Sending Thoughts & Prayers {and Ryan's Fall Concert}

Can you tell I was enjoying getting my Verve stamps out before I went out of town?  I had fun creating this card for the current Verve Inspiration Challenge.  This card went in the mail to a friend that needed some encouragement for scary health issues happening.  She certainly could use extra prayers.

And a happy dance from over here...show choir season is starting to get into swing.  Ryan had his choreography week start this last week and Jonathon's is this week.  Here's a few pictures from Ryan's fall concert two weeks.  I love watching my kids perform!  I love his facial expressions...and that both Nanas came to see him too.

Happy Birthday Karen!

It's the fabulous Karen Baker's birthday today!  And in honor of her special day, we're throwing her a party.  Erin is our host and we were all asked to bring a little something to our party.  In addition to my card above, I thought I'd bring along a little silly string (probably will keep Karen's boys occupied for a bit during the party) and knowing Karen she'd think of something creative to do with the silly string!  She is one amazingly talented designer and above all she is a kind friend and loving mom.  I love reading her blog as she'll teach us, laugh with us and share her amazing talent with us.  I feel blessed to call her my friend.  I'm hoping one day soon we can meet in person.  We have so much fun chatting about being moms to all boys and sharing stories about them.  I'm sure we'd have even more fun in person.

For my card, I had to honor Karen by using my spray mists...she is the queen of mists.  And I did a bit of a diy embellishment by using flowers to create butterflies.  And I think Karen loves the PTI impression plate like me...so I finished off the card with embossing it.

Happy Birthday Karen!  I hope you have a wonderful day!  Be sure to check out what all the talented designers have brought along to the party.  

Erin

Cristina

Kelly Marie

Christina

Kelley Eubanks

Yvonne

Virginia

Laurel

Jen

Dana

Michele

Lynn

Lindsay

Amy

Aimes

Jen R

Lisa

Lynn

Karen's, birthday girl's blog,

Peace

 

Good Morning!  I'm popping in to share my card for the current Verve Get Your Diva On Challenge.  The challenge this month is to create a handmade embellishment.  I was inspired by this card on Pinterest and decided to give it a whirl.    I love the Teresa Collins Christmas papers.  I don't think I've ever purchased any of this brand paper before, but I love all the damask and text.  Gorgeous. 

To finish off the tree, I used the star from Verves Merry Wishes and the peace sentiment from New Mercies.  Finished it off by adding a couple of gems and inking up the edges.  Of course, the background panel is using my linen impression plate too...it's never far from my creations :)  Hope you all have a fabulous Monday!

Ingredients:  Cardstock: PaperTrey Ink White; Stampin' Up Chocolate Chip; Ink:  Stampin' Up Cherry Cobbler; Patterned Paper: Teresa Collins; Stamps:  Verve New Mercies and Merry Wishes; Gems:  Hero Arts; Impression Plate:  Linen PTI;



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!

CASE-ing Maureen!

Guess what I get to do today?  I get to meet three of my fabulous blog friends in person!  Tonight I'm having dinner with Amy, Laurie & Jinny.  I can't wait to meet them in person and Jinny was so generous to cook for all of us at her home.  Doesn't get much better than that!

 The current Verve Diva Dare is to CASE a Verve Diva.  Since I'm meeting some new friends today, I thought it only appropriate that I CASE my dear friend, Maureen, that I got to meet earlier this year.  We're now trying to figure out how we can get together again!  I just lived she wished closer (but don't worry Moe...I'll find a way to get to BC!) I loved her card below with the pops of color and the gorgeous white space.  This card went straight in the mail to my niece, Madeleine, who starts college this week!  I am so proud of her and am wishing her so much success as she starts the next step in her life.

Thanks So Very Much

It's time for my final card for this month's Viva La Verve Sketch Challenges.  I love my new Basic Grey Oxford collection.  The blues, reds and greens in the patterns are gorgeous.  And of course, I love Stampin' Ups Cherry Cobbler ribbon.  That ribbon wins the most used award!

Not too much to say today...getting back into the groove of school around here...Have a fabulous day!

If At First You Don't Succeed...

Reminder:  check here to see if you were my blog candy winner!

This weekend I was working on the Viva La Verve sketch challenges.  My first card was this one...while it is okay, I just wasn't thrilled with it.  

And here was my second try a day later...I'm entering this both over at the Viva La Verve Challenge and at the Moxie Fab Felt Challenge.  I like this one a ton better.  The Verve loopy flower cuts the felt so smoothly and I love the sentiment from the Verve Words of Wisdom set.

Embellish Color Challenge (two ways)

Happy Friday!  Before I get to my cards for today, I thought I'd share the last of the first day of school pictures.  He is the only one at his bus stop...but he didn't seem to mind one bit.  He was more than ready to go to school and quite impatient that he had the wait for 45 minutes after Collin left for school.

Here's Pat with his little buddy...they still have afternoons together until next year when Marcel is in school all day!

Ready to go...he gave a quick "Bye Mommy..." and off he went without a hitch!  I do have a funny story from yesterday.  At the beginning of the school year, not all of the kindergarten children start on the same day so that they can do screening.  We assumed there were only two days of screening, so we sent him on Thursday.  Well...we got a call from school.  He wasn't supposed to come back until today....can you tell he's our fourth?  We weren't paying enough attention!  He didn't mind one bit when I went to get him.  The school secretary was laughing.  She proclaimed, "He is so sweet!"  I'm sure my little chatty boy had no problem keeping the conversation flowing while he waited for me...
Now onto some cards for those of you patiently waiting.  I'm playing along with the wonderful inspiration photo for the Embellish Challenge to emboss flowers.

For my first card, I stuck with my CAS theme for the week!  I used the Verve Meditations set for the flowers and sentiment and heat embossed the flowers.  To add a bit of texture to the card, I used my PTI linen impression plate and inked the edges up slightly.

I had some extra flowers, so I decided to keep creating. I decided to play along with the Viva La Verve Sketch Challenge.   I embossed the flowers on Soft Suede paper for the background panel.  I am very pleased with both cards...despite the different styles.  Let me know what you think!

Happy 8th Birthday Collin!

Happy 8th Birthday today to my sweet, sweet Collin!  He gets to start school on his birthday...and doesn't seem bothered one bit about it!  I think that attitude might change as he gets older!  I love this little man. He is my shyest boy and is always quick to give a kiss to those he loves.  He is very thoughtful and expressive to us; telling us he loves us and misses us if we are ever away.  He is creative and extremely clever with his hands.  Whether it is cooking, crafting or watching Pat do handiwork, he definitely is clever.   He's a wonderful big brother to Marcel and just a sweet, sensitive soul.  Oh how I love this little man.  Happy birthday my sweet boy. 

Of course, I have to share Collin's birthday card.  The colors/papers are what we used for his birthday party invite as well so I'm sure he'll be pleased with it!  He wanted lots of stars on the invites so I've added them to this as well.  It was inspired by the Viva La Verve Sketch.

In addition, in honor of my self proclaimed CAS week on my blog :), I also wanted to share a fun little back to school notebook that I made for the boys.  I picked the notebooks up for really cheap and I thought they'd be perfect to pop notes to them in their lunch boxes.  I combined my Verve & PTI stamps for the easy, peasy little notebook.  I love the Dream Big sentiment from Verve's Words of Wisdom.  Perfect for so many occasions!

Hi There!

Guess where we just came home from?  A gorgeous week in Ocean Isle, North Carolina!  Lots of relaxation at the beach (with some awesome waves!) and at the pool too...more pictures to come, but I thought you'd like these two of my happy little guys. How about Collin's volcano and Marcel's big muscles?
I was itching to get inky last night (yes...after 11 hours in the car) and my mum certainly helped out.  We came home to a stocked kitchen.  She is simply the best and it certainly saved us from having to go out to the grocery lsast night.  So...I decided to have a go at the current Verve Get Your Diva On Challenge. The challenge was to have a tag on your card. Hope you have a fabulous Sunday!  We're off to the Cincinnati Reds game this afternoon.

Ingredients: Verve Accent Notes Stamps; Lilly Bee Designs Paper; PTI Button, Ribbon and Twine; SU Cherry Cobbler, Baja Breeze and Basic Black Ink; Hero Arts Gems

Happy Birthday Olivia!

It was my niece, Olivia's, 10th birthday.  It's a big milestone to hit double digits!  I wanted to make up a sweet, girly card to celebrate with her.  I pulled out my Basic Grey Olivia paper...a fun coincidence that the paper is named after her :)!  Maureen taught me how to make these fun felt flowers.  I really didn't believe her that they only take a minute.  They are super fun.  If I had little girls, I would be making these for their headbands or purses!

Jonathon and I had fun picking out Olivia's present.  I always enjoy picking out presents for my nieces, but honestly am out of touch when it comes to what the trends are with girl toys.  We picked up Squinkies.  Ever heard of those? Walking through Target, I asked Jonathon what to get and he said those immediately.  We're hoping she likes them.  Happy Birthday Sweet Olivia.  We love you very much!

The layout for my card was inspired by the fabulous Viva La Verve sketch below.   

Blowing Bubbles

Do you remember when/where you were when you first learned to blow a bubble?  I was in the "back back" of our family station wagon driving from Pittsburgh to New Mexico...that was a loooonnng drive. My cousin, David, taught me how to blow bubbles and shuffle cards on that trip.   When I got home from work last night, Jonathon was proudly showing me how he learned to blow a bubble yesterday.  Of course, I had to snap a few pictures!
I also wanted to share a card for the latest Viva la Verve Sketch Challenge.  I used some of my newer papers for this card...it came together quickly and I'm pleased with the nice clean layout with a few extra little embellishments.  Hope you like it too!

Ingredients:  Cardstock:  PaperTrey Ink Kraft, Stampin' Up Cherry Cobbler and Whisper White; Ink:  Stampin' Up Basic Black, Kraft White and Cherry Cobbler; Twine:  The Twinery; Stamps:  Verve New Mercies; Ribbon: Stampin' Up Cherry Cobbler; Die:  Verve, Stampin' Up and Spellbinders; Patterned Paper:  Lily Bee Designs

Time to Celebrate

It was one of my co-workers birthday on Monday...and since he is a guy...I decided to pull out some of my less frilly patterned papers for the current Verve Diva Dare challenge.  The challenge is "Sentimental About Paper".  Clean, simple and perfect for a guy...

With Heartfelt Sympathy

Hello there...I've been on a bit of a blue kick using up some of my blue patterned paper.  My sympathy card is using last week's Viva La Verve sketch created by Maureen who will be in town very, very soon!  The stamps are from my new Verve New Mercie's set.

I'm keeping this quick as I'm heading to bed in a few minutes!

Get Your Diva On!

Good morning!  This week I came home to two packages from Verve.  One from my order for this month's release and the second package from Maureen as an early hostess event!  In less than one week, I'll get to meet her in person and she sent me fabulous Verve stamps as a thank you.  I think I doubled my total number of Verve stamps in one week and that equals happiness for me.  So now...onto the challenge for this month.    The Get Your Diva On Challenge challenge is to make a card inspired by some Pretty Purse Pastic.  My first card is inspired by my bank card.  I picked up on the shades of orange and the diamond image using the Verve's Accent Notes set to create a damask type background.  I love that the top of the image is a heart and it fits perfectly with the sentiment for the card.

My second card is inspired by the Target gift card that one of my boys received as a birthday gift. I loved the fun colors so I decided to color the sentiment stamp from Verve's Big Wishes and coordinate it with the colors from the My Mind's Eye Lime Twist paper.

I hope your weekend gets off to a fabulous start!  I'm off to buy donuts for the boys...Jonathon had a friend sleepover and donuts are the breakfast request!