Truckfull of Love

This is a fun little card I made using Stampin Up!s Loads of Love set. This is a great set as it can be used for love sentiments, Christmas--it has a tree for the back of the truck--or any other greeting need.It has many accessories to go with it such as a roller stamp with dogs chasing the truck, people to go inside the truck and other accessories that go with it.

I used Stampin Up! card stock for the base, as always. I like that because it is much thicker than store bought card stock and the end result is a sturdier and, I think, better quality card. I also used my copics to color in the truck. I used my floral punch and my circle punch. I really didn't think I'd get as much use of these punches as I have. I thought they'd get put by the wayside eventually, but they haven't yet.

I hope you like it! I recently made this for my etsy shop for Kelly, who also has her own shop here at KreatedbyKelly who bought it for the menfolk in her life. She liked that it was fun but still masculine enough to give away.

Days of Firsts

So many firsts in the last few days. My oldest had his first soccer practice on Saturday. He is so excited about playing soccer like his uncle and aunt do. Here he is with the coach getting tips, I presume.

He came home flushed from running and so eager to tell me about it. When I asked, he said he learned to not use his hand, but to use his feet. He said, "did you know that, Mommy?".

Today was his first day of school. He is starting preschool and will be going 3 days a week. I was nervous about him going--mostly about him having problems being away from me but he did just fine. The teachers sat him right down and gave him a project to do. He was writing straight lines and coloring in a page. He didn't even notice when his baby brother and I left. I think he will do just fine in school.

No More Blooms

Here in South Carolina we are in the middle of a drought. It's a shame, all of my roses are suffering as well as my vegetable garden. We water as little as possible, but they need much more than they are getting. So, since I am sad I'm not getting any blooms, I'll post some pictures I took earlier in the season when everything was still beautiful.

The first one is my first gardenia bloom of the season. I have about 6 bushes so the scent is everywhere. I cut them and put them in bowls all around the house. For those of you who may not know this, if you cut the gardenia just below the bloom then let them float in a bowl of water it will last longer. You will get lots of scent throughout the house.

The second is of my climbing rose. When we moved into the house a trellis was already built onto the backyard entrance. It is the perfect spot for a climber and since I love roses... Unfortunately, this climber isn't doing to well. It will have to be cut back drastically soon because of the damage it received this summer. Hopefully, next year will be better.

My First Award!

My good friend, Katie, also known as papermakeup, gave it to me. It is a blogging buddy award. Very sweet of her. She also blogs about cardmaking, scrapbooking and other paper projects. She's been doing paper crafts for a long time and has ALL the toys and knows all the good resources.

So, check out her blog, she has lots of good ideas on it!

Thanks Katie!

If you would like to pass the award on to some of your blogging buddies, here are the rules:

1. Only 5 people allowed.
2. 4 have to be dedicated followers of your blog
3. one has to be someone new or recently new to your blog and live in another part of the world.
4. you must link back to whoever gave you the award.

Gift Bags

Wok had her 60th birthday recently and we gave her a nice ring with stones for every member of the family on it. I didn't want to just toss it into a regular gift bag and found this pattern. After some tweaking, this is what I came up with. I am really pleased with how it turned out. It is perfect for small jewelry boxes, candy, toys--pretty much anything. I'm now working on a bigger one for bigger gifts.


My husband calls this one the banana bag because the flowers look like banana slices!

1st Birthday

My little guy turned one on Saturday. I honestly don't know where the time has gone. It seems like just yesterday he was a colicky infant and I wasn't getting much sleep. Now, he is a happy, curious crawler. It's funny, you think the first 3 months will never pass. They seem to last forever. Then, you turn around and he's one.

We had a wonderful time. His Pops and Grammy came in for the celebration and, of course his Wok was here. He had his first bite of birthday cake and loved it. He kept smashing his little fists into it. By the time he was done making a mess, he needed a bath.

Sympathy Card

I think sympathy cards are the hardest to get right. You don't want glitz, glitter, ladybugs, butterflies and cutsey things. You want to convey your feelings in a sophisticated and simple way. It's hard to do. Even going to the grocery store to pick up a card, you get covered in glitter. And that is probably the hardest thing to do for a cardmaker. We like glitter, bright colors, ink, stamps, ribbons, die cuts--all of it. Most of us have drawers and shelves of stuff for cards.

My mom's friends's father died. It was expected, but loss is still loss. I made her a card to give him at her request. I wanted it to be simple, elegant and give her a place to put her own thoughts. This is what I came up with.

New Picture

I changed the picture on my blog. My husband (finally) read my blog this weekend after much prodding. Isn't in the marital contract somewhere that he has to keep up with my blog? I'm sure it is. He likes the blog but said my picture was scary. I said, "scary as in a bad picture?". He said "no, more like sociopath scary". Ok, so upon realizing I now became someone people warned their kids about, I changed it.

He also said he could tell I held the camera and took the picture. I did. I have no pictures of myself. Ok, the last one I have is just after my second son was born and I am not putting that mess up. So, I figured out how to use the delay on my camera and took a picture outside on my back deck.

Happy now, honey?

Tile Drink Coasters

I'm really pleased with how these came out. I made a bunch as Christmas gifts this year and they went over very well. I only used black for them and wanted to experiment with color this time. I found this fantastic stamp at a garage sale for $2! Can you believe it? I think she bought it for a particular project then decided to unload it. I love the stamp. So much so, that I made cards with it, too.

Back to the coasters. I used permanent ink instead of sealing with acrylic. I did this for two reasons. One, it allows the roughness of the tile to be felt and I like that. Two, I can't use acrylic seals because of my asthma. I could take the artistic road here and say it is purely aesthetics, but that would be a big, fat lie. I spray acrylic, I don't breath so well.


I put little felt feet on them and, voila!, they are finished. I really like these. I think there are going to be more gifts going out.

Well, crap...

I finally got some time to work on the layout. Notice the nice 3 collumn design, thanks to bloggerbuster and I swiped some things from Katie's blog. She is papermakeup if you check my blog roll.

One of the things I swiped from her is the playlist. I love Peter Gabriel's Solsbury Hill and put it at the top of the list. I have my speakers turned up and wouldn't you know it, some dude is singing in the background! That's what I get for not previewing the songs. Now, I have to go back to the site and change it.

Sheesh!

Wok Turns 60

Wok, also known as my mom, turns 60 tomorrow. For her birthday we got her a family ring. It is very simple and pretty. It has a stone for each of us, me, my husband, the kids, and is set in silver. I think she'll like it.

For a card, I wanted to make something a bit sophisticated instead of silly or funny. I'm thinking that 60 is a milestone and want to give it the respect it deserves. I have this great paper from K&C Company. It is double sided and I really like it for cards. Instead of having a blank inside, there is a pattern. I just put plain, light-colored card stock on one side for writing a note.

I don't have to worry about Wok seeing it, as she doesn't read my blog. I think she would be perfectly happy living without a computer. Oh, the horrors!

Maybe I need to stop...

I sell things all over the place. Half. com. Ebay. Etsy. Local consignment sales. All places.

This last week I have been ironing, tagging, sorting and pricing for our local city wide consignment sale. I have been really busy with it and am selling 178 items.

This morning, Stas was jumping up and down on the wii fit pad and I told him not to. He says, "why are we selling it?"

Guess he thinks mommy has a one-track mind.

So I was wrong...

I had originally said that I would never put pictures of my kids into such a public forum. I didn't want some freak to see them. What would happen, I didn't know, but I didn't want to go there.

I was talking to my husband recently about starting a family blog that other family members and friends could view. It would, like most family blogs, have pictures, events and such so other could keep in touch. Here is the conversation:


Him: Don't you have a blog?
Me: Yes, but it is public.
Him: So?
Me: Well, don't you want a private one for pictures of the kids?
Him: Why?
Me: So not just anyone can see them.
Him: Why?
Me: So pictures of the kids are just for those who we choose to see them.
Him: Why?

Seeing the pattern here? I wrongly thought that of all people, my husband would not want pictures of our kids floating out there in internet space. He doesn't care. As long as I don't post location (like I would) he sees no problem with it.

Ok, so I totally misread this one.

And, here are my boys, Stasiu and Bohdan.