Amy's 1st Day Digi Layout

I've been feeling the "itch" to scrap again, so that's what I did today. This layout took all afternoon, because I was fiddling with it so much. It might have been worth it, because I like how it turned out even though, or maybe because, it's fairly simple.

Credits:

Template: Collection 4, Janet Phillips (Daily Digi Files #4-no longer available)

Digital Kit: It's Elementary by Dani Mogstad (SweetShoppeDesigns)

Font: CTMH Noodge

Not too much to report except that the girls let "Oma," across the street, cut their hair today. She's offered to do it for years, but they always said no. Just in the past few months they thought it might be a good idea and today it worked out all around. She cut quite a bit of what she called dead ends off (over 2 inches on both) and admonished me to not put their hair in ponytails as the bands are breaking their hair. Headbands are okay though. She said the bands are too harsh for their baby fine hair right now. I don't have photos of the haircuts by Oma, because they decided to surprise me and show me when they were done! It didn't bother me because Oma was going to do it last weekend, but our schedules didn't mesh, so I knew at some point soon she'd do it.

I also spend a fair amount of time working on organizing some of my digi stash. Not done yet, but made a little headway, which is better than nothing, right?

So, all in all, a decent day, even though weather-wise, it sure feels like fall right now. I'm wearing jeans and earlier today I had my knitted socks on!

Thanks so much for visiting! Hope you have a great start to your week

Thanks and Wish...

I got a package in the mail yesterday and said something about an order I'd placed. Um...I hadn't placed any orders and I didn't even recognize the company! I carefully opened the box, just in case I was going to have to return what I didn't order and when I peeked inside, I started doing the giddy girly dance. You know the one where you jump from foot to foot on your tippy toes and clap your hands in glee? Well, that was me. You see, this was from two very special young boys named Bjorn and Mathias, who have a very, very special grandma named Kathi. I have a birthday coming up on Monday and Kathi, I mean the boys, got me the Hero Arts Dots and Flowers background stamp! I've mentioned it in a previous post (I think I said I was too cheap to buy it) and have had serious stamp envy when Kathi's posted cards using her Dots and Flowers background stamp.

It was just the ticket to get me to go out into my craft room and break it in! Wanna see?

I used one of Kathi's cards as the starting off point for my card. Because I don't have that adorable owl, I took things in a different direction. I recently discovered a blog called Scrap a Little! Erin, of Inky Smiles, told me about these lovely cardstock roses she found and there was a tutorial on how to make them! I knew I had to try them out. And decided to make one for my card today. I used my Cricut and George cartridge to cut the hearts needed, only mine is the original Cricut and it doesn't cut all the same sizes. So I had to adjust a smidge with the sizes I have available. But it was easy peasy to put the rose together. When I finished though, I thought the rose was WAY too big to fit the card well, so I took off the largest hearts layer. I think it still looks nice and the size works better. I don't know if you can see it well, but I sprayed some Glimmer Mist (Iridescent Gold) on the rose as well. Oh and you'll have to look closely, but I added a dot with my Desert Sand marker, then I went over it with a Sakura glitter pen. I used the same pen to draw lines on the Colonial White piece.

Supplies:

Stamps: Dots and Flowers (Hero Arts), For Every Occasion (CTMH)

Ink: Desert Sand ink pad and marker (CTMH)

Cardstock: Bamboo, Desert Sand, Colonial White, Topiary

Accessories: Sakura Clear Star glitter pen, glittered brad (Hobby Lobby), Martha Stewart punch, Glimmer Mist

I then got to work making another card. This one was inspired this one created by Sarah of Sarah's Paper Tray. I came across some glittery clear embossing powder by Stampendous and decided to try it and see how it would look. I like it, although it's hard to photograph. LOL I've long admired the cards I've seen where the dandilion fluff image is used. Earlier this summer or maybe late spring, I found a clear stamp set called Fine and Dandy (by Autumn Leaves) at Michaels (the concept store in Brighton) and thought it would work great.

I like how this one came out, too. I guess I am in a glittery mood today as I used the same Sakura glitter pen on this card (on the scalloped piece and in the focal image dandilion). A month or so ago, I discovered Michaels was carrying those teeny tiny mini brads and I picked up a couple of packages. It's the Recollections brand. I finally broke open the package today. I used a ruler to try to get my holes all lined up straight, but it must have slipped a tad. Oh well. The wish sentiment seemed to fit just perfectly. I didn't want to use the whole swirl on the image, so I inked the stamp up and then scotch taped off the area of the image I didnt' want to use. Had I been thinking ahead, I might have stamped the entire image first, then the dandilions and you could see it peek through, but that would be too clever on my part. LOL

Hindsight is 20/20, right?

Supplies:

Stamps: Fine and Dandy (Autumn Leaves), Card Commentary (CTMH)

Cardstock: Kraft (Archivers), Bamboo, Topiary (CTMH)

Inks: Desert Sand, Topiary {used a Topiary marker to draw a line, too} (CTMH)

Accessories: itty bitty mini brads (Recollections at Michaels) Sakura glitter pen, EK Success border punch, Nestabilities circle and scallop circle dies, glittered clear embossing powder (Stampendous)

And that does it from me today. Thanks for your support and encouragement about the things I am working on these days. It sure means a lot! Thanks, too, for visiting!

Cross Stitched Butterflies...

Hello there!

Remember all those days over the summer when I said the girls and I went to the pool and I'd let them swim while I worked on my handwork? You may or may not have noticed that I never said just what it was I was working on and that was on purpose. It was a birthday gift and I didn't want the recipient to have an inkling of what I was up to. Sneaky, huh? I finished up the project, framed it and sent it on its merry way and then the waiting started. I was antsy to hear that it arrived safe and sound and it did!

You want to know one of the reasons I love the internet so much? Because I've "met" some pretty special people online that I never would have had the opportunity to meet in real life. Kathi is one of those very special people. We first "met" when we were both consultants for CTMH. The following is true, but I don't know if Kathi even remembers this...I hope it doesn't make her feel on the spot or anything, but I had posted something on the consultant message boards and I think I had said I wasn't sure if I could share where I got the information from as it was from a book. I think I had taken a picture of the book and posted it or something like that. Anyway, Kathi responded with what I've come to know as her wonderful wisdom and pretty much told me about copyrights and such(a very strong passion of hers and she lets you know not to violate them). I remember sort of feeling put in my place by her response, but not in a bad way. It just made me much more conscious of copyrights and that is a good thing. But I didn't think she liked me much at that time...I don't know why, maybe I thought I should have known better at the time about copyrights. LOL I ended up quitting CTMH and she ended up starting a blog. I'd check it from time to time (when I could remember she had one, this was way before I discovered Google Reader) and over time I would be so enamored of her creations that I left comments and it was from there that we would email each other from time to time and our friendship blossomed. I'm truly grateful to Kathi for her wisdom, humor and immense talent in creating deceptively simple cards. She inspires me to want to do and be better. And because of this I wanted to do something extra special for her birthday. And here it is...for my friend Kathi. Thank you so much for your friendship.

I have met so many other wonderful friends online as well. And I appreciate and treasure each one.

I didn't mean to get all sappy, but I think it's important to let those you care about know you care about them. Have a wonderful day...thanks for your friendship and thanks for visiting!

Stepping Out...15 Minutes At A Time...

Happy Thursday to you! My friend, Kari, of Kari's Scrappin' Korner, will be so happy. She wrote on her blog that she was going to start walking today, the day her kids started school. She was motivated by Laurel of Laurel's Place because Laurel recently posted her fitness goals, a fabulous album she made and the blog address of her fitness blog. Well, Kari, today I walked "with" you! *Ü* I pulled on my walking shoes and enjoyed a brisk walk through our neighborhood. The weather was gorgeous and I really enjoyed it. The battery in my mp3 player is dead (gotta plug it in), so I just listened to the music of the birds and life in the neighborhood. I actually walked for 35 minutes and realized there are lots of streets in my neighborhood I could walk...some are fairly even and some are on somewhat steep hills. Makes me wish we didn't have snowy winters, but if I can, I'm going to try to walk every week day outside.

As I was walking, I was contemplating starting a new blog for journaling my not specifically crafty posts and ultimately decided against it for now. Mainly because I strongly doubt I'd keep up with it. LOL Plus, I'm trying to streamline things, not necessarily add another to do, to my list (which I'm going to start writing down instead of relying on my feeble memory) of things I want to do! So, forgive the forays into less than crafty topics, if they are not your cup of tea. But, in the end all these things will certainly work towards my Creative Bliss and so to me they would fit as subjects to write about.

I mentioned earlier that I was pretty much gonna try a no buy philosophy or at the most, a very extremely limited buy, in regards to crafty stuff. Gotta work on delinieating between the needs and wants. And I'm applying that to the household stuff, too. Tightening the old belt, as it were. To that end I've been picking up some interesting reads from the library. One book is called You CAN Afford to Stay At Home With Your Kids, and while it was written in the late 90s (so some financial figures are off a bit) the basic principals seem very sound. It made a lot of sense to me about things one can do to be able to live well on one income. I've also borrowed Frugal Living for Dummies, The Complete Tightwad Gazette and The MomsTown Guide To Getting It All. Well, true confession time, when I checked out that last book, I thought it looked familiar and I finally checked my bookshelf...Oops, I already bought that one! So the book went back to the library and I'm reading my own copy. LOL

Anyway, the gist of all this is I'm finally working on some internal stuff that I've been wanting to do in addition to getting the house cleaned up. Mom's starting to take a little bit better care of herself, so she can care for her family better.

Another thing I'm working on is Flylady. I've know about and have been subscribed to her emails for several years (I get them in digest form, not individually, so I get one or two emails a day at most). Frankly most of the time, I glanced at them and moved on to other things in my inbox. But, for the past few weeks I've been reading most of the digests again and gearing myself up for the whole You Can Do Anything for 15 Minutes philosophy.

Speaking of which, my 15 minutes for typing this up are done, so I need to close for now and get working on my household planner. I hope I won't bore you to tears by posting stuff like this (and links) from time to time, but in the end all of this stuff may help me get back out into my craft room. *wink, wink* without feeling any guilt that I'm neglecting something I need to be doing. Maybe it'll help you, in some small way, too.

Have an awesome day and thanks so much for taking the time to visit.

My First Pair of Socks...Completed!

Hello there! I hope you are doing well this fine Monday. I spent my morning finishing up washing those remaining dirty windows. Whew...tick that chore off the list for a while. LOL Of course, it's looking might stormy right now, so thank goodness I worked more on the inside of the windows and not so much on the sides facing outside, so it can rain and I won't feel like I am back at square one.

Our weekend was pretty quiet, or rather mine was, by choice. Steve and the girls headed out to our friend Dave's for lunch on Saturday, then I took them to the pool when they got back. On Sunday they decided to head back to the foothills and take another hike at another State Park. I did opt out of this day trip, so I could have a quiet day doing something I wanted, and that was to work on my socks. It was nice and relaxing. And I finished them up early last evening! Yay, me! Wanna see?

Of course, I can see all my mistakes and areas where they could look better, but those don't negate how good it feels to have accomplished making my own pair of socks. It's not near as hard as I thought it would be and I can see where the appeal in making them is. They don't take too awfully long and they look kinda cute. In fact, both Jessica and Amy have requested a pair! *Ü*
And this is a somewhat strategic shot to show you how they look on my feet. This way you can't see the laddering effect I haven't been able to get out of my stitching. Laddering is what happens when you don't pull your yarn quite tight enough when you are changing needles. I pulled so tight I thought I'd break the yarn and I still got ladders, so I guess I need to practice more to get it to look right. Still and all, I pretty pleased that they fit, look neat and are comfortable!

Thanks for stopping by! I hope you have a great start to your week.

First Few Days...Done!

Hi There!

I hope this finds you well and ready to enjoy a lovely late summer weekend. Our weather is supposed to be warm (hot?) and dry. A good weekend to be out and about. Both girls made it through their first few days of school and their enthusiasm and spirits are still very high. Jessica told me there's a new girl in her class from Afghanistan! Her teacher is still really, really nice and she comes out of class with a bright smile on her face. Amy adores, I mean, adores her teacher! It's so nice to see my girls excited about school (kind of like I was when I was their age). Amy's teacher had them sitting on top of their desks while they were doing a social studies lesson on the continents (I think). Anyway, they were "flying" from continent to continent during the lesson. Way to make it fun and interesting, huh? Amy was in awe that the teacher let them sit on TOP of their desks! LOL I heard Amy's friend, Hattie, tell her mom...I just LOVE Mrs. H...I think Amy feels the same way.

I thought maybe I'd get out into my craft room during the week, and obviously, that has not been the case. And I'm not sure just when I'll get back out there. Someday, soon, I hope. Here's the deal, just to give you a heads up. Several weeks ago, Steve bought a new version of Quicken. He's been inputting all our financial data into it. He wanted to show me the facts and figures and said, now that the girls are in going to be in school full time, have you thought about going back to work? The answer to that is no. And I felt a little mad that he wanted me to think about it. But I couldn't ignore that my purchases weren't helping our situation(it's not bad by any means, but the economy has done a number on our investments, like it has so many others). So, knowing that it's very important to me to be able to stay at home, I've been extremely conscious of my spending since then. I'm making use of free resources where I can and the library has proven to be a good thing. It's an older library and for a long time didn't have books I wanted to check out, but that's changed somewhat, or I'm more open to what they have to offer, LOL. Plus they are building a brand new building up the road that I think is supposed to be bigger. ANYWAY...I've been checking out books on cutting costs, living frugally, being thrifty, whatever you want to call it. And, some crafty books, too. (*wink*) If I'm brutally honest, there isn't a thing I really need in terms of crafty supplies. Sure, there are things I think I want, but I've got enough supplies here to last me a long, long time. And I've made a vow to myself to USE it! LOL So, when I get back out to my craft room, that's what I'll be doing. Stretching my brain and creativity to use what I've got. That should definitely help the budget(and give the old brain a workout).

As an off-shoot of that whole way of thinking...one of the things I've been really looking forward to now that the girls are in school full time is finally getting to work on getting better organized around the house. You know...without distractions! And I'm hoping doing these things will help me "earn my keep" around here. Maybe if I work on not spending needlessly AND taking better care around the house, I'll be able to be at home for a while longer yet. I don't think I'll be bored, but if I am, once I get done what I want to around here, then I'm sure I'll be much more open to maybe looking into some part time work.

So, with that in mind, I've gotten started on some of the things I've neglected for too long around here. Yesterday's project was finishing up washing the screens on the windows and getting the windows washed. Which entails much more than that implies. Our windows have storm windows in front of the actual window, so it's like I have two sets of windows to wash, plus all the debris that accumulates on the sills. And because it's time-consuming...I've not done it in a long time, making it take that much longer to get done now. I'm proud to say that I've done ALL the screens and gotten three more rooms of windows done, as of yesterday. I still have two more rooms to do and then this project will be done for a while. With plans to do it more regularly, so it doesn't get this bad again. LOL

BUT, if you've gotten this far, it's not all work and no play for me. I HAVE been working on crafty stuff...just not making cards. I've finally been working on making a pair of socks for me! Remember I started a sock earlier this summer? Well, in my recent library visits, I came across a book about knitting a pair of socks at the same time! Not just one, but both, so when I'm done with the project, I'll have a pair completed instead of just one and then having to start all over again for the second (which makes one want to sigh...I have to do this all over again??). I hear they call this Second Sock Syndrome, meaning a lot of times only one sock ever gets made. LOL

I found two circular needles similar to the length recommended in the book (a smidge longer than called for, but it still works) in my mom's stash of knitting needles that I found several months ago. They are all plastic, which I wasn't used to at all, but they are working out fine. And here's where I am with the project as of yesterday...

I've actually done the heel part (the part that intimidated me the most about making socks) and it wasn't too bad at all! Last night I finished the sole and am now working on the foot part, then it'll be the toe and I'm all done! Because I have rather "muscular" calves, thanks to my mom and grandmother (I could never wear tall boots comfortably because my calves are kinda large, couldn't zip them up without catching some skin-ouch-or squishing them so tight the boot never fit right) I am making these shorter socks than the pattern calls for. I figured I'd never get the sock over my calf and I don't want to do the work and not be able to wear them. This is just a basic sock, no fancy stitches or designs. I wanted to figure out how to do it first before trying to get all fancy. LOL

And if you got this far, bless you! I hope I didn't bore you to tears. I just wanted to give you a heads up as to what I've been up to and thinking about lately. I'm not upset or anything about the changes...I'm thinking of it as an interesting challenge and something kind of, sort of, fun to see how well I can do at cutting costs.

I hope you have a terrific weekend! The girls are itching to swim again and now that the weather is supposed to warm up...I think that's what we'll do.

Back to School Time!

Okay, so I'm a day late...school actually started yesterday. But man, I took advantage of the kid free time to delve into some deep cleaning and before I knew it, it was time to pick the girls up! LOL Then the adreneline rush from feeling good about how clean my entry way is wore off and I was pooped.

Both girls were so excited to get back to school that they were awake before their normal wake up time. The had gotten dressed, ate breakfast, made lunch, and brushed their teeth well before it was time to leave. They were definitely chomping at the bit. LOL (Geez, didn't they have a fun summer with their old mom?)

Ahhhhhh...that they would retain this enthusiasm and excitement for school throughout their academic career.

Both girls were just as excited about school at the end of the day. Jessica said her 1st grade teacher is really nice and Amy proclaimed third grade to be awesome.

Both girls got up early again this morning, yay! After I dropped them off, I had a teeth cleaning appointment to keep, then I got back to cleaning after I got home. The bathrooms are sparkly today. *Ü*

I hope you are having a positive week full of enthusiasm as well. Thanks for stopping by!