THE WINNER !!!

There was a wonderful anticipation at getting to pick the winner of my first blog candy, but I felt so sad for everyone that didn't win. I wish I could send something to everyone. I would just like to say a huge heartfelt THANK-YOU to everyone whe has visited my blog, your encouragement means a lot to me.
The WINNER Is...... Andrea Hays from Crafts on a Whim !!!!!!!!
Congratulationd Andrea, please leave me your address in the comments below.

JOY

The new challenge topic for the SALT blog is JOY. I put together this sighn with some wooden blocks from an S-U stamp set that I decided to cling mount instead. The paper is Basic Grey Dasher. Now on another not i'd like to share some verses with you about joy.
Neh.8:10 The joy of the Lord is your strength.
The Lord is "the joy of the whole earth" Ps 48:2 Yes, He is the hope for ALL mankind.
If we trust him, he can even give us joy in place of mourning, Isaiah 61:3
All Heaven rejoices over one sinner that comes to Christ Luke 15:7
Now consider Hebrews 12:2, Let us run with patience the race that is set before us, Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the JOY that was set before him endured the dross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God. Can you imagine that the Bible says that it was joyful for Jesus to suffer for us, why ? Because He knew that His sacrifice would make a way for our salvation and forgiveness. Praise God !!! I sincerely pray that all of you have placed your faith in Him. So that you can do as First Peter says that ye believing can rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory !

God's Love

I needed a sypathy card when I saw Cindy Keery's color challenge listed at Allison's site. The colors were ruby red, choc. chip, close to cocoa and very vanilla. I must admit it was a hard combo for me, but I found this ribbon from Basic Grey that had all the colors in it !! Have a blessed night, I have to go to a meeting at church !!

Nursery Bash

These adorable animals are from my new set, Nursery Bash from Close To My Heart. The papers are from two different S-U packs. Hope you enjoy!

Weekend Sketch Challenge #21

Beate's sketck challenge for this week is to make a file folder card. She has a tutorial for making one on her site, beate.blogs.splitcoaststampers.com . I made this card for a wonderful woman in our church who is getting out of cold Alaska to go sailing with her husband. The inside says get away and refresh on it. This paper is from a scrapbook kit that retired from S-U last year.

Vintage Travel

All of the paper used for this card is from the Vintage travel paper pack by Close to my Heart. The lighthouse and sentiment are from Stampin-up. Masculine cards are not always easy for me , but this came together pretty quickly, with a little help from the paper !

Snow-Cat Trio

I have been seeing this layout everywhere, and everyones looks so wonderful I decided to try it ! I love these colors together. Everything was based around the ribbon, and I went from there,The circle punches and sentiment are from S-U, I don't know who make this cute cat, someone sent it to me in a care package from Fairbanks.

Mojo week 4

I remember when I just had to have the Big Deal alphabet set from S-U, I'm ashamed to admit i've hardly used it though. This card is for the Mojo Challenge week 4, at poetic artistry, you should try them, they really help !

Christmas Pine

This card uses the Peaceful wishes stamp from Stamping-up. I used craft ink for the pine cones do I could dust them with irradecent ice embossing powder. The berries were popped up with crystal effects.

Giant Sunflower

This card was a challenge to myself to use these huge flowers, that I had to buy !! So I bought them because they were beautiful, but have been at a loss as to how to use them. This sunflower reminds me of my cousin Matt and my pap, they were always trying to see who could grow the biggest sunflowers in the garden !!
The center of the flower is a scalloped circle cut out with spellbindes, then embossed with a Cuttlebug circle embossing template. The very center is a jumbo brad in an undesirable color, so I sponged on brown craft ink, covered with clear embossing powder and heated. The e.p. is to hold the ink in place,it will wipe off without it ! Then I painted on some brown Sticles (a must have new color !) . The paper is Melow by Basic Grey.

Weekend Sketch Challenge # 20

I always need masculine birthday cards, they are the hardest for me ! This one is for Beate's wonderful sketch challenge that she runs weekly. You should try them if you haven't already ! They help get the creative juices flowing ! The ship is form S-U and the papers are from the Basic Grey Mellow pack.

SORRY, I forgot to tell you the drawing for the candy will be next Sunday morning.

My First Blog Candy !!!

My family and I had a wonderful time in Fairbanks with family ! I went a little crazy at the craft stores, and now it's time for you to share in the wealth !! This is my way of saying thank-you to my wonderful friends who have encouraged me by checking out my blog . I want you to know how thankful I am for you . Now for the goods, I went a lottle nuts on rolls of ribbon, so the winner will get a yard of each pictured, some are Martha Stewart ! Large grommets, jumbo brads, alterable clips, an alterable wooden picture frame, a handfull of Foof-a-la buttons, Bazzill bling flowers, prima Forever Flowers ( four different colors) One sheet each of the Arctic Frog by the sea paper pad and one sheet each of the Seven Gypsies Capri journey !

O.K. all you have to do is leave a comment and tell me what you like about my site, maybe a favorite style or card. Or what you dislike about my site! Or something that you would like to see me do on my site. I would really appreciate it if new comers would take the time to brows my blog and actually see my work before leaving a comment. I do this out of courtesy to blogs I leave comments for candy on! Have a wonderful week and good-luck to all of you !!

Don't go away !!

These will be my last few posts for a couple of days . We are taking a little trip to Fairbanks Ak. to see family and of course shop !! I can't wait to hit Michaels ! But don't go too far away cus i'll be picking up some goodies while i'm out to have my first blog candy when I get back ! So check in on Sunday to see what's up for grabs !!
These cards are the three techniques that i'll be teaching at my class when I return. It's so nice to leave and know that I have these planned !

Mojo week 3

These two are for the mojo challenge over at poetic artistry. Check it out !!

A Mommy's Happiest Day !!

Thie was one of the three most happiest days of my life as a parent, three because I have two more boys to go ! Micah asked God to come into his heart and be his saviour a few months ago, and then followed the Lord in believers baptism last week. The Bible says that we should have no greater joy than to see that our children walk in truth. I pray, pray, pray, pray everyday that they will just follow God and do right when they grow up. This was also a very special day for my husband, since he's the pastor he got to baptize Micah.
The God's promises theme came from the SALT blog, this is their theme challenge for the week. Check them out !

THE MINI CRISS CROSS CARD :
Some of you aked for the dimensions for this card . Please follow these dimensions, then check out Beate's tutorial at splitcoaststampers.com/resources/crisscrosscard.php
Base Piece 2.5 by 10.5 score at 3.5 from each end
Cut one piece of D.P. 3 1/4 by 2 1/4 them cut diagonally from corner to corner, This makes your two triangular panels, if you want two different D.P. then cut two.
The insert is one piece 2 1/4 by 3 1/4 and one piece 2 1/8 by 3 1/8

I hope this makes sense !

Kudos to Nancy !

I have to give Nancy at Inkcicles the mojo credit for this one. We were talking on the phone yesterday and Said how much I liked the new criss cross cards, and I wanted to demo them at my next Technique class, but that they used soo much paper. A few hours later she showed me an adorable little pint sized version, that I hope she posts on her site ! When I saw the Caardvarks mini sized card challenge last night I went to work making one of my own ! I don't know if you can tell in the picture, but the brad in the flower I put a glue dot on and smooshed into Brownstone glitter.

Periphery

These flowers were stamped on top of a sheet of the Periphery paper by Basic Grey.

Maybe a little better picture ?

Weekend sketch # 19

O.k. first of I must say that next week when we go to Fairbanks for a litle trip i'm going to purchase the things to make one of those cool lightboxes to take pictures in. With the summer sun fading here at the top of the world I just can't get enough light to make my pictures look good. You can't really see it good , but the new purely pomegranite ribbon from S-U is so beautiful ! This card is for Beate's weekend sketch challenge #19, she pulled out another beautiful sketch again. I really look forward to Fridays and having her layout give me an extra bit of momentum ! The stamp is in S-U's Holoday Mini called Stem Silhouettes, which I might add is on sale this month at 30% off. AND it's die cut, so no cutting out of the rubber !! In the future i'll show you what you can do with the extra rubber from the die cuts, don't be so hasty to throw it away !

Criss Cross Dutch Girl

I did my first criss cross card last night with the help of Beates wonderful instructions (found at Split Coast ). Let me tell you I am absolutly in love with this design !! Mostly because it really utalizes all the matching d.p. that i'm obsessed with. This one is Dutch Girl by Cosmo Cricket, with river rock as the base. I hope you enjoy this because you will be seeing a lot more of these cards !!

Second challenge card

This card was the original for the Mojo challenge, but the circle was too big to go up and down . So I turned the sketch sideways to utalize the flowers that I had punched before, but never used.This paper is Tres Jolie from My Mind's Eye, as you can see by how much i've used it lately that I absolutly adore it! The flower pieces were run through the Cuttle Bug swirly embossing folder, the punched out with a Stampin-up flower punch.

Mojo Challenge Week 2

This card is for week 2 of the Mojo Sketch Challenge over at Poetic Artistry. Julee also has a cool new store called Verve Visual, check it out ! Anyway I followed the sketch o.k. , but as an extra challenge we were to use a forgotten image that you stamped and it never made it onto a card for whatever reason. Well you know we all have a stash like this of pieces we spend hours coloring and embelishing, and then decide not to use ! So I picked out something, centered the whole card around it and then put it aside again cuz it wouldn't fit ! Don't worry, it will still get used i'm working on tweaking the design to fit while still utalizing this sketch.

Baby Shadrack

I was honored to be asked to make this name frame for a new baby in town. The colors in the nursery were moss green, baby blue and burgandy. And the theme was trains. Every time I make one of these I think it's a shame that I haven't done one for my own children yet, but thats the story of my stamping, always making stuff for others but never taking the time to work on my own scrapbooks. Oh well, I like doing for others !! Gods blessings on you baby Shad.

Sticker Challenge !

I purchased these puffy princess stickers thinking I would use them to make little girl birthday cards, then they got burried under a pile of stuff in my stamp room. Then today I saw that Caardvarks was running a challenge to use stickers. I pulled out the princess puffies and went to work with my new Spellbinders that my sweeter that honey husband purchased for my birthday !!

ink swirles

I really like making my own backgrounds by rubbing and sponging on different colors of ink. The Joy and snowflakes are from S-Us snowflake spot set, the swirl from Cats Pajamas.

Big Primas !!!

I love these beautiful big Primas, but they are so big it's hard to put them on a regular sized card. The big swirl is from Fancy Pants, sentiment and butterfly from Paper Tray.

Vintage Christmas

I worked on this card off and on all day. I've had stampers block the past few days. I'm waiting impatiently for a stamping-up order to come so I can prepare my cards for this months tecnique class that I teach. The back ground paper is from Basic Greys new Mellow collection. Stamps from S-U.

Party

Nancy and I went to a Close to my Heart party yesterday, This is what I made. I thought I would post this since it's Sunday, and I won't have time to stamp ! Have a wonderful Lord's day.

I won !! Finally

After entering countless blogg contests, and thinking I would never win anything, I finally won something !!! And what a something it was. I got a brand new set from the Cat's Pajamas, courtesy of Karrie Baker aka www.stampgirl.typepad.com. I've never owned anything from that company, but I have to tell you they are soo cute , i'm sure i'll be buying some more !! And these are my first two creations with the set. Hope you enjoy, and go check them out for yourself !

Another sketch challenge

My new goal in stamping is to use stamp sets that I bought impulsively and never use. Sooo that's how the hippo was chosen for this card.

Weekend Sketch #18

I colored these flowers yesterday, but was at a loss for what to do with them. I knew that Beate would be putting up the weekend sketch challenge, so I waited for that inspiration to come. She did not dissapoint !

Birthday Circles

When the going gets tough punch circles ! Did you ever get some new paper that you just love, the colors are beautiful and it all coordinates so well. But you are at a loss with what to do with it. Well this card came out of this kind of frustration. I wanted to use all the papers cuz I loved them so much , so I punched circles out of them. I hope Beate's sketch challenge tommorrow gives me some inspiration !! Good night.

Thank-You

This card is for Beate and her husband, who is serving our country in the Air Force. My husband and I would just like to say thank-you to all of our service men and their families for their sacrifices. Beate, we will be praying for all the arrangements to work out for you . Romans 8:28 "And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God"

Totally Cool !

My love for paper piecing is what finally made me purchase this set "Totally Cool" from Stampin-up. Even though this card took me the better part of my day to complete I had fun making it ! Isn't that what stamping is all about !? Sometimes we get so caught up in deadlines and such that we loose the real reason for it all .

Fun With My New Bellas

This card is for Mellissa, a wonderful friend from church who is having a baby !

Fun Witn

Fall Flower Girl

After waiting over a month for my Bella order, I finally have some of my very own !! Nancy and I picked up this great ribbon at our local fabric store and the card just came together around it, based on Beat's sketch challenge.

Inspired by the Ocean

The idea for this card started one morning while I was doing a workout tape. The ridiculously in shape girld were bouncing around on the beach, with the ocean in the background. I noticed how the colors of the water blended from dark to light shades of blue and green. I thought I would try to duplicate it with ink. While the card turned out not to have anything to do with the ocean I am pleased with the results !

Weekend Sketch challenge #17

Boy !! This challenge did not come easy. It was hard to fit it all on a regular sized card. I would have made it bigger, which would have made life easier, but I don't have bigger envelopes. I have made a lot of different sized cards lately that were pointless because I couldn't send them. Anyhow, I hope you enjoy this one. I happen to love everything about Stampin-Up's cowboy stuff !