Finishing Up Christmas Cards

I'm getting close to finishing up my Christmas cards for this year. I'll admit to being ready to being done!  I have all the envelopes addressed too...waiting for the last few to be completed.   So, on Sunday, when I was working on more, I was looking for inspiration.  Jay Gee's Nook was the perfect spot. I love the neutral tones on the inspiration below so I used the fun patterned stamp from CAS-ual Fridays Countdown set (stay tuned for more from this tomorrow)...and the sentiment from Verve.  Love the touch of twine, the star and the gem.

And in the spirit of easy mailing, I created a few one layer cards as well using Technique Tuesday and WPlus 9 stamps.  Hope your Christmas creating is going well!

 

Peace on Earth

Happy Thursday my friends.  I loved hearing what you were thankful for yesterday.  Thanks so much for stopping by!

So often I forget about my patterned papers, but when I was away on my scrapbook weekend, I was intentionally trying to use some if it. I love the more subtle patterns like this paper from My Mind's Eye with the flourishes and text.  I always love the Jay Gee's Nook challenge, and particularly loved the Noel portion of the inspiration photo.  I took inspiration from both the colors and the wreath. And I used one of my newer dies from Memory Box.  Love the end result with the touch of gems!

 

 

Merci

Happy Monday!  I hope you all had a fabulous weekend.  We had a rainy first half of the weekend, but it ended with a gorgeous day yesterday.  My weekend was filled with all kinds of fun. Friday night I met up with two of my college roommates for a quick drink.  It was great to catch up.  Hopefully next time we'll have a bit more time.

On Saturday night, I had a few friends over and was able to catch up on the three little guys scrapbooks.  I need to journal, but am so glad that they are caught up!

And then on Sunday, I took senior pictures for my dear friend, Katie's son.   We took some in the summer, but wanted some with the beautiful fall colors too.  Here is one of the two of them!  Laughter is never far with either of them and I love this picture!

And...if you've made it this long :), my card is inspired by the current Jay Gee's Nook Challenge.  I loved the little flowers in the bottom right.  And...I got to play along with my new CAS-ual Fridays Stamps...they stamp beautifully!  I used the Truth Is and Big Thanks stamps sets.  Be sure to stop on over here for all the gorgeous sneak peaks.

 

Thanks

I had been meaning to play along with Jay Gee's Nook Challenge this month since I missed last month's challenge and I always love the gorgeous inspiration photos.   This month was no exception!  I was inspired by the soft pastels and the patterns in the pillows.  And...don't tell but the little banner for the thanks was a mistake....when I stamped thanks originally it smudged a bit.  So my fix was to stamp it onto the banner and then add the button.  Have to say I'm happy with the way it turned out.   

Hope you have a fabulous Monday!  I'm traveling for work this week...but I'll be back with more blog posts.  We'll see if I feel chatty or if the posts this week are short and sweet.

 

Thanks

Good morning!  I made this card for Jay Gee's Nook Challenge, but I am a day late entering as the challenge closed.  No worries though...still love this card and think I need to make a set of these cards instead of just one!  Hope you all have a fabulous Sunday!  We'll be relaxing at my house...getting ready for the first day of school for everyone tomorrow!

 

Love You

Before I get to my card, I have a quick story to share with you.  This little guy always has something funny to say.  Last night at dinner, "Bon appetit...that's British for your food's ready."  Made us all giggle...doesn't hurt that he is cute as can be.

Now onto my card.  Don't you just love the inspiration photo from Jay Gee's Nook below.  I loved all the bling...but switched it out to pearls...a nice sweet little 3x3 card for the one I love :)  Happy Thursday...one more day until the weekend!

 

Congrats!

Hi there...I'm traveling for work this week...so I'm popping in with a very, very quick card for this month's Jay Gee's Nook Challenge.  Isn't the inspiration photo below fabulous? It's been a long time since I made a square card...I love them.  Not sure why I don't make them more often...

I'm looking forward to coming home to see my boys and hubby after three days away...here's hoping there are no flight delays on my way home from Jacksonville!

 

A Bright Happy Birthday!

My Auntie Pat turns 70 in a few weeks and I wanted to make a nice cheery card to help her celebrate!  I think this meets the criteria of both cheery and bright!  I used three Paper Smooches sets to make the card.  One for the green background, another with the flowers and a third for the sentiment.  Yes...I am in love with these sets.  I added a touch of chevron ribbon from aMuse and we were ready to roll.  I am entering this in the current challenge over at Jay Gee's Nook.  I loved the pattern on the wire basket in the bottom right and the circle lanterns in the top right.  I'll be sending this off shortly with lots of love to my Auntie Pat!

 

Just a Note - Jay Gee's Nook Challenge

Today...we're leaving on a jet plane...don't know when we'll be back again!  Just kidding...my mum and I leave for England this afternoon. It will be a quick trip for me...just one week before I'm back home, but my mum will stay for a couple of weeks.  It has been way to long since I've seen nana and I can't wait. But wow will I miss Pat and the boys!  A week is definitely the longest I've ever been away from them.  So, I'm leaving lots of little notes for them and a few little treats. I've pre-posted several blog posts, but unless I can easily find wi-fi access won't be blog surfing much.  So I'll see you all soon!

And before I go, two quick cards.  First is a PaperSmooches inspired card for the current Jay Gee's Nook Challenge.  I love the color inspiration and the stamps played to this perfectly!

And second...a quick card for a co-worker.  Perfect colors for a masculine card inspired by this week's ColourQ Challenge.

PS Do you like how Marcel snuck into this picture?  Can you tell he's saying "cheese"? :0

Lovely. Beautiful. Darling.

Jay Gee's Nook Challenge  has such fabulous inspiration colors.  I love the soft subtle feel to all the photos.  So, I used the colors and the soft feel as my inspiration for this card.  I also really let the patterned paper do the talking.  I stamped the background once with Ranger Pumice Stone ink and the PTI Polka Dot stamps.  I then cut out banners from the coordinating paper and stitched them on to the main patterned paper panel.  Added a couple of gems and adhered the panel to the card base with dimensionals.  Super quick but I love the soft feel.  What about you?  What inspires you from Jay Gee's inspiration photo below?

Welcome Sweet Baby

 

Happy Thursday everyone!  Popping in with a baby card inspired by Jay Gee's Nook Challenge. Isn't the inspiration photo so fun?  So many different things you could do with this.  I decided to use the sweet little birds on the wires in the top of the photo for my inspiration.  And of course, I couldn't resist using my beloved PTI linen impression plate yet again.  Can you hear my happy sigh? :)

I thought you'd get a kick out of these pictures too. Collin has been asking for a robe for a few weeks.  He's making me laugh though because he couldn't remember what it was called and kept calling it a rug instead of a robe.  When we did buy one at Kohl's this weekend, he said in the car on the way home, "I don't know how to wear my rug."  I started laughing since a "rug" is a hair piece...I think he's a bit young for that!  Pat has taken to calling Collin Hugh in honor of Hugh Heffner. 

And...Collin is never to far from my side in the craft room.  Here's his latest Valentine :)

Happily Ever After...

**Card Removed for Publication**

Happy Wednesday!  The work week is almost half over and I'll be heading home from my work trip at the end of the day.  Here's hoping for no delays on my way home!

I''m popping in to share a card for the current challenge over at Jay Gee's Nook. Looking at this card, I really wish that I had used zig zag instead of straight stitching, but we have to remember to share the cards we like but may not love. This falls into that category.   I think the inspiration photo below has so many glorious ideas!  I went with the photo in bottom middle row as my primary inspiration, but there are truly a ton of jumping off points for this card!
Hope you get a chance to give it a try and that your week is going well!

Breakfast with Santa

This past weekend the show choirs sponsored breakfast with Santa.  Marcel loved very minute of it!  He was ready to pose with Frosty, Santa's Reindeer and of course, sit on Santa's lap!  I love the look on Marcel's face!  He was very intent on making sure that Santa new he wanted a new bike!

Collin on the other hand was a bit to shy.  So...unfortunately he's not in any of the pictures. He was more comfortable staying close by with us.  I love the boys questions about Santa:  "How did he come all the way from the North Pole?"  "Are we going to the North Pole to see him?"  "How does Santa get to see everyone?"  "If his elves aren't with him, how does he remember what is on our list?"  A great event put on by the show choir!

Keeping with the Christmas theme, I have a card for the current Jay Gee's Nook Challenge.  There is a ton of fabulous inspiration on the photo below.  I went very clean and stuck with the inspiration from the sweet little heart at the top of the photo!

I am blessed.

Good morning!  Today is my 41st birthday.  I was thinking about what to say about another year passing yesterday and the only thing that came to mind is life is good.  Really good.  I feel very blessed.  I could write pages about why I feel this way, but instead am choosing to keep in short and sweet.  I am blessed.

So...that's all...except of course since it's my birthday, I thought I'd share a birthday card.  The current challenge over at Jay Gee's Nook is to use your holiday stamps to make a non-holiday card.  I used the PTI Merry & Bright set.  Embossed the top panel, added some Stickles for a little extra shine and the card was done!

PS  If you need a laugh, go check out this rap video by my co-workers for my 40th birthday last year.

Happy Wednesday!  Popping in with a quick picture from our Chicago trip.  I thought this bean at Millenium Park was very cool.  I love the reflection of the entire Chicago skyline behind us.  As you can tell it was a beautiful day there on Sunday.  Don't you wonder who thinks of these types of creations?  So cool...

Now...onto my card for today.  When I saw the current challenge over at Jay Gee's Nook, the pastels immediately made me think of a baby card.  I decided to pull out a couple of the pastels and make a very CAS card.  The sweet little bells are from Stampin' Up.  Looking forward to using them on Christmas cards too!

 

Thanks So Very Much Jinny!

I mentioned on Wednesday that I was meeting Amy, Laurie & Jinny in person on Thursday!  Jinny was super sweet and invited us over for dinner at her home where we got to meet her entire family.  I wanted to bring a little something for her as a thank you for her hospitality. I had fun making the banner from a variety of yellow papers in my scrap bin.   The favorite pieces are the Verve Loopy Flowers that go with the Verve Making a Statement set.  I made this for two challenges:  Jay Gee's Nook challenge and the Verve Get Your Diva On Challenge (that finished up last week...but I couldn't post ....otherwise Jinny may have seen this!

 

Of course, I have to share pictures of our time together.  Here we are all at her Jinny's home.  It was wonderful to meet not only Jinny but her whole family.  Her little girl, Adina, stole my heart.  Her husband, BJ and son, Ezekiel, were so kind too...but if I can sneak in some little girl time having all boys...I surely will.  She even let me carry her around a bit!  Here we are all after eating Jinny's yummy Mexican dinner (and her hubby helped with super scrumptious guacamole!)

 And after dinner, we went down to the Plaza in KC for dessert at the Cheesecake Factory!  More yumminess...I had a white chocolate macadamia nut cheesecake with caramel...that definitely didn't go into the calorie counter!

The food was delicious...but what was the best was getting to meet friends in person.  It's so easy to tell that if we lived closed by we'd spend lots of time together.  Thanks so much Jinny for having us to your home and Amy/Laurie for driving to see me and taking away time from your families.  I hope that we get to do it again, very, very soon!

Carbon Copied with Karen Baker

I am thrilled to be playing along with a new challenge that the fabulous Karen Baker has created.  The challenge is to use the same stamp set and the same challenge.  A "carbon copy" of the stamp set and challenge, but likely two very different designs.  The stamp set Karen and I are playing along with is PaperTrey Ink's set from Stamp-a-Faire, Iconic Images and the challenge is Jay Gee's Nook Challenge.  We both adore Judith at Jay Gee's Nook, so we thought this would be a great one to do together. 

Karen is amazing at adding texture to her cards without a ton of layers so I wanted to try to do the same with my card.  I took my PTI Linen Impression Plate and inked it up with SU Perfect Plum ink and then ran the kraft paper through my Sizzix to create a bit of texture.  I then added the twine, bird and sentiment.  I stamped a few images on the white panel and then adhered the sentiment panel with dimensionals.   Let me know what you think.  And...be sure...to stop by and what Karen has created. I am sure you'll be impressed!

Here is the inspiration photo from Jay Gee's Nook.

Cast All Your Cares on Him

Ingredients:  Patterned Paper:  My Mind's Eye; Cardstock:  SU Whisper White and Real Red; Twine:  The Twinery; Stamps:  Verve and Hero Arts; Ink: SU Night of Navy and Ranger Distress Ink Antique Linen

Today has been one of those grumpy days.  One of those days when you yell at your children in front of their friends.  When they keep asking for more and more, and after saying yes for what feels like the 100th time, you say no, lose it and start yelling.  Yes...yelling in front of their friends like a crazy person.  And then you take their friends home and they still say thank you.  Your son apologizes to them for the "all the yelling."  And their friends respond, "It's okay.  Happens at our house too."  I don't particularly enjoy days like this, but they are reality.  And the good news is there are certainly less yelling days than great days.

My card today is for Jay Gee's Nook Challenge.  I made this a couple of days ago and adored the inspiration photo.  My mother-in-law would love this card as she loves anything with a boat theme and patriotic colors.  The sentiment seems very appropriate today too.   Hope you all are having a fabulous week.