I have a Dream...

" I have a dream". A bit off track of the famous one, but still a dream. Mine would be to be able to create as my paid profession. I am always careful of what I dream of because I don't always think it comes in the form we had anticipated. My fear is that my dream of being able to stay home and play in my stamp room all day- every day, may come in the form of a lay-off. I have to say I would certainly like my dream to be of my own choice. I have always envied Tim Holtz for being able to do what he does. I guess that is most likely a dream of all us crafters. None the less it is still fun to dream.

I had a few of the designer paper scraps from Heidi Grace-Winnefred St. which I got on clearance at JoAnns last year. I have a special attachment to it because my grandmother's name was Winnifred- Grandma Winnie. She has been dead 20 years now but I still think about her often. Ok, back to the card. I wanted to use the tag which is from K& Company and I used a stamp set from Fiskars-Family. It had the perfect word to fit the tag and the beautiful flourish that filled the spellbinders scallop oval. I took a Sakura gel pen- Clear Star to certain parts of the flourish to give it some subtle bling. If you click on the picture to enlarge it you can see the metallic color at the tips. Some pretty seam binding, a Prima flower and some rhinestones finished off the card. The flower pattern in the bottom right corner of the paper created a perfect edge to put my rhinestones on a diagonal for bit of a different look. I kind of like it.

Not much happening this weekend. We had our neighbors over for a cookout before they move today. We certainly are going to miss them. They were a very nice couple and always included us when they had parties or a family get-together. They are moving less than an hour away so we will still be able to see them every once in awhile. Tomorrow night we are having some other friends over for a cookout that is long over due. The weather is supposed to be gorgeous so it should be a nice relaxing evening out on the patio with good friends and good wine.

Have fun and enjoy!

Settling back in...

Life can finally start to slow down and we can settle back into a slower pace of life. Elliot moved back to school yesterday and with less angst on my part. Last year I felt the need to make sure he had all the comforts of home. I don't know who I was trying to comfort, him or me. This year as long as he had his clothes and essentials I was fine. He on the other had was ecstatic to be out on his own again. I spent the day getting the house back into shape and his room thoroughly cleaned. Even though I seldom go to that end of the hall, I no longer have to be hit by the smell of dirty clothes. I did what laundry he didn't take and I wondered if the child has any underwear or socks because I folded and put away dozens of them. I had forgotten his motto- why do laundry when you can just go out and buy more.

Today's card is a birthday card for my mother-n-law. I made the large yellow flower out of satin ribbon and a button. I just gathered the ribbon with a running stitch along the edge and then used hot glue to put the button in place. The white flourishes are from an EK-Success punch called Swirl Flourish and the border punch is MS optic dot. the designer paper is DCWV- Cafe Mediterranean. I stil haven't used any of the new products I purchased from the Novi stamping expo. They keep calling to me but I just can't seem to find the time- maybe tonight.

I think we have gone through our dog days of summer. The temperatures have settled back into the low 80's with low humidity. It is so nice to sleep with the windows open again. My flowers finally look great and I and I can actually sit out on the patio and admire them again. I love fall but I am certainly not looking forward to it this soon. I feel like I fell asleep and woke up three weeks later to the end of summer. The days have certainly gotten away from me. Hopefully mother nature still has a few nice weeks in store for us.

Take care and enjoy!

Forever Friends...

I think I'm back! I'm starting to find a little bit of the stamping mojo I seemed to have been missing as of late. It might just be the anticipation of the Novi stamping convention that is this coming weekend. I have my wish list of items that I am hoping to find and a list of things I already have. Mostly colors of mists, stickles and flowers that I don't want to duplicate. I definitely have enough stamps, so this will be a tool and embellishment expedition.

I just picked up this DCWV paper "Cafe Mediterranean" and the colors just flowed as I put it together. Help me out here- the butterfly at the top of the card; is he right side up? I couldn't quite figure out which way was up. I don't know, maybe it isn't even a butterfly.

I found a really good deal on this new MS border punch- "Optic Dot" at Michaels this weekend. For some reason it was marked ($7.99)50% off as was the corner and I was even able to use a 40% off coupon on the corner punch because the clerk said it wasn't clearance. The corner punch rang up at $4.99 and only $2.99 after the coupon. Of course I had to go back and see what else was on the rack that didn't really tickle my fancy at full price but for $4.99 would be a nice addition to my collection. I ended up only getting the "Rain Drop" edge and corner. The others just didn't do it for me, not even at that price. I have no idea why these were so cheap because they are the newer designs. As you can imagine I was in pure heaven.

Did you know that Paula Dean now has designer paper plates, napkins, placements, place cards and confetti. Before you know it she will have punches and paper. The light teal flowers that I used on my card come in a package of 300 for $1.49 but they were on sale for 30% off that at Michaels. Each one is four petals but putting two of them together makes a real cute full flower. You can see the embossing on the petals in the image below. I put a small Prima paper flower in the center. The lighter celery leaves are from Creative Impressions and I just love them. They are very airy and they shimmer so nicely. I didn't have any rhinestone flourishes so I made my own. Not quite as fancy but they work.

Not much else happening here. Again the weather man is teasing me with thunderstorms tomorrow. I am beginning to think he is enjoying this.

I will let you know if I find any of the "must haves" or "to-die-fors" this weekend at the convention. I am very disappointed that Ranger won't be there. That means it will be hard to find the new Tim Holtz items. I was hoping to save on shipping costs with buying direct- oh well!

Have fun and enjoy!