Ladystamper

I hope you all forgive me for being a bit late with my Friday Bloggers Challenge. The holidays have kept me busy! I haven't had nearly enough time for stamping. On the flip side, I have had loads of family time! I am really enjoying it. Christmas was this last week and we had my father in law in town. He is always lots of fun. Then, I had my anniversary this weekend as well! 18 years. Can you believe it? With the number of kids I have...yes, you can believe it! Anyway! We had a bloggers challenge to make something based on something we saw that inspired us. We had this challenge a month or so ago as well, and I knew right off what I was going to do. Of course, I never did get it done that week so I was excited to have another chance. This is a beach towel that found residence in our home a while ago. (I swear, we collect more towels, socks, and random shoes that should be allowed!) The colors were just so vivid and bright and, frankly, colors I would never put together, that I wa

I live far away from most of my family. Ever since I got married, we have lived in a 'far away' place. We lived close for a couple short periods of time during transitions, but for the most part, we have been off on our own. It wasn't so bad at first. We were just starting out and building our own family and it was nice to be able to do things our own way...if you know what I mean. As the kids got older, and the number of children grew, it became harder and harder to go 'home' to visit. Now, we rarely go home. It is sad. I do good all year, but at Christmas time, and especially this year for some reason, it is hard. I miss being able to gather together with the family for the holidays. I am so grateful for all the friends I have made that have become my surrogate family. Stamping has been a great way for me to meet lots of wonderful people! I am so blessed by great friends. They make this season a bit easier. SO! tonight I am sharing a fun card I made a few days ago

I got a call this morning from a friend asking if I would make her a special Christmas card for her daughter's teacher. I felt so honored! I was inspired by a project in the January Stampin' Success. That is a magazine that comes to every SU demonstrator each month. It is full of business tips, stamping ideas, organization tips, upcoming specials and just all around good stuff! I tweeked it a bit to fit my taste and the Christmas theme. I think it turned out great. I purchased the Illuminations set right after the Fall catalog came out and have not used it much. I love how elegant it looks here. All the images are stamped with Chocolate chip. I used the blender pens to pick up ink from mellow moss, burgundy and banana pads to color them in. I cut out the J, the flowers and the leaves and adhered them with Dotto. The pearls are from the Pretties kit and stuck on with mini glue dots. The card base is chocolate chip layered with a sheet of Apple Cider designer paper, river rock, a

One of the blogger challenges was to do a sympathy card. I, thankfully, have not had much need for these cards. I'm sure I will in the future. You know...One of those "circle of life things" so I was happy to make one. I used the M3 to color the image on the stamp and then stamped it onto whisper white cardstock. I colored in the image by dipping my blender pen into my pastels and coloring with that. It gives it a faux watercolor effect. I used a sponge dauber to rub some bashful blue chalk around the image to soften it up. I roughed up the edges of the white paper wtih my cutter kit and layered it onto a card base of kraft. The patterned paper is from catalogs past. I have been making lots of these little mini albums lately. For the cover, I use left over chip board pieces from packages of designer paper or other packaging. I cover them with paper and then use my bind-it-all to punch holes and put the spiral binding on. This one has stamped pages as well. They a

I did not fall off the face of the earth, more like the earth fell on my face. LOL Just kidding. I did run into my front door with my face and got a nice big bruise. I will not force you to look at the pictures of that. Let's just say, I am not known for my gracefulness and everyone can tell just by looking at my face. I have been trying to catch up on loads of stuff before the kiddos are out of school for Christmas break. You couldn't tell by looking at my house tho! I have done some stamping. I did these for my bloggers challenge group but did not get them out on the days I was supposed to. I will share them anyway and hope the other blogger challenge players will forgive me for my tardiness. This first card is one I made to show versatility in stamps. I made another one but didn't manage to get a picture of it. I love this set! Lovely as a Tree is a perfect stamp set for every occasion. If I was going to have one stamp set, I think it might be this one. It is incredibly

Hello again! I have been having a fun week. I decided to make crafts to sell in a consignment shop with my friends Kim and Laura. I have been working on mini albums and framed art. So, even tho I haven't posted anything, I have been creating! I will be sharing in the next few days. I just have a few minutes here before my sweetie gets home. We are going to Orlando tonight. I wanted to share a vinyl project I am offering. You can do them in any colors. Let me know if you want one! The board is 8 inches tall and 24 inches long.

I needed to make some Thanksgiving cards today so I pulled out my Apple Cider designer paper. I love this stuff! I have to admit tho, I did cut up a full piece of paper. But, the card bases were already cut and the topper was cut. So, those are 'technically scraps.' The paper is two sided and yummy on both sides, but I went with the river rock side because I LOVE the polka dots! You just want to touch them they look so good! The card base is river rock, the designer paper is river rock, so of course, I stamped the flowers from True Friend with .... river rock! I added a bit of sparkle with my stickles on the flowers...can't really see it here but it looks good in person. The scalloped border is done with my new Spellbinders Nestables. love it! The ribbon is some silky ribbon from my stash...probably a WalMart find. I stamped Warm Wishes in black and popped the sentiment on with dimensionals. I love monochromatic cards! They are so clean and easy. The fact that we have these

This is pretty much how I feel about Monday. LOL Just kidding. I thought this picture of Ben was just too cute! He was playing with the camera the other day taking pictures....don't you just love digital?! and he got this picture of himself. Not too bad! I don't remember what he was being but I'm sure it was something scarey. I made this card the other day and kind of liked how it turned out. I had these two pieces of designer paper in my , you guessed it Scrap pile! I liked the colors together but the patterns were a bit much next to each other. I added some rickrack (sorry mom....she has a phobia of that) and a strip of lite yellow ribbon along the 'seam' of the two papers. It toned them both down and made them friends. I added a big daisy from my pretties kit and a chipboard circle from some kit I got from somewhere, in the middle. It is a simple card that could work for lots of things. If you want to see some great samples of big flower cards, check out this bl

I absolutely LOVE to quilt! I love piecing, I love shopping for fabric, I love hand stitching, I love snuggling up in a quilt! But....I really don't have time to quilt right now. Not with fabric anyway. I do have time to quilt with paper tho! This page is made with a collection of different designer papers I had in my scrap basket. I really wanted to focus on the picture of Ben, so I made a faux quilt backdrop that kind of blends into the background. The colors are so saffron, celery, rose red and soft sky. I tied them all together with a strip of Cutie Pie paper (also a scrap believe it or not). I added some faux stitching around the edges with my white gel pen. (Don't tell, but I didn't even paper pierce! I just drew them on!) The mini brads are from a couple different color families to match...sorry..."coordinate" with the papers. I covered a chipboard heart with scraps from the scraps of paper I used for the background and "stitched" them together as

This week our bloggers challenge was do make something using Old Olive , Pumpkin Pie , Brocade blue and Chocolate chip . I think these colors look awesome together! I couldn't wait to play this morning! I happened to receive a special surprise from Stampin' Up! yesterday so...had to use that too! This set is called Time Well Spent and will be in the new Spring/Summer catalog as a level three hostess set. Isn't SU awesome?! I adore this set! The project I made is a little mini scrapbook/journal that may end up with my daughter...we shall see....The 'cover' is made from chocolate chip cardstock. I put a piece of Whisper White on there and stamped some flowers with my Chocolate Chip pad. The big flower in the upper left along with the two larger flowers in the bottom corners and the butterfly are all cut out and adhered with dimensionals. I know, it took me all morning! I tried to stick with the colors in the challenge and I really like how they turned out. I added a

This little set caught my eye right away when I looked at the new catalog. It is so fun, cute and versatile! (Mom, you need this set!) I had been planning on buying it sometime, so when the "All in the Family" promotion came up, I did it. The promotion is in honor of a Stampin' Up! employee, the general manager of the Australian office. Dave died from a rare blood disease. Stampin' Up! is sending his family all proceeds from the sale of this set. I think it is such a wonderful idea! Stampin' Up! really is a great company. I stamped these little guys with basic black onto confetti white and used my M3 to color them in. They are SO easy to line up and assemble! I used my new spellbinders die to cut the scalloped rectangle and then mounted it onto some Old Olive cardstock. The designer paper to the left is from the Sweetie Pie collection. I used two different scraps of ribbon I had in my ribbon jar and stapled a bit of one to the edge of the card. How did I ever stam

I had a super saturday last week, literally! After my fall festival in the morning, I taught a couple classes at the church at our "super Saturday." That is a fancy name for a day of crafts for the women. I love them! I offered a craft using my vinyl art and another making cards. Here is a picture of some of the cards we did. I gave everyone a basic color palette and let them get creative. Some of the cards were really great! I love seeing what people come up with. For my crds I used River Rock cardstock and stamped the linen background with either chocolate chip or old olive. The focal point is stamped on white natural paper. I inked up my Garden Silhouette flowers with my M3 - old olive and ruby red. I stamped one image and then spritzed the stamp and got another image out of it. The second image looked almost better than the first! On the image at the bottom left, I stamped the several times without reinking to give depth. I also added stickles to the flowers for some blin

Okay, this is the funniest thing! For Halloween, Ethan wanted to be a pirate. I actually wanted the whole family to go as a "merry band of pirates" but...you all know how 'plans' go..right? anyway, Ethan wanted to be one, so I got him this costume. I don't like to buy the premade costumes in the store because they are basically made from tissue paper that will rip apart before the child actually gets to any Halloween activites and that will end up in crying, wailing, and more temptations for mom to run away and never come back. SO, I bought him pants and a shirt and belt he could wear other places in the future, like, to church and school, and splurged for this hat. Little did I know that the hat came with a mustache and beard! Take a look at that mustache! Have you EVER seen anything so freakin large? It was a total riot! All the kids had to try it on. I have pictures of all of them wearing it. Some of them used it as a Uni-brow! In fact, when we got to the trun

Have you ever had a vision of a finished project and just couldn't get it to work out? I know I have. Sometimes after I have struggled with something for a while I find the best thing to do is to just walk away from it. Or, let it get buried on my craft table. ;o) I had pulled out this black 'pocket' a while ago and tried to make it work and it just didn't. I found it this week while I was cleaning up and decided to give it another go round. I am pretty happy with how it turned out. The pocket is from the SU pockets and pieces (pg 179 of the current catty). Frankly, there are SO many pieces in this packet that I don't think I will ever run out! I stuck the pocket together with sticky strip to keep it from coming apart. Snail just wasn't strong enough. The front is made with Rose Red designer paper, basic black, and rose red cardstock all layered. I stamped the LOVE with white craft and colored in the letters with the VersaMarker. The definition is stamped in bl

I remember when I was a kid...it seemed that as soon as school started the weather started cooling off. It hasn't been that way for a long time now! Maybe it is because I live in Florida. I don't know. It has been getting nicer here for a few weeks, but we finally have weather that lets you leave the windows open at night and snuggle up in a quilt. I am loving it! Of course, nothing good comes without a price. You guessed it. The kids are sniffling. My kids don't ever get really "sick" but they do get sniffles now and then. Ben is home today, and has been all week. Funny, I got a call from his teacher yesterday asking if he was okay and if he just stayed home to snuggle. I told her that was about it. He doesn't have a fever or anything, just wants mommy time. Sometimes that is hard to get around here. As some of you know, I have my hands in many things these days. One of the things I have been playing with is vinyl art. I actually purchased a (quite expensive

Today our lesson in Relief Society was on gratitude. Not only gratitude for our blessings, but also gratitude for our trials and tribulations. Some of you may be thinking...why in the world would I be grateful for trials?! The hard times in our lives are the times when we are actually learning. When we are growing. If we never had things to suffer through, we would never grow. I know this to be true. Now, I'm not saying that I start each day with a prayer asking for trials and much suffering, on the contrary! I do, however, start each day asking for the strength and ability to overcome and endure all that may come my way. I have had my fair share of hard times, but I've made it this far! I guess I am just feeling very grateful today for my life. For the good, the bad and the ugly. I would not want anyone else's life. Mine is a perfect fit for me. I went on a date with my sweetie Saturday night...we hadn't had a real date in almost a month! Those of you that know me will

I have to say that I have totally enjoyed each and every comment on here! Most of you said your family and children bring you the greatest delight in life. That is so wonderful! That is true for me as well. I am so very blessed to have six healthy happy children that get along with each other...now and then. The winner of the blog candy is.... CALI! Congrats! I hope everyone will take a minute and read the comment Cali left. She works with abused children and is a truly wonderful person. Her comment is worth a read. Cali, please send me your address so I can get your goodies out to you. I had so much fun with this, I just may make the candy a weekly thing...stay tuned! :o))

I know I said I would post some blog candy yesterday but I didn't even get near my computer! What a crazy day! I had planned on doing it the night before but...I was in the kitchen doing the dishes and I was so dog tired that I laid my head down on the counter for a minute. My son came into the room and said, "go to bed mom, dad and I will do the dishes." Now, who in thier right mind would turn down that offer? My boys HATE to do anything in the kitchen that doesn't involve eating. I immediately turned off my water(boiling for herb tea) and skedaddled upstairs and went to bed. I'm no dummy! The kitchen was not cleaned to my standards, but I'm not about to look a gift horse in the mouth! Speaking of gifts, I have a little blog candy offer today. In honor of my 8000 hits, I am offering the following: A simply scrappin kit "Just Delightful", a stamp set "Delight in Life", three mini spools of ribbon, some acrylic tiles AND a copy of the latest

I decided to update the look of my blog. Yeah, like I have a clue how to do that! I have spent over two hours now trying to change it to how I want it and I'm giving up! If I asked him to, Ethan could probably fix it for me. My 8 year old. Why is it so hard for me to figure out this computer? My kids are way better at computer stuff than I am. I can usually figure stuff out, but it takes a lot of trial and error. I try to read the instructions and it feels like I am reading another language! It is very aggravating! So, after much trial and loads of error, I am going with what you see here. It isn't bad, but isn't what I had in mind. The bad news is that all the awesome blogs I had links to here are lost in cyberspace somehow. darn! If you have an awesome blog, let me know! I'll add it here! I guess I will have to start over. sigh... I wanted to update for two reasons. One, I saw a link on someone else's blog for new blogger templates. Yeah, I obviously can't fig

Do you have something that just makes you happy? Something you do that just relaxes you and makes you feel good? My friend Jessie called me Saturday from Texas. She had the nerve to move away. I tell ya! Anyway, she called to tell me that she was feeling better than she had in months. Why? Because she went to a stamp party and stamped! She hadn't realized how much she had been missing it. Now, she has moved clear across the country and has had quite a few things on her mind. But, how many of us 'forget' to do the things that make us happy? Or maybe, we don't forget so much as we just get too busy to do those things? I know I do. I have been so busy lately that I don't know what I have been doing! I took time last week to scrapbook a bit. True, I kind of HAD to because I had a crop and needed a page project, but I decided to take the whole day and just scrapbook. Kim came over and we had a ball! I had forgotten how much I love to scrap! (I also love to be with Kim, s

So...my sister sent me this diet. Not that SHE needs, it but she thinks she does. Let's not go there. Anyway, it is this magic diet that makes you lose 10-17 pounds in 7 days. No pills, no drugs, no knives,....just this all veggie soup that you eat every day along with other certain things. You can find the diet here . So far, I am at day 4 and although I had lost 2 pounds this morning, it is back. I just don't think that is fair. I have not cheated at all! My DH says it is just because I am getting older and I should accept it. He is not bothered by my extra fluff....grrr...I guess that is good, but I am bothered by it! I am not going to give up on the diet. I will see it through to the end and report back. Maybe I will get lucky and it will actually work. Maybe I will just end up buying bigger clothes. Maybe I will try an all chocolate diet next to make up for all the dadgum tomatoes I've eaten this week! I do like tomatoes, but after four days of a highly tomatoey fla

A sure sign that autumn is in the air is when the apples are ready for canning! Yes, I canned again today. It is a funny story, kind of....I went to the library to return my books...why did I get them there? Of course they were late, of course I want to buy them now, sheesh....anyway, on my way home I innocently drove past my favorite veggie stand. I think they were thinking of me when they made today's sign. It said "we have boxes." I never can seem to leave that place lately without a box full of something! I wanted pears, but the Bartlett pears were not very pretty and not very cheap. They had red pears ,which I had never seen before, that smelled Wonderful! So, I bought a box(of course) of them. Then I called mom to ask what kind of apples we usually can. She couldn't remember. sigh, by this time, I was getting TOO HOT. Do you know what I mean? Florida, humidity, black clothes...yeah, too hot. So, I just decided to get Rome apples. They looked good and were cheap.

I was asked to share a workshop wow at the Orlando regional last week. It was one of the funnest things I've done! I absolutely loved it! Shari was kind enough to get some pictures of me. When SU called and asked me to present, they told me I could do whatever I wanted and I had 5 minutes. Not a whole lot of time! I asked a few of my customers what they had seen me demo that was WOW to them. They seemed to like this craft schooshing technique, so that is what I showed. It is a super easy technique that I kind of morphed from other techniques over the ages. The way I do it is to take a sheet protector and split the seams so it is only attached, front to back, on the side with the ring holes. Open it up and schmoosh craft ink, I used the spots, randomly on one side. Using another color, do the same on the other side. I try and use colors that will look pleasant when they are combines. Like, red and blue, pink and yellow, any color and silver, etc. This card uses red and blue. When b

I had a great weekend in Az with my sisters. They are the cutest, craziest gals you will ever meet. They got all the good looks in the family. sigh...oh well. At least I'm the oldest so I can boss them around. Ha! (yeah, I'm the one on the far left...such a flattering position...thanks mom)I took Thor with me and we had a good time just he and I. It was interesting traveling with him...I travel so much by myself that I forget how nice it is to have someone to talk to. He is a boy of few words most of the time. In fact, on the plane, he would wake me up every time I dozed off "so he wouldn't be bored" but he didn't say much. He just wanted me awake. We did have some nice talks tho. Mostly he used the time to do a big time sales pitch for a new video game he wants. This trip was the first time I got to meet my newest niece. She has to be the most beautiful baby, not born to me, that I have ever seen. She has her moms big blue eyes and these perfect lips

I love to read. I read books of all kind. History, fiction, self help, biographies, decorating, and even books on organizing. I look to look at pictures of organized homes and see all the creative things people come up with. One of the best organizing books I have read was given to me by my mother. I'm SURE she wasn't hinting or anything when she gave this to me......It is called Organizing From the Inside Out by Julie Morgenstern. Her method to organizing is to keep things where you use them. Not a mindboggling idea, but still...makes you think, no? In her book, she talks about the different kinds of people and how they 'organize' or take care of things. One of the titles she gives is Conquistador of Chaos. This is someone that waits til things get way out of control and then they come riding in on their great white horse to charge through the mess and set everything in order. Today, as I was running all over town, finishing a placque that had been ordered three months

It is pouring outside today! I mean, buckets of rain are falling. It is awesome! I love this time of year. I know, there is the whole 'hurricane' thing, but...the storms are awesome here! Since I grew up in the southwest and we had little to no rain for most of my life, the rain still facinates me. I love the rolling thunder and splashing in puddles! I drove my kids to the bus this morning because we were running late, and well, because it was pouring. Yes, I am a nice mom now and then. The kids were so cute running from the car to the bus with their little backpacks over their heads. Trying so hard to stay dry. Ben cracked me up tho when he darted through the rain only to purposely jump right in a puddle before he got on the bus. Yeah, his teacher is going to love me for that one! I can just hear his little shoe squeaking all day. Good think I am going in to the school today, I will take him some new socks. Silly boy! I had some time....no, let me rephrase that. I MADE some t

It seems the holiday season starts a little earlier every year. It always amazes every year when the Halloween stuff is out right after school starts. This year, I notice the Halloween stuff has Christmas decorations at the edges. Are we in sucha hurry? Well, if you plan to make your own Christmas cards, it is never too early! I haven't actually started mine, but I have been thinking about them. Here is one I came up with Saturday. What do you think? I'm also looking for a wow idea to share at the Orlando Regional, so I won't tell you how I did it. Leave me a comment so I know if it is a'wow' or not. It is super easy. Well, okay, semi super easy. ;o) In family news, we are enjoying a day off of school today. Why? It is listed as a teach prep day/hurricane day. I'm thinking they were pretty darn confident to 'plan' a hurricane and wanted a loophole so they could still have a day off. After a whole month of school, the teachers do probably need a day to re

When my parents came for Labor day and birthdays a couple weeks ago, we had a ball! It is always a treat to have family around. Since I have been married I have only lived close to family for a couple of years. I feel like we miss out on so much! At the same time, if we didn't live all over...my parents probably wouldn't have been to as many states as they have. I think we have broadened their horizons. ;o) We decided to spent Labor Day at Blue Springs. The boys had gone camping there, but the rest of us had never been. We hooked up with some other families from church and headed out early. We are not usually big on long days at the beach. The sun really gets to us. Okay, the sun really get to my husband! I just get worn out in general. We figured we would st ay a couple of hours. We stayed for about four hours! It was just wonderful! The water is beautifully clear and cool. It was great for all the kids. They swam, ate, rode in canoes, looked at the alligators...yes, there wer

My nose is running, my eyes are burning,...my hands are pruney...what? No, I'm not sick, I'm canning again! I ran out of my homemade salsa this weekend. Horrors!! I tell ya, after making my own....I don't want that store bought stuff any more! I just happened to be passing my favorite veggie stand and they had tomatoes! So, I decided to fix my "no salsa" problem today. Of course, they didn't have any Jalepenos...so I ended up getting those at the grocery store. These are not exactly a high ticket item so I didn't mind. I got two boxes of tomatos, a mere 50 pounds, but I only managed to finish one box today. I guess I know what I'm doing tonight! Last night I stayed up and stamped a bit. It is so nice to be able to sta mp AT my desk! I didn't even have stuff on my lap! Amazing! I have everything I need within arms reach. Well, except all my stamps, but...I can lean over really far and reach a lot of them. I am still attempting to slog my way through

We have had several dogs over our families history and I swore I would never have another one. But recently, I have been really thinking it would be a good idea. My kids are all getting older, no more babies, and I am home alone alot. Just last week I had a couple days when I was really jumpy. Every little noise was making me nervous. I hate that feeling! I started thinking that having a dog around might ease my nerves a bit. My kids have been begging for a dog for years! It is pretty easy to say no to them, but when my dear hubby started hinting that a dog would be the perfect gift for his 40th birthday....I knew I was going to have to give in. We found this sweet boxer mix at the SPCA here locally. We had picked out a shepherd the day before, but when we saw both dogs in action with Ben,....it was pretty clear she was the one for us. She is totally calm yet playful, house trained, quiet, and just loves all the kids! The first day she was home she was a bit ner vouse I think because