Welcome our family additions!!

((OK...)) I know what you are thinking! Are you kidding me? Nope I am not kidding you! So, I realize that all you House Mouse Stamp lover's probably really do not adore real mice, although you might adore those stamps, but truly these aren't mice, they're rats!! LOL... now isn't that a bit better!! Well, we have had rats and mice both as pets over the years, but we tend to lean towards the rats mainly now, because they are bigger so if one gets loose, they are a bit easier to locate!! ((((HAHAHA))) So, REALLY I am not sure how to convinence you that mice and rats are really super sweet, but THEY ARE! I have to admit to kissing many a rats and crying when we have lost one. Well, we have lost all our other rats, not in the house hehe but to rat heaven. So, my oldest dear daughter asked if she could go buy Avery an Easter Rat! Now isn't that just the cutest and the sweetest! LOL... So, maybe it's because I have been doing these house mouse challenges lately, that I folded and said sure. Now, here is where the problem came in. I sent my 18 year old and my 12 year old dear daughters to the pet store by themselves with the intention to purchase only one rat, well, upon their arrival home they unveiled 3! Of course they gave me the big ole spill that they saved their little lives, because they were in the feeder rats bin!! Which I guess I totally don't get. These rats are fancy hooded rats, which are raised to be pets... but I guess the snakes don't really care...so of course once I seen those cute little whisker faces, I totatlly fell in love with them!! LOL... So let me introduce you to these 3 lovely ladies!


This is Athena, isn't she just mystical!

This is Rocket, fast and speedy! ((also known as X-ray)) LOL

And this is Louise, a little old fashion, but modern!

Rats really do make delightful pets. I would have a rat any day over a hamster or gerbil and we have had them all. They are smart, truly interactive and we have never had one with a bad attitude or that was hard to handle and we have NEVER been bitten by one. They have all been super sweet. Rachel even had a hairless rat once, now I am not so sure how lovely in looks she was, but she was super sweet and very loving! Well, thats my exiting news for today, so have a rat-tat-tatty kind of day and SMILE; maybe the Easter Bunny will bring you an Easter Rat too!! hehehehehehe

House Mouse Challenge #31 - Bags and Boxes

This weeks challenge was to make a box or bag using a stamp. Well, I am thinking that mine is more a bag... LOL... not really a box, but not really a bag, but closer to a bag then a box!! LOLOLOLOL.... So, I made the template myself, although I have seen things like this before but thought it would be easy enough to do without a template. I took a 11x7 piece of card stock and made my first score (going across the shorter length) at 4.5, then made another score an inch from the first. Then measure 4.5 from the last one and score again, that should leave you with another inch area. So, it should be 4.5x1x4.5x1 = 11(wink-wink). Then I used my fiskars shape it tool and cut the oval out, used a fiskars boarder punch and did the edge that folds over the top. I placed a white piece of card stock behind that design so the white would show through. I added a few flower stickers, as well as the bee. Stamped the little sentiment and the mice and colored them with my mark-it markers. Cut them out and I place the one mouse on a pop-up dot as well as the sentiment. This holds a snack size baggie. I filled the baggie with gummie bears (had those one hand) and then added the little mouse inside the bag with a glue dot. I stapled the baggie to the back and then folded over the flap, punched two small holes at the top and then ran some ribbon through it to be able to carry it. I kind of appears more purse like I suppose!! Well, this really did not take me very long to make so I thought this would be a great thing to give little ones that you might visit at Easter or ones that visit you that you might want a little something for, but inexpensive. I am not usually very good at explaining things, so if I have done an awful job doing so please feel free to send me an e-mail! Thanks for stopping by and looking and happy box and bag making!

Another One Layered Card

I thought since I had to make a confirmation card today I would keep to this one layered challenge that is going on over at the Hero Arts Blog. I wanted the card to be simple, but pretty. I knew I wanted it to be mostly white and you just can't beat those embossing folders for adding so much for doing so little. I used this cute little Hero Arts stamp that I actually won once just leaving a comment months back. I thought it would be perfect for this card. Thanks to my friend Mindy for the "my Faith" mini stamp set! I really have a hard time doing simple, but I really liked how this turned out. I will be duplicating this card again, maybe for a wedding! :O) I probably don't really need to explain this because it is so simple, but I embossed the botton side, stamped by heart and my words. Added my ribbon, then stickled my heart.... yep simple, but lovely and quick! I placed a nice bible verse inside and added the heart in there too!

Thanks for looking!

One Layered Card

In celebration of Hero Arts Birthday Blog, there is major celebration going on over there. One of the challenges was to do a one layered card. Tough thing, I must admit. So, since this is truly a challenge for me I thought I would give it a try.
Soooo.. I wanted a kind of springy elegant card, I guess I have spring fever. I bought this stamp a few months ago and have yet to use it. I guess this is kind of it's unveiling for me. LOL.. It is an ArtCard Stamp called Decorative Birds. I inked my stamp with four different inks. The flowers are a mix of Colorbox Orchid Pastal and Dew Drop Perfect Plum. The branches are ColorBox Lime Pastal and the birds Color Box Chestnut Roan. I actually stamped the image twice, the side on the left was the second stamping and I just did not ink the birds or the sentiment and then just added some more flowers and branches (plus I also flipped the image). After stamping I then outlined the stamped design with a 05 Millennium Zig pen. I then added a sparkly blue chalk for the background/sky. Inked my edges with the lighter pink and brown. Used a threading punch from Fiskars and wove my ribbon through that and added the bow and pearls to finish this off. I would not normally even think to do a one layered card, a little more challenging for me then a layered card, but, I do like how this turned out. I think I will do a fun one layered card now. umm..... off to look at stamps! (also, thanks for making me think outside the box!)

Cupcake Template :O)

OK... my good friend Ami just gave me a site I can upload this and you can now click on this image and it will take you to a much larger picture and then just right click on that image and it should save a nice big/original clear sized download for you... or just click on this post title and it will take you right there also... hope this helps and you can just replace that grainy one!! THANKS AMI.. you're the best!

Cupcake Template :O(

ok... I just figured out that my cupcake template does save the way I told you, but it is not so great as being clear in image. I am soo sorry. Blogger must really resize the pic and so when you saved it even though it appeared to save ok, when you go to resize it/blow it up/expand it; the size it is grainy and probably not clear. So first if you know anything about how I can upload something so someone can download it in it's original size, could you please educate me there with an email. In the meantime, if you saved this and are not pleased with the clarity of the template, please do send me an email and I will email the template to you per your request... so please "do" ask, really no problem and maybe I can get this figured out so future postings of templates will work for you correctly! Thanks.....

Cupcake Template

Here is the template that I made yesterday. I promised I would make a one page template of it for you, so here it is. Please remember this is my original template, so please feel free to use it for your personal use, although I know it is not a complex template I still took the time to make it and then post it here for your use, so please be so kind and give me credit for the template when you use it and if you would please give me a plug and link to my blog your creation if you post a card you have made from it anywhere. I would hope you would honor that. If someone else would like a copy of it, please direct them to my blog to retrieve it and leave me a thanks. It is always nice to get some kind of feedback or just a thanks for sharing. So, I believe you should be able to right click and "save picture as" to your file. Once saved you can open it up in your program and adjust the size. You can also open it up in WORD and adjust the size there too if you don't have a special program. Then just print it off. Thanks for stopping by and I would love to see any creations you have made. If you send me a copy of your cards I would love to post pictures of them here as well as a link to your blog so think about it and I promise to post them here with the my template! ENJOY and remember to come back, who knows, maybe I will post a template every few weeks!! I'm creative that way c'ha know! (((smilie smilie)) PLEASE SEE THE BELOW POST FOR A FINISHED CARD USING THIS TEMPLATE..

Clearly Vintage

I just wanted to do a plug for an awesome blog that is centered around vintage. Cora has lots of nice images as well as a nice vintage stamp line that she sells at her Etsy Shop. I failed to ask her if I could borrow some images to place here to show you, so since I did not ask permission I will just direct you to her blog and on her blog she has her link to her shop. So if vintage is your thing or not; you should check it out and tell her Nina sent you! :O) Her blog is linked in this title, but here it is too: http://www.clearlyvintage.blogspot.com/

House Mouse Challenge #30 - Shaped Card

HEY THERE CUPCAKE! OK.. I must admit, I have cupcake on the brain a lot lately... LOTS!! But that is altogether another future post, I promise! So, this week's house mouse challenge was to do a shaped card. I instantly knew I wanted to do a cupcake... guess because that is what is on my mind lately! (hehe covering mouth giggling) so anyway, I stamped the panda bear from the wheelbarrow ride and colored him and cut him out. I knew I wanted him to adorn the top of my cupcake. I made my own template for this card and I when I get around to it I will make a whole sheet pages of all the pattern pieces and upload it so if you want it you can have it, but that will have to be another day. I actually made my base out of a darker pink heavy paper per my pattern. This way the backside of my card was a pink. The crimped cupcake holder is the same paper, just a seperate piece that was crimped. I did this mainly because I wanted my baskside to have color. Since I had made some individual peices of pattern that were loose like the icing and the cupcake holder I just traced around my pattern paper for the icing and inked it with the dew drop inks and them I crimped my card stock for the holder and then I traced it and then cut my piece. Be careful when you crimp things, you will want to make sure you crimp then cut the piece to fit and I will tell you why. It tends to make your piece smaller because it crimps, thus using a bit more paper... so always crimp first and them cut... that was the paper crafting tip for the day! I also outlined my icing in black sharpie because I wanted my icing to stand out more, plus I wanted to have some swirls within the top too. I chose to add the black and white ribbon to mainly pull it altogether since I used the panda bear, plus it really pops and it adds some weight to the bottom which makes it more balanced to me. It really is a balance kind of thing, that's another thing balance, it truly is a funny thing, it is mainly just something I feel in my work, but there really is a truth to balance whether it be with color or a feel of weight and how it carries your eyes. Then I had these lovely sequins that I bought off Easter clearance at the craft store last year really inexpensively and thought that would be the perfect finishing touch. Although, I wanted to add some little white pearls in the center of the sequins from crafting many years ago I couldn't locate them ((oh well)). I also used the same pattern paper from the icing on the full inside and added my sentiment that said "because you're special". I made this for a friend that just had foot surgery. I am certain she will just love it. OK... Thanks for looking and I promise to have my template here in the next week for you to right click and save to your files... I think I might just add a little hanging tag from the bow that says "for you" or "thinking of you", but here is my pic for now.... so in the meantime... have a cupcake kind of day!

Where does the time go?

Yes, I seem to be asking myself this question a lot lately!! This is my youngest daughter that just turned 12! Wowzer!!! My other daughter just had her 18th birthday, but she didn't stand still long enough for me to get a really good pic of her with her tradtional cake shot!! LOL... the funny thing is with all my children now is that we have to do cake in the evening, when it is dark so we can turn out all the lights and "get" "the full candle effect". Although I must agree it does make for an awesome picture to scrap!! I have a great one of Avery like this too and I can't wait to scrap it... not sure what I am waiting on since I took that pic of him back in September!! Well, just thought I would share a piece of my weekend with you all. Thanks for taking a peek!

House Mouse Challenge #28 - One for the men

OK.. I must admit, I kind of did a real quickie here and because I did want to try this out, but my time for the last few weeks consist of doing things either late into the night or somewhat quick. So... this is somewhat quick, a bit simple, BUT I guess a little masculine. I think the key for making cards for men is truly the colors you tend to pick. I went with brown, red and black; "Manly" colors! LOL.. well, I guess. I stamped my tree and really didn't do another thing to it.. lazy? Then I matted it on the red and used my fancy corner punch and then stamped muzzy, colored him with mark-it markers and then cut him out placed him in front of the tree, glued him down added the chipboard frame (colored a roll of dots on that red) and added the mushroom, drew my little lady bug on that and stamped and matted the hello, added my ribbon and called this a quickie manly card!! I really wanted more of the tree trunk to show in the frame, but it did not work out that way, because I cut too much off one side and had to correct it ((ugh)) LOL... oh well... Thanks for taking a peek!

Some More Domino Pieces...

Here are some more pieces I made from dominos. I have to say I have never made any type of jewelry before or any kind of pieces. I find that these are a lot of fun and leave a lot of room for such a tiny piece for creativity! They truly are a miniture piece of art with wire and beads. I will be selling these so if you see one you would love to have leave me a message or send me an email and I will get back with you. I promise that I will be back with some instructions and pics as with the how to's. Thanks for looking and leave me a post to tell me what you think? Thanks for stopping by and visiting my blog and I ALWAYS love to receive posts/luvins from you all!!







This last one I flipped the domino the other direction and I actually used a paper bead there too. The paper bead is sealed with an acrylic sealer too so it is not soo soft. Thanks for stopping by!

Domino Necklaces

Here is a fun thing to be creative with if you love jewelry or know someone that loves jewelry that would love to receive a unique handmade piece. I stumbled upon domino necklaces while "Stumble Upon"ing on evening and instantly knew I wanted to give my hand a try at these. I thought they would make wonderful gifts for anyone that enjoys wearing jewelry. If you have read my blog at all you seen the 70 domino necklaces I made for a women's retreat. They were quite a bit more simple, but simple is nice (you can see those here). I made these this past week. I really wanted to incorporate beads and wire into them. This first one I made as a demo for my friend Mindy, she asked if I would make her an Asian inspired one in red. Well, I am not sure how Asian it looks, but I think it turned out pretty grand. I stated off with drilling holes through the domino so I had a way of attaching the wire. I then added the alcohol inks which dry really fast on these. I then stamped a small flourish with a archival ink which is permanent. I drew the little flowers which is what I think makes it kind of Asian (hehe what do you think Minday?) and added some small doodling with some dots. Then I heat embossed some gold around the edges and then let that cool. I then sprayed it with a glaze. Then added my wire and beads.


This one I started the same way with the drilling, really no reason in the drilling the holes, I just drilled where I thought I might want to run some wire through. Then I used a denim and eggplant alcohol inks. Once that was dry I used a part of a stamp to emboss the swirls in silver and then added my beads and rhinestone. This necklace I did not seal, so not sure what that means. I wore this one to church yesterday and received lots of compliments on it. It looks great on a short cord necklace with a white shirt and blue jeans!

This one is really simple and I just stamped it in a permanent ink and then colored it with my mark-it bic markers. I sealed it with an acrylic spray and then added the small rhinestones. I thought she was a bit different and love that stamp.
The stamps I used for this stamp and the swirls I bought from The Enchanted Gallery/Blog She has some really unique ones and makes them just the right size for the domino's. Plus she has a lot of good information within her sites. I will be back some time to do a step by step of how I did mine. So, not sure when that will be, but I promise to be back to give you some pics and some how to's.

So thanks for stopping by today and now I must fly to the grocery store, ahhhh the pit falls of life!

Sour Cream Container

Want something fun to add to your Easter Baskets or give to your teachers or classmates? Well, these are perfect little treats you can personalize. I made the one in the picture for a Teacher's Appreciation dinner (which I think are a bit boring) and had them sitting at each of the place settings. Now can you see these with really cute paper! This one is pretty plain per the paper, but I used the fish paper because it was a Christian school and thought it was perfect.

These are super easy!! Just use a piece of 5 1/2 x 4 1/2 piece of card stock or pattern paper. I used pattern paper. Or you can stamp your paper or you might even have scraps this size! Some people use adhesive I personally used Aleene's tacky glue. I use this glue because it dries so quickly and it is easily found anywhere. SOO... you place whatever you want to adhere this with across the bottom of one long ends (5 1/2 side). Since I used the glue I just rolled this over and stuck a finger in both openings and held it for a few seconds and then it looked like a empty toilet paper roll. Next add your sticky strip or glue along one short side which is now the end of the tube (4 1/2). If you are using adhesive place your adhesive down the same time you place your long strip down which will make it a bit easier for you and then roll into a round tube shape and adhere. I used glue so I added my glue to one end after I made the tube and then squeezed the end that has the adhesive/glue on it together. Place the closed end into your crimper and roll up and back three to four times. Add your candy, then turn your container the opposite direction, squeeze that end together and run in through the crimper. Punch two holes in that end, run ribbon through. Punch out a a flower or tag or whatever you want to add and punch a hole in whatever you are adding and run both ends of your ribbon through the holes in your punchout and then tie in a knot or bow. Your container is closed nicely and the recipient can get the candy out without destroying the pouch.

I also did the round text in Word under the word art, bet you didn't know you could do that, did you? So if you want to try it out you open word. From the file menu select Insert>Picture>Word Art. You will then see the word art box. First row, third icon is an arc. Select it. Click ok and you will see the words "your text here". Change the font to whatever you want and type the text you want. Click ok. It will now appear on the page. Highlight your phrase by clicking on it once. Then click on the WORD ART SHAPE icon. It is the blue A tilted slightly, in my progran this appears at the botton of the screen, left side, you may also have a little "abc" instead of the slanted A. click that then select the cirle. It appears flat but just grab a handle and stretch it out to a circle. I found that I had to print it off first to make sure it was as round as I wanted it. I printed off a sheet of these and then used my larger punch to punch them and added them to the center of my punched out flower, which was a whale of a punch one. Have fun and hope this works for you.

Thanks for visiting today!! Hope you all get to craft this weekend!!

Artist Trading Cards

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These are my ATC's that I made for a swap over at scrap.com. It was a mystery swap so we could do whatever we wanted, there was no theme. This is actually my face in all these cards and if you want to know how to start these out to make some of your own unique cards, you can check it out here on my blog. I really had a lot of fun with these and I will probably make some more of these type of cards to swap. They are each a mini piece of art and each one is different as you can very well see. These are all hand drawn and colored with Bic Mark-it markers with some chalks to do the skies. They are all originals; one of a kind. NOW the hard part to this was to figure out which one of these 20 do I want to personaly keep? I will be swapping 19 of them out and keeping just one! oh the decision!! Everyone in my family had their own favorite, but I just can't seem to decide. I think I will keep the "got milk" one, which is the top left one. I laugh everytime I see it with the milk mustache, I think I secretly always wanted to be the "got milk" model! LOL... it was my husband's idea to add the milk mustache, I had "got milk" on her pail, but then he suggested that and I thought, brillent and fun!! and now I get to be the "got milk" model!! LOL... Now, I took this pic inside so it is ok, if you want a closer look at these you can click on the picture and it enlarges it for a better close-up or you can click on that funky code next to the pic, not sure how I got that there or how to get rid of it but it also takes you to a larger pic LOL. Also, if you see white specks everywhere it is because I used a chalk with sparkles in it and that is the sparkles sparkling, they really don't have those specks in real life. I alway like to do the backs up too to my ATC cards and I do these in the program Print Shop 23. This is the back side of these cards.I know a lot of people don't put much thought into the back, but I personally think it just finishes off the card nicely. I guess I just want the whole card to be a piece of art! If anyone reads this and would like to trade a card with me just leave me a note and I would love to trade! These cards will be traded out, but I would love to make some more! Thanks for visiting my blog today and make sure you leave me a note and tell me which one "you" like, I would love to know! :O)

BE Morgan (using a masking technique)

This lo was done for the ETG Feb. Challenge which was TECHNIQUE - MASKING.

This is something that really interests Laura and she had us try masking. Wanted us to do something unique and not sure how unique my idea was butt, I did mask. We could have used any medium we liked, ink, paint.. etc and I used different colored inks.

I started off with this huge pic of my youngest dd and thought since she/the photo was missing the top of her head I would have these "thoughts" floating out of it... LOL.. now not sure if I accomplished this or not but I cut some flowers, hearts and stars using my cricut george cartridge and then I masked with them using my inks. you can see that my shapes are more true to the cs color but with all my doodling they don't look as masked at they did in the beginning stages, but that is ok, because I really liked how this lo turned out. It is soo morgan too. This really was a simply and fairly fast lo too. Good thing since this was the last day to upload for the challenge. Nothing like waiting till the last minute to see if you can pull if off... LOL... Rachel my oldest dd took this pic of her sister... I am starting to think that Rachel truly has hidden talents in her photography skills and she seems to be able to catch a lot in a photo. I simply loved this photo of morgan, she looks sweet with a bit of mischievous shining in her eyes... kwim? LOL... yep.. certainly morgan!



This is a closer look at the doodling and masking... but with all the doodling it is kind of hard to see the masking now!

BOM (book of me) Challenge

Here is the layout I did for the BOM Challenge for the ETG over at scrapbook.com. The challenge was to scrap a page about things that make you happy. You also received extra points if you included at least 5 things. I kept this fairly simple and knew exactly what I wanted to do. I kept it all in the neutral zone for the colors. Printed my picture off in sepia and inked the edges with some different browns and reddish browns with colorbox chalks (I just love those things). Then in Print Shop I typed the beginning of each of my boxes with sentences such as "Happiness to me consists of" and I'm Happiest when" or "It makes me happy" etc. (get the idea?) then I left room to finish the sentence in my own handwriting. So I cut all those boxes, inked them and then finished the sentence about things that make me happy. I then also made the title in Print Shop and punched out the tags and added them to the title with brads. I used a mesh type embellishment behind that and put together the layered flower and added a button with hemp in it as well as some hemp around my picture. I then just added the little extras and also added a little bit of doodling, not much though. I laid this all out prior to writing in my boxes just to make sure it would all fit nicely. I think I actually had about 3 boxes left over. I think I will do a few pages kind of like this for my BOM about things I love, things I dislike.... :O) we'll see, sounds good now! LOL... SOOO, if you don't have a BOM going I suggest you start one. We always tend to scrap everything and everyone except ourselves. I am glad I have started doing these challenges because now I have a book just for myself and all about me... some day someone just might pick it up and take interest in it!! I really liked how it turned out the only thing I might do a little different is use a little thicker marker to write in. I may go back and go over it all, or maybe not!!





THANKS for looking! and thanks if you left me a message!

Another Birthday Card

This was just another quickie birthday card I made for a friend. I used this cute Penny Black Stamp called Party Animals. I think this is actually the first time I used it to make a card. I colored the image with Bic Mark-its. Inked the edges with colorbox chalk - pink and added that cute striped pp. I outlined the image and the pp with black to make everything pop just a bit and added the blue ribbon and bow to bring out the little bit of blue in the image and the 3 yellow felt flowers gave it just the right balance I think.



Thanks for looking!

Purse of the day - Tag

Ok, here's a fun way to kind of get to know a bit about our friends here in blogland. Nancy of Wind Star Creations hit me with this purse-of-the-day tag. Pay her blog a visit and check out her beautiful blog; it is linked to this title post or on my sidebar.

The Rules:

1. Post a picture of whatever bag you are using today - not last weekend when you and your hubby went out to that fabulous restaurant. No cheating!!!

2. Tell us how much it cost. This is a no-judgment zone -- there will be no ridiculing or eye rolling here. And, if there is a story to go along with how you obtained it, I'd love to hear it.

3. Then, I pick 5 people to post on their blog!


Well, Fist I must say I am glad we are photographing the outside of our purse and not the inside!! If there is one thing about me and if you haven't figured it out yet, it is all about color!! I love love love color. On my walls, in my clothes, in my work and so it also carries into my purse. I fell in love with this turqoise colored purse I bought at Payless Shoes. We were shopping for shoes for my dd for basketball and I seen this color and thought OH MAN I love it, wasn't so much about the purse as it was about the color of the purse! The store had a sale buy one get one @ 1/2 price, so I actually think I only paid a mear 10.00 for this purse, BUT isn't that simply a GORGEOUS color. I too like to change purses with the seasons, as I am sure many women do. The purse I was carrying before this one was a bright pinkish purple that I got at the outlet mall and didn't carry it long as I got it at the end of the season, so I imagine I will be pulling that one back out and carrying it again here real soon; mainly because it just screams spring & summer, plus it is a Liz Claiborne and I rarely buy designer things, but I think I only paid 15.00 for that purse on clearance and it soo rocks. I am all about a good sale too! :O) Soo, anyway, this is my winter purse and the color does so rock and it has been a good purse so it will be around for a little longer, but I sooo love to change my purse, kind of weeds out all the junk that gathers in there too! :O)

So now to tag five bag buddies!

Ami
Leigh Anne
Ullis aka Emmy
Jenny
Beth