Dawn's Card

For this card I used one of my new "American Art" stamps by Karen Stolper. The girls in this stamp line are adorable! My friend Sue sent a link to their site and I immediately ordered three of them. The card says "winter wishes" because Dawn and Monique live in Washington, where, in the winter, it rains a lot. I used a clear envelope to mail it and my mail carrier said she loved it!

Skating

Hello and Happy Saturday! I made this card for my daughter Monique. I love how the ice pond ended up. This is another of my Elzybells stamps and I used colored pencils and my clear Gelly marker to decorate it. I had to wait to post it until Monique received it in the mail. She called yesterday and said she loved it!

Winter Greetings

Hello and Happy Winter! I made this card for my sister Sandy. She lives next to a nature preserve and has many deer visit her yard every day. She feeds them and cares for them as if they were her children. When I saw this stamp set (Dear to My Heart, by Memory Box), I knew I had to have it. I love the many different deer and choices of antlers in the set. I plan to make more cards with this set very soon.

More Rosie's Roadshow

This card is one of my favorites! I had to wait until my daughter Monique received it in the mail, to post it. The stamp is called "bookies" and the ladies are librarians. Since Monique is a librarian, and I work in the local high school library, I knew she would love it! I used some of the little sticky dots from Joann's $1.00 rack to make the fake brads, and I colored the design with colored pencils.

Rosie's Roadshow

Here is my latest creation using my new Rosie's Roadshow stamps. I love the little tree (he is called Douglas) and the snowmen ornaments. Over the years, I collected many snowman ornaments like the ones on this card. My kids called them my "decapitated snowmen." I love all snowmen ornaments, with or without bodies!

More thank-you cards...

I made a few of these because I love the color combinations. The patterned paper I used is one of my favorites. I made a New Year's resolution to spend more time working on my cards. I purchased some awesome new stamps in December and received a few more for Christmas, along with some great Stampin' Up gift certificates from my kids. Also, my friend Crystal is hosting our Stampin' Up new catalog open house on Saturday and I can't wait to see the new sets being offered.

I'm finally back...

Well, I'm finally back and ready to post! I have been busy throughout December and now, I'm ready to post some new cards. I have been working on my Christmas thank-you cards and here is the first one. Of course I had to use my Elzybells! I just love these stamps and can't wait to see what they come out with next.

A new technique...

This is one of the beautiful cards Crystal showed us how to make at my Stampin' Up card club meeting last Thursday. It's called Stained Glass and it's made using vellum for the main stamped image. We had a lot of fun at the party and I reached the third level of hostess gifts, which means I got a LOT of hostess gifts and products! I almost exhausted my wish list, which is OK, because the new SU catalog will be out in January. I can't wait to create a new list. This weekend Katy and Cindy are coming over to make Christmas cards and I'm sure we will have a great time and make some beautiful cards.

I didn't make this one...

I didn't make this one...but my friend Katy made it for my birthday! I love this card! The colors are perfect together, and it's so cute. Katy keeps saying she is not creative enough to come up with good card ideas, but this card proves her wrong! Keep up the wonderful work, Katy. And, thanks again for such a lovely birthday card.

Another Elzybell

Here is another card I made with my new Elzybell stamps. I thought this pink-spotted background paper was perfect for this card. The sentiment is a sticker, and I used a white Souffle marker to emboss the snow and the trim on her outfit. I think these stamps are the cutest I've seen in a long time!

Elzybells

Woo Hoo! I finally found time to play with my Elzybell stamps! My dear friend Katy came over today to stamp with me in my studio. We had a great day and I made a couple of cards with my new Elzybell stamps. Here is the first one. I used Stampin' Up watercolor crayons to color the image. I also used my Gelly Roll shiny gel pen to color some of the snowflakes in the background.

Marine Corps Birthday

Did you know that November 10th is the Marine Corps Birthday? This year the Marines will be 232 years old. Being married to a Marine who is a Vietnam War veteran has taught me a lot about the history of the Marines. The Corps first started celebrating the birthday 84 years ago. In 1923 the Marine Barracks at Ft. Mifflin, Pennsylvania, staged a formal dance. The Marines at the Washington Navy Yard arranged a mock battle on the parade ground. At Quantanamo Bay, Cuba, the Marine baseball team played a Cuban team and won, 9 to 8.
The first "formal" Birthday Ball took place on Philadelphia in 1925. First class Marine Corps style, all the way! Guests included the Commandant, the Secretary of War (in 1925 the term "politically correct" didn't exist; it was Secretary of War, not Secretary of Defense), and a host of statesmen and elected officials. Prior to the Ball, Gen. Lejeune unveiled a memorial plaque at Tun Tavern. Then the entourage headed for the Benjamin Franklin Hotel and an evening of festivities and frolicking.
Over the years the annual Birthday Ball grew and grew, taking on a life of its own. In 1952 the Commandant, Gen. Lemuel C. Shepherd Jr., formalized the cake-cutting ceremony and other traditional observances. For example, Marine Corps policy now mandates that the first piece of cake must be presented to the oldest U.S. Marine present. The second piece goes to the youngest Marine. Among the many such mandates is a solemn reading of the Commandant's birthday message to the Corps.
Like the U.S. Marine Corps itself, the annual Birthday Ball has evolved from simple origins to the polished and professional functions of today. Nonetheless, one thing remains constant, the tenth day of November! This unique holiday for warriors is a day of camaraderie, a day to honor Corps and Country. Throughout the world on 10 November, U.S. Marines celebrate the birth of their Corps -- the most loyal, most feared, most revered, and most professional fighting force the world has ever known.

Veteran's Day

This is a card I made for one of the veterans in my life. It's always nice to remember the sacrifices they made to keep us safe. Veteran's Day is the perfect time to say "Thank You!" to our fighting men and women.

Stamp Club

This is one of the cards we made at our October Stamp Club meeting at Bonnie's house. I decided to "sparkle it up" a bit, so I used my Gelly Roll gel pen to trace the snowflakes. I really like the effect the gel pen adds.

I have been really sick with a horrible sinus infection, and can't wait to feel better again. I need to start making my Thanksgiving and Christmas cards real soon. Can you believe it is already November?

The other Halloween card

This is the other card I made for Halloween. I love this pumpkin paper. The cool ribbon I used on both cards is from Michael's. I'm pretty pleased with this card, too! I kind of cheated on the brads - they are not really brads at all. Since I had already punched the corners of the patterened paper and didn't want the brads to show on the inside of the card, I punched circles out of scrap cardstock and attached them with glue dots. Then, I used a little Liquid Glass (Close To My Heart) to add dimension to the 1/4" circles, and make them look like brads.

Halloween Card

For this card, I used Glitter Candy Corn from the Heidi Grace Jeepers Creepers Collection. I just love this paper. I don't usually make Halloween cards, but since I get a few cute homemade cards from my daughters every year, I decided to give it a shot. I really like the way this one turned out!

Punch Card class

Yesterday was our Punch Card class with Crystal. We made five different cards (two of each) and I really liked all of them. My favorite has to be this beautiful pumpkin card. We made the pumpkin with the Stampin' Up large oval punch and the stem with the small oval punch. The middle three sections of the pumpkin are popped up for effect. It is so cute and it was very easy to make. Keep up the great designs and wonderful classes Crystal!

Sympathy card

Hello! Here is my latest creation. It is a sympathy card for my friend Katy. I just love the patterned paper on this one. Green is one of my two favorite colors, so I think this is one of my favorite cards. I have more to post later from our latest card class.

Christmas card class

Hello out there! It's been a while since I've posted! My daughter Dawn and her significant other, Liev, have been visiting for the past week (from Tacoma, WA), and we have been very busy catching up and having fun. Sadly, they are leaving today.

Also, I was finally called back to work last week! Yeah! They found the funds to pay me for the year, so I am back! I love my job and the paychecks are nice to get, too.

I did manage to find time to attend Crystal's Christmas card class last week and we made some beautiful cards. My favorite is pictured here.

Make-n-Take

Today Katie and I went to a great shop in Waterford called Jane's Craft Studio. I had ordered some adorable AMuse stamps, and they came in, so we had to go pick them up! As it happened, the store had a cute make-n-take using AMuse stamps for us to do while we were there. Here is a photo of the card we made this morning.

They also had all of their Hero Arts stamps on sale for 40% off, and a lot of new Fall and Christmas stamps had recently arrived. We spent a lot of time browsing and saw many cool card samples. Now that I have my new stamps, I can't wait to get creative once again!