merry christmas caard, a wreath and not knowing any better

so i decided to go backwards (not an unfamiliar place for me) and do the caardvarks challenge for day one (today will be day 7). I think it came out kinda cute (although the ribbon scanned up a little crooked). the sentiment is Purple Onion embossed with versamark and white EP. And the die is from Quickutz (proper white berries here miss amy!)

Yesterday I decided to do a little project that's been waiting around for a year. Yeah, a year. I'd bought some Christmas picks at Michael's after Christmas - they were 90% off or something like that. Normally I'm not buying after Christmas (like a lot of you smart folk out there) but these were so pretty - my favorite colors - particularly the wedgewoody blue - here's a picture. There's also a pale green and silver. I thought now wouldn't that make a pretty wreath? Yeah it would. I bought a wreath form and grabbed a bag of glue sticks and then didn't make the wreath. I noticed those picks sitting up in my closet yesterday and didn't fight the feeling. Went right to work. It was fun and very satisfying to just make something and hang it right up on the door. Here's my wreath -

This is the extent of my

Christmas decorating thus far but I've got a little bit of time.

Now onto the 'not knowing any better' thing. Have you been following along on Tim Holtz's blog this week? There's a link on your right in case you haven't. I've been visiting every day and today's entry made me laugh to myself. Tim was talking about his technique for the day - embossing with dye ink. Well - way back when I first started stamping - I guess about 15 years ago - I just sorta jumped in. My sister had sent me a few stamps and some embossing stuff and I hadn't a clue what to do with them other than use the insert instructions with the embossing pens she sent. I didn't even have a heat gun okay? No one told me you can't emboss with dye ink so I didn't know any better and I did. Yes you can emboss with dye inks - really. You just gotta be fast! It wasn't until years later - I'm talking maybe 5 years I'm in a stamp store and an employee tells me this - you can't emboss with dye ink. I thought to myself well gee I have been but I guess you know better 'cos here you are working in the stamp store! Of course it's easier to emboss using pigment inks - and especially Versmark - probably one of my all time favorite stamping products. But sometimes it's pretty funny how you can learn something better on your own - not knowing any better cos there are no rules then right? Have a wonderful Friday kids!