March 5, 2012

Magical Monday - Children's Birthday

The challenge this week is "Children's Birthday" at the Paper Cupcake's Challenge Blog; There's Magic In The Air. I thought this was a great for me on this particular day, although I am not a child, it is my birthday today! So, of course I picked the image from Paper Cupcakes called "It's My Party". I colored the image with my Souffle 3-D opaque Ink Pens. I love how different these look, although you can't really shade with them, I still love the look of them. I kept my card fairly simple. Criss-crossed my ribbon on each section piece and instead of adding bows I added fiber to give is some fun fuzzy texture and then added some lines of pearls & rhinestones. Added a touch of Stickles to the crown and wand for a little sparkle and called it complete.



This month has just flown. Our dog Millie just over a month ago was diagnosed with a detached retina. We took her to an emergency clinic and seen an optamologist shortly after that. They put her on pain meds and we watched it for a few weeks. One night I literally thought she was dying, mainly because she seemed in so much pain and wasn't really responding to me much. I ended up getting some more meds and took her to the vet the next day. Her eye pressure was extremely high, which a normal dog's eye pressure is usually around 10-12 and hers was 57! I ended up taking her right into emergency eye surgery which was to remove the eye. So we did that and they also found a benign tumor behind her eye which they removed as well. She just got her stitches out last Thursday and she is doing great and is glad to have that cone off. This is her new look now and we are getting use to it. It certainly doesn't seem to slow her down at all. We can't thank the wonderful vets enough that seen us through it all, there were 4 different ones totaled and I loved them all, but I truly appreciate the South side Animal Hospital that took her into emergency surgery and was waiting on my call after we visited the optamologist. They were the best! Anyway, she is doing great and I am sure she knows and feels she is deeply loved.



This past Saturday Morgan my youngest daughter went to sectionals for speech. She does a duo with another girl which is funny in content. I really did not know what speech was prior to her doing it and it was nothing like what I imagined it to be. There are lots of categories and nothing like giving a speech. It is more like acting and doing improv, but not. That is the best I can describe it. Anyway... Her and Christa took second overall in their category and their school took first place overall the schools in their sectional. It is won by a point system. So each time a child wins in their category they get points for which place they took and their school walked away with the highest points which landed them in first place over all. They are crazy talented kids and a joy to watch on the stage and off. Well, anyway here is a picture of the group that went to sectionals. They are off to State now and that is in a couple of weeks. We are lucky that it will take place close to home, which is really nice!



Morgan is the cute one left of the trophy holding her red ribbon and the girl to the left of her is her partner in the duo. These kids work a lot of hours and it looks like it is paying off. I hope they rock State!

And here is a project I just did for a friend. She wanted to give her friend some personalized wine glasses and asked if I would paint them. She wanted butterflies on them and this is what I came up with:

I actually painted eight so she will get two in each color. I loved how they turned out. I would have only did one thing differently. I did the bases with the white and black dots, but I did both glasses in each the colors with the same colored dots. I wish I would have did white dots on one pink glass and black dots on the other pink glass and so on in all the colors. This way all the glasses would have been different, but alike and and the dots would have made that difference. Not sure if that makes sense to you, but I know what I mean and oh well, next time. I love these so much I think I will have to make myself a set!






For anyone who would like to attempt this I thought it was pretty easy and it would make a lovely gift. I used only six colors and the type of paint I used was FolkArt enamel for glass and ceramics (total: about 2.00 a bottle; can buy at Wal-mart or any craft store). You bake the glasses once they are complete (follow instructions on the bottle) and that sets the paint. It is suppose to be top shelf dishwasher safe, but if it were me and someone took the time to hand paint them, I wouldn't risk the dishwasher and would hand wash them. Maybe I will try a piece of glass and run it through the dishwasher to see how it holds up. I also made my own template for the butterflies and did not buy one. I just used my butterfly punch by EK and punched a border long enough to go around the glass. It lined up a little funny so I had to cut one butterfly off and add a smaller one to the fill in where it did not line up just right. I used re positional spray adhesive and then stuck it on the clean glass. I then added the paint and took the template off immediately after painting all the colors. This works the best while the paint is still wet. Otherwise it tends to tear off some of the paint that dries to the template. Then I cleaned the sticky off with a q-tip and some alcohol and then repainted the butterflies with another coat of paint to make them more crisp. Then I went and added all the details freehand. This was a lot of fun and the first time I have ever done anything like this. It certainly won't be the last. I am seeing some lovely Christmas gifts forthcoming! Wouldn't a truffle bowl be lovely? You could always print off a design and tape it on the inside and then just paint over the design too. This could be some endless creativity and fun.

Also, I want to lift up all the communities that have been dealing with the deadly and devastating tornado's that went through. We had some in Indiana, but they were much further South and missed us. I have a bad feeling this is just the beginning of a really scary spring storm season and living in tornado alley does not thrill me. My heart goes out to all of the communities and people and especially to the ones that lost love ones. Some truly sad stories there. So, holding all of that in prayer, because we certainly can't make sense of it all.

OK.. That's if for me and thanks for lurking by. I hope you enjoyed my post today. If you have any questions regarding my painted glasses feel free to e-mail me or leave your question in the comments and I will get back to you.

So, Happy Birthday to me and to anyone else that shares my day! Make sure you stop by the Paper Cupcakes challenge blog I have left a little freebie there in celebration of my birthday!



Have a joyful day full of everday ordinary kind of blessings!