BEST OF 2009

Thought I would do a little review of 2009 so I can remember how the year played out.

My 2009 goals were to lose 15 pounds and pay off the last two credit cards. Well, neither one of those happened so I will try again.

Favorites of 2009:

Favorite spiritual moment: The simple faith of my kindergarten students.

Favorite Book: Sarah Palin: Going Rogue

Favorite Movie: The Notebook

Favorite non-craft purchase: Bathroom 4 chamber soap dispenser

Favorite craft purchase: Cricut Expression

Favorite vacation: Puerto Rico

Favorite get-away: Canoe Bay Resort

Favorite remodeling project: New bathroom shower

Favorite laughable moment: "Does Jesus believe in Santa Claus?"

All in all it has been a great year! Our wonderful Lord has brought us all safely through it, only a few minor accidents. Steve is still employed and I have a wonderful job that I really enjoy.

Now it is time to look ahead to what the Lord has for us in 2010. I pray He will be able to find me faithful.

October Blog Hop

WooHoo! It is time for the October PTI Blog Hop. This month is all about sharing Christmas ideas. So, last minute I came up with these two cards. The ideas came from an old craft magazine but I tweaked them using a couple of my PTI stamp sets.

The first one uses the NEW Holiday Tree set with a sentiment from the NEW Tree Trimming Trio. Colors and inks are Ocean Tides, Black and Vintage Cream. The second card uses Pure Poppy CS with the New Rustic Snowflakes DP. The stamp is from the 2008 Holiday Tags set.

Thanks for stopping by!!!

I'm Back!

Wow! What a summer! I couldn't wait for school to be out so I could have some free time. Well, I think I've been even busier. lol!

I had a request for 2 cards for the girls from church that are heading off to college this week. I wanted to use my new Everyday Button Bits stamps from PTI and these seemed that they would work fabulously. I am so pleased with the way these turned out. I do need to order MORE PTI buttons though. The first card is made from the buttons in my stash and the second card is using the wonderful PTI butons. What a FUN assortment.

Enjoy!

PaperTrey Princess Challenge

I am so thankful for this challenge! I have been spending every free moment working on the cookbook I'm putting together for my home economics class. The girls turned in over 1000 recipes and now I'm working like crazy to get them all into cookbook form. I would really like to get it DONE before my kindergarten curriculm comes. It will be strange to shift gears from teaching highschool home ec. to teaching a classroom full of 5-6 year olds. I'm exceited about it though!

On to the challenge! We were shown a picure of this beautiful April Cornell placemat and napkin. The challenge was to make a card following the same colors and design.

I used Vintage Cream CS as my base and some of the layers. I also used Ripe Avocado and Spring Rain CS and ink. The stamp sets I used were Fancy Flourishes and Mega Mixed Messages. The ribbon is Ripe Avocado and the button is Spring Rain with the Cream Twine. The fold idea came from the Journal of Paper Engineering. (what a fun book!)

All items used are PTI except for the message layer and that was cut out using my Cuttlebug and Nestabilities.

Bring on the next challenge! I need to get my head out of the cookbook sometime!

Baby Shower and Graduation!

Ah, procrastinated again! DMIL (Dear Mother-in-Love) needs a card for a baby shower and I need a card for a graduation celebration.

I made these up this afternoon and now we need to leave in about 5 minutes. Nothing like waiting until the last minute.

Everything I used is PTI and Nestabilities. They were both inspired by cards I saw in CARDS.

Enjoy!!!

Weekend Fun!

What a wonderful weekend! I was able to make three more cards; one Father's Day, one Praying for you, and one Graduation.

The Father's Day card was designed from one I found in my Cards mag. as well as the Graduation one. The Praying for you idea was from the PTI gallery. As you can tell, I'm not very creative on my own. Thanks to others that are willing to share their ideas so that I can get headed in the right direction.

I finally used my clear cardstock on the grad card. I really like it, however, it is difficult to photograph.

ENJOY!

Stamp sets: Fresh Alphabet, Scattered Showers, Friends til the End, Wise Owl, and Around & About Sentiments.

Happy Father's Day with PTI

What a fun day! I got all of my "FLYing" done this morning so I could spend the afternoon making Father's Day cards for the church bookstore.

WOW! At first I was really bummed that I hadn't purchase "Men of Life" for my Father's Day cards but as you can see, I made out just fine.

I grabbed my newest issue of Cards Magazine (June 2009) and got inspired!!! My ideas came from Dawn McVey (Father's Day: Tea Leaves), Danielle Holsapple (Background Spot and Dots), Davinie Fiero (Owls), and Kandis Smith (Birds). Thanks, ladies!!! You all ROCK!!!

All of the backgrounds were stamped with PTI stamps except for the Tea Leaf paper, which is also from PTI.

Stamp sets used were:

Faux Ribbon, Background Basics: Spots and Dots, Father Knows Best, Fresh Alphabet, Pond Life, Around and About, Wise Owl, Polka Dot Basics, Heartfelt Basics, Mailbox Greetings, Background Basics: Text Style, Bird Watching, Mega Mixed Messages, Journaling Lines, and Trajan Monogram.

Just about all of the cardstock and inks are PTI except for the colors that PTI hasn't come out with yet, like SU! Creamy Caramel and SU! Ruby Red.

Buttons were from my stash and the twine is from PTI and I LOVE IT!!!

My FAVORITE is the way that the background on the bird card was made with Journaling Lines using Ocen Tides ink in one direction and Dark Chocolate for the other drection.

I hope you have enjoyed seeing these cards and maybe I can pass some of the inspiration on to you!

ENJOY!

PaperTrey Princesses Challenge 2 & 3

Whew!  I finally finished challenge 2 and here is a challenge 3 card with a bit of challenge 2 added into it.  

If you remember, challenge two was to dust off some PTI stamp sets that hadn't been used or seen ink in a while.  I hadn't used Background Basics: Spots and Dots or Teacher's Apple.  Challenge 3 was to make a card with out any additional layers.  

DS#4 wanted a card for his teacher, so I used my neglected Teacher's Apple Set and did a Challenge 3 card with just stamping on the card base.  I really like the simplicity of this card.  Jonny, I hope your teacher likes it!  I sure do!!!

On my Spots and Dots card, I added a Nestability circle stack and used a sentiment from Mega Mixed Messages.  

PTI Princesses, Challenge 2, card 2

What a fun stamp set, "Around & about Sentiments"!  I knew there was a reason I ordered it. ;)  I found a card that Pine did in the PTI gallery and I put my own spin on it.  I LOVE the way that you can curvy, swurvy the sentiments.  I really think it adds a great deal of pizzaz.  

This is one of my new favorite color combos, Dark Chocolate, Melon Berry, and Kraft.  I also used my new Versamark Dazzle pad on the flowers along the side.  There are also some Vintage Cream dots on the kraft.  

Thank you once again Pine for your great inspiration and for designing such a cool stamp set.  You are doing MN proud!!!

Two cards down, two more to go....

PTI Princesses, challenge 2, card 1

Happy Mother's Day!  My family has kicked me out of the kitchen so I thought I would post my final Mother's Day card.  This is the one that I made for my Mother-in-Love.  

Michelle issued the second Papertrey Ink Princesses challenge to use a PTI set that we have but we haven't used.

Unfortunately/fortunately I have 4 sets that haven't seen ink yet.  

It was a lot of fun to finally ink up my Life set.  I love the soft look of these flowers.  I was inspired by a card I found in the PTI gallery by moxelliot .  I changed quite a few things but she got me headed in the right direction.  Thank you!

I used a Lavendar Moon background card and then layered it with Plum Pudding, Lemon Tart, and PTI White.  The flowers and the sentiment are from the "Life" stamp set and the "Happy Mother's Day" is from the Women of Life set.  The ribbons are Lavendar Moon and Lemon Tart. The scallop is made using a Fiskers scallop punch.  

I have challenged myself to use all of the uninked sets to complete this challenge.  1 down, three to go!  

Procrastination Mother's Day

Now I did it!  I procrastinated making my Mom's Mother's Day card and I had to send it priority to hope it gets to her on time.  Why do I do this to myself?  I made all these M.D. cards for the bookstore but don't take care of my own Mom.  

Oh well, thanks to the PTI gallery, I found a beautiful idea from a card Maggie Holmes had made using "Wishing You".  This is my rendition of her card.  I really like the way the bow turned out and the embossing of the Fresh Snow ink was wonderful.  The fine detail embossing powder PTI sells is fabulous!

The card base is Lemon Tart and the scallop border is Aqua Mist.  I used the Fisker's border punch to make the scallop.  The ribbon is Berry Sorbet and the buttons are from my stash.  I keep telling myself I have to use up what I already own before I buy the PTI buttons.  This gets harder with each color release!!!

The stamp sets are Wishing You and Women of Life.  Thanks for stopping by to say "Hi"!

Hoppy Birthday and Mother's Day Tea

Here is a fun card I whipped up really quick since DS#4 needed a card for a b-day party.  I love how Guidelines 2 can be a fast fix for guy cards, yound and old.  I used the frog from Pond Life and also the Hoppy and the Birthday.  I put tape over the part of the sentiment that I didn't want to stamp, inked up the stamp, removed the tape, and I only got the words that I wanted. I also used my Nestability Stars. 

Next is a  group of fun gift sets I made for the church bookstore.  The sentiment is mainly from Warm Happiness but I did insert the "Mom" from Women of Life and used the tape trick again to remove the "a friend".  The tea pot is from the Tea for Two stamp set.  The patterned paper I used is from the Making Memories Flower Patch collection.  This collection is what the Stampin' Flybaby's Spring Craft Kit contains.  So fun and cheery!!!  Thanks again, Lauren, for your wonderful Timeless Template, available only from www.papertreyink.com !!!!!!

I backed the openings in the box with the heavy plastic that the PTI stamps come on originally.  I'm so good at recycling!  lol

Blog Award

I have just been honored by receiving this fantastic award.  Thank you Edith.  I feel so undeserving.  I do love the Lord with all my heart and I do try to honor Him in my life and in my crafts.  

The Exalting Christ blog award is given to bloggers who consistently exalt the name of Christ on their blogs. What a joy to see crafters blend their passion for Christ and papercrafting. This award is given to bloggers who share Christ through their posts or through the design of their artwork. We are commanded in Scripture to be "salt and light" sharing the Good News of Jesus no matter where we are (Matthew 5:13-16). This award is just a way members of Women to Women: Sharing Jesus can say thanks for exalting Christ with us!

Rules:

1. Post the blog award in a regular post on your blog with the explanation, including the original link to WTW and the rules for passing the award along
2. Name five people (more or less is fine!) to whom you want to offer this award and link to their blogs. The blogs need to obviously exalt Christ in some manner.
3. Contact the bloggers you have named to let them know they can pick up their blog award from you.
4. Invite them to permanently display the WTW blog badge and/or the award on their blogs. The badge can be obtained on the WTW site.

I"ll have to come back and add my list of people that I will pass this on to.

Bridal Shower with PTI

Welcome Back!

Mrs. Bookstore wanted some Bridal Shower cards since there is a shower in the month of May for one of the ladies in the church.  Looks like PaperTrey came out with the Scattered Showers set just in time!  Here are 3 of the cards and the 4th one is down in the Papertrey Princesses challenge post.  

They all use Scattered Showers for both the image and the saying.  I really like how they all look so different with using basically the same stamps.

The first card is made with Aqua Mist and Lemon Tart cardstock.  The second one uses Pure Poppy and PTI White.  The third one uses Vintage Cream, Aqua Mist and Ocean Tides.   I saw the idea for the cut off Nestability die cut on Dawn's Blog

She sure does GREAT work!!!

Well, I hope the cards sell and that the bride likes them!

April PTI Blog Hop

 Welcome to another Papertrey Ink Blog Hop.  This month we needed to use one of Lauren Meader's templates.  I LOVE these templates!

This project uses the Recipe Wrap-Up.  I used it to help organize all of my gift cards.  Our school started using a program that when we buy gift cards part of the money goes back to the school.  I hav

e lots of gift cards to organize and keep track of the balances.  

PaperTrey Princesses Challenge #1

Welcome, Papertrey Princesses, to your first challenge.  For this challenge I would like for you to use paper piecing to show off some of those great outline images.  

I flunked coloring, so until I master the art of using copics, I like to use this technique to add a splash of color to my cards.  

The first card uses the new Tea for Two tea pot.  I also used the small tea cup from the new anniversary set and the verse from Warm Happiness.  The tea pot is paper pieced using the Polka Dot Parade patterned paper.

Card two uses the Scattered Showers outline umbrella along with the Pink Patterns patterned paper.  

For the third card I used the PTI stamp set Boards and Beams along with the Everyday Blessings patterned paper.  Even the roof and trees

are paper pieced.

I can't wait to see how you use paper piecing in your cards, layouts, or other paper projects.  

Happy Mother's Day

Just a really quick post showing some of the Mother's Day cards I made for the church bookstore.  These are all so different it is hard for me to pick a favorite.  

I think I am done making M.D. cards for the bookstore, now I need to make some for my Mom and my Mother-in-love.  

Happy Birthday Mom and Filed with Flair

Wow!  Two posts in one day!  

This first card is one we made for Ink Pad Missions and I liked it so much I made one for my Mom too.  It uses PTI's Woman of Life set.  The colors are also from PTI. 

Next is the FANTASTIC Filed with Flair boxes I made with Lauren Meader's template that can be purchased from PTI. (www.papertreyink.com)  These are so fun and EASY to make.  I made a different color of box for each type of card.  As I finish a card I put it in the appropriate box.  When a box has 10 cards in it I will take it to the bookstore to sell.  I should have taken pictures of the sides. I used the Friends til the End patterned paper.  I'll have to photo the side of the next box I make.  The fun part was seeing all of the PTI sentiments I have from different sets.  

Enjoy!!!

Raspberry Suite Week 3

I finally decided to join in the fun and partcipate in Dawn's color challenge.  Once I got going this was a lot of fun.  All of the cardstock I used is from PapertreyInk and My die cuts are made with Labels One Nestablities.  After all of the talk about how to attach the ribbon "through" the button holes I had to try it myself.  The sentiment is from PTI's Heartfelt Basics.

Well, Suzanne, it took me a while to find it, but I finally did and I thank you for this award!  I do feel loved!

You will all need to stop by Suzanne's blog and check out not only her gorgeous cards but also her beautiful quilts.  Even better yet is when she combines the two.  WOW, girl!  You do wonderful work!

Now it is my turn to pass on this award. 

The rules for passing this award on: you must post the award on your blog, name the person who awarded you, then pass the award to 6 other bloggers and leave a message on their blog that they've received the award.

1. Kerianne 

2. Edith

3. Lori

4. Lee

5. Cheryl

6. Michele

I invite you to stop by and visit the blogs of each of these wonderful ladies.  They inspire me to be a better stamper, a better organizer of my time, and have a closer walk with God. 

Bookstore Grad Cards

Time to start gearing up for graduation.  The bookstore lady said she wanted 30 grad cards so I figured I'd best get movin'.  Here are eight cards to add to the collection.  As I've said before, these are inspired by other people.  I sure wish when I printed out ideas the printout would say whose they were.  Oh well, if one of them looks like something you have done, THANKS!!! 

I think all of them use PTI stamps.  The die cuts are made using Spellbinder's Nestabilities.

2 Masculine Guidelines 2

Okay, you are probably sick of this set by now but I'm still loving it!  It makes it so easy to make great guy cards.  Here is one for a guy in our church and one for my big brother.  The first card also uses Mega Mixed Messages and the second one uses Father Knows Best and Birthday Blessings.

I hope they both enjoy them!  

PTI March Blog Hop

WooHoo!  Time for the March Blog Hop at Papertrey Ink! This month we were to make our background paper and then use it in our project.  I had such a hard time figuring out which was my fav, so you get to see my fav 4!  

Here are my four backgrounds.  I apologize for the shadows.  It has been raining here forever, or so it seems.  Hard to get a good pic with cloudy skies and no sunlight

And here are my four cards.  I really am enjoying using Guide Lines 2 from the March PTI release.  It makes creating backgrounds soooooo much fun!  I also used "Wishing You" with those beautiful tulips and "Mega Mixed Messages" so I can say just the right thing in just the right size.  

Thanks for stopping by!  

Easter & the Bookstore

Today I got an order for about 75 cards.  I should be able to make some progress on my using stamps challenges this way!

5 of the ordered cards are Easter cards so these are the first three.  Since they are for the church bookstore I figured I'd best not use bunny's or eggs.  Unfortunately, I don't have an Easter cross, so colors and Easter sayings will have to do for this year.  

I found the ideas for these cards in the SCS gallery so if I CASED your card, THANK YOU!  I have not much originality!  I used PTI stamp sets on all of these except for the Happy Easter  stamp that is from SU!  I am sooooo looking forward to receiving my Mega Mixed Messages stamps  from PTI so that I can have a larger version of the Easter Wishes.

Thanks for stopping by!  Come back again to see how I am doing on my order! 

PTI- Dawn's Color Combo Challenge

Final card for the PTI Anniversary Challenges.  Suppose I'll win with this one?

Dark Chocolate

Aqua Mist

Lemon Tart

PTI Friendship

Today's PTI challenge is to create a card for your bestest friend.   I sure hope she likes it!

PTI Sketch Challenge

Not my favorite card but I do like these colors together.  I used Faux Ribbon and Polka Dot Basics.

This card was made for a Papertrey Ink sketch Challenge.  Random winner receives LOTS of PTI ribbon!  SWEET!!!

Over the Rainbow with PTI

The challenge is to make a card or project using Pure Poppy, Summer Sunrise, Ocen Tides, and Ripe Avocado.  I have so many Valentine's cards to make I decided to combine the two.  Enjoy!

I was inspired by a card in CARDS April '08.  Pardon the photography.  Not the best time of the day for pictures, plus picture taking isn't "my thing".

Time for another Blog Hop.  I haven't done one of these for a while, but it is good to be back.

For the January Blog Hop we were to make a birthday card.  I couldn't decide which one to do so you get to see both of them.  Our third son has a birthday tomorrow so the "Out of the Box" card is for him.  I got the idea from the Aug. 2008 Cards magazine.  I used Pure Poppy and Ocean Tides.  Thanks Niki for showing us how to use Faux Ribbon to make background papers.

Next is a card using "Out on a Limb, Revised".  This idea also came from a Cards Magazine.  I used Raspberry Fizz ink and ribbon on this card.  

Both of these cards go towards my challenge to make 5 cards using some of my PTI stamps that haven't seen ink in a while.

Here's the count so far:

Butterfly Kisses-0/5
Mailbox Greetings-1/5
Out of the Box-1/5
Out on a Limb-1/5
Silent Night-0/5
Teacher's Apple-0/5
Boxes Bags and Tags-5/5

Boxes, Bags & Tags

Here are the first five cards for my challenge.  These were all made using PTI stamp sets and most of them were CASED from the PTI gallery.  Thanks So Much was from Mary K., Get Well Tea from Julie Cameron, With Sympathy from Mary K, Baby was inspired by Niki E, and Special Birthday was actually my own idea.

I hope you enjoy looking at these.