This is a scrapbook layout I finished doing a challenge at CocoaDaisy.com, a new site I discovered with so many talented scrappers.

I am hoping to sell at the Farmer's Market in Phoenixville. They are having a Bee festival to pay homage to the honey bee for all it does for our gardens. These are some of the ideas I have come up with to sell. I know I need some help with my photography, and editing doesn't seem to be working for me either.

I have made a card, candle and some wine charms, some with beaded wire holders and the others will have a hoop and some beads to put them on the wine glass.

All about Jake

This post is all about Jake. Jake has always thought his hair to be his strength, there have been really ugly scenes at the salon when he has been forced to get his hair cut. Last night started off that way, he was whining and begging not to go. These pictures do not really show the length of his hair. While I really don't mind long hair on boys, I cannot stand the long bangs in the eyes (I know it's a grown up thing!). You can actually see his eyes in these photos, usually not so much. So with out further fanfare here is Jake before:

and here is Jake after:

Isn't he handsome?

inspired by the Gnome Walk

Jake and his friend with their Spring Show t-shirts.

I have been following The Shabby Stamper's blog http://ponygirl40stamps.blogspot.com/2010/03/knobbly-gnome-walk-day-three.html for the past 3 days, she is doing a gnome walk with her favorite set Knobbly Gnomes, which as it happens is my favorite set too! I haven't had time to play with the set because I am making so many thank you cards for the middle school. So I took inspiration from one of her gnome cards to make one of my Alice cards. Take a look at her Gnome card, I used the same techniques as her, except I used flannel background for the bottom layer. This card is for the costume designer so I wanted lots of texture. I popped Alice up. I used certainly celery, bashful blue and very vanilla. I colored Alice with watercolor pencils. Thanks for looking!

more Alice in Wonderland cards

Two more cards I made for the play my son is in. The stamps are from a set I got from RedEowyn. The Dodo Bird is for the band director. I used a sheet of music form a very old piano book dated 1918. I found the book in tatters at a used book sale. You can see the paper is very brittle. I really liked this title for the card so I choose to think the tears give it character :) I used Bravo Burgundy ribbon and card stock. The Alice card is for the Art Teacher who has made incredible scenery with the help of a group of students. One of the scenery pieces has a flamingo on it so I thought this was a good image for him. For this card I used SU's Cameo Coral, and Bravo Burgundy for the mat and photo corners, I colored with prisma water color pencils and a blending pen. I have two more cards to make, the school's other art teacher is helping with the program and some work on the scenery and a parent volunteer is making almost all the costumes, by hand, by herself, wow!

thanks for looking!

new anti card challenge on SCS

oh boy, I happened upon a brand new challenge called an anti card challenge, since I love making other projects besides cards, this will be right up my alley. http://www.splitcoaststampers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=482486

Lauraos wanted us to make a bookmark for our next door neighbor's daughter, Hermoine, who is turning 10 today. I decided since she has 6 older brothers she is quite the tomboy, and as well as being an avid reader plays the guitar. She has started her own rock band, "The Rockin' Readers". Ok that is lame, lol, doesn't matter no one reads my blog anyway :)

I used some not so new but totally uninked stamp sets for this, Su's Extreme Guitar and Extreme Elements. I also folded the book mark in 1/2 and put some little basic grey magnets on it so it stays put. The dimensions are 8 1/2 x 1 3/4 for the very vanilla and 9 x 2 for the yo yo yellow card stock.

ho challenge #2 single layer

This week's Ho Challenge http://craftyhoschallenge.blogspot.com/ is to make a single layer card with ribbon and button (s). I just got these Alice in Wonderland stamps from RedEowyn because my son's school is performing the play and I wanted to make the adults in charge thank you cards. Let me know what you think, good enough for the director? I am not sure if I like the coloring on this one. It came out brighter than what I wanted. I do love the wood button and it is the only one I have.

This card fits in with the teapot tuesday challenge here: http://mothermark.blogspot.com/2010/...ht-hed-be.html

Crane cs

SU ribbon

wood button

watercolor pencils and blender

Stazon brown ink

My family played a game tonight at dinner. We almost always play a game at dinner, tonight we played Pigs. You roll two rubber pigs and get points assigned to how they land. Someone has to keep score and when we play we have to search for paper and pencil. So tonight after dinner I came up to the craft room and made this folder. Inside is a 5x8 pad of paper. The flap has a magnet holding it closed. I used SU retired dp and the stamps are also SU called card game. I love the red satin ribbon across it with the little heart brad. So now when we need to keep score we will still have to search, but hopefully we will find this cute pad!

another challenge! CPS155

I remember my friend Joy - aka Daiseyfreak http://daiseyfreak.blogspot.com/ - saying, once you start challenges they become addicting, and since she is an addiction therapist I think she knows of what she speaks! Well just what I needed, another addiction, but wait, this is a good addiction because it helps me use the stash from my craft supply hoarding addiction LOL!

For this card I used SU's French script background on some KandCompany dp also where the dp strip came from, a chicken wire background (cannot remember where I got this). The rooster is from Rustic Rooster an old SU set it is popped up with dimensionals and the sentiment is from Carte Postale, held on with hodgepodge hardware. The twine was in the garage.

I seem to be in a French mood looking at the past few cards I made. I guess because my 6th grader is taking French this marking period and comes home talking about it (not speaking in French though). I think I will give this to one of my daughter's most remarkable and talented teachers, Kate, she gives Abby singing lessons, is her choir teacher and she and her husband bought an old farmhouse they are rebuilding. With all the work they needed to do just to live comfortably in the house they still decided to build a chicken coop and take care of chickens, a 3 year old and a newborn. Makes me tired to just imagine this.

This card was made using the sketch from this challenge:

http://cardpositioningsystems.blogspot.com/

now since I am just jumping on the challenge bandwagon I am not sure I am doing everything I am supposed to do to fulfill the challenge. I am just starting to randomly find challenges that look interesting to me. I found this on the most talented Jeanne Strieff's blog: http://inkypaws.blogs.splitcoaststampers.com/

If I didn't do anything I was supposed to please let me know so I can become a better challenge player!

Thanks so much for looking. I am off to look at the 80 cards posted ahead of mine. Hey it's a snow day I am stuck inside anyway :)

Spring Ho Challenge

I have met a great group of ladies on Splitcoast Stampers. We have gotten together from all over the country to stamp together. Some of my fellow stamping ho's are setting up weekly challenges, so of course these are some challenges I am going to make sure not to miss. This week is the first one, think spring! I think I have been saving this stamp just for this card. So putting ink to new rubber I bring you my first spring card. You will recognize the saffron background as the same one I did for this morning's card. I goofed on this one but the image covers it nicely and I couldn't throw away a perfectly good piece of card stock LOL! this card uses all StampinUp! materials, elegant eggplant, so saffron and whisper white cardstock, white taffeta ribbon and a piece of silver hodgepodge hardware (oh yeah I broke that out from my hoarding!) the image is Serene Spring. The challenge can be found here if anyone wants to play along: http://craftyhoschallenge.blogspot.com

Moxie Fab World Trigger Tuesday entry

I got inspired by a challenge today. I don't really do many of the challenges I find out there, but I thought it might be a good way to start stretching my creativity. I used all StampinUp products, the cs colors are black, kraft and so saffron. I embossed the french script background in white and embossed the bird in black. The greeting and bird stamps are from the set Carte Postale. The white ribbon is the very elegant taffeta ribbon. The border punch is a SAB reward from SU. I found this challenge here:

http://www.moxiefabworld.com/2010/02/tuesday-trigger-inspiration-straight.html

let me know what you think :)

I have another challenge to work on today, but I thought I might post this before life got too hectic.

family banner

Today I decided to try to finish putting things back into the craft room, when I got a bunch of boxes emptied and put away, I rewarded myself by making something just for me :)

I made this banner from a mega pack of stuff from Cosmo Cricket I found in an outlet store.

I think I will hang it in the craft room or maybe by my bed.

A Blog Hop!

For my friend Gabby

I took a long time trying to photograph this card and still all the glitter did not show up. She has pink sparkles in her hair and the blue background is outlined in sparkles. I took the inspiration for the colors from my daughter's room.

Rock on Gabby

This digi stamp is being offered at Paper Make Up stamps with all the proceeds going to Gabby's family.

you may need to scroll down to Moody for Rock. Thank you for hopping with us all today, I hope you enjoyed all the creative cards my friends designed.

Don't forget to comment on Joni's blog for a chance to win this awesome image http://astickysituation.blogspot.com/

Big Snow

Oh yeah it snowed overnight. It really snowed. by the time it stops we will have at least 2 feet of snow. Too bad for the kids it is Saturday, . Jake is measuring the snow at 15 inches and it is still snowing hard. Jake and Layla went out in the morning for some wild romping in the snow. We have had a hard time getting Layla back inside. She loves snow. Jake got a chance to go sledding with our neighbors Ricky and Dierdre at the elementary school yard. Abby walked herself over to Sarah's house because they were both soooooooooo booooooooooored. Josh got to play with the snowblower, he helped some neighbors dig out too.

Christmas cards started!!!

I can't believe I have started my Christmas cards in February. I am not late I am early this time. I was so sad I never got cards out to all my friends this year, I decided to join a challenge to make 5 cards a month. I figure that will be about 50 cards, that should be fine. I put some sparkle on this card, you just can't see it in the photo. I also popped up the joy ornament and the merry christmas on the red ornament. I really need to figure out how to take better card photos. I am trying to keep the cards simple and flat, so I don't have to figure out different postage on the different designs I make.

Top Note Swap finished!

I joined Tracy's (tdean32) big shot topnote swap on SCS. I took a spot in the ABAC (anything but a card) and a card spot. I made these gift card holders for my ABAC spot. I saw the idea on Beth Beard's blog, I made some adjustments because I didn't have one of the dies she used, I just made a smaller version of the large envelope for the gift card. Her version is here http://stampwithbeth.typepad.com/stamp-with-beth/2010/01/gift-card-holder.html Thank you Beth for sharing this great idea.

This top note card is made with SU's Of the Earth stamp set. I stamped the flowers in white craft ink and then stamped over it in ruby red. It gave the look of snow tipped flowers. I also used the texturz plate to give the ruby red cs a wood like appearance.
I got a chance to do some stamping with friends. I don't really have much chance to go somewhere and just stamp for fun. Teresa took me out to Northeast Philly to meet her friend Wendy. We made valentine mailboxes and the cards I posted earlier with the sweet treat heart cups.

another card

here is another card I made for valentine's day, a couple of versions. I also sent this one to my friend DJ. I was in her swap on SCS - "I Love You Man"

trying to work out blog issues. Somehow the lay out on my blog changed since last year when I posted.

Ok I have not posted in forever. I am really going to try to be better at this LOL!

I made some valentine goodies using the StampinUp! heart treat cups and some of the new clear mount stamps SU! just came out with. May I just say I love the clear mount rubber. What a space saver. I have been redoing my craft room since Christmas and it will be a great help to unmount my stamps so they fit in a dvd or cd case instead of the bulky bubble packs they come in now. I have over 350 stamp sets (can you say addiction?) and as you can see it is a mess, even though I just organized them. If you look at the 2nd cubby from the left you will see 20 sets in the dvd holders, much neater and easier to organize. So pictures of cards and a sneak peak at my new room. When I get it all finished I will post pictures of the whole room, before I can destroy it!

I felt the card on the left was a little bland so I jazzed it up a bit, I like both versions though.