Hang in there card

Still making get well cards here. I took a break because I was not feeling well. I love this card though. It is a giraffe stamp that I bought for baby cards. However, I am in love with him so I made him a get well card. I paired it with this cute dollar stamp that says hang in there. The papers are old olive and one of the pinks from stampin up. I was too lazy to dig out brads, so I used stickles in the corners. The bow is some dollar ribbon I had. All in all, I like the way it came out. Simple and fun.

I hope you are well.

It is hard to say what the bigger accomplishment is....

It really is hard to say what the bigger accomplishment is. Me making Delilah a bed, or me getting Delilah to actually get on the bed. In either case, both happened.

I am SO proud. I made this dog bed for Delilah. It was the second (and last) project from my sewing class. I was not able to get too much help because the class was only an hour and a half and in that time I could not even get that white cord all the way around the blue part. After several desperate calls to Mom and some real quality time with the seam ripper, it is done. Here it is.

The bed:



The dog by the bed:


The dog on the bed:

She actually dislikes the camera. That is part of the reason for the pitiful face. Of course once the camera battery died Delilah made her self comfortable and is sound asleep on the bed. More pictures of that later. I am so giddy!!!! Yeah that is right. Cheesy, but I made something and my favorite creature in the world likes it. Hooray!!!

It is almost begining to look a lot like Christmas

Tonight was the night I was going to rock the Christmas cards. I started the process but got distracted. Here are the cards I have to show for the night.

The first are my real Christmas cards that I borrowed the pattern for from someone on splitcoast stampers. Here is the original card. Mine has a way to go, but here are the first three. I will start to mass produce them soon.


I got board pretty quick, so I took a challenge from a friend to use this really bright designer card stock. She was convinced it could not be used in anything that would look good. Well, the Christmas card went terribly wrong :) Here it is though. It makes me laugh. I tried to mute it with the chocolate chip base and the always artichoke version of the tree from lovely as a tree. I realized part way through that was hopeless, so I glittered it up with stickles and made a scalloped edge on the pink. It is now going to be a get well card for my friend in the hospital. I know he needs a laugh. I will tell him it is a Christmas Card gone bad. I am sure he and his wife will be happy I am smart enough to realize not to mass produce this one.



I was determined that this paper could make a cute card. I made a quick I miss you card for one of my favorite people in the WHOLE world who moved to Toronto. Sort of appropriate since Bellas are from Toronto. Hopefully she will like it when it makes it way up there.


There has been a real lack of cards for a few days since I have been working on my big sewing project. Hopefully, I will be able to post that in the next few days.

Happy weekend!

Bellas are very fun to play with!!!!!

Surfing the various stamping blogs I have seen lots of interesting stamps, but none have quite the flare and sassy feel that Bellas do. At first, I thought they would be hard to use and/or hard to find uses for. After a while, I realized I really liked them and I liked the fact that it was a small business owned by a woman who was passionate about her products and business. There was free shipping so I decided to see if they were as much fun as they looked. Here are my first cards with them. I have to say I was having a bad day and by the time I was done with these cards I was all smiles. They are fun stamps.



The first is a belated birthday card. I like the stickles on the balloons. In terms they are really 3-D and cool. I also like the way the bella came out. I probably would note punch the flowers on the blue again, but all in all it is pretty cute.





The second card is for the girl that watches my dog for me. Sarah is all girlie girl. I think she will like it. It is a simple card with just a little paper piercing and some glitter. I still like it. I will probably use water color pencils next time to keep the detail in the stamp, especially in the stripes on the pants. Still it is a happy card.


The last is yet other thinking of you card for my friend that had heart surgery. At least the sending happy thoughts is a decent sentiment. I might have to put a note in this one to note that it is not your normal get well card for a 76 year old man, but I really wanted to use the stamps and clearly the girl in the ball gown would not be right :)


Hope you like these!

An array of cards

Well, tonight I am beat. School was tough today and I was tired when I started. I needed to make another couple of cards in my get well series for my friend Chuck. I know this week will be hectic. I also needed to make a birthday card for my friend Freddie who has a birthday tomorrow. That women LOVES birthdays and coffee. What better to use than Stampin Ups Treat Yourself Set for her. I thought I would use a little Cool Caribean and Chocolate Chip combo. I also added some Real Red and Pallet Gray for the steam and some of the words. It is a cute slider card so the steam rises up from the mug. I put a Happy Birthday inside in red.


While that set and those colors were out, I decided a little popcorn action would make a cute get well / thinking of you card. I like it. Basically the same stuff as above with a little Marigold Morning for the pop corn. Both cards have some stickles for fun. I love that stuff. Glitter made clean. God Bless the person that made Stickles!!!!

The last two cards are ones from my stash. The first is a monochromatic card with Brocade Basics. A little paper piercing and some dimensionals and this one was done. I love the cherish stamp in that set for so many things. However, in this case, when I know he and his wife are really cherishing life now, it seemed really nice.


The last card is a fun one. I used tag punches to make the pinwheel out of designer paper. I am a fan of the burgundy paper and ink too. I also love the swirly background stamp but cannot remember the name. I am too lazy to go look :) The tag is stamped with Happy Harmony's thank you stamp. I know that for me, being thankful during a long illness is hard. I figured that a gentle reminder of thankfulness would be good as well as my thankfulness he is doing better.


I hope you like the collection. I figured I needed to get a pile ready for the mail each day this week.

Have a wonderful day!

My first project on my own

Today I decided it was time to make my first sewing project on my own. After a few calls to Mom, and some improvising, I finally finished here it is ........


Yeah, I know the picture is bad but it looks like a little blanket. That's right. It took most of the day to sew that. But it is more than you know. There is batting in there people.

So, when I started the process, I thought it was going to be a much bigger blanket. Based on the pattern, I thought it was going to be about a yard and 7/8 on the top and bottom. Nope. It is much smaller. However, I learned a lot and now can put together something bigger someday. (I hope).

Well, of course this was for Delilah. Clearly it will not cover the furniture when she lays on it, but I thought she would like it anyway.


She did not look impressed. I told her it was her treat. Below is her reaction to the word treat. She was a little annoyed when there was no snack for her.





However, all the excitement did make her sleepy.


Hope you had a good day!

A strange trio of get well/thinking of you cards

Still trying to keep going with a card a day for my friend in the hospital. I realized that with no mail on Sundays, I needed to add a card or two to the stack to go out in the morning. I admit that get well cards and masculine cards are hard for me. Combining them has really made me stretch a little in the last few days. It has been good though. So, here is the set of three. How is that for diversity????




You will notice that I cased myself with the Believe card. It is the same card as in prior post. I made if for a Confirmation Card for my niece. I was thinking of the faith of this couple I am making the cards for and how much they appreciate the prayers of others. I thought it was important to celebrate that beautiful faith, so that card seemed appropriate. It also let me put off making a masculine card for a few minutes :)


Next, I took out the Lovely as a Tree set that I borrowed one more time. I stamped some of the small leaf in chocolate chip on the natural colored card. I then sponged chocolate chip, green, and mustard over the card to create a weathered textured look. I put the green on next with the little pine cone/branch stamp in green chalk ink. It all looked a little bright so I sponged it with brown and added the brown eyelets. I distressed the long edges too.

The next layers are some mustard designer paper I had and some misc red. I stamped the green tree in a green liquid chalk ink and used my white gel pen for snow. I never did that before, but I like it. More chocolate chip sponging. The red is on dimensionals and the twine is tied around.

I like the card. I really took some time to make it work. Normally, I would have either dumped it half way through or just went with what I had and coped. I guess I am learning something with practice.

The last card is just happy and bright. I guess I needed to balance the other two cards somehow. I love this little ghost stamp and only use him a few weeks out of the year. There was a challenge a few weeks ago where you were supposed to use Halloween stamps in a different way. That was my inspiration for this "Hi" card.

Well, I am getting that look from Delilah that says stop blogging and pet me. With that face, I cannot resist.

Happy day to you all!

Pink with a twist -- Part 2

Thanks to some good friends, I found out that the comment function has been fickle in letting comments go through. I decided rather than continue to collect comments on the pink with a twist thread, I was going to just celebrate all the women dealing with breast cancer and lupus by making the donations to both organization. I will send $100 to each in honor of all those women and their families that we know dealing with these illnesses.

Lovely as a tree and natural beauty

Well, it was a REALLY long day and a I was cranky. I decided to stamp a card for my friend in the hospital. I was looking for some inspiration so I surfed onto Splitcoast stampers and decided to use the sketch challenge for a layout. I think I like this card. The base is chocolate chip. The patterned paper and the green color are a sheet of two-sided designer paper. The mustard is from a packet I picked up at Target. The leaf is from stampin up's lovely as a tree and the background on the mustard is from stampin up's natural beauty. It is hard to see, but the yellow and green sheets have been sponged with chocolate chip to create some depth and I punched the edges of several sheets for a little added detail. The right sides of the card are distressed.


These are the two sets of thank you notes that I mentioned a few days ago. They are simple cards for my friends that will need so many thank you cards since they will need to send out a bunch to thank all those helping them and praying for them. I hope to make another set or two in the next few days. The top set says "Thank Heaven for Friends Like You" inside. It is Lovely as a Tree of course for the stamps. The bottom set has the oak from Lovely as a Tree in Chocolate Chip (can you tell I bought a whole pack of that :) ). There is just a simple thank you stamped at the bottom. I wanted them to have options on how much space they had inside to write or not have to write.



The last pictures are of Delilah because, of course, this is about me and the dog.


Off to play!

Odd get well cards

Well a dear friend of mine had quadruple bypass surgery Monday. Thank God he is alive and doing well (all things considered). Due to the risk of infection, the family has asked that people not visit. They will take him cards though. I thought I would make a couple. I sat down with the intent of making a pretty and thoughtful card. They I thought, "He is going to get a ton of pretty sappy cards. I want him to smile." I went through my stamping treasures and found my happiest stamp, which just happens to be these penguins. I thought I would bust out my snowflake punch to add to the card (mainly because I would have had to walk down stairs to get my snowflake stamps for the background). Then I thought, it needs something to make it pop. I remembered I had a bottle of stickles I have never opened. I managed to get the bottle open and stickles flowing (which was quite the task). Well these things rock. Shiny, happy, texture, way cool!!!. Here is the card. I wonder what they will think when they open it. It is not a typical "Get Well, Thinking of You, Praying for You" card. I just wanted to make sure they smiled. It makes me smile.



I was having stamping fun, so I made him a card from my dog too. I had not used this little dog stamp yet, but I had to buy it because it reminded me of Delilah. The "ruff day?" stamp from A Little Love at Stampin up rounded this out nicely. It is Marigold Morning (I miss that color) and Chocolate Chip. I put two of the dogs on dimensionals and put the other one flat and at an angle to make it more interesting. It is a little closer to a get well card. (I hope).



Thanks for looking.

Delilah and her hair saga

Today was a tough day at work. I made some great thank notes for a dear friend and his wife last night. He had quadruple bypass surgery today. Thank God it went fine. Now if he can move through the recovery. They have had so many people doing so much already, his wife is overwhelmed. She said she did not think she would ever be able to thank everyone. I thought I would help by making the thank you notes. I wanted to make another set and put on stamps and return addresses tonight, but no energy. There is always tomorrow.

Anyway, I did feel like blogging a little. I found the inspiration. There was a great card on Inky Paws in the post Doggie Kisses. Here is the link.

It completely reminded me of Delilah before her haircut. I know, you are thinking that is a sheep dog and Delilah is a Goldendoodle. Well, you are seeing the well groomed doodle on the right of the page. Here is shaggy Delilah before her last haircut.

Wasn't she cute all fluffy?



Well maybe scruffy is better.



Either way she was cuddly.





Did I mention that was the tragic haircut? She had been at the kennel and got a little matted. Here is the result of the haircut. God love the groomer, he tried to make her cut. She was not amused. It took me forever to get her out of her crate where she went to pout.





She clearly was not a happy camper.


I hope you have a good day, even if it is a bad hair day.

Pink with a twist--

I was surfing some stamping blogs today and saw that some of the ladies were not only turning their websites pink for October, but were going to donate money based on web traffic. What a great idea. I think I will do the same with a small twist.

For each comment on this post, I will donate 50 cents to the Susan G. Komen fund and 50 cents to the Lupus Foundation of America. I will donate up to a $100 to each foundation. Why split the money? What is lupus? Both good questions. You see, I have lupus. It is an autoimmune disease that impacts an estimated 1.5 - 2 million people, over 90 percent of which are women. The experts don't yet have a known cause or cure for lupus. It is often hard to diagnose, so the number of women that have lupus may be underestimated. While lupus can be deadly, it also can be treatable in many cases. Unfortunately, the road to diagnosis can be long and frustrating. Many people have significant organ damage before doctors figure out what is happening.

Here is a list of symptoms that is published by the Lupus Foundation of America.

"Although lupus can affect any part of the body, most people experience symptoms in only a few organs. The most common symptoms of people with lupus are listed below. Occurrences of particular symptoms happening are listed as percentages.

• Achy joints / arthralgia (95 percent)
• Fever of more than 100 degrees F / 38 degrees C (90 percent)
• Arthritis / swollen joints (90 percent)
• Prolonged or extreme fatigue (81 percent)
• Skin Rashes (74 percent)
• Anemia (71 percent)
• Kidney Involvement (50 percent)
• Pain in the chest on deep breathing / pleurisy (45 percent)
• Butterfly-shaped rash across the cheeks and nose (42 percent)
• Sun or light sensitivity / photosensitivity (30 percent)
• Hair loss (27 percent)
• Abnormal blood clotting problems (20 percent)
• Raynaud's phenomenon / fingers turning white and/or blue in the cold (17 percent)
• Seizures (15 percent)
• Mouth or nose ulcers (12 percent)"

I am lucky, my lupus has been annoying. While I have ended up in bed many days, for the most part, lupus has left my organs alone. Hopefully, we will see a cure for lupus in my lifetime. Thanks for helping fight two illnesses that are a constant battle for millions of women.

Here is a card a made a while back that seems to fit this post. One of the traits of lupus above is a butterfly rash. As a result, butterflies are often associated with lupus. This one just happens to be pink.


These two cards were made for two women I know that are currently battling lupus.




Hopefully we will all see a day when people no longer have to raise money to find cures and they can spend all their money on stamping :)

Thanks for stopping by.

Pick for October

It seems there is a movement on the internet to have blogs go pink in October. Here is the site coordinating that movement. It is a novel idea, so I thought I would make the change. I might even keep it for a while. The pink is pretty cute.

So now you know the reason for the change.

I hope you have a great day. Let's hope that by next October there is no need to go pink. God bless the work of those trying to find a cure for all diseases.

The new machine

So, after I went to sewing class, I thought, "Hey, I could do this." I came home and made a list of things I would actually sew:

I could fix the hems in my pants.
Finally replace my curtains.
Make happy accent pillows.
Treasures for the dog.
A blanket for where Delilah sleeps on my bed.

OK, so the point is I could buy all this stuff and move on or I could spend the money on a sewing machine. The people where my class was showed me their machines. They were expensive. I pondered. I surfed the net. I found a sale. God Bless Amazon.

Well, today it came. My new, highly discounted sewing machine. Of course, I could not leave it in the box, so I went out and bought a couple fabric straps and spent the afternoon working through the owners manual. Yep, I can work it. It is pretty fun. Now, of course after a few hours, I got board. I really needed something to make for there to be a point. For now I have it set up in the living room so I can watch TV while I play. I will find it a better home after sewing class later this week.

Of course that means that my good intentions of starting Christmas Cards today are shot. I think I will go play with stamping stuff for a little while though. A good way to unwind before bedtime.

Happy Saturday!

Fish out of water......

So today was a big day. I went to my first sewing class EVER. Now the real odd part of this is that I don't own a sewing machine, but a friend asked and I thought "Why not!!!" Anyway, today we learned to measure and cut out our pattern. So far so good. Next week we get to sew. So tonight, I went online and surfed for a machine. I found a really nifty one that was 56% off with FREE shipping. Happy dance for me!!!

I am pretty excited about learning a new project. Now I have to decide what I am going to make for my second project once we finish our skirts. I am thinking that I should make something for the house or dog because I don't know that I am confident enough to wear what I make. I know, silly but true.

Anyone know some good doggie patterns????

Have a great day. More cards and stories about the dog to come.