Sweet Sunday Sketch #110

Good morning! I do believe that today is going to be the first day in over 10 days that it will not rain. It's still cloudy and cold, but no little moist drops are falling from the sky. And believe it or not, by Thursday, we're supposed to be back in the 80s! Skirt and sandal weather! Crazy! I guess my little allergy break is over. *sigh* The moment I got my sneak peak of Karen's new Sweet Sunday Sketch yesterday on facebook, the wheels in my head began spinning. Another college roomie of mine announced she is pregnant, and baby cards are a-spinning in my head! Oh how I love making them! They're always so soft, and cute. For this card, I pulled out some of MME's Fine and Dandy True Blue dp along with some Summer Sun cardstock. I stamped the sailboat from Bitty Baby Blessings six times, three on the white, and another three times of dp. I paper pieced the sails and colored the rest with my copics. I added some spica glitter pen to the flag and boat bottom for a subtle shimmer (this is a "boy" baby card, after all!). I added some baker's twine instead of ribbon to keep this card feeling light and airy, and not too heavy. I used my little copic trick again to turn some white pearls into aqua pearl to match the dp. LOVE my copics!

Today is a relaxing day. I'm taking a break from life. My car got rear-ended on Friday, which of course, threw my whole day into turmoil. I truly am fine; completely unscathed. I've been giggling in retrospect that I was simply "shaken, not stirred," lol. My car actually held up pretty well when hit. It was a low-speed accident, and I really do have so much to be thankful for in that respect. I wasn't on the freeway, etc. The other driver was unfortunately uninsured, but at least is an honest person, and immediately took blame. All I have to say, is thank goodness my insurance covers me in the event of an uninsured driver hitting me! My insurance is about to be worth every penny I've poured into them over the last 13 years! Then yesterday was all business. Taxes are now done, dishes are done, I cleaned the kitchen, read for a while, and even managed to bake a banana cake (with peanut butter frosting!!!). Today, I slept in, and it's church from home. Then I'm off to join some girlfriends for a stamp camp. Thus, the nice break from life. And I'm so looking forward to it!

Tomorrow it's back to the grind. Only five more days until Spring Break!

Thanks for stopping by!

Supplies-
Stamps- PTI: Bitty Baby Blessings
Paper- Summer Sun, Whisper White, MME Fine and Dandy True Blue dp
Ink- Memento Tuxedo Black
Accessories- baker's twine, nestabilities, dimensionals, tea dye stains, copics, spica glitter pen, pearls

Sketch For You To Try

Good morning! I finally had the opportunity to sit and play with this month's Sketch for You to Try this morning (along with baking a banana cake!). I used some more of MME's Stella and Rose Gertie dp on this card and pulled all of my colors from the paper. I colored the image with my copics, covered the cherries and strawberries with some diamond glaze, and used some diamond stickles to added some shimmer to other little bits of the picture.

Sorry to keep this post so brief, but there are a million things that I need to take care of today. It was a crazy week at work, when it was supposed to be an easy week. Every big event ended up being cancelled due to the lousy weather (field trip, jog-a-thon, and hour-long disaster drill). Needless to say, I was stressing over lesson plans where none existed; filling entire days and hours with plans at the last minute. Crazy! I'm so glad it is the weekend.

I promise to have more for you tomorrow- cards AND words, lol.

Thanks so much for stopping by!

Supplies-
Stamps- Stampendous: Tiers of Treats
Paper- Rose Red, Very Vanilla, Baja Breeze, MME Stella and Rose Gertie dp
Ink- Memento Tuxedo Black
Accessories- ribbon, slot punch, copics, tea dye stains, dimensionals, diamand glaze, stickles, pearls, button, twine

Just Because...

I have a love of all things Disney (Disneyland, movies, etc). I am a proud member of the Disney cartoon musical generation. And this guy does them justice! Watch it. I promise you'll love it. :)



(I noticed it's a little cut off on the right side, but if you click the "You Tube" button in the bottom right corner, it will open a new window where you can see the whole screen. Enjoy!)

Thanks for stopping by!

Sweet Sunday Sketch #109

Good morning and happy second day of spring! It's back to the work grind for me this morning, in the rain. Fortunately, we have a staff development today, so the kids won't be trapped indoors all day with me. Those poor little guys always get so stir crazy when they are trapped inside of a classroom all day with no way to get all of their energy out. The rain is supposed to stop sometime later today, and tomorrow is supposed to be beautiful.


We're back to some wonderful 90 degree corners with Karen's Sweet Sunday Sketch from yesterday. Thank goodness! I don't have quite the hate/hate relationship with circles anymore like I used to, but I still would only label it as a love/hate relationship, lol. Having nothing but corners was so nice. So many of my cards lately (which usually follow a sketch) have had a circle of some sort on them.

As soon as I saw that rectangle image panel, I knew I wanted to pull out my Miracle Blossoms. This oldie, but goodie never lets me down. I used some more new dp (Is it just me, or is there a plethora of new dp out there?!) on this card, mixing a few companies. After coloring the tulips blossoms with my copics, and highlighting with a little bit of white gel pen, I popped up each blossom on a dimensional.

That's all for today. Thanks so much for stopping by!

Supplies-
Stamps- Verve: Miracle Blossoms
Paper- Kraft, Whisper White, Simply Chartreuse, Echo Park Little Girl & Walk in the Park dp
Ink- Memento Rich Cocoa
Accessories- ribbon, medium scallop die (PTI), pearls, sewing machine, copics, white gel pen, dimensionals

Viva la Verve!

Good wet afternoon. I'm trying not to float away, blow away, or be struck by lightning. There hasn't been any lightning for about 20 minutes now, so I figured it might be safe to jump online and post this card to share with you all. But in the meantime, it is absolutely dumping rain and the wind is whipping it around like there's no tomorrow. It's one of those days where I'm glad that I have nowhere to be. I can just stay home, curled up under a blanket, and enjoy the sounds of the rain on the roof, the wind in the trees, and the thunder rattling the windows (aka, a perfect day!).

Uh oh, the thunder just started again, so we're going to make this quick. I played along with this week's Viva la Verve sketch (Which was sooo fun to play with! I'm definitely going to use this sketch again!), and pulled out some new dp while I was at it. The dp is Echo Park's Little Girl mixed in with some Pacific Vineyard from PTI. I stamped three balloons from Verve's Birthday Bash, two onto dp and one onto white cardstock to be colored with my copics. I popped them up with various layerings of dimensionals, added some twine for their ribbons, and a little gingham bow to tie them together. I masked the sentiment, also from Birthday Bash, to split it onto the two banners.

Ok. Enough for today. Gotta get this computer off! Thanks for stopping by!

Supplies-
Stamps- Verve: Birthday Bash
Paper- Whisper White, Kraft, Echo Park Little Girl, Pacific Vineyard (PTI)
Ink- Memento Tuxedo Black
Accessories- twine, apron lace punch, ribbon, corner rounder punch, dimensionals, copics, white gel pen

Mojo Monday

Good afternoon! Winter is officially rearing it's head again here in So Cal, and the rain is a-comin'. It rained for a while last night, and much bigger storm is on its way in as we speak. We're expecting around 5 inches of rain tomorrow. FINE by me! I am so looking forward to getting a day or two of relief from my spring allergies. I love spring, but I dread it every year.

I absolutely love this week's Mojo Monday sketch and was anxious to sit and play this morning. Cruising through the blog world for inspiration highlighted one trend this week: Think Spring. Spring colors, flowers, light and airy cards.... They were everywhere! As much as I love spring, the flowers blooming, planting my veggie garden, I have to admit that I'm still enjoying winter. I dread the end of spring because it means the summer heat is just around the corner. Ugh. And since tomorrow is the first day of spring, I guess it was permissible to create a spring-y card. :)

Babies are still on the brain in my studio, lol. Another one of my college roomies just called a week ago to tell us that she and her husband are expecting their first baby in October! Yay!! It truly is the "baby" season in my life right now. So many of my friends are starting their families, and I couldn't be having a more wonderful time cuddling all their little bundles of joy!

I pulled out another new doily die, did some sponging, popped up the cute little giraffe, and added some flag sentiments to finish of the card. Nice and cheery. :) I think A&B in Pittsburgh will love this little burst of spring amidst all of their snow.

Thanks so much for stopping by! Have a wonderful weekend!

Supplies-
Stamps- Verve: To the Moon
Paper- Ruby Red, Pumpkin Pie, Whisper White, MME's Stella and Rose Mabel dp
Ink- Memento Tuxedo Black, Summer Sun, Pumpkin Pie
Accessories- ribbon, jewels, nestabilities, PTI doily die, sewing machine, corner rounder punch, dimensionals, copics, sponge

Sweet Sunday Sketch #108

Good afternoon. It's an absolutely gorgeous day here in So Cal... About 70 degrees, sunny, white puffy clouds, a slight breeze. Yup, be jealous. This week is supposed to be very spring-like, but winter is right on it's heels once more. A big multi-day rain storm is looming in the forecast for next week. Which, truly, is fine by me. I love spring, but man, oh, man my allergies have a field day this time of year. A little rain gives me a day or two of respite from the flu-like symptoms.


To play along with Karen's Sweet Sunday Sketch for today, I pulled out some more new dp from the Stella and Rose Mabel line. I went with some yellows and aquas on this one. The aqua took a little tweaking in my editing program to get it to appear the correct color. Why don't aquas photograph true to color, I will never know.

I played with a few other new toys on this card, as well. I picked up this glittery ribbon (yup, it's glittered ribbon!) at Michael's back around Valentine's Day. They had it in a few colors at 50% off after the holiday, so I definitely snagged a few spools of this aqua, pink, and red. Lastly, there is a bit of baker's twine on this card. This has been something I've seen around a lot, and love the little extra "oomph" it gives a card over regular twine. This particular thread has some aqua woven into it, which was perfect for my card!

It's been a wonderful, relaxing weekend. Our sermon at church this morning was such a wonderful reminder of the power of prayer. The question? Why don't we pray more often when it is so powerful? Such a convicting question. But the best part of today was the potluck we had after church. I attend a satellite campus of our big church, which allows us to do some more "small church" gatherings, such as potlucks! The food was fabulous (yay, ham!), and there was tons of fruit to chow down on. Not to mention the desserts... Eek! It was wonderful just to sit and socialize and meet a few more people. We should do these more often. :)

We have another round of parent conferences at school this week. I'm trying to get psyched up for them. They're always a bit dreaded in advance, but once I'm into them, I'm completely fine. I really do enjoy the chance to sit and celebrate with parents over their students' accomplishments. Of course, there are always one or two hard ones thrown in there, which I always pray to come and go quickly, lol. I also have book club tomorrow evening, and I haven't even finished the book yet! Eek! I'm a huge book-a-holic, but I've just been out of a reading mood for the last week or two. And unfortunately, this funk fell on the back of this month's book club book, which I've heard from the other gals is fabulous. I may need to park myself on my couch and crank out some of the book today and after school tomorrow so that I can at least keep up with some of the conversation, lol.

Thanks so much for stopping by! Have a fabulous remainder of this gorgeous Sunday!

Supplies-
Stamps- Verve: Happy Birthday PJ
Ink- Bermuda Bay
Paper- Whisper White, Bermuda Bay, MME Stella and Rose Mabel dp
Accessories- ribbon, button, baker's twine, jewels, white gel pen, nestabilities

Viva la Verve!

Good evening! I've known for a day or two that the first sketch I needed to play with this weekend was the new Viva la Verve sketch. Why, you ask? Because it is Maureen's sketch debut!!! Julee even managed to dig up a great little shamrock image for the sketch layout.

Unfortunately, I don't have have any shamrock stamps, embellishments, and I don't even own a heart punch to create my own... Something that may need to be remedied in order to remain friends with Maureen. ;)

Instead, I chose to work with this Irish Blessing from the Verve set, Blessings. It makes the most beautiful wedding cards. Add in some new dp from MME's Stella and Rose Mabel, and this card came together relatively quickly. I had a little trouble with the ribbon placement and size due to the sentiment being so wide. I fudged it a little bit from the sketch.... Shh! Don't tell! Instead of a shamrock, I used another dainty paper flower with a button in the middle. I added some platinum stickles around the edge to give it just a little bit of shimmer. The scallops felt a little lonely once the card was said and done, so I snuck on a row of pearls at the last minute to jazz them up.

LOVED the sketch this week, Maureen! I can't wait to see what you have up your sleeves in the months to come!

Thanks for stopping by!

Supplies-
Stamps- Verve: Blessings
Paper- Really Rust, Vintage Cream, MME Stella and Rose Mabel dp
Ink- Tangerine Tango, Really Rust
Accessorie- ribbon, button, nestabilities, tea dye stains, pearls, stickles

Mojo Monday

Good evening! I came home from work today itching to get into my studio and get crafty. I was rather intimidated by this week's Mojo Monday sketch.... So many different panels, and a diagonal one, to boot! Eek! But then, waiting on my porch for me, was the answer to my problems.... New dp! I ordered the new Stella and Rose lines from MME and have been anxiously awaiting their arrival.

I stuck with a teal and mustard color scheme straight from the dp itself. The sketch called for some kind of embellishment in that upper corner, so I decided to mimic the flowers on the dp and create a little paper flower. I added a button in the middle with some twine so I could sneak a bow onto the card. ;)

I stamped the sentiment from Beautiful Kindness in More Mustard and then rock-n-rolled it in some Not Quite Navy for a bit of shading. I love the dramatic effect it created with the two opposite colors! I also happened to go a bit crazy with my sewing machine on this card. Lots and lots and lots of stitching. I just happened to have this golden color thread from a curtain sewing project a few weeks ago and it matched this dp amazingly. Love it when little gifts like that happen!

I'm so looking forward to Friday and the weekend. It's going to be one of those rare weekends where I have absolutely nothing planned. Well, other than getting an oil change, and my windshield repaired, I have nothing planned. I might need to sneak taxes in there as well. Sheesh! Scratch the nothing planned. But at least I get to be home for large chunks of time.

TGIF (almost!) everyone. Thanks for stopping by!

Supplies-
Stamps- Beautiful Kindness (Verve)
Paper- Whisper White, More Mustard, Stella and Rose Hattie (MME)
Ink- More Mustard, Not Quite Navy
Accessories- twine, buttons, tea dye stains, nestabilities, tacky glue, sewing machine

Viva la Verve

Ah, this is my celebratory, "I finished my report cards" card! Hooray! I really do think that report cards are up there as one of my least favorite things to do as a teacher. I know they are informative, and really necessary, they sure are a lot of work. It's a great feeling to have them done and out of the way once more. Only one more round to go, and that's at the end of the school year!

I used last week's Viva la Verve sketch for this card. Lots of new PTI goodies arrived on my porch this week, and they most definitely were begging to be used. In particular, my new Royal Velvet cardstock and coordinating Pacific Vineyard dp. Love that deep purple and green together! So regal!

I swapped up the big star/embellishment for some simple pearls, added some gorgeous ribbon, and finally inked up my Sweet Treats stamp set. I think this little frame could become a new favorite. I love those swirly vines in the background! I popped up the center oval, stained the edges with my tea dye stains, and added some glitter to mute the stain even more.

Thanks so much for stopping by!

Supplies-
Stamps- Verve: Sweet Treats
Paper- Royal Velvet, Vintage Cream, Pacific Vineyard dp (PTI)
Ink- Elegant Eggplant
Accessories- ribbon, pearls, dimensionals, glitter, tea dye stains, Classy Label Die, Embossed Oval Die (Verve)