Crazy Crafty Creations

Zebra stripe cake

2011-01-18T00:12:00.000-08:00

In mid December my hubby's cousin contacted me and asked me if I could help her out and make a cake for her mom's big birthday coming up. (she was turning 39 with 11 years experience. ;)) So after the holidays we got together for a little consult to discuss what she had in mind. The theme of the party was 39 again. It was a surprise party. Her mom loves animal print, particularly zebra print, so I was asked if I could do a cake with zebra print.

The inside of the cake was alternating layers of white and devils food chocolate. I did a strawberry filling in between each layer and covered it in buttercream frosting. Then I covered it with white fondant and did zebra stripes out of black fondant. I finished it off with purple ribbon and a sign on top (made with dowels, and SU cardstock) that said 39 again! Here is the finished product. I was pretty pleased with how it turned out. Not bad for my first fondant cake in a couple of years.

Christmas card 2010

2011-01-14T20:14:00.001-08:00

I know this is way late, but here is this years Christmas card. I made it before Christmas so I didn't have an updated family photo to go with it. So I will include this years Christmas Eve photo as well for those who want to see it.

Anyhow, for the Christmas card I used My Digital Studio from SU.

What a good flash can do for a photo

2010-12-29T09:52:00.000-08:00

O.k. Don't fall over dead k? Yes, I'm still alive, and yes, I'm actually posting! I know, shocking right? These past several months have been crazy! Emily is now 5 months old. We're only a month away from being able to finalize her adoption! I can't wait!!! For those that have asked about Em's birthmom, she is doing fabulous! She actually spent Christmas morning with us so that was great to have her here. :D For more on our lives, and our adoption, you can check out our adoption/family blog here. For now, I wanted to share a few things with you. I'll be doing separate posts for each.

The first is all about my new camera flash that I got for Christmas! In September I took a fabulous and fun photography workshop hosted by a couple of fantastic Pro Photographers I know. During this workshop they covered just about everything you'd ever want to know about photography. Including flashes. They mentioned a type of off camera flash where you can bounce the light off of various things because it has a rotation and tilt to the flash. This happened to be one of the things I mentioned to my husband I would like for Christmas.

I have a fairly decent camera, a Canon Rebel xsi. It's a 12.2 mp. For my needs I don't need any more. I would like to get a couple of newer and nicer lenses, but for now, like I said, what I have works. But I didn't have a good flash. All I had was the on camera flash and a really cheapo flash that would blind everyone who I took pics of so I never used it. So my hubby decided he would get me a new flash for Christmas. What I wanted was a flash that had a 360 degree rotation with a 90 degree tilt. He probably got a nicer one then what I needed, but I'm really happy with it so I'm not complaining. He got this one, a Speedlite 580EX II.

Here is an example of what a good flash can do for your photos. Now, I'm not a pro by any means, just a hobbyist, so keep that in mind, these are just snap shots that I did.

For this first pic, I didn't use a flash at all. This is just the seriously bad lighting in my kitchen, not to mention that my incredibly adorable Em was moving when I took it:

This next one is an example of the on camera flash, do you see how Em looks kind of blue:

Now here is a picture using the speedlite, much better:

Now, one the things I mentioned is that with the flash having a rotation and tilt you can bounce your flash off various things. So here is an example of my flash bouncing off my living room walls (which are a goldy beige color) and an example of the flash bouncing off my white ceiling. Bouncing your flash means that you can point the flash towards something, in this case the wall and the ceiling, and it will give the photo the glow of whatever it is you're bouncing the flash off of. Did that make sense? Here, let me show you.

For this first example I took a pic of a card box I made for my mom for Christmas. In this photo I pointed my flash toward my wall. Remember, it has a golden tone to it. So it gave the box a golden glow:

Now, I took a photo of the same box, same angle, but this time I bounced the flash off the white ceiling. Here are the results:

See the difference? Cool huh? Yup, I'm pretty pleased with my new flash. :D Stay tuned for more projects. I have this card box, and another one to tell you about. And I have a few other projects to include some quilts and our Christmas cards to show you. :o)

Baby Announcements

2010-08-16T23:21:00.000-07:00

Emily has been having some tummy and reflux issues. So I haven't had much time for anything other then holding her and trying to make her feel better. I did some research on the internet and found some suggestions that I tried tonight and so far she has been an angel and sleeping well. We also have an appt. with the dr. tomorrow so we will see what she says.

Anyhow, since Emily has been sleeping peacefully for the first time in days it seems like, I decided to see if I could come up with an idea for her baby announcement. Here it is!

I used Pink Pirouette and Whisper White cardstocks. I also used the dots embossing folder with the big shot. I used the punch from the SAB catty (not sure what it's called but it is in the main catty, and I can't find that right now). Then I used the retired set, "I'm Here" and a sentiment set call Small Sayings (also retired). I also used ribbon from the new SU catty. The only thing on here that is not SU, is the little hands in the corner. Not sure what those are from, I borrowed them from my sister-in-law.

Sorry that the inside is wonky. I couldn't get it to load right on blogger. Anyhow, I got the idea to do the little hand print behind the words on the inside from this card on Splitcoast. I got a little help on the wording of the last part from another adoptive couple who's blog I read (the words "lovingly placed in our arms") But the inside says:

Jacob, Sharon & Tamara

are proud to present

the newest addition

to their family

Emily Rose Crown

July 26, 2010 @ 5:26 a.m.

9 lbs. 5 oz. 21 inches

Lovingly placed

in our arms through

the gift of adoption

August 2, 2010

I also did the photo for the inside. Our Photographer has been booked and we haven't been able to mesh our schedule with hers yet. And hubby is leaving on Thurday for his annual 2 week training for the Reserves. So rather then delay the announcments till after we can get the pictures done when hubby gets back, I decided to try to see what kind of pic I could do myself. I think I did a fairly good job. ;o)

Home Sweet Home!!!

2010-08-03T22:29:00.001-07:00

We're home!!!! We got a call Sunday morning from the dr. asking us if we wanted to bring the baby home. She was well enough to leave the hospital! The heart murmur wasn't detected, the rapid heartbeat is gone, the infection is gone, blood sugar levels are normal and the jaundice is gone! We were, needless to say, thrilled!! So after Emily's last round of antibiotics at 3 and then a couple of hours of bathing, changing, taking her newborn pics from the hospital and feeding her one last time (cause she was a hungry girl and couldn't wait) it was time to go!

After leaving the hospital we went to Emily's birth mom's house to visit. Such a wonderful visit.

Then we went back to the hotel

Monday afternoon (my dad's birthday, and Emily's 1 week birthday) was court where K signed relinquishment and consent forms and since there is no agency involved in our adoption, the judge signed legal guardianship of Emily to us.

Then it was time to come home!

What a wonderful few days it has been. K is never far from our thoughts. We owe her so much!

And finally, 9 years ago today, I married the most amazing man! Happy Anniversary Jacob!

Prayers for Emily and K

2010-07-30T23:10:00.001-07:00

Dear Family and Friends,
As you all know our little Emily was born early Monday morning and has been in the NICU since shortly after birth. She is improving, and if all continues to go well, we should be able to take Emily home next Tuesday (which how cool would that be! That is our 9th wedding anniversary). This Sunday is Fast Sunday. We would like to ask that you and your individual families remember Emily and her birth mom K in your fasting and prayers on Sunday. If you are unable to fast, will you please say a special prayer. Please bless that Emily will continue to improve and that we will be able to take her home soon. Also, K is going to court on Monday to relinquish her rights which will allow us to bring Emily home when the time comes, and allow us to proceed with the adoption. K is doing well and is very much at peace with her decision. Please bless her, that she will continue to feel strength, peace and comfort in her decision. That she will always know of the love that we all have for her. Thank you for your continued prayers and love.
With Love, Sharon, Jacob, Tammy, & Emily

And NICU Mommy

2010-07-28T01:43:00.001-07:00

An NICU Mommy..... That's what they call me. The nurses...... When we imagined this time, never did we imagine that we would be NICU Parents, but we are. Our little Emily was born with a low blood sugar which isn't unusual with babies of a high birth weight. After her first feeding her blood sugar actually went lower. So the dr. ordered an IV drip of Sugar water to try to get her blood sugar to go higher. It was working great! Until she started eatting less and less. She went from eatting 2+ oz. in a sitting, to not even an oz. sometimes half an oz. And even getting her to eat that much took work. She was getting fussier and fussier. So the dr. ordered some tests. Turns out baby girl has an infection. Not surprising since K's water broke and it wasn't until almost 23 hours later that Emily was born. The dr. detected a heart murmur yesterday, it was still there today, so an Echocardiogram was ordered. The cardiologist at the hospital reviewed the tests. we are still waiting on the official report from Primary Children's Hospital in Salt Lake, but according to the cardiologist here, he says that the holes in the chambers in Emily's heart haven't closed up yet, but he says because she has been sick, that isn't surprising. So according to him, it isn't cause for concern right now, but if at her first well baby check up there is still a murmur, the pediatrician will need to keep an eye on it. We'll see if the PCMC dr. agrees with his assesment. Emily's oxygen levels have been dropping off and on, and her breathing goes a little fast at times, but that is probably due to the stress of being sick the dr. says. So they continue to monitor her. We continue to spend every second we can with her, and pray for her. We aren't sure how long we will be in the NICU. K signed a release with the hospital social worker allowing us to go home with the baby when she is released since K herself will be released before Emily. The nurse said to not be surprised if we are there through the weekend. We hope she is wrong. But, we will stay as long as it takes for Emily to get healthy.

Speaking of K, she is doing well. She was having some heart trouble as well, but an EKG showed nothing wrong according to the nurse. Haven't talked to the dr. yet though. But she is doing well. Walking around like a champ. So much so that I had to tell her to take it easy. I worry about her. But I know she is in good hands. K is a trooper. Very strong, very amazing. Emily comes from her, so I have no doubt she will be o.k. K should be released tomorrow (Wednesday) so court should be Thursday. We'll know more in the morning.

No, none of the last few days is like I imagined it would be. The experiences we have had, the tears we have shed, every last bit of it, has been worth it. Why? Because of this precious little one right here:

1 hour old. After her first bath.

1 day old. Hanging out in the NICU with mommy and daddy. She is always so content in Daddy's arms. :D You can see some of the lines that are hooked to her, and her IV in this picture. The IV is in her head so it won't be easy for her to pull or kick out.

She's Here!!! Welcome to the World Emily Rose!!

2010-07-26T23:41:00.000-07:00

She's HERE!!! I'll post pictures when we get home and I can edit the size so they don't lock blogger. But for now, here are the details:

Emily Rose born via c-section after 22 hours of labor including 2 hours of pushing! (Ya, our birth mom is our hero! you should have seen her! She was and continues to be, the strongest person I know!)

Birthdate: July 26th at 5:26 a.m.

height: 9 lbs. 5 oz.
weight: 21 inches
hair: sandy blonde, and lots of it!
eye color: probably will be blue since both of her birth parents have blue eyes.

Baby update

2010-07-22T22:17:00.000-07:00

Just a quick baby update. For more details, including a pic of our angel birth mom taken today, after her appt, check out our family blog (linked on the right). Our birth mom is now 39 weeks. She is 70% effaced (has been for 3 weeks) but is now dialated to a 1and a half (has been at a 1 for two weeks, so it's a little progress) Although she has been having contractions since yesterday morning, they are an hour apart, so she is in the very early stages of labor. She is measuring at 44, so the doctor is wanting an ultrasound to find out how big baby girl is. If she is too big the may need to do a c-section, or induce labor, (which we are hoping they won't have to do a c-section!) so we will see. The ultrasound is Monday morning so I will have more news then. Unless K's labor progesses more, which is what I'm hoping for! Poor thing is sooooo ready!

Soft Blanket for baby

2010-07-18T21:55:00.001-07:00

Babies love soft things. They like the soft texture. I have seen a lot of soft blankets out there, everything from velvet to satin to silk to any kind of soft material you can think of. Call them lovies, softies, snuggies, whatever you decide to call them, babies love them! I decided to make our sweet Emily a soft blanket. It doesn't have any batting in it, it's just simple. I did a chocolate satin and I was going to do a green velore, but I found this soft pink velore with roses embossed in it and it was as if the fabric was calling to me from the rack saying, pick me, pick me! So, I did. ;o) I did a checkered pattern on the front using the pink and brown, the back is all brown satin so both sides are soft and it is bond in the pink velore.

In this photo you can see the colors a little better (the lighting in my family room isn't good, sorry) You can also see a little better the embossed roses on the pink velore. The back is also shown.

I did roses because our baby's middle name is going to be Rose (after her birth mommy who's middle name is also Rose). We are at almost into the single digits till her due date! Today is Sunday and there is 11 days left, tomorrow will be 10 days left, and then we are in the single digits. I know she can be late, but we're hoping the dr. won't let our birth mom go over since she is starting school again with in weeks of giving birth. We'll see though. Our next appt. is her 39 week appt. on Thursday. :D

Quilt for K

2010-07-15T22:24:00.000-07:00

I made a quilt for our expectant birth mom K. (She's due in just 2 weeks!! Can't wait for baby Emily to make her arrival!! She is 70% effaced and dialated to a 1. Same as last week, but baby has dropped a little.) We also made a matching one for the baby. (Not my original idea to do matching quilts as a gift. Not sure who's idea it was. But I love it!) I asked her what her favorite colors were and I found out they are pink, purple, orange, blue & green....... yeah............ I thought it would be difficult trying to incorporate all those colors into the quilt, but it actually wasn't. The hardest part was picking the fabric of course. But once I picked those it was easy. I am a basic quilter. I do squares. That's it. I am going to have my mom teach me how to do other styles, but for now, squares it is. I forgot to take a picture of K's quilt before I gave it to her. But her's is the exact same as the baby's with 1 exception. K's squares are 5 inches finished. The baby's quilt has 3.5 inch finished squares. This of course makes the baby's quilt smaller. Anyhow, here is the baby's quilt. My mom, aunt, and a family friend helped me to tie K's, and I tied the baby's.

Each of the colors had 3 different fabrics. Then I found one that had orange, purple and pink to tie them all together. It is bound and tied in purple. The quilt is 11 squares across, and 11 down. I am so thrilled with how it turned out. Here is a close up on the some of the fabrics.

1 layer cards, late, but as promised!

2010-07-09T09:10:00.000-07:00

O.k. I totally suck! I know, I updated a couple of weeks ago and said I stamped. I am just now posting those cards! I'm sorry! Between issues with my computer & getting ready for baby (any day now! Our birth mom is 37 weeks so baby could come any day now! But I think we're ready. LOL)

Anyhow, here are the cards I did. I did multiples of some of these. On all cards I use Whisper White cardstock & Tuxedo Ink from Momento.

On this first one (one of my favs) I used the SU dots embossing folder (EF) with the big shot. I have a cuttlebug, and I love it. But I find that the big shot gives the impression way better than the cuttlebug. For some projects I will want a subtler (is that a word?) impression so the cuttlebug will work great for those. For these cards however, I wanted a deep impression, so the big shot it was! Anyhow, back to the card. I used the dots EF and the Kind & Caring Thoughts from Stampin Up (SU) as well for the sentiment. I used a purple gingham ribbon which I am not sure where I got. I'm assuming HL (Hobby Lobby) or Michaels? Anyhow, very simple, but I love it!

This next one is almost the same but instead of the dots EF from SU, I used the Stylized flowers EF from Provo Craft.

This one is one of my favs. I used the Kind & Caring Thoughts set (SU) for the image with Rose Red, Lovely Lilac & Certainly Celery markers (SU). And then the sentiment is from Watercolor Trio set (SU). I used the SU dots EF on the right side, the image on the left and a ribbon from Michaels down the middle.

This one was using all Kind & Caring Thoughts with the Rose Red & Certainly Celery markers (All SU). This one and the next are using repeat stamping (ink your image and stamping it a couple of times before reinking). Also used the pink ribbon from Michaels.

This card is my next to favorite one. It is using the Watercolor Trio set with Rose Red, Certainly Celery, & Lovely Lilac markers (all SU). Also using the Michaels ribbon. I love how this one turned out!

This last one is my absolute fav! I need to make more because I wasn't how it would turn out so I only made 1. I used the dots EF from SU, purple ribbon from Michaels & the Kind & Caring Thoughts set from SU for the sentiment. This one is actually the only one that is not a 1 layer card. I had to do the dots on a seperate peice of cardstock and then adhere it to the card base so that the dots could be on the top. I also used the Elephant die set from the Cuttlekids collection from Provo Craft. Seriously, how cute is this!!

As soon as I can I will add some more projects that I have been working on, including quilts (3), more cards and a few other goodies.

Still Alive

2010-06-18T01:37:00.000-07:00

Yes, I am still alive. Life has been hectic since being chosen to adopt our baby girl. Our birth mom is due in just 6 weeks. I can't beleive how fast time has gone by!

I have kept myself busy with lots of quilting projects, a couple of cakes and shopping for baby! Up until tonight I hadn't stamped in literally months (other then the once a month stamp club which I haven't been to in a couple of months).

Well tonight, I found myself itching to stamp. Rather then just going to bed like I did the last time I wanted to stamp, I opted to stay up and "scratch the itch" to stamp so to speak.

I popped in the movie Sense and Senseability and stamped away! I finished 16 cards just as the movie ended. Not too shabby! Most of the cards are 1 layer cards, but I love the way they turned out. I will take them out in the morning and take pictures of them. In the meantime, I thought I would share with you some photos that my friend Ashley of Monarch Photography took of us with our birth mom. For her privacy we refer to her as K and ask that if you know her name, you do the same. We also don't show her face to protect her privacy as well. We have a lot of photos with her face, but like I said, for her privacy, here are a few for you to enjoy that don't show her face. These photos were taken on Memorial Day when K was 31 and a half weeks. She is now 34 weeks. Almost Baby Time!! Enjoy these photos and tomorrow I will have some cards to share with you!

Project for BABY!

2010-04-04T18:08:00.000-07:00

We have been getting ready for our new little one to join us in just 115 days. It still seems so far away, but the time is going quickly. With today being Easter we had a nice relaxing day. So I spent a couple of hours making a project for the nursery. Right now the nursery has a pink crib set (which I love!). But I want to make another one (an additional one) that will be, what else but purple and green (with Roses since the baby's middle name is Rose which is her sweet birthmom's middle name). ;o)

A while ago I bought some letters from HL spelling the word BABY. Since we hadn't been chosen yet, and didn't know if our future little one would be a boy or a girl, I hadn't decorated the letters yet. So since we had been chosen now, and our little one is a girl..... Well, see for yourself:

I used the Cottage Wall Designer Series Paper from Stampin Up! I also used some ribbon from the craft store for embelishment on the letters and to hang the letters on the wall. I used Prima Flowers with brads in the center for embelishment as well.

I inked the sides of the letters with Mellow Moss Craft ink (SU) and a sponge. Then I inked the edges of the paper letters. I then attached the paper to the letters using modge podge and then applied a thin layer of modge podge over the finished letter to seal it. I added the ribbon and flowers and used sticky tape to attach the ribbon to the back for hanging.

I hung the letters above the crib:

I love it!

(For some reason everything in these pictures look a little more yellow then what they actually are, but you get the idea. :D)

O.k. Sharon, where have you been? ;o)

2010-03-13T08:36:00.000-08:00

I know, I've been out of blogging for awhile. Why you ask? Well, I've been a little preoccupied! We were being considered for adoption by a wonderful birthmom. On Wednesday she chose us! Our baby girl will be born on or around July 29th! We will have a very very open adoption and could not be more thrilled! For more of the story, and for an ultrasound photo, check out my family/adoption blog.
http://jacobandsharon.blogspot.com/2010/03/our-birthmom-k.html

I will be doing a lot of crafting in the next several months. July 29th is still 4+ months away and I need something to keep me busy! I will post some projects soon! I have a few for you to see. But for now, I'm heading to bed to take a nap. For some reason, I've been too excited to sleep lately. ;o)

Build-A-Bear Birthday Card

2010-02-15T21:54:00.001-08:00

Sunday was not only Valentine's Day, but Sunday was also my mother-in-laws birthday. She is such a fun lady that I wanted to do a fun card for her. I hadn't used my Build-A-Bear set yet really, so I wanted to use it for her birthday card:
I like how it turned out!
Stamps: Aida BG, Build-A-Bear, Build-A-Bear Word set (SU) (not sure what the word set is called)
Cardstock: Certainly Celery, Pretty In Pink, Whisper White, Nursery Paper Pack (all paper SU exceot paper pack, got that from HL)
Ink: Momento Tuxedo Black
Access.: Signo Gel Pen, Copic Markers, white grosgrain ribbon

The bears dress is paper peiced. Seriously love how this turned out. I know, it's a little more like a little kids card, but I just loved these colors together. Very springy!

I found this fabulous sign at Hobby Lobby and just had to get it for her. ;o)

Gift card holder

2010-02-06T00:25:00.000-08:00

Seriously, can I be any worse of a blog mommy? Sorry to anyone out there still reading my blog! I will try my hardest to be better and post projects more often.

I haven't felt much up to stamping lately, or doing anything crafty. But I determined to do the challenges on SCS in hopes of getting some creative mojo back.

My neice Kim turned 19 at the end of Decemeber. I can't beleive she is so grown up!
What do you get a 19 year old? I asked my 14 year old daughter Tammy what she thought her cousin might like. Kim and Tammy are really good friends and if anyone knew what she would like, it would be Tammy. Tammy suggested a gift card to one of Kim's favorite stores, Plato's Closet. Gift care it is! But that meant I needed to make a gift card holder. So here is what I came up with. Not my best work, but o.k.

Tammy chose the colors, they are some of Kim's favorites. And Kim is obsessed with fairies. I don't have any measurements for this, I just winged my way through it, and this is the result:

The colors Tammy chose were Taken With Teal, Elegant Eggplant, and Basic Black. I used the Build A Bear stamp set from SU for the flower on the outside. I also did the scallop edge punch from SU for the border. I paper pierced the edges of the sleeve thing and used the circle and scallop circle punch for the front focal image.

The inside looked like this:

I used some scrap cardstock to make the pocket for the gift card. The Happy Birthday sentiment is from the SU Sell-a-brations set Whimsical Words. This is one of their new unmounted sets! SU unmounted, who knew?! I love it! It's the best of both worlds! unmounted stamps take up less storage space, and you can see exactly where you are stamping your image, BUT you still get the awesomeness that is the unbeatable SU quality rubber stamps! Love it!

Since Kim loves, and mean LOVES fairies, it was only fitting to put a fairy on the inside! For this I used the Enchanted Fairies set from Artful Inkables. I colored it using Copic markers. After I was done my daughter thought it needed some bling. So I added some stickles to the detailed parts of the fairy's wings.

Like I said, not my best work, by any stretch, but not awful.

Request

2010-01-21T21:31:00.000-08:00

I know I have been MIA these last few weeks. The day that I made my last post I found out that a very old and dear friend of mine had been involved in a horrific car accident (we met when I was 13 and she was 14). She was driving south on the freeway, was temporarily distracted (like for only a couple seconds), swerved a little too far to the left, and over corrected. She crossed both lanes of south-bound traffic and the Expedition she was driving rolled 3 times before coming to a stop on it's side. She and the two passangers in her car (including her 9 year old daughter) were wearing seatbelts, but my friend was partially ejected from the vehicle. The front part of the drivers side roof caved in on her and she suffered severe head trauma. My sweet friend also suffered a broken cheek bone/eye socket, broken ribs, and a broken arm in 3 places. Her daughter and the other passanger escaped virtually unharmed with only minor bruising from the seatbelts.

For 12 days my friend was in the ICU in critical condition in a coma. This past Saturday, January 16th, she passed away. It has been a hard few weeks. I was able to go to the hospital to see her the day after the accident and again shortly after she passed away. I have known her husband since 10th grade and he is also a dear friend. He is doing as well as could be expected. I also saw him for a few hours on Monday. He is devastated and misses his sweet wife dearly. They met in high school and were married for 12 years (this year would have been 13). Her daughter is doing o.k.. She doesn't really understand what's going on, how can you at 9 years old. My heart is breaking for her loved ones left behind, ecspecially her husband and daughter. I wrote this on my other blog the day of her passing, shortly after returning home from the hospital. It sums up what I have been feeling. http://jacobandsharon.blogspot.com/2010/01/god-be-with-you-till-we-meet-again.html

So this is why I haven't been around. The funeral services are on Saturday. I don't normally make posts like this, forgive me if it offends anyone, but please, please keep Matt & Dayna (her husband and daughter) in your prayers. They really need comfort and strength right now.

Hopefully soon I will have some projects for you. I have been stamping, a little bit, I just haven't been up to posting much. But soon, very soon.....

Happy New Year!!!

2010-01-04T08:59:00.000-08:00

I can't beleive it is 2010 already! That's just crazy!

It's around this time of year that people make resolutions. I normally don't like to make resolutions just because I know I won't stick to them. But this year, I thought I would make some crafting resolutions. I have been in a stamping funk for the last several months. And so to get myself out of it I decided to make resolutions.

First of all I'm joining a stamp club. Which I am totally excited about. My mom joined with me as well. I'm hoping it will help get my creative juices flowing again.

Next, I am determined to make at least 5 Christmas cards a month. This way I won't be scrambling at the end of the year when it comes time to mail out Christmas cards again. Each of the 5 will probably be the same. I don't like mass producing, but 5 isn't that many to mass produce. So I will have 10-11 different styles. :D

I also want to get my birthday box going again. A couple of years ago I made a birthday box, with index cards for each birthday and anniversary in our family. I made cards and put them in the box and then at the end of the month before I would get the cards ready to mail out for the next month. I stopped doing the birthday box right around the time we started getting ready to move. Now that we are settled I want to start that up again.

Another thing I want to do is just stamp. Stamp for fun, stamp for me. It's been a long time since I've done that. Stamping cards to put in my box of "hey, I need a card" cards. ;o)

The final thing, I need to come up with a way to raise funds for our adoption. Not sure if it will be stamping related. I know we could sell the ink storage units again. Hubby is starting college next week, in addition to his full time job, which is in addition to the Army Reserves, so he is rather busy right now and doesn't have the time to work in his shop. Plus he says it is waaaaaay to cold to be out there right now. So I need to figure something out. I'll let you all know so that if you want to help you can get the word out.

Things have been eerily quiet on my crafting blog these last several months and I'm determined to change that. I fell down the stairs early early Christmas morning and I'm still recovering from that. But I'm getting better every day. So be ready! Cause craft room, here I come!

Neighbor gifts

2009-12-22T16:09:00.000-08:00

This is the first time we have lived in a neighborhood where the neighbors do gifts for each other for Christmas. We love that! Been trying to figure out what to do from us. We were going to bake Christmas goodies but with hubby's work schedule and our daughter at her dad's for a couple of days we just didn't get to it. So instead I'm making bread and we bought honey bears to go with. I made little tags (using the My Digital Studio of course) to go with them that say "Wishing you a Beary Merry Christmas!" Love how the tags turned out.

I found a cute Christmas Bear Clipart online and used that. The background is from the Christmas Jingle kit on the software. I did the label and matted that, did the text and added brads. These will be attached to the honey bears and given with the bread. Love it! The longest part was finding the right clipart. All in all these took less than 4 minutes including printing. :D

And the Christmas cards, were just as quick. This was the finished product:

Can't wait for Christmas!!!

Christmas Cards gone digital!

2009-12-16T23:39:00.000-08:00

Sorry that it's been so long since I updated my blog. This has been a crazy year. So crazy that I haven't been able to do our Christmas cards yet. Normally I have them not only done, but mailed out by now. I want to send them because we have pass along cards for our adoption that we are sending with them (that and I always send Christmas cards). I tried to buy some this year, but just couldn't. But making them was just stressing me.

That is until I remembered that I have the My Digital Studio from Stampin' Up! I could make Christmas cards quickly! So far I have come up with 2 options. After figuring out what photos I wanted to use they each took less than 5 minutes. What do you think? I'm still going to play around a little and see what else I can come up with, but not bad if I do say so myself. These are both done using the Christmas Jingle Scrapbooking Kit on the My Digital Studio. Love it! Seriously, this software, has got to be one of my favorite crafting purchases in a long time!

My goal for next year is to make at least 5 Christmas cards a month starting in January. This way by December I will have plenty of cards and I won't stress so much come time to send them. That's the plan anyway. ;o) I will be sitting down in the next week or so to make a Birthday card for my neice. So I will have that for you soon. I promise it won't be a month before I post again!

Oh, and adoption update. We are still waiting to be chosen. Our agency profile is officially updated and we are good to go and back online with them. We are also in the process of looking into getting approved for the states Foster to Adopt program. You can help us get the word out that we are hoping to adopt. Take a look at the right sidebar. You'll see our adoption blog button and an HTML code to go with it. copy and paste that HTML code into a gadget on your blog and viola! A button directing others to our blog. (BTW, the button, was made by me, using My Digital Studio. Soooo quick and easy, I love it!) If you want to stay updated on us and our journey, other than my occasional updates, I update our adoption blog often so check it out. :D

Look at me! I'm digi-scrappin!

2009-11-18T14:45:00.000-08:00

I told you yesterday about my box of goodies from Stampin Up! My first stamping order in a year. In that box of goodies I told you I got the new My Digital Studio. I got it because I wanted to try my hand at digital scrapbooking. I have tried before and just couldn't get the hang of it. So I decided to see if all the reviews I have heard about how easy this program to use are true. And can I tell you, they are oh so true! I love this product! My Digital Studio rocks! I did a whole 12 page layout in under an hour. Love it!
Most of my pictures are on my computer so I had a hard time trying to edit the images, send them to snapfish to get printed and then when I would received the prints I would find I would spend hours at my craft table just trying to do 1 page. Then I would get discouraged before even finishing that 1 page and would walk away. This has made it so easy for me to scrapbook. I love it!!!
Here are just a few of my favs. I used the already put together for you Christmas kit and just dropped my pictures in, did some journaling, a little tweaking and tada! I did use a little creative liberty on some of the pages. Like on the one with the white background and red blocks. The predone layout showed pictures there, I took out the space for pictures, left the red blocks and had this as journaling page.

Not bad for my first attempt at digiscraping!

A little of this, a little of that

2009-11-17T23:03:00.000-08:00

I know I've been quiet lately on this blog. I guess that getting things ready for our adoption home study (the updated one for our new home) wiped me out more than I thought. Not to mention the moving 900 miles thing. Anyhow, I am finally starting to feel normal again, not to mention I just got a box of goodies from SU. My first stamp order for myself in about a year (I ordered cardstock for my brother-in-laws wedding invitations, but that wasn't for me so that doesn't count). So I'm really excited to use all my new goodies. I got several new stamp sets, and the new My Digital Studio, just to name a few. I am going to be working on my Christmas cards soon so stay tuned.

In the meantime I have been blogging like crazy over at our family blog. Partially because blogging on that blog takes no more effort then sitting here, but mostly because of what November is. Did you know, that November is National Adoption Month? Did you know that this weekend, Saturday to be exact, is National Adoption Day? In honor of National Adoption Month I have been blogging each day about adoption. The first week my posts were all about adoption resources that I have found. Last week was all about adoption success stories and families who have been brought together through adoption. This week I am blogging all about other families hoping to adopt and next week I will be spotlighting birth moms. Starting with a profile of my cousin who placed her son 5 yrs ago. So be sure and check that out.

Anyhow, I realized the other day that I never shared the photos I had taken of the family I shot in July. This was the family of 15. So here are just a few of those.

this was the whole clan. This was my first time doing a group larger than 8 so I wasn't thrilled with the large group shots, but I did like some of the smaller ones.

This one is the grandparents in this group.

This one is a candid of two of the grandsons.

One of the families, I dubbed them the blue family since they were all wearing blue.

This is the brown family since they were all wearing brown.

One thing I learned with this shoot is that 10 a.m. is not a good time to shoot. That was the time the family requested though so I went with it. The sun was way to bright though as you can see in some of the pictures.

I also don't remember if I ever shared these. I did a shoot with some friends of mine who are also hoping to adopt. These photos were for their adoption profile. Here are just a couple of my favorites.

WCMD challenge 5

2009-10-20T10:36:00.000-07:00

This is the only other challenge I was able to do for world card making day. And it wasn't even a card challenge. This challenge was hosted by Magnolia-licous. They have such cute stamps, I don't own any, but I'll soon be adding some of these to my collection.

In this challenge we had to make a Holiday Ornament. I didn't want to do the traditional glass ball that I do when I do Christmas Ornaments. Instead I started going through my chipboard to find a good base. I found a large circle and decided to go with that. The paper I chose was Vintage Holiday from TAC. I placed my cicle on the paper and traced around it and then cut along the lines. Then I used some creamy caramel ink to give it an aged look. I attached the paper using some modge podge then added some ribbon. My image is from SU and is the set A Very Merry Christmas (retired). I colored it using colored pencils, punched it out using my circle punch and mounted it onto real read with I punched out with the scallop circle punch. Using my white Signo gel pen I placed a dot on each scallop to give it some dimension. I mounted the focal image using dimensionals so that it sits off the ornament just slightly. I used my crop-a-dile to punch the hole through the ornament (since it is thicker because of the chipboard, I knew the crop-a-dile would work beautifully) and then threaded some of the same ribbon I used on the ornament for the top to hang the ornament from a tree. It's not quite what I set out to do, but I was happy with it. :D

WCMD challenge 4

2009-10-16T17:53:00.000-07:00

Sorry! I know it's been awhile since I posted a card from World Card Making Day! Sorry!

This challenge was hosted by some of the Splitcoast Ladies. This challenge was a 3 part challenge. The first part was, it had to be a Thank You card, then it had to include the color Chocolate (or a different shade of brown) and it had to follow this sketch. Love the way this card turned out!

First I stamped my roses and leaves using the A Rose Is A Rose stamp set and the ink colors I used were Regal Rose, Pretty In Pink, Mellow Moss and Chocolate Chip (I stamped the chocolate chip off once before stamping on the peice) Afterwards, to give it an aged look I used the DTP technique on the peice. Then I mounted it onto Mellow Moss CS and stitched along the edges. I mounted that whole peice to my Chocolate Chip card base and added some flowers for fun. The saying at the bottom is a white rub-on.

I still have my ornament to show you so look for that soon. I will be starting on my Christmas Cards shortly so I'll have those for you soon too.

Cookie!!!!

2009-10-13T22:54:00.000-07:00

O.k. so I'm not so great lately at updating my blogs. Sorry! In my defense I have been busy getting the house ready for our updated home study for our adoption. Incidentally it's scheduled for next Tuesday. We may end up having to do it next Friday instead though, we'll see. Our new caseworker wants to meet my daughter and she will be in school during our appt. time. So I asked the caseworker if we could move the appt. to later in the day after DD gets out of school, or if we could move it to Friday since Friday is an early release day (our case worker only does home studies on Tuesday's and Friday's). So we'll see. But it's moving along again. YAY!!

Anyhow, I know I owe you a card, I will post one soon. Right now I'm too tired to post one, but I figured I would post something crafty, so here is a cake I made for my brother-in-laws birthday a couple of weeks ago. He turned 36 and when he was asked what kind of a cake he wanted he said a Cookie Monster cake. Apparently Cookie was his favorite character growing up. I don't have a Cookie Monster cake pan, so I made up my own cake. I think it turned out pretty darn cute. What do you think?

More cards and stuff to come, I promise.

WCMD challenge 3

2009-10-10T01:04:00.000-07:00

It's 2a.m. and I'm still awake. Why? Because hubby is switching his schedule at work and he is trying to get used to needing to be up at night for work. So I figured I stay up for a little bit with him. Aren't I sweet? ;-)

I figure since I am up, (and he is in his office feeding his fish and probably updating Facebook), I figured I would post another card from World Card Making Day.

This one was for the Stamping Bella challenge. Now I do happen to own a few bellas (as the stamps are called), and I love them! Bella's are so cute and are a must for any stamper. Just sayin'. Anyhow, this challenge was to do a card showing what you and your friends like to do, the twist to that was we had to make the card with an 80's theme.

Now when I think 80's, I think tie dye. My husband was confused by this when I told him that. To him, tie dye is 60's. He's right, but see, I remember growing up making tie dye shirts at summer day camps, and friends birthday parties. So to me, 80's is tie dye. So, for this card I did an 80's tie dye, bella card. My friends and I love to just hang out, goof around, and chat. So here's my card:

The tie dye was done with the shaving cream technique. I used 4 different colored reinkers for the background. (Real red, yo yo yellow, tempting turqouise, and green galore). I love how the background turned out, totally remeniscent of the tie dye t-shirts I used to make with my friends when I was younger. :D I mounted the bg onto a real red card base then I colored the bella (PMSabella) with copics and mounted her onto Taken With Teal (I'm trying to make myself like this color, can you tell?). I added some ribbon and mounted this onto the card. After putting the card together I decided it needed something so I punched 2 flowers out of some extra tie dyed cardstock and put them together with a brad to finish it off. Seriously love this card. Call me crazy, but I do. :D

I do have a couple more from WCMD that I still need to post, including a christmas ornament, but I can't keep my eyes open so those will have to wait. The pillow is calling my name. :D

WCMD challenge 2

2009-10-08T10:45:00.000-07:00

I know, I know, I'm falling down on the job! Sorry! I'm fighting off a cold, and I'm afraid the cold is winning. *sigh*

Anyhow, here is another card I did for WCMD. This one was for the Crafty Secrets Challenge. Again, I don't own any of their products yet. We've been saving for the move and for our adoption, so I haven't actually bought anything in a year, well, until I made over my craft area that is. That about covers my spending for the next year. LOL

Anyhow, back to the card. This challenge was to make a poppin' card. We had to pop the card with dimension somehow. I chose to do this in 2 ways.

First I stamped my solid butterfly in Yo Yo Yellow, then I stamped the same solid butterfly in Yo Yo Yellow again on another peice of cardstock. I then stamped the flowered butterfly overlay in Real Red on top of the second peice of Yo Yo Yellow. Then I cut around this two layered butterfly and then bent the edges. After that I attached it to the first butterfly, this was to give the butterfly's wings some dimension. Then I stamped the saying and mounted the peice on real red cardstock. I added more dimension but raising this whole peice using dimensionals and mounting it on my Taken With Teal Card base. I decided to add a peice of ribbon and luckily was able to slide it under the already mounted raised peice and attach it from there. I know, it's simple, but that's what I prefer. :D

WCMD challenge 1

2009-10-05T21:47:00.000-07:00

Saturday was World Card Making Day. Over at SCS they had a day full of challenges from member companies. I didn't get to do nearly as many challenges as I would have liked, but I did get to do a few. Saturday I ended up going to see my dad who just recently got home after over a month in the hospital. He had double knee replacement surgery so I went up to see him. But I did get some of the challenges done.

The first challenge was sponsored by Unity Stamp Company I don't own any of their products yet, but the key word there is yet! This challenge was to use a quote or a saying as the main focal point on your card. So I went through my stash and found one of my favorite quotes for cards to make for my soldier when he was deployed. "I wouldn't mind being lonely, if you were here to keep me company". this card was simple. I just cut a strip of patterned paper from a paper pack I have from Hobby Lobby and I mounted it on Chocolate Chip. I paper pierced and stitched then mounted that onto the card base of Taken With Teal. I added some Chocolate grosgrain ribbon just for an added touch. Then added my saying which I stamped using Chocolate Chip Ink and mounted on more Taken With Teal.

I should add that, the folks over at Splitcoast and all the member companies joined together with Operation Write Home to have all of us crafters who wanted to, donate our cards to OWH. Operation Write Home is an awesome cause. I know first hand how much the soldiers love it when they can send hand stamped cards home to their loved ones. I received a few myself from my husband from organizations just like OWH.

More cards still to come in the next week, so stay tuned!

Just in time for world card making day!

2009-10-02T15:38:00.001-07:00

My craft area is almost done! Minus the curtains it is done. :D I love it! It was a lot of hard work, but sooo worth it! Here is a reminder of what the area looked like before we bought the house. (This is all the old owners stuff) . Now here is what it looks like: (ignore the mess in the family room, that room isn't done yet)
Let's take a closer look at the craft area: On the side of the counter there is about 9 inches where I store my tables and ironing board (and my step stool because I'm short and can't reach the top shelves in the cabinets LOL! When I want to work I can just take those out and stamp and then put them back when I'm done.

When we installed the cabinets, we installed the upper ones with a bridge cabinet in the center so that it would fit my marker and ink storage unit that hubby made me.

The cabinets were originally an Oak color, I sanded them, painted them, sanded some more, painted some more, installed them, installed the counter top, installed the hardware, installed the new flooring (it had been carpeting but we pulled that out and put in hardwood laminate). (My mom helped me with the installation of everything, THANKS MOM!!)

I absolutely love, love, LOVE it! And it's just in time for World Card Making day tomorrow! Join me on SCS for lots and lots of challenges! Just what I need to get my creative juices flowing!

A peek at my new craft area (A work in progress)

2009-09-20T22:27:00.000-07:00

So this is the project I am currently working on. This is the family room before we bought the house. (This is all the old owners furniture and such). You can see a little nook off the family room that the old owners used as a computer area. This is what we are doing to that little nook:

The laundry area is in a closet just off this area, The washer and dryer have been pulled out of that area so we can tile underneath them. Once the grout is all done we will move them back and will finish off this area you see. We ripped out the makeshift closet that was in the corner and put wall to wall cabinets and a counter top. This will be my craft area. I am painting the cabinets a creamy bone white. the walls will be a Golden Crust color (that's the name of the Dutch Boy color) and the countertops are a pretty Granite look.

A close up of the cabinet area. After we are done painting these we will install new laminate (wood) floors (we already ripped out the carpet in this area). I have some fold up tables that will go in the corner and be pulled out when I am ready to work on stamp projects.
A close up on the cabinet color. You can see the countertops as well.

We hope to be done with all this in another couple of days. As soon as we're done I'll post pictures, and then I can start stamping again! YAY!!

We're here!!

2009-09-07T09:14:00.000-07:00

Just a quick note to let you know we arrived safely and are loving our new home. We have a lot, and I do mean A LOT of boxes to unpack so it may be a week or two before I have any new projects to show you. But I just wanted to update for those who were wondering, that yes, we are here, we're safe, we're tired, we're exhuasted, but more then anything, we are sooooooo glad to be home!!

Moving Cards (The rest of them)

2009-08-29T07:34:00.000-07:00

I'm a bad blog mommy! I'm sorry, I have an excuse! 1 week from today we will be arriving back home in Utah at our new house! Which means, on Wednesday we load the truck, Thursday we clear housing (we live in Military housing right now and so we have to sign for quarters and then sign out when we leave, the housing office comes and inspects and everything) And on Friday we leave New Mexico and start the almost 900 mile trip to Utah!! So needless to I have been busy getting everything ready.

Anyhow, because I have been so busy I have been forgetting to post the rest of the moving cards. So here they are: This is the same set I used for last years moving cards but I wanted to use it again, since it is the only moving type card we have (hence why all the rest of the cards have been non-moving themed). So this time I made it an all white card by stamping the truck in the center and adding the guy driving and the moving items in the back of the truck. All were stamped with momento black tuxedo ink. I then colored the image using markers and a glitter gel pen for the hub caps, door handle and bumpers. I finished it off by adding the sentiment at the bottom. (Stamp set- Loads Of Love and Loads Of Love Accessories by Stampin Up!; cardstock- Whisper White Stamping Up!; Markers- Copic Markers; Gel Pen- unknown; Ink- Momento)
This next one I started out by printing the sentiment at the bottom of the cardstock (took a few tries on scrap paper to get the placement right) and then used the faux framing technique (also known as reverse masking) to sponge my Pale Plum ink all over. Once I got the coverage I liked I then stamped my images randomly using Perfect Plum and Mellow Moss. (Stamp Set- Heartfelt Thanks by Stampin Up!; Sentiment- My Printer; Ink- Pale Plum, Perfect Plum, Mellow Moss By Stampin Up!; Cardstock- Whisper White by Stampin Up!) The pale plum ink started seeping through the mask after 5 cards and I didn't want to make a new mask so for the other 5 cards I did this way simple (possibly too simple, meaning I might tweak it later) card:
This one was simple, as you can see all I did was stamp 3 flowers using Pale Plum, Perfect Plum and Mellow Moss. So simple, So easy. (Supplies are same as above card)

So there you have it. The rest of my We're moving cards. I didn't have time to send them out before we left so I will do that when we get there. Probably not till we're settled though. Anyhow, today we are taking a break from packing (partly because we can't do anymore. What we have left is the stuff we still need, like clothes, so that will all get packed on Monday and Tuesday.) Instead, we are going out with some friends of ours who are also hoping to adopt. We're going to try a new wing place in town. Should be lots of fun! :D I probably won't post again until we are in our new home so see you then!

Crock Pot Sunday- Caramelized Onion Pot Roast

2009-08-23T21:42:00.000-07:00

O.k. so this is last weeks crock pot Sunday meal, but it has been a way busy week and I haven't had a lot of time. My crock pot is now packed so there won't be anymore Crockpot Sunday posts until after we are settled in our new home.

Anyhow, this recipe is also from that same Betty Crocker Slow Cooker Cookbook, but I put a twist on it. The recipe calls for Beer and we don't drink so I used Root Beer instead. The recipe also calls for Dijion mustard. We didn't want to buy any since we are moving so soon. So I used what we had which was Honey Mustard. I have to tell you, this recipe turned out soooo yummy! It calls for 4 lbs. of roast which is a lot, ecspecially when it's just my husband and I. But I ended up being able to cook the roast, and use it 3 different ways for 3 different meals and a lot of lunch leftovers. :D Anyhow, here it is:

Caramelized Onion Pot Roast
4 lbs. beef boneless chuck roast (I actually prefer the leanest roast I can find so, use whatever you like)
1 tablespoon Olive or Vegetable Oil
1 teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon pepper
6 medium onions, sliced into thin rings
1 ½ cups beef broth
¾ cup beer (I used root beer)
2 tablespoon packed brown sugar
3 tablespoon Dijon Mustard (I used honey mustard)
2 tablespoon cider vinegar
1. Trim excess fat from beef. Heat oil in 10-inch skillet over medium-high heat. Cook beef in oil about 10 minutes, turning occasionally, until brown on all sides. Sprinkle with salt and pepper.
2. Place onions in 3 ½ to 6 quart slow cooker. Place beef on onions.
3. Mix remaining ingredients; pour over beef and onions. Cover and cook on low heat setting for 8 to 10 hours or until beef is tender.
4. Remove beef and onions from cooker, using slotted spoon. Cut beef into slices. Skim fat from juices in cooker if desired. Serve beef with juices.

And as an added bonus, like I said, we ended up being able to use this for 3 seperate meals. The one we always use left over roast for is BBQ Beef Sandwiches. This is one hubby really likes to make.
All he does is takes the leftover roast, shreds it (which with how it cooks up in the crock pot it shreds beautifully)Then he puts it in a pot with BBQ Sauce, flavor of your choice and lets it simmer for 5-10 minutes. Serve with fries or something on the side on a toasted bun and viola! Yummy!
For this particular one hubby used Honey BBQ Sauce, and added a little honey and A-1 sauce. Good stuff!

The 3rd meal, I don't have a picture of, but we shredded the roast and put it in a pan with some taco seasoning (just the kind you get in the seasoning packet works great) and cooked it according to the directions on the packet of seasoning mix. And we had shredded beef tacos. Sooo good!

I love meals like this, where you can cook once and make a few seperate meals. *grin*
Stay tuned in the next day or two for another moving card. :D

It's Official!! We're Homeowners!!!

2009-08-20T08:19:00.000-07:00

Monday, the sellers signed the papers and the papers were overnighted to us (since we are still in New Mexico). Tuesday we received the papers, signed them, had them notorized (thank goodness for JAG who notorizes for free to military), and overnighted them back to the title company. Wednesday (yesterday) we got a call that the papers had been recorded and funded and it was official!! We are homeowners!!

Our house is going to take work to get it to where we want it to be. We know that. That is actually what we wanted. We wanted a home that we could make our own. We didn't want to pay $20K more for upgrades that someone else did that may not be quite our tastes. The same upgrades that we could do ourselves for half that, and they would be our tastes. *big grin* We're sooooo excited! My mom went on the walkthrough on Monday and went over again on Tuesday to take more pictures. So here are some photos from that. The front of our house. It needs a good power washing to get all the dirt that collects over the years off the house. We are going to spruce up the landscaping and are considering doing maybe some flower boxes under those two front upper windows you see. They are too thin to me and need some help, so some simple window boxes should do the trick. This is our living room. This room will be painted a pretty taupe color, will have the flooring changed out (eventually, for now it will be covered with my gorgeous burgundy rug that Jacob got me while he was deployed to Afghanistan). This room will have the window coverings changes and will have my piano, my antiques and some furniture that my mom is recovering for us. This is our kitchen. We are going to refinish the cabinets, replace the countertops and backsplash and paint. In a few years we will redo the whole kitchen.
I will share more pictures later. For now I just wanted to share the good news!! I need to get some more packing and cleaning done. We are over halfway packed and in fact all 3 bedrooms are packed, empty and cleaned out with the doors closed. We're making progress. Just 2 weeks till we move!!!
I will also be posting this weeks crock pot recipe in the next couple of days along with another card. I haven't forgotten. I have just been so busy with phone calls and paperwork and everything that goes with buying a house long distance. Well, everything that goes with buying a house for that matter! LOL

Moving cards part 2

2009-08-16T23:24:00.000-07:00

Crock pot Sunday will be a little late this week. But trust me! It will be worth the wait. *big grin* (hint, my version of the recipe involves root beer to make carmelized onion pot roast. Plus, I made roast, so you know what that means! Hubby is making BBQ Beef Sandwiches so I will have that to share too. I made my roast tonight, he makes the BBQ Beef tomorrow. I wanted to post them together so that's why I'm not posting tonight)

Until then, I wanted to share my next card that I did for our upcoming move.
Remember the announcements that I did for my brother-in-law and his new wife before they got married? Well, I had a ton of cardstock left because I over ordered accidentally. Luckily Night of Navy is a color I like to use. So I figured it would be the perfect color to use for this next card. For this one I used Night of Navy as my card base. I added some Brocade Blue to it down the middle of the card base. Then I added my stamped image (I used Stampin' Write Markers, not ink) from Garden Silouhettes (can you tell that's my favorite set?) I printed up the words Home Sweet Home for my sentiment onto Whisper White and added that at the bottom. I added some paper peircing (may be hard to see in the photo) and some ribbon down the side. Really simple and easy. I like how they turned out. I did 10 of these as well.

I thought Home Sweet Home would be a nice sentiment to use for some of my cards because it fits oh so well. First of all, we are not only moving, but we are moving into our very first home that we will actually own. Up until now we have always lived in apartments or military housing. This will be the first home that we have ever bought. As if that wasn't exciting enough, we are moving, not only to our very own home, but to our very own home back home! Clear as mud? *wink* Well, let's put it this way. For the last 6 years hubby has been in the military so we moved away from home to live in other states. Hubby is about down with his Active Duty status (he has joined the Reserves) so this means we can move back home to Utah. So to Utah we are headed. We have more family there then when we lived there before. So we are extra excited. And I thought that Home Sweet Home fit in so many ways for these cards. *big HUGE grin*

I will post the Crock Pot Sunday in a couple of days. For now, I'm heading to bed. Tomorrow I am packing my cake stuff since I don't plan to make any cakes between now and when we move (less than 3 weeks now!!)

Crock Pot Sunday- Swiss Steak Supper

2009-08-12T07:48:00.000-07:00

Sorry that this post is late! We have been busy packing. Yesterday I posted one of my Moving cards that I made and I will post another one soon. If you missed it, be sure to scroll down to the next post.

Anyhow, on to this weeks Crock Pot meal.
Also from the Betty Crocker Slow Cooker cookbook--

Swiss Steak Supper
1 1/2 lbs. beef boneless round steak
1/2 peppered seasoned salt
6 to 8 new potatoes
1 1/2 cup baby carrots 1 medium onion, sliced
1 can (14 1/2 ounces) diced tomatoes with basil, garlic, and oregano, undrained
1 jar (12 ounces) home style beef gravy
Chopped Parsley, if desired

1. Trim excess fat from beed. Cut beef into 6 serving peices. Spray 12-inch skillet with non-stick cooking spra; heat over medium-high heat. Sprinkle beef with seasoned salt. Cook beef in skillet about 8 minutes, turning once until brown.
2. Layer potatoes, carrots, beef and onion in 3 1/2 to 6 quart slow cooker. Mix tomatoes and gravy in a bowl. Spoon over beef and vegetables.
3. Cover and cook on low heat setting 7 to 9 hours or until beef and vegetables are tender. Sprinkle with Parsley if desired.

This meal was so easy, and oh so yummy! I did up some croisants to go with it. (the picture is hubby's plate, it looked better then mine) I will post another card soon so stay tuned for that! Now to get more packing done! Only 3 weeks till we move!!

Moving cards part 1

2009-08-11T09:57:00.000-07:00

I haven't forgotten about Crockpot Sunday. I will post this weeks recipes later. I just wanted to start sharing my moving cards. This first one I have for you was just for fun. I was joking around about how we moved less than a year ago and I sent out "We've moved" cards then. So now when people get these new cards they are going to say "again?" So for fun, I made up some cards that say this:
This card is a no stamp card. I printed the sentiment on my printer using Very Vanilla Cardstock and then mounted it onto Taken With Teal. The printed paper is from a paper pack I got when I did the recipe tin a few weeks ago. I layered it onto Taken With Teal cardstock and then stitched it using my sewing machine and red thread. Chocolate Chip cardstock was used for the card base. Simple, quick and easy. *grin* I did 10 of these.

I also have a few other designs that I did that I will share later. I need to space them out because my craft room is now in these: All 4 of those boxes are my stamp sets. I have about 14 boxes total of my craft stuff and several rolling cards and cabinets that we just saran wrapped and taped closed (we saran wrapped them so that scorpions and other nasty things don't crawl into them and stow away. Yes, we taped our boxes really well too *wink*).

Crock Pot Sunday- Beef Stroganoff

2009-08-03T10:30:00.000-07:00

Our family takes turns cooking. Hubby's nights to cook are Monday, Thursday & Friday. Tammy cooks on Wednesday nights. That leaves me cooking on Tuesday, Saturday and Sunday. Since Sunday is church day and a day of rest I try to make that day as simple as possible for meals. What easier way to do that then in the crock pot! (I love my crock pot!).

So I thought I would make a weekly post on my blog with my Sunday Crock Pot recipes. :D
This Sunday I did Beef Stroganoff. I have made this one before and it turned out better last time, but it was still oh so good! (I do have a version of beef stroganoff that only takes about 20 minutes, but sometimes it's nice to do this yummy, melt in your mouth version.) It serves 8 so this recipe makes two meals. I cook it all at once and then freeze half of it. The night before I want to use the frozen portion I take it out of the freezer and put it in the fridge and then heat it on the stove before serving.

From Betty Crocker's Slow Cooker Cookbook:
Beef Stroganoff
2 lbs. beef stew meat
1 large onion, chopped (1 cup)
1 can (10 3/4 ounces) condensed cream of mushroom soup
1 can (10 3/4 ounces) condensed cream of onion soup (our local grocery store doesn't carry cream of onion so we do 2 cans of cream of mushroom and it's delicious)
1 can (8 ounces) sliced mushrooms, drained
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1 package (8 ounces) cream cheese, cubed
1 container (8 ounces) sour cream
6 cups hot, cooked, noodles or rice, for serving, if desired

1. Mix beef, onion, soups, mushrooms, and pepper in 3 1/2 to 6 quart slow cooker.
2. Cover and cook on low heat setting 8 to 10 hours or until beef is very tender.
3. Stir cream cheese into beef mixture until melted. Stir in Sour Cream.
4. Serve beef mixture over noodles or rice.

Serves 8

Isn't that simple! Seriously, the prep time is less than 10 minutes. Perfect for Sundays. Just set it all in the crock pot when you wake up in the morning and it will be ready by dinner time!

I do have about 5 different cards to show you so stay tuned for that!

Today is also my Hubby's and my 8th wedding Anniversary so I just wanted to say Happy Anniversary honey!

Adoption Blog Button, how you can help! :D

2009-07-30T11:40:00.001-07:00

I want to thank my awesome friend Jill! She and I have been friends since high school. I posted on FB asking if anyone knew how to make blog buttons. Not only did Jill come through for me, but she came through in a fabulous way! Our new button is on the right. Isn't it fabulous! She asked what it was I was wanting I told her something blue and brown like our pass along cards (see our other blog for that story). Using that as a referrence she came up with our awesome buttons. *big grin* Now, why am I telling you this? Because you can help us with our hope to adopt! That's right! All you need to do is right click on our button (I posted it above) and save it to your computer. Then go to your blog dashboard, click on layout, click on add gadget, click on add picture. A box will come up with a place to link and also a browse box. In the link area put in our blog address (www.jacobandsharon.blogspot.com) and then where it says browse, add the picture you just saved to your computer of our button. Then click save. It's that simple. Then everytime someone clicks on the button from your blog they will be sent to our blog and will be able to learn all about us. With your help to get the word out, we know our hope to adopt will become a reality!

Service Auction Recipe Tin

2009-07-26T13:30:00.000-07:00

I recently made a recipe tin for a lady at church who won a custom one in a service auction. The colors she chose were red and purple. Bright colors aren't my thing and to add purple with it is a little Red Hat Society to me. So I was concerned with how it would turn out, but these were the colors she chose, so who was I to tell her no. I actually like how it turned out. I did bright red like she asked and then I used various shades of purple. Here is the end product:
And a closeup:
The ribbons:
Index dividers on the inside:
Recipe Card:
Not to bad huh? I was actually really pleased with the way the various shades all blended together. The index dividers were done in the recipe categories that the winning bidder wanted and then I did 2 blank dividers in case there were any others she wanted to add. I did 30 recipe cards for each category and 20 blank ones for each of the 2 blank categories. She was excited when I showed it to her so I was pleased. :D
The other service that I donated was a photo session with a CD of all the editted images. Little did I know that the winning bidder of that auction would be a professional photographer who wanted me to take photos of her whole family. We are talking her, her husband, 2 of their kids and their spouses (it was supposed to be all 3 kids and their spouses but 1 family was unable to make it) and 9 of their 10 grandchildren. That's right! 15 people in all! I was sooo nervous. First of all, she is a professional, second, 15 people! The largest group I have ever done was 8 at a wedding, and that was 4 years ago and all but 1 were adults! But this group was so fun to work with and because their mom/grandma was a professional, they were all used to photos and posed like the pros they are. It was great! I still need to edit the photos, so I don't have any to show right now, but I will show a few as as soon as I am done.

Anyhow, in addition to photo editing I am working on our "hey look, we've moved (again)" cards. We are set to move in just 6 weeks so I need to pack my stamp room. I want to get the cards made before we move because I don't know how many weeks it will be before I can unpack that room. So I will have those to share with you in the next week or so. Until then, I thought I would post this photo I took of my DD Tamara. She had to touch up her now red hair with dye and decided to go a little darker. It is now almost the exact color mine was when I was her age. :D

Creations by Tammy

2009-07-06T16:09:00.001-07:00

So it's been a bit since I last blogged. Oops! I didn't mean for it to be that long. Truthfully I have spent no time in my craft room for the last 2 months almost. Although I need to make a recipe tin for someone at church (who won a custom one in a service auction our Releif Society -women's group- did last month) so I will be spending part of this week doing that. Who knows, maybe it will give my Mojo a boost because obviously my Mojo has taken a flying leap to somewhere unknown.

While I haven't been in my stamp room, someone has. :D My daughter decided to raid my stamp room and create something. She looked through my stash of ideas and found a photo wallet that I did ages ago.

I had no clue what she was doing until she finished. This was all her, with no help from me, not even to ask questions about where things were. :D I'm so proud! How cute is this?!!

Happy Birthday Tammy!

2009-06-06T09:40:00.000-07:00

Today is my daughter's 14th birthday! I can't beleive it's been 14 years. It sounds cliche' but it really does seem like yesterday that she was born. I just wanted to say Happy Birthday Baby Girl!! I love you!

My system for organizing stamp sets

2009-05-31T19:33:00.000-07:00

I have been asked to share my stamp set organizational system several times and I keep meaning to, but I keep putting it off and then I forget. I figured since I mentioned it in my last blog post, and again was asked to share it, that I should do it now before I forget again. So here you have it, my stamp set organizational system.

First I took my stamp sets and I sorted them into categories. (I wanted to do them in categories because when I know I am doing a Christmas card I didn't want to have to sort through the binder until I found a Christmas set, now I can just go straight to that section.) I have Floral, Animals, Nature, Children, Other Occasions, Whimsical/Fantasy, Every Occasion, Words/Sentiments, Christmas, Patriotic, Tags, Background, Miscellaneous, And then all my single stamps. I also have my wheels in this book as well so that I have them at a glance as well, however all my wheels are in special cases made for storing wheels so those are easy to find. After I separated them into categories I stamped each set onto a piece of white cardstock and then labeled them in the book (I'll show more of that in a moment). As for my book, I have an ordinary 3 ring binder (I didn't take a picture of it, cause it's just and ordinary 3 ring binder. ;-) Next as you will see, in my binder I color coded each category.The lines you see show the separation of sets so I know what stamp goes in which set. Then I wrote under each set in the book, the sets name, the category and # that set is in the category along with the brand of stamps it is (Stampin UP, TAC, Missy B, Hanna Stamps, MFT, Etc.) and how many stamps are in that set.

Next I labeled each set with the colored label, category, and set # that corresponds with what is in the book.

As I get a new set it gets stamped into the book and labeled accordingly and then gets put on my shelf. It was alot of work when I started this system, but now it's really easy to keep up with it. The hard part in the beginning was the time that putting it together consumed.

Here is where my system comes into play. Take for example when I was making my niece's graduation card the other day, as I said before I didn't remember having a graduation stamp. So I opened the book and started flipping through. I came to the Every Occasion category and my Year After Year set from SU.

As you will see, it's listed in the book as Year After Year, Every Occasion # 7 (which means it's the 7th set I have in that category) and then set of 8 (because there's 8 stamps in the set) and that it's a Stampin Up set. (The brand of stamp, is important and I'll show you why in a minute.) I saw that there was a graduation cap in the set. Perfect!

So now I had to find the set. So I go to my shelf, and I know from what my book has labeled that I am looking for a Stampin Up set, color category orange for Every Occasions, set # 7.

Look! There it is! It took me literally less then 10 seconds to find it. Since I knew what color category I was looking for and what set # it was.

Now, the reason I put the brand is because different brands are stored differently. All of my SU sets are all mounted on wood blocks, so I know if it's an SU set that I am looking only in the SU plastic cases. My unmounted sets are all kept in either CD cases or DVD cases. It just cuts down on the looking time if I know the brand I am looking for with how I have them stored.

Here is a shot of my TAC sets so you know what I'm talking about. Some of these cases have more then 1 set in them so you'll see that those cases have 2 labels.

Here is a shot of my single stamps. They are all on my top shelf and are at the back of the book. That way if I choose a single stamp I know where they are located too.

Is this system complex? I don't think so, but some may. It works for me though. It sure has cut down on the time it takes to find a set to use. Before I started doing this I found that I would be standing at my shelf for sometimes 30-45 minutes just pulling out sets and looking for the ones I wanted to use. Now that I have this system it has cut down that time drastically. I will look through the book and in less then a minute find the set I want and then it takes me around 5-15 seconds tops to find that set on the shelf. So in less then a minute I'm stamping rather then it taking 30-45 minutes to even start a card.

So there you have it! Clear as mud? I hope I didn't confuse you all too much and that this makes sense. Like I said, the most time consuming part is when you start the system having to stamp every set into the book by category and then labeling the set and the book. But once you have all your currently owned sets done, it's fairly easy to keep it up as you add new sets to your collection. :)

Happy Graduation!!

2009-05-30T14:24:00.000-07:00

My neice Kim is graduating from High School! I can't beleive it! I have known Kim since she was 3. She is actually my daughter's cousin on her dad's side, so since DD's dad and I never married Kim isn't technically my neice, but she is to me. I have a picture of Kim at the age of 4 holding my daughter when my daughter was only days old. So it's hard to beleive now that here she is, 18 and graduating from High School!

I wanted to make her a card but I don't have any graduation sets. So this is where having my sets all organized and stamped into a binder comes in handy. I was able to open my binder and look for a set to use. I have SU's Year after Year which has a Graduation Cap! SCORE!! I didn't remember that this set included that so yay!! I need inspiration so I went to the gallery at Splitcoast Stampers and I found this adorable card by liandrin16. I love the crayon resist technique and I hadn't used it in ages. So her card inspired me to do just that.

Kim's High School colors are Blue and Gold (if I remember correctly, but I know blue is one of them) so I opted for just the Blue and I did some black as well. First I took my Glossy cardstock and randomly stamped the cap using Momento Tuxedo Black Ink. Then I used my white crayon to highlight the areas I wanted highlighted. Next I took a sponge and my Brilliant Blue ink and sponged over the cardstock until I got the coverage I wanted. The ink doesn't stick to where you put the crayon (hence, Crayon Resist). I then mounted this peice onto Basic Black and used my Signo White Gel Pen to do some faux stitching lines. I mounted all this onto my Whisper White card base and stamped Congratulations from SU's set Holiday's and Wishes (or is it Hugs and Wishes, I always get those two mixed up). I added three brads just for some balance in the top right corner. There you have it, quick, simple, fun. :)

Happy Graduation Kimberly!! I'm so proud of you!

Cooking Ourselves Thin

2009-05-29T15:28:00.001-07:00

A few weeks ago on Lifetime a show premiered called Cook Yourself Thin. It's all about how you can still eat the things you want, you just make simple swaps to bring down the fat content and calorie count. I started watching it, very intrigued by the idea. I told hubby about it. He too was intrigued and started watching the show with me. I'll have to admit, we were skeptical... In making cakes they swap ground almonds for the fat from butter and oil (I have to figure out what else can be used because I'm allergic to all tree nuts, so no ground almonds for me, I'll figure something out though, cause I have to have dessert everyonce and a while!). To keep the moisture in the cake that you normally get from oil, they use things like butternut squash or carrots or even beets. (See where our skeptism is coming in, but hey, we're willing to give it a shot, we just have to figure out what to subsitute for the ground almonds.)

Last night we made our very first meal using the Cook Yourself Thin method. We made Steak and Cauliflower Mashed Potatoes. I know, you're making an EEWWWWW face right now aren't you? Trust me, I was too when I first saw it done on the show. But, again, I thought, we'll give it a shot. I desperately need to get healthier and I have tried so many things, but it's hard to stick to diets. That's why I wanted to try this, it's not dieting, it's basically changing how you cook.

Can I tell you, this was soooooo yummy! I mean mouth-watering yummy! Here is a link to the recipe on Lifetime's website: Steak & Cauliflower Mashed Potatoes

Hubby was concerned when he saw the steak was seasoned with fresh rosemary, salt and pepper-that's it, just those 3, he couldn't figure out how it would be good with just those 3, and I'm not a fan of rosemary, so I wasn't looking forward to it. However, it was the Cauliflower potatoes I was really concerned about. But wowzers! It was all delicious! And filling! Here it is:

Yes, that is 3 slices of flank steak you see, not that much steak, and not very many potatoes, but, it was sooo filling! And did I mention mouth-watering delicious! Oh! And did I mention, this whole plate was less then 400 calories! Seriously, less then 400 calories for a whole meal! How's that for yummy, delicious, healthy food!

We decided after last night's success (we bow down to the cooks on the show, we were so wrong in our thinking that it wouldn't be good) we are going to keep on trying out these recipes and see what happens. I'm hoping within a few weeks that I will be feeling healthy enough to start exercising again and hopefully within a year or so I will be at my target weight. That would be so awesome! Wish me luck!

I do have a card to show you, my neice is about to gradute from high school! I'll save that post for tomorrow. :)

Seriously Honored!

2009-05-28T10:32:00.000-07:00

Remember this card that I did back in April for the Vegas VSN on Splitcoast.

Well, this morning I got an email telling me that my card had been moved to a different gallery on Splitcoast. I was confused... So I clicked on the card link to find out where it had been moved to. It was moved to the High Rollers Gallery (a.k.a. challenge winners gallery). (Each hostess chose 2 cards as their favorites/winners for their challenge. And the winning cards get the distinction of being forever featured in the High Rollers Gallery on Splitcoast.) Huh? The High Rollers Gallery... There has to be some mistake.... So I check the VSN forum. Nope! No mistake. There is my card listed as a winner under the Bellie Up To The Buffet Challenge. Seriously, I'm so honored! There were some gorgeous cards in that challenge (in all the challenges actually). And Jenn (jbalcer!!) and Lori (stamp_momma) chose my card... my little card... to be a winner! I'm so tickled! Thanks ladies! You totally made my day!

New Craft Area

2009-05-17T11:57:00.000-07:00

When we got back from Utah we put all the stuff we had gotten for the baby into my daughter's room so that it would be out of the way for a little bit (knowing that we would have to move it before she got back from her dad's). We didn't want it all outside in the garage where it would get saw dust on it (not to mention where it could have bugs crawling all over it). We have only a few weeks before my daughter comes back so that means it's time to move things around.

Our kitchen is actually an eat in kitchen that we never used other then for cooking since we had a dining room for eatting. Instead we had a book shelf with some cookbooks in the eat in part of the kitchen. So we needed a new place for the cookbooks. So I moved my cake stuff into the food storage room (since I don't get asked to do cakes often anymore there isn't a need for that stuff in the kitchen). Then I moved the cookbooks to the now empty cupboard where some of the cake stuff had been (yes, we have that many cookbooks that they fit an entire cupboard, and I still have two cupboards in the kitchen that still have cake stuff in them, because, yes, I have that much cake stuff too). We moved the bookshelf into the food storage area as well and then moved the dining room table into the kitchen. There had been a rug under the dining room table that we moved into the living room (the dog loves that, now he has an even bigger area to lazy around in and you can often find him smack dab in the middle of that rug). I left the pictures up that were in the room formerly known as the dining room because they are our wedding pictures and I love to look at them. (we had the best photographer, Rebecca Montague of Montague Photography, based out of Bountiful Utah. Who sadly, doesn't do weddings anymore, but she offers tons of other great photo ops.)

Anywho, the next two days were spent moving all my craft stuff into what had been the dining room. We had left the bookshelf with the photo albums (and my colored glass collection) in the dining room and I utilized the empty shelves to store my stamping and crafting books on it. The shelves that hold my stamp sets and alterable items were put next to the existing shelf. (we couldn't put it right next to it because there is a telephone outlet there that sticks out)

Here is my paper storage. The filing cabinet has all my 8x10 paper and the wire unit next to it holds my 12x12 paper. There is a purple box on top of that with my diecuts and chipboard. (the box on top of the filing cabinet is the hardcase for my camera, there is also my mini tripod, and come crocheting stuff on top of it that won't fit anywhere else.)

Here is my main crafting area. I like this set up. I have a lot more work surface area. And when my daughter is back, there is lots of space for her to work with me (she has her own area in her room, but it's nice to be able to work on projects together sometimes and in my old room there wasn't the space to do that)

Because the window is there I had a limited space to put my ink and marker storage. So I came up with a new setup for it. Just goes to show you how versatile this unit is. :o) (Thank you once again to my wonderful husband for making me this awesome unit)

I have one other area that I don't have organzied yet so I didn't take a picture of it, but it's the area with all my rolling carts that house my ribbons and punches and embossing powder and other crafting goodies.

Now that the room formerly known as my craft room is emptied out we have been moving the baby's stuff into it. So that room is now known as the baby's room. I know that it may still be years before we are chosen by a birthmom, but it's good to know that when that does happen, we are ready. The baby's room now has a crib, a dresser/changing table, a pack and play (portable crib), a book shelf, a chair for rocking the baby to sleep, and a car seat and stroller. We do still need a high chair but since the baby won't need that until he or she is 4 months old at least, we have a little bit of time to get that. The closet is empty right now which is perfect because now we have space to put diapers and such as we get those. We do have some blankets and burp clothes but we haven't gotten any clothes yet because we don't know if our little one will be a boy or a girl.

So things are shaping up. I did decide to make another crib set (well, I'm doing the quilt and my mom is doing the rest of the crib set). The jungle animal one I did just looks too boyish, which is great if our little one is a boy. But, I want something else in case our little one is a girl. So I had an idea in mind to do a sweet soft set with roses. My mom thinks it's a fabulous idea and is all for making two crib sets. So I'll see what I can find at the fabric store this next week. Wish me luck!

Mother's Day Cards

2009-05-11T12:47:00.000-07:00

I know Mother's Day was yesterday, so sorry that I am posting these a day late.

Last week hubby said that he was going to run to the store and get his mom a Mother' Day card. *shock* That is something that should never ever be said to a stamper. Seeing the shock on my face (and because I semi-jokingly told him that I was offended he would buy a card for his mom) he asked me if I could make one. I told him yes, but the same rules as always apply. He had to pick out the stamps and colors. To which he replied that would be why he didn't ask me to make the card, he doesn't like picking the stamps and colors. I told him, that if I am going to make the card, he needs to have some part in it to, which is why I have him pick the stamps and colors. So he chose A Rose Is A Rose and then proceeded to stand there looking at my ink colors saying that he couldn't figure out what colors would go well (since the roses are two toned he would have to pick two colors). I asked him what color he wanted the roses and to let me worry about what would look good together. Relieved that he didn't have to figure that out he said either Yellow, Pink, or Peach roses.

So using that as my jumping off point, I chose Cameo Coral & Pumpkin Pie for the roses so they are a peachy orange color, So Saffron and More Mustard for the tiny flowers so they are yellow and Mellow Moss and Old Olive for the leaves. All were stamped randomly on a Whisper White card base. I printed the sentiment on my computer onto Whisper White Cardstock and mounted it on Basic Black off-centering it onto the card. I attached 3 black brads in the bottom right corner of the card and added a black stitched ribbon with an off centered bow to balance things out.

All Supplies are SU except printed sentiment which was done on my computer and the ribbon which I got at Hobby Lobby.

This next card is for my mom. I had to do a lot of tweaking on this one. I didn't like the way it was coming together, but some last minute additions made it turn out well (in my opinion, I just hope my mom likes it)

For this one I chose the Designer Series Paper from SU's SAB catalog. This is double sided paper, so I cut it to fit the card base (which is Whisper White) and then I scored it so that I could fold over the green side of the paper and be able to show both patterns. I punched a flower out using my 5 petal punch from the blue part. I then used my scallop edge punch to scallop the green part. I used my small hand held punch (don't remember the size) to punch tiny holes in each scallop, then I used my white Signo Gel Pen to make the holes stand out. I added a strip of the blue to the green to make it all blend better, printed the sentiment again on WW cardstock, mounted it on Certainly Celery, and added 3 blue eyelets. I decided I didn't like the white that was showing through from the blue peice, so I took a scrap peice and punched more flowers, Added some crystal stickles for some sparkle to where the white was showing through. Once the stickles was dry I attached two punched flowers using a brad, turning them so you could see the stickles and both flowers. I then used White Gel Pen to make the petals all stand out.

Cardstock, Paper, Gel Pen, Punches, Brad and Eyelets are SU. Stickles are TAC, Sentiment printed on my computer.

What's Cookin'

2009-05-07T22:49:00.000-07:00

I have been spending the last couple of week resting up from our trip to Utah, and trying to catch up on things. Now that I am finally caught up on everything else that got left to the side while we were gone (like things do while you're on vacation) I have been working on catching up on Splitcoast challenges. More specifically the photo challenges. A few weeks ago the challenge was to take a photo of food.

My hubby does a good chunk of the cooking at our house (I know, you're jealous). But a few times a week I get a chance to cook (I love to cook, I normally just let him do it because he likes to so much). The other day Jacob asked me to make roast for dinner. Let me interject for a moment. There are certain things that he cooks and certain things that I cook. Roast and most crock pot meals are my domain. I knew that the reason he was asking me to is because he wanted to make BBQ beef sandwiches for dinner. So, I made roast and potatoes and veggies (normally I do carrots but we were all out so I did green beans and corn instead). Whenever I make roast hubby will take the left over roast and make shredded BBQ Beef sandwiches the next night for dinner. So that's what we had tonight. I forgot to take a picture of that, but I did get a picture of last nights dinner or roast, potatoes, and veggies. We take some of the broth and juices of the roast to make the gravy. So, without further ado, here's what's cookin:

I'm going to work on the other challenges I've missed. I have also been doing some stamping. I have made mother's day cards, but seeing as how both my mom and hubby's mom read my blog regularly, I won't post those till Sunday.

My latest creation

2009-05-03T22:20:00.001-07:00

When we first started the adoption process everyone told us not to get too excited because it can take a long time to be chosen. Everyone was right I told myself. Fast forward a few months and here we are officially approved for adoption and I can't help but get excited and start preparing. Yes, we know that it may still be years before we are chosen, but here's the thing, even though we don't yet know our baby's birth parents, and we don't yet know our baby, and we haven't been chosen yet, we still love them all. We love our baby's birth parents and their families. And we love our baby. Already we feel like they are all part of our family. So yes, it may be years before we are chosen (we hope not, but it may be) we want to get excited and start preparing. So far we have a crib, a stroller, a car seat, and some blankets and burp clothes. We are going to start getting other things such as bottles and diapers and such with each shopping trip we make to the grocery store. A pack of diapers one trip and a pack of wipes the next trip, etc. That way when we get the call that we have been chosen, we will be ready. I'm someone who likes to plan ahead. I have no control over when we will be chosen, but I can prepare for when that day comes.

I have been working for the last two weeks on the quilt for the baby's nursery. My mom is working on the rest of the bedding (bumper pads, sheets, etc.). She made my daughter's before she was born so this is kind of carrying on the tradition. I wanted to make the quilt though. I chose a fabric set that has jungle animals and have tried to do coordinating fabrics in yellow or green so that the set will work for a boy or a girl. I hope I have done the job.

I hand quilted around all the animals and leaves and then the borders. I also hand stitched the binding on (well, sort of, I machine stitched the front of it on and the hand stitched the back so that it all has a nice finished edge, hand stitching the front allowed me to have better control over where the back was making it easier to stitch the back on) I love the way the tiger turned out! The quilting around the animals gives them a more dimensional look and actually makes them look a little like stuffed animals.

Why did I choose jungle animals? Because of this stinkin' cute elephant! If you know my husband and I or you have been a blog reader for a while, you know our story about elephants. Just in case you don't know, or may have forgotten here's a shortened version, an elephant never forgets. (it's true, look it up). I woke up one morning shortly before my husband left for basic training in the Army. I had a stuffed elephant that had been placed on my back. My husband then explained to me that an elephant never forgets. And then he said that no matter where he is in this world, no matter how far away he is from me, he will always remember me and be thinking of me and will never forget his love for me. So ever since then elephants have been our thing. This would also be why I make him cards with elephants on them. So when I saw this fabric panel at hobby lobby I had to get it.

New blog name and another VSN card

2009-04-29T18:36:00.000-07:00

Crazy Crafty Creations, how's that for a new name for my blog? I was going to change it back to My Own Stamping World, but then I realized that I share so much more on this blog then stamping. So Crazy Crafty Creations it is.

Now that we got that covered I have another VSN card to share with you.
I really don't like the color gold so this was a hard challenge for me. I don't wear it on my person (with the exception of my wedding band) and I don't use it (often) in my crafts. I just don't like it. I like the more muted, brushed, antique-y colors. So this challenge to use lots of gold on your card was difficult at best. But I think it turned out o.k.

I embossed the main image in gold, then colored the white spaces of that image using copics. I used brushed gold cardstock on part of the card along with gold ribbon and gold hardware and a gold brad. I also embossed the sentiment using gold embossing powder as well.

Fantastic News!!!! (means a blog name change)

2009-04-28T14:02:00.000-07:00

I just got word from our adoption caseworker. We are officially and approved adoptive couple! YAY!!! He has posted our profile on the agency's website. We are adopting through LDS Family Services. The great thing about them is that birth families don't need to be LDS in order to use their services (which are free to birthmoms). The services include counseling for birth families, and if adoption is chosen LDS Family Services will provide medical care for the birth mom as well as counseling after placement. Which was really important to me. I was a teen mom, I had Tammy when I was 16. I can't even imagine the hard decision and sacrifice that will be made by our birth mom so it was really important to me that she be given all kinds of support by not only her family, but by the agency as well. The agency is very low pressure. In fact, they even offer services to help those birth parents who choose to keep thier children. They offer counseling and parenting classes. The services there are numerous. We were so glad when we chose to go with them.

We hope to find a birth family who is wanting an semi-open adoption. We want to keep in touch through letters, pictures, and emails for years to come. We think that contact even after our adoption is finalized is essential to everyone, not only the families and us, but to the precious little baby who is so loved by all.

If you or anyone you know is considering adoption or is just in need of help making decisions in their pregnancy, contact LDS Family Services. Our profile along with a lot of other couples who are waiting for the blessing of adoption, can be viewed at http://www.beta.itsaboutlove.org/ Contact information to the agency are on the website as well. To learn more about us that isn't in the profile, check out our family blog at http://www.jacobandsharon.blogspot.com/

Now that we are officially approved I have to change the name of my blog. I am going to change it Crazy Crafty Creations. So for those of you who are subscribers to my blog, starting tomorrow your notifications will come through with that name. If you have my blog linked to yours, please change the name in your links.

Thank you everyone for your prayers and support! We are so excited about this new path our lives are taking!

It's A Vegas Buffet!

2009-04-25T15:46:00.001-07:00

Thank you to Paula who suggested doing a challenge to get myself out of my stampers rut. I went to check out Splitcoast Stampers and what do I find? Today is a Mini VSN! (VSN is Virtual Stamp Night) Filled with great challenges that are just what I need to get my creative juices a nice push!

The theme for this VSN is Las Vegas, all of the challenge have a Vegas theme to them.

So far I have done 3 of the challenges. Here is the first one:

"No one starts a night on the town in Vegas on an empty stomach, now do they? We've got your famous Las Vegas Buffet-line right here! Who doesn't like to have a few choices on the entree and the side items, and I really love a good salad bar. But, let's be brutally honest here.... it's all about the dessert, isn't it? Cheesecake, creme brulee, cobblers, CARROT CAKE! MMMMM, MMMMM!Well, we'd be remiss if we didn't kick off Vegas night with a trip through the buffet line. Best thing about this one is that it's calorie free.

Bellie up to the Buffet!

Grab yourself: a main dish entree - favorite stamps set

a couple of side items - cardstock and ink

and head straight the dessert cart, girls. Our challenge to you is to choose at least 3 dessert items from the list and have at it. Show us what you've got when there are no calories to contend with. Buttons Brads GlitterDew DropsPunchesSewingRibbon EyeletsRhinestones Die Cuts, Whatever you can think of . . . . Accessorize it, baby"

So for my "Main Dish" I used one of my favorite sets, Garden Silhouettes. For my side items I have my cardstock (Tempting Turqouise, Chocolate Chip and Whisper White) along with Chocolate Chip Ink and Marker, Tempting Turqouise Ink and Marker.

For my Dessert I used my crafters tool kit, a needle and some thread to do some zig zag stitching, I also used 3 brads, and some ribbon.

Stamper's Block

2009-04-25T03:04:00.001-07:00

Have you ever had Stamper's Block? Well, that is me right now. I literally haven't been in my stamp room to stamp anything in over a month. The last thing I think was the invitations for my friend (for her future sister-in-laws bridal shower). That was over a month ago! And honestly, I have no desire to stamp either. I know I need to though. Since we got back from Utah I have been working on hand quilting a baby blanket for our future child. (I know, it may be a few years yet before we're chosen by birth families, but there was a lot of work that needed to be done to quilt this blanket and I wanted to have it done just in case it isn't years before we're chosen) I am pretty much done with that, all I need to do now is stitch around the edge border parts and then bind it (I'll post pictures when I'm completely done). Other then that I'm done. So I think tomorrow, rather then working on the quilt I am going to lock myself in my stamp room and stamp. Hopefully I will be able to produce something decent and have something to show you on Sunday.

Grease Is The Word!

2009-04-22T20:00:00.000-07:00

The rest of our trip went awesome. We got back late Sunday night. The house we were going to put an offer in on is now under contract so we chose a different house. We will put in an offer on that one within the next few days. We did get our pre-approval so that will make the buying process go so much easier knowing what we were approved for. Anyhow, Tammy was in her school musical Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. She did awesome! I'm so proud of her! She has quite the stage presence and has a beautiful singing voice.

Tammy played Frenchy in Grease. Despite the sound system not working half the time and most of the kids forgetting their lines (it was a Jr. High play after all), she did great! She nailed everyone of her lines and sang her solo beautifully! (Tammy is in the front right bottom corner, yes, the one with RED hair! You were expecting to see her with her blonde hair weren't you? She decided to dye it, "for the play" but really it was because she has been wanting to dye it for a while and the play gave her an excuse. I really love red hair on her! She has been wanting red hair for a long time. Although now my hair looks brown next to hers and not the usual dark red.) This scene is the opening scene introducing all the characters. They each ran out on stage shouting their characters name and then got into position. Once they were all out they did a dance number.

This one was my favorite scene. This was the Beauty School drop out scene. (Can you tell from the "angels" with "curlers" in their hair). (I got this picture from my sister-in-laws blog, the one I took of it wasn't any good.)

This was the curtain call at the end. I missed Tammy bowing because of course I was clapping loudly for her! I did get this picture of the rest of her part of the curtain call. The kid next to her played Doody in the play. He kept blushing each time he had to dance with Tammy. Apparently he has quite the crush on her.

Tammy had such a great time that she is determined to try out for all the future plays and musicals that her Jr. High and High School does from now on! I say got for it! She will do awesome!

Great Job Tammy! I can't wait for your next play!

The wedding cake, final result!

2009-04-21T00:19:00.001-07:00

So I was looking through books that I have with cakes and I came across a gorgeous cake with Blue and Purple flowers. I thought it would be the perfect cake for my brother-in-laws wedding. I showed to them to make sure that they would like it and after I got the go ahead I set about making the flowers (I did tell them that I would attempt to make the cake, but seeing as how I hadn't gotten to practice it, I couldn't guarantee it, but would try my best). The cake required over 1,000 flowers. I ended up not having time to make them all so I had to change the design of the cake at the last minute. Well, sort of, I made the cake on Friday for the wedding on Saturday. I had absolutely no time to on Saturday to do the cake so I had to make it on Friday. The end result wasn't what I was aiming for, but I do like the way it turned out. I wasn't sure about it at first, but looking back at it, I do like the way it turned out. The bride and groom seemed to both really like it so that is what matters right. And apparently it tasted good too.

The bottom layer was white cake with blueberry filling, the middle layer was Lemon cake with cream chees filling, and the top layer was white cake with raspberry.

The cake topper

Details on the cake. I made pale buttery yellow roses, and pale purple roses, as well as lavender roses. I also made some indigo blue 5 petal flowers. The cake was frosted in a pale pale blue, with white "beading" and shell borders.

Over the next few days I will share photos of our trip, including pictures of my daughter in her school musical. :) I am working on some projects that I hope to be able to share with you soon as well.

The rest of the week and a new name

2009-04-20T07:37:00.001-07:00

Last week was such a whirlwind weekend. We saw a lot of houses, decided to put in an offer on one (the tri-level) found out Saturday night that it had just gone under contract. Decided aganist putting an offer in on the other house I mentioned last posting (the area isn't the best my brother said, he lives a couple of miles from that other house, so he knows). We went to my daughters play 3 times. She was Frenchy on Thursday night and did amazing! Thursday I also baked the cakes for the wedding, Friday I decorated it (and finished just in time to go to the third and final night of Tammy's play). Saturday was the wedding, pretty much all day. The ceremony was in the morning, a wedding luncheon in the afternoon, and the reception that evening. We left Sunday morning to come back here and made it home by just after 11. Whew! What a week! My brother's were awesome to let us stay at their house. And I think my brother Matt (who owns the house) even enjoyed having our dog there. I will post pictures later today or tomorrow, right now I am going to go rest.

****Oh! Update on the adoption! We got our assessment to look over. We proofed it, there are a few corrections that our caseworker needs to make but other then that all is good and positive. (Just things like, he said I was 15 when my parents divorced, I was 14, just little things like that so we can sign it and he will make the changes). The approval board has already met to talk about our case unofficially so once he gets our signed assessment back we will be officially approved for adoption!

***** Speaking of the adoption, I need to change my title to my blog. We have an adoption blog for prospective birth families to learn more about us. Well if they click on my name, they will see that I have two blogs, this one and that one. They will also know what my last name is because of the current title of this blog. The agency doesn't want last names known so I need to change my blog title. Just wanted to give you a heads up! :)

House Hunting, Books, Great Deals, oh my!

2009-04-14T18:37:00.000-07:00

Greetings from the floor of my brother's house in Utah. LOL I am using hubby's laptop and for some off reason I planted myself on the floor rather then sitting in a chair. We have had a nice trip so far. The drive here was uneventful, which is to say, very good. We didn't even argue which we normally do when we are both tired and ornery and stuck in a car for a long time. ;) We spent the first two days at Jacob's mom's house. While there we got to meet our soon to be sister-in-law who came with hubby's brother (her fiance') for dinner. I showed them the picture of this cake I found and want to do for them. They loved it. Hopefully it turns out the way I am hoping. Hubby's sister and another brother and his wife were also there so it was so nice to catch up with them. After the weekend at my mother-in-laws house we came to my brother's house.

For the last two days we have been house hunting. While our intention was to just look for now and actually buy in a few months, we think we may have found the house for us so we are going to talk about it and pray about it and weigh some pros and cons and decide whether we want to put in an offer now or not. If we do we would request a closing date of July 1st which seems like a long way away, but really, it's only a little over two months. We figure if we close then, we will owe our first mortgage payment right around the beginning of Sept. which is when we plan to move back here to Utah, so the timing should work out perfectly. So we'll see what we decide. It is between two houses, one is just about perfect and wouldn't need any work done to it other then wall color (it's all white). It has new flooring through out, completely renovated kitchen and bathrooms, and a great backyard along with a 1 car garage where hubby would have his wood shop. 4 bedrooms, 2 bath, and a livingroom, and a family room. It's also a Tri-Level which would be great for me, I wouldn't have a huge amount of stairs to climb, which is tough for me to do on my bad days with my back. But this house is also a little more then what we wanted to spend. The other house is a lot less money, has the same amount of bathrooms and bedrooms, has a livingroom and a family room, but has an office that would make a great craft room. The kitchen and bathrooms all need updating, it's a split level which hubby hates, but for he likes this one, the backyard isn't very nice though and it also has no garage or wood shop so we would have to build a garage along with all the other renovations that we would need to do eventually. So we have to weigh the pros and cons of both. Both are good locations, good schools, nice neighborhoods etc. So we will see.

Anyhow, now, on to my great deal! We weren't going to get anything for the baby until we were officially approved for adoption (our case worker assures us it will be any day now) but, we were out shopping today and just looking at baby stuff for fun and we found a stroller/carseat combo regularly $170, for $104. We couldn't pass it up! Hooray for great deals! Not to mention that my mom just called and saw a listing on Craigslist for a new crib and mattress for $50 which would be awesome if we could get that!

Oh, and to top off the day, my mom gave me a present that she bought the baby while at a thrift store. She found one of my favorite books from growing up. I had several, you already know about Goodnight Moon, Stand Back Said The Elephant I'm Going To Sneeze and of course, The Runaway Road. But I haven't told you about another of my favorites, The Monster At The End Of This Book. It's a classic tale starring the lovable Grover who reads the title of the book and is so scared that there is a monster, monsters scare him. Over and over he tries to stop the reader from turning pages and tries tying the pages together, building a brick wall, and even nailing the pages shut. But the reader (who is so strong according to Grover) gets to the end of the book and they find the monster........ they find....... Grover himself. Grover says that he told you not to be scared (even though he is the one who was scared! hehehehehe It's too cute! And she found it in mint condition, not even a bent page. I love it! She is going to get the Runaway Road for me too. *grin*

The last few weeks

2009-04-06T15:42:00.000-07:00

The last few weeks here have been busy. I have been making cakes, wedding announcements, bridal shower invitations, and at the end of it all, my wonderful friend Belinda came to visit. Yay!! You've seen the pictures of the announcements for my brother-in-laws wedding, and the invitations for my friend's future sister-in-laws bridal shower so I won't show those again. You have also seen the cake samples for my brother-in-laws wedding as well so I won't show you those either. Although I will post pictures of the actual cake at the wedding which is in just under two weeks. YAY!!

A lady in my ward (congregation at church) had a baby a couple of weeks ago. I took her dinner and of course had to use that as an excuse to make a cake. I used the same design that I am probably doing for the wedding cake in a couple of weeks only I used pink roses instead of blue roses (since she had a girl). I wanted to try out doing white scallops with white rosettes to see how that would look. What do you think?

I haven't been doing much stamping lately. I think I kind of wore myself out with the announcements and invitations. I need to get in my craft room and stamp for fun. I kind of forgot what that was like.

Picture Tag

2009-04-01T06:57:00.000-07:00

My Sister-In-Law Andrea tagged me. It's been a while since I have been tagged and frankly, this one looked like so much fun that I had to do it. Here are the rules:

1~ Go to your document/picture file

2~ Go to the 6th file

3~ Go to the 6th picture

4~ Blog about the picture

5~ Tag 6 friends

Anyone who knows me and/or has seen my house knows I like to be organized. Ask my husband. I reorganize my house probably once a month. Seriously, I try to find ways to make things function better. So I like to reorganize. (Does this translate into being a neat freak? Not really, I just like things clean, but I wouldn't say I'm a "neat freak") Anyhow, my pictures are no exception, they are organized into categories, and sub categories etc, so when the rules said to go to the 6th file and then to the 6th picture, I had to go a little further.

I went to the 6th file which was our family photos category, then to the 6th sub category file which was wedding photos, from there I had 3 files (bridal pictures, engagement pictures, wedding pictures) so I went to the 3rd one (since 3 twice equals 6 right?) which was my wedding photos. From there I found a 6th photo, now I want to share the pictures just before and after this one too (cause they are cute and I will use any excuse to show off my wedding pictures. *wink*)

So just before that 6th photo that I finally came to we see this:

My photographer was trying to get a photo of my sweet hubby and I with our parents. She told my father-in-law to scoot in a little closer. So he scoots in closer and hugs my mother-in-law. Rebecca (our photographer) realized where Jacob gets his affectionate ways from. So after she snapped that photo she took this one of us with our parents, (this one was the 6th photo that I was supposed to post in todays picture tag)After this photo she had Jacob and I kiss (again, we did a lot of kissing pictures, after all, it was our wedding day!) and have our parents act annoyed: And this final picture is my favorite in the line of photos with our parents. This time Rebecca asked the parents to kiss and for us to be shocked. Now, my stepdad right after Rebecca told us what to do for the photo asked why we would be shocked that they were kissing. And then he said, "after all, we are married", then he grabs my mom and plants one on her, so my look of shock, is real! I hope you enjoyed my little story through pictures. As for who I will tag, I don't know if any of them will do it, but just in case they want to, I want to tag, my mother-in-law Alice Ann, my sister-in-law Ruth, my other sister-in-law Janele, and my friends, Robyn, Lydia, and of course, Shelly.

Recent Photography

2009-03-21T12:06:00.001-07:00

I haven't posted and photography shots in a while. Sorry bout' that!

Last weeks photography challenge on Splitcoast was the 25th challenge. We were asked to post something that makes us smile. And then there was a bonus challenge where we posted a photo that we have taken that could be a postcard. So here are my iSmile photos:

I read the challenge and immediately thought of my husband, my daughter, and my dog. Well, my daughter is at her dad's, so I couldn't do a photo of her. My husband was sleeping, the thought of taking a picture of my sweet wonderful husband taking a much deserved nap after a hard day at work made me smile even more, so I tip toed into the bedroom and took this:

My dog always makes me smile, he cracks me up. He's such a funny dog, if you knew him, he would make you smile too:
Now for the postcard challenge, I actually posted a picture I had taken at White Sands while my in-laws were visiting back in January. That is sand, not snow in this picture.
Now this weeks challenge is to take a picture of something at an odd angle, whether looking up at it, down on it, angle the camera, etc. The weather has always been really nice in New Mexico, with the exception of a few days here and a few days there. It has been so nice lately that my hubby has started watering the lawn on our designated days (since we live on a military post, they have days that are designated for us water our lawn.). Well yesterday was one of those days, I went outside and took some pictures, here is one I took of the trees turning green and the sun peeking through. I love this shot!

Scrapbook Profile

2009-03-20T21:32:00.000-07:00

Our caseworker for our adoption asked us to do a profile online, which we have done, it will be posted to the agency's website as soon as we are approved. In addition though he asked us to do a scrapbook profile. When they meet with birth families they don't always have a computer to show them our online profile, so the scrapbook profiles are to tell them a little about us. So I created these pages for our profile. The scrapbook profiles are 2 pages all about us, just kind of a teaser if you will. I was just waiting on the photos from Snapfish to add to it. I got those on Thursday so I was able to finish the pages. I'm not a major scrapbooker, although I am trying to get into it more. So these aren't the best pages, but I was still happy with them.

I used the Bali Breeze DP from SU (I love this paper, I wish I had more, I'm running out.) I paired it with Tempting Turqouise and Certainly Celery. The Our Family is printed on Whisper White cardstock with my computer printer. I used my crafter's tool kit to paper pierce the pages and then hand stitched them. They took quite sometime, almost 8 hours total, but they were well worth the effort.

A detail shot of the stitching:

Tomorrow I will post some of my latest photography shots from the recent SCS photography challenges.

Another Cake Idea

2009-03-18T21:48:00.001-07:00

I got an email last week from the bride-to-be (and my soon to be sister-in-law) telling what she wanted in her wedding cake. She likes the idea of the pillars and asked if I could do something on the sides of the cake so that the cake wasn't just smooth on the side. She also asked if I could do frosting flowers instead of silk flowers (she has seen some of my past cakes I guess and likes the flowers I have done on those, the thing is, most of those are frosting flowers, but they are non-edible since they are fondant flowers). So I took her thoughts and ideas and came up with another cake choice. I am actually really pleased with this one. If they choose this one it will have more roses on it (I ran out of blue buttercream frosting, now I know I need to do lots of blue frosting for the actual wedding cake if they choose this one). Anyhow, here is what I came up with:

My sweet wonderful husband made me a second 10 inch dummy cake, this time with holes in it for the pillars so I could actually do the cake with the pillars like they are meant to be.

Here is a close up of the cake, looking down on it a little. Here is a close up of the top tier (left bare on the top so if they get a cake topper they can put it on there). You can also see the scallops on the sides. I did rosettes at the top of each scallop. I did a larger shell border on the bottom of each tier and a small shell border on the top of each tier. A close up shot of one of the roses (the roses are a denim blue, I can't get them darker without the coloring effecting the flavor, this is actually my favorite of my blue colorings too, and the leaves are a Juniper green). I love how the roses came out! They are the best buttercream roses I have every done!

I did try a cake with a more elaborate filigree pattern on the sides, but I did one layer and my hands were killing me. There is no way I would be able to do a cake of that calibure in the amount of time that I have an still be able to function afterwards. So this is about as elaborate as I can get and still be o.k. after making it. This practice cake took about 4 hours (partly because I had no clue where I was going with it when I started it). I would spend 5-6 hours on the actual cake to make sure it is as perfect as I can get it. Such as the scallops being evenly spaced on their actual wedding cake.

We'll see if they like this one. I hope so, I had fun doing it. I'll let you know!

New color

2009-03-18T15:22:00.000-07:00

Shelly and Lydia loved both cards, although they were in agreement that the red roses was their favorite (it was my favorite too). They asked if I could do it in pink instead of red though. So here is that card in pink, black and white. I hope you like it girls!

Announcements and Invites

2009-03-17T15:33:00.000-07:00

For the last 4 days I have been working on the announcements for my brother-in-laws wedding. It took me over 20 hours, but I finally got them done! I did 200 of the announcments and then another 50 sealing cards (for those who are invited to the ceremony). I changed the info on the announcements, pulled out all the personal indentifying information, but this sample shows what I did for the announcements.

Both the bride and the groom have blue as a favorite color and Navy blue is one of the wedding colors. So for the announcements I did a 5x7 invite. I used the ticket corner punch to notch the corners. I did white cardstock over top of that (cut to 4.5x6.5) and stamped the cherry blossom image from Garden Silouhettes in Navy cardstock. Then I did the vellum over top of that with the announcement part printed on it. I tied a navy organdy ribbon at the top.

The ceremony cards were done on shimmery white cardstock. They are 2x3 and have the info printed on them with a flower from the came Garden Silouhettes set in Brocade Blue ink (stamped off once). (I didn't take a photo of those, sorry)

I hope the bride and groom like them (the have seen pictures of them, I just hope they like them in person!). I do need to revamp the wedding cake design. When I did the 3 that I posted in my last post, the bride had said that she really didn't know what she wanted. It wasn't until after I did the cakes that she told me what she had in mind. So I need to revamp the design to fit what she is wanting. Hopefully I can do it. That is my next project.

My friend Shelly emailed me the other day on Facebook and asked me if I would be willing to come up with an invite for a bridal shower she and her sister (my friend Lydia) are throwing for her brother's fiancee. They are doing a tea party bridal shower (how cute is that for an idea!) and asked me if I had any cute tea party stamps. I have almost 200 sets, and no tea party sets. But I told her that if I were her I would do an invite with spring flowers and the words You're Invited on the outside and then the tea party info on the inside. She loved that idea. So I came up with two announcements for her and Lydia to choose from. I hope this is what you had in mind ladies! Here they are!

This one is done with red, green and black and has roses. (Wreath of Roses from SU, I forgot I had this set actually! So glad I found it because I love this set)

This one is done with SU's set A Rose Is A Rose. I did the roses in spring colors of pinks, yellows and greens. The card is paper pierced around the edges of the focal image with a pink ribbon tied around it.

If you like the color scheme of one but like the images of the other, I can combine. Just let me know your thoughts!

3 to choose from!

2009-03-10T23:54:00.000-07:00

So I ended up doing 3 mock cakes for my BIL and future SIL for their wedding. They will get to choose thier actual cake from these 3. I hope they like at least 1 of them! Two of them are o.k. in my opinion, but one of them, one of them I really love. And I hope they choose that one. But we'll see. Anyhow, here they are!

The wedding colors are various shades of blue, with a little bit of lavender. I bought some silk flowers that are some gorgeous shades of blue and some purple ones that are a little darker then lavender, but compliment the blues so well.

(keep in mind, the actual wedding cake icing will be smoother then this, these are styrofoam cake dummies -that hubby made of course- and I had a harder time icing them then I expected. so ignore the bumpiness of the icing).

Cake #1-
This is a classic 3 tier cake, stacked construction, navy satin ribbon, dot border, with some flower clusters. (If they choose this one I will do more flower clusters then just the ones you see here)

Cake # 2-

On this one I did a shell border, I used seperator plates between the layers. I added the flowers to hide the gap between tier 1 & 2. If they choose this one the pillars won't be so tall. Since this is a cake dummy and I will want to use it for future use I didn't want to put holes in the middle one to make pillars smaller (which is what I would do on the actual cake, the bottom part of the pillars would go into the middle tier itself.)
I added some flowers around and inbetween the pillars and a flower cluster on top.

Cake # 3-

This is actually the 2nd cake that I made (and the 2nd one that I showed them) but it is my favorite so I wanted to show it last here. This one is a 3 tier cake. Seperator plates are used in between the layers, and flowers are used to hide the gaps. Shell border is done on the bottom of each layer and a flower cluster on the top. Do you see why this one is my fav?

All in all I'm pleased with how these turned out. I had contemplated some more elaborate cakes, but since I will only have about a day to do the cake (including bake time) I didn't want to present something that I can't finish, or that I can't have look perfect on wedding day.

Invites and dummy cakes

2009-03-09T09:46:00.000-07:00

My brother-in-law (hubby's brother that is just younger then him) is getting married in less then 6 weeks. He asked me if I would make the wedding invitations. I said sure. Silly me! They need 200+so I will be a busy little bee getting them done. I have some of the supplies, hopefully the rest will get here soon so I can knock them out and get them to the bride and groom with ample time still left to mail them out.

BIL also kind of "joked" in Jan. when he was here visiting that if he got married I could make his wedding cake. Well, what do you know, he gets engaged. I ask him if he was serious and wants me to make the cake. He says yes but he will talk to his lovely fiancee' (who I have never met since we don't live there, but I hear from everyone who has met her that she is great, a perfect fit for him) I hear nothing back from them. Another BIL tells me that as far as he knows yes, they want me to do the cake since they are telling people I am doing it. So o.k. I talk to BIL who is getting married to confirm with him, and he says that he hasn't heard anything to contrary from his fiancee' so yes, I'm doing the cake.

Rather then having them choose a cake off the internet or from a photo and having them fall in love with it only to find out I can't do it and make it look perfect I figured I would do some mock-up cakes and then let them choose which one they like. That way I know that I can do whichever one it is they choose and do it well. Rather then baking and decorating multiple cakes and having to find some poor soul to pawn them off on my sweet hubby decided to make me some "dummy cakes". These are cakes made out of styrafoam. This way I can decorate them, take the picture, wash the frosting off and decorate the next cake, take that picture, etc. Then the bride and groom can choose which they like that way. Saves a lot of un-needed baking. Not only will this work for mock-ups, but once they choose their cake if it is one I need to practice I can do that on the dummy cake as often as I need to so that the cake will look fabulous come wedding day. (or as fabulous as I can make it) So this weekend hubby has been working on dummy cakes for me. He is almost done with them and then I can start decorating.

As for the invitations, I did 7 samples, the bride chose 1 that she liked, but asked me to incorporate a couple of things from some of the others. So I did that. Now I am just waiting on them to choose an ink color (that and the rest of my cardstock) and then I can start on those. So hopefully by the end of the week I will have some cakes and invites for you to see (the invites with all the indentifying info taken out of course).

As for the scrapbook pages for our adoption profile, I am waiting for a few photos to come from Snapfish. I love Snapfish, I am getting 10 photos printed and I'm only paying 90 cents!

In the meantime, I found this project that I never shared with you. It is one I did for a friend of mine before she moved from KS. Yes, it is that old! I made one similar for a few of friends, each taylor made for them.
I sure miss my KS friends....

Update!

2009-03-06T11:41:00.000-08:00

Just wanted to post a quick update on our adoption. We had our home study today. It went fantastic! Our case worker was very impressed. He said they are just waiting on the background checks and 1 more letter of referrence (we have 4 of our friends who are writting letters and they are waiting on 1 still). After they receive those he will write up our adoption study and then we will be approved! He said that it should only be a few more weeks!!!!
We are so excited and beyond thrilled!

I am working on our online profile stuff. I am mostly done with that though, just tweaking a few things here and there. As soon as I am done it will be ready to be posted, so as soon as we are approved the agency will post that on their website. In the meantime I am also working on our scrapbook profile. I have 1 of the 2 pages done. Hopefully I will have those done in the next few days and will be able to show you all those.

Anyhow, I just wanted to let you all know how well it's all going. :) After we are approved we just wait to be chosen by a birth family. Hopefully that won't take too long to be chosen but we are prepared for it taking a while. Hopefully it won't, but it might. In the meantime we are so excited that the approval process is flying by!

Happy Birthday Hubby!

2009-03-01T11:45:00.000-08:00

Happy Birthday to my honey! My sweetheart turned 32 today! (the above picture is one that I took of him while scouting for picture locations the other day. I made him "model" for me so I could figure out if I liked that particular location or not. I told him to sit on the rock for me, he decided to strike some poses. hehe)

As you my faithful blog readers know, hubby asked me a few weeks ago if I would make him a birthday cake done with Chocolate Fondant. He said he didn't care what it looked like and I could use that as my opportunity to practice my skills. I haven't made flowers for almost a year so I thought that this would be a good time to try. This cake is a cake of firsts, my first time making Chocolate Fondant (recipe from Michelle Foster on Cake Central just sift 3/4 cup of cocoa when you are sifting your powdered sugar.) This was also my first time making chocolate buttercream frosting (Recipe from a Wilton tiered cake book that I have). And since I didn't have regular fondant, I use gum paste for my flowers. This was my first time making gumpaste flowers. The fondant was harder to work with them I thought it would be. I added 3 lbs. of powdered sugar like the recipe called for but it was a little too much. It was brittle in spots so I really had to manipulate it. But it turned out alright, ecspecially for my first time making it.

The cake is done in a heart shape. Hubby wanted chocolate cake (with chocolate fondant, that combined with the chocolate buttercream is a whole lotta chocolate)

Now I know what you're thinking, either you're thinking that "there is a rose missing in the front there" however,that was intentional, the roses cascade down the side and end up in front

Or you're thinking "that is a whole lotta roses!" That too was intentional. Hubby is 32, total there are 32 roses and leaves. :o) See, there is a madness to my method.

Happy Birthday Honey!

Two Hearts/Split Negative

2009-02-27T11:49:00.000-08:00

I'm sorry that it's been a few days since my last post. I have been crazy busy getting all of the latest round of paperwork in order for the adoption. But this morning I mailed it all out. Anyhow, here is another card I did for VSN this last weekend. This one is actually my favorite. I made it for my daughter.

This challenge was called Two Hearts Beat As One. It was to use the split negative technique. This is a technique where you emboss the same image twice, once on a light peice of cardstock using dark embossing powder, and the other time on dark cardstock using light embossing powder. I opted to go for black and white for the image. I used the Gerber Daisy stamp from TAC. I wanted to add another color to the card itself to make it really stand out. Since the card is for my daughter, what better color to use then her favorite. Turq

Supplies:
Stamps: Gerber Daisy, TAC, So Many Sayings
Paper: Whisper White, Basic Black, Tempting Turqiouse
Ink: Black Craft, Versamark
Accessories: Clear EP, White EP, Heat gun, ribbon

Now I just need to get started on DH's birthday cake. He gave me creative liberty on the cake as long as I covered it in chocolate fondant. So I am going to take the opportunity to work on my rose making, using Fondant of course. Which is why I am starting today, it takes forever for these puppies! (two days to be exact) I'll post pics of the finished cake.

Bittersweet Love- VSN

2009-02-24T07:41:00.000-08:00

This VSN challenge was to make a card using a stamp that you just can't get to work, or just had to have and now it sits there collecting dust because you just can't decide what to do with it. So this rocking chair from TAC was my choice. I bought it several years ago and I have used it once. That card wasn't the greatest (that's putting it mildly). I have been afraid to use it since for fear that I would end up with another card that sucked.

While this card doesn't suck, I am actually pleased with it, it definately could have turned out better.

Supplies:
Stamps: TAC Rocking Chair, So Many Sayings
Paper: Chocolate Chip, Old Olive, Whisper White
Ink: Black, Chocolate Chip
Accessories: Colored Pencils, Aquapainter, brad, corner ticket punch, word window punch, fiber

New Love- VSN

2009-02-23T18:42:00.000-08:00

The card I have to show you today was made for the VSN- New Love challenge. The challenge was to make a card using a new stamp set (it couldn't be older then 2 months), use new access. or also use things that you hoard because you love them so much and can't bare to let them o.k.

While my set (B is for Baby ~ by Hanna Stamps) isn't less then two months old it is the last one I bought. I got it about 3-4 months ago, whenever it was released, I really don't remember. At any rate, with our adoption approval hopefully on the horizon we have cut all extra spending. This sadly means stamps too. So I used this set for this card since it is the newest set I have. I did however use several things I have been hoarding. I used paper that I only use for special things, buttons that I don't like to use because they are so cute, and ribbon that I have been holding on to because I am almost out of that color and can't bare to let go of what I have remaining.

I decided that I like this card so much that it would be good for adoption announcements when we finally get our baby. It is easily changed to pink (or probably purple since I hate pink) if we get a girl. I don't know about you, but I like it. :)

Supplies:
Stamps: B Is For Baby (Hanna Stamps), So Many Sayings (SU)
Paper: Whisper White (SU), Bashful Blue (SU), printer paper (not sure who makes it)
Ink: Black (Momento)
Accessories: Copic Markers, Button, Ribbon

Would you let your kid do this?

2009-02-22T23:15:00.000-08:00

Today was church. Boy was it a doosy. I almost didn't go because I was hurting so much. My back was killing me before I even left the house. By the end of 1st hour I was in major pain. By the end of the 2nd hour I could feel the fluid pressure building up in my spinal cord. Now having Syringomyelia, I know, fluid pressure is not a good thing, the step after that is blacking out, which has happened twice to me. But silly me decided to try and stay for the 3rd hour anyway. Wrong move!

I was sitting there in Relief Society (a meeting for just the ladies) and this other sister (we call each other brother and sister in our church) came and sat behind me with her two and a half year old. He should have been in nursery but wasn't. He was apparently acting up in the nursery so she brought him to RS. No big deal... until... the kid starts kicking the back of my chair! So much so in fact that he is actually moving the chair. Seriously, this kid wasn't big, he was pretty little, but yet he is kicking my chair and moving it! I'm not a small girl! So those were some powerful kicks to be doing that. What does his mom do? Nothing! She laughed and thought it was funny. O.k. back up a sec. He first started shaking my chair. She giggled and told him that wasn't nice. So he laid down and started kicking. She did at one point tell him that if he didn't stop she would send him back to class. O.k. I don't know about you, but nursery is a place where the kids get to play with toys for 2 hours while their parents are in other classes. It's not supposed to be a threat or punishment! Did she ever tell him to stop kicking my chair, or take him out? Nope! She just let him continue and when she noticed he was moving the chair with his He-Man kicks she laughed! So with each kick, I have sharp shooting pains going up and down my back. Luckily I didn't pass out. I was waiting for it because like I said, it has happened twice before when the fluid pressure got too bad. I did start seeing spots. I think if I had to sit there for any longer I probably would have passed out. By the end of the 3rd hour the pain was excruciating and unbearable!

Why did I just sit there and not get up you ask? Because, get this, I was afraid of offending her! She doesn't come to church that often, in fact it was the first time I had seen her there in a month. So I thought if I offended her she may not come back for a while. So I just sat there. In retrospect maybe I should have just got up and left, but like I said, I didn't want to offend her.

After the disastrous 3rd and final meeting, I endured the 30 minute car ride home. Not easy when you're already in excruciating pain. But I got home and had a hard time moving. I tried to do as much as I could in the way of getting things for myself. My hubby has a hard time seeing me like that so I try not to show it when I am in that much pain. He knew I was in pain but I think I hid the extent of the pain pretty well. I don't like taking my pain meds so I took 4 advil and hoped that would dull the pain a little. It didn't. After dinner I laid down on the couch with my heating pad. That did help slightly and I fell asleep.... for 4 hours! I didn't wake up until almost 10p.m.! So now here I sit, 12:30 a.m. and unable to sleep. Oh, and I am in almost as much paind now as I was by the end of that 3rd meeting.

Seriously, the next time I decide that I can make it through all 3 hours of church when I am already in a lot of pain before even leaving the house, just please, somebody kick me! Oh, wait... just have the little boy kick my chair again! *rolling eyes* Here's hoping next Sunday will be better....

It's VSN Time!

2009-02-21T12:57:00.000-08:00

If you are new to my blog and don't know what VSN stands for it, VSN is Virtual Stamping Night. It's an event over at Splitcoast Stampers that is done every quarter or so. There are all sorts of challenges based on a theme for that quarters VSN (this quarter was, "What's Love Got To Do With It" so all the challenges had something to do with love.) You have 45 minutes to complete your card for each challenge. It may sound like a long time, but it really isn't. Some of my cards took me right up to the time limit, some were done quicker. Anyhow, the event was last night and continues today. I did some of last night challenges, I hope to be able to do some of today's as well but we'll see. Over the next few days though I will be sharing with you the cards that I created.

This first one was for a challenge entitled For The Love Of Chocolate. Seriously, who doesn't love chocolate! I know I do! So basically the hostess came up with 3 color combos based on different types of chocolate and we had to choose our favorite kind of chocolate and do a card done in that combo. I like all chocolate but lately I have been gravitating toward Dark Chocolate. I never thought I would say that, I used to hate dark chocolate, but now I love it!

The color combo for dark chocolate was Chocolate Chip, Cameo Coral, and Apricot Appeal. Here is my card, I created it for my sister-in-law whose birthday is in April-

Supplies-
Stamps: Garden Silhouettes, On Your Birthday
Paper: Whipser White, Cameo Coral, Apricot Appeal, Chocolate Chip
Ink: Stampin' Write Markers, Chocolate Chip
Accessories: Crafter's Tool Kit, Needle Thread, Chocolate Chip Taffeta Ribbon

Tomorrow's Forecast

2009-02-20T18:58:00.000-08:00

So yesterday I mentioned that I have been stamping the last couple of days. I wanted to share with you another card. For this one I used the color combo from this weeks Color Throwdown challenge.

I don't have Tangerine Tango so I used Only Orange. I'm thinking I should have used Groovy Guava though. Oh well. I'm still happy with how it turned out.

For this card I started out with my main image (SU's And Everything Nice) and I stamped it on White cardstock using Momento Tuxedo Black ink. Then I colored it with my Copics. I then mounted my image onto Only Orange and then on Brilliant Blue. I paper pierced the top corner and added a brad. For the card base I used the cuttlebug swirls embossing folder on the Brilliant blue peice, mounted that onto the ballet blue card base and paper pierced the top and bottom along the brilliant blue peice. I added some ribbon, mounted my main image and then used my stampin' write marker to ink up just the top part of my sentiment from SU's Brighter Tomorrow, stamped that on white cardstock and then punched it out using my word window punch and mounted that with a brad. Inside the card I stamped the other half of the sentiment. So the full card says, Tomorrow's Forecast, Brighter Than Today. To finish off the card I added Crystal Effects to the rain puddle and the rain drops so that the rain would look like actual water.

It didn't turn out half bad if I do say so myself! *grin*

Don't pass out!

2009-02-19T19:38:00.001-08:00

Don't pass out, I actually have cards to show you! I stamped yesterday and today and thought I would show you the cards I did.This one is for a lady at church who is having a really tough time (pardon the bad pic, I don't know what was up with my camera skills tonight). I don't know much about this lady, I just see her every once and a while but lately she hasn't been there. I wanted to let her know that she is missed. I just wanted the card to be very simple, so I did a white, no layer card. I used my Heartfelt Thanks set which I haven't used in ages! It's probably been several months. I used my Bashful Blue, and my Mellow Moss marker to ink up the flower then stamped that on the card. Then I used my Black ink to stamp the outline part of the flower and the sentiment. It needed something so I added some ribbon (although I'm not completely thrilled with the ribbon, but I running out of choices when it comes to ribbon so I had to go with what I had.) I hope it brightens her day. :o)

Stay tuned tomorrow for another card.

Tulips in Bloom

2009-02-18T09:40:00.000-08:00

I wasn't going to post again today, but I walked into my living room and I saw the Tulip plant that my husband got me for Valentine's Day. The Tulips are starting to bloom so I had to show you. *grin*

(Taken with my Canon Rebel Xsi, 18-55 mm lense, color setting was faithful, zoomed in completely, on RAW setting, converted to Jpeg to upload here)

Photo Challenge

2009-02-18T09:15:00.000-08:00

On SCS this week the photograpy challenge is to take pictures of wood. The catch was that we weren't allowed to take pictures of trees or anything like that for our wood picture. I decided that I wanted to take pictures of an old fence for my wood pictures. My sweet hubby suggested this "two rail" fence near the museum that we have on post.

This first one I wanted to get some of the New Mexico architecture and landscape in it

For this second one I wanted to get the fence in a fun angle. So I chose to squat down and take a picture of the fence from the side.

One this last one I decided to try a black and white shot. I love shooting in black and white. I decided to get the fence head on with some of the New Mexico plant life in the background. I thought black and white was fitting for this. This one is my favorite.

Valentine's Day Dinner!

2009-02-15T08:29:00.000-08:00

My hubby made me my traditional Valentine's day dinner last night. This is the same meal he made me on our very first Valentine's Day together just after we got engaged. He closed the doors to the dining room and kitchen so I couldn't see what he was doing (we have pocket doors that he closed). And he made me dinner. When he opened the doors to let me into the dining room I found this:

DH bought me a tulip plant. The reason he bought it is because the pot was wrapped in purple paper and the plant itself is green. (He knows me very well, my favorite colors are purple and green).

I also found this a table set with dinner and candle light:

This candle lamp is the very same one he bought me and had on our table that very first Valentine's day dinner.

He also did sparkling cider in nice glasses and Virgin Strawberry Daquiri's (We don't drink so both were non-alcoholic of course). And of course my dinner:

Stuffed Pork Chops in a cream of mushroom sauce, stuffing on the side, and my two favorite veggies, french style green beans and honey glazed baby carrots! Yummy! And he did Key Lime Pie for dessert.

After dinner we went to a movie on post (it's only $2). We went to see Bedtime Stories. We ran into a friend and his son there so we sat with them. Such a funny movie! We came home after the movie and played a couple of rounds of Mario Kart on the Wii. It was a good night. I love you honey!

Valentines Day for DD!

2009-02-10T08:19:00.000-08:00

Every year in addition to the cards I make for other people on various holiday's I make a special card for my daughter. This years Valentine's day card was no exception. The color combo was from the Color Throwdown blog. Although I don't have the In Colors so I used Pretty In Pink and Real Red (along with the Chocolate Chip).

Supplies: Stamps- Holidays & Wishes, A Rose Is A Rose; Cardstock- Pretty In Pink, Real Red, Chocolate Chip, Whisper White; Ink- Pretty In Pink, Real Red, Chocolate Chip, Gable Green, Green Galore; Tool & Access.- Red Grosgrain Ribbon, Scallop edge punch, Crafter's Tool Kit
(All supplies used are from Stampin' Up!)

No more 365....

2009-02-09T14:46:00.000-08:00

So I am finding it harder and harder to take picture every daym for instance, 3 out of the 7 days last week I didn't get pictures. 1 of the other 4 days was of a card I made. So I decided after 1 month of doing the project 365 that I'm not going to do that anymore. I will however still post photos when I have them. I wasn't feeling well at all yesterday or I would have posted then.

Anyhow, I have 3 photos for you today.

Since I got my new camera I have been wanting to take picture of White Sands from up on the mtn. pass going from Las Cruces to WS, just so that I can remember years from now just how teeny tiny WSMR (White Sands Missile Range) is. So, here is a pic of where I live:

You can see the light colored buildings in the almost center there? They almost blend into the surroundings, that's WSMR. This was taken with my Canon Rebel using the 18-55 mm lens with UV filter on. I tried the photo with my polarized filter (because it was a little foggy) and with no filter at all, the UV filter gave the best results. (I have been trying different photos with different filters and such, just to see what results come with using each one. That is the best way for me to learn. I don't like reading manuals.)

This next photo I actually did for the SCS photo challenge last week. It was to take pictures

of windows. I wanted to find a stained glass window somewhere thinking that the chapel on post had some. Well, they have colored glass panels in the windows, but no stained glass of the type I was wanting. I did try to get good pictures of the windows on the post chapel, but they were retarring the roof and had roofing supplies and orange cones everywhere so that was a no go. So I drove over to the Missile park on post and took a picture of this glass block window that houses the rocket exhibit. The yellow that you see if actually the rocket that is behind the windows, not a reflection. I decided to practice my black and white shots. But I wasn't feeling very well and didn't want to leave the house, so I went to my living room window and took come pictures of the tree in my front yard. Depsite having gotten the roof line in the very corner of the picture, I liked this one.

Tomorrow I will post one of the cards I have. I can't post the other one for a few days because the recipients, or at least one of them reads my blog, so I will post that one later in the week.

Sinfully Rich Fudgy Brownies

2009-02-05T08:03:00.000-08:00

Next week is cooking club with some of the ladies from church. Each month there is a theme and all the participants bring their chosen recipe already made. This gives us a chance to try everything that everyone brought. We also share the recipes so that we can make everything at home as well. This is my first time going. I'm excited!

This month's theme is Pasta or Chocolate. I don't know a huge amount of pasta recipes so I went with chocolate. When I was growing up my family would make these rich and delicious brownies from scratch. I'm not sure where we got the recipe, probably from some cookbook somewhere I'm sure, but we have been making them for 20+ years. yummy, yummy, yummy! Well, I haven't made them in about 10 years and the last time I did they didn't turn out the best. So I wanted to practice making this recipe before taking it next week to the cooking club.

Can I tell you, they turned out better then I remember! *drool* I thought I would share the recipe here. These are just a few of the brownies. Hubby took the rest to work.

Sinfully Rich Fudgy Brownies

4 oz. unsweetened chocolate (we use the baker's brand that comes in the 8 oz. blocks)
1 c. butter
4 eggs
2 c. sugar
1 tblsp vanilla
1/4 tsp salt
1 c. flour
Chocolate Marshmallow Frosting (recipe follows)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease 13x9 pan. In a large saucepan combine chocolate and butter. Heat over low heat until melted and smooth, stirring often. Remove from heat. Beat in eggs, sugar, vanilla and salt until thoroughly blended. Stir in flour, blending well. Spread evenly in greased baking pan. Bake 25 to 30 minutes. Brownies should be moist. Do not over bake. Cool in pan. While Brownies are cooling, make the frosting.

Chocolate Marshmallow Frosting

4 oz. Unsweetened Chocolate (this is the remainder of the bar)
2 eggs
1 (1lb.) pkg Powedered sugar (approx. 3 3/4 cups)
4 cups mini marshmallows
1 c. butter
1 tblsp vanilla

In a medium saucepan combine butter and chocolate. Heat over low until melted and smooth, again stirring often. Remove from heat. Add eggs, vanilla and powedered sugar, beating until smooth. Stir in Marshmallows.

Once the Marshmallow mixture is complete and the brownies are cooled top the brownies with frosting. Refrigerate for several hours. Cut chilled brownies into bars. Store in refrigerator. Makes 40 small brownies.

*Tip: If you cut the chocolate into small peices it helps with the melting process. Also, my butter was still hard so I cut that into small pats as well. By cutting both the chocolate and the butter it helps to control the melting process so that the chocolate doesn't burn.

Randomness

2009-02-03T09:59:00.000-08:00

Why is it that I relish being able to work on multiple projects? Is it because I'm crazy? Probably! Is it because I have time on my hands? For sure... Is it because I get bored easily? Most definately!

Right now I am working on several projects. My hubby's birthday is in a few weeks and he asked me on Sunday if I was going to make him a cake. I asked him if he wanted me to make him a cake. He again asked the same question, was I going to make him a cake. I took that to mean that yes, he wanted a cake for his birthday. So I asked him what kind of cake he wanted. He answered by simply saying Chocolate Fondant. I asked him what kind of actual cake did he want under the Chocolate Fondant. He stated that he didn't care as long as there was chocolate fondant on the outside. Should I be a smart alec and make Chocolate Fondant and then put it in a cake pan and give that to him so that there is no cake, just chocolate fondant? I'm kidding. I will make the cake covered in chocolate fondant. My friend Belinda has a yummy recipe for said fondant that tastes like fudge. yum! So I will have to email her to see if she still has the recipe.

Another project that I am working on is of course baby blankets and receiving blankets. I realize that it may be a few years before we are actually chosen by a birth mother. I just would like to be working on something in the meantime. I have a bit of a control issue. Right now there isn't much in the adoption process we can be doing, so I figured I would go ahead and be proactive (in otherwards, have control over something in this whole crazy, stressful, wonderful, amazing process) and make blankets and such. Because, after all, it may be a few years, but it may also only be a few months before we are chosen. It happened with two people we know at church. Both couples were chosen very quickly. 1 couple was chosen with in 2 weeks of being approved for adoption, the other was chosen with in a few months. Although we know that it happening that quickly is not normal, but just in case.... Speaking of which, we have our very first appt. with the case worker on Friday. YAY!! Then we get to do mounds and mounds of paperwork and interviews and home studies. We are told that should only take a month of so depending on how quickly we get the paperwork done, which hopefully we will get on Friday as well.

Yet another project is the Christmas stockings for hubby and I. Since I have my daughter's done (had that done before this last Christmas of course) I can now work on the ones for the two of us. I will do one for the baby after we get him or her. But I don't have to have that one done until his or her 2nd Christmas. I want to have a baby's first Christmas stocking for the first Christmas. :)

I am also working on some scrapbooking and cardmaking as well. The scrapbooking is for our adoption profile. We will need to have that done in a month or so, as soon as we are approved, so I am getting a head start. Although I do have plenty of years to catch up on with other scrapbooking as well.

My photography is going well. I am getting more and more ideas. I am hoping to do a fundraiser for our FRG (Family Readiness Group, for hubby's Company- it's a military thing) where I will take family photos and put them on a disc and give each families pictures to them on the disc along with a copyright release so that they can then print any of the photos they want in whatever size they want along with posting them online as well. All my time and effort is donated. The money will go 100% to the FRG. But this way the FRG will be able to raise money and I will get photography experience taking family portraits. I went out today scouting for places to do said photos. Sadly, WSMR where I live is very dull and not in the slightest bit picturesque. So the hunt for a location continues. I find that photos on location are nicer then with a plain backdrop, but given with the surroundings I have to work with, I may have no choice but to go with a plain background.

I am also working on putting together the final details for the sale of ink storage units. The plans are all done and put together. I am just trying to figure out what we will be charging and all the details. But hopefully I will have that hammered out soon and up on this blog within the next week.

Anyhow, enough randomness for today. Tomorrow I plan to work on a schedule for myself so I can be a little more organized with this chaos that is currently in my head. ;) I hope to get some projects done to show you too in my stamp room. :)

Grease is the word! And Project 365 part 4

2009-02-01T08:07:00.000-08:00

Where did January go? Seriously! It just flew by didn't it? Here we are, already February. Crazy!

Anyhow, on with the final week of Jan. in pictures.

Jan. 25- I forgot to take a picture until at about 11:30 at night I was sitting there with my husband and pulled out my camera. He posed for me. Nice huh.....

Jan. 26- The photography challenge on SCS this week was "A is for..." We had to take a picture of something starting with an A. Mine is A is for Antiques. I took several pictures of various antiques around my house but this one of my antique treadle sewing machine is my favorite.

Jan. 27- Fabrics for baby quilts and receiving blankets. I have some for boys and girls. I know it is probably still a long way off before the adoption process is complete and we have our baby placed with us. But I thought I would get a jump start. :)
Jan. 28- Plant in my front yard. Just practicing with my Macro lens.
Jan. 29- A pecan from the tree in our back yard. I call it the death tree. I am allergic to tree nuts.
Jan. 30- This one makes me laugh. I have a wide angle attachment for my camera lens. I put it on and tried to take a picture of the dog. He walked right up to the camera so I adjusted the lens, snapped the picture and ended up with this. You can see the circle which is from the attachment itself. But it actually looks like I am looking through a peephole in a door and seeing the dog on the other side. It was a shot I didn't mean to get, but makes me laugh just the same.
Jan. 31- Again, I forgot to take a picture until late at night. Hubby and I were playing the Wii so I thought I would take a picture of that. Why not right?

And as an added bonus: My daughter has been auditioning for her school musical. That is a huge deal in and of itself cause she gets terrible stage fright. She made it all the way to call backs for the part of Sandy in Grease (she didn't originally try out for Sandy either, but the teacher liked her so much that she was asked to do a call back for Sandy). (side note, why didn't we do fun musicals like Grease in high school? Just sayin') She didn't make it for that part but was put in the Chorus. I was so proud of her. Just the fact that she audtioned was huge for her. So I tell her I will fly up and come see her in the play thinking I am just going to see her in the Chorus right? Well then she calls me on Monday and tells me that she not only is in the Chorus, but she is the understudy for the part of Frenchy! That is the part she originally wanted, not to mention the part that 75% of the other girls who audtioned wanted. :) Well, the really cool thing about her drama teacher is that her teacher beleives that understudy's put just as much work and effort into learning the part as the actual actors who are playing the part do, so feels that the understudy's should actually get to be on stage as well in the role of the part they are understudying for (with me still?). So the play runs for 3 nights. 2 of those nights she will be in the chorus and the other night my girl will be on stage as Frenchy! I am so very proud of her. Hubby and I are both going up for it. :)

How bout' them apples!

2009-01-31T08:09:00.000-08:00

This card is actually the first one I took a picture of in my Macro Studio so it isn't the greatest pic, but the card is cute. For this one I stamped the apples from Give Thanks (SU) in Momento Tuxedo Black Ink onto my white CS and then colored with Copics. I mounted it onto Basic Gray. (I went the longest time without getting Basic Gray, thinking I would never use it, finally I got some, and seriously, I don't know why I waited to get it. I love this color! It goes with so much. Love it! I took some Green Galore and stamped the Print Pattern BG stamp onto it with the same color ink. I punched the bottom using my scallop border punch added the ribbon by stapling each side to the BG peice. Then mounted it onto my Basic Gray card base so that you can see a little bit on top, and a little more on the bottom of the card. My focal image was attached using dimensionals. I love how this turned out! I made a few of these as just because cards. :o)

Fairy Birthday

2009-01-30T14:35:00.000-08:00

The other day this card popped into my head that I thought would be so good for my neice Addison's 1st birthday card. Here's the thing though, Addie doesn't turn 1 until April. But I couldn't pass up making her card early anyway. These stamps from Artful Inkables are so cute. I stamped the baby fairy on my cardstock using my Momento Tuxedo Black Ink I then used the masking technique to stamp the mushrooms so that the fairy was sitting on the mushrooms. I colored the fairy and the mushrooms with my trusty copic markers and mounted the image onto Certainly Celery CS. I used my paper piercer to stamp around the edges of the celery peice. The larger celery peice is stamped with the Canvas BG stamp (SU) using Certainly celery ink giving it that tone on tone look. Then I added 5 brads to the left side of that peice, mounted it to my Pretty In Pink card base, paper pierced just under the canvas peice, added my image and then stamped my sentiment using the Momento ink. I serioulsy love this card. It reminds me of Addie. She is the cutest baby girl, seriously (o.k. aside from my own when she was little, but that was 13 yrs ago). Addie always makes me smile. And this fairy is so darling I just knew it would be perfect for Addie's 1st birthday card. :o)

Another Birthday Bear

2009-01-29T15:43:00.000-08:00

The other day I posted a card that I had intended for my uncle but as the card came along I decided it was to be for my brother-in-law. I finished that card with him in mind and it's perfect for him. I still have no clue why, but as his wife, and my sweet sister-in-law (DH's sister) said, it has him written all over it.

Well, that left me with needing a card for my uncle. My uncle and his family kind of keep to themselves so I don't know him very well. I haven't talked to him since my grandpa passed away a few years ago but still, he is my uncle and I love him so I wanted to make him a card. but seeing as how I don't know him well and can't really base a card on his personality, I needed a card that was simple. Well what better for a simple card then a white card (I love doing white cards!). I stamped the bear (Under The Stars- SU) with my tuxedo black ink (momento brand, works better with the Copic Markers) Then colored him using said Copic Markers. I stamped the sentiment, added some ribbon and there you have it! Birthday card for Uncle John!

About the Macro Studio

2009-01-27T22:20:00.000-08:00

So my friend Robyn asked what a Macro Studio was and asked if was something to help me take pictures of cards. Yes, that is what I use it for but it is oh so much more then that. Macro Studios can be purchased online for around $20 or so for a basic studio. I made mine through the help of the website that I posted a few days ago for less then $1. My poster board was .50 cents. The box was free, it was one we found for our move to NM from KS several months ago. The tissue paper was in a pack and then I used a little bit of packing tape. So no it isn't professional, but it does the job just as well.

Anyhow, a Macro Studio, yes, although I use it mainly for cards can be used for so many things. It no only makes your colors better and really helps to focus the eye on the item you are photographing, but it also helps the light to dispurse more evenly on your item which in turn also helps with the colors. Case in point. I took this picture of my sister-in-law's card without the macro studio. I took it in the same room with the same light at the same time of day (about 9 at night):

Now the same card, again same room, same lighting, and same time of day (in fact this photo was taken directly after the above photo) using the macro studio:

Do you see how the color's look so much clearer and truer. Take the white for example. In the first photo you can see the the white actually looks a little yellow. But in the second photo you can really see the colors better and not only that but see the detail of the card better too.

Macro Photography is close up photography. It is where you can really capture the details of what you are taking pictures of. Have you ever seen a picture of a rose with a water droplet on it and you can really see every detail, or a picture of a bee on a flower and again, you can see every detail?

The above photo is one I found on Wikipedia, it shows what you can do with Macro Photography. Link is here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Hibiscus_petal.jpg

Well, That is Macro Photography. A Macro Studio is just an extra tool that can be used to help capture the details of your photo subject, in this case my cards. Although I did take some more photos today using my Macro Studio that weren't of cards that I will post on Sunday with my project 365 post. Anyhow, I hope that answered your questions on what a Macro Studio is for. :)

Happy Birthday Andrea!

2009-01-27T11:27:00.000-08:00

I feel like a horrible sister-in-law. I have been sending out cards to all my siblings and Jacob's siblings and all the spouses for severaly months now, not to mention all the neices and nephews. Well when I make cards as you know I like to make ones that just fit the recipient. My sister-in-law Andrea's birthday is today. I made a card a few months ago for her but it just didn't seem to fit her. So I scraped that one and I have been trying to come up with a card for her. Well on Friday I finally got it right. But here it is her actual birthday and I still haven't sent the card. I was going to send it yesterday but wasn't feeling well so I didn't make it to the post office.

So Andrea, I apologize that you don't have your card yet. You will get it soon. I did however want to post the card so you could see it. You are a wonderful sister-in-law, an amazing mother, the best wife there could ever be for my brother and an awesome friend. You trully mean the world to me and I hope you know that. I hope that you have an amazing birthday.

As for your card, I will send it today but I wanted to post it now so you could at least see what it looks like and so that I could explain my reasoning for this card. There is a reason I went with this color combo and with this layout and stamp set. The color combo I found on the Color Throwdown blog. Pink Passion, Basic Black, and Kraft (although I added green for the leaves). The reason I chose this combo is because when I think of you I think of bright and fun. I chose the layout I did because it is classic. Just like you. When I was choosing the stamp set I wanted something that was elegant so I chose A Rose Is A Rose. All of these together sum up my feelings toward you: bright, fun, classic and elegant. I could choose so many more words to describe you, but to me, these sum it up better than anything. Once again, I hope you have a fabulous day. I love you!

Birthday Bear

2009-01-26T00:32:00.000-08:00

O.k. so it's 1:30 a.m. on Monday morning and for whatever reason I can't sleep. So what better thing to do then blog right? After all I have been promising for a week now that I would post some cards. So I have 1 for you tonight/today. Seeing as how I am starting to get tired I am just going to post the 1. I will have another very special one for your tomorrow (Tuesday) though, and I have lots more so there will be lots and lots to see this week.

Anyhow, I made this card about a week or so ago but I didn't take a picture of it because I hadn't built my macro studio yet. (Just makes the cards look nicer and shows the colors and details better, I'm still getting the hang of it and I could have better lighting when I take the photos but that will have to wait because we are trying to save money right now. But I digress)

I started making this card for my Uncle who has a birthday in April but as it was coming together I decided it should go to my brother-in-law who's birthday is in Feb. Not sure why but this just seems more like an Aaron card then an Uncle John card. So this will go to him and I made another one (different but with the same set) for my Uncle. (in case you haven't noticed I like to make cards individually for each person, makes it more special for the recipient and funner for me.)

For this card I used the Under The Stars stamp set from Stampin' Up! I stamped the stars in black ink on the Blue Bayou cardstock and then colored the stars in with my copic markers. It gives it a fun look. :) I paper pierced the Wasabi cardstock both above and below the Blue peice using my crafter's tool kit (in case you haven't noticed that is one of my favorite tools). The corners of the chocolate chip peice were punched using the ticket corner punch. I colored the bear using my Copics as well, stamped my sentiment on the bottom using the On Your Birthday stamp set (also SU) and added some wide Grosgrain ribbon to finished it off. I am so thrilled with how this turned out. Seriously, I have no clue why this card is just screaming Aaron. But it is. :) I hope he likes it.

Project 365 part 3

2009-01-25T15:46:00.000-08:00

Taking pictures this week was somehow easier then last week. I think it's because I made more of an effort to actually take pictures.

The challenge this last week on SCS was to show winter in a new way. Well here in NM we are still in the 50's and 60's every day. No winter weather for us. So I didn't do the challenge this last week.

Anyhow, here is my week in pictures:

Jan. 18- It cracks me up when the dog does this. If we don't pay him enough attention (a.k.a. fawn over him every moment of every day.) he trys to get our attention by getting in our faces. So I had to snap a picture of just how cute he is.

Jan. 19- Hubby working in his shop (a.k.a. the garage)

Jan. 20- The dog being oh so cute again

Jan. 21- We had an activity at church this day and I had to bring a dessert (or an appetizer, I chose dessert) I made cupcakes and did a swirled two color frosting on top. It's really easy to do. You just load half your bag with one color and the other half with the other color (so that the colors are side by side) and pipe your frosting on. :)

Jan. 22- This picture is for my mom. I got ambitious a couple of weeks ago rearranged my living room. So I took this picture to show how it looks now. Our living room is almost double this size so the rest of it is fairly empty space but that's o.k. for now.

Jan. 23- I finally made my macro-studio. I'm pleased with how it turned out. I got the directions from this website: http://strobist.blogspot.com/2006/07/how-to-diy-10-macro-photo-studio.html I did use a different size box then what they recommended because I didn't have what they suggested. I did take pictures of the cards I have done recently and will post those starting tomorrow.

Jan. 24- I actually had a different picture for this day but when I took the dog on a walk I saw the sunset over the mountains and I just couldn't resist doing this photo instead. I was so struck by the beauty of the colors.

I promise I will have cards for you tomorrow. I have actually made several in the last few weeks so I have plenty to show you. Have a great rest of your weekend!

Labels and Lists

2009-01-22T08:24:00.000-08:00

I have been doing some work to my blog. Did you notice? I am working on labeling each of my posts (it's going to take a while since I have been keeping this blog since 2006) At the end of my posts you will see a label, or a category for that post. That way if a post is stamping related and you want to see more stamping related posts just click at the bottom of that post on the label you want and it will pull up all my other posts that are under that same category. Clear as mud? I just figured that since this blog is about so many different things such as stamping, cake decorating, the newly added photography, not to mention random posts and personal posts and all the other crafty things I do, this way it would be easier to find what you may be looking for on my blog. Seriously, clear as mud?

Now, I also have added new and updated blog lists. I added the blog lists that show not only the blogs I like but also when they were updated last. How cool is that? I love that blogger offers that.

Anyhow, I am still working on the label part and I have to update the friends and family blog list but I hope you enjoy what I have done far. :)

Scorpions and walks and dogs oh my! (Project 365 part 2)

2009-01-18T20:54:00.001-08:00

So taking pictures every day is proving harder then I thought even with my boring and non-busy life. But still, I'm getting it done. As you can tell from this weeks project 365 title it was a funfilled week complete with a scorpion in my bathtub of all places. So without further ado, this week in photos:

Jan. 11- An updated picture of the outside of our house for our adoption profile. (Yes, even though we are just in the application process I really want to get a headstart on all the profile stuff)
Jan. 12- SCS has weekly photography challenges to get our creative juices flowing. This weeks challenge was to take a picture of signs. This particular day I didn't have our vehicle so I was kind of limited to where I was able to take pictures. I chose our street sign on the corner. (yes, our skies here are normally that blue and clear. *grin*)

Jan. 13- The dog thinking that because I am the back yard that must mean I am there to play with him. ;)

Jan. 14- On this day I was home by myself and I couldn't find the dog. Normally he comes when I call him. This time he didn't. I thought, is he outside, nope, not outside, where is he. Lo and behold, this is where I find him. Happy and content on my bed giving me a look like he is just daring me to tell him to get off. (He's a little spoiled)

Jan. 15- This day I decided to take my camera when I went for my daily walk. Let me tell you how interesting it was holding camera, holding the dogs leash and talking to my mom on my cell phone all at the same time. This is a view of the mountains near our house, I walk past here every day on my walk.
Jan. 16- So this day I got a lovely surprise, a scorpion in my bathtub. How fun huh? (Not so much... It was about an inch in length, this is the 6th one we have had in 5 months -unless you count the 2 very small baby ones, then this one makes #8 )

Jan. 17- Hubby decided to take a break from school work and woodworking and go on my daily walk with me. I figured since he would be with me it would be much easier to take pictures. Here is hubby and the dog on the walking path near our house. (the total walk is about a mile)

I know that this is up late today. I will try to have it up earlier next week. Now, my brother-in-law (it's partly due to him that I have this awesome new camera, he helped me figure out what I wanted. *grin*) commented on one of my earlier posts wanting to know what flash I am using on my pictures so I thought I would share here rather then just emailing him. I actually am using the built in flash on the camera. I do have another flash that I bought but I don't know how to use it and frankly I am a little intimidated by the camera let alone the flash that I got *snicker*. So for now, I am just using the on camera flash. Maybe someday soon I will actually use the flash that I got for the camera. ;) I also shoot mostly at auto ISO. I am just starting to learn about all the different ISO speeds and what they do. So far, not too bad, but I'm sure I will get better. ;)

Tommorrow I will post some cards I made this weekend. I need to build a macro light box to help me take better photos of my cards but right now it is too late so that will have to wait till the morning.

The Valentines M&M's...

2009-01-15T16:37:00.001-08:00

Valentine's Day 2001 my hubby and I had just gotten engaged. J wanted to make my day special so that day he had come chocolate roses sent to me at work. Not only were there chocolate roses, but the chocolate roses were in a really pretty bud vase with Valentine's M&M's (a.k. white, pink, dark pink, and red) filling the bottom of the vase instead of what would normally be water. Cause they were chocolate roses so they didn't need to be watered. ;) That night I got home and J had gotten a key to my apartment from my friend who lived in the same apt. building (she had my spare key, I had her's, incidentally, she is now my Sister-In-Law, she is married to my husband's brother, she is the one who introduced hubby and I, sorry, off course there). Anyhow, J had gotten the key and gone upstairs to my apt. and made me a really romantic dinner and gave me a hummingbird music box (Handblown glass, hummingbirds have a special meaning to me). The music box played the theme song to Somewhere In Time (which btw, is the bestest most romantic movie of all time!) which is one of my favorite movies. How sweet huh? To top that off, every Valentine's Day since (except when he is deployed or away at training) he has made me the very same dinner. :) I'm a lucky gal!

So anyhow, (if you are still with me, bless you! ;) lol) This Valentine's Day since Hubby and I are saving up for our upcoming adoption we aren't spending any money (o.k. so he already bought me my super cool camera, but that was before we decided to adopt). I still wanted to do something special. I could do a coupon book, you know where I give him coupons he can cash in. O.k. so that would be good but I didn't want to do the same old same old coupon book. I wanted to do it a little different. Then, that first Valentine's Day flashed through my mind. I could do chocolate roses with M&M's but how to incorporate the coupon book idea. I could do tied to each rose a "coupon" of sorts. O.k. but we are both trying to eat healthier so chocolate roses AND M&M's..... hmmmm.... I decided that instead of doing the chocolate roses I would do handmade flowers. So the Nested Flowers technique sprang to mind but how to make an embellishment into an actual flower. AH HA!! I've got it!

First I made my flowers by cutting my different sizes of circles (out of Rose Red DSP from SU) using my Colluzle cutting system that I got when I was an SU demo. Then I distressed the edges of the circles using the side of my scissors. Next I punched a hole in the center of each circle using my crafters tool kit (SU). I then took some floral stem wire and using the plier things in my crafter's tool kit I made a small loop at one end. Then I stuck my brad through that and threaded each circle of the "flower" through the floral wire and then the brad. I fastened the brad to hold it all in place and then wrapped floral tape around each stem to finish the look off plus give it some support. I then used my tag punch (SU) and punched out some tags then stamped the Always stamp from Terrific Tags (retired SU) using Rose Red(SU) ink to coordinate. On the back of each tag I wrote my coupons. Some are a movie night with movie of his choice, a day playing video games (without me nagging him to help me), a week without housework, a day to do wood working (again without me nagging), and the list goes on and on. I tied each tag, or rather coupon to the stem of each flower using some ribbon and then put them in my bud vase. Then I filled the vase with Valentine's M&M's and tied a ribbon around the vase.

There are 14 flowers, 1 for every day till Valentine's Day. He will still get some chocolate without having the chocolate roses added in (although I'm sure he would have liked that too). I hope he likes it! I think he will really like the coupons, ecspecially the ones where I don't nag him for a whole day. ;)

Thank you Luna!!

2009-01-15T13:22:00.000-08:00

So back in August I made and posted a card for the VSN on SCS. The card was supposed to be based on our favorite children's book. I had 3 favorite books, one was Good Night Moon (but I figured a lot of people would do that one), One that I thought was called The Highway Takes A Vacation (which I couldn't find proof of so I couldn't do that book for a card) and Stand Back Said The Elephant, I'm Going To Sneeze. I chose Stand Back to base my card on. Here is the original post: http://mystampingworld.blogspot.com/2008/08/stand-back-said-elephant-aka-vsn.html

Well, the other day I got a comment to that post from a lady by the name of Luna who had gone searching for the book The Highway Takes a Vacation. The only thing she found online was my blog post. So she did some more searching and she found that she and I both were remembering the name wrong. The name of the book is actually "The Runaway Road" by Stanley Mack. http://www.amazon.com/runaway-road-Stanley-Mack/dp/0819310174

Thank you Luna! I absolutely loved this book growing up and I really was sad that I couldn't find it. My hubby and I are in the process of adopting and I'm so excited that I can now get this book for our soon to be little one. :) Who knows, maybe even my daughter will like it. Sure she is a teenager but this book is timeless! Thanks for making my day Luna! :D

Project 365 part 1

2009-01-11T15:58:00.001-08:00

In my last post I mentioned that I saw a posting on SCS about something called project 365. This is where you take a photo every day for 1 year to chronicle your life. Since our lives are kind of boring out here in the middle of no where NM it wouldn't be much fun if I did that. So I decided that instead of doing that I would just take a photo a day to kind of sharpen my photography skills (as beginner like as they are right now). This way I can see how I grow as a photographer. This post will have more pictures then will be normal as it has a week and a half worth of pictures, but next week I will have just 1 week (I am posting them by week that way I don't overload my blog with daily posts of pictures, ecspecially seeing as how this blog is about all of my crafting such as cardmaking etc., not just photography.) So anyhow, without further ado, here is my first week (and a half) in photos.

Jan. 1 - My in-laws came to visit so this photo is of my DH chatting with his mom.

Jan. 2- Photo of the gorgeous sunset at White Sands Sand Dunes

Jan. 3- My daughter hiding from the camera.... again..... She does that alot.

Jan. 4- A coin rack that hubby made to hold all his coins that he has been given in the Army.

Jan. 5- A collection I have of heritage items, the picture is of my Grandma in her early 20's, the doll she made I think when she was in her 30's (not sure on that one though) and then the glass case is filled with items from my great grandmother and my grandmother to include my great grandmothers baby spoon and some doll house items.

Jan. 6- Hubby playing the Wii and wondering why I am taking a picture of him.

Jan. 7- A plaque that I have from my grandfather with his name on it. Probably hung in an office of some kind.

Jan. 8- Playing with the macro lense which makes items appear larger and more vibrant.

Jan. 9- Practicing Night Shots, This one of the moon behind trees was taken in my front yard, I'm not so good at night shots, that will come though.

Jan. 10- Last nights full moon was the brightest and biggest that there will be in 2009 (according to Yahoo news). It was a little hazy out but still a great photo op! This was taken at sunset as the sun was setting and the moon was coming up. Taken from 60 miles away with a 70-300mm lense.

Next weeks photos will just be for 1 week and not for a week and a half. Also, I am working on some stamping projects that I hopefully will be done with soon. One of them I am so excited about and can't wait to show you. I hope that it turns out as well as I think it will, so far so good. Also, very soon I should be ready to announce news about the ink storage that my hubby made me last month. Let's just put it this way, if you are looking for a great solution to your ink storage and think that a unit like mine would be perfect, you can get one just like it, or get the very detailed plans to make your own! We are just trying to work out the final details, but stay tuned!

Recipe tin, cake and project 365

2009-01-05T20:52:00.000-08:00

This is a project that I created last week and then forgot to take a picture of before I posted the cards. I have done many recipe tins for other people but never one for myself. So I decided it was high time to do so. I have so many recipe books filled with lots and lots of recipes (close to 10,000 recipes in all) but I have my favorites. You know, the old back ups that when you can't decide what to make you make those. So I wanted a place to store the recipes for the favorites in our house. This is what I came up with:
The image is of course Voila from Stampin Up. I used some printed paper that I have had for awhile (sorry I don't know where I got it from). The paper was applied using modge podge and then sealed with it as well. I added the ribbon using sticky strip and then added the image and sentiment with more modge podge. The image was stamped on white CS using Momento Tuxedo black ink and colored with Copics. I stitched the edge of the main image using my crafter's tool kit (SU) and a needle and thread. The flowers I got from a crafts store and the brad was sent to me by a friend in England. I haven't added fibers and ribbon to the handle because I haven't decided whether I want that or not. We'll see.

I haven't blogged the last couple of days because my in-laws have been here visiting. While they were here we decided to celebrate their birthdays. My FIL's birthday is this month and MIL's birthday is next month. So I made a cake. I ran out of powered sugar so I didn't have as much frosting as I usually do and I had to make what I had stretch so I wasn't happy with the final product at all. Plus the day before we had spent the day out and about (one of the places we went was White Sands National Monument and we climbed the sand dunes, so I got quite the workout). I was really worn out by the time Saturday and making the cake came around so I really didn't have the energy to do a good job. But it turned out o.k. and my in-laws liked it so that's all that matters right?

I'm not going to share the picture of my in-laws with the cake because I haven't asked them whether I can post pics of them on my blog. You understand right?

On SCS someone posted about something called Project 365. This is where you take a photo a day for an entire year as a way to kind of mark what you do in your life. Well, I live in the middle of no where with my husband. There isn't much going on in our lives that is worth photo-ops. So instead of taking a photo each day regarding something in our lives I am just going to take a photo a day. The photos may be something special that we did that day, or it may be of scenery or something special that I see, or maybe just something I decided to take a photo of for fun. I figure this will help to improve my photography skills and give me a reason (as if I needed one) to use my new camera each day. Rather then posting the photos here every day I am going to post them on Sunday's. Since I didn't find out about this until last night I will post last weeks photos along with this weeks on Sunday. So be looking for those. :o)

A few cards

2008-12-30T08:48:00.000-08:00

I was able to stamp a couple of cards over the last few days. My daughter has been busy playing Guitar Hero World Tour (to which she is grounded from that today because she didn't want to get up this morning but that is a different story), and my husband has been busy building more ink storage units (more on that later). So I was able to stamp. I looked in my birthday card box and saw that I hadn't made one for my father-in-law yet. His birthday is in a little over a week now, not to mention that they are coming to visit in a couple of days so having it for him when he gets here would be a good thing. So I went through my sets and found my favorite chef, Voila! Since my father-in-law likes to cook (dutch oven mostly, which his dutch oven is yummy! but that is off the point) I thought this would be perfect. I really had no clue what I was going for but I'm pretty sure this wasn't it.

Although I do still like it, it just wasn't quite what I had in mind. Maybe it's the cake colors that are throwing me off. I don't know. I paper pierced the zig zag pattern and the faux stitched using my BB marker from SU because I couldn't find a thread that matched. Stamp set: Voila (SU); Cardstock: Bravo Burgundy, Basic Gray (SU) PTI White; Ink: Momento Tuxedo Black; Accessories: Copic Markers, Crafter's Tool Kit, Bravo Burgundy Marker

Next came my Nephew David's card. He will be 5 next month and I wanted to do something different then what I have done for all the other nephews (I try to do an original card for each one if you couldn't tell, that's the joys of stamping.) I have done, frogs, pirates, cupcakes, fish, birds, etc. so I was kind of stumped. Then I looked at my Crazy for Cupcakes set (which the cupcake card that I did was for a nephew on my side of the family so technically I could have done a cupcake card for David). I saw the balloons and decided those would be perfect. Well, like I said, he will be 5, so I had to do 5 balloons.

The colors are off in this (sorry, still trying to get used to the new camera, oh, ya, I got a new camera!!, more on that later too) so the lighting is bad. I couldn't find my post-it-notes so I couldn't do actual masking so instead I stamped my 5 balloons and then colored 3 of them, then stamped the other two on another peice of CS and then colored and cut the balloon part out of each and peiced them over the original balloons. I know, it would have been easier to just find the post-it notes. (I have since found them, I cleaned my craft room yesterday). The ribbon is actually artichoke not black like in the picture. Stamps: Crazy for cupcakes, On Your Birthday (SU); Cardstock: Tempting Turqiouse, Only Orange (SU), PTI White; Ink: Momento Tuxedo Black; Accessories: Copic Markers, Ribbon

This last one (like so many of my cards) looked so much better in my head. But it still turned out o.k. I wanted to do faux framing cause I haven't done that technique in ages. So I cut out my template, laid it over the white card, sponged my ink and then stamped with my stamps. I did get a little of the ink from the stamps on the top of the card so I just covered up those oopsies by DTPing the top edge and added some ribbon. I also added a few brads and a sentiment as well.

Stamps: A Rose Is A Rose (SU); Cardstock: White (SU); Ink: Cameo Coral, Ruby Red, Old Olive, Black (SU); Accessories: Ribbon, brads (SU)

I did make a recipe tin but I forgot to get a picture of that, I also did a scrapbook page but the pictures of that turned out not so good so I will retake that and take a picture of the tin and I will post those another day.

Now for the new camera news. Can't beleive I didn't mention this sooner. My sweet hubby knows I have been wanting a new camera. As you know a couple of months ago I went to Utah to see my family (most particularly my daughter who lives there with her dad). At the end of the visit I went down to Cedar City to visit most of my husband's family (his oldest brother and his family weren't there but everyone else was). My husband met me there and then we came back to NM together. Well while we were there another of my husband's brother's had his camera out and was taking family pictures of each of the individual families as a present for my mother-in-law. I got to use his camera to take some pictures of him and his wife together. It was so fun! It had the continuous shooting feature and was just a blast to use. The problem was, his camera (since he is a photography major) is expensive. Well, after much discussion and research we decided that a Canon Rebel Xsi was the way to go. It is a step up from what my brother-in-law has so yes, it was more expensive (it's actually the same camera he will be upgrading to very soon, and he is the one who recommended it). We found a great deal on Ebay for the camera and a bunch of accessories (to include lens, filters, tripods, etc.) for a little more then the retail price of the camera itself. The problem is, I hate spending money, ecspecially on myself. Well, my sweet husband decided to buy it for me. When I told him that we had already gotten our Christmas presents he said that it wasn't for Christmas, it was an early Valentine's Day gift to make up for all the occassions he has been gone for over the last 5 years (since he has been in the Army). Sweet huh? I love my new camera. I am still getting used to it and some of my pictures aren't the best lighting wise. But I'm getting the hang of it. *grin* Yes, I do have the best husband in the world! Speaking of him, I will post more on the additional ink storage units later. For now, I have to go bug my daughter more. She still hasn't gotten up. Ya, grounding her from the Wii for the day really worked....

Merry Christmas!

2008-12-25T22:47:00.000-08:00

It has been a great Christmas. As my husband pointed out this morning at 10 a.m. when our daughter was still sleeping, this was the first Christmas in years where we were all together just the 3 of us. In fact, the last time was the 2nd year we were married. (We have been married for over 7 years now). Someone has always been gone on Christmas, whether it was my husband with a deployment, or my daughter being at her dad's (we share her on the holiday's normally). So it was great having all 3 of us here. Yesterday we had our Christmas dinner and then were getting ready to play a game. The neighbors came over so we had to postpone the game temporarily. While Jacob and I were talking to them Tammy decided that she was bored so she turned on Jeff Dunham's Christmas special (we DVR'ed it a few weeks ago). I walked in and this is what I saw, I just had to chuckle. In the background, our pretty tree, filled with family ornaments to include several nativity ornaments. In the foreground, Achmed. Nothing says Merry Christmas like Achmed The Dead Terrorist:

After we finished laughing our butts off we settled down to play a game. Clue Mysteries

The dog decided he needed to join us (he cracks me up!)

We also enjoyed the glow of our tree
I took this picture just for fun. It took forever for my daughter to decide to wake up, in fact we ended up waking her up at 10:15. (She fell asleep with her santa hat on for some reason, she's a teenager, I don't pretend to understand her)

Before we woke her up we made our Christmas breakfast of Cinnamon rolls. (we like things to be relaxed and easy on Christmas so it's Cinnamon rolls for Breakfast and leftovers throughout the day)

After everyone was awake and fed we opened presents.

Of course we started out with stockings. Speaking of which, Tammy loved her new one:

She kept rubbing it and commenting on how long it must have taken. I told her she was worth it. We decided to get the family a Wii this year and we each got a few other things as well. The only one that didn't know about the Wii is Tammy, so to start out the excitement we wrapped one of the controllers and put it in her stocking.

We spent the rest of the day playing games and napping. We also got to talk to some our loved ones on the phone. It really was a good day. I hope everyone else had a fabulous day.

For now, it is bedtime so A Merry Christmas to all, and to all a good night!