Yesterday I packed up a lot of my card-making supplies to take with us to Florida for the next few months. It took me a long time as I had to go through a lot of stuff (blush), figure out just what to take, and pack it safely. While Christmas shopping at Target one day, I found the storage container shown here. I ended up buying one and then returning to buy two more. They turned out being perfect for so many things from ink refill bottles to small tools to embossing powders to stamp pads to adhesives to single stamps ... well, you get the idea. I've filled up 4 flat rate boxes from the post office full of paper. My rolling supply case is almost full and the matching shoulder bag has my Cuttlebug, my Sidekick, and so much more in it. My dear husband says "No Problem!". He says we have room for all of it! No need to mail those 4 boxes!
Today I continue the packing ... clothes, financial papers, etc. And if I finish all that, I will start taking done the Christmas decorations. One big motivator to get all this done as soon as possible is that the temperatures are predicted to dip down below zero the next few nights! We definitely want to start our drive to Florida on Saturday.
Thank you for stopping by and have a Blessed New Year!!!

Before the tree gets "undecorated" and taken down until next Christmas, I thought that I would capture its evening beauty and post it on the blog. Tonight I plan to take a few minutes to just sit and enjoy it one more time. I usually keep the tree up into early January, but this year we will be heading "south" and it has to come down sooner than later.

We had a very Merry Christmas and are now preparing for our first four month winter stay in Florida. Mike (my DH) and Molly (whom you see in the photo) don't think that it should be too hard to pack up all we want/need to take with us in the car. We have been taking things do there since we closed on the house the end of June. This trip we won't be bringing much for the "house" since it is going through the remodeling process. For January and February, we will be staying in a rented house a mile or so away. We will probably get lots of use out of our bicycles riding over to check the mail every day as well as checking the progress on the house.
Being the CFO of the family, I need to organize/bring all that goes along with that position as well as bringing personal items AND MOST IMPORTANTLY, card-making supplies. That might be the most perplexing task ... what do I NEED to bring? what do I WANT to bring? how much CAN I bring? will we have ENOUGH room in the car? should I MAIL some things? (thank goodness for the USPS's newer FLAT RATE boxes!) And I will be bringing along my Christmas gift ... the Scor-Pal! I am so excited to start trying it out!

I am really looking forward to some dedicated card-making time this winter. There is an idea swimming around in my head ... I plan to visit some of the smaller gift shops on the island to see if they sell any handcrafted items. Perhaps I can find an outlet for some of my cards. There is a shop called Island Paws that I'd like to see, especially.



Well, back to laundry, etc. The temperature has finally reached 12 degrees F here this afternoon. We have so much snow for the end of December as so many of you must, too! We definitely had a beautifully white Christmas.

Wishing you all a Happy New Year a wee bit early ... we might be running around like crazy on the 1st packing the car for our departure on the 2nd.

JustRite Stamp Storage

I bought some JustRite stamp sets over Thanksgiving weekend from their online store (on sale!). After removing them from their various packaging, I wondered how I was going to store them as well as transport them when needed.
I used the box of the "10 Designer Center and Borders". It had a liner in it which held the stamps separately. I cut it up to make two dividers and a place-keeper (so the stamps can't move around). In the lid I am storing the printed images of all the stamps from each set. Again, I used a bit of the liner to keep them secured in the lid. Thanks for looking!

A Fun New JustRite Stamp

Having seen so many great cards made with the JustRite Stamper sets, I had to try them. Here is a thank you card I made using the "thank you" circle. It probably is NOT my best card design-wise, but I wanted to combine the new stamp with my favorite puppy stamp. And I am working on using ways to put more depth into my coloring. This time I used chalk to make the puppy seem soft and furry as well as shading around the puppy. The cardstock and patterned paper is from one of the DCWV tablets entitled DOG. The puppy stamp is by Stampland and the thank you is, of course, by JustRite (the set is called "10 Designer Centers and Borders"). The card base is SU! Kraft paper. The ink is SU! Close to Cocoa ... I LOVE that color and the name, too.

It is 17 degrees here today, but sunny. I hope wherever you are, you are having a sunny Sunday, too! I think it is a good day for me to decorate the tree.

Snowflakes and Scallops

It's beginning to look and feel a lot like WINTER here in Minnesota today! So I decided to post a card I made earlier in the week.
I used So Many Scallops stamp from Stampin' Up, three embossing folders (from Quickutz, Sizzix, and Cuttlebug), Bashful Blue cardstock from SU! and white Bazzill as well as the Bashful Blue ink. Thanks for looking! And have a good weekend!

Snowmen in October?

This might be one for our records, at least. This morning my husband and I picked up our daughter and grandson's new puppy from the kennel where she stayed over the weekend while we all made a quick trip to Kansas City for our nephew/godson's wedding reception. When we woke up this morning, there was ALOT of snow! Mike made the snowman while I walked the puppy whose name is Ginny! We think this was her first experience with snow. It is so fun to watch a puppy experience snow! By noon, my husband's valiant effort at making a great mid-October snowman began to slide off its foundation! Sure glad that we both had our cameras!

Our Sweet "Boys"

Since I am still working on all those Christmas cards, I don't have any new cards to post. Instead I thought I would post a recent pictures of our two grandsons! The big one loves having a "real cousin" and I think the little one will, too, once he knows what a "real cousin" means! Have a great weekend!

Our ministry is now working on Christmas cards. I am making 77 of this design. The cardstock in green and red is Bazzill. The white paper between is a shimmer paper. The candle stamp is one of the $1 stamps from Michael's. The ribbon is from my stash of ribbon! The embossed Christmas design on the red paper is done with a Cuttlebug embossing folder. I have all the parts cut out or punched out, the white and red papers adhered to each other, some adhered to the green card base, all the candle images stamped and punched out, all the green scalloped ovals punched, but need to "color" all the images! Better get back to work. :-)

Working on card-making ministry projects

It is a lovely fall Saturday in Minnesota. After spending most of the day outside, I thought I would take a little time to share some pictures of my latest project for our card ministry at church. I made 25 feminine birthday cards this week and should start on Christmas cards tonight which will be used for families at our church with soldiers as well as for our home-bound packets we send out. I've posted a close-up of one of the cards, too. This one has holes punched in the white scallop circle which is my favorite look, but it is quite time-consuming when you are making 25.
Hope you got to enjoy a lovely day wherever you are!

This is where I create my cards ...

Last Fall, my dear husband agreed to my purchase of a desk and storage cabinet for my card-making hobby. Just when all the boxes arrived, his back went out. No, it wasn't when he looked at all those boxes! I was so eager to get the project going that I put both pieces together pretty much all by myself. (And very proud of my accomplishment, too!) I also posted the picture of the bed which is in my craft room as well. Every once in a while, extra supplies make their way to the bed and our grandson now loves to sleep in that bed when he comes for "sleep-overs". Whether used as a creating space or a guest room, I love having it right across the entryway from the kitchen. I can multi-task that way!
Our summer was so busy that I spent very little time in my craft room. I am looking forward to spending some quality time in there this weekend! Hope you have a great one, too!

More Pictures from Sunny Florida

This weekend we did more swimming, some errands, fishing, and went to the causeway beach which is between Sanibel and Ft Myers. We bought aqua socks for Reilly and a beach umbrella for me. The previous owners left us three beach chairs -- thank you! From the slideshow you will be able to see where we were and some of what we did. Reilly got to hold a starfish which some fishermen gave him and then he put it back in the ocean. He also held a live seashell and returned that to the ocean, too, after a photo op by Gramee. I mostly sat in one of the beach chairs as we couldn't seem get our umbrella deep enough into the sand for it to stay by itself. No! I didn't hold it the whole time, but we used one of the chairs to brace it! Reilly became my assistant photographer this weekend. You will see lots of his work in the slideshow as well. (Thought I should replace this slideshow with a single photo. Perhaps there will be another slideshow soon!)

Our Trip to Sanibel

It has been almost a week since we embarked on our 3.5 day drive from home to Sanibel. Pulling the trailer went very well and that was a big relief. Both Reilly and Molly the dog were great travelers! We were so happy when we finally pulled into Ft. Myers. We were almost at our destination! A quick trip through the Pulbix grocery store for some provisions and we were headed to the causeway. Reilly was pretty patient while we got the trailer unloaded even though he wanted to jump into the pool right away. He has just loved being able to swim as much as he wants to. We invested in some pool toys and have had so much fun. We stopped at the beach between rainstorms the other day. Papa and Reilly spent some time at the Sanibel Rec Center yesterday playing air hockey, foosball, and some other fun games. (There was an "old ladies pool exercise class" according to Reilly, so they didn't swim there then.) LOL! Mike is pressure-washing the pool deck right now. He is going a great job. Reilly and I put together a four foot floor puzzle today which was a gift from Bonnie (our realtors' daughter who is a senior in high school this year). You'll see the pictures of the finished puzzle in the slideshow! Thanks, Bonnie! Right now our plan is to swim if it is still raining (but not lightning, of course!) and then fish when the rain stops. And we will need to get something to cook for supper, too. Maybe we will go to Jerry's for some groceries and show Reilly all the tropical birds there!

Loading the Trailer

Today is not only TRAILER day, but loading day #1. Don't ask how we got the futon and chair up from the lower level and into the trailer! Suffice it to say, Mike forgot to hire some movers! I hope we can both get out of bed tomorrow! We don't have any more large items to put into the trailer which is a big relief. By the way, an 8' x 5' trailer isn't as big as one would think.
We have our trip mapped out and our reservations for 3 nights on the way down. We'll be stopping in St. Louis, Chattanooga, and Tampa. Even though Tampa is only 2.5 hours from our destination, we are driving 3 long days and decided to arrive in Fort Myers mid-day on day #4. We'll need to stop at Publix for groceries on our way to the house.

Our Slice of Paradise

We are so busy getting our new place organized. We have made two trips down there so far, but we are embarking on a driving trip this Saturday pulling a U-Haul trailer and bringing a grandson and our dog. This just screams photo journalism, doesn't it?

I know I started this blog to share my love of card-making, but there just hasn't been much time at all for the past couple of months for much card designing at all. I am hoping to get back to that sometime soon, though! My fingers are getting "itchy"!

In the Pines and now In the Palms, too!

Lots has been going on around here since the last time I posted. We've been busy with family activities and with purchasing a home in Florida! The picture I have posted today is of the new home. We are really looking forward to spending more time down there especially during the winter.

Our card ministry has been very busy as well. We made hundreds of cards for First Communion, graduation, and thank you cards for a family dealing with the illness of their little daughter. Now we are focusing on our annual fundraiser -- selling cards at our annual church festival.

I am hoping to be able to start posting more cards soon. Even though I have been making cards, there hasn't been time to take any pictures!

My Tilda with Glasses Coloring Project

Good morning ... it is truly a lovely Spring day here in Minnesota. We've had 2 scorchingly hot days this week, but it looks like the temperatures are settling back down into the "open window" range! Hurray!
Lots going on this week which has caused me NOT to get any cards made, BUT I have been working on my coloring techniques using the Copic Markers. I have also watched some great videos (online) about Copic coloring. So I thought I would post my first Tilda colored with Copics. I think these little people from Magnolia Stamps are just too precious. If you'd like to view these videos, you will find them at http://.copiccreations.wordpress.com.

Copic Colored Graduation Card

I took a Copic coloring class this past Wednesday at Smudges in Chanhassen. It was very informative. (And it was a lot of fun, too!) Leslie and Trish (our instructors) had taken the Copic Markers certification class, so we learned a lot more than just technique. So when it came time for me to make a graduation for a friend's daughter, Callen, I knew I should practice my Copic coloring techniques. I used the same design that I posted earlier with the Changito monkey grad. The card base is blue to go with her school colors. And the Cuttlebug "congrats!" embossed Bazzill mat was leftover from the other cards made for the St. Hubert's 8th graders. The ribbon is from my SU! stash and is the same color as the cardstock. I stamped an extra diploma, wrote the school letters and year on it, cut it out, and added Diamond Glaze to it before adhering it with 3M foam tape. Oh, I also added the silver "jewels" in the four corners where I'd used the SU! ticket punch (love that punch!). I tied a little gingham ribbon on the larger ribbon for a little added interest. I stamped "We're proud of you, Graduate" (Wordsworth by Rubber Soul) on the inside as well as 3 little diplomas from Perfectly Clear Stamps (Stampendous) along the bottom of the insert. I used Versafine Majestic Blue Ink. To decorate the back of the envelope, I used Hero Arts Rolled Diploma and Graduation Cap stamps and, of course, the Copic markers. Practice makes perfect ... I am just hoping for BETTER!

Copic Marker Colors Used: B69 (Stratospheric Blue), B91 (Pale Grayish Blue), E33 (Sand), E34 (Orientale), E37 (Sepia), W0 (Warm Gray No. 0)

Floral Gate-Fold Birthday Card

Can you believe it? This is the first gate-fold card I have ever made! I have always loved the idea, but never remembered to try it. And I also tried another idea on this card as well. I stamped the flower image in green and then stamped it again in red and used a tiny punch, so I could mount them on the green stems. Now I call that a little putzy, but I loved the end result. Of course, I had little circles flying all over my desk while punching them. The ribbon idea came from a card on SCS. (I will search it out and give the designer credit.) Please excuse me for not sharing all the details on the names of the supplies. It has been a long day. I, mostly, just wanted to share the card! I will mention that on the inside, I used companion paper to the designer paper on the front of the card. I am definitely planning to make more gate-fold cards in the future ... they are a fun change of pace!

P.S. Better late than never, I'd like to thank two Splitcoast Stamper gals for the ribbon idea and for the popped up blossoms on the stamps image. They are Maricela and Robbie (robbier52). Thanks, again!

Cuttlebug Mother's Day Card

Not much time for card-making this week so far! We spent the last weekend visiting friends in Florida (our first and only winter "get-away" this year at the beginning of May!). Arriving back in Minnesota Monday afternoon, we quickly became "daycare" for our little grandson who came down with a virus Monday morning. He has been coming to our house each morning since then. Hard to shake that virus! I did get to attend a Cuttlebug class at Smudges (our LSS in Chanhassen) Tuesday night. It was such fun and I tried a number of new ways to use the embossing folders and dies. The teacher had such cute ideas and the other gals in the class were lots of fun!
With Mother's day on Sunday, I still needed to make three more cards. I used the design from one of the class cards! Definitely a CAS! (I changed the colors, the sentiment, and did the inside differently as well.) The cardstock consists of white Bazzill for the card base, SU! Bashful Blue for the mat and Barely Banana for the butterfly. Two different CB embossing folders were used along with the Mini Scor-It. I added pearls to the butterfly for a little bling. It is a quick and easy card but looks like you fussed! ;-)
Thank you for looking!

MOJO84 Monday

First of all, I should explain the title to this post, because I am sure some of you might be wondering what it means! MOJO is the name of a sketch challenge I've seen posted on the site SplitcoastStampers (lovingly referred to as "SCS"). I have always avoided things like this in the past. It takes me a long time to come up with my own designs so why would I get involved in something like that? According to Wiktionary, MOJO means: 1. A magic charm or spell; 2. Supernatural power or luck. And many times, I need magic, supernatural power, or luck to come up with a card design I am happy with. LOL! So I signed up to receive the Monday MOJO sketch. It comes right to your email and there is no real deadline for sharing your MOJO card which helps me a lot.

This is my interpretation of the MOJO84 sketch for this week. I know that I just posted another card using the SU! Garden Whimsy butterfly, but I just love it and it is Spring here (or it is supposed to be!). I can't say that it took me any less time to make this card, but I do have high hopes that if I keep taking the MOJO challenge, it will help. My cardstock choices were Bazzill for the card base and Colorbok for the pink cardstock mat. I ran the pink through my Cuttlebug using the Dotted Swiss embossing folder. The patterned papers are from DCWV 4x6 paper pad titled "Sweets". The ribbon is SU!, the flower is Prima, and the gems are Creative Candy from A Muse and Crystal Stickers by Mark Richards. The buttons are from my stash. (I love buttons!) The "thank you" sentiment is from the SU! Seeing Spots set. I had stamped the butterfly on SU! WW, but it looked so bare even though I tried sponging the edges and stamping off some tiny flowers. That is when I decided to stamp the butterfly on the patterned paper. It was always my intention to stamp a second one and mount it on top of the first one. The scallop and the circle were both made with SU! punches. I used the SU! ticket punch, too! (I love punches, too!) All three elements are mounted with 3M foam tape. Thank you for dropping by today!

Happy Mother's Day

It seems to take me a long time to design a card. I am not sure why, but sometimes it drives me nuts! With Mother's Day coming soon, I decided to get to work on my mom's card. I wanted it to be pretty, but I also wanted to use some colors outside my comfort zone. The colors I chose are SU! Groovy Guava and River Rock. The butterfly is from the SU! Garden Whimsy set. Stamping the image two and cutting one of them out to mount on foam tape does so much for the dimension of the card. I couldn't resist adding all the pearls to the butterfly! The CB Dotted Swiss Embossing Folder was used on the Groovy Guava mat (I've loved dotted swiss since I was a little girl!) i used the Martha Stewart scallop border punch on it to coordinate with the scallop-punched circle where the butterfly rests.

Congratulations!

I love this giraffe stamp from Inkadinkado! My coloring skills need improving, but I have watched a couple of videos on-line and am taking a Copic marker coloring class next week ... so there is hope! The card is going to a delightful family we have met at our church/school. They have 4 adorable daughters. We just found out that they are expecting baby #5. I think that news deserves a handmade card!
I started with SU! Chocolate Chip cardstock for the card base. Next came a mat of yellow/white gingham pattern paper followed by SU! Chocolate Chip cardstock embossed in the Cuttlebug using the argyle embossing folder. I lightened it up a bit with my Inkssentials white opaque pen. (Love this pen!) The stamped image and its gingham mat were cut using the Creative Memories Cutting System (I bought the circles and ovals on Ebay a couple of years ago and didn't use them much, sound familiar?). It worked great for this image, though, since it is fairly large. I did a little "doodling" around the image oval to add some interest. The stamped image in the circle is one of the SU! Circle of Friendship set. It says "Congratulations on your news" on the outside of the circle with "Hip Hip Hurray" on the inside. I chose to punch a little circle from the extra gingham paper for the center and covered that with the little brown flower and yellow brad. Both the oval and the circle are adhered with foam tape. I added the yellow/brown flower combo after trying various colors of ribbon (which just didn't work!). Thanks so much for looking!

Changito Monkey Grad Cards

Here are 3 variations of the 8th grade graduation card I am making as part of our card-making ministry at church. We are making the graduation cards for the 8th graders at St. Hubert's School. I wrote "SHS" and "09" on the diploma to personalize it. Stamps: Changito Grad by Stampendous; Paper: SU! WW, Bazzill white, SU! Black, DoubleMates Emerald Isle; Ink: Stazon Black, Zig black pen; Accessories: Ribbon, Shamrock Button, SU! ticket punch, CB Congrats EB. Thanks for stopping by!

Amy's Monkey Birthday Card

Monkey cards have become a tradition in our family, so I was tickled to get the Changito Birthday Set (acrylic) and make this first card with it. I used my Spica pen to glitz up the birthday present even more, but you can't see it in the photo. Our DD loves green and pink. These are the supplies I used: Changito Birthday Acrylic Stamp Set, Happy Birthday by Stampendous, paper: SU! WW, Pixie Pink, DCWV Green, Bo-Bunny Press Baby Plaid, and ink: SU! Glorious Green, Pixie Pink Markers, and accessories: At you Spica clear pen, green gems, SU! ribbon, SU! circle punches. TFL!

Happy Spring

Needless to say, I did not get any Easter cards made this year.  I was too busy making First Communion cards for card-making ministry.  So I decided to make some Happy Spring cards.  This adorable little chick is from A Muse.  Isn't she cute?  And I have always been a fan of Bo-Bunny Press patterned paper.  The one I chose for this card is called Baby Girl Plaid.  I used leftover Bazzill white Scor-It embossed card fronts as well as Bazzill Bling to mat the pattern paper and the stamp image.  The scallop circles were punched with the SU! scallop punch.  The image is colored with SU! markers So Saffron, Certainly Celery, and Pretty in Pink as well as Zig marker Pure Orange.  I stamped the image and the sentiment with Memory Box black ink.  I am thinking about lining the envelopes with a companion pattern to the Baby Girl Plaid.  :-)

Thanks for stopping by.  And oh, Happy Spring!

Ric's Birthday Card

Here is the same stamp set I used for the last card I posted, but adapted for our brother-in-law who is a Green Bay Packer fan!  I used one of my Cuttlebug embossing folders on the white Bazzill mat. Ink and cardstock are Stampin' Up! Glorious Green and YoYo Yellow. Ribbon is from my "stash" as usual.  The card is mounted on black cardstock.  The little gifts and the "b is for birthday" are popped up with foam tape.  Sure hope he likes it!  

B is for Birthday

This is the birthday card I made for our daughter-in-law's birthday. I got the idea from a gal on Splitcoast Stampers. I had just gotten this stamp set and needed a jumpstart on an idea. A big thanks to "karengiron" from SCS. I used SU! Real Red and Always Artichoke cardstock along with the patterned paper from Bo Bunny Press (my stash). I love the Marvvy scallop punches, so had to use them as well. The ink and ribbon are also from SU! I had fun decorating the inside and the back, too. Thanks for looking!

St. Patrick's Day

The design was CASED from a fellow card-maker on Splitcoast Stampers. She used a couple of the stamps from the SU! "Priceless" set. I just thought it was so clever that I had to do it. And I certainly will continue to do so in the coming years as it makes one of the prettiest shamrocks I have ever seen. I used SU! Wild Wasabi ink as well as Wild Wasabi cardstock. The plaid patterned paper is from my stash as well as the ribbon and silver jewel. The other stamp used for shamrocks is called Clover Border.

Wild About You!

We recently became grandparents for the second time to another wonderful boy! Here is the card that I made to send to the proud parents upon our return from being present for the birth. The colors were chosen from the theme of the their nursery. The stamps are from the SU! set entitled "Wild About You!". The cardstock and ink are Certainly Celery. The patterned papers are from DCWV Nana's Kids. The ribbon is by May Arts, I think. The buttons and thread are also from my "vast stash" ... shhh! ;-)