Stock tip.....

Remember when I said that everyone should consider buying stock in Barnes and Noble since it appeared that my family was keeping it in business? Wellllll.....buy LOTS of stock in it.

1) Tuesday night went to B&N so DH could buy a new book to take on his weeklong trip with his grandparents. Everyone in the family walked out with more than one book

2) It would appear that yours truely walked out with FOUR books

3) As of 4:18pm I have finished THREE of those books

Obviously I have a reading addiction. I don't seem to have a "type" of book that I favor. I just LOVE to read. I really admire those that can capture my imagination with words (I HATE watching movies of the books I've read....."they" (whoever "they" are) usually miss the MAIN part of the book).

But, I digress. The latest books that made the list:

Janet Evanovich's Fearless Fourteen: Yes, I've read all the other's but Thirteen (don't know why I missed that one). Easy afternoon reading. I find the Stephanie Plum character amusing. Maybe because she bumbles her way through life (kinda like me....but she ends up with two hot guys wanting her and I end up with three guys who put up with me, hehe)

The Art of Racing in the Rain by Garth Stein. Here's the books summary: " A heart-wrenching but deeply funny and ultimately uplifting story of family, love, loyalty, and hope--a captivating look at the wonders and absurdities of human life....as only a dog could tell it".
I don't know if I'd say it was deeply funny. But, it grabbed me and made me bawl at the end (got to quit reading books like that. I'm going to make myself look 10 years older with all this crying I've been doing lately over these books)

And Sarah Dunn's Secrets to Happiness. No tears. Good. Kinda scary in that I could see myself knowing (hopefully, not being) the different characters.

Those who can write just amaze me. I sooo wish I had that talent. Just imagine~~the ability to make someone pick up a book and not put it down until it is done because that person just has to know what happens next (ok, ok...I will admit, that sometimes it is an avoidance thing, but hey!!! It still has to hold your attention.....or mine!!)

**********************************
Kids are gone for a week with their grandparents and yes, they took their cameras. How is it that my kids have iPods, digital cameras and yet their mother has neither of those?!!
I did not make any new projects to share while they are gone. I hope that you will stick with me as I share some favorites from the blast from the past. It might be cards. It might be paintings. It might be some "artsy" moments of photography. It might be more book reviews.

Gotta love creativity. It can come in sooo many different areas. Hope you'll join me this next week as I go off the stamping path a bit and do some exploring.

Retro to Modern

A little background history is needed to explain this (belated) Father's day card.

A few months after the Toad (DH) and I got married, we bought our first home. It was a condo that was decorated in a lovely 70's shade of avocado (?) green. All the walls had wall paper on them (including the kitchen ceiling!). We were both working full time and trying to train daily as we were racing mountain bikes also at the time. That did not leave a whole lot of time for working on updating our new home. So, when the TV died, we decided not to replace it ~ that way we would not be tempted to sit in front of the boob tube instead of getting stuff done. (There were many jokes among our mountain biking friends about our entertainment highlights being putting a red sock in with the whites and watching it go round and round in the wash).

Forward to 15 years later. While we finally did get a TV, we never hooked it up to cable (the only way to watch it). All we could do is watch videos and later DVD's (and since we were joined by two children in this time period, our TV viewing pretty much was catered to them....veggie tales for a Saturday night, anyone?!!). At Christmas time, we bought the boys a Wii for their big present. But!! It was kept at Grandma/Papa's house because the deal with the kids was that the playroom had to get cleaned out to make room for the Wii. It actually worked out pretty good. The kids were not always asking to play the Wii as it was something that was just done on the weekends when they spent the night at their grandparents house (yes, I'm very lucky.....my kids spend almost every Saturday night at their grandparents!!)

When the oldest turned 12, we brought the Wii over to our house since he was having a friend spend the night. We had many discussions and decided to keep the Wii at home. But!! All those "threats" of the playroom having to be cleaned out, never came to be. 'Cause mom and dad finally figured out that there was not enough room in the playroom that was needed to allow more than 2 kids in there and safely play!!

So, we are sitting in the family room with our little TV in this very LARGE nitch that DH had made for our entertainment center. The Toad calls up his buddy to "just go look and see what is available". Yeah, right. He comes home with this HUGE flat screen TV (one should never let two males go look at electronics without a female present!!). Sooooo, guess what DH's father's day gift was?!!! hehe

Here's the outside of the Retro TV card:

This card is LARGE. It measures 6 1/2" x 5 " not including the rabbit ears. All the knobs were just outlined along the edges with my black copic marker to give them some dimension. Now, here's the kicker~~the inside

BWHAHAAAAA!!!!!!!! I LOVE this image from Art Impressions!! Hehehe!! It's PERFECT for this card, don't ya think?!! I originally wanted to place the "flat screen" tv on the little tv table that Art Impressions has to go with this set. But the angle I had made of my TV screen did not work out with the table and I was too lazy to draw my own (decided that this flat screen was up on the wall). The sentiment on the screen was done on the computer. The border around the TV is faux. The image was stamped on Gina K's 120# Pure Luxury paper and everything was colored with my copics (Once again, I'll apologize for the poor picture. I wasn't able to fold over the top of the card due to the rabbit ears, and trying to hold the card, take the picture and keep the dog from messing everything up, it was a miracle that I got this shot at all!!).

This card took me forever to make mostly because I thought too much about the coloring instead of just doing it!! But I'm very pleased with how it turned out (too bad you can't see all the subtle shading....I about broke my arm patting myself on the back with this one!! hehe)Supplies: Paper: Textured 12x12 creamy caramel and going grey. Brushed silver and chocolate chip and Gina K's 120# pure luxury. Inks: Stazon jet black, copic ciao markers. Accessories: punches galore!

Thanks for stopping by again today. I'm going to try and get a couple of more projects done to spread out over the next week or so. My kids are leaving on a trip to Yellowstone with their grandparents (have I mentioned that I have great In-laws?!) and are taking my....uhhhh, my son's camera, with them so I won't be able to upload anything new!! (When I mentioned to DH that I needed to go buy myself a camera since the boys were going to be gone for a week, he just looked at me and said, "can't you go a week without posting anything?". HEELLLLOOO!!! This man does not GET the importance of blogging!! BWHHAAAAAAAA
I promise I'll post something one way or another...it just might have to be some "blasts from the past" type of thing!!

Have a good one!!

Rome Wasn't Built in One Day....

......but parts of it got painted in 4 hours!!

Tonight is the beginning of VBS (Vacation Bible School) at our church. This past week, the main backdrop to Rome was built and painted by various talented families (yours truly was was not involved in that portion of the set design/work). But the final buildings of Rome didn't get completed until yesterday afternoon/evening. Which means that the portion that I WAS asked to help with needed to be completed TODAY. No time for detailed work. Just slappin' some paint to give the illusion of pillars.

Please excuse the poor pictures. The lights had been turned off and I didn't feel like wandering through the "underground church's" passageway to try and find the main switches (the hallways have been blacked out so that the "leaders" of the different age groups can take the kids to the underground churches that the believers worshiped in). I had a hard time getting a decent angle as the "flags" have already been placed along the main church aisle that designate the different age groups. In other words~~~ these are lousy pictures and I'm not in the mood to try and take more!! LOL!!

The first picture has too much of a glare on it. I'd like to think that in real life the "roundness" of the pillars shows up better since the faint shadowing on the other side of the pillars has gotten washed out in the picture (by this time, the gal that is/was in charge of the set design was tired and HATING all things VBS and just wanted a little bit of paint. Preferably paint applied by someone else. She told me to leave my perfection at the door and just slap on some paint. I tried......)

I'm not sure what those nice circle glares are in the last picture. Who knows?!!

Here's the kicker to the whole project. My oldest DS has "outgrown" VBS and doesn't really want to be a "staff" member. My youngest wants to be with his older brother (which means he does not want to go to VBS either). Sooooo, I'm just going to hope that this qualifies me for a special jewel in my crown (and for those of you who know me....yeah, I know, I need all the help I can get in that department!!)

I'm still working on DH's father's day card. I just got the stamps Saturday night and haven't finished coloring the image. Luckily for me, the man is a gem and will only give me a hard time about my late offerings for the rest of my life (sigh..... or until I'm late with the next card for him!!)

Thanks for stopping by again today!! I'm off to do some coloring!

Foiled.....

.....that pretty much describes my afternoon~~~foiled.

The Toad (aka DH) and his dad took the boys (including the dog) for an overnight camping trip this afternoon. They are driving within 2 miles of their camping spot then loading up all their gear and the boys' on their mountain bikes and "biking" into the camping spot.

WONDERFUL, GLORIOUS FREEDOM TO CREATE ALL DAY!!

Except I got foiled. By a book. I'm sure that I'm the last person to read (or as the book cover indicates, seen the movie) My Sister's Keeper by Jodi Picoult. Yup. Finished 423 pages today (ok...I had started it yesterday...but had only read the first 70 or so pages as of this morning). All my FREE hours that I was going to create, create and then create some more were taken up with reading and ended with me bawling my eyes out over this book and giving myself a headache.

But!! I still need a card for DH's grandfather and for DH for father's day (which, according to my calendar, is TOMORROW). Soooo, I remembered a card that Gina K did on stamp TV. Loved the technique and the colors. Decided to adapt the idea for DH's grandfather's card.

I used SU's exclusive texture plate with an extra piece of paper for the sandwich in my Big Shot with regular tin foil. Stamped my sentiment form SU's All Holidays and did all the matting/layering. IRL the sentiment does NOT look like it is layered crooked. I have looked at it several times to make sure my tear fatigue eyes are not playing tricks on me!! The "brads" are faux made with my 1/4" hand held punch. How can someone run out of something so basic as black brads, I ask you?!! Leave it to me, I would be the one! But this needed something to add that little extra "pop".

I wish I could say that I LOVED how this turned out. But I'm going to be honest here. This one was better in my head (ok, ok, it was better when Gina did it!!). I'm going to walk away from it and see how it hits me tomorrow. Hopefully, I'll have time to come up with something else if the effect is still the same in the am. Supplies: Paper: SU's cranberry crisp, whisper white, basic black. Stamps: SU's All Holidays. Inks: SU cranberry crisp. Accessories: Tin foil, Big Shot, Texture plate, 1/4" hole punch, mini glue dots

Thanks for dropping by again! I'm going to try and stamp out the new images I ordered for DH's card (how many hours do I have before they get home?!! Nothing like procrastination to make one create!!)

Oh Where, Oh Where did my Mo-jo go???

Oh Where, oh Where did my mooo-jo go?
Oh Where? Oh where can it be?
It's gone from me, oh where could it be?
Oh where, oh where could it be?!

Made the mistake of entering into my DS's bedroom with my mojo. Haven't been able to find it since. But have discovered that the kid who just fit into size 12's has now outgrown that size. And that he is now in an adult size 6 1/2 shoe (maybe he stepped on my mojo and squashed it to another world?!). He also has developed a severe dislike to anything that remotely resembles a child's outfit/pajamas (but would consider keeping it if it means he can stop trying on clothes). How did this happen?!

And sadly, both boys have outgrown SEVERAL boxes of books (may I strongly recommend buying stock in Barnes and Noble? It would appear that we are keeping that bookstore in business).

Crossing my fingers that once his desk top and shelves are found, I'll find my mojo. DRATS!! Had TWO kids.....grrrrr.....what if my mojo escaped to the other room?!! Ye gads...it could take DAYS to rescue it!

(obviously, my brain is turning to addled mush with all this cleaning. But, I see the light at the end of the LOOOONG, dark and dreary tunnel. I can only hope that the vast amount of time in this cleaning mode of darkness will not affect me permanently. I've had some urges of painting walls come upon me while scrubbing baseboards. I'm hoping that it was just a moment of delirium in a weakened state of mind)

Please keep up the search for my mojo. I still have a couple of father's day cards yet to make!!

(sigh....back to the dungeon of DS's room.....)

Clean and Simple~~You ROCK!!

Today's addition highlights the thank you cards that I made for DS's b-day. Yes~~~his birthday was almost two weeks ago. Yes, I'm the bad mother who did not get this done sooner. I'd like to think that some check marks will be erased beside my name as I'm still old fashioned enough to believe that thank you cards should be sent and not done with an e-mail or phone call (though, thank yous have been known to be given over the phone in addition to the written notes!!).

I kept with the theme of DS's birthday guitar hero card (which can be seen here). Since I had 7 of these to make, I wanted to keep them simple.

The hardest part of this whole card was the masking of the "R". I had to cut several tiny pieces of tape 7 different times!! I used my Real Red marker to color over the "R" once the tape was removed. Since this is a clear set, the water based marker does not cover the image well. So after stamping, I had to go back over the "R" with the "writing" tip of the marker. Pulled out my copic ciaos and did some light shadowing along the bottom and one edge of the guitar.

This just happens to work for this weeks color challenge on SCS again!! Didn't plan that when I set out to make these, but hey!! I'll take it! I have to say, that I LOVE one layer, b/w cards with just a POP of color!! Supplies: Paper: Whisper White. Ink: Archival Jet Black, Real Red marker. Stamps: Rock Star by Inkadinkado

Well....have only the hallway and the boy's rooms and the dreaded office/craft area to clean. Otherwise, my house is pretty presentable!! WOOHOO!!!! Wonder how long that will last?!!

Thanks for stopping by again!!

Don't Mess With Dad

Today's Wacky Wednesday challenge on the Rubbernecker Blog was to create a Father's Day card. Of course, being more like Erma Bombeck vs Martha Stewart, I have not even started on ANY of the cards that I need to make for this upcoming holiday. I decided to combine this with the sketch challenge on SCS and get a double bang for my buck.

This is a funky card. Originally, I had the 5x5 piece of creamy caramel as my base. Got everything laid out and something just didn't mesh. By chance, I plopped down the base on a scrap piece of Really Rust! AHHHHH!!! It needed that extra pop. Sooooo, since the DP was already adhered to the base, I just cut a piece of Really Rust 1/4" larger than my base and adhered THAT to the creamy caramel. Makes taking decent photos rather challenging...but IRL it's ok! hehe...(that would be Erma being too cheap to cut another piece of DP to do the card "correctly").

The center panel (the brown with the silver brads) is actually grunge paper that I painted with Vintage Photo crackle paint. I then sponged some chocolate chip ink and vintage photo ink over it to highlight the cracks more. In real life, it looks like old, cracked leather (and smells like it too!! The grunge paper has a "leather" scent!! PERFECT!! hehe). It is adhered with dimensionals so that the brads lie flat.

The image is from Stamp Oasis and is stamped with chocolate chip craft ink and clear embossed. Thank goodness for SU paper snips to cut around it. I did direct to paper with my ink pad in really rust on the rust panels. Added the brads from the SU silver hardware kit.

This is going to be my FIL's card for father's day. He loves things western (do you think that has anything to do with being born/raised in Nebraska? Running a feed lot?!! LOL!).

Thanks for stopping by again today!!

Pop of Red

Today's color challenge on SCS was to use white as our main color. The catch? Make it a one layer card!!

Now, I personally love this look and definitely wanted to play along. Got a light bulb idea and went to whip out my card. Easy peasy, right? NOPE! Go figure that I'd slip and totally mess up the sentiment when I stamped!! But, mistakes are just a another chance! So I ended up changing the sentiment and the color and rather like the outcome:

I used my Cuttlebug Swiss dots embossing folder along the top and my Scor-Pal for the other embossed lines. The flowers are from SU's Pretties kit and colored with my copic markers. I think that this would be a great card to mass produce and leave the sentiment blank for those last minute "need now" cards. Supplies: Paper: Gina K's 120# pure luxury. Stamps: SU's Warmest Regards. Ink: SU Real Red, copic ciaos. Accessories: Pretties Kit, decorative brad (unknown), Scor-Pal, Cuttlebug, Swiss Dots embossing folder

Thanks for dropping by today!! I'm off to continue my quest to get my house CLEAN!

Wacky Wednesday on Monday

YIKES!! Talk about cutting a deadline close!! I had wanted to do the Wacky Wednesday Challenge from Rubbernecker last week, but never got the time. Decided to try and "whip" out a card for the challenge (hoping that it will still be accepted......if not, oh well!! I still made a card, right?!). This week's challenge was to use Prism papers in Spring Willow, Intense Orange and Intense Yellow. Guess what?! I don't have any Prism papers!! But!! Luckily, the wonderful hostess Broni gave SU color substitutions in Old Olive, Summer Sun and Pumpkin Pie. SU I have!! Yippee!! I get to play! Here is what I came up with:

These colors seemed like sunset colors. And with a sunset, you need silhouettes. And probably my favorite set from Rubbernecker is Floral Silhouette. I first took a piece of Gina K's 120# pure luxury paper and using my favorite LARGE stencil brush, layed down a layer of Summer Sun. I then went over some of the area using Pumpkin Pie. Then, because I wanted the bottom corner still darker, I added some Ruby Red to the mix. I cut out the 1/2 circle using my old Creative Memories circle cutter. I then layered that over a small piece of black. The old olive piece is textured and the scallops made with my SU scallop punch. The Summer Sun layer has the new Flourish background stamped in summer yellow. The sentiment is also from the Floral Silhouette set and I masked it and used my stampamajig to stamp on the different layers. The layout was inspired by the FTL45A that can be found on the Clean and Simple Blog. My card measures 4 1/4 x 4 1/4 inches instead of the 3x3 that the sketch called for. But inspiration is inspiration!! Supplies: Paper: SU's Pumpkin Pie, Summer Sun, Old Olive (textured), Basic Black and Gina K's 120# pure luxury. Inks: Summer Sun and Ranger Archival Jet Black. Stamps: Floral Silhouette, Floral Background from Rubbernecker. Accessories: Black ribbon from Target, Circle Cutter from Creative Memories, scallop edge punch and stampamajig.

Thanks for stopping by again today!! I'm off to do some more cleaning that has been put off for waaaaay too long!

I'm glad for Quickies

Hold on to your hats~~I've got ANOTHER card for you today!! Last night while I was skimming through some of my favorite blogs I came across this great card by Jenn Balcer. Immediately I knew that I had to do this easy sketch and which paper I wanted to highlight.

I made my card a 5x5 square as I wanted to show off more of the designer paper by Me and My Big Ideas. The black swirls on this paper are FLOCKED!! OOOOOOO!!! I just LOVE it!! Can't keep my grimy little fingers from touching it!! This is the paper that made me buy this pack!!

I started with a base of Baja Breeze, and then a slightly smaller square of black. Cut my three panels and layered. Customed dyed the large Pretties Kit flower with Baja Breeze reinker and colored the smaller black flower with my black copic marker. Added the ivory pearl......then dug out my Cherished Memories rub ons (that I just had to have and had yet to ever use! (insert rolling eyes here_____)). All in all, I think this card took me about 10-15 minutes to complete (which for me~~ is a record!!) Supplies: Paper: SU Baja Breeze, Prism black, M&M Big Ideas Specialty Paper pack. Inks: Baja Breeze reinker. Accessories: Pretties kit, SU Cherished Memories rub ons.

The weather is cold, wet and gloomy. Which means that DH is not going to be working outside today. He mentioned something about cleaning the house (sigh.....) Guess I should be happy that he'll help ruin my Sunday, BWHAHAAAA!!

Double the Inspiration

Hope everyone is having a WONDERFUL weekend!! I've just been putzin' around today and came up with a double challenge card!!

I just love all the unique sites that Steph comes up with for the inspiration challenges on SCS. This weeks was from Design Dazzle. I spent waaaaayyyy too much time just cruising the site and the blog before getting serious and picking this nursery as my inspiration. I really liked the CAS pop that this room has. I over thought the layout and after messing around with several ideas~~this is what I came up with:

This also worked for this weeks Ways to Use it Challenge which was to make our own images to fit a design need. I pulled out my SU sponge daubers and inked it in Only Orange. Using my copics cias I added a bit a shading. Interesting effect, IRL. The alcohol inks on the water based inks doesn't blend the same way as alcohol on alcohol. But I rather liked the look so kept with it! I hand drew the "stems" and cut out the leaves free hand from an old SU 6x6 print pack. I used my Versamarker on the leaves to add some shadow. Cut a strip from the same DP and used my scallop punch for the border along the side. I decided against adding a sentiment. This card just seemed like the type of card one would grab for a quick note. Supplies: Paper: Gina K's 120# pure luxury, SU 6x6 designer pack. Inks: Only Orange, copic ciaos, versamarker and chocolate chip marker. Accessories: Scallop punch, sponge daubers

Finish Line in Site

Whew!! Today is the last day of school. All I can say is.....5 am....making coffee cake and fruit salad. Getting party game supplies together. Getting the teacher gifts in undecorated bags (sigh). Only 1/2 day to go.

The finish line is scheduled for 12:30pm. Then~maybe then~ I can make something for ME!!

Guitar Hero Turns 12

I'm sure all of you have been sitting on the edge of your seats just wondering if SuperMom was able to finish all her projects in time or did the kryptonite get her?

SuperMom DID finish her projects. BUT only because she married SuperDad, who took over the every day chores of feeding the kids, cleaning up the kitchen and running out to buy more tape and pick up white cardstock from SuperMom's sidekick~Ultimate Upline Kerney!!

Ok.....First things first. Oldest DS turned 12 on Saturday and his biggest birthday wish was to get Guitar Hero and Guitar Hero/Metallica (he makes his daddy so proud!!). Here is the ever enthusiastic birthday boy (at Grandma's house for the "family" celebration). Got that 80's "hair band" going for him!

And here is the lead guitarist with the rest of his band (youngest DS and dad) putting on a concert at home.

(who knew that it took such concentration to play? I'm tellin' you tho....this stupid game is harder than it should be!! Maybe "air guitar" is a guy thing...I STINK at it!!)

With this "theme" in mind~I created this card for the kiddo:

I was inspired by these two cards that I found on SCS. The first one is by Diamondanglefish, which was inspired by Michelle Zindorf's card.

I dug out my Me & My Big Ideas specialty card stock and chose one that had the most "boyish" colors/feel to it (you can't tell in the photo, but it has some diag "clear embossing" along each of the "stripes". Still being on my "wrinkle free distress kick", I first masked off the bottom portion of the image area and then stamped the guitar image using Black stazon and clear embossed. I then swiped my distress inks on my craft sheet and misted with water. Layed down my image in the wet ink and dried with my heat gun. Repeated until I got the look that I wanted. The embossing resisted most of the ink....there are a few flecks on the "white" but it actually looks pretty cool IRL. I then used sponge daubers to add vintage photo distress ink for more detailed shading on the one side of the guitar and across the bottom. Highlighted the guitar with my white gel pen. Distressed the edges and added some more vintage photo ink along the edges. Found some green and blue wire and twisted to mimic the guitar wire. Added a couple of brads and wah-lah!! DS even gave it a "this is really cool, mom" vote! (hey!! That's more than the usual "glance at the card and toss it aside response" that is more the norm!!)Supplies: Paper: Me & My Big Ideas specialty cardstock, SU's wild wasabi, basic black and Gina K's 120# pure luxury in white. Stamps: Inkadinkado's Rock Star. Ink: Stazon Black, Ranger Distress inks in Peeled Paint, faded jeans, vintage photo. Accessories: Sponge daubers, brads, wire, heat gun, mister, craft sheet.

********************************************************************************************

I also got the 12x12 scrapbook done for the Principal's 50th birthday. The front cover has a picture of the principal with 50! in the corner. The first two pages are pictures of the principal in various activities at the school (a great shot of him catching a snooze in a wheelbarrow during a work bee!). The rest of the layouts are two pages: one side has a class picture and the other side has birthday wishes that each grade wrote up for the principal. This was done from K-12. All of this was done using the school colors of black and red with some wonderful Cardinal designer paper that the Ultimate Upline Kerney let me use!! I'm not going to post this project since I have not gotten permission from ANYONE of the 300+ people/kids that are shown. Just trust me that it turned out good!! hehe

Thanks for stopping by again!! I enjoy sharing my projects and hope that you find some inspiration from them!