thanks for everything

My thank you note to Nicki (see yesterday's post) uses some new-to-me Cosmo Cricket DP I'd purchased this month but not used 'til now ... what's up with THAT, you ask?! ... and the CPS124 sketch.

The Cosmo DP was a spot-on match color wise to some CTMH Aspen DP I had on hand, and I distressed the ivory card stock a bit using some Ranger distress ink, then faux stitched around all the borders with a CTMH Cranberry marker and punched out a snowflake for the accent. Easy peasy!

stamps: clear & simple's thank you 2009; paper: A1's natural white card stock, CTMH Aspen DP and card stock, Cosmo Cricket's Oh Joy: Frosty DP; ink: Ranger antique linen and black soot distress inks, CTMH's cranberry marker; tools: Paper Studio's snowflake punch

RAK from Nicki

It was least expected, but much appreciated! In today's mail I received a free stamp set and a "Thank You for your business" card from Nicki Jackson, one of the co-owners of Clear & Simple Stamps. SUCH a sweetie! Here's the card, pictured at left, and the stamp set I received appears to be a special edition, 'cuz I can't find it at their online store (at least, YET!)! I'm outta here to play; catch ya later!

let it snow!

Yep, it's snowing outside as I type this, and I've gotta admit, it's lookin' mighty pretty! No, don't confuse the "pretty" talk with someone who enjoys winter - I'd like it if it'd be winter for 2-3 months max, but it seems to extend its welcome here all too often! I talked with a friend last night who moved to the UP (Michigan-speak) a couple years ago, and she reported that they got 4' of snow in a recent storm, while we trolls (that's what they like to refer to those of us who live "below the bridge" as) only had about 1" of the white stuff to contend with here. This is one of my New Year's cards - that's what I'm calling the cards that I procrastinated on and didn't mail before Christmas. This card started out as a tag from CAM that's grown into a card.

My DH called me over to the kitchen earlier this a.m. when he spotted 5 male cardinals in our small plum tree outside our kitchen window. It's located way too close to the house, actually, and he's forever trimming branches from hitting our garage roof. Those who planted it apparently didn't give it much chance for survival into adulthood, eh?! But I love it - we've put a couple bird feeders around it and our next-door neighbors posted a "Beware of Attack Squirrel" by it (that's a whole 'nuther story!). Here's a lousey shot thru the screen and dirty window of a few of 'em. Two are on the right (2 in branches, 1 below pines), and one's in the top third of tree on the left. They're tricky to catch on film or my photo-taking's a bit below par ... which do you suppose?! ... but they're sure a beautiful bird! Our state bird's the robin but heck ... they leave the state in the winter, folkes!

countdown to Christmas

Christmas Countdown - Christmas Layouts

the tree 2009

This year's tree is all decked out in white and clear decorations. I'm not usually into themes, but my style is generally country and our tree usually consists of mainly hand-made ornaments. I've exchanged stitched ornaments with friends and teachers over the years and have quite the collection. This year I used a couple containers of simple ivory ornaments that I'd purchased a couple years ago, added our kazillion glass icicles in varying sizes, then looked thru my stash and used only the white/ivory ornaments I had. Yep - enough to pretty much fill the tree!

Merry Christmas!

Not a card, but a family story to share with you tonite ... those of my extended family who are local got together at my sister's house today. We dined on a yummy ham, mashed potato, green beans, some strange corn dish, rolls, butter - a pretty t'riffic feast. When I'd finished my meal, my DH, brother and I all noticed my youngest working on a "project" of sorts with his mashed potato. It was akin to Close Encounters of a Third Kind but with a holiday theme.

Can you spot Santa on the right and the words "Ho Ho Ho" on the left? Yep, that's my son! Santa's hat's a bit strange, but methinks that was because my son was spotted working on this crafty item and by then he was acting a bit sheepish ...

happy b'day, Beth's friend!

Every now and then I'm called upon to make a card for someone at work, and this one's for Beth's friend. They travel a lot together, so I used the boat and loaded presents in the little dinghy. It's based on the CPS144 sketch. I'm hooked on sketches and almost always start cards using 'em. So, do the papers I used make you think of starry skies, sandy beaches, and the water? Sigh ... it didn't to my DH! The "sandy" background is stamped repeatedly using a "birthday" definition stamp, and the circle and square and puffs of smoke are all popped up using dimensionals of varying heights. I smudged ink around the circle piece to give it a bit more definition.

stamps: Hero Arts' birthday definition, SU's Boatloads of Love, Loads of Love Accessories, and Heard from the Heart (inside sentiment); paper: BasicGrey Dasher, My Mind's Eye Bohemia, SU's Kraft; ink: Ranger Black Soot distress ink, Tri-C watercolor markers, Versamark; accessories: Basic Grey metal art, Hirschberg Schultz cord trim

stamp simply

This mass production is killin' me! No, not really ... I don't mass produce, but, inspired by the lovely and talented Julie Koerber, this card joined my Christmas card stash today. I'm such a slacker, I've not sat down and adressed envelopes, so that's my goal for today. Get the cards ready for Monday's mail, Sue! I'm in the Christmas spirit but have had a cold these past few days and been sucking down the Hall's cough drops. I didn't even make it to my usual Saturday make-'n-take this weekend. I really feel much better today ... just in time to return to work Monday, right?! Hope you're enjoying your weekend!

whoo hoo! uploaded to SCS 7/2010 and was selected as a CAS favorite of the week!

stamps: SU's Cold Play; paper: The Paper Co's white card (I use these or similar product for the base of most of my cards and affix a card front to them - which extends my supply of card stock stash); ink: Ranger's Black Soot distress ink and SU's Pumpkin Pie, PC-generated inside sentiment (yes, it's a snowman in a snow storm!)

secret Santa 2009

We celebrate the start of the holiday season with a fun week of Secret Santa where I work (insert shameless plug for Kettering University here). Generally, it consists of exchanging small value gifts the first 3 days, and a larger gift on the 4th day during a lunch get-together. Here's the card I made to house a PC-generated gift certificate for my final day's gift. It's fun sneaking about to hide your gifts the first 3 days, and on our 4th we try to guess who our Secret Santa was before we open our last day's gift. We even all bring our final day's gift to the restaurant in a plain brown grocery sack with the name hidden on the bottom of the bag! As usual, a fun time was had by all! So, what do you do to celebrate where you work?

I punched the dove and sprig out on both cardstock and cardboard, glued 'em together, and popped 'em up using dimensionals. Then, crafty me, I stapled the tag to hang down inside from the top of my grocery sack, and adhered my card (with gift certificate inside) from that. It was, needless to say, probably the lightest gift there!

stamps: studio g (inside sentiment); ink: studio g; paper: deconstructed Bath & Body Works gift bag, accessories: tag - from the Bath & Body Works gifts (a 2-part lotion and soap set in matching plaid containers), ribbon - (you guessed it!) from the Bath & Body Works gift set, peace - a JoAnn's dollar find from last year, dove - Cuttlebug and QuicKutz 2x2" set

sparkle

Christmas-time is near ... you just listen to my eldest son on our morning drive to school and work! He's been picking out Christmas music for the past month to play en route. Here's a clean & simple card I made today, to add to my growing collection of Christmas cards. I haven't regrouped recently to check how many I have altogether - there's some remaining from last year, some that were returned for additional postage that I put aside, and those I've made recently. I think I should be pretty much set, but it seems I can't get enough of Christmas-related stamps. I TRY to hold back ... really I do! grins ...

Recent stamp releases I've spotted while blog trolling has me thinking Valentine's Day and I'm itching to switch!

speaking of Christmas ...

On Christmas day Stampin' Silvia (hey, that's my Mom's name too!) will be drawing one lucky winner to take home the loot pictured at left, in honor of her 2 year blogoversary. Stop by her blog some time before now and then ... only 10 days to go! I can't believe time's flying by so quickly! So much to do and so little time!

enablin' I will go ...

I happened upon some t'riffic blog candy this evening while I SHOULD have been making the last of my Christmas cards and thought I'd share my find. Visit Lifestyle Crafts' letterpress give-away post by Dec 21 if you agree this blog candy ROCKS! And good luck, all!

winter 09 issue's out!

The kind folkes at Scrapbook & Cards Today have released their latest issue - available at your local neighborhood scrap stores and booksellers ... AND at the magazine's free download site! Check it out and enjoy!

go Disney!

My eldest and I had a "date" today! We went to see a matinee showing of Disney's The Princess and the Frog, followed by eats at Qdoba and sundaes from MickeyD's. The movie was great - a Cajun version of The Frog Prince set in modern-day New Orleans. Great music, characters, and story telling. The voodoo references and bad guy getting sucked out of the movie at the end by the spirit shadows was a bit creepy, reminding me of a similar scene in Ghost, and made me question the G rating, but overall, I'd give it a 4.75/5 star rating! I know we'll be quick to pick up the DVD when released!

nontraditional Christmas colors

If my buddy Pat hadn't been with me today, I'd have thought this card to be a perfect one to give her this Christmas ... if it had a little bit of bows and glitz?! My buddy loves pinks and this one fits that order in a big way, eh?!

Today's make-'n-take from Karen's, there are no deets to share today - all materials were supplied in the class.

happy blogoversary Sheetload!

It's been crazy busy at work and I'm just dropping into a chair when I get home, but I WILL stamp again soon - honest! 'Til then, I'm blog trolling this evening and happened to check out the kind folkes at Sheetload ... and see they're celebrating their blogoversary by offering blog candy, some of which is pictured at left. So stop by, leave a comment, visit a spell ... and I'll talk at ya tomorrow!

SU news, part deux

Blog-surfing this a.m. I happened upon some more sneak peeks of changes to come in January, pictured here. Interesting ... looks like ek success-styled punches in our immediate future, doesn't it?!

I'll be back with a card post later ... off to play!

the blind side

A few friends and I went to see The Blind Side today and grab some eats afterward. If you're unfamiliar with the story, it's a docudrama based on the life of NFL offensive tackle Michael Oher. Tho' these types of movies are never 100% true to the facts, it was an interesting flick and I'd recommend it. I laughed. I cried. I laughed again. I'm a huge fan of Sandra Bullock, but my major fault with the movie is that it seems to be more a movie about Leigh Anne Tuohy than it is of Michael Oher; maybe that's to be expected tho'. And it was still t'riffic, maybe a 4/5 star rating.

enabler alert re color inc

Hi folkes! Just a quick stop to let you know that Donna Downey and the kind folkes at Color Incorporated have teamed up to offer some sweet blog candy on her blog - giving away each of their three products (a stand out, framed print, and gallery wrap canvas) to Donna's blog readers. All you've got to do is leave a comment on her blog post by 10 p.m. EST Sunday to enter.

SU news

Had you heard the news? Starting January 5th you'll be able to purchase SU stamps in your choice of wood or clear mount. The new clear mount stamps store in DVD cases made especially for them. They'll be cheaper than buying wood mount, tho' both stamps use the same kind of rubber. I'm pleased! I'd recently been debating removing my stamps from their original wood blocks and mounting them on cling vinyl, mainly for storage issues.

blog candy at JB's

Hi, it's your friendly neighborhood enabler ... checking in with a quick post before hitting the hay to let you know that Jenn Biederman of Created by JB fame is offering some blog candy, so stop on by some time between now and Sunday, December 6th! (so what are you still doin' here?! I'll catch ya later!)

Operation Write Home

I mailed a package - this time with 44 cards and a donation to offset mailing costs - to the kind folkes at Operation Write Home this past week. They in turn will mail them to deployed service people to use to be able to write to their friends and family. OWH can use a variety of themed cards so I think it's good to occasionally weed thru the cards in our stashes and think of our heroes. If you've been making more cards than you can use lately, please think of them, won't you?!

happy b'day SueS

I hang with a couple other Sues ... it made life interesting when we bowled on the same team some years back ... who's up? Sue? Sue? ... or the other Sue?! Or Barb, Debbie, or Laurie?! And another coincidence? When I was pregnant with my first born, so were Barb, Debbie, AND Laurie! And the same doctor from a group practice of three delivered both mine and Barb's babies, just 4 days apart! We were recommended to this group practice from different primary care doctors, however. What a grin, eh?!

But, back to the present - for Sue's birthday I decided that since it's December AND I recently purchased these cool self-adhesive candy dots (a.k.a. snowballs), a snowman birthday card was in order! My stamping buddies Pat 'n Kim 'n I recently took in a stamping show in Birch Run MI where I spotted these cuties and snatched 'em up. I stamped and embossed the snowflakes background, stamped and colored the snowman, matted the image and outside sentiment, and used a combo of Inkadinkado and SU stamps for the inside sentiment, which now reads "a little note on your special day ... the chill of winter is warmed by friendship. Happy Birthday." We're getting together to take in a movie this weekend and eats later where I'll be able to hand her the card rather than risk mailing these "snowballs." Heck, they could melt, y'know?!

stamps: Inkadinkado's picket fence, SU's It's Snow Time; paper: SU's Night of Navy, Whisper White; ink: StazOn Jet Black, SU's Dusty Durango and Old Olive, Tri-C watercolor markers; accessories: Pebbles' candy dots

NORAD Santa tracker

In its 54th season of tracking Santa Claus on his annual journey around the world, the North American Aerospace Defense Command annually provides a minute-by-minute update on Santa's travels.

The Web site - at www.noradsanta.org - features the history of the program, information on how NORAD tracks Santa, and interactive games - available in English, French, German, Italian, Japanese, and Spanish. Tune in on or after December 1st to check it out!