A Cause and a Challenge!

Yesterday I was fortunate to NOT get called in to work so it gave me a lot of time in my scraproom.  I started by putting all my leftover supplies away that I had used recently.  Then, with a cleared desk there was nothing else to do but make it dirty again!!  LOL!

While blurfing around yesterday I ran across Lori Craig's post HERE, who referenced Taylor VanBruggen's post HERE about this card drive that is going on for a wonderful cause that is close to my heart.  Many of you know that I work with babies!  Well my official title is a Neonatal Nurse Practitioner.  What that means is that I am an advanced practice nurse who takes care of sick babies.  I know all too well about the struggles of parents as they deal with the loss of a baby.  Thankfully I don't work in the NICU right now, so I don't see as many losses as I used to, but you never forget the grief of a parent once you have seen it.

So when I heard that they were having a Dragonfly Card Drive to collect cards to give to bereaved parents who have suffered a loss of a pregnancy or a baby, I knew that I wanted to help out!  

I made three "girl" cards yesterday and will work on some "boy" ones today!  The cards are supposed to have a Dragonfly on them because that is their symbol of hope for the parents who have suffered a loss.

I took the opportunity to continue using more SCS sketches as I continue on in my journey to use ALL the sketches from the Master List at SCS!  I really love sketch challenges and it is great to have a card idea already laid out so all I have to do is play around with the elements!  :-)

I made two of the same card that came from Sketch number SC11...

Here are the cards following that sketch...

The Dragonflies are from a border stamp by Katie & Co.  The Sentiment and Footprints stamp are from PaperTrey Ink's With Sympathy: Loss of Child set.  The DP is from MM and is actually scraps from a previous project that I thought looked sweet and soft for a baby.  The border punch is called Loops from MS.

To make the footprints become the soft pink like that, I stamped them with my Versamark watermark  ink and then rubbed pink Inkadinkadoo chalk over the top of it.  It allows the image to be colored in a soft pastel, but still lets the words read through beautifully.  I also chalked the edges of the sentiment panel.

The next card I made uses SC06...

I designed this card so that the tag could be removed to show the baby's information on the back.  The Dragonfly and flower silhouettes are from Unity's May09 KOM.

This sentiment is from the same PTI set called With Sympathy: Loss of Child.  One confession I have to make is that the subtle stamping of the words and the silhouettes below the sentiment is NOT intentional.  I had the whole card done when I finally stamped the sentiment on this layer and of course I DROPPED my inky stamp right onto my project and it bounced twice.  It left a subtle stamping of the sentiment.  I wanted to cry because that was the last of the striped DP and it was otherwise ruined.  So instead of tossing the whole thing, I decided to [try and] make it looks like it was on PURPOSE!!  And above is the result of the finished product.  While not perfect, I think I was able to salvage it!

This is what the front of the tag looks like in full view showing off the two gorgeous Unity stamps!

And on the back of the tag I used this Amuse Baby Announcement tag so the parents could fill out the information about their baby and keep this tag as a keepsake and reminder.  Having been with many parents after a loss, I know that they truly enjoy the mementos they can have of their babies.  Where I work we always provide a picture (if they want one) of their baby all wrapped up and "resting" peacefully.  After many years in the field, it doesn't get easier and I end up crying right along with the saddened parents and family members.

I hope that many of you will be inspired to participate in this card drive.  If you are interested, please check out Taylor's post about it HERE.

Now how about a quick attempt at comicsl relief after the deep topic we discussed above?

On the 20th of each month the Dirty Dozen Girls and DD Alumni are challenged to make a card.  This month our hostess was none other than Jeanne Streiff  who gave us a challenge called Funny Thing is... We were to make a card using our sense of humor and we were restricted from using any sparkles, glitter or the like!

Again I used a SCS sketch!  This time SC23...

And here is my funny card...

The funny thing is really all contained within the sentiment that comes from this SU set called Sassy Suzie.  I am in love with the red and yellow color combos that I keep seeing around the galleries and so I decided to do a card using those colors predominantly.  This K & Co. paper was just the perfect find.  I colored in my image using Copics.  And added a dollar spot ribbon that I found at Target.  The brads come from BG.

Can you read the sentiment from this closeup?  It's a real hoot!!  (Notice I didn't say Hooters!! LOL!!)  The inside of the card says Happy Birthday!! It was a fun challenge that was relaxing to work on because I got to color!!  :-)

Sorry for the long post, but I wanted to get you guys all caught up with my creations.  I hope to work on the boy Dragonfly cards today!

Have a great weekend and may your bucket be overflowing with family time and fun while making happy memories to scrapbook later!

Circle of Friends

Hello there my blog friends! I hope you are having a great Tuesday!  I have a project to share with you today that was one of the projects I submitted for my first Dirty Dozen/Fan Club Gallery.  Now that three months have passed, we have permission to share them on our personal blogs too.

In just a couple of days I will be on my way to CHA and so I decided throughout the next week, since I won't have something new to share with you every day, that it would be the perfect time to share the projects from my DD Gallery back in October.  I am working on getting all my blog posts pre-scheduled so that they will still appear every day while I am away.  But,  I also hope to add some extra posts during the week that will share with you some highlights from CHA!  I am hoping that my limited technology skills won't hinder that goal!

Anyway let's talk about our friends... Do you have a Circle of Friends?

Have you thought about how we have many different types of friends in our lives?  I feel so blessed with many friends and I am very thankful to have them all!  Some of my friends, like you special blog friends, I haven't even met before.  I am excited though, because while I am at CHA, I hope to meet some of you. :-)

Other friends we have while we are at work.  We may not socialize with them while away from the office, but while at work you know you can count on them to go on break with you, have lunch with you or just share in camaraderie with you at work.  Still other friends are the lifelong types that we have built and nurtured for years.  We may not get to see these friends as often as we like, but we know that the friendship is rekindled and right where we left it with just a phone call or a visit.

Then there are those friends in our lives that are important to us on a day to day or week to week basis. You know the kind, they are the ones that are there through thick and thin and stand by you during all of life's tribulations!  I made a picture to hang up in my scraproom that reminds me of these special friends that grace my life. And I thank God for all of them!

Here is my Circle Friends...

From left to right and top to bottom, here are my friends that play a special role in my life!  Melissa, my sister Michelle, my BFF Tiffani, my mom Sharon, Michelle, Lori and Lisa.  Each of these ladies has been strategically placed in my life to provide for me what I needed at a special time in my life and I couldn't have made it without them.  I am so thankful for each one of the these women and feel blessed and honored to call them my friends.

I can see this picture from where I sit in my craft room on my computer and it is a wonderful reminder of the love I have for these ladies. Now let me tell you how I made this picture frame...

The inspiration piece for this project came from the inspiration poster we were given for the Gallery's theme for October called "Treats All Around."  This piece focuses on the circle grid that can be found HERE. I chose colors that went with the decor of my room and covered the background and chipboard grid with the beautifully coordinating Fleur De Lis patterns.  And if you are going to use these types of patterns on your papers, then it only makes sense to go to Damask Designs from Paper Trey Ink. to find coordinating stamped images.  That is exactly what I did and added a row of damask designs to the bottom of the picture where I printed and matted the title.  In alternating grids I added Prima flowers decorated with tiny pearls in the middle.  I think it came out as beautifully as each of these women represented here are on both the inside and the outside!  I hope you like it too!

Here is a list of the supplies I used...

Stamps: PaperTrey Ink: Damask Designs

Paper: DP: Little Yellow Bicycle, Black CS: Recollections

Ink: Amuse: Black; Computer printed Title

Accessories: Chipboard Grid: Fancy Pants; Flowers: Prima; Pearl Accents: Studio 18; Ribbon: Dollar Store;

Techniques: Power Point Word Art (title)

I will be back tomorrow with a new design to share with you from Whimsie Doodles!  Have you remembered the coupon code I gave you that gets you 20% off your total order?  Well head on over there and use it now! All the new releases are there, plus she snuck in some extra new Valentine images that you will definitely want to add to your collection! 

Here is the link to the store

Enter the coupon code KELLY20 for your discount!

Have a wonderful Tuesday and may your bucket overflow with a wonderful bunch of ladies that you can call your friends!

It's Friday with Flair (Unity Style!!)

I feel like I have a hangover from all the hoopla of being announced as one of the new Dirty Girls at SCS yesterday! It has been a crazy ride already but I love it!! Now that the new Fan Club Gallery is all loaded up, I am hoping for things to settle a bit! I am looking forward to a nice weekend!

But before we can get to the weekend, we have to address today!! It is Friends with Flair Friday and that means that we get to visit 50 blogs all filled with Unity goodness! I am excited because I was out of town last week and never got a chance to get around to all the blogs, so I am definitely looking forward to some amazing Unity projects today!! The Unity Fans never disappoint me with giving inspiration!

Be sure to visit the Unity website this weekend because there is a 30% off sale going on through Sunday! Click on the banner below and head over to Unity and see some of their new releases and also some of the items that are on sale this week!

I am so proud of my fellow DT member Kelli Caslow who is on the Whimsie Doodles DT with me. She is the very talented stamp designer who along with Lisa Hetrick created the newly released stamp set shown below!! I know that I am going to be buying this adorable set and I hope that you will too!! You can find it for purchase HERE!

Happy Fall Y'All

So onto today's project!




I was commissioned by my neighbor and good friend Lisa to make the cards that she wanted to send out to her family and friends for Halloween this year. She was a big part in designing them and had a pretty good idea of what she wanted!





They are photo cards and she is going to slip in a picture of her daughter and son where you see that I left the opening!


The images were colored with Copics. The orange CS is from Coredinations, and the DP is from K & Co. The black card base is from Recollections.


This set is so fitting because she has two kids, one girl and one boy and I just altered the boy a little to make him shorter than the older sister. I used the masking technique to do that!


I stamped the web in the corner and hand drew the silk that the spider is hanging from!

The set you see used is Trick or Treat Peeps which includes the Witch and Frankenstein kids and also the cute little spider and web shown here, plus more images and some sentiments too! (The sentiment we used is from PTI's Spooky Sweets II collection though.)

The card is rather clean and simple in style (well for me anyway! LOL!) but they really make a statement because of the bright colors and contrast that we put in them.

The border punch is from Martha Stewart!





I am making a total of ten of these and they are almost done! All I have left is to cut out the Trick or Treaters and attach them to the card. She plans to insert the photo of her kids and get them out in the mail soon!

Isn't this set just the cutest Halloween set you ever did see??

Be sure to stop by the Unity blog if you didnt' start there already and follow along the blog roll for today's FWF participants. Have you found the FWF Blinkie yet?? And don't forget to take advantage of that awesome sale going on right now at Unity!!

Have a Flair-filled Friday and a wonderful weekend too! May your bucket be overflowing with all treats and no tricks!!

I am posting soon the winner of the Kissmas Gingers

set from yesterday's comments... be right back!!

Final Sketchfest Challenge Card

I have had soooo much fun working with the sketches all week long at the Sketchfest going on at Caardvarks! The sketch designer Heidi Van Laar is uber talented and provided such awesome sketches to inspire us! My thanks go out to Caardvarks for hosting the challenge, Studio Calico for sponsoring the challenge and also to Heidi for the awesome sketches! I was able to submit a card each day this week which will put me in the running for a chance at winning a spot on the Caardvarks Crew beginning in November! Wish me luck!! It would be such an honor to be chosen and it makes me really nervous since I saw so many fabulous entries in Mr Linky this week!! AAck!!

I decided to go with a Halloween themed card for this sketch which you can see pictured below...

I didn't change it up very much, but where you see the small circle, I inserted my adorable spider brad from a new collection by MM called Spooky Alley. I bought the fibers that you see below at Michael's and have been hoarding it for a very long time! It is a great fiber to make scarves out of!!

The stamps are from PaperTrey Ink's Spooky Sweets II collection. The stamps you see used are the ornate circle and the spider web. The sentiment strip is actually a strip of paper from the Recollections Halloween Paper collection. In fact all the paper comes from the same collection except for the white mat which is GP cardstock.

I added a bit of sparkle to the spider web by drawing over the stamped image with my Sakura Gelly Roller pen. I debated adding some more touches to it but finally decided that between the DP, the ornate stamps, and the furry fibers, it really didn't need any more embellishments or treatments. Enough is enough!!

Thanks again for taking a look at my card today. I appreciate all the nice comments that have been left and it has been nice to see some new names visiting my blog. I hope you will come back again!

Enjoy the rest of your weekend and may your bucket overflow with sweets of the non-spooky kind!

What a Sweet Wednesday it is!

It's Wednesday, aka Hump Day for some of you that have Monday to Friday jobs! But for me Wednesday's are really SWEET days because they are the days when a new Sweet Sketch is released from the Sweet Sketch Wednesday blog and I get to share with you a creation I made following that sketch! This Wednesday is especially sweet because it is the fourth Wednesday of the month which means there is also a Color Challenge with this month's sketch! SWEET!!

Arlana, the sketch designer has been a little under the weather, and I hope she is feeling better! She always has such neat sketches to use. They are the fun kind where you get to add a lot of special touches. I happen to like the busier cards more than just the clean and simple ones I have been showing you lately. But the neat thing is that you can always uses the sketches to fit your needs! I hope you will go and get the sketch and play along with us this week!

Here is this week's Sweet Sketch number 12!

These are the colors she chose for the challenge...






And here is the card that I made from it! (My couch really is red, but it photographed kind of pink!)

Sitting Here Thinking of You

This card uses a new stamp set that I got when I was at CHA earlier this month. It is such a cute set from Papertrey Ink called On My Couch Additions. They were out of the main On My Couch set, but the accessories set that I got still comes with a whole chair and all the makings for a room!

Here is a closeup of the scene I created using that set...

I wasn't sure if the geometric designs were supposed to be pictures or pillows, but I think they could be either. I used them as pictures on this card! LOL! The DP's come from many sources. The "wallpaper" is from Sassafrass, the card base is from Scenic Route and the ornge dotted paper is unknown. I used SU inks; Real Red, Certainly celery and Pumpkin Pie for the couch, carpet and pictures respectively. The senitiment was stamped with Amuse Black ink. My Copic markers were used to add shadows and color the pictures. The sentiment was sponged using one of the nesties as a template with So Saffron SU ink.

I bought the yellow gingham ribbon from a local stamping expo that came to town and the orange felt flower I bought online but don't remember from where! The border punch I used is from Martha Stewart.

I created the look of wood floors by coloring with my Copic markers onto white cardstock in stripes and then going over some of the stripes a second time to add a deeper color and make it appear like streaks of woodgrain. I think it looks pretty realistic for paper! By adding an outline of gray around the bottoms and right sides of the carpet, couch and pictures I tried to give the illusion of depth with the light source coming from the upper left hand side of the room.

So head on over to the Sweet Sketch Wednesday blog where you can see all the creations that the DT made up for you to look at. It is always fun to see how different people interpret the sketches. Come along with us and join in the fun and make sure you share your project on the SSW blog so we can all see it!

Have a SWEET day and may your bucket overflow with lots of people that you can sit and think about that make you smile!

Everyone Needs a Little Inspiration!

Dictionary.com defines inspiration as

• Stimulation of the mind or emotions to a high level of feeling or activity.
  
• The condition of being so stimulated.

Don't you feel sometimes that you could use a little inspiration? Doesn't your mojo leave you temporarily and you struggle to find just the right stamp to ink up or the right paper to use? Well thankfully SCS has designed a way to help us get out of those ruts and to find inspiration from other artists and websites. Every Saturday you can log into the SCS Inspiration Challenge Forum and find many ways to be inspired.

Last Saturday we were inspired by Bellacor Vases that can be found HERE. There were over 1500 vases to choose from and anyone could find something to inspire them. As soon as I saw this vase HERE, I knew exactly what I wanted to do. I had found my inspiration!!

Here is the card that I created after being inspired by that Bellacor Vase.

I decided that not only do I need inspiration sometimes, but so do others who are struggling with one of life's toughest battles... the loss of a loved one. I kept this card clean and simple because when you are trying to comfort someone who is grieving, it is better to take the minimalist approach so the true sentiments can be felt. I used my Unity silhouette flowers from the Birdie Inspiration set and lengthened the stems using a Sharpie Fine tip marker.

When I created this card I was hoping that I could inspire someone going through a tough time and move their mind to a higher level of feeling loved by me. On the inside of the card I used a Stampin Up sympathy stamp that says...

May God's love

heal your sorrow, and may

His peace replace your

heartache with

warm and loving memories.

I also played along with yesterday's Inspiration Challenge IC193 that can be found HERE! This time we were to be inspired by an ecclectic online store called The Curiosity Shoppe. They had really neat ideas and I found lots of creations that I would want to CASE or borrow! I chose THESE Earrings as my inspiration.

When I saw them my mind went directly to Dawn McVey's Damask Designs stamps from PTI and to the Ambrosia Collection by Basic Grey. So with the lace earrings as my inspiration, and the Damask stamps along with some BG, I was led and they led me to make this rather formal Birthday card...

I cut out one of my label nesties twice in one size and once in a large size. Then by turning one of them 45 degrees I was able to create this medallion like mat for my stamp. I decided to stamp the Happy Birthday sentiment right on top of the strip of Damask Designs. To finish it off I added four rhinestones to accent the center piece in the medallion.

Weather permitting my family and I are going to do some boating and jet skiing. Ricky will just be fishing since he is still supposed to be resting his eye. I am happy to say though that everday he is reporting that his vision is improving and his eye is hurting less. My daughter Leah made it back to Gainesville yesterday and is still in a little pain still but also doing better every day!

Please have a wonderful day and may your bucket overflow with inspiration from many sources!

Aaahh! It's Good to be Home!

I never thought I would say this but I was glad to be home and even back to work today! There is something to be said about routines and your normal way of life being comfortable!

I wanted to share a few things with you from the CHA Supershow and tell you some of the cool things I bought! So I hope you don't mind a little recap of my weekend!

First of all as I arrived on Friday evening it was too late to go to the Supershow because they were shutting down within the hour, so I made my way to my hotel room where I met up with Vianna. Vianna and I met through Stamp TV's Florida group and it turns out that we live less than two miles from each other. We had already met each other before this weekend so that we could be more comfortable rooming together. She was such a sweet roomie. She thinks of everything and even brought us some wine and pepperoni and crackers to have before going to dinner!

Christina and Vianna at Giordanno's

We met up with Christina from Scrap Time in Canada for dinner. I had never even heard of Scrap Time before, but you can be sure that Christina's site will be some place that I visit much more frequently from now on! She took over a thousand photos from CHA's trade show and has them posted on Flickr. Check them out right HERE! And be sure to go to her site regularly where you will get to see her use and report on many products from the SB industry.

We had dinner at the famous Giordanno's pizza restaurant. They make the heaviest pizzas I have ever seen! Their pizza's are stuffed and look like they are a calzone that is turned inside out! The pieces stand a couple of inches high and are filled with the ingredients of your choice! We had a good time getting to know each other!

So Saturday morning after a breakfast at Denny's, we headed into the Supershow! I will say that I was a little disappointed that it seemed more like many other expos I had been to. I think I thought I would see more of the trade show displays and get to see some of the new stuff coming out! But all in all there were great things to buy and lots of make-n-takes to do.

Vianna hooked me up and saved me a seat for one of PaperTrey Ink's Make-n-Takes and I got to meet Debbie Olson! Here is the card that we made...

I also got to meet Dawn McVey and the owner of PaperTrey, Nichole Heady. I have always been impressed with how she runs her business. Nichole does nothing that isn't pure perfection! There stamps are awesome and I am glad that my collection of them grew this weekend!

Dawn McVey, Vianna, Nichole Heady

I also went over to the Splitcoast Stampers area where all the company sponsored Make-n-Takes were going on and I got to meet some of the "famous" people from SCS! Here is a picture of a few of the people that were in the area helping people make their SCS pins and greeting people!

Back row from L-R, Beate Johns, Lori Craig, Daven Nolta

Front row from L-R, Jen Balcer and me!

I have a funny (and embarrassing) story to tell you about the guy you see pictured above. He was helping me make my pin after I had introduced myself to Beate and Lori. I said to him, "so did someone drag you along with them to help out today, or how do you belong to Splitcoast Stampers?" Turns out he is none other than the founder of Splitcoast Stampers, Daven Nolta (along with his wife Tracy!) I wanted to crawl under the table and hide! So I kind of laughed it off and went along making my pin! LOL!! How embarassing!! :-)

Here is the adorable pin that they had us make...

Then, to no surprise to anyone who ever reads my blog, the highlight of my time at CHA was meeting Angela Magnuson and the rest of the Unity crew! I had heard that they had left before the Supershow started so I was sorely disappointed, but then much to my amazement they were doing Make-n-Takes in the SCS area between 11am and 1pm on Saturday. Thankfully I showed up just at the right time or I would have missed meeting them. I gave Angela a big hug and I am sure that I gushed like any groupie meeting her idol for the first time!! She is so sweet and beautiful on the inside and the outside! And the thing that blew me away the most was that she actually recognized my name as one of her customers and regular uploaders to the Unity Gallery on SCS! She really made my day!

From L-R, AJ Otto, Angela, me and Brooke!

Here is the Make-n-Take from Unity...

You can't tell it from the picture, but the base of this is a wood block! Oh so cool!! And some more great news is that Unity is going to be having a line of scrapbooking stamps coming out soon! I got to see a sample of it and am so excited to get my hands on those too! I didn't buy any Unity stamps while at the Supershow because only one store was selling it and I had practically everything already that they were selling. I did get to see a sneak peek in person of the August KOM and it's another great one!! Woohoo... can't wait!!

I also got to meet two other special people that are a part of my daily online life. I met Sue Morris (but she has the picture of us) and Deb Felts. Both of them are in the Florida Stamp TV group and I recognized each of them in the crowds and introduced myself to them. The Stamp TV Florida group was supposed to meet up for dinner, but as it turns out, I think a lot of us just got too tired to make it til the end. I ended up leaving at about 3pm with sore feet and an empty bank account! LOL! So my apologies to Jean and any one else who had hoped to meet up. I certainly hope to do that in the future! I love all you ladies and appreciate your comradery on Stamp TV!

Deb Felts with me!

So where did most of my money go?

• Seven new PaperTrey Ink stamp sets
• Seven new Cornish Heritage Farms sets
• Stamp N Foil in eight colors
• The complete collection of Judikins Mica Gloss inks
• Assorted papers and collections of paper from Nikki Sivils, October Afternoon and Imaginesce
• A collection of sand glue mixtures from MuddPuddles
• Many colors of flowers from KaiserCrafts
• The I-top Brad Maker kit from Imaginesce and
• The Crafter's Companion

I am so excited to put some of these things into use! I will let you know as I use these things how they work. I am really excited about the brad maker and the Crafter's Companion.

I hope I get some time in the stamp room or it is going to seem very wasteful that I bought all this stuff if I don't use it!

So for now that gets you all caught up with me! I am glad to be back and into my routine. I hope to have some projects to share with you tomorrow and I will also start showing you some of the assignments that I completed using this month's SheetLoad sketch. I hope you went to the site to get your free copy of the eZine. It is a really wonderful sketch that you will want to use over and over!

Have a great day and may your bucket overflow with exciting new things to keep you inspired in your craft room!

SheetLoad Sneak Peek! And Final showing of May's Sketch

Wow! The month of May sure has slipped by rather quickly!! I can't believe that it is June 1st already tomorrow! We are already in "summer mode" in my household. Both of my kids exempted their final exams, so their last day of school was on Friday! Tiffany will walk with her class on Wednesday for her Graduation!

With the new month before us, it means it is time for a sneak peek at my submission for SheetLoad's new eZine being released tomorrow. I am not one of the featured designers for this month's release, but I am playing along with the other DT members.

Here is a snippet of the card I created using June's sketch! Be sure to visit tomorrow and I will show you the whole thing!!

Be sure and visit SheetLoad of Cards tomorrow for the release of the June eZine issue. And today you can visit there and see some more sneak peeks!! Click HERE to get some more previews of what's to come on June 1st!

I have one more order of business for SheetLoad. I am afraid that I won't be able to share with you the complete set of cards (nine 4.25 x 4.25 square cards and nine scraplings) that I made using May's SheetLoad sketch because two of my green Copic markers ran out of ink right in the middle of coloring my images. But I did get the second sample done. I made three of each of these too.

So here is sample two of my take on May's SheetLoad sketch with the scrapling! The DP is from Junkitz; the flower stamps (in two sizes) are from Unity's August KOM; and the sentiment is from the Essential Sayings set from MFT (which happens to be on sale right now!)

I have to order some Copic refills today!! Do you know how often you need YG03 and YG11 when coloring your stamped images? I have been paralyzed for a little while now!!

And finally, I have one other thing to share with you today...

We have exciting news in our Family!!

My baby sister is getting married {again!} This is a picture of my sister Michelle (I named my daughter after her) and her fiancee Claude! They have been dating for over a year now and are the sweetest most "in-love" couple I have ever seen!

Claude popped the question last week and they are planning a wedding in January!!

Aren't they a cute couple??








So of course big sis had to make a congratulatory card for the happy couple!



Here is the Clean and Simple card I made for them....

I barely stamped on it! I just used the sentiment stamp from SU's A Little Birdie Told Me set. I let the DP from PaperTrey Ink and the embellishments steal the show on this one! I used my Martha Stewart border punch to make the black lacy edging.

I couldn't be happier for them... Claude and his two daughter's are going to be a wonderful addition to our family!!

That's all for now! Have a great Sunday and be sure to visit tomorrow when I will have my June SheetLoad sketch to show you!

May your bucket always overflow with good news in your family too!

SOA Challenge Cards

There are so many challenges going on this week over at the Stampin Out Alzheimer's site!

Have you had a chance to go over there yet and sign up?? You won't be sorry that you did. First of all, for a minimum donation of $5, you can gain access to all the activities. The money...100% of it... is going to help fight Alzheimer's!! Most people in this world will be affected by someone they know or love who is afflicted with the terrible disease. As I told you in a previous post, my dear MIL has been diagnosed with Alzheimer's and is slipping away from us before our eyes. It is my prayer that people with an interest in preserving our memories into scrapbooks will also care enough to donate some money to help preserve some memories into the minds of those afflicted with Alzheimer's.

You can click on the gadget on the right side of my blog and donate to this wonderful cause! Jen and Susanna have already reached their goal, but wouldn't it be a wonderful thing to surpass it by leaps and bounds?

I have three challenge cards to share with you today.

Here is the first one...

Kate from I {heart} papers is donating a $30 assortment of Flower Soft to the winner of this challenge which was to use Flower Soft on our project.

For this card, I used Basic Grey DP, and the stamped image and sentiment stamps are from Stampin Up! called Friendships Grow. I colored the image with Copics and then added the Flower Soft to the background flowers in the stamped image and also to the accent Prima flower on the ribbon. I used my Nestabilities to cut the mat for the image and the sentiment.

Here is my second card called Nuts for Buttons...

This challenge was called "Button, Button, Who's Got the Button?" We were to use at least three buttons on our card. The winner of this challenge will two Vintage button collections from PTI!

Since PaperTrey was the sponsor of this challenge, I chose to use their stamp set called My Punny Valentine. The squirrel and the sentiment comes from that set. The tree is from Unity and is called the Burberry Tree. The grass stamp is from SU!

I was going for the Clean and Simple look for this card. The DP is from Sassafras, the Hog Heaven collection and the ink used is from SU! The ribbon is from Michael's. I am not sure about the buttons... they were in my big canister full of buttons!

Finally, here is my last card submitted to the challenges at SOA...

I called this card Grunge Birthday! The sketch was the required element for this challenge from Taylored Expressions. The winner of this challenge will win a $25 gift certificate to the TE store! The colors I used came from K Werner's Designs recent color challenge #53.

Closeup of the Unity stamp!

This card originally started off very elementary looking and even feminine (so my husband says); but with the help of distressing tools, staples, black ink smudging and the awesome stamp in Unity's This is the Time stamp set, I was able to transform it into the masculine grungy birthday card I needed for a teen boy in my family.

Here's the inside!

I hope to have some more SOA challenge cards to show you this weekend. We only have through the 31st to get our cards submitted to enter into the contests!

Tomorrow I will have a Sneak Peek for you of the card I created using the new June Sketch at SheetLoad! The new eZine will be available on the 1st!

Have a great Saturday and may your bucket be overflowing with wonderful memories that will never fade!