaller than your standard card. The Blush paper I mounted on Cranberry Crisp CS and tied a piece of the stitched Cranberry grosgrain ribbon (still available as a write-in from SU!) around it. Lastly, I used my totally fun stamp set Paper Tray from papertrey ink for all of the stamping. I used the flower that they have and flipped it over and used the back-side of the flower to make the Creamy Caramel outline on my Cranberry Crisp Bloom. I also used the stamps that make the centers of the flower and colored them about half-way to create my leaves. I was trying to mimic the patterns on the flowers on the Blush paper. Anyway, the "hello" is also form the Paper tray stamp set too. I did some light sponging of Chocolate Chip on the edges of the Whisper White CS and that's about it! Let me know what you think, and take care!!!

Blog Candy Heads-Up!

Hello out there! I was just looking at my blog counter and realized that I'm within 1000 hits of having 10000 views!!! Well, for those of you familiar with Beate's blog fresh & fun, it took her only 3 months to hit 10,000 and then just ONE MORE to hit 20,000!!! So, while it's taken me about 5 to get to 10,000 it's still amazing to me that I'm even up that high. So, just a little FYI, when I hit 10,000 I'm going to have some really fun blog candy for you to win. So, keep checking!!! :)

Here's my Spring Mini Swap Fun #2 for your viewing enjoyment. This card was made by Chris Smith. She has a really wonderful blog (it's in my links on the side) called "from my ink pad to yours" and you should check it out after you view her card. Here it is:


The first view of the cards is with it shut, and the 2nd is with the card open, to display how she created a circle window into the card so that you can see the little flower stamped inside. I love her faux stitching around the outside of the circle window! Chris used the Doodle Alphabet and Doodle That stamp sets from the Spring Mini. She also used the Seaside Ribbon Originals and the colors used for markers and paper are Sage Shadow, Bashful Blue, and Whisper White (with a white Signo gel pen for the colored parts in the letters). I just love the simplicity of this card and I'm a huge fan of Bashful Blue, so this is one of my favorites in the swap. Thanks Chris!!! Be sure to leave her comments here about her card, and take a second to visit her blog! Take care.

Spring Mini Swap Fun #1

I took part in a fun swap with some ladies on SCS with the theme of using Spring Mini catalog items. I got my swaps in the mail today and they are GORGEOUS!!!! I decided a while back to share some of them with you (creators permitting) so that I can take a break myself from having to create a project for each daily post. I've been super busy lately and it's been hard to make sure I have a project for each post I hope to do (every day but Sunday) each week and to keep the creative juices flowing. I've been in a slump. Well, the ladies in this swap certainly didn't let me down, or you!! So, the first featured swap artist is Janet Creech (njcreech). She didn't have a blog to link you to, but click here to see her SCS gallery and here's her card:


Janet has a great gallery, you should make sure to click on that link and check it out and leave her a few comments. I'm sure she will appreciate comments left on her card here as well since she doesn't have a blog of her own for you to post them to.

As far as these swap cards go, I will do my best to let you know at least what stamp sets were used, or other items from the Spring Mini that appear on the card. Some came with recipes, some didn't. Janet used the Spring Mini stamp set "Office Accoutrement" for all of her stamping except for the "thanks" which comes from the stamp set "Much Appreciated". The Chocolate Chip paper is actually from the Spring Mini Designer Series Double-Sided "Notations" Paper pack. She also used BOTH of the great new punches available in the Spring Mini. The one that made the tab is called a Round Tab Punch, and the one that made the notebook-like holes is the Spiral Punch. It's great for making your own books and such. I love this card and it gives you an idea of the great cards you can expect to see as I post more from this swap. Thanks for looking, and take care!

Baby Doodles

I got my Doodle Alphabet and Doodle That sets from the Spring Mini today and just had to play around with it. I messed up FIVE of my card fronts with fingerprints from the colored in flowers and letters - augh!!! It took forever to get this one, and it had a tiny smudge. I got some bleach on a paper towel and DABBED on top of the smudge and it pretty much disappeared. I won't tell you where it was, see if you can see it :) It's a great way to get rid of tiny little smudges and works at least with Perfect Plum fingerprints. I'm not sure about other colors. Anyway, I used my Doodle Alphabet and Doodle That sets to make this card, along with Simple Sayings for the sentiment at the bottom and Warm Words for the "welcome" at the top. I used Pale Plum, Perfect Plum, Whisper White and Slumber Party patterned papers for this card. I used Plum, Rose and Pink grosgrain and Soft Subtles pink brads. My small corner rounder was taken apart to make the scallops and I used my Stamp-a-Ma-Jig for stamp placement of the "welcome" to make sure it didn't seem crooked. The inspiration from this card came from a card Heather Nichols posted on her blog. See that card here. I hope that whatever little girl is born next that I give a gift to has a mommy that enjoys receiving this card! Take care!

SCS Blogger RAK Group

Most of you are probably familiar with Splitcoaststampers.com and if you're not, there's a link to it on the right side of your screen in my sidebar. I am a member of the RAK group which you can access here in the forum section of the site. If you're a member of the RAK group you can now be a member of the new Blogger's RAK group which can also be accessed through the RAK link I posted above. I thought that this new group sounded like fun so I signed up and made my first card today. Now I just have to decide who to send it to! I tried to keep the layout and composition of the card clean and simple, and I think I succeeded. I was going to do an only black and white card but couldn't resist adding a splash of color with the Petals & Paisleys DS paper that's in the Spring Mini. I used the flower and flourish from the Doodle This stamp set (which I LOVE), the sentiment from my Papertrey stamp set called Paper Tray , and Black StazOn ink for all of the stamping. I used my ticket corner punch and some black brads for a little added detail, and that's about it! I hope she (whoever she ends up being) likes it! Take care!

Cards for Troops

As most of you know, I don't post on Sunday's. Well, I got an e-mail from a nice lady named Debbi about something she thought I would be interested in participating in. She was right! I didn't want to wait to tell everyone about it either.

Please see Debbi's blog (click here) for a really great way to make use of cards that you have sitting around, or simply a fun cause to get out that rubbah' and ink and start stamping for. Debbi's son is in the US Army and she's a member of a group that supports our troops. She has lots more info on it in her post and on her blog, so check it out.

I'm going to be sending a card her way. Having been a part of the US Air Force as an Active Duty member myself for over 7 years, and being a spouse to an AF pilot, I know the demands that the military places on our troops and they deserve all of the support and prayers that we can possibly give them.

Do you want a FREE Giga Scalloped Oval Punch?!?!?

Gina K. is giving one away on her blog. Check it here for your chance to win it. I made my note cards that I posted earlier today with it's companion (great for matting purposes) the Mega Oval Punch. The Mega Oval punch is a little smaller than the Giga Scalloped Oval punch so they make great cards and who wouldn't want to win the Scalloped one as it is all the rave right now in the stamping world? So stop reading and go check it out!

Simple Notecards

Well, my husband is out of town this weekend, so I won't be able to do much stamping because I try to do it when he's around and can keep an eye on the kids. I've already lost nap time as stamping time because my oldest, Emma, no longer needs naps. That means I don't have two sleeping children anymore, and I feel like I'm ignoring them when I'm stamping. My girls have also been pretty sick the past few days with fevers one day and then nothing the next, and HORRIBLE coughs. Myself, for once it seems I haven't caught what they have, but wheter it's because I'm pregnant or maybe not, my allergies are the worst that they have EVER been. I might as well be sick too. With all of that going on, these are what I managed to squeeze in. Hopefully I'll be able to do something more today for next week's posts. I made some simple note cards to give as thanks to ladies that helped at Church on Friday. We had to feed 30 hungry missionaries and they helped us make the food and I just wanted to give them a thanks from myself and the other ladies that asked for their assistance.

Anyway, these cards were rather simple to make. I used my Marvy Uchida Mega oval punch to punch out a mask. I then placed this on my Whisper White note card and sponged in the various colors you see (from left to right: Pretty in Pink, YoYo Yellow, Almost Amethyst, Cool Caribbean). Lastly, using my Black StazOn - I hardly use Basic Black anymore! I used one of my very first Michael's $1 stamps to stamp the sentiment. I wish I had had more time to dig through that stamp bin! I only purchased 4 of the $1 stamps and would have loved to have gotten more. Oh well, I'll start small :) I hope you like these note cards. Take care until Monday!

Better Early Than Not At All....

I made a card for Emma's birthday the other day. The good thing is, I have until April 21st to give it to her, so it's DONE! I didn't even make one for her last year, I'm such a bad mommy!!!! This year I said to myself, "I have time right now, so I'm going to do it right now and just let it sit!" Here's the card, both opened, and closed (so that you can see the pop-up in the circle window better):


For this card, I used my brand new Petals jumbo wheel from the SU! Spring Mini. I used Taken with Teal ink to roll it on my Cool Caribbean paper. Also on the card is some of the now unavailable Winter Mini DS Paper "Loves Me". I used some of it behind the circle in the little window (the pink part is the DS paper). I made use of my newly purchased oval and circle cutting systems from Creative Memories to cut the ovals that are mounted on the left-hand side of the card. The bottom oval layer is Taken With Teal. I used my large SU! oval punch to punch out Birthday Beauty and then trimmed it to fit on the circle that I punched with my SU! 1-1/4" punch. To make the window I simply used the SU! 1-3/8" punch and popped the smaller circle up with a dimensional. The ribbon is some rose grosgrain and some light pink polka-dotted organdy. Now for the fun part! I used Primas on the left side with some pink brads. I love Primas!!! I stamped the little girl from the Birthday Beauty stamp set both on a piece of Whisper White (which was later matted on the Pretty in Pink piece) and on a piece of the light pink DS Loves Me paper. I stamped it on the paper so that I could cut out her dress and adhere it to the Whisper White piece. I thought it looked cute for a dress. Next, I added Dazzling Diamonds glitter (via use of my 2-way glue pen) to her sash and the light dots on her dress. I colored her in with my Prismacolor pencils and blended with my blending stump and some baby oil. Then I added a last touch of glitter to her crown. Well, that's how I made her card! I think I may go back and add some pink circles to her cheeks to give them a little "color", what do you think?

I thought I would post a picture of our Pug, Oscar. He's the one that chewed through our internet cable about a week ago. He had his very first bath from someone other than me (or my hubby) this week, and he came home so pretty with a little blue bow and he smelled SO GOOD that I will never bother to wash him myself again (at least as long as we live here). Plus, the great thing about taking him to a groomer who only charged $23 for EVERYTHING (brushing, bath, nails clipped, ears cleaned, dip, perfume) is that I got to stay dry through the whole process! Definitely a bonus to not smell like wet dog myself. Oscar's a little hard to bathe....Anyway, here's our cute "little" guy (he's actually pretty big as far as pugs go):

Comment Help?

Before I show you my little card for the day, I was hoping you could help me. Yesterday I received an e-mail from Juanita saying that she really wanted to leave a comment, but couldn't. Is anyone else having this problem? I have NO IDEA what to do about it if you are, but it will at least let me know that I have a problem that needs to be fixed. I don't always get comments on everything, so I hadn't thought anything about the fact that for the past two posts there were none. Thanks in advance for trying to comment to let me know if you're having a problem. I guess if I have another "zero" comments post, I'll know something is up. Thanks!!!

This card I made yesterday with the stamp set I chose as part of my free merchandise from being a hostess on my most recent order. I love it when I get to do that!!! Anyway, I hadn't wanted to buy it because I didn't want to buy EVERYTHING in the Winter Mini when I knew that not all of it would come back in the Idea Book and Catalog and thus I couldn't demonstrate with it anymore (if I wanted to offer current merchandise to my customers). So - I got it for FREE as a hostess to my own workshop and I used it on the very last day of the Winter Mini catalog promotion!! LOL The stamp set is Love Matters for the word "friend" and the other one used is also from the Winter Mini and is called Small Sayings. I used a marker to break up the words and place them on my circle in a different manner than they are on the stamp. Gotta love markers!!! Anyway, the paper with the large Taken with Teal circles on it is from the Winter Mini paper pack called Loves Me, while the paper with the smaller light Cool Caribbena polka dots is from the NEW Spring Mini catalog and is called Petals & Paisleys. It coordinates perfectly with 2 stamp sets in the Spring Mini and one Jumbo Wheel also in the Spring Mini. I LOVE this paper!!! I will have to stock up on it before the Spring Mini goes away on June 30th. I used my new circle cutting system to cute the large matted circle on the card, and it's made by Creative Memories. I have a friend who is a consultant for them. The rest is pretty self-explanatory. I just colored in the letters with my markers, added some ribbon, and that was it!

*****Did you know that SU! has a new special ??????*****

CATCH THE FEVER!!!!!

Customers/hostesses can receive 50 percent off any one item from the new Spring Mini Catalog, but ONLY in the month of March. Here's how:

• Purchase the Polka Dots & Paisley Bundle (item # 109145, $34.85) and receive 50 percent off any one item of their choice from the Spring Mini Catalog. The Polka Dots & Paisley Bundle includes:
  • Polka Dots & Paisley stamp set
  • Petals Jumbo wheel
  • Petals & Paisley Designer Series Paper
  
  
• There is no limit to the number of bundles that a customer may purchase on an order. With each bundle purchase, she qualifies for an additional item from the Spring Mini Catalog at 50 percent off.

• Hold a $400 workshop and receive 50 percent off any one item of their choice from the Spring Mini Catalog.

• Click here to see the Spring Mini Catalog

Contact me if you would like to place an order today to get ANY ONE ITEM in the Spring Mini Catalog at 50% OFF!!!! See my SU! website for more details on this great promotion - just click on "SPECIALS" at the top of the page.

Win a CUTTLEBUG just for posting a comment!!!!!

I wish I could say that I'm able to give one away myself. I stumbled across Julie Brooks' blog (click on her name to go there), and she's giving one away absolutely FREE just for you posting a comment with your favorite BasicGrey product or color scheme. Enjoy (both her great blog, and entering in her blog candy contest)!