On Vacation

I won't be posting until the week of May 4th--hubby and I are going on vacation!! Just a reminder for all who may be interested in participating that National Scrapbook Day is Saturday May 2nd. I'll have to take a day the following week to play.
Until next time...

Wedding Card

inside:
This is one of the quickest cards I've done but I like it! A card doesn't have to take hours to make and be really involved for it to be special and personal. Here's how it's done:
Cut a plain white 8 1/2 x 11" piece of cardstock in half width-wise at 5 1/2" Then take one side and scored it in half at 4 1/4". Next, emboss the front of the card using the Cuttlebug folder Bow Frame Card. Cut out the box inside the frame using a paper trimmer or craft knife, which will form a window to the inside of the card.
Using the Graphically Speaking cartridge, select the 'icon' feature and press the "Me & You" button to access the heart. Cut a heart out of a blue scrap piece of paper at 1" with 'real dial size' feature ON. Leaving the 'icon' and 'real dial size' features on, press your shift button and the "Me & You" button again. This time, cut a heart out of a pink scrap piece of paper at 3/4".
Use stickles to outline the embossed areas on the front of the card and the two hearts. For this card, I used silver for the front, pink for the pink heart and aqua for the blue heart.
Once dry, glue the hearts--a little offset towards the top--on a scrap piece of white cardstock, approximately 1 3/4" wide and 2 1/4" tall. Mount this scrap onto a silver piece that measures 2" by 2 1/2". Using your window as a guide so that the two hearts are visible from the front of the card, adhere these layers to the inside of the card. With a silver pen, write 'congrats' or other greeting on the bottom of the white layer, well underneath the hearts so that the sentiment is not visible when the card is closed.

Thanks for looking!

Attention Cricut Lovers!

Kristina over at Creatively Counting My Blessings is offering a Cricut cartridge giveaway--the winner will receive his/her choice of Kitchen Solutions, European Decor Solutions, or Stamping Solutions.
To be entered, all you have to do is sign up to receive e-mail updates from her new store, Your Memories Here, and then leave a comment on her blog (linked prior) to let her know. Easy peasy!

Thinking of You

I made these simple cards to serve as sympathy cards. The one on the left was for a lady who lost her mother and the one on the right was for a man who lost his wife. All of the paper is from Making Memories and the sentiment is from CTMH. I pierced the paper along the bottom leading to the sentiment and inked the edges of the paper with Tim Holz's distressing ink.
I added coordinating paper to the insides of the envelopes. This was the first time I've done this, but I do think it gives it that extra touch.
Thanks for looking!

These are a few of my {favorite} things

This was a challenge for the design team over at Whimsical Scraps and Bugs. We had to do a layout about ourselves...something that we often forget to do. There were a lot of options for this, but I decided to go the route of making a page about a few of my favorite things. It was fun to do, and it forced me to take a few moments to reflect and be thankful for the things that the Lord has given for me to enjoy. Here's my list, which is obviously not in any particular order :)

• My hope found in Christ (okay, this would top the list anyway)
• Chocolate
• Holidays (used the Christmas tree from Christmas Cheer on this square)
  
• The love among my family
• Faithful friends
• The beauty of Creation
• Good sleep
• Comfort of home (used the home from Joys of the Season here)
  
• Crafting

The title is from Plantin Schoolbook; the 'few' is from Opposites Attract. The brackets around 'favorite' are from Printing Press and the heart is from Graphically Speaking.
The patterned paper is from Making Memories, as are the stamps (Ransom) and the cardboard flowers. I used 'Thickers' for the word 'favorite' and for the brackets around the heart.

Thanks for looking!

Ashlyn's First Day of School

I was recently going through some older pictures and I stumbled across these ones from my niece's first day of Kindergarten. She's a teenager now! Unbelievable. She is such a sweetheart...just look at that shy/excited/nervous smile on her face! Anyway, I thought these would be cute pictures to use with my new Cricut cartridge, Sesame Street Font. How cute are those little characters peeking out from the letters? I think this cartridge is going to get a lot of use. The ric-rac cuts and the apple is from Plantin Schoolbook, and the patterned paper is from a DCWV stack.

Thanks for looking!

The Los Angeles Zoo--fauna

The lion was particularly photogenic this visit! But the wildest ones of the bunch?


The little monkeys that came home with us that day!
Thanks for looking!

The Los Angeles Zoo--flora

My sweetie had the day off yesterday so we took advantage of the extra time to have a family day at the LA Zoo. How fun to let the kiddos roam from animal to animal. There is so much scope for the imagination there! The weather was nice--warm but not too hot, and many of the flowers were in full bloom. I don't often devote a post to photography, but I thought I would share some pictures of the varieties of flowers we saw yesterday. Perhaps I'll share some animal pictures with you tomorrow or later this week.

Thinking of You

This is yet another MojoMonday card (sketch 79, pictured at the bottom of the post). I hope you're not getting sick of seeing them! I really want to get back to scrapbooking, but sometimes when my time is limited all I can finish is a card.
I've had the birdhouse stamp for a long time, but I'm not sure I'd ever used it. I used watercolors to color it in. The sentiment stamp (hard to see, but it is to the right of the birdhouse) is from Stampin Up! and it says 'thinking of you.' I inked the edges with distress ink to age it a little and to give it some more depth.
Thanks for looking!

You're "Tea"riffic

I made this card to donate to a stranger named Jen Tapler. She is going to have a charity auction for all the cards she collects with the proceeds going to raise money for the Alzheimer's Association. Jen is seeing firsthand the effects that this disease is having on her father, and I do hope that she will receive many cards that will further the work of the Alzheimer's Association.
As if that incentive is not enough, for those that participate before April 3rd (that's Friday so you have a couple more days), she is having a huge stamping blog giveaway (see details on her blog, linked above). Even if you don't get a chance to participate before Friday, you can still make a card (or cards) and send them to her before April 20th.
I got the sketch from this week's MojoMonday, seen below.
Thanks for looking!