YAY meee!!! HAHA

Well, I think that's a record... and not in a good way!!! LOL My poor neglected blog. I hadn't posted anything in over 4 months, but when I received a message on Facebook the other day, it was totally the kick in the butt I needed. I'll get to that in a minute. I have been so preoccupied with my daughter for these past few months (you can read more about that on the last SEVERAL posts that I just put up) that I really hadn't even THOUGHT about my blog. I have also kind of shifted gears and been posting videos on YouTube. There's more interaction with people and I'm more of a "talker" than a writer anyhow. I'm enjoying that a lot!!! In case you want to check me out there, my channel is 77ButterflyLuv. Hope to hear from you! :) Also, if you have a channel, please let me know where to find you! So about that message I received... It was from the blog coordinator of Fancy Pants Designs telling me that one of the Pocket Chicks wanted to use one of MYYY cards for her inspiration and they needed my consent for it to be featured on their blog. How freakin' exciting is that?!?! I won't lie, I was bouncing up and down on the couch. LOL I have only ever submitted one card ever for publication which {obviously} didn't get picked up and while I realize this is not the same thing, it is super exciting to me. Sometimes you want a little reassurance that your "work" is good and I tend to be very critical of my stuff so it was really nice to hear that someone on their DT "LOVES" my card that I posted on their FB wall several months ago. I hadn't thought anything of it since so to get this message was a total SHOCK! And, BONUS that they're sending me some free goodies. Whoot! Looking forward to see what this designer (not sure who it is) comes up with tomorrow! I haven't been crafting TOO much, but I did make a couple of cards the other day and wanted to share. I'm super happy with how they both came out. For the 1st one, I used DCWV's Snapshot Stack. I also used a couple of the Studio Calico wood veneer pieces.

They're the perfect pair, aren't they? :) (inside)

For this card, I used a piece of chevron paper and some tiny little polaroid die cuts that I made using a Quickutz die I recently bought. I used more of the Studio Calico wood veneer people, making these singles meet and become a couple! hehe I used word and letter stickers to write "You & Me... let's see what developes." I just thought that was the cutest saying and YES, I thought of it myself. I'm so clever sometimes. :P

I just kept it simple and used some washi tape on the inside.

I will try to be better about keeping my blog updated. Thanks for visiting!

She IS my Sunshine!!!

With all my daughter's health issues over the past few months, I have had my fair share of emotions. It was SO hard to see her hurting and being unable to help her. It was heartbreaking to hold her down while they put in her IV's and it was even worse to have to hold her while they sedated her and feel her little body go limp. I'm sorry to be so graphic, but my poor baby girl has really been through a lot for being only 21 months old. When you're in that situation, as much as you TRY not to, you start thinking the worst. I cannot imagine my life without my daughter, she's my dream come true... and my absolute SUNSHINE!!! I had whipped this left page together in no time, but really wanted to do a second page with the lyrics to the song I often sung to her in the hospital. I used the Dear Lizzy Neopolitan collection for most of this layout with a few other embellishments. The stamp set I used is the Stepping Stone alphabet from Studio Calico and of course my precious Thickers!!! I am so pleased with how it turned out. Sorry about the poor pictures. I need to figure out a better way to shoot 12x12 layouts. Any tips are appreciated!!!

...and Through the Woods

I had picked up some stamp sets online from My Cute Stamps and ended up using the set Picnic with Little Red for this card. I used the Hero Arts tree background stamp and cut out the individual trees to place over the cloud background and ground that I hand cut. I paper pieced Little Red using red velvet paper for her jacket and hood. I also used that paper for the napkin inside the basket and then colored every other square with a white pen to make it checkered. I used Copics to color her face and applied a little make-up on her. I'm still new at Copics, but I'm getting better! This card was really fun to make, I was giddy when it was all done. I just think it turned out ADORABLE!!!

Scrap weekend at my place!

Back in March, I had a scrap weekend at my house. My mom was nice enough to take my little ones and I ended up with 6 girls (including myself) for the weekend. I didn't get a whole lot done, but I had FUN and that's all that ever really matters to me. I wish we could do this more often!!! I bought 6 5-6 foot tables so everyone would have their own space and then everyone pitched in towards that cost and food. $40 for the weekend I thought was a SWEET deal, don't you? :) These were the girls one night.

I used some Glitz papers on this card, some beautiful flowers from I Am Roses that I received in a RAK and an older metal embellishment from American Crafts.

I can't believe I actually SCRAPPED something!!! I've been doing cards over scrapbooking for a long time now and I really missed it. I used Echo Park papers for this layout with some matching stickers. Super easy, but CUTE! These were my kids last Spring/Summer. I'm WAY behind... even further than that. By years! LOL

I used MFT's - PI and the Pinwheel for this card. I paper pieced her clothes and made the pinwheel 3 dimensional by cutting a 3/4 inch square and folding the pieces inward. I used a little gem for the center. Easy enough! :)

And, MFT's - Blowing Bubbles for this one! I paper pieced her clothes (as usual! HA) and used glossy accents on the bubbles to make them look more bubble-ish. LOL I put some washi tape on a piece of paper then die cut the clouds.

Valentine's Day is NOT in May! LOL

Yes, I'm well aware that Valentine's Day falls in February and I did in fact make these somewhere around then. ;) Things have been a little hectic here as my daughter got an infection back in January and has been battling it, in and out of the hospital, since. If you see my last post prior to this one, you'll see that she had gotten a fever and I knew something was wrong, but I had no idea it would end up being the drama that it became. She ended up having surgery, stayed nearly 3 weeks in total at the hospital and came home with a PICC line. She's doing much better now and seems to on her way to a full recovery. Fingers crossed!!! Let's show some LOVE for my baby girl. <3 I used some of the Crate Paper Paper Heart collection on this card and MFT's Pure Innocence - Love You with all my Heart stamp set.

I know these aren't traditional Valentine colors, but I have been LOVING yellow for a while now and I loved how this card came out. I used the Penny Black Love Song stamp, some GORGEOUS flowers from I Am Roses and Prima and of course some twine from The Twinery!!!

Happy 80th Birthday, Nana!!!

HAPPY NEW YEAR, everyone!!! Hope you all had a fun, safe night and rang in the New Year with the people you love. It was a pretty quiet night here, but it usually is for us. My hubby worked, but was home around 7 and my parents came over and brought Chinese food which has pretty much been our New Years tradition for as long as I can remember. The kids stayed up late, we played some games and hung out. Then we watched the ball drop, listened to LMFAO (LOVE that darn song and wish I could do the shuffle! LOL) and went to bed. My poor baby girl had a rough night sleep and therefore, so did the rest of us. I was up with her from about 2-5am when she finally decided to fall back to sleep in bed with us. :/

Today we actually went to my grandmother's 80th birthday celebration. My aunts (and my dad) rented a room and had a big party for her. All of my aunts, uncles and cousins were there. Even though we just had our family Christmas party, it was nice to get together again. Avery was not quite right all day, I think she must be cutting a tooth and that must be what kept her up all night. Even when we got home, she cried for an hour, didn't want to eat (totally not like her) or anything. I feel so bad because there's nothing I can do for her. I gave her some Motrin because she's groaning like she's in some type of pain, gave her a bottle which thankfully she took because I don't want her dehydrated and put her up to bed early. I'm hoping she sleeps better tonight. Fingers crossed for us please!!!

I just wanted to share the couple of birthday cards I made for my grandmother. My dad asked me to make her one for him with bees on it since her name is Honey. Luckily I had this cute bee stamp!!! I used paper from the Basic Grey Urban Prairie collection and hand cut the honeycomb(esque! LOL) shape. The bees are popped up off the card and I added some Stickles to their wings. I adhered some buttons to the edge, tied some twine through one of them and added my favorite rose trim to the bottom.



Nana also likes tea/tea pots. I used some of the same papers for this card and a bunch of Prima flowers. I love the doily one especially. It's very Nana-ish!!! HAHA The stacked tea cup stamp is from a Flourishes set I got quite a while back. I stamped it several times on the different colored papers and paper pieced them back together on the patterned paper. Kind of reverse paper piecing I guess. :P Lastly, I had some tea pot brads so I used one as the center to one of the flowers and it was the perfect finishing touch.



Wishing everyone a Happy New Year and the very best for 2012!!! {{{Hugs}}}

In the Meadow - WMC80

Well, I had a long, tiring day home with the kids. I swear, some days they just run me ragged and I feel so beat down. I know that may sound horrible, but it's the truth. I love my kids OF COURSE, but I'm feeling very overwhelmed lately and I'm not sure how to get out of this funk. Ever been there? Any advice? I really miss stamping (not that I stamped anything on the card I made!!! LOL) and crafting in general. When I went upstairs earlier, I had my 3 and a 1/2 year old sitting on a chair next to me, but he was more like standing and looking over my shoulder/bumping me in the elbow. While he was being cute and complementary "Ohhh, that looks good", "Yeah, I like that!", etc., it was still highly annoying. Also, my 17 month old daughter was standing on a chair next to him, pulling everything out of my craft tote. Then she crawled under my table and proceeded to whine and try climbing up my legs until I picked her up. Needless to say, I couldn't get much done!!!

There are 3 challenges going on right now that I want to participate in. The first one is for my friend Jenny over at Wee Memories (Challenge #80) and since this one had to be submitted by tomorrow, I had to get to this one first. See, I have priorities. :P This week "anything goes" and this is what I came up with. I have had this Cosmo Cricket paper for a while and love the non-traditional colors. The card itself is 5x7 which I've actually never made before. I used the teal with the snowflakes for the top portion of my card for the sky and the pink swirly one for the bottom representing the meadow. I adhered a tall chipboard snowman from the same line and then used letter stickers to write "In the meadow we can build a snowman". I ended up pulling off the "o" in meadow and replacing it with a snowflake charm and added some twine to string it up... or down... not quite sure what you'd call it. HAHA Lastly, I added some "stitching" with a couple of Gelly Roll pens and a ruler. In my opinion, this totally ruined my card. When I moved the ruler, the ink smudged. I am such a perfectionist that this really bothers me!!! I know, I know. I'm being hard on myself. Maybe it's just my mood, but I am trying to get out if it. I promise!!! :)

JOY! haha

Just another couple of cards before it's "too late". :)

I love pink and red together for Christmas. It's kind of traditional meets non and it looks pretty and girly. I embossed the word Joy from a CTMH stamp set I've had for a while. I added some rose trim (LOVE this stuff!!!), pom pom ribbon and adhered the acrylic snowflake with a glittery brad.



Again kind of non-traditional Christmas colors with the green and purple/pinks, but FUN! I used my Nesties to cut the shape for my sentiment then stamped a faint background and embossed the work Jingle from that same CTMH stamp set as mentioned above. I added some velvet holly leaves, a few pearls for the berries and strung a jingle bell from the word itself.

I love snowmen!!!

Who doesn't love a cute little snowman? I know I do!!! I just don't necessarily like going out in the cold and snow to build one. :P

This first card was super simple. I used a sweet Christmas tree background paper, added a Cosmo Cricket (I believe) chipboard snowman, a felt snowflake and the "Merriment" sticker.



I found this set of Christmas screens to use with Glimmer Mist at Michael's. I honestly only had one or two colors of mist at home so I bought a red one at the retreat. I misted around the Snowman stencil. Then when he was dry, I added black pom poms for his buttons and a felt button to his hat.



For this card, I used some Nestabilities to cut the shape out. Then I embossed the snowman from one of Unity's kits and added a few black brads. I added some white flower trim to the bottom and tied some pretty red ribbon with pink trim in a bow and adhered to the top corner. The inside says "Snowbody like you". :)

Beauty of Christmas

Just sharing a few more cards I made at that retreat. I'll probably have a couple more posts before the weekend arrives. SHOCKER! haha

I've had some SEI velvet paper for quite some time and decided to try embossing on it to see how it came out. It might be hard to see in the picture because it really has a subtle effect, but it's a cardinal sitting on a branch. I went with a polka dot background paper and added the word JOY in Thickers... which I have about 50 packs of. Can't have enough options, right? :)



I LOVE this pretty cream background paper with the blue glitter. Since I liked the effect of embossing on the velvet paper, I did that again with a snowflake background. I saw a pack of blue Prima wintery embellishments at the little store they had there and wanted to use the butterfly so I had to buy those. Who's surprised? LOL I also knew I had a stamp at home that said "A Snowflake is Winter's Butterfly" which would've been perfect for what I had in mind, but of course I didn't pack that with me. :P You know how it is when you know EXACTLY what you want?! Grrr! I ended up thumbing through what I did have with me and found this other sentiment that worked instead.



I used the same background paper for this card and simply embossed the Winter Wonderland sentiment then added the bird from that same Prima set. SIMPLE, but so elegant. I wish it was going to be a Winter Wonderland this year, but it looks like we won't be having a White Christmas this year. Awww!!! I'm sure they'll be plenty of snow in the coming months so I'll try not to complain!

6 Days 'til Christmas? Oh {rein}deer! LOL

I don't know why, but time keeps going by faster and faster! People always said that's what happened when you got "older" and I think that must be what's happening. It seems the whole year just flew by. Each month, I'd say "I can't believe it's already September... November... December..." and then just as quickly, the month's half over. Now we're finding our way into the new year and it's just crazy to me!!!

I went to a scrapbooking retreat mid-November and said I'd be posting pictures of the cards I made throughout the month and here we are, 12/19 and no Christmas cards posted. And actually, no cards mailed either. What a slacker!!! Honestly, I haven't wrapped a gift yet and am not much in the holiday spirit. I think it's partially the lack of snow here in NH and also the fact that I can't believe it's December and Christmas is in less than a week!!! Guess I better believe it though because it's coming whether I'm ready or not!!!

When we went to the retreat, we went over to Michael's before checking in. I saw this little reindeer stamp and it was 50% off. I kept putting it down and picking it back up, but I just couldn't resist it and I'm glad I couldn't 'cause she's just the cutest!!! I also picked up some little Santa hats which fit perfectly on her head and thought that would be perfect.



It's kind of hard to tell in the first picture, but I stamped the image twice and popped it up off the card. Oh and I added a tiny felt pom pom for her nose. :)



For this card, I used a Cuttlebug embossing folder for the background. I sponged some white pigment ink over the snowflakes and added a few pearls. Super simple, but love the look!

End of November

Well, it's the last day of November which was a great month for me! It started with trick-or-treating with my little ones since we had that freak snow storm before the actual holiday and postponed it a week. You can see a picture of my little cuties in my last post!

Mid-month I went to a scrapbooking retreat with one of my best friends. We had a great time and I'll be posting pictures of my layouts and cards throughout the next month. In the meantime, this is us!!!



And this is one of our favorite parts... BACON!!! LOL



The following week was Thanksgiving! This is a picture of me and my mom! <3



This is my cute little family... me, my hubby and 3 children!!!



Lastly, MY BIRTHDAY was yesterday. This is me. 34 years young!!! Just goofin' off at Walmart. LOL



And this is me with my other best friend who came out to dinner with us to celebrate my birthday!



I hope you all enjoyed November as well and had lots to be thankful for on Thanksgiving and this year in general. I can't believe tomorrow is the start of December. This year has flown by!!!

UPDATE!!! When I checked my e-mail this morning, I had an e-mail that I was the winner of a giveaway on the Scrapbook Steals website. I won two stamp sets from Sweet Stamp Shop. I had to add this news to my November post since the e-mail was dated 11/30. Told you it was a great month for me!!! ;)

Halloween... a tad late!

Hey! It's me... LATE as usual. LOL But my mom always said "Better late, than never", right? :P We had a freak snowstorm on October 29th that made us lose power for 3 1/2 days and postponed our Halloween here in NH. I took this picture early on in the storm, but I loved how the crisp white snow looked against the bright orange pumpkins!!!



They cancelled trick-or-treating on the actual holiday, 10/31. Then we somehow ended up missing the rescheduled date for our own town so we headed over to a friends' neighborhood on Sunday, 11/6 to bring the kids out. Here are my babies, Buzz Lightyear and my little Piglet.



I had actually made some Halloween cards BEFORE Halloween, but never posted them. Imagine that!!! HAHA This first one is my FAVE, but I did end up tweaking it a little and forgot to take a picture before I mailed it off to my cousin Lisa, who I always used to watch The Wizard of Oz with when we were kids. All I did was switch one of the witches from another card and used the one I had colored green instead. Can you believe that I actually forgot to write inside the card when I sent to her? I was so mad when she left me a message about it on Facebook. What an airhead!!! In fairness, I *was* without power and at a friends' writing out the cards. I thought I'd double checked them all, but apparently I missed one. LOL I punched out the butterflies on black paper and used the negative space to add a pop of color with some twine. I used mandarin and lilac from The Twinery. It was kind of a pain to do, but I love the effect. The "Little Witch" stamp is one of MFT's Pure Innocence stamps. I was so upset when my whole stamp set went missing after making a few cards with it. Low and behold, I found it stuck to a bunch of my Nestabilities at a scrapbooking retreat I went to last weekend. I think I screamed in joy! LOL I really thought my daughter had swiped it, threw it in the garbage and it was gone for good. What a relief!!! I also found 3 of my Christmas Unity sets that went missing YEARS ago while packing for my retreat. Whoot!!! Anyways! I finished the card with a flower and one of the punched out butterflies and added the orange pearls down the center. I just LOVE how it came out!!!



This is the card I swapped the green witch out from. It looked MUCH better with the two little white girls. ;)

For my friend, Melissa:



For my friend, Melanie:



For my mom:

The Play Date Cafe - Challenge #107 (PDCC107)

Hello, friends! I have been slacking in the world of blogging for the past couple of weeks. I haven't done any hops (wahhh! LOL) and haven't created much either. I have been trying to get up into my space and organize a bit and I also have something else I'm working on that is taking up some of my "free" time. There are so many challenge sites out there that I decided I need to participate more. With that being said, The Play Date Cafe has their Color Splash challenge this week. The colors were black, white and a splash of ORANGE! I hardly ever use orange (besides for Halloween) so this was a FUN one! I had bought the two new spiral blossom Nestabilities and had been wanting to try them out so I just had to put a big flower on this card. I used the butterfly film stamp from the CTMH stamp set, Take a Picture and the Dream Big sentiment which is from one of Unity's Itty Bitty stamp sets. LOVE that one, one of my faves for sure!!! In addition, you know I had to add an extra butterfly to my creation... with a splash of orange bling! ;)

Just a side note, the link to the CTMH stamp set is my friend Peggy's site who currently sells Close to My Heart products. If you're interested in any items and don't have a Consultant, I know she'd appreciate your business. She's super sweet and a good friend. Hiii, Peggers!!! hehe

Swimming for Katie

A few weeks ago, I {heart} Papers released some very special stamps trying to raise money for a fellow stamping friend, Katie Renz, who was diagnosed with stage 4 gastric cancer and is battling this nasty disease. Katie used to sell CTMH a while back while I was also selling it so I'd known her (or at least her name) for a while. Katie has 3 small boys and her story is truly heartbreaking!!! You can read her story on her blog. All proceeds from the sale of these stamps go directly to Katie and her family so how could you NOT buy it? I know I couldn't resist! Another stamping friend, Ashley Nguyen Newell, decided to have a giveaway through her own blog so the card I made is being entered for that and also to send to Katie directly. Jenny Suchin (love her!!!) was also kind enough to collect donations for flowers to send to Katie and I was happy to pitch in. It's really nice to know that people you've never even met truly care and will do what they can even from afar. I've been a part of some great and generous things lately and it makes me so very happy. You never know what you can do to brighten someone's day and I sure hope we've done that for Katie, even for just a moment. {{{Hugs}}}

It's *almost* Halloween!

I hope everyone's enjoying my favorite season... FALL!!! It seems the leaves just barely start changing and then it's over!!! I actually heard a rumor that NH might actually see snowflakes later this week. I'm not quite ready for THAT yet!

My hubby and I actually got to go to a Halloween party this past weekend. Thanks again to mom for watching the little ones. I was out at Walmart with the kids and tried on this mask, but Andrew didn't approve! LOL



We ended up dressing up as pirates which we did about 5 or 6 years ago. I couldn't think of anything clever and I didn't want to spend a lot of money to wear something once. As it turns out, we didn't take any pictures so it worked out ok! HAHA Now I'm onto my NEXT costume dilemma. My 3 year old wanted to be Buzz Lightyear and I had friend who kindly lent me the costume, but now he's changed his mind and INSISTS {persistently} that he is being the Big Bad Wolf. I have bid (and LOST) two auctions on ebay and his school party is the day after tomorrow. I've convinced him to be Buzz for his class party and will hopefully pull off a small miracle and get the wolf costume by Monday. I'm just not sure HOW I'm gonna make that happen. Cross your fingers for me!!!

So I made these cards a few weeks ago, but figured I'd wait until closer to Halloween to post them. Hope you like 'em!!!



For this card I used some Halloween papers by American Crafts. I used the stars for the "sky", the pumpkins for the "ground" and stamped the fence in grey along the border to further separate them. I LOVE this tree from the CTMH set which I cannot think of the name of right now. :P I'll have to insert that later. LOL Those little ghosts are by Making Memories and I love those little guys.



I was really pleased with how this one came out for it being so "simple" to make. I embossed some kraft cardstock with an embossing folder. The brushed some black chalk over the embossed image, colored the skeletons in with a with a white gel pen, the crowns with a dark purple gelly roll pen and stamped the sentiment in the middle. DONE! :)

I hope everyone has a HAPPY HALLOWEEN and you get way more TREATS than tricks!!! Though I really need to lay off the treats. HAHAHA

Happy Anniversary to me!!! Ok and to my hubby, too! ;)

Me and my husband celebrated our 5 year wedding anniversary on the 14th. My mom came over to babysit for two nights so we could get away for a much needed mini vacation.

We started by getting TATTOOS!!!

We didn't get matching ones per se, but we did both get tattoos that represent the kids. I got 3 roses to cover up an older tattoo that I wasn't in love with anymore and I also got three BUTTERFLIES to represent my three children!!!

My hubby got our little ones' footprints and names.

After the tattoos, we went out to dinner and drove the 2+ hours to the Mountain View Grand Hotel in Whitefield, NH. We arrived late so it was dark, but we got to take a better look around the following day. Beautiful, huh?


Friday morning we went on a zipline canopy tour at Bretton Woods. That was such an AMAZING experience. I am afraid of heights, but it was so awesome, I can't even describe it.

We did 10 ziplines... YUP, I came across THAT! Wooo hooooo!!!



Two repels...



...and two suspension bridges!!!



There was also a rainbow out from the time we were getting on our gear for almost the whole time we were out there in the treetops. I have a "thing" for rainbows and one of the songs surrounding our wedding was "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" so it was really cool to see this on the day of our anniversary! :)



On the last day before we came home, we went on the Aerial Tram up Cannon Mountain. When we were living up "north" about 10 minutes from here, we never went so it was fun to finally do it.



It was pretty overcast and grey when we went, but still so amazing. On a clear day you can see into 3 states (NH, ME, VT) and Canada. How cool is that???



Happy Anniversary, Honey! {Not that he reads my blog! LOL} I LOVE YOU!!!