TGIF!!

Hope everyone had a great week. We have been crazy busy this week and I haven't had much stamping time. I'm hoping to find some crafty time this afternoon!

Since I don't have any cards to show I thought I would share some pictures I took yesterday when we took the kids to the county fair. They had a total blast. We went through all of the 4-H barns and had fun checking out all of the farm animals. The kids were excited that they got to pet a cow, chicken, rabbit and they got to hold a baby chick.
After the barns we hit the carnival. They loved this. It was $1 ride day (compared to the normal $3-4 per ride) so we let them ride pretty much everything they wanted to (thanks to a carnival fund from grandma Debbie). The only bad part was, it was HOT! and when I say HOT I mean REALLY HOT! Overall, though, we had an awesome family day!






I hope to have a card or something crafty to share later today. I hope you all have a wonderful weekend! Thanks for stopping by!

Weird, weird, weird...

Weird. This morning I tried and tried to get the picture of my graduation card to upload into my post. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing. So I thought I would try again later today. So I took the kids to VBS, had breakfast with my mom, picked the kids back up and came home and checked my email. I saw a comment from Kisa that said "I like this one"...thinking she was just being totally sarcastic about my post with no picture I went to my blog and there it was...the picture I tried and tried to post this morning...in the post. I have no idea how it got there since it didn't seem to be working for me. Anyway....I finally jumped on the JustRite Monogram bandwagon. I bought the tiny letters and customized this graduation card. I actually had to make 3 grad. cards yesterday and thankfully the names were all short (jeff, tim and joe). I think these turned out pretty good. Now Tom can quite harping on me about getting these made (they are for his nephews/cousins). Now to get them in the mail.
Hope you all have a great day. It is a hot one here today so we will be hanging out inside where the temp is always a pleasant 74. Thanks for stopping by.

Blogger is not cooperating

For the life of me, I can't get blogger to do anything this morning. I will try again later.

Happy Tuesday

Hope everyone has a great day. We have a busy day today again...VBS, a playdate, a trip to the zoo...probably no stamping, but you just never know. Here is a card I made last week. To be honest it is a lot prettier in real life (IMO). The butterflies are stamped on and cut out of transparencies and the the backs are covered in glitter - they are popped up using dimensionals. All stamps are from DRS Designs, glitter is Art Institute and CS is SU.



Hope you have a wonderful day! Thanks for stopping by!

Monday madness

I'm posting my Monday post early because we have a crazy morning cut out for us tomorrow, and I'm not sure if I will have any blogging time what so ever. The kids both have vacation bible school starting at 9:00 tomorrow morning. I know that doesn't sound too crazy except for the fact that Beckett doesn't typically get out bed until then. It is going to be a real challenge getting us out the door on time.

Because I haven't figured out how to schedule a post, I'm posting my card that I was going to share tomorrow. I just got some of these adorable Riley Moose images from someone in the wishRAK group on SCS. I think they are just so stinkin cute. I colored Riley with colored pencils and OMS. I love the color combo of Ballet Blue and So Saffron. I thought it worked well for this card. The sentiment is from Inkadinkado. CS, DP and the blue gingham ribbon is from SU. The solid blue ribbon is American Crafts.

I also wanted to share a couple cards that Annabelle made yesterday. She made them all by herself (except I had to help cut and tie the ribbon for her). I love how one opens to the left! The stamp she used is from Hero Arts.

Inside view:

I hope you all have a wonderful start to your week. Thanks for stopping by!

Christmas in July

I keep seeing Christmas cards popping up on people's blogs lately so I decided to start playing around with my new DRS designs Christmas stamp. From the first time I saw this stamp I knew that I wanted it, but I wasn't sure what I would do with it. For this card I decided to paper piece the Christmas bulbs and then create a sentiment with some rub-ons that I had laying around. The words "peace on EARTH" are all made with individual rub-on letters. To add a little more zing I added some glitter, double ribbon and some corner gems. I went with a simple layout again due to the size of the main image. Stamp is from DRS Designs, CS and ribbon comes from SU, rub-on letters are CK, the background DP is Basic Grey, the dp on the bulbs is from DCWV and from that handy SAMS club pack and the corner gems are once again from Target (sorry don't know the brand).
I hope you are all having a wonderful weekend! Thanks for stopping by!

Sunflower Saturday

Here is another card I made with my new DRS Designs stamps. I love this huge sunflower stamp! I colored it with a combination of Prismacolor markers and Prismacolor pencils/OMS. The glitter is Art Institute and Martha Stewart. CS, hodgepodge and the chocolate ribbon come from SU and the green ribbon is May Arts. Almost forgot...the leaves are Prima.
I hope you are having a wonderful start to your weekend. We don't have any set plans (which I love) so you never know what lies ahead for us this weekend...although, I have a feeling we are going to be shopping for some new mini blinds and then I'm hoping for a whole lot of stamp time! Thanks for stopping by! Have a great day!

TGIF!

It's Friday, YAY!!! It has been a long week and I had hoped to take the kids to the zoo or something today but the weather has been a little unpredictable the past few days so I'm not sure what we are going to do.
Today's card was a fun one! A few weeks ago I got some new stamps from DRS Designs, and I finally found some time to play with them. As you all know I love butterfly stamps, and DRS has A LOT of cool butterflies to choose from. The butterflies I used on this card can be found in their "background" catagory. It is a 4 corner background stamp that I cut apart into individual stamps. It is really hard to tell from the picture, but the butterflies are cut out and popped up with dimensionals. All stamps are DRS Designs, CS, glitter and hodgepodge are SU and the black gems in the corners came from Target. The ribbon was a gift so I'm not sure the manufacturer. I hope you all have a wonderful day! Thanks for stopping by!

SC184

I don't do the SCS card sketch challenges very often but I thought this week's sketch was really cool. The sketch had squares where I put the flowers but I just couldn't make it look right with squares under the flowers. I like how this turned out but for some reason feel like it still needs something. After having it all glued together I wish I had stamped the sentiment on vanilla instead of white but hind sight is 20/20.
The stamps are from Verve Stamps, DP is Cosmo Cricket (still using my scraps from the piece I cut up the other day), CS and brads are SU, flowers are Maya Road, ribbon is American Crafts.
Thanks for stopping by!

What's the word, bird....again!

OK, so I have to say that it is hard to come up with a different blog post title every single day. I feel a little lame saying "happy (fill in day of the week here)" all the time so I try to change it up a bit. I know yesterday was what's the word bird and now here it is today...I can't think of anything else so What's the word, bird...AGAIN. It's ok with me though, because same as yesterday, it still makes me smile.
Here is another really simple card. It follows the July Sheet Loads template (sort of). I needed a card to send to a friend, for no particular reason, so what better sentiment than...What's the word, bird. Isn't this bird image cute? It is from Inkadinkado and I bought it yesterday in the $1 bin at Joann's. They had a bunch of really cute Inkadinkado clear stamps in their $1 bin so of coarse I didn't just buy one. For this card I *attempted* to make it look like clouds behind the bird. Not sure if I succeeded but in the end I thought they looked ok. I cut some clouds out using my Cricut machine and then used them as a mask and sponged around them. The ribbon is more of my American Crafts Target clearance find (I should have bought more). DP is from that handy dandy SAMS club pack that I have been talking about for months and the CS is SU.
The glitter is Art Institute and the pearls were from the Target $1 spot.
I hope you all have a wonderful day! Thanks for stopping by.

What's the word, bird.

For some reason I love this sentiment from Inkadinkado...What's the word, bird.
I smile every time I read it.
This is a really simple card layout - mainly because the Gina K owls image is huge. There wasn't much room left on the card after I matted the image. I colored the owls, branch and leaves with pencils and OMS and then added some Art Institue glitter to the leaves for a little sparkle. The brown ribbon is SU and the blue is American Crafts (I got a bunch of 3 yard spools of American Crafts ribbon on clearance at Target for $0.98). The CS is SU and the DP is once again Cosmo Cricket Gretel. I notched the corners but couldn't find the right color brads or gems to go so for now I just left them empty.
I hope you are all having a wonderful day! Thanks for stopping by!

Pictures from the 4th.

I don't have a card to share with you this morning but I promise if you stop back this afternoon I will have one for you. Instead, this morning I thought I would share a couple pictures from the 4th of July. Someone in our neighborhood is a firefighter and as a special treat for the kids on the 4th, they drove a fire truck through the neighborhood (very slowly) so the kids could have a parade behind the truck (with it's lights and siren going). Lots of kids had their bikes decorated for the 4th. It was really neat to see the kids having such a great time. For some reason stuff like that really gets me choked up. I cried watching the kids get so excited over the fire truck. In fact I have tears streaming down my face as I write this. There is something so special about the innocence of a child. Annabelle rode her bike and Beckett rode in the wagon with our neighbor's daughter. It was only a short parade but the kids will remember it forever.
Thanks for stopping by this morning. I plan on stamping later this morning and will post again later today. Have a great day!

Sweet n Sassy stamps - Fundraiser Info

Just in case you haven't seen it yet, Sweet n Sassy stamps are doing a fundraiser for a great cause. Now through the end of the month 50% of all stamp sales will be donated to a family whose 19 month old daughter is going through chemotherapy (she also has Down Syndrome). If you were ever thinking of buying stamps from Sweet n Sassy, now is a great time to do it.

Hope you are all having a great night!

Mini Golf Fun

I had planned on posting a card this morning but for the life of me I can't find the picture (and when I say can't find I mean I went through our entire iPhoto library and it is not there). The worst part about this is I actually ended up tearing the card apart to salvage a piece off of it and threw the rest away. If I find it later I will post.
So instead, here are a few pictures of our mini golf adventure from a couple weeks ago. This was the first time the kids had ever mini golfed and it was definitely a challenge! They had fun though, so it was definitely worth it.
I hope you all have a terrific day! Thanks for stopping by!

Stamping again, Woohoo!!!

I got more stamping time in this morning, yay! I was up WAY before everyone in the house so I decided to head to the basement for some ME time!! I bought this stamp a couple weeks ago and I'm so glad I finally got to play with it a bit. The main image is "Bird Duet" from Inkadinkado. I got mine from Jacksonbelle Embellishments (I also got the "Bird Quartet" but haven't inked that one up yet). The sentiment is from a clear Inkadinkado set (but I can't remember the name right now, sorry - I'll edit this later when I find the name). The DP is from that yummy Cosmo Cricket Gretal pack that I got at Hobby Lobby a few weeks ago. The CS is all SU.
I hope you are all having a great Monday! Thanks for stopping by!

Blog award and a tag!

My SBS-13 sister Debi gave me this blog award! Thanks Debi, sorry it took me so long to get it posted! If you haven't checked out Debi's blog, I definitely recommend it. She has some great things there!

Debi also tagged me, so here goes:

10 Years Ago:
I was working for a dairy ingredient company testing yogurt and buttermilk cultures to make sure that they actually did their job correctly. I had been dating my husband for a year. I started mountain bike racing. I bought my first rubber stamps.

5 Things On My To Do List:
1: Enjoy Life
2: Stamp
3: Exercise
4: Organize
5: Clean

Fav Snacks:
I have too many fav snacks...this is the reason why I NEED to exercise. I am a sucker for anything sweet (except chocolate, if you can believe that).

If I Was A Millionaire:
Pay off bills, save for the kids college education, save for retirement, donate to charity.

Places I Have Lived:
Lancaster, WI
Platteville, WI
Dodgeville, WI
Eau Claire, WI
Stoughton, WI
Madison, WI
Boring, I know...someday I might actually get out of this state, you never know.

Thanks for stopping by! I hope you all have a terrrific Monday!

RAK request

Hope everyone is having a great week. It has been a tough day for our family. My uncle passed away this morning. He had been dealing with some health issues but it was still a shock to lose him at such a young age (he was only in his 50's). It is going to be a rough couple days and I don't expect to be posting anything crafty for a few days. This is going to be especially hard for my mom and if you could all keep her and her family in your thoughts and prayers during this difficult time it would be greatly appreciated. If anyone has an extra sympathy card laying around and wouldn't mind sending a card to her please send me an email (thlr2003@gmail.com) and I will forward her address to you.

Hope everyone is having a great weekend! I'm planning on stamping later today but I thought I would share some movie reviews this morning.
Last night we watched:
Charlie Bartlett- I thought it was a good movie. Kinda fits into the category of dramedy...part drama, part comedy. Overall I thought it was really good.
I also watched a few other movies this week:
National Treasure II - I really liked it but you really have to let go of any sense of reality when you watch. Totally far-fetched, fun action flick.
Definitely, Maybe - I REALLY liked this one. Total chick flick. Definitely recommend.
Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants - The sequel to this movie is coming out this summer (and it looks cute) so I wanted to see the first one before the 2nd one comes out. It was good. I am planning on hitting the theatre to see the sequel.
Becoming Jane - Still feeding my Jane Austen obsession (I have her books on hold at the library too, but I'm currently reading Harry Potter and want to finish those first). This movie was good, although somewhat slow in places and a little depressing. I think Ann Hathaway did a great job playing Jane, but I'd put this on the "if you have nothing else better to do" watch list.

I hope to be back later with something crafty, but we'll see. We have a lot of house projects going on today so I'm crossing my fingers that they go smoothly and I get some stamping time.
Have a great day! Thanks for stopping by!

Sketch Challenge SC182

I don't do the SCS sketch challenges very often but I really liked this week's sketch (and I've seen a lot of cute cards on other people's blogs made with this week's sketch). To make the background squares a decent size I had to make this a really big card (6x6). I didn't have great lighting when I took the pictures so the colors are a bit off. The cardstock base is a chocolate chip color. The layers are Ruby Red. The DP is this delish Cosmo Cricket paper that I got at Hobby Lobby this week (sb paper is 50% off this week @ HL). The bird stamp is from the clear Inkadinkado set "Birds Galore" (Thanks Kisa!) and the sentiment is from Verve Visual. I also used Prismacolor markers and pencils along with some SU Dazzling Diamonds glitter on the bird. Not sure the manufacturer of the ribbon (sorry).
I hope everyone has a great weekend! Thanks for stopping by!

TGIF!

I didn't get to stamp yesterday so I got up early this morning and headed straight for the basement. If I can't stamp during the day, I might as well get up before everyone else and stamp in peace and quiet. I got this butterfly stamp set in the mail from Kisa earlier in the week and I have been dying to play with it. I love butterfly stamps...especially ones that you can paper piece easily. There are 4 different stamps in this set and I love all of them! This is just a simple no sentiment card. I mainly just wanted to experiment with the butterflies. When I first started I made all three thinking I was going to line them up across the card except they didn't fit (after I had already glued all the mats together), oops! I decided to try the zig zag layout and thought it turned out ok. Nothing too exciting, just playing around!
I hope you all have a wonderful weekend! Thanks for stopping by!

Have you been wondering where I am?

Probably not, but I'll tell you anyway...nowhere. I have just been sitting at home all week accomplishing nothing. I wish I had a card or something to share but I haven't had time this week to do anything crafty. I have to babysit today which probably means no stamping time again but we'll see. I hope you are all having a great week and I hope to have something to share soon!

I cannot get Blogger to cooperate with me today. I've tried moving this photo down but apparently it really wants to stay at the top of this blog post. So anyway, here is a card I started working on yesterday and finally found some time this morning to actually glue it together. All stamps are from Inkadinkado. DP is Basic Grey and CS is SU!.
I hope everyone has a wonderful day! Thanks for stopping by!

Finally, a project this week

I haven't had much time to do anything crafty what so ever this week. I wanted to try and get a couple cards done but I just couldn't find enough time. My sister asked me a couple weeks ago if I would make a name frame for their neighbor's little girl. I of coarse waited until the last minute and didn't start it until today (she needs it on Saturday). This is a lot bigger frame that I have done in the past. The photo area is 20"x8". I cut the letters with my Cricut. I had wanted them to go straight across but after I had them all cut out they wouldn't quite fit in the frame in a straight orientation and I didn't want to hassle with cutting all new letters at a smaller size. All of the DP used is Basic Grey and the CS is Stampin Up!. I stamped the purple letters with SU Linen and French Script. The frame was natural wood color so I spray painted it with white spray paint. I hope she likes it.

Thanks for stopping by!

Some movie reviews

Well, nothing new on the craft front, but I did watch a couple movies over the past week...
Once - as I've said before, this was a good movie. The music is awesome. I just bought the soundtrack today. Highly recommend! I'm thinking of putting this one back in our Netflix queue so that I can watch it again.
The Namesake - I really liked this to, but it is a little slow to get going. Definitely more on the artsy, Sundance side than mainstream movies.
Fool's Gold - Cheesy chick flick...loved it! How can any woman not love a cheesy romance movie filled with a shirtless Matthew McConaughey?

Hope everyone is having a great Wednesday!

The Swell Season were FANTASTIC!!!!!!!

The concert was PHENOMENAL, AWESOME, INCREDIBLE...!!!! I have been to A LOT of concerts in my life and this was by far my favorite. The entire group is just amazing. Glen Hansard is hilarious and super talented. He plays the same beat up guitar that he played in the movie. Everything about the whole concert was incredible! I don't know how to add YouTube videos to my posts but I have some links to some videos of them performing. If you have any time, definitely check these out - they are definitely worth watching!

Falling Slowly - Live at Sundance
Falling Slowly - Letterman Performance
When Your Mind's Made Up
Lies

If these links don't work, just do a YouTube search for The Swell Season...there are tons of great videos.

There will be no stamping today because after the late night last night (we didn't get home until almost midnight) I am pretty much a non-functional human being today...but it was SO worth it! If you ever get the opportunity to see The Swell Season LIVE...run, don't walk, to the ticket office! You won't regret it!

Thanks for stopping by! Have a wonderful day!

Guess What!!!!!

They just opened up some seats for tonight's sold out The Swell Season concert. So with less than 2 hours notice we decided to be spontaneous and got tickets (GOOD tickets!). If you aren't familiar with The Swell Season, they are the 2 actors from the movie Once. The two actors wrote and sang the songs for the movie and won the Academy Award for best song. I just watched this movie last week and was going to write about it on here today but ran out of time. The movie was good, but music was phenomenal. I can't wait to hear them in person! I will let you know how it was, tomorrow. Hope you all have a wonderful night!

Another Sunday post

Well, no sign of those severe afternoon storms (yet), but I spent some time in the basement this afternoon anyway. Here is the card that I just spent WAY TOO LONG making. I have really struggled the last couple weeks with my card making and I really wanted to make something good. I guess this card would fall into the almost good catagory. I'm not 100% thrilled with it but it is a definite start to getting my mojo back. The sunflower stamp is from The Angel Company and the background is SU's French Script. I colored the sunflower with pencils and OMS and then layered a second flower over the top. The ribbon is SU's chocolate chip taffeta ribbon. This was the first time I have used it and I have to say it is pretty nice. Glitter on the flower petals is Art Institute Lions Mane and the flower center is Martha Stewart Brownstone.

Thanks again for stopping by. I promise there won't be a 3rd Sunday post since I have a movie I want to watch yet tonight. Hope you all enjoyed your weekend!

Happy Father's Day!

Hope everyone is having a lovely day. The weather is beautiful right now but they are forcasting some nasty storms with hail for this afternoon.
Here is another card I made during my stamping time yesterday. Images are Inkadinkado and Hero Arts. CS is SU! and DP is Basic Grey.
I'm in a bit of a stamping rut this past week or so. I hope I can find my stamping mojo soon!

Thanks for stopping by. Enjoy your day!

Hope everyone is having a great week. We have yet more rain coming our way today. I don't have anything to share yet today but hopefully after I get this house cleaned up I will find time to make those last 2 Father's Day cards for Kris. I hope you are all having a great day!

I actually stamped something!

I finally found a little bit of stamping time yesterday and I didn't even spend it staring at the wall. I have been in a huge stamping rut and the previous 2 times I went to stamp I just sat there...staring...accomplishing nothing....blank mind. Fortunately, yesterday I decided to actually stamp. My friend Kris has asked me to make 3 different Father's Day cards for her. This is the first one I came up with. The stamps are from Verve Visual and Stampin Up!. DP is Basic Grey and CS is Stampin Up!.

I hope everyone is having a great start to their week. We are headed to the zoo for a playdate with one of Annabelle's preschool friends and then this afternoon Beckett is getting a MUCH NEEDED haircut.
On the movie scene, I have only gotten 1 movie in the past several days and it was Mama's Boy...not great. Funny in a few parts but not one I would recommend. Hopefully I will have a couple more later this week. Tom started moving his movies to the top of the Netflix queue so I'm not getting as many of my movies as I would like. Thanks for stopping by! Have a great day!

I haven't had any time to stamp in several days so I thought I would share a card that I made about a year ago. Simple card but I liked how it turned out. Hopefully I will find some time this week to create something new.

Hope you all have a wonderful Monday. Thanks for stopping by!