Forgotten Treasures

The Last day of 2015, the years just keep going by faster and faster don't they. Well I started out the year thinking I was going to use a lot more of my forgotten treasures, so maybe I should extend that into the next year because I have a lot more that I can use.  Do you remember the rain dots, those were a big thing a few years back and yes I have a few left.

My facebook group sends birthday cards to each other and this is for one of those girls.  The image is a diecut from K&co. it already had glitter on it, and the corner treatment is from the same package.

K&co. -- Flora & Fauna diecut cardstock and vellum pack
Glitter Tulle (Walmart)
Penny Black -- Sprinkles and smiles sentiment stamp
Cloud 9 design -- rain dots

I hope however you spend the evening celebrating the year to come that you will stay safe.
Prayers continue to go out for all those effected by all this flooding.  I am so thankful that we have not been effected by it.  This is the highest we have ever seen the Mississippi since we moved here and it is just amazing to see how far it has gone off it's banks.

Thanks so much for stopping by and I want to thank all of you that drop by and give such encouragement and friendship to me, I truly appreciate each one of you, and wish you a very Blessed New Year!

Hugs,
Connie

Quilted Birthday

Wow can you believe another year is almost over.  The rain has stopped here and that is cause for great Thanksgiving.  Also the drain behind our house worked great this time so we had no flooding in our yard which means our shed was saved from being flooded again.  Our pump is running almost constantly still the ground is one big sponge but the rain has stopped!!  I can't imagine how much snow we would have had if that was would have been snow and not rain.  My daughter and son in law had to spend one extra day with his parents since the weather was so bad yesterday, they are hoping to head to North Carolina today.

I forgot to share the card I made for my friend to go with the place mats I made for her birthday,  I wanted to do a quilted look, the stitching is all pen work, no real stitching on the card.

Taylored Expressions -- Hexagons dies with Faux stitching
K&co. -- Classic K paper
Spellbinders-- Rose Creations and Back to basics tags dies
Hero Arts -- All Occasions messages sentiment stamp
BasicGrey -- Brad
Gem on tag

I hope your week is off to a wonderful start, Thanks so much for taking the time to stop by,

Connie

I thought I would share the following with you just in case you don't have a google account and still want to follow my blog:

An update on Google Friend Connect

Posted: December 21, 2015

  

In 2011, we announced the retirement of Google Friend Connect for all non-Blogger sites. We made an exception for Blogger to give readers an easy way to follow blogs using a variety of accounts. Yet over time, we’ve seen that most people sign into Friend Connect with a Google Account. So, in an effort to streamline, in the next few weeks we’ll be making some changes that will eventually require readers to have a Google Account to sign into Friend Connect and follow blogs.

As part of this plan, starting the week of January 11, we’ll remove the ability for people with Twitter, Yahoo, Orkut or other OpenId providers to sign in to Google Friend Connect and follow blogs. At the same time, we’ll remove non-Google Account profiles so you may see a decrease in your blog follower count.

We encourage you to tell affected readers (perhaps via a blog post), that if they use a non-Google Account to follow your blog, they need to sign up for a Google Account, and re-follow your blog. With a Google Account, they’ll get blogs added to their Reading List, making it easier for them to see the latest posts and activity of the blogs they follow.

We know how important followers are to all bloggers, but we believe this change will improve the experience for both you and your readers.

Posted by Michael Goddard, Software Engineer

Little Princess

My great niece turned 3 earlier this month and she is a little red head so I tried to color the princess's hair with some red touches.  It was so neat that I picked this theme for her card this year because when viewing pictures of her party I see they had a princess cake for her :)

Hero Arts -- Magical Castle stamp set, colored w/ markers
Carta Bella -- Alphabet Junction paper
Poppystamps -- Stitched Landscapes
Wink of Luna -- Gold for the stars

I also was going through my pictures and realized I had forgotten a card for a close friend.  I had bought the Christmas ornament  for Colorist and this is the only card I had managed to do using that pack, I am hoping this year to color the whole pack so when next Christmas rolls around all I have to do is make up the cards.  I am sharing it this year to just share a few points just in case you are thinking of buying the pack, I had to cut this down to fit on an A2 card, it was a bit too big, so the whole border has been cut off.  I colored with my Spectrum noir markers and even though I didn't use much ink, the paper kind of bunched up while coloring, but once it was done it all laid flat again, it is pretty thick paper so I was surprised by it but happy with the results once the ink dried. HERE is a link to the product in case you haven't heard of them, they have other books I might get also.

Hot off the press -- Christmas Ornaments for Colorist colored w/markers
Wink of Luna gold
Wink of stella -- clear glitter pen
Queen & co.  Irridescent Rhinestones

Hope you have had a nice relaxing weekend.
Thanks so much for stopping by today,

Connie

Merry Christmas

For to us a child is born,
to us a son is given,
and the government will be on his shoulders.
And he will be called, Wonderful counselor, Mighty God,
Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace
Isaiah 9:6

This is a Cross-stitching I did a few years ago, everything you see is a stitch, and it measures 14x8 inches.  My hubby made the frame out of old wood our friend was throwing away, looked like barn wood to me, so thought it would work perfectly. I hope it gets passed down to many generations in my family.

Wishing you a wonderful day of celebrating the most precious gift our world was given, our Lord and Savior, Jesus!!

Connie

Holy Night

These went out to my Nieces and Nephews, I did nine of these, if they live with their parents they all got the same card, I did not send multiple cards to one address this year like I have done in past years.

I used 3 different papers on these, I think I liked the lighter ones more.

I bought the border stickers with these cards in mind, I thought they made a pretty chain for the ornaments to hang from.

Dreamweaver Stencils -- Nested Ornaments Used Gold Pilot marker for the topper
Stampendous -- Holy Night stamp, embossed in gold embossing powder
Impression Obsession -- Pine die
DCWV -- Wild splendor for branches
Anna Griffin -- Christmas Scrapbook pack
Starform  -- border stickers for ornament hanger

Thanks so much for stopping by, I know how busy everyone is now,  Wishing you relaxing moments to reflect on the precious gift we have been given in this baby boy.

Connie

Child is Born

Made a couple more for my friend and Pastor and his family.  The ribbon is more goodies that my sister gave me and the holly and berry brads are from Making memories, stamped the sentiment added gold pen to the star and punched border.

My mind's eye -- winter papers
Martha Stewart border punch
Studio G -- sentiment stamp
Making memories -- Holly berries and leaves
Spellbinders -- Labels 3
Ribbon -- Home sweet home

We had a Beautiful Cantata yesterday at church, this year just seemed not to go as the norm, not sure why, maybe because the warmer than usual temps we have had, or the kids coming a week earlier than normal, but after yesterday's service it really put me in the right place to celebrate our Lord's birth and had a wonderful visit with our church family after, feeling so blessed.

Thanks so much for taking the time to stop in today,

Connie

Masculine

For my great nephew that has turned 19, the frame is a stamp that I hand cut after embossing, the clock has also been embossed.  I stamped part of the sentiment with copper ink but it almost looks pink in the picture.

All night media -- Frame stamp, embossed with copper embossing powder
Deep Red -- Roman clock stamp, also embossed with copper powder
DCWV -- Tattered time paper and Metallic paper for the gears
Taylored Expressions -- Sprockets dies
Stamps of life -- postmarks 2 stamp sentiment

Hope you have a Terrific weekend, last one before Christmas!!

Thanks so much for stopping by and letting me know you did,

Connie

Seasons Greetings

My sister has given me a few items that I can use on cards over the years and this wreath sticker and the shiny ribbon are from her. I embossed some veins in the leaves and gave a little dimension to the flowers using my stylus.

Jolee's Boutique wreath sticker
Spellbinders -- Decorative labels 28 die
Wild Rose Studio -- Annabelle's Christmas paper
Martha Stewart -- Leaf punch
EKSuccess-- flower punch
Ribbon
Tulip bead paint - white (center of flowers)

Our daughter and son in law made it safely last night, so good to see them, and our little terror of a grandfurbaby, their cat just goes crazy when she comes here and wants to go on everything, so she keeps us hopping.

Thanks again so much for taking the time to stop by and let me know,

Connie

Peace

For our Aunt's and Uncles, there are not to many left.  In our cardmaking group we send out packages to someone that we randomly pick that had participated in our challenges and this Peace stamp was sent to me after this last set of challenges.  As you can see it is even a little bigger than the 4 1/4 x 5 1/2 inch card, she didn't send any packaging with it so I am not sure who the maker of the stamp is.  I embossed it with clear embossing powder and then went to town inking the background with three different color blues.  Added a few sequins and was done.  Hubby said he wishes I would have put snowflakes on instead of the sequins, maybe next year ;)

A girl in our group did this same type of technique but stamped a big snowflake it was so pretty I had to try it for myself.

Our daughter and son in law are coming home tonight, they have a long drive from North Carolina to Illinois today, just thankful they won't be driving through any snow.  I have a busy day of cleaning ahead of me and cat proofing the house :)

Thanks so much for taking the time to stop by!!  Love to hear from you,

Connie

Christmas in the woods

I just got back last night from a trip back to Michigan to visit with my Father in law, sister in law and brother in law, then the next day it was to see my brothers and sisters.  The time goes by so quickly, but it was fun!  I forgot to schedule a post for this weekend, but everyone received their cards so I can post them now :)


Have you seen the cards using the stampin up embossing folders, I just thought they would make a great Christmas card.  HERE is a link to some of the cards using the image.  I don't have that embossing folder but I do have one from Darcie so I first tried that, I made three of these.

I inked the embossing folder before embossing to get the tan background.  I just wasn't as happy with them, so I tried using my birch tree die for the background instead and some tan cardstock for the background and was a little happier with my results. The birds wing was colored a little darker with ink before gluing it onto the bird and I colored his beak with a marker.  Added a little grey chalk to the trees.

I was a bit happier with these so I went ahead and made the other 7 I needed using this design. These went out to my brothers and sisters and my hubby's brothers and sisters and my father in law.

I lost my list of supplies so I hope I have this is correct from Memory :)

Taylored Expressions -- Birch Tree die and Accessories dies (bird)
Poppystamps -- Stitched Landscapes (snow)
Darcie -- Birch tree embossing folder
Glitter Glue (walmart)  for snow
Sentiment stamp -- from cardmaking and paper craft magazine

Thanks so much for stopping by, I know how busy things are this time of year.  I have a lot to get finished before my daughter and son in law arrived Wednesday night.  I may be a little late getting to everyone's post but I will get to them :)

Connie

Sweet

My daughters birthday was a couple days ago and I liked how the last watercolor panel I did turned out from Taylored Expressions that I decided to do another one for her birthday.  I again colored it with distress inks and I was curious how my spectrum noir markers would work on it also so I used one around the border and I think it colored well, I may have to try that next time around to color a whole panel with markers.

Taylored Expressions -- Keep in touch watercolor panels, painted with distress inks and marker around the border
Spellbinders -- A2 matting basics A die
Martha Stewart -- Border punch
ODBD -- Mini tags die and mini tag sentiments
Ribbon --Dashes, Dots and Checks
Basic Grey -- LilyKate paper

I really love that the Our daily bread designs have little charm dies in with their mini tag dies, this is my first time using one and I thought it was so cute, I used the heart charm, I think you can see it better in this next picture.

They also have a cross charm with the set of dies.

Thank you so much for dropping by, I know how busy this time of year is, and I appreciate when you leave a comment letting me know you did.

Connie

Pinwheel Placemats

I made these place mats for my best friend for her birthday, I found the pattern in one of my old  Country Marketplace magazine and new she would like them, she lives on a farm and loves red.  Did any of you get that magazine when it was published.  Country Sampler is still being published, but for some reason they stopped publishing the Marketplace and I have saved quite a few of the issues that had patterns of projects I knew I would like to do someday.  I loved how these turned out, I may just have to make myself some too ;)  They were machine pieced and quilted.  I love to hand quilt but I just managed to finish these the night before her birthday and that wouldn't have happened if I had hand quilted them.

I am sharing this with Stephanie's Roses of Inspiration link up once again this week, head on over and check out what everyone is up to this week.

Here they are together

Just one

And here is a little closer picture to see I just did the same quilting the girl who did the pattern did for hers.  My first attempt at doing the free motion quilting.  Usually I go the safe route and just stitch in the ditch (follow the squares)  But I loved the effect her stitching gave to them so I gave it a try.

I managed to get 10 cards made last night, one for each of our brothers and sisters and my father in law, they are all getting the same type card, I will share when I know they have received them, so they can see them in person first.  I may just get my cards all made before my daughter gets here, I don't know how much crafting time I will have after that.

Thanks so much for stopping by and please let me know you did, would love to hear from you,

Connie

Celebrate

I had another teen boy card to do for my nephew this time and so I went with this cat celebrating.  The ribbon had these words already printed on it.  I colored the button with a marker since it was clear.

Penny Black -- Bubbly stamp set colored w/markers
Hampton Art -- sentiment stamp
Spellbinders -- Classic circle, and lg. inverted circle dies
Recollections -- Awesome boy paper
Button colored w/marker
Twine
JoAnn Essentials -- ribbon

Thanks so much for taking the time to stop by, hope your week is off to a terrific start!!

Connie

Side Step card

When I have done this type of card before I had to measure everything out and score and cut the weird shape.  Well my Scrapbook store had a sale this summer with big cuts on a lot of products and they had this die set 40% off, so I just couldn't pass it up, all the dies you see here came with the kit other than the layered labels the sentiment is on. HERE IS A LINK if you want to see how they suggested to use the die set.  It looked to me like they used tooth picks for the stems, I wasn't sure about going that way, even though I would be hand delivering this one to my friend in my church craft group, so I used the swirls for the stems.

Here is the head on picture of it.

I thought I would show a side view of it too.

The leaves and stems were cut from watercolor paper that I had done in different shades of green. I inked onto the embossed areas of the flowers.

Sizzix -- Card Basic Step ups (link above) dies
Spellbinders -- Labels seven dies
DCWV -- Wild Splendor paper
Stampendous -- Birthday Assortment sentiment stamp
Recollections -- Iridescent Rhinestones

Hope you all will enjoy a wonderful weekend!!
Thanks so very much for taking the time to stop by, I know how busy this time of year gets,

Connie

All Aboard

My Great nephew turned 2 a little while ago and this is the card I sent him. This is a stamp set that I picked up at the Michael's $ spot.  They don't have as nice of stamps as they use to but they do still sell stamps in that section.  Did a little bit of sponging around the sentiment and main image panels.

StudioG stamps -- train and sentiment, colored w/markers
Crate Paper -- Little boy blue paper and #2
Spellbinders -- A2matting basics A dies

Thanks so much for taking the time to stop by and let me know you did, I really appreciate it,

Have a great day,
Connie

Wonderful as you are

Have you seen the new Taylored Expressions watercolor panels. HERE is a link to them.  They are very nice heavy duty weight watercolor paper, this is from the Keep in touch pack. Some of them have sentiments already on them, this one I had to add my own, and look how crisp it stamped on there, yes I used my MISTI to get it nice and straight.  I used Distress inks and water to watercolor it.

I am sharing my card today over at Stephanie's Roses of Inspiration link up post.

Taylored Expressions -- Keep in touch watercolor panel, colored with distress inks
Teresa Collins -- He said she said paper
Paper Smooches -- Happy Birthday sentiment stamp set
Rhinestones w/scrap piece of paper behind it
Fiskars -- Border punches

I think I have that problem that if I don't see the sun for awhile I start to get a little blue feeling. We have been rainy and cloudy for 4 days straight now, and that is unusual for down here. I can see a bit of blue sky peeking out from the clouds this morning so that will be nice.

  There was a little bit of confusion on my post yesterday, I received the MISTI for an early Christmas present not for an early Birthday present.

Thank you all so much for stopping by, I really do appreciate and enjoy reading your comments!

Connie