PTI Go-To Sentiment Card...

So, I've been wanting to participate in the PTI challenges going on this week, but have had a few obstacles... 1 being, for the first time since BEFORE CHRISTMAS, I've had to work a FULL week this week! LOL.  I'm still sort of in disbelief about this...ha! I'm EXHAUSTED!

Secondly though - the other issue is I've been taking my photos outside since one of the lights for my tent broke...and since I work all day, I only get to stamp at night...and by the time I get to photograph...too late!  I just might catch up and play along anyway, because there's lots of fun challenges going on!

ANYWAY -- enough blah blah blah, I know, I'm getting on with it.

The challenge for the first Make it Monday challenge was to create a "Go-To Sentiment Card"  I tried -- I kind of feel like I more made a background paper out of sentiments...but I'm going with it, and I'll keep trying on my own, just because I thought it was a neat idea.  This will be my hubby's valentine this year.

I went through all of my sets and pulled out all of the "love" sentiments, and got to work.

I've added the three little hearts from Wonderfully Whimsical, as well as one of the hearts from Heart Prints for accents.  I'm fairly satisfied with how this turned out - I will definitely be trying this one again!!

Thanks PTI for the challenge, AND for the opportunity!!

Supplies:
Stamps: (All PTI) Round and Round, Heart Prints, Damask Designs, Mod Squad, Simple Little Things, Signature Greetings, Wonderfully Whimsical, Beyond Basic Borders, Background Basics: Tin Types
Ink: Dark Chocolate, Versamark, Fresh Snow
Paper: Dark Chocolate, Pure Poppy, Select White
Accessories: Stickles, Clear EP, dimensionals

Papertrey Favorites...

I'm AMAZED by the giveaway over on Nichole Heady's blog today...and figured I'd be foolish not to give it a go, lol.  I'm reposting a card I made back in April for my friend Pam, for her birthday.  It was for a blog hop, and I'd have to say, it's one of my favorites I've made this year.

I cut the sides of the dress free hand, using punches for the neck and arm openings.  A little stamped tissue paper made the ruffled skirt, and Raspberry Grosgrain trimmed it nicely :).  Thanks to Nichole and the peeps at PTI for this awesome opportunity -- and to the rest of the PTI design team for their seemingly effortless showcasing of the new products each month!!  Happy 4th Anniversary -- wishing you many more!

Getting Organized...

Soooooo, those of you that are familiar with me, know that I moved my crafty space up to the main floor of my home, after a few run-ins with some unwanted house guests... Since then, I had gone through a VERY long creative dry spell, and now that I'm getting back in the game, I'm trying to get my space organized, for as little investment as possible.  So far, so good, really...I've not invested too much $$, but have spent a little time, and honestly I think it's worth it.  I think I'm going to like my new set up, once it's finished, of course.

So, my next two posts are going to be dedicated to some of my 'home-made' organization.  I made my own color cubbie out of foam core board...that will be my next post, but today is about die storage...

I've been hemming and hawing over die storage for a while.  I wasn't sure exactly HOW to go about my dies and embossing plate storage.  I wanted something that was compact enough, but easy to see what I have, and it had to be NEAT.  My friend Barb, had a cool system, where she put her nesties on magnetic sheets, and filed them in metal dvd cases, and those were filed in photo storage boxes...and then there's Dawn, who made the most adorable die storage for all of her PTI dies...so I thought, and thought and thought, and then POOF!!  I finally figured out how I was going to store my dies.  I took elements from Barb, and Dawn, and made my own system.

 I went to Home Depot, and bought these Magnet vent covers.  They measure 8"x15", and 3 come in a pack for less than $5!  I cut each cover in to 6 4"x5" magnets... (so that's 18, count them, 18 magnet sheets for less than $5)

Then I cut some Kraft CS 4.25"x7.25" and mounted the magnet on one side, and I've written the name of the dies on the tab with no magnet.  Eventually, I'll cover those with nicer labels, but I've at least got them all labeled for now, so I know which dies are which.

 

ETA: the magnet on the card with the number dies measures 4X6.5 (or 6.75, I can't remember!) In order for me to fit them all on one card, I cut the magnet larger :)

Then, I broke out a photo box, and used some of the foam core that was left over from my color cubbie, and made a couple of dividers for the box (they measure 4.25" x 7.5") and I hot glued them in place.  I've organized my dies/embossing plates/folders as follows:  Spellbinders are up front, PTI dies are in the center, and all of my embossing/impression plates are in the rear.

 I was so proud of my little creation, I shared it with hubby (who was SO enthused, I might add) but he was curious what I was going to do with the vent covers, so he got what he asked for, right??  Anyway, while he was sitting there, marveling at my work(*snicker*), I took my PTI rick rack die, and just laid it across the PTI section.  You see, it's too wide to fit sideways in the box, and I still want to be able to put the lid on the box.  So, I was just going to lay the die, diagonally in the box.

Hubby says "you're going to leave it like that?"
I reply, "Well, yeah.  I'm not sure how I'm going to store it yet, look, it won't fit".
So hubby says "I can't believe you are going to go through all of that, and leave that thing like that".

Then, all of a sudden... POOF! (it happens alot around here) hubby had a BRILLIANT idea.
Hubby: "Babe -- do you have a piece of magnet left??"
Me: "Yes, I have this larger piece that I haven't cut yet"
Hubby: "You should glue that to the inside lid of the box.  Put the long one on that magnet.  Then it will still be in the box, but stored neatly."
Me: "WOW -- that is a FANTASTIC idea, and I'll have plenty of room for more!"...

then of course, he sat there, all satisfied with himself for the rest of the afternoon ;).

So, there you have it...my die storage... oh, and I'm slowly but surely procuring enough white photo boxes that I will soon be able to build a fort with them...and I will share my plans for them with you, as they happen...

Until next time...thanks for stopping by, and make it a great day!!

PTI Blog Hop!

The post that almost wasn't!!  I'm having technical difficulties, when, of course, I FINALLY have a blog hop project to share!  eesh.  Luckily, I had a backup plan...

The challenge this month is to show some love to some neglected PTI stamps.  ALL of my stamps have been neglected lately, so this wasn't a very hard challenge, lol.

What I did here...is created some fun felt hair clips for my daughter's friend, and decided to incorporate them into her birthday card.  I die cut the star shapes out of PTI Chocolate and Raspberry felt, then I attached the two bitty dot Hawaiian Shores 'tails' to the star with a little scor tape, to hold them in place, while I sewed the star layers together and onto to the alligator clip that was wrapped with Hawaiian Shores twill.  Cute, right?

I used the Outlines Alphabet to create a background for the Raspberry layer.  Now -- I see some of the 8's are kind of 'glowing' in my photos...creepy, yes.  But I can assure you, this is not how the card looks to the naked eye!  After stamping my background, I used my Fillable Frames #3 die and stamp set to stamp my sentiment on (which is from Birthday Bash Sentiments).  Behind it, are 3 strips of rickrack, cut with the rickrack die.  They are adhered to the card front at the top, middle, and bottom.  This allows me to clip the clips onto the card, incorporating them into the design!

I loved the way this came out, and honestly, while DD was excited to give this to her friend, I could see she wanted to keep it for herself, lol.

Thanks for popping by!!  Make it a GREAT day! :)

Supplies:
Stamps: Outlines Alphabet, Birthday Bash Sentiments, Fillable Frames #3
Ink: Hawaiian Shores, Raspberry Fizz, Brilliance Chocolate
Paper: Hawaiian Shores, Raspberry Fizz, Select White, Dark Chocolate
Accessories: Raspberry & Chocolate Felt, rickrack die, Fillable Frames #3 die, Hawaiian Shores bitty dot & twill ribbon, Hawaiian shores buttons, chocolate DMC floss, alligator clips, star nestabilities

Hi there...

Remember me??


It's been awhile, and while I haven't actually MADE anything in over a month...I have a few projects that I've never posted, so I thought I'd share one with you all today.  I had made this for a Papercrafts sketch challenge a few months back.

It uses my FAVORITE color, Orange Zest.  These pretty little roses are from Prima, the sentiment from Papertrey Ink's Out on A Limb Sentiments.

While I haven't been online much - I've been plenty busy...makes me wonder how I had time to do everything I was before too! lol.  The holidays here were great, no stress.  I enjoyed a week off with my girls, and it was heaven.

The New Year so far, has been a good one, and I hope that it continues on this trend...*fingers crossed*  I'm truly blessed!!

Thanks to those of you that have popped in!!  Wishing you all a WONDERFUL day!!

You know...

I never quite realized just how big my kitchen floor was...until we recently painted our kitchen, and I got on my hands and knees and scrubbed the entire thing with a handy-dandy scrub brush.  I have one of those Hoover hard floor cleaners...well, let me tell you -- those things apparently DON'T work very well.  When I saw all of the dirt and nastiness that I got off of my floor by scrubbing, eeeeek.  I was embarrassed that I've been using that thing for so long!!!

Anyway -- I'm quite happy with how the kitchen turned out.  We've been talking about painting it for over 2 years, and we FINALLY did it.  When we first started talking about painting, I had bought new bulbs and shades for my chandelier in the dining area, and I said "That way when we paint, it will look fresh and new".  Well, one by one the bulbs started to blow, and I kept saying "Nope, not going to change them until we paint - then I'll change them all at once"...by mid-November, we were down to 2 bulbs...it was getting hard to see dinner, lol.

We had volunteered to host Thanksgiving dinner, so between that and the nearly non-existent light to eat by, we decided to FINALLY paint.

Here it is, all finished, and looking pretty :)

This is the dining area end:

and the kitchen end:

Now, I'm most excited about this -- I have plate covers on all of my switches...you know that saying "the shoe makers children have no shoes"?  Well, my hubby is an electrician, and since we had been talking about painting the kitchen (following a Family room addition onto our house, that partly involved the kitchen), he never put plate covers on all of our switches in the kitchen...SOOOO, now the room is complete, and looks so nice!  Check out these fancy schmancy switches:

Since we had a little more than 2 years to prepare for this momentous occasion, hubby sprang for these super duper programmable dimmers, buying them here and there, until we had enough switches for the kitchen. (about 8 or 9 all together)

Thanks for taking a tour of my home improvement project with me!! :)

Hope all is well with you all -- have you got your Christmas shopping done yet???  I'm about 90% there, YEAH!!! :)

It's a WRAP!

Happy December!!!

Today, the My Time Made Easy team is sharing a GREAT new template that is available for purchase RIGHT NOW over at My Time Made Easy, called Wonderfully Wrapped.  Let me tell you -- this is a FUN template.  It's SUPER easy to put together -- with a more sophisticated look.

Here's mine:

I was feeling a bit nostalgic, as today is my last post with the team at MTME.  Those of you that follow me, have noticed I haven't been around much.  In fact, my last post was the last MTME release!  I think I need to take a step back for a while, focus on my family, and my home...and you never know, you may just see me pop back up out of nowhere...but for now, this is what I need to do.

BUT -- back to my nostalgia ;).  I decided to go back to the VERY FIRST digital papers offered last year, the "12 Days of Snowflakes", and as usual, I felt the need to tweak the colors, because I've had this pretty ribbon FOR-EV-ER, and never had a good paper that matched it, that's the beauty of digital paper, and a little photoshop know-how.  Here's the side view:

I kept it very simple, creating a large ornament out of some silver glitter paper using my Marvy Mega Circle punch, and hand cutting the ornament 'topper'.  I used the frame and a sentiment from So Sentimental, and affixed it to the front. Done!

Simple, elegant, EASY, just the way it should be.

I'd like to take a quick moment to thank my fellow teammates for all of their support, laughs, and shared late nights over the last year... they are ALL an amazing group of women, and I'm BLESSED that our lives have crossed.

I'd really like to thank Lauren, for giving me this amazing opportunity.  She is such a delight to work with, and her creativity inspires me daily.  I love to see her business grow and flourish, she deserves it.

And of course, I'd like to thank ALL OF YOU...for stopping by, and leaving a word or two, or for just stopping by, and perhaps sharing a smile :O).

I wish you all the happiest of holidays, may they bring you joy that lasts all the new year through!!

Now, hop on to the rest of the team's blogs, they've ALL got something marvelous to share with you today!!