Lots of gifts and cards, but no time to post or blog

I can't believe that Christmas has come and gone...well, not entirely for me. I still have 2 family "Christmas" gatherings left. I have been busy making cards and gifts for various peeps on my family and friends list. Here is a gift set I made for a former coworker. It was very easy and quick. I just love to make things from coasters, they are so versatile and inexpensive. I covered this coaster with some decorative paper by Provo Craft using my Tombo mono-adhesive runner, rounded the corners and then sanded all the edges with a sanding block. A friend of mine gave me a bunch of the tiny calendars that she ordered on line. I used several different stamp sets and stamped on each month of the year with appropriately themed stamps. I then mounted the calendar on a scrap piece of yellow cardstock and then mounted that onto the coaster. I added 2 standard white brads in the bottom corners using my new Crop-A-Dile that I got for Christmas to punch the holes(VERY Sweet)! It's like going thru butta! I tied on a piece of yellow organdy ribbon to finish it up. I attached a scrap piece of cardstock to the back to make it stand up and that's all there was to it!! Next I made a matching jumbo clip. The metal clips were purchased about a year ago on clearance from WalMart. I punched 2 - large(1 & 3/8 inch) circles from a coaster and 2 from the dp. Then I punched a 1 inch circle from the yellow cs and a flower from some white cs. I attached the flower to the yellow cs using a small yellow brad and then adhered the layers using my ZIG 2 way glue pen. The back side of the clip just has the dp glued to the coaster circle. I applied 2 coats of Mod Podge matte to the front piece and the back piece and let them dry. Both pieces were then glued to the clip using my trusty hot glue gun. I like to use the glue gun because it dries quickly and forms a strong bond. I tied on 3 matching ribbons and taa daa!! Also, very easy! I made these last night and gave them to my former coworker today at lunch and she loved them. If you have never made either one of these you should give them a try. I think you'll agree at how easy and nice they are.

Thanks for stopping by and I hope to get more of my projects posted ASAP to share with everyone! Happy Holidays!

Love the SCS Weekly Sketch Challenge

Tomorrow is my friend's husband's birthday. I have been way under the weather for the past few weeks so I was gonna just give him a card from my stash, but when I logged into SCS today and took a look at the Sketch challenge I knew that I could handle a quick card made special just for him.

He's not a particularly serious guy, so I used one of my fave stamps by American Art Stamp. I colored in the image using blender pens and ink from the tops of my SU ink pads. I followed the sketch exactly which always makes it easier to make a card quickly. This only took me about 20 mins. The base is SU True Thyme cs and the decorative paper is from the DCWV Old World Stack. The textured DCWV yellow cs was run through my Cuttlebug using the Birthday embossing folder. I just love my Cuttlebug!! I sanded it with a sanding block and mounted it on SU Blue Bayou cs. I distressed all the edges except for the layers that are stamped, but I did sponge them. I hope he like it!! And I am proud of myself for posting to my blog again this week!!! WhoooHooo!! I am on a roll!! See all the rests of my card deets below and thanks for checking out my new blog!

Stamps: American Art Stamp, Sentiment is Mikes $1 clear

Ink: SU True Thyme, Blue Bayou, Marigold Morning, Stazon black

Paper: SU True Thyme, Blue Bayou, Whisper White, DCWV textured yellow cs and Old World Stack dp

Accessories: brads, Cuttlebug, pop dots, sanding block

Techniques: Sponging, scissors for distressing edges, sanding

Swarovski Cyrstals for Mary's Birthday

A dear friend and coworker recently had a milestone birthday. She turned 50 and I wanted to do something special for her. She has mentioned on several occasions that she would love a bracelet made with pastel colored Swarovski crystals as she knows that I enjoy making jewelry as one of my crafting obsessions. Normally I prefer to work with natural beads and hemp, but I decided to venture away from my comfort zone and make her what she she wanted. These are what I came up with.

I created a trio that she can wear all together or individually. The colored Swarovski crystals are 6mm and the clear ones are 4mm and are by Pure Allure. I also used some liquid silver tube beads by Bead Bliss. Each bracelet is 7" and is finished off with a 1.3mm silver crimp bead. To string everything on I used .5mm Stretch Magic jewelry cord. Her husband threw her a super party, and I think she was very happy when she opened my gift! Happy Birthday, Mary!

Quick Warm Wishes Card

I promised myself that I would post at least 1 time a week to my blog...so here I am! I made this card for the SCS's Color challenge today which can be found here.

I had the SU bashful blue and certainly celery, but no basic grey so I used a grey cardstock that I had in my bulk pile. This was a very simple layout. The dp is from an older DCWV matstack. I have to confess that I have many of these 4x6 matstacks and 12x12 stacks from DCWV. I usually get them at the end of the seasons for a very discounted price, I am just such a paper hoarder. I haven't located a stamping/scrapbooking store near my home to purchase all the wonderful dp I see so many people using. I guess along with this bloggin' stuff I am also going to have to get shopping online as well! The stamped stocking and sentiment were a Joann's/mike's $1 clear set (so many cute ones to choose from) colored in with metallic colored pencils and dotted with a red and gold sparkle gel pen. I used the largest Fiskers oval punch and a Marvy scallop punch. For my corners, I don't own the tag punch from SU so I used a 1/2" circle punch. I also added 2 large silver brads and a piece of grey twill. My main image is up on pop dots. This is a 5"x5" square card. Yeah!! I did it!! and It's posted!! You have no idea how proud of myself I am! I still have some more constructing on my blog to do. I want to get all the links to the blogs and sites that I enjoying visiting. I think I will finally put a link to my blog on my siggy at SCS...I am nervous about what people will think....I won't know unless I just do it, so here goes nothin!!

My Neglected Blog

How does a wife and mother who works full time outside of the home have time to keep a blog? I know there has got to be a way...well, i am back for a second try after being away for 2 months. I actually TOOK the time to make a card for the Inspiration challenge at SCS for this week. It was lots of fun. I used my first piece of DCWV The Metallic Stack cardstock! I've had it for about a month and was looking for just the right card to use it for. I am not much of an artist, but I can get by. After using my Swirls stamp set from Autumn Leaves I still needed to add my own freehand doodles to fill in space the way the jacket was. I think I got it pretty close. The whole while I was coloring this in with my metallic gel pens my DH was pestering me to watch some college football with him downstairs. It's so hard for me to fit everything I want to do into 1 day. The sentiment is one of those Michael/JoAnn's $1 mini clear stamp sets. I seriously have 40 of those cute little sets! I used my versamark to stamp it and then heat set it with detail white embossing powder. I hope you all like my little creation!! Thanks for stopping by. I will try harder to keep up with this Bloggin' thing...I know I can do better!!

No time for my "Crap" room

I haven't had any time to play in my crap room for the past few days. I am trying to get my son, Alex's room painted, but the prep work is killing me! He had stuck an EXIT sign above his door that must have had some kind of industrial strength adhesive on it cuz I could not get it off for the life of me! It took me about 2 hours and several products to finally get it off the wall. Goo Gone was my savior! Then there were all the places where the top layer of drywall was peeled off the wall...how does a child manage that? And then all those little nail holes...they went on and on and on...the boy had christmas lights draped all the way around his room! I told him, in a firm tone of voice, that when he gets back into his own room there will be no nails, screws or other punturing devices hammered into the walls! Tomorrow morning I think I will be all set to get the primer on, Whew!

I really wanted to take part in the Featured Stampers challenge today. Heather, aka inglishrea, has a gorgeous gallery!! I will try to case at least one of her cards sometime this week. Well, my arms and hands are killing me from all that scrubbing, so I am gonna hit the hay. But first, I am gonna give my oldest son a quick call cuz he was getting back from his Honeymoon and was driving to Syracuse to spend his first night, with his new wife, in his new house.

TTFN!

Making cards and ripping up carpet...

I spent most of my day in my youngest son's room ripping up the ratty old carpet in his room. Whew, that's some hard work! I have been meaning to do this chore ever since we move into our house, 15 years ago...ooops! I actually painted his room when we first moved in, I did a whole theme of a construction zone (very little boyish), but now that he's 18, I have decided to update!

I managed to get a card done for the SCS Way to Use it challenge. I chose my colors from the decorative paper. I just love this American Art Stamp image. I have a ton, no, seriously, a ton of DCWV textured cardstock! Remember, "I love all kinds of paper"! There are so many wonderful colors in lots of shades. I have started to purchase Stampin' Up cardstock, but I just can't afford all the beautiful colors that I want. I own 49 SU stamp sets. About half of them I purchased new and the other half I bought on Ebay. I have been making cards for about 1&1/2 years and it is one of my favorite things to do. I was really into scrapbooking about 6-7 years ago, but have gotten away from it cuz I just din't have the time for it. I like to make cards because I can usually complete one in about an hour. A scrapbook page would take me more like 8 hours. Well, I still have a bunch of tacks to pull up out of the beautiful hardwood that was under the ratty carpet so , I'm outta here! TTFN!

Time to get BLOGGIN'

So, I figured it was about time for me to get caught up with the times. I belong to a wonderful website called Splitcoaststampers and I really enjoy going to other members' blogs to see what else they are up to. I love all kinds of crafts and while I plan on showing off my cards that I create, I will also be sharing other crafts as well. This whole "bloggin'" thing is new to me so be patient please...Not sure how this will all turn out. Wish me luck and thanks for stoppin' by!