Thanksgiving

Posted on | November 25, 2010 | 8 Comments

Happy Thanksgiving day everyone!! I hope all of you celebrating will have a wonderful time with their loved ones!!! I know we will be. Today our little family will have a small feast of duck and different side dishes. While doing a project for M’s school on this topic we learned that the pilgrims and indians didn’t sit down for a turkey meal, the turkey came later, but most likely it was duck and other animals that they hunted back then.

I hope that today we’ll all be thankful for each other and the time that we have together.

I hope you also enjoy the little card that I have to share with you today. It’s a very clean and one layered card using Clear and Simple’s Happy Fall set. I love this card because it’s clean AND I won’t have to pay an extra $.17 to mail it off {::SMILES}.

You all have a great one and if you are one of them Black Friday early morning shopper, stay safe!!!

All Eyes On…

Posted on | November 20, 2010 | 5 Comments

Emma!!

Ha!

Ok, nuff of that {::SMILES}. Today WPlus9 wants to focus on Distress Ink. After emailing Dawn and telling her that I’ve got none and she told me that I can focus on using ink in general I remembered that I purchased some Distress Crackle Paint some while back and never used it. So today I want to focus on it — with ink of course!

For this card I did some regular stamping on the the two, left and right, ornaments. For the center I used the paint.

The paint comes with a brush and to to use it is like applying finger nail polish to your nails but thicker.

Let it dry, and this does take some while, or you can use a heat gun to hasten it up a bit.

Unfortunately I couldn’t get a good picture of it. But if you look at the Crackle jar again it more less looks like the crackles on the label. Fine little crackles like that. I’m not so sure if I like it. I think if the crackle was a bit bigger I’d like it more.

Have a goodie and until next time!!

If Looks Could Kill

Posted on | November 15, 2010 | 10 Comments

It’s color cue time again with WPlus9 and this month us designers get to pick our own colors everyone to play with. Mine’s pretty easy: Red, black/gray, kraft with white as an option. A friend of mine asked me if I can make her ten cards for Christmas and so I’ve trying to come up with one layer designs. This was one of them and I think it’s a keeper. The stamps I used are WPlus9′s latest set: Classic Christmas. I love the ornaments and the fonts for the sentiment!!

So… we went to IKEA and the night before we went I signed up for an IKEA family membership because a few of the things I wanted were on sale if you’re a member. Then while browsing around to see what items have reduce pricing I decided to check the other store (there are a few in London and two are up north, 20min from one another) and oh my, another piece I need is on sale there for members! Hubby was out at his friend’s when I did all that discovery and when he came home I rushed to greet him and said: “I have a fantastic idea!!” He looked at me, paused, and turned right back around. I ran to him and asked where he was going again and he said: “Nope, nope, I don’t want to hear it. I don’t want to know what your great idea is. You have that look on your face (my high school friends used to tell me my eyes would twinkle in an evil way when I had some crazy bright ideas). I’m going back to Pete’s.” I started laughing and told him to get comfy on his chair. After he was nice and toasty I told him that instead of one IKEA we’re going to go to two IKEAs because there are items at each store that are on sale.

It’s really hard for me to tell you how he felt or looked but I caught it on camera:

If looks could kill I wouldn’t be blogging right now {::SMILES}. He didn’t get over it the next day. Oh he took me to IKEA and he was talkative and all that but when I tried to dance to a song with him in the car he’d say: “Don’t try to be fun with me, it’s not going to work (he somehow knew I was kissing up), it doesn’t make the drive any more fun.” I had a great time laughing. I love it when he’s miserable that way ha ha ha…

Amazingly enough he was very patient with my IKEA shopping. I had a list but it wasn’t a for sure list so I still had to touch and ponder. It was great that he was there though because he told me what can and can’t work (we have REALLY hard walls, not sure what but you need a drill to hang anything up!). It was great that he came too because we got these boxes in our Honda Civic Estate (a wagon basically):

It was a good thing M didn’t go. We have a roof rack but it rained. The main boxes in the photos are three Alex and one 5×5 Expedit. If the weather was good we’d have brought back a blue Hemnes too. Hubby’s idea. He said it’d look good and I can put my kits in there better than the other piece I was looking at. I did look at the Hemnes but thought it was a bit too much but hey, if the hubby said so I’m not going to say no {::SMILES}.

Did we go to both? No. It was raining. Plus the Alex were on sale and it wasn’t mentioned on the site. So we still saved money. Is hubby happy now? Oh no!!! He still has to put the Expedit together he he he… I’ll probably be on hot cocoa duty all this week!!!

My Friends

Posted on | September 25, 2010 | 19 Comments

I didn’t know that blog peeps talk and even meet in real life. Even though I’ve always used a chat application or use social network sites like Facebook I only talk or add people that I know in real life or those I work/have worked with. But as I blog more and visit certain people regularly we became friends. Sometimes I think I know my blog friend more than my real friend. Weird I know but that’s how it is. Meeting people with the same hobby (or addiction) has helped in the creative department. Back in the days my card was more less like the above and now it’s gotten to be a bit more busy, a bit more fun, with a little bit more details.

I have to say that if it wasn’t because of my blog friends I wouldn’t still be crafting as much and blogging on a regular basis. But because of all your comments, encouragement, inspiration and friendship I am still going. It’s hard to just give a shout out to one or even a handful. I’ve drawn inspiration from so many! So here’s to all of you.

This is the theme for the PTI blog hop this month. I am late at entering but I thought I’d give it a go anyways.

PS: It was so hard making the above card!! If you’re interested in learning how to tie that ribbon, with all the dots facing forward, check out this old video of mine. I’ve perfected it since but haven’t gotten the chance to redo the video. There’s less adjusting and it looks like the above.

Fall Harvest

Posted on | September 17, 2010 | 5 Comments

Today M’s school had an event, half a food drive and half a little celebration at the local church for the food we’ve gotten and will continue to receive. The children had a little program and they were all adorable.

I’ve been to many food drives. I’ve been involved in a few of them too — or least make the posters for the events — but today was the first time that I saw fresh produced donated to a food bank. There were fresh peaches, corn, carrots, etc. There were homemade jams, breads, and other goodies. Amongst the glorious (fresh) food was my canned goods, juice and rice (fresh) from the Commissary. After some serious eye-balling I did see other canned or fast food items but not many. I felt kind of lame after that event and you could obviously tell which items were from the American, ha!

Speaking of fall, it’s getting cold here, the leaves are starting to change, and it’s in the low 60s this week for the high. We turned the heat on yesterday but we seem to have a problem telling it to come on at the right time. We’re used to the modern electronic thermostat and not the old dial system. Light is getting harder to come by too. There’s still daylight but it hasn’t been as bright as usual, if the sun shines it’s for a short moment. I do love fall though. It’s the only time that I can dress up (boots, calf length skirts/dresses, light jackets, etc.) although I am a fan of sun dresses and flip-flops.

Since we’ve been back I keep thinking of the food we had in Belgium too. So divine and the whole experience is making me want to go on our next trip: Paris, for a weekend!! Let me share a few pictures while I think about it… We ate at the Hotel de la Poste in Bouillon, Belgium. The food was AWESOME and pretty looking too!

This was my Tartare. It’s a starter dish. Salmon, clams and spices. There’s soft cheese too and bread. The brown line on the back is the sauce.

This was M’s main dish as part of her kid’s meal. She shared the dish with Jovie although Jovie was quite content with bread and a lot of butter (she’d poke her finger into the butter and lick it — classy I know).

Did I tell you that this kid can smile on command? I’d say, “Cheesy smile” and Jovie would do the below. Aaah, I’ve trained her well, huh?

The very nice restaurant that was children friendly. Oh, it’s pet friendly too. You can’t find a dog (with a pink cast) lounging around the lobby in an American restaurant.

I have a thing for nice table settings. I LOVE formal dinners at our home, esp. on holidays. It’s one of the reason why I’m not a fan of buffet holiday meals. Formal dinners don’t come often and when it does it’s an excuse for me to decorate the table and cook thoughtfully prepared dishes. I love this design style. Just so elegant and simple.

Yes we did some food splurging but we deserve it I think. It was a celebration. We celebrated being together, hubby’s graduation (distinguished grad!!), our current debt-free life (the house we just sold was our last debt), our move to the UK, and our first big trip.

Card details:

I had fall in mind when creating this card. Even though the card’s a tad bit on the bright side it contains fall colors: red, gold/yellow, green, and brown. For the stamp I used Clear and Simple Stamp’s Topiaries set. The card is pretty simple which brings me back to my roots… simple ol’ papercrafter me. Other materials I used are: SU cardstock, Etsy Annie42 Twine, and Copic markers. I distressed too using an old Making Memories tool.