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!