Spring is coming!!!!

We had a BEAUTIFUL day here in northern California.  It was about 60 degrees (F)  and sunny!  It's the time of year when the Narcissus bloom and reminds us Spring is coming!! 

These pink flowers have also bloomed, I think they are nicotiana but I am not a gardener so I won't swear to it.  I just know every January we have pink flowers in the front yard!

I did manage to get a couple of cards finished today.  I can only share one card as I am entering the 2nd card in a contest and I am not sure if I can post it or not before they select a winner.  I asked them that questions so I will post it as so as I get the go ahead or the contest is over.  I think I am going to have to find some challenges for something other than cards, as that is all I seem to be making lately.  (I do have fun  making cards though! lol)

 

I cut the octopus from a pattern I made using a Mrs Grossman's sticker as a guide. (If you are wondering why I didn't use the sticker, it was too small.)  All the ink used on this card is Distress Ink (imagine that, me using Distress Ink! lol) The sand is a blend of 3 colors of distress stickles, the shells are real, the fish are brads from PaperWishes.  The inside reads {Thank you for being my friend} (brackets included)!!  Let me know what you think

Take care

Linda

Just a couple of cards

Not a bad day considering I started the day with a migraine, it turned out FABULOUS! After taking some meds and a 5 hour nap I finished 2 cards today, one fulfills a request and the second is for a "Challenge 59" at Art Creations Friday. It also helps that Erinn and Joseph (my oldest and youngest) went shopping and Erinn made some delicious clam chowder for dinner!



My first card was requested by, well I won't say who just on the off chance the recipient stumbles across my blog. Anyway, the requester saw the alligator and KNEW that I needed to make a card using it. So here it is! Requester (you know who you are) let me know if you like it, please! The inside says "Thanks for being a great friend."

I used a cream diamond finished cardstock which I inked using distress inks (Tattered Rose, Worn Lipstick, Shabby Shutters and Peeled Paint) then I stamped "friend" using Tattered Rose and Shabby Shutter. The alligator is a Sizzix die, even though you can't really tell (except on the face) I inked using Distress inks and painted her toes with baby pink acrylic paint. After the paint dried I covered with glossy accents to give her toes a shine! The log was created using beige cardstock inked with various brown Distress inks (bet that surprises you! lol) and a smidgen of black. After the card stock was inked I cut the log free hand!

I found a couple of challenges today, the one I mentioned above, plus one at Scrap-Mart's blog. The Scrap-Mart challenge is for a vintage card and the prize is one Tim Holtz new Sizzix die (and it's even autographed by Tim !!!!) I am still working on that card.


On to the card I finished for Art Creations Friday! They provide an image you have to incorporate into your art work.

The woman is the image they provided. The car and man w/umbrella are Tim's stamps. The background started as the same cream diamond finished cardstock as the card above. Again I used distress inks (Peeled Paint [I think], Broken China and one of the browns. . .I wasn't paying attention) then I dripped some water over the background. I stamped the man in Stazon Jet Black, I masked him then stamped the car in Archival Coffee. The woman was printed on the cream cardstock, cut out and mount on foam tape. I used a DYMO Embossing Label Maker for the text. Inside the card reads "Happy Belated Birthday!" (I used the label maker for that too!

If you know me, you know I NEVER get side-tracked or go off on tangents (yeah, right).  Around 8:30 p.m I told the requester mentioned above I would post the card but to give me "30 minutes or so" .  I opened my blog (within the requested 30 minutes) and noticed Wendy (Vecchi) had updated her Studio 490 blog, so of course I had to go read it as this her first blog since getting back from CHA.  Before she left, she had a giveaway if you posted a comment before she got back.  I got down to the winners and the 2nd one was "Linda" but didn't think too much as there are LOTS of Lindas out there.  Then I started reading the comment and recognized it as MINE!!!!!!  Then I read on to see that Ted and Michelle of Stampers Anonymous gave Wendy a set of her new stamps for each of the winners!  How generous is that??!!!!!!  Thank you  Ted and Michelle for giving Wendy the prizes!  Thank you Wendy for having the drawing!  Thank you Rick for mailing the prize!!!! 

Hope you have a fabulous weekend!  If you haven't already done so, be sure to leave a comment on the post above for your chance to win a prize on my blog!

Take care,

Linda

One Heart One World . . .

will be coming to this blog soon! 

Takin' a step towards a goal

One of goals for 2010 is to move "outside" my comfort zone. While I am comfortable creating cards, scrapbooks and altered art, I am not so comfortable putting it "out there" for the world to see. Starting this blog is one of the ways I using to reach my goal, but still my blog is still in my relatively "safe" world - since everyone leaving comments are family or friends.



Another path I plan wander down is "entering" some challenges. I found Lyneen's blog, "I am Dreaming of Castles" (http://dreamingofcastles.blogspot.com/) and she conveniently has a list of other blogs with challenges for each day of the week. (Thank you Lyneen!!!) From Lyneen's blog I went to the Sketch Saturday blog (http://sketchsaturday.blogspot.com/).



This week's theme is Whimsical rubber stamp images. This is what I came up with:





Here is what I used on my card:
"Bug Journey" stamp - Penny Black (1996) Yard sale find!

Sentiment stamp - Art Impression - 1998

Stazon Ink - Jet Black

Kimberly water color pencils

Azure (Dark Blue) paper - The Paper Company

all other paper - unknown - it all came out of my scrap bin including the card base

I also used the following Ranger products

Alcohol Inks and Pens

Distress Embossing Ink

Embossing powder -Seafoam White

Distress Ink - Vintage Photo



What do you think? Any suggestions? Any suggestion on how to keep embossing powder where you want it instead of where it wants to go? Thanks for looking and please leave a comment or two.



Take care, be safe.
Linda

The corruption continues. . .

I worked on corrupting 2 young hearts yesterday!!! My sister-in-law Annette dropped by to work on a scrapbook. She brought her 6 year old grand-daughter, my great neice, Savannah with her.


Before they arrived, I had been working on my die-cut "catalog". I am trying to catalog all the shapes I have. So while Annette worked on her scrapbook, Savannah helped me cut some "shapes" with using new dies I had ordered from Sizzix. (they had an AWESOME sale, up to 85% off some dies!!!!). After we finished our cutting, Savannah got down to some serious work! She made about 1/2 dozen 12 x 12 pictures for friends and family! I was the lucky recipient of this fantastic picture!

In some of her other creations she used stamps, brads, ribbon, gemstones, all kinds of flowers as well as die cuts and hand drawings! (Of course, I didn't think about taking pictures of those until after she left.) Nothing like corrupting them while they are young!


At some point my son, Joseph, came in the studio. (he's 20) I had 2 alligators (new die cut) sitting on the table as I was going to ink them. He really liked them, and wanted one of mine. I told him he had to make his own! (I know I am such a mean mom!) Savannah and I explained how to use the Big Shot and he cut an alligator for himself. Savannah decided she needed some more die cuts so Joseph & Savannah searched the dies and found the "perfect" ones. Both "kids" had a blast. Joseph ended up creating this awesome card! His first ever!!!

Joseph "free-handed" the hat! I think he did a fabulous job. . . leave comments on what you think. Corrupting another one, this time my own son! lol

Hope you are having a fantastic weekend!

Take care, be safe,
Linda

Corruption of a quilter!

As I posted earlier, last Saturday was Scrappin Saturday and I had 6 ladies over, one of them being a quilter, SJ. I am slowly corrupting SJ into a papercrafter! And she is having fun with it! I forgot to get pictures of her cards before she left, so she brought them to me today and here they are:

(the first 2 were created from the kits that were available)






The "Happy" card was desiged and created by SJ! Inside the card say "Birthday"



Didn't she do a fabulous job?

Thanks for dropping by! Check back soon, I am working on a challenge or contest or something. . . haven't quite figured out all the details, but I will let you know as soon as I do!

Take care, be safe,

Linda

A fabulous day!!!

This morning I wrote a list of things I want to accomplish in 2010. There were maybe 1/2 dozen things on the list. I wrote it while sitting at my CLEAN workspace in my studio. I set the list aside, sorted a few scraps of paper (I store them by color). While filing the paper I thought of something else to add to my list and when I went to get it, it was gone. I searched the table, the floor, the files I had put paper in, but it was no where to be found. I know one day it will turn up when I least expect it.

One item on the list was to donate some "extra" paper to a local elementary school. I have been thinking of doing that for a long while, but never got around to it. I am happy to report on Friday my son dropped off a box of 12 x 12 paper! The stack was about 4" high or so!!! The sad thing is you can't even tell I have less paper.


Another thing on the list is to make 60 mother's day cards and 60 "other occasions" cards (i.e., birthday, thank you, miss you, etc.) cards by March 15 and mail them to Operation Write Home. I got a start on the mother's day cards today. The inspiration for these quick, simple and elegant cards came from http://www.making-handmade-cards.com/ What do you think? (I think comments are great!)



Since these cards are going to our troops, I take a piece of paper, fold it and attach it as a card liner so the troops have room to write a letter to their loved ones. I also stamp the inside sentiment on the "outside" of the "letter".




I made 10 of them, but messed up one, so there are only 9 for OWH. Yesterday I made 6googly eyed cards (like the ones in the previous post).

Also to help with my card, I went through my scrap files and cut 100 plus pieces of paper for card backgrounds. Again, sadly you cannot tell I took any paper from the scrap files. Next I will go through the files to pull coordinating solid papers.

I am in a "background paper" swap over at All Things Tim Yahoo group, so I made the background paper today too! (You can see bits of it around the cards above.) Are you part of ATT? If you are are you playing in Allie's background swap? It's actually a 2 part swap. The first part is make the background paper, send it in. Get some paper back, create something with the paper you receive, post the project and then the group will "vote" by leaving comments. The one with the most comments will win. If you are not part of the ATT group and you LOVE Tim, go check it out. http://groups.yahoo.com/group/AllThingsTim/

My husband, son and I have been planning on going to see Sherlock Holmes. We made it to the theater today! (As a side note I have to say I do NOT tolerate loud sounds well, it doesn't matter whether it's someone talking, stereo, TV etc. I just can't deal with it as it makes my head hurt and can even trigger a migraine. ) We found seats, munched on popcorn, and waited for the movie to start. The previews started and were so LOUD, I felt the sound in my seat! I took some Excedrin and kept hoping by the time the "real" movie started it would be a little quieter. It wasn't. So within 5 minutes of the start of Sherlock I was gone. I requested a refund, which they gave me with no problems. Now don't think I missed something because I didn't. . .I went shopping at a thrift store that was having a huge sale. . .50% off everything in the store! The check out line was almost as bad as those lines on black Friday, but it moved quickly! I got a few games and some books!



I made it back to the theater with about 45 minutes to spare, so I sat in the van and read in the quiet!!! Life is good! Hope you had a great weekend too! (I'd love to hear about it~ leave a comment. Comments are good!)

Take care, be safe
Lind

What do you get . . .

when you get 3 scrapbookers, 1 digi-scrapper, 1 quilter (who is being drawn into the paper world) and 1 knitter together? You get some AWESOME cards, a digi-page a little closer to being complete, some rows added to a pair of socks and have lots of fun! Today was the first time I have had a "Scrappin' Saturday" in forever! 4 of the 6 and never been to a Scrappin Saturday. I hope they enjoyed themselves!


Here are the 5 samples cards I made. The card in the front left is using all Hero Arts stamps and designed by me! I actually entered this into their monthly contest. . .a first for me. The "I Love You" card on the left was inspired by the card on page 18 of the Jan/Feb 2010 Papercrafts Magazine that just showed up in my mail box one day! The "I Love You" card on the right is my variation of the card. The 2 "googly" eye cards were created this morning in desperation to get a birthday card sample for this afternoon. I finished them about 12:10. . . everyone was due at 1:00. (I tried and tried to come up with a fun masculine card last night, but I was not satisfied with anything I came up with.)

The 3 scrapbookers, Vi, Sheryll and Pat, had never made cards before.

Vi made this awesome Valentine card. She also worked a layout after she finished her card.





This is Pat's beautiful creation.




Can't show you SJ's and Sheryll's cards because I forgot to take pictures once they finished. (Guess I was talking too much, imagine that! Me, talking!) Sheryll made a butterfly card. SJ made the butterfly card, the "I Love You" card and designed her own birthday card.


Charlene (my partner in crime and roommate in Sep/Oct when we are cruisin') was working on a digi-layout so she didn't play with paper today. Nancy worked on her knitting. She was making some socks! I tried to tempted her into the world of paper, but no luck today.



Hope you are enjoying your weekend!

Take care, be safe

Linda



PS - I really do have spaces between paragrahs, but for whatever reason they are not showing up on my post. Guess I still have lots of learnin' to do on this blog thing.

Another rose

Like I said in a previous post, I am hooked on roses. I made this card for (bunco)Melissa's birthday. Except for the rose and card base, all the other papers came from my scrap box! The rose is of course grungepaper as are the leaves. It's hard to tell in the picture, but I debossed veins in each leaf, then took a toothpick and inked the tip (using my fire brick distress ink pad) and followed the debossed lines. I lightly inked the edges of the leaves with fire brick too. I used Sizzix oval tag on grunge board, covered the tag with paper, inked the edges, stamped "happy birthday" in coffee archival ink and added some gemstones. I used a red mat with a torn bottom edge, on top of that I used a piece of "left over" paper that I had created at some point using, I think, alcohol inks, I added the green to the piece specifically for the card so it would tie everything together and give a bit of contrast. (If I didn't use alcohol ink, then I used distress ink. Pretty bad I can't even remember what I created two weeks ago. Guess I am getting those senior moments down! lol! Rebecca - if you are reading this, just stay quiet. Not a word! LYM)

On the inside of the card, I used the same red mat with the printed green paper I used on the oval. The inside sentiment is a Great Impressions stamp in Archival Coffee.





I really hate throwing out paper and I keep every little scrap, sometimes to the point of being riduculous. The more I like a paper, the smaller the piece I am "willing" to keep. lol My scrap box is about to burst! Guess I need to make some art! What about you? Are you a paper keeper?

Take care and stay safe
Linda

The weekend was not a total loss

I had great plans for my weekend! Finish a few projects, clean the studio, enlarge the work area, make an awesome retirement card, work on another project or two and make a blog post or two. In other words, relax and have fun (well, except for the cleaning part).


The weekend started well(on Friday), I cleaned some (I'd show you some "before" pictures, but they are too scary, seriously. lol) and then I finished the 12 Tags of Christmas (remember I made 2 sets). By "finishing", I mean the backsides. If there were staples or brads showing on the back, I inked a 2nd tag and slapped it over the backside, if nothing was showing on the backside, I just inked it. I had a couple fronts on a couple of the 2nd set of tags to finish too, but the fronts were mostly complete.

After I finished the tags, I worked on my 2010 coaster calendar. I made the January page! (August, September, October and November were already completed and December was started.) The snowflakes were created by burning glue and painting! I will go into details some day.


Saturday started bright and early with some more cleaning of the studio (trust me there was/is a LOT to do because during the holiday it is not only my studio but the "junk" room too). Then we made a trip to Home Depot and JoAnn's. My work area has been an oval table which is great, but I "lost" surface area because of the oval. I had been wanting to get a piece of plywood for the top to enlarge the surface area. . .I went from a 40" x 58" oval table

to a 41" x 84" "lopsided" pentagon!


(Oh, and just because the "before" table picture is clean, it doesn't necessarily mean the whole studio was cleaned.)

About the time we got to JoAnn's to buy some felt, I started not feeling the best but managed to get home and finish the table project. The rest of Saturday was shot and I didn't do a whole lot. We rented "Up" from the redbox (for a $1.00) We were really disappointed with the movie but decided we got our money's worth - 75 cents worth was because Max, our golden retriever who rarely barks went crazy and, was barking madly at the TV when the old man was looking through the scrapbook - we were in tears from laughing so much! The other 25 cents worth was when the kid went sliding across the window of the blimp. By Sunday morning, the face was really hurting (something that happens when the barometric pressure drops and just before the migraine starts). I took some Excedrin and a hot steamy shower. Both helped some and I was a little more human! Enough so that I went to see "the Princess and the Frog". Very good movie. . . sorry, I am wandering. Seeing the movie and doing my mom's weekly shopping was all I managed to do on Sunday.

Yesterday my head was still bothering me, luckily I had the day off and was able to sleep most of it. Last night I finished a "project" I had been wanting to do for a long time. . . I FINALLY labeled all my distress inks!!! Now I only have 13 more labels to create but I will wait until the new inks are out otherwise I will lose the labels between now and then. Wait! Why did I say 13 more labels? Do I know something you don't? Nope, I don't. . .well I am sure I know some thing you don't, but not about DI (and I am SURE you know things I don't! lol). If you notice in the picture, there is a label missing. It's the Faded Jean label. No, I didn't forget to print it, just when I started "coloring" the labels, I had a dyslexic moment and alphabetically speaking Fire Brick is just after Faded Jeans. I started with Fire Brick as it was in the first cubby, didn't notice until I was finished with the red that I had jumped up line. Apparently I wasn't feeling as well as I thought.



So, the weekend was not a total loss as I checked a few items off my "to do" list!


Anyway, today my headache was gone and felt more like myself!!!! Hope you had a fabulous start to your week!

Some random ramblings

If you know me, you know I LOVE eBay and Tim Holtz' stuff! Put the two together and I can get into BIG trouble (but it is oh so fun! lol) Last week I was checking out stuff (because I need more, lol) I found a "few" Visual Artistry sets listed, I put bids in on 10 auction. Didn't win one of them. Not one to give up easily, I found more auctions including one for "The Journey" set and put a bid on it (at the same price I had bid on a previous auction I didn't win.) THEN I found an auction with a lot of 7 sets of the stamps that included "The Journey". I debated for a bit on whether I should bid or not since there would be a duplicate set if I happened to win both auctions. The debate was short! The lot of 7 sets arrived today!

Last Sunday I stopped by Stampers' Corner (my fav LSS) to get some more tape for the nifty tape gun we received on the cruise. I was being good, on a mission, just the tape, NOTHING else. Honest, that was the plan. I ran in, got the tape, walked up to the cash register so far so good. . . and then I see boxes and boxes in the classroom being rifled through by some women. "Is that a sale?" I asked Amber. It was. Wood stamps for F I F T Y CENTS each!!! No matter what size!!!!! 4 sets of clear stamps bundled together for $2.00 for each bundle! How is a girl NOT to buy stuff?? Well 30 minutes (maybe an hour. . .who keeps track of time when shopping a sale?) and $48. lighter I left the store! (Too bad I can't lose weight as fast as I can spend money. lol!)

Now I just have to find time to play! Speaking of playing I am having a Scrappin’ Saturday at the house on January 16, 2010. If you are interested in dropping by, let me know.

December 30 my AWESOME husband and I celebrated our 8th anniversary! We went to Frank Fats (the original one on L Street) in Sacramento for dinner! Before dinner we wander through a couple of antique stores I had just discovered. In one of the stores, they had bags and bags of used stamps for sale for $1.00 per bag, so I grabbed a couple with thoughts of using them on ATCs for THE cruise.

Today, I went to Scrapmap to get to Jim West's blog to add it to my list of blogs I follow. I haven't been following it, but I always mean to . . . because last time I was there he had just giveaway some trips. While at www.Scrapmap.com, I noticed there was a new logo picture for Tim’s New England/Canada cruise. . . it includes a used postage stamp. lol Great minds think a like!!!!!! (PLEASE let me have my delusions that I have a great mind too, please! Thanks! lol)

A couple of weeks ago, I won a prize on Lori’s blog The package arrived earlier this week! She was EXTREMELY generous!! Thank you again Lori!
I will post a picture when I make something with the goodies you sent!

Take care,
Linda

Roses, I am hooked!

First, thank you for the comments! Made my night! Like you Juliet, I want to go back and make all of the other ones.


I have to tell you about my experience with grungepaper roses. I first saw one last June when Tim came to Elk Grove and I was fortunate enough to take his classes at Stampers Corner. A rose was used in the Patchwork Pandemonium class. Full instructions on how to make the roses wre included, but Tim had convinced his friend Keychain to make 60 roses prior to the class so we didn't make one that day. I was intrigued and added that to my list of things I wanted to try.

Carol (Stampers Corner) ordered some of the Sizzix dies and I JUST had to have one, so I ordered one.

There sat my die for MONTHS, then I went on the cruise and I made a rose in Wendy's class and really enjoyed it (although not the cutting part so much). When I got home I moved "make a rose" up on my list of things to do, but never seemed to find the time. Then on the last day of the 12 Tags of Christmas, Tim used roses on the tag. So I dusted off the die and haven't stopped.

The picture is a wedding card I made for a friend's daughter's wedding. For the white roses, I used acrylic paint. I formed each layer, glued (glossy accents) the individual layers to itself, painted them, waited for them to dry, then glued everything together. After I made these, I tried Eileen's trick of inserting a brad on the bottom layer, which has been working well.

I also made a birthday card with a rose, I am working on a plaque for someone that will have 3 or 4 or 5 roses (haven't quite decided yet and have 7 or 8 roses in the wings waiting.) I also showed a couple of co-workers how to make them!

Hope your first day of 2010 has been awesome! My has been totally relaxing. . .I've been reading Memorial Day by Vince Flynn for most of the day.

Congratulations to Lori for her Cool Yule Dude tag winning an "Artist Choice" award on Tim's blog! If you haven't seen it, check it out!

Take care, be safe

Linda