More blog candy...

I found another fun blog with some blog candy up for grabs. Check out this link http://paper-rose-petals.blogspot.com/search/label/Blog%20Candy%20Alert%203%2F25%20Drawing and while you are there check out her amazing cards! I'm in love with this ladies work...in fact I just stumble on the blog candy totally by accident, I was at the blog following a link from splitcoaststampers cause I just loved her cards and wanted to see more of her work. You can bet that I'll be checking in on her blog often just for the eye candy and inspiration. But since I was there, I figured might as well add my name to the list for a chance to win, so you might as well add your name too! Good luck! :)

Blog candy...

Check out this link http://callmecraftyal.blogspot.com/2010/03/follower-blog-candy-open-thru-314.html for a chance to win some awesome blog candy and some links to some great digital and rubber stamps! This is the personal blog of the girl that used to do the Sheetload blog (I think). And I really miss the sheetload blog, but how fun to have a chance to win some fun blog candy! So check out the link and leave some comments for your chance to win!

And the links that you are lead to from the above blog have some great digital stamps that would be great for cardmaking, not to mention they each have a freebie or two that you can try out! So good luck and have fun!

It was a creative weekend...

And it even included a scrapbook page!! I don't even remember the last time I made a scrapbook page, it's been that long!

Our creativity also extended to many of the games that Mercedes wanted to play this weekend...boy, does that little girl have an imagination! She sure kept me hopping trying to keep up with all the things she wanted to do. She wanted to play a game where she would "act" naughty and then have to get sent to time-out and then she would try to sneak away and I would have to catch her and bring her back. Another time she set up a store and I was required to come buy something every three minutes for over an hour! Try to accomplish anything when you have to stop every three minutes...needless to say, I didn't get much done other than just play with her during that time period! lol It was good practice for her math skills though, all that making change, except for all the times that I would just give her a nice "tip" for her good service! lol

I also managed to get a few more favor boxes done, although I didn't do any today at all, I do have 20 done now! I have been working hard on cards though cause I do have my sister's and my mom's birthday's this month and they both want card's as gifts so I like having lots for them to choose from. I am also putting together a care package for someone and I may be doing a farmer's market in the next month or so, soooo I can't have too many cards on hand. Hence the need to constantly be making cards.

I did have an extra motive for some of these cards though. I am a member of a great online scrapbooking community at http://www.scrapcentral.ca and we have monthly crops. This month I added a few card challenges, so I made some cards as examples of my own challenges. And then today I went a little crazy and actually got 17 gift tags made...I can never have too many, since I'm always selling out of those, I figured I better start making alot more of them, because everyone seems to love em! Besides they are a GREAT way to use up scraps and I love using scraps!!

So here's all the gift tags

You can't tell, but the tag above here ^ has the coolest poofy flower--definately one of my favs!

The challenge for the following 3 cards was to use spring like embellishment...i.e. flowers & butterflies.

The challenge for these 3 cards was to use spring like colors....i.e. blue, green, pink, purple and yellow

Thirteen down, Eighty seven to go...

Well, I'm starting to get a little faster at making these favor boxes. The first five I made took me 2 hours, but tonight I made 3 in about 45 minutes, so I seem to be getting better at them at least! Here's what they look like...

I know all the tags and bows aren't perfect, but my girlfriend is going to have to untie them to put the glasses inside them anyways, so that's why I'm not to worried about it.

Nothing too exciting has happened over the last couple days. I've been sleeping during the day alot, but then I'm up late so it all evens out. My dr. tells me I just like to "work" the night shift. I figure whatever works right?

I get up and get Mercedes off to school, do a few things around the house for an hour or two and then go back to bed for a few hours. I'm still getting my eight or so hours of sleep, I just get some during the night and some during the day while she's at school. It just works best for me since I am most productive from about 10pm-2am, so I still get to stay up late and do my stuff at my best time of day, but I'm also still getting enough sleep so that I don't get to overtired and grumpy. And being that I'm single I can do whatever I want! Man, I love that!

No big plans for the weekend yet, so hopefully it'll just be a lazy and quiet couple days. I don't think we have to be anywhere or do anything, so I'm fine with that. I do have a dr. appt tomorrow, and I will of course be working on more boxes, and need to get some more cards done, but other than that I'm hoping to just take it easy, sleep in, have our little Mommy & Mercedes party and hopefully not have to spend any money!

I'm trying to save my money since I'm hoping to have something to celebrate in a couple weeks...can't let the cat outta the bag yet, but when it happens I will be one very happy camper! I'm happy just thinking about it!

Well that's enough for tonight. I'll be back in a day or two. :)

This makes 25...

It's only March 1st and this is my twenty fifth post...one more than all of last year!! Yay for me!! My goal this year was to blog more often than last year and here we are only 3 months into the year and I've made my goal! I'm so proud of me...if I do say so, myself!

Well, it was a typical Monday, nothing too exciting...hard to get up at 7am, but I did manage to catch a nap later so I can't really complain.

Our weekend was rather uneventful as well. We just mostly hung around the house, slept in, watched a couple movies and then caught the closing ceremonies of the Olympics. Gotta love the way we Canadians can make fun of ourselves! lol

I also finished my girlfriends wedding invitations, but forgot to take more pics before I packaged them up to be mailed! Doh!!

I have a new project for her wedding to start on now though. They got shot glasses with their names & date engraved on them for favors and she couldn't find any packaging that was a reasonable price, so I told her that I would see what I could come up with. After a little experimenting I found something that will work and I can do them for $75 less than anything else she could find, so I will be working on those for the next little while since she needs 100! Part of me wishes I hadn't opened my mouth, but most of me is glad that I can help her out, and I can use the little bit of extra money too. I'll post some pics when I get a few done, cause so far I've only made the one prototype and I think the pic will look much cooler when I have a bunch done.

Here are a couple cards I did get done on Sunday though...

A little of this and that...

Well, apparently the retail therapy yesterday did good for both me and Mercedes! Last night she amazed me by totally cleaning and organizing her own scrapping desk! It had been completely covered and piled up with stuff at least a foot high! And with absolutely no help or prodding from me she totally cleaned it herself! I was so proud of her! And she was certainly proud of herself!

So here she sits, behind her newly cleaned off desk!

Mercedes is also a very creative person. We are lucky to come by some of our creativity genetically, with some extremely creative mom's, aunts, uncles, grandma's, grandpa's, great grandparents, etc. and of course we also work at it and excerise our creative muscles alot too. I also encourage her to be creative as much as possible, and I firmly believe that the more creativity you use, the more you have. So here are a couple examples of projects she's done lately.

These two pictures she made a couple days ago with some 3d paints that we got at the dollar store and they are so much fun! Definatley two dollars well spent!

This is a Layout that Mercedes made a while ago. She loves dogs so much that she did a layout using pictures of dogs that she found on the internet! lol I think that is just too cute!

I was also quite productive last night. I managed to get a bunch of paper and supplies re-organized, which always feels good. I had bought a bunch of little baskets at the dollar store yesterday so I was having fun filling them up and re-grouping supplies.

At about 10:30 I was starting to get tired, so I thought that maybe I would have a relatively early night and not really work on any cards, but then of course the closer it got to midnight, the more awake I got and the more my creative mojo kicked in, so the idea of going to bed was put off and the card making supplies were pulled out and I starting creating. I don't know why, but for some reason I am most creative after midnight!

I started with a quickie gift tag just cause I wanted to use my new cuttlebug embossing folder that I had bought yesterday, and I already had these hearts cut out, so it literally took about 2 minutes to make this one. Gotta love that!

I'm still loving these folded frame cards, so I made a couple more of these, and for a little something extra I added some distress stickles around the scalloped edge.

This one took a little longer to make, but I'm really happy with how it turned out. I used some purple cardstock, unknown yellow patterned paper, the green patterned paper is from the Basic Grey Wisteria collection, and then just white cardstock. The font is Shelley Allegro for the Sentiment and the image is just a sticker from the dollar store (man, I love that place! lol) and the photo corner is a cuttlebug die cut. The scalloped edge is done with a Fiskar's punch.

After I finished doing a few things for myself it was time to buckle down and get to work. I had made wedding invitations for my girlfriend that is getting married this summer, but she called me earlier this week and asked if I could make her 10 more, so I got started on those last night.

Since I was going to leave them to dry overnight, I decided to take the opportunity to fulfill a photography challenge and try to take some pictures of an inanimate object from a bunch of different angles. I actually think the pictures turned out kinda cool, so I'm glad that I took the time to take them, even though it was almost 5 am! (Needless to say, I'm kinda tired today!)

Anyway this is only the first layer of the invitations, under the vellum is a pic of the couple, then under that is black cardstock with a pocket which contains the RSVP card and envie, and then all the layers are attached with 2 silver eyelets and tied together with a black ribbon at the top. And there are 9 rhinestones that I put on the stamping on the bottom of the vellum. So I still have quite a few steps left before these will be done!

But anyhoo, here's the pics, and I will post a pic when they are all finished.

Retail therapy Rocks!!

Had a fun trip to Lethbridge today with Mercedes and so stay tuned to see what new things I may come up with to use some of my new purchases. We found a new dollar store, so I got some new things there, and there was also a stop at the scrapbook store where of course I found a few treasures, and then last but not least I hit the scrapbook section at Walmart!

So I just finished putting everything away, and I am coming upon my most creative hour, so here's hoping by tomorrow morning I will have many new creations to post! So don't forget to check back often in the next few days to see what I've been up too! :D

It's a miracle....

Not only am I up and at em, functioning and productive, but I am dressed in real clothes, have makeup on and I'm smiling!! It's an early morning miracle!! This is something that definately does not happen very often!! :D So just to mark the occasion I decided I better snap a pic to prove it to my doubters (I know you're out there, and you know who you are! ;))



No big special occasion really, just a fun date day with my daughter Mercedes cause we are going to go into the city and do some shopping and have a visit with one of my bff's.



The first stop will be at the scrapbook store since I need to grab some supplies to make a few more wedding invitations for my other bff since they can't seem to quit adding people to their guest list! lol Then of course no trip to the city is complete with out a stop at Walmart where we have to look for a new backpack for my ever growing princess that is constantly complaining that her current one is too small. I also have to pick up a few other supplies while there. That will be followed by a quick stop at Office Depot to get ink for my printer, and then off to spend some time with my girlfriend when she gets off work. Last, but definately not least we are stopping at a new dollar store to see what kind of treasures we might find. And then depending on the time and our energy level we may even go out to dinner together (also depending on the lightness of my wallet) ;).



It's been quite awhile since Mercedes and I have gone to the city together so it should be fun and this will also qualify as our Friday "date/party" night!



Last night we watched the Olympics for awhile. Throughly enjoyed the women's figure skating and then I stayed up late making cards...



Just some quickie gift tags using the cuttlebug to emboss the background, nestabilities for the scalloped circles and ovals and then some cute stickers I got at the dollar store.

Another fold frame card, this one more suitable for a boy.

Fairly basic lines, but I think classy looking wedding card 6"x6" and I made an envie to match...looks much better irl

Another wedding card simple black, white and silver, with clean lines. Love the classy look of these.

Did a few of these thinking of you cards last night. Once you pick a pattern it's so easy to just make 3 or 4 at the same time just by switching out patterned papers, so these came together really quite quickly, and they are one of my favorite designs for using that I'm thinking of You die cut.

These two are basically the same card I just switched the patterned paper around and then changed out one of the cardstock colors. Quick and easy way to make two different looking cards without having to go to all the trouble of rematching papers.

I love this card for some reason. I think it's just cause it's kind loose and free feeling. The yellow background is a cuttlebug thank you embossing folder and then the addition of the dictionary flower just adds a kinda organic feel to it. Maybe I just like it cause you can never get two that will look exactly alike!!

Good morning...

Well it's not very often that I post in the morning, unless of course I haven't gone to bed yet, but today I was up early because Tuesday is Mercedes choir practice so she has to be at the school by 7:30am and usually I just come back home and go back to bed, but today I decided to just stay up and try to get some stuff done just for kicks! lol

Right now I'm sitting here, watching Les Miserables 10th Anniversary Concert at London's Royal Albert Hall with my stereo just cranked and I'm LOVIN' it! Definately one of my favorite musicals ever!! Of course I'm sure I will cry when the song "Bring Him Home" comes on, since that was sung at my brother's funeral, but it will be a good cry. Yesterday was the 4 month anniversary since he passed away. It's hard to believe it's been that long already, and yet in other ways it seems so much longer. Time can be so weird sometimes.

Otherwise things are going pretty good around here. Every day that goes by Mercedes and I get more and more used to our new family dynamic and our new routines of it just being her and I. We are starting our own schedules and traditions and it's all starting to become "normal". She is crying less and less about wanting things to go back to how they were and she has quit asking me to let her dad come back home. She seems to have accepted that the divorce is happening. And that makes it easier on me.

I must admit I have absolutely no regrets about filing for divorce. I know that this is the right thing to do. I am so much happier and really haven't missed him and am just enjoying moving on with my life. I definately don't miss all the trouble he constantly seemed to find himself in.

Anyhoo, I have been busy making cards and have come up with a couple new styles. The first one is based on a mojo Monday sketch from a couple weeks ago, and then for the next 5 I used a folded frame tutorial that I found on splitcoaststampers.

Mojo Monday sketch http://mojomonday.blogspot.com/2010/02/mojo-monday-126.html

Folded frame tutorial http://www.splitcoaststampers.com/resources/tutorials/foldedframe/

Mommy & Mercedes Friday night is...

Party Night!! Or so Mercedes tells me! ;)

Today was a fun and busy day, just me and Mercedes, hanging out around the house, then doing some errands, and finally ended off the day with a Friday evening party.

Mercedes idea of a party is when we have a special supper, a movie, some kind of snack, and she gets to stay up late.

Today's errands included getting groceries, mail, picking up prescriptions and then she got a couple things from the dollar store. After all that we went to the library and she got to pick out some movies for the weekend and some books to read. It's so cool to see her reading chapter books now and it's neat to see her reading books that I actually remembering reading when I was about her age!

The party officially started when we got Subway for supper, and then we were supposed to watch the movie "Marly & Me", but Mercedes begged to watch Lion King 1 1/2, so needless to say I *may* have dozed off during some of the movie, but Mercedes was ok with that since she was pretty wrapped up in the movie.

After the movie, we read together for awile, then we played with her new toy that she got today, and then spent some time together on the computer. By the time we had finished all our activities it was 11:30 and time for bed! All and all Mercedes had a very fun Friday night and I enjoyed our time together.

I'm trying to make more time to enjoy these things she wants to do together cause I know that before I know it she won't want to do things with me, so I want to treasure every minute with her that I have. All and all today was a great day.

Insomnia, the start of big projects, and of course a bunch of cards...

This week is reading week here, so I made a goal to at least get started on this big project that I have planned for myself. Currently I have a scrapping desk & shelves set up in my living room and Mercedes has kinds taken that over, and I have pretty much completely moved into the den where I have set up another scrapping area. Now next to the den is a storage room, that could be made really nice, so the ultimate idea is to fix up the storage room and gather all the scrappin supplies and put everything together in the storage room and then just have one storage space and one scrappin area. However to do this, is going to be one very big, huge, gigantic project!!! I have lots, and lots, and lots of supplies...lots...more than you think...lots!

So tonight I couldn't sleep so I decided to tackle one shelf. Here's the before shot...

And here is the after shot...The things on the very top shelf will be coming down, they are Brad's I just need to get more boxes to pack his stuff in, and the stuff on the bottom shelf is mostly stuff that goes with my sewing machine which is on a table just underneath this shelf. Not sure yet what I'll be using this shelf for, but definately stuff that I use alot since this is very close to my workspace, so super handy space for the stuff I use daily.

This is a new card design that I just tried. This is the Mojo Monday126 sketch. If you've never tried one of there sketches, definately give them a try they are awesome and they have new ones every Monday. Check them out at http://mojomonday.blogspot.com/

These are all just some cards I've made over the past few days. I'm enjoying making these ones that use the scor-pal...you can tell that I'm still having fun playing with my latest toy! ;)

I thought this was a cute card for a boy's birthday

I'm loving this blinged out gate fold card, but it was a bit of a pain trying to get all those little gems all even around that big blue gem!

Just some gift tags I made for a local store....I was trying to match the gift bags that she sells

Another gate fold card with a bling'd butterfly on it

Another cute teddy bear gate fold

A quick Mother's Day card that was requested from one of the local stores that sell my cards. You can't tell in the picture but the patterned paper is up on foam tape so the butterfly kinda comes outta the circle...if that makes any sense?

Just more gift tags for the local store. As you can see I've been keeping busy, but enjoying it!

Hope you are all keeping busy too, and feel free to leave a link in the comment section, cause I'd love to see what you've been up too! :)