Our house ~ decorated mostly my way!

Jacquline's x-stitch

This is the cross-stitch I made for our newest niece. The colors in her room are pink and brown, so I tried to use varying shades of those two colors. I didn't know EXACTLY what shade of pink and brown her mom used... I'm hoping that it goes well with her decor. It is an odd size, so I am getting it framed for me. I have to wait til Monday, though, to take it in, because that's when my craft store has 1/2 off the frame! :-)
I thought it turned out pretty - I really like the font that I used. I hope she likes it! :-)

Stamping Party 2

Here is the card that I made at the stamping party:

We created the background paper with the different colors by dropping drops of ink (Purely Pomegranate, Old Olive, More Mustard, Soft Sky) from re-inkers onto glossy paper. We then took another sheet of glossy paper and smeared/blotted, etc., the ink until we achieved the effect we wanted.
We stamped the trees on the background with StazOn Timber Brown. The pumpkins and leaves were stamped on designer papers, then cut out. The gourd was mounted with a dimentional dot to make it stand out a little more, and 2 of the leaves have a layer of Dazzling Diamonds to add some "bling." The leaf above the sentiment is a brad.
I love the sentiment on the inside... it's just very sweet!
Happy Thanksgiving a little early, everyone! :-)

Stamping Party

I hosted a stamping party Tuesday night... except we held it at someone else's house. Here are the hostess gifts that I received:
This is a little purse-type bag made from folding one sheet of 12x12 paper. You could use it for a gift bag to hold cards or CD's, etc. I thought it was a very cute idea!
Here's the side view
And here it is with a card stuck in the pocket.

The card below was also a hostess gift from the party. I love the color combination on this... she used SU!'s Purely Pomegranate, Soft Sky, Wild Wasabi, and Sahara Sand.
Outside

inside

I love stamping parties for the fellowship, and because we get to try new techniques and such that I am not able to try because I don't have the tools needed. It's just nice to be with other Christian ladies, as well.

Happy Harvest Mix

Finally - I'm back to doing a little stamping. I'm not sure why, but I was in a stamping funk there for a while. I just didn't feel like stamping... maybe because I see what others post on their stamping blogs (of course, these are designers of stamps and they have ALL kinds of toys to play with at their fingertips) and rather than being inspired, I got a little discouraged. ANYWAY, I've decided that it doesn't matter what others do, I can only do what I can with what I have. So - today, I stamped a little bit:

Happy Harvest Mix
Recipe...
The back of the little card.

So - here's a little treat recipe for you, if you want to indulge in a little fall sweetness. A handful of ingredients all eaten in one bite tastes a lot like a Baby Ruth candy bar.

Enjoy the season!

Boston Historical Sites 09-15-2007

Here are some more pictures in leiu of my stamping sabbatical... enjoy your trip to Boston with me! :-)

SLACKING...

HI! I'm still alive... but haven't stamped lately. These are slow months for me as I don't have many birthdays/events that I HAVE to stamp for, and since I am now addicted to Facebook, and I FINALLY just caught up with reading everyone's blogs last week, well, I've been slacking. I hope to have some projects to post for you soon - that is, all of you who actually LOOK here (Janelle... are you the only one? If so, I'll be posting for you!) :-)
In leiu of stamping/scrapbooking/x-stitching (I'm working on one), I'll post a "stuff" here for you... a couple of my photos taken recently:

09/11/07 Sunrise 7:50 am (I see some BEAUTIFUL sunrises here!)
09/13/07 7:08 am Sunrise
09/13/07 7:08am Sunrise
09/13/07 7:11am Sunrise
Christopher Columbus Gardens - Boston, MA

09/15/07

Mission: Accomplished

Well, I FINALLY finished the project that I alluded to here. I created 4 memory boards... 2 magnetic and 2 "French Memory Boards." Here are pictures of the results:

Coffee themed magnetic board - we collect magnets from places that we visit
Gingerbread themed magnetic board (you can click on the picture to make it larger so you can see the detail)
Coffee themed memory board (I have yet to put pictures up!) Please forgive the fact that the ribbon is not totally symmetrical, but I wanted people to be able to see the coffee cup without a line across it. It was rather difficult to get the lines straight and even, but I kind of like the fact that it's not perfect!This is after I added silver paint pen to make the steam stand out, as well as some black magic marker to make the cup stand out against the dark background.
Gingerbread themed memory board
This is after I added silver to again highlight the steam
My dining room area with the boards on the wall.

I must say I was pretty pleased with the results. This is how I made them....

I already had the material from my previous projects of making curtains for our house in MD. I stamped images using the SU! Gingerbread Man wheel, Like It a Latte, Year Round Cheer, and Sketch an Event. The "Thinking of You" steam stamp is from Stampendous.

I cut out each of the stamped images, then took them to my friend, Beth's, house. We scanned them on the computer, and from there I was able to change the sizes, flip the images, etc. I just typed all the words on the computer using different fonts, then flipped them to mirror the images. I printed all of these things out on iron-on transfer paper, then cut all of them out and ironed them on the fabric. Of course, it was rather labor intensive with all of the cutting and trying to figure out all of the placements of each image, but I thought it was well worth it!

After ironing on the images, I then stapled the fabric to the boards. The boards are just 12"x12" cork boards from Walmart. Chris cut the thin board backing from a poster frame to fit and I used spray adhesive to glue the cork board to it. For the magnetic boards, I recycled the metal piece from an old magnetic dry erase board for one, and the other metal piece was a smaller one that I found in my cross-stitch materials box. Apparently, my aunt, from whom I received the supplies, used it to keep her patterns on. Anyway, I just used the double-sided tape stickers that came with the cork boards to adhere the metal to the front of the boards.

The twill tape pieces that I used for the memory boards was originally bright white. They are actually trach ties that I got from work... most people don't use them anymore (utilizing Velcro trach ties instead), but they come in every trach kit. Since they weren't being used, I was able to take them home and use them for cards and crafts! The best part is they are FREE! Anyway, I tea-stained them to make them more beige in color, then used flathead thumb tacks to tack them into place. I secured the ends around the back of the board with my hot glue gun. I used my left-over cut out stamped images and hot glued them to cover the tacks. I added a little sparkle with a red glitter paint pen, highlighted some things with a silver paint pen, and added dimension to the marshmallows and whipped cream with white liquid applique (from Marvy Uchida). I then used regular picture hangers on the back and ta-da... they were done!

Hope you enjoy my creativity! I'm so thankful for this talent that God has given me!

Hoppy for You birthday

This is not the greatest picture, but I LOVED this card. It is a little difficult to see, but the cardstock I used is called Gamma Green, and it is almost iridescent. It is awesome! I loved the little frog (from Too Punny), and the dots and circles on the background, as well as the sentiment are from Riveting (both sets are SU!) The blue and green striped ribbon is from Michael's, and I just used a regular staple to secure it. I can't remember the colors I used! Thanks for stopping by!

Karate Kid

This card is a little wild, even for me, but I needed a cool background for this Karate Kid. My nephew, Jake, turned 10 this year, and loves karate. I called my sis to make sure that I colored this little guy's belt and headband the right color.
Jake was impressed that I knew what color his belt was! I love trying to stamp cards that are made individually for that person's interests!