a little birthday candle action

the birthday queen should have made an appearance on Tuesday to wish Michele a wonderful day - so she's makin an appearance today - better late than never. And whilst we're doing that I'm gonna show you the little project I was working on - a little book for Michele.

The ribbon is gettin in the way of some of the words but it says:

Are you ready? Cue music; Hit the lights; add a little birthday candle action; Now lets all sing.....

If blogger wasn't a pain when you post a lot of pics - well i might format this a little differently but actually you can see how it reads. The words to the song are on your left and the little illustrations are to your right. I don't know if other families sing the "how old are you now" part but we always did - and still do to this day - so i threw that in as well. (yes - i ran out of time and i had to give in and print some of the last verse - the how old are you now part - if i didnt this little book would still be sitting here and it was late as it was with the MLK holiday). I used a lot of Purple Onion Designs stamps, natch :-) and my own little drawings that i drew on bristol board, inked then colored in with prismas and odorless mineral spirits (mcpt technique). Oh yeah - i used my binditall to put the whole thing together - i just love my binditall!

I better run - have a good one! And Michele - happy birthday again missy!

....edited to add - i totally forgot to edit these photos so they're gonna come out large when you click - sorry about that!

Took a wee break and now I'm back

Yeah I decided I needed to actually make some things and stay off the internet. well... not entirely but for the most part. how's that? I don't know about you, but I can really spend way too much time looking at blogs etc. By the time I finish, I'm wondering how come I don't have time to make anything! (sound familiar?)Okay so in the past week or so I've been busy making things when I'm not watching CNN (that's a little addiction that resurfaces when election time rolls around. can't help myself. don't want to)

The husband, who is a bigger CNN junkie than I, had the television tuned into the playoffs. When we were married, a million years ago, it was I who was the Giants fan. Grew up with the Giants. It is thoroughly entrenched in my family and background. I can, however, live very nicely without football. I had a bit too much of it growing up. Just the sound of the fans cheering sets my teeth on edge every Sunday. However, the husband loves it. He was a Colts fan. Long story. Suffice it to say he has pretty much always liked the Giants but since we were married - he's a Giants fan. Anyway....

Can I tell you what a happy man sounds like? I should have taken a picture to show what one looked like last nite. I was up here watching a movie. I could hear him yelling etc so he really didn't need to come running up the stairs to tell me who won.

Regardless, I have been making some things. One thing I'll have to wait to post - I need the recipient to receive it first. I realized today it's going to arrive late - forgot about the holiday. But I do have a little project I can show. It's one of those satisfying-yet-simple little projects you just smile at and say well now isn't this just great!? I was looking at Martha's website a few weeks ago and saw this project: Holiday Card Scrapbook I have saved probably every Christmas/holiday card I've ever gotten. Yes, I'm a serious packrat. I certainly save one sample of the cards I've made and sent each year. And I have trouble throwing out the cards I receive and certainly cannot throw away the photo cards I get. My plan originally was to make a traditional album of said cards (sent and received). But let's get real - it wasn't going to happen. I have enough plain old scrapbooking to do, right? So I saw Martha's project and thought that would get some major piles taken care of tout de suite! Here's another view
I took all the cards I had immediately handy - that was 4 years worth. I got the general size then cut up some cardboard (chipboard in scrapbooky lingo) so it would be larger - cover -fashion. Took those and covered them with holiday scrapbooking paper. Used my cropadile to punch the holes (love that cropadile so you can punch a predetermined depth over and over again and it comes out perfect!) in the covers and cards. Set eyelets in the cover holes front and back so that the D-rings would slide smoothly through. I decorated the covers with the year (with Quickutz Zoe numbers I believe) and then if the card I made to send that year had a vertical orientation I put it on the cover. The horizontally oriented cards (2007 and 2004 see above) got taped on the inside front cover. I used my rectangle nestabilities for that white scalloped rectangle on 2007. Fun, easy, and practical. Totally my kind of project. Best thing was I had everything I needed to make these so I could just sit down and do it! I will be making more as I uncover other years cards that have been packed away.

Okay. That's enough for today. It is a holiday but I had to get up early and retrieve the darling daughter from her cast party. The final night of her latest play was last night. They have sleepover cast parties. Can you believe it? Really. We live too far away from the school to probably ever get to host one of these but the parents who have hosted say the kids have a great time - no problems whatsoever- they're the best bunch of teenagers ever. Do you ever hear people talk about teenagers this way? Amazing isn't it?

another card and is this winter or what????

okay its take 2 for the crimper faux ribbon and the nestabilities circles (i also got rectangles but i've yet to play with those yet - maybe today) And yes, its the wonderful Damask Stamp from Purple Onion Designs - I love this stamp! It looks equally good stamped repeatedly with black for the main pattern on the card as it does stamped with versamark to create the watermark behind the sentiment.

Yesterday it hit around 70 here in the burg. Today it's supposed to be in the 60's. I certainly don't mind not having the heat cranking all day (while wearing several layers inside the house)and I am enjoying having the windows open. It's just so odd. By tonite it will all be over so I'm going to enjoy it while it lasts. Have a good one

another warm day here in the burg; an oldie but a goodie

so warm I have the windows open. I have to keep reminding myself it's January! Even living in Virginia we shouldn't be having this kind of weather in January - it's crazy - not complaining mind you.

Here's a little thank you I made for my dear friend June. I used a few Christmas presents finally - this StampinUp! set called Priceless and some Nestabilities. I'd been looking at both the stamps and the dies for months and months and well - isn't that what Christmas is for? :-)

Anyway I used Versamark and clear ep for the bottom portion. Then I stamped the sentiment with Ancient Page (my favorite black i think) and clear ep'd that (yeah i embossed that dye ink again) then versamarked over the entire circle and clear ep'd it. The band that looks like ribbon going across is cardstock I ran thru my paper crimper. Yeah - a paper crimper - remember those? I loved that thing years ago. I was looking for something else and came across it and said well gee - I think I need to use this again. It really is an oldie but a goodie yaknow? As it happened I didn't have any black ribbon handy so finding that crimper was a little bit of serendipity.

warm wishes on a warm january day

....here in the burg
Earlier this week I would have said it felt like an
ice-burg. It was so stinkin cold! Today a totally unseasononable day. Sunny and in the 60's I guess. I'm going to enjoy it as long as it lasts.
Anyway -
I wanted to make a card for a friend who is ill.
I saw a lovely card challenge via my friend Amy's blog. Amy is the Guest Designer for January at i{heart}2stamp and Amy made a lovely card (Amy only knows how to make lovely cards) and I thought I'd take a crack at that challenge. So here it is. I had pop-dotted the sentiment and finally gave up on scanning it as I couldn't get a straight scan - apparently I can't get a straight photo either!
I used some textured white cardstock I found at ACMoore, some snowflake vellum I had hanging around, my marvy punches, a hand held punch; SU! mat pack (yes June I finally played with it!) and sentiment stamp (from SU! All Year Cheer I set -retired) and silver cord; versamark and white ep.
I have a few thank you's I made last week I'll be posting tomorrow. Now I'm off to watch Amazing Race. It'll be a nice break from the CNN ballot bowl we've been watching most of the day- I enjoy the politics but it's enough for one day.

Smart Pet Tricks

I was going to title this stupid pet tricks but I just can't call Frankie & Holly stupid. They're too smart and I love 'em too much to do that. But they have been quite the rascals of late so I thought you might get a giggle out of their antics.

First up is Holly. My mostly companion.

I have no idea when this particular trick began although I discovered her doing this in early December. I spose you could say she has always been doing this - while we are not in the house? But I would think that in 10 years we would've caught her before now. Soakin wet.... nuff said. I spose we all may have to learn to close the lid. (I have to remember to ask my sister, the vet, if this is really bad for her or not)

Next up is Frankie (I call him Franklin when he's in trouble. He gets called Franklin a lot. He's the original Peck's Bad Boy I swear. He opens doors, medicine cabinets and the freezer. I am NOT kidding - and he is so darn cute he gets away with it all) Yesterday I was sitting here at the computer and I heard a paper rustling sound. At first I dismissed it, somewhat absorbed in what I was doing at the time. Then I heard it again. This strange paper rustling noise. I thought I'd better investigate although my imagination is often much worse than the reality. I got up from my chair and walked out of this room and looked from side to side. Then out of my bedroom walked Frankie - in this get-up - a Kohl's bag worn superhero-style. I started to laugh so hard I almost cried. Frankie didn't seem amused. I told him I had to get a picture first before I rescued him (he owes me at least that much LOL!) He declined to comment on how he got him self into this situation although I did inquire. I took the bag off of him and he went on his merry, crazy kitty way.

I know people who don't have pets are missing out. Seriously. I adore these two furry friends and they reward me daily with love ...and shenanigans.

Have a good one!

Bye Bye 2007

hello 2008

I am sure i should be making some resolutions but they are always the same ones so I shall spare you.

We finished off the year here by going to the husbands family Christmas. Had a nice time. I promised you a look at the last gift card holder I made. Well, a few weeks before Christmas I decided I was going to make something to hold the gift card we were giving our niece. She is a special girl to us- and my husband's godchild (she is one of a set of triplets - the others are boys). I got her some hair bands and some earrings and a bookstore gift card. She's 11 and a reader and enjoys Nancy Drew. So I decided I'd start searching the antique stores in the area for an old Nancy Drew book. I have my own small collection of Nancy Drew (from my childhood) but I am not parting with mine just yet! I went up to The Old Lucketts Antique Store and had a wonderful time searching floor by floor and while I didn't come up with a Nancy - I did find a book that resembled a Nancy by the same author, Carolyn Keene. Then I set about making the book into a gift card holder. It didn't take that long to cut out the pages. I modpodged the pages together and it worked out great. The gift card as well as the hairbands and earrings all fit inside the book. My husband gave her the present and when she opened it he told her he was sure that she must have things she'd like to hide from those 5 brothers of hers - she made a huge smile.

We got home on Sunday afternoon and have been trying to catch up ever since.

Tomorrow I'm hoping to play with some of the things I received for Christmas. We shall see......

Happy New Year everyone!

almost christmas'd out

well it was a nice and quiet christmas around here.
for which i'm grateful
so much hubbub beforehand
we did something on Christmas Eve we've never done before - we went out for dinner! Now that was nice! Came home and dove into the Christmas cookies!
here are a few pics (i make a number of other cookies but you'll get the idea)

note the total destruction of the rainbow cakes. I had to have a discussion about proper choice of knives for cutting this particular creation with the family. i spend a lotta time making that particular one... i'd rather it not be hacked to bits.

By the way - the rainbow cookies - or really cakes - came to be part of our regular holiday fare a few years ago when I was finally able to find a recipe that tasted like a childhood memory of mine. It took years to find this recipe. When I was little. my grandfathr would go to a particular french bakery in NYC nearby where he and my grandmother lived on East 35th Street. My grandparents would come to visit every Sunday and they would often bring those cookies. Delectable cookies of all kinds but the favorite, hands down, for my sister, brother and myself was the Rainbow. These little cakes were not very large but there weren't that many in the lovely bakery box so my mother would cut each one up into 3 pieces and we'd each get a piece. Unbelieveably delicious. Three thin layers of colored cake. In between the layers was raspberry jam and the whole thing was topped off with chocolate. Yum doesn't even begin to describe the flavor. Anyway I finally found a recipe that I tweaked every so slightly and we've been in Rainbow heaven for the past maybe 5 years!

Anywho....
Christmas day came and went but we're still Christmas'ing it. We're off to the husbands family Christmas tomorrow in Delaware. I wrapped some more presents today and baked another round of sugar cookies. Then i set about decorating them - ze best part!

We always painted cookies as far back as I can remember. My mother would sit us down with paintbrushes, icing and food coloring and she'd let us have at it. I came upon the edible gold dust - used on the stars you see above - over 10 years ago in a cake decorating store. I take the "dust" and use lemon extract (like you'd use water and watercolor paints) and then paint on the cookies. You get the pretty gold as well as a light flavoring of the lemon and its really delicious.

I think its time to post this so I'll be off. We'll be back on Sunday and hopefully I'll get a moment to post another gift card holder I made. This one is definitely a little different - i hope our niece likes it. I'll let you know.....

some christmas music

for your listening pleasure

gift card christmas 2 - the sequel

okay first things first - my header magically appeared this morning - it had been cut off and I was saying a little prayer to the blogger gods they'd fix it and indeed they did. The picture is of moi at age 3 at Christmas time. Note the stockings in the background. (Yes, I still have mine.) Some of you may recognize this photo of me from an ATC I did a while back.

Okay. That's enough on that....

This morning I went to Greenberry's (the local coffee place) and met up with my good friend June.

(Lauren - there was a chocolate teacake in the vicinity.... I've been to Greenberry's a few times and never looked at the bakery items... why torture myself right? omigosh - June you should take a picture of that thing so Lauren can see it! )

We had a wonderful time catching up over coffee, didn't we June?

Okay so on to the cards!

It's Gift Card Christmas 2- the sequel. Starring 2 gift card holders!

I made this gift card holder for June. It's a little tip of the hat to our love of "Monk" and his hating the word Joy at this time of year. (I used some Basic Grey Fruitcake paper and the Joy is from that adorable Purple Onion Holidoodle Sentiment Set) as well as some Hero Arts alpha stamps for the shmoy.

I also made another gift card holder for another friend but I had to wait til it was received so I could post it.

Here's the whole thing - IN REALITY its a library pocket dressed up in holiday paper masquerading as a gift card holder! (I used an old Deluxe Cuts template to create the library pocket. Come to think of it I used another Deluxe cuts template to make June's gc holder....Isn't it funny how you may not have used something in a long while and all of a sudden you pull it out and say wow... this is pretty darn cool? Why haven't i used this in sooo long?)

Then there is an insert that holds the gift card. I pulled out the Happy Holidays stamp form a StampinUp set and used white embossing powder on that. Found a holly and berry eyelet and set that in the center of the circle.

I used a coffee cup stamp I've got and versamarked that and used some white chalk to color it. And i got out the sewing machine and made the pockets.

After the coffee I came home and got started on my baking. I baked most of the afternoon and into the evening. How thoughtful those television folks were to put on "White Christmas" again so I could listen (and watch) while I was baking - dontcha think?

I'll be back tomorrow to show you all the goodies.

gift card christmas

yeah - around here it's the year of the gift card

i have bought non GC gifts for my immediate family (husband and kids) and a few for the husband's family gift exchange (which will take place on the 29th) but this year i've purchased a lot of gift cards. For a few reasons - mostly because i haven't a clue what to buy certain people! In my mind a gift card is a wonderful gift i'd love to receive (no guilt spending) so i'm thinkin some of the recipients wil be quite pleased (i have a few who ask for GC's to particular stores. It goes without saying i love these relatives !).

Of course I have guilt about all this GC'ing. As much as I love giving and receiving them, its still feels like cheating.

(yes, I'm nuts)

So to assuage some of that guilt i decided to make cute GC holders.

(heaven forbid i let myself totally off the hook, right?)

And while I was making the GC holders, I was also doing the latest Rick Rack challenge at Caardvarks ! (it's a two-fer folks!)

I used a Cuttlebug Snowflake embossing folder to create the pocket portion of the GC holder. I topped that with the Rick Rack. I stamped the HoHoHo (from Purple Onion Designs Holidoodle sentiment set ) in versamark and embossed that with white EP. I took some Making Memories snowflake charms that I had in my stash and punched a hole in the top of each. Then i cut out the little white tags using my Quickutz and used some of their rubons for the teeny tiny to: from:. I strung the charms and tags on a piece of bakers tiwne and then tied that to the rick rack. Finally, I stitched all around the blue to create a pocket to hold the GC.

I have to say I'm rather pleased with how they came out. I know the recipients will enjoy them as they are ones who appreciate such things as handmade GC holders.

An aside - i've been offline since yesterday early afternoon. My router decided to die and I finally arranged to get a new one sent to me just a few minutes ago (over the phone with a very nice technician). The joy of the broken router will be fully realized when my husband and daughter get home and realize my computer is their only way on the interet. I can see I will be off the computer a lot between now and when that router arrives. (Which probably is just as well seeing as I have a very long list of things to bake, presents to wrap etc. huh?) Anyway, I thought I'd quick post this and get on my way to do some more shopping and then hit the grocery store for a big shop. I have a very lengthy list - mostly consisting of baking supplies. If all goes well, I will be done with my shopping by tomorrow and then this house will turn into a bakery and wrapping emporium :-) Hope to check in sometime later......