Quick and easy cards (again!).......

Every now and then I just get a bee in my bonnet to make some really quick cards.. just for the heck of it.. and of course, it always "inspires" me when I NEED some thank you cards after my birthday or Christmas! (and I just had my birthday in late June, so was in need of thank you cards). I do have some pre-made thank you cards, but I wanted to use my Sizzix dry embossing machine, so I lugged it out and played. It's always fun to make something new.

I love the look of embossed papers. Isn't that pretty (below)? I used a floral embossing folder and ran it through my Sizzix machine using some pre-cut 3-3/4" x 5"  pretty free digital (rose gold) papers that I printed onto white cardstock, compliments of Free Pretty Things for You. I LOVE her beautiful digital papers. She offers free papers, and also has some you can purchase in her Etsy store.

I already had some colored card bases, so all I needed to do was cut my papers to size, leaving a 1/4" border, and then run each one through my Sizzix. Behind each "matt", I put a doily that I had cut in  half, just for a little interest. And voila! Here's what I came up with:

White gold rose on dark puple.

I added some clear Stickles glitter to the leaves and a few of the roses.

Palest of blue gold roses on a white card.

Light pink and gold roses on pink card.

Sorry about my name! It looks like Greek! I doubled over it with my watermark but was too lazy to redo it......tsh... tsh. this was a cream gold rose on purple card.

To do something different, I used a kraft card and envelope, and some pretty kraft paper for the matt that had this foiled dark pink/purple. I didn't emboss this one and added a polka dot paper I had behind it, for a little  pop.  The metal flower came from my son's girlfriend. She makes jewelry, and for my birthday she sent me a box of all sorts of bling and flowers and parts of old jewelry, etc. What a thrill to get that! This thank you card actually went back to her, with one of her pieces of bling on it.

On each envelope, I gussied it up with a strip of matching paper (except on the kraft envelope). The little labels I made using one of my label cutting dies, and then stamped the words on it with Onyx black Versafine ink. Wanted to keep it simple, right?

As usual, my "quick and easy" cards took me a little more time than I had planned, but I enjoyed every minute I spent wrapped up in my little world of papers and ink, scissors, embossing, and glitter!

OTHER STUFF..............

Yes.. I had my birthday on June 29th and it was a fun and special day.... only my hubby and me..... but my 3 sisters, and my son, called me, and I had gifts to open in the morning, afternoon and evening (most came by UPS and most were things from my Amazon.com wishlist!) I love having a wishlist on Amazon!

The gift bags from Amazon were beautiful!

Got the book Sewn Gifts, from Helen Philipps, that I've been wanting forever (thank you sister)!! She has the most awesome blog..... full of color and delight, and sewing, and crocheting, and gardens........ is published in magazines and has published these wonderful books.  She's such an inspiration to me. She lives in England and I so enjoy her. Take a peek at her blog here.

I also received her other book (thank you again sister!) entitled Patchwork Gifts. I'm just swooning as I look through these books. I want to make everything!  I also received Mollie Makes Crochet, another wonderful book that I've been wishing for.

My sisters definitely KNOW how much I love pink!

And to top it all off.... hubby made me dinner and the most wonderful gluten free, homemade prune cake with white buttercream frosting! My mom always made me homemade prune cake on my birthdays, for many years.  What a nice end to a fun and special day......

It's hotter than heck here and this coming week going to be above the 100's. That's when I stay inside and craft and bake!

Happy weekend!


 

Idle body....... busy hands.......

Since I've spent the last two weeks pretty much SITTING with my leg up.....(because of my fall two weeks ago), I decided it's a good time to play with all of my crafting goodies that have been gathering dust on my shelves this summer! Maybe try a few new things and projects........ maybe make a few things for my Etsy shop.....maybe bake something new (well. that was kind of hard to do but I made one attempt with limited success - more later on that).  

I've been glued to YouTube much of the time, getting ideas for new cards and projects. Would you believe I have 826 videos "liked" that I want to make???? Don't think I'll get those done in a lifetime, do you? It's just too addictive watching YouTube crafting videos.... that's all I can say.
 
I got this pretty Bo Bunny 6x6 paper pad on sale at our local Bi-Mart, so decided to make some quick little cards.  Hum.m.m.m.m and gee....do you think I bought it because it matches my flowers?

I found a video for some "quick" cards showcasing some Stampin' Up designer papers, although my cards didn't turn out so quick. I just can't seem to "do" quick.  Here's the link to the video by Jackie Bolhuis.  I loved how she took just 4 pieces of paper measuring 4 x 5-1/4", cut them up, and turned them into four pretty cards (you also needed the card bases) - I used white ones.

Here are my 4 cards:

Here is one of Jackie's cards (below). This card does not match her video, as I couldn't find a picture of those cards are her blog.. but this one below is very similar to her video as far as design.

Her video cards had doilies on them, but of course, I had to MAKE my own doilies! (used my Cricut cutting machine which I haven't used for months)... and also cut out the words, rather than stamping them (which is so much easier and quicker)! I did stamp one card and just used scalloped circles which can qualify it as a "quick" card.. the rest.... not so quick.

Here's the quick one.

The following ones I made my doily using the Cindy Loo Cricuit cartridge with the little bird on it, and I made the Thanks and Thank You with that same cartridge.

I put clear Stickles on the blue word that I cut out with the Cricut.

Matchy matchy flowers!

I used some silver paper for the words - so pretty! Gots to have some glam, right?

Aren't these cards just yummy and summery??  Love them!  Speaking of yummy, I just discovered a neat website called "Yummly". It's really neat with thousands of recipes. More about it in one of my next posts!

In the next day or two, I'll show you some of my other projects - I'm having a grand time, and having an "excuse" to craft, rather than go outside and work in the yard........ is kind of fun! (although I have still managed to get outside, crutches and all, to water and do a little weeding). Bad girl.........

 

Thrifty, frugal quick Easter cards!

I live in a small town and it's 30 miles to the nearest craft store. I decided at the last minute this week to make some simple little Easter cards for my step-granddaughters. Hum.m.m.m. no Easter paper, nothing with Easter bunnies on it and no Easter stickers or anything! What am I going to do?

I sure don't want to drive 30 miles one way for a couple of little pieces of Easter scrapbook paper!

Dollar Tree to the rescue.  I bought a little bag of 10 tiny 2"x2" sticker boxes for (of course) $1.00! I figured I could cut off the little fronts and backs and use them to decorate my cards.

 So I got together a little 6x6 book of patterned paper from Echo Park - I Love Sunshine, some different colored 5-1/2" x 5-1/2" plain cards that I'd gotten on sale a few years ago, my dies for cutting labels, my corner punch and some clear Stickles........... and went to work!

I needed to make 5 cards,,, even one for my son which had to be masculine. I began by corner punching the little 2x2 pieces I'd cut out, with my decorative corner punch. See top left below. Then I printed some Easter sentiments on my cream cardstock with pink color, and used my Hot Off the Press label dies to cut some labels for the inside. (See below)

I picked some pretty and bright papers from the Echo Park pad, cut them to 4-1/2" x 4-1/2" and adhered them to the front of each card. There was a little extra strip left for the inside.

I made a little label with the die, and use my tiny alphabet stamp set to stamp either "hop hop hop" or "peep peep" on little labels and a circle.

I put Stickles clear glitter in places like the bunnies' ears, chick's tummy, eggs, and on the labels around the edge.

These were SUPER QUICK and fun and easy to make and cost me the total sum of $1.00. I had just purchased the corner punch at JoAnn Fabrics with my 60% off coupon and was anxious to use it. It makes a plain square of paper look pretty fancy don't you think?

Here are the 4 feminine cards.

And I even made one for my son (who is my "baby" at 37!). I used some woodgrain backed paper from a Simple Stories Vintage Bliss 6x6 paper pad, added a couple of the little box tops to the front and a few stickers of the eggs, and I think it turned out pretty nice.. even for a guy.

If you don't have a Dollar Tree nearby, maybe another discount store or even the bigger box stores would have little packages of treats like this to use... especially if you're on a budget like I am. 

On the inside of each card, I put the little stickers that were inside the boxes, two little plastic butterfly stencils (again from the Dollar Tree), a piece of cardstock to draw on and a little notepad. So I guess the total cost for each card with the stuff inside was $3.00.

Think outside of the box when you're in a pinch and don't want to make the long drive to your craft store! Have you ever been in this situation and made do, and got a little creative with what you already had or could get for super cheap?

HAPPY EASTER TO YOU ALL!

 

Life on pause mode.....

I don't have anything in particular to blog about today, as I've been SICK for almost two weeks and my life has totally been on PAUSE! So thought I'd try something different today and just start writing with nowhere in mind to go with it. 

I have no plan for today's blog, other than I know I should post "something" as haven't been here since before Christmas. and... where in the heck did the time go? 

I've been in a stupor since 2 days before New Year's. My husband and I both got sick one day apart.. him first, then me. Not fun at all.. we couldn't take care of each other (though does hubby really take care of wifey when she's sick? not usually!). 

We both have spent the last NINE days in our jammies (at least I have - he got dressed and actually put his shoes on!). I haven't been this sick for 5 or 6 years, but won't dwell on it since I'm finally feeling better and feeling human again! 

I'm just going to post some random pictures with a running commentary.. that's about all I'm up to today!  And I know everyone is so done with Christmas so will mention it just a little, as at least I felt good then.  Although.... I was so worn out from our move, and then all the work we did, and then company, and Thanksgiving, that Christmas decorating just didn't happen much this year. I guess we deserve to have a year now and then when we aren't perfect and don't get it all done!

I think my little (fake) tree had the sum total of about 10 ornaments on it! We got it put up on maybe Dec. 20th and then I couldn't find the tub of ornaments in our garage.. and I mean we looked everywhere. I found a few little stuffed fabric ornaments that I had made 30 years ago in the one tub I brought into the house of "soft goods" so stuck those on the tree.  and found a little (big?) canvas board I had made a few years ago, so hung that on too. Poor little tree.

Looks pretty good at night with the lights! I really enjoy the lights - yes the tree is still up.

Our kitty, Maddie sure did like that tree (and still does)... of course. And she only knocked it over once!  Not much decorating happened after we got the tree up. And I still felt good.. but no motivation this year for some reason to decorate. So I didn't.

Oh.. I did manage to make a batch of chocolate chip cookies. I was SO craving chocolate! This was in between making 18 gifts for Christmas presents. That's another whole story of what happened during the month of December. Maybe I'll show some of them in another post. I ate a few (cookies) and ended up giving the rest to our new neighbors... ages 58 and 59 and they are raising their FOUR grandchildren! Yikes. I felt like they needed some sweets, bless them.

OK... Christmas came... we had our own little event at our house.. had a nice breakfast, opened a few gifts. Table of gifts below - poor tree in the background.

Went to my sister's house 70 miles to the south of us at an elevation of about 2,000 feet higher, on Dec. 26th and got to see my nephew and his fiance, and my great nephew. What a little cutie he is!

Did I mention that he was sick??? coughed all over everyone... hum.m.m.m.m. did most everyone there get sick? yes.. except for his mom of course. She's immune. But they live in Florida so it was a special treat to see him and give him a few hugs. He had NO INTEREST in opening his gifts!

My sister made a GORGEOUS quilt for our great nephew. It's a monkey theme and love the bright colors.  She makes such beautiful quilts (sigh... I'm envious).

Here's my sister's picture perfect "log cabin" in the snow. Did I tell you they had about 2-1/2 feet of snow??? Yes... I just moved from there in October... I'm so glad! We had NO snow!

My little (partial) family at my sister's house. Me in front in red (God did I eat that much? I had just run from the car where I set the camera... ran through 2 feet of snow and up the (icy) steps so I could be in the picture. 

I really didn't take that many pictures at my sister's house.. for some reason... I don't know why as I usually take hundreds. Now I regret it. I had decided to try to spend more time visiting and less time with the camera always in my hand. Now I wish I had more.  It was a lovely time and lots of food.... which is a good thing, right?

So Christmas comes and goes.....and I knew my nephew and finance, and my other nephew's wife and her son (the ones who live in Florida) were going to stop by our house on Dec. 28th on their way back to Portland, so I decided NOW was the time to decorate! So I got busy and put a few things on our mantle and shelves around the house.

My Christmas mantle! Everything I had was in my soft goods tub.. and I had bought a few glittery pine boughs, so those got stuck in a little vase!

This is the extent of my decorating... star paper wreath was also in my soft goods tub!

Well.. it did look festive and I've enjoyed it immensely since then (while being a couch spud).  And on a side note.... I DID finally find the tub of tree ornaments, but they never did get put on the tree.

I got a pretty picture hung in our bedroom above my dresser, and a quilt hung on the wall over our bed. Oh.. and also put up my mom's tea cup shelf that has been sitting on the floor in our bedroom since we moved in. I wanted to paint it white first. Well.... that never happened did it? so up on the wall it went.. though no teacups on it yet (see the empty shelf on the wall on the right?).

Pretty quilt on my pink walls. This is supposed to be my "cottage style" bedroom, but not there yet. DARK furniture keeps being added (hint hint hubby.. I don''t need a dark wood headboard!). You promise to paint it white don't you? And I'll paint that teacup shelf white too. It's a deal. And fleecy blanket on the bed for our new kitty. this room is NOT picture perfect yet! But I do love the quilt on the wall.

My mom's beautiful antique lamp....... plus a thrift shop picture in pretty pinks hung behind my dresser... all done (finally) in preparation for company. Isn't that how most things get done anyway???/ company coming? And I even dusted off the dresser!

Note to self: That dresser needs to be painted white also!

Company came and went on Dec. 28th.... Dec. 29th hubby gets sick.  Dec. 30th I get sick. New Year's comes and goes while we are moaning and groaning and feeling sorry for ourselves.

See the frozen "fog" (also called hoarfrost) on my little vine maples that I planted last Fall? It's been COLD here and house is SO cold and we've been cold. (I wear leggings under sweat pants, a pair of normal socks and wool socks over them and heavy fleece lined slippers, and my feet STILL are cold. A t-shirt, long sleeved thermal shirt and sweater over that.) Those little white things that look like thorns or stickers are just the frost from the fog. Was so pretty the other day - taken from inside the house of course (in my jammies - of course).  It's been COLD here though not down to zero thank goodness. Most nights in the low 20's.

All three of our (outdoor) cats get to be inside at night. A first for us. The two black cats have been outdoor cats for years and usually stay in our (somewhat heated) garage at night. But with our new kitty, hubby as decided that it's too cold for the two big ones to be out in the garage (well SHE got to be in the house, but not the two big ones).. and now all of a sudden, they all get to sleep in at night! They've finally accepted little Maddie onto their couch bed, though somewhat reluctantly.

My black female with the bright eyes, looks a little perturbed still.

I got a wonderful gift for Christmas from my sister. A Sizzix Big Shot die cutting and embossing machine! I'm so thrilled - a fun new toy to play with.. though really haven't played too much since I've been sick.  I did manage to make some "thank you" cards last week using an embossing folder I bought 2 years ago, in anticipation of getting an embossing machine.

I ran a glue stick over the embossed designs and then sprinkled glitter all over.. you can't see it in the pictures though. They sure turned out pretty and were super easy! I LOVE those birdhouses!

That's the extent of any crafting I've done since I've been sick.

And that's all of my exciting news for now.  I'll show more projects made with my Sizzix once I get some cutting dies and more emboss folders. I'm excited to try some fancy cards and flip cards, etc. There is so much I want that I can't decide where to start with the cutting dies. 

I've been spending alot of time on YouTube and Amazon since I've been sick.. making a wish list on Amazon and getting ideas on what cutting dies I want on You Tube. You Tube is my best friend right now!

I hope everyone is finding a little time to relax after the holidays and that you aren't sick!

Note to self:  I need to change my blog header!

Bye for now...............