Happiness and Peace

This went out to a lady at church who I felt needed some lifting up, I hope it was an encouragement for her.

I used another of the small coloring cards I bought.

The paper I had chosen to go with this had some small  blue dots in the background very light, so I added some of my own to the image.

Creative Expressions -- to calm and inspire coloring sheet, colored w/markers
Raspberry Road designs -- Love lives here paper
Martha Stewart - border punch
Jute

My daughter and son in law arrived yesterday afternoon and we had the UHaul unpacked and it all fit in the garage and in their room by Supper time, so I fed all those that helped out.  So thankful that it all fit so well and that they made it here safely.

On this memorial day I would like to give tribute to all the men and women who died so that we could have the freedom we have today and to their families who lost a loved one and most were so young in age, may we never forget the price they paid for us!

Thanks so much for taking the time to stop by today!!

Connie

Party time

Usually I do some kind of animal for this great nephew because he loves them and talks about being a Vet when he grows up, but I thought I would change it up this year :)

Used a silver marker around the edges of the framing and stamped a couple of the extra stamps they had in the set around him to make it more of a party time look, with the same silver pen I added a few dots too.

I found this stamp set for sale a little while ago so I had to pick it up and finally used it, when I went to look for paper that may go along with it, I realized that I had bought the matching paper years ago, that is too funny, so I actually have a true matching card.

My Mind's eye -- Boy Crazy stamp set and Boy Crazy papers, colored w/markers
K&co.-- Card Quotables sticker sentiment

We have been getting rain for the last few days but we are getting a little sunshine too so that is nice. My newly planted flowers and veggies are loving it and I haven't had to water since first planting them so that has saved me time :)

Our hummingbirds have come back, I am finally  seeing them, but they don't hang around long enough for me to take a picture, as soon as they see any movement they are gone.

Wishing you a very fun and creative weekend,
Thanks so much for stopping by and letting me know you did,

Connie

Glitter flowers

My sister in law's birthday was yesterday and this is the card I sent to her.  I hadn't played with my microfine glitter since March can you believe it, HERE is my post on how I used it last time with a link to how it is done. This time I cut around the flowers after the glitter and coloring of them.

The silver borders on the paper they are new ribbon dies I bought.  I cut these out of silver metallic paper, check out the link you get a lot of different styles in this one die it is so cool.

Here is a closeup of the sparkle in the flowers.

Isn't that shimmer so pretty and it doesn't come off, so no stray glitter bits.

Elizabeth Craft Designs -- Flowers in frame peel off stickers and microfine glitter, colored w/markers
Rasberry Road designs -- Love lives here papers
Paper smooches -- Happy Birthday sentiment stamp
Cheery Lynn Designs -- Alison's Ribbons die
Martha Stewart -- leaf punch and butterfly punch
Paper studio -- gems

I didn't write up my post very clearly yesterday, I made it sound like my hubby took those pics but those were all pictures I took of our trip, I was trying to say that the first picture was the only one I took in North Carolina, when we were with the kids I didn't even think of getting out my camera. But the rest of the trip I did get some photo's and I may share more later.  We have decided to let the kids store all their stuff in our garage instead of them renting a storage unit so we have a lot of work getting it ready for them to come on Sunday so I may not get to sharing photo's until after that.

Good news yesterday my daughter got a job she starts in June it was her second interview and she was hoping for this one over the first one so it worked out well.  Still praying my son in law can find one soon also.

Thanks so much for stopping by today and hope your week is going well,

Connie

Thanks and Savannah

I needed a thank you card so I reached once again for my colorist book.

Hot off the press -- Blossoms for Colorist, colored w/Spectrum Noir markers
David Tutera -- Celebrate sentiment

I thought I would share pictures that I took from Savannah Georgia today, my hubby took a lot of pictures in North Carolina with the kids but I just enjoyed the time with our daughter so I didn't take any pictures there, I did though get this picture of my Hubby at one of the Rest Areas in North Carolina, it was just beautiful, lovely landscaping and surrounded by mountains.

The rest of the Pictures are all of Savannah along the water in the Historic District.  There were many levels to the city, very unique and cool.  So there are a lot of bridges, loved the moss hanging from the tree in this one.

Here you can see the lower level and bridge a little better.

I totally love the look of the exposed brick and the iron balcony's in these pictures.

If you have never been to this city it is just beautiful, we spent most of the day walking around and taking pictures, we didn't even step foot into any stores so I can't tell you how the shopping is, but there was plenty of it if that is your thing.

Thanks so much for taking the time to stop by today, I appreciate hearing from you and hope your week is off to a wonderful start.

Connie

Evelyn's 1st Birthday

Thank you for all the Congrats on the kids graduating.  I managed to down load my pictures on to my computer from the trip but haven't had time to go through and figure out what I may want to post, so today I am sharing a card I made for Evelyn's first birthday and some pictures from her party :)  Many of you that follow my blog this past year know the hard road that this little girl has had to go through to get to this point. Thank you all again for your prayers this past year, she is doing so well, she still has a little problem with her digestion, her Mom says she has many blowouts, but she is thankful that Evelyn loves getting baths so that helps. So thankful for the healing God has done in this little girls life.

I decided to watercolor this image using my Spectrum Aqua markers on watercolor paper.

Here is a closeup of the coloring, I need a bit more practice with these markers but I think it turned out pretty good.

Inky Antics -- Lester, colored w/Spectrum Aqua markers
Papertrey ink - Hodge Podge papers
Taylored Expressions -- Whimsy #'s die
Penny black -- Sprinkles and smiles sentiment stamp
Recollections -- Button Brads
Spellbinders -- classic oval and scalloped oval dies

Here is Evelyn getting ready to sample her cake

I love how she is looking right at my hubby in these pics!

Here she is with the books we got her, Right after my hubby stopped taking pictures and was heading back to his seat, they took the books from her and she started crying so I think she liked them :)

Thanks so much for stopping by today and hope your enjoying a great weekend so far!!
Still working on catching up on your blogs,

Connie

Duke Graduation

Good Morning all, wow this past week has been very busy, we drove from Southern Illinois out to North Carolina for our daughter and Son in laws graduation.  It was just fantastic to be able to be there and see them graduate in person.  We went an hour and half before and stood in line to get in, my hubby was able to sit on the end so we got pictures of the kids coming in and when they were up front being hooded, I guess you call it :)

In this first one Amanda is first and Zach is right behind coming in.

Here are the kids outside before the ceremony, loved this picture of them :)

While we were waiting in the Chapel for the kids to come in I got a text from Amanda and she found out that she had the highest GPA of the class and I can't remember if it was a little under or little over 200 graduates so we are very proud of our girl!!  Today and next week she is already doing interviews, so we are praying she finds a job she likes.

I promise I will have a card for my next post and maybe share some pictures of the rest of our trip, we ended up going to Savannah GA and onto St. Augustine FL and back home, I haven't downloaded my pictures yet, I took these from my hubby's camera :)

As you can imagine I am a whole week behind in my commenting on all your blogs, so I hope to catch up in the next few days visiting your blogs.

Thanks so much for stopping by while I was away and for today,

Connie

B-Day - Forgotten Treasures

I was going through my older scrapbook supplies and found something I haven't used in many years and that was these big bold letters from K&Co.  I just loved the look of these when I first saw them, pretty colors in the set and I liked the embossing on them, then I had them home and thought now how am I going to use these on cards?  I have only used them once or twice at the most, when I saw them this time I thought I would go for a big bold sentiment :)

To go along with the embossing on the letters I decided to do some embossing around the card to frame the letters.

The card measures 5x7 to accommodate these large letters.  It still felt like it needed a little something extra so I cut the "Happy" die cut and added it to the top of the card.  Well it just blended right in with the embossing I had done, sooooo I cut out the Happy two more times, once with a very thick cardboard and then again with a little lighter color of pink and that helped give it the depth to go with how thick the other letters are.

I am having a hard time with taking pictures of all this embossing I have been doing, I think I need more lighting:)

Hope this inspires you to get out those long forgotten treasures I am sure you have and use them in your next project.

Thanks so much for taking the time to stop by today, it means a lot when you let me know you did!

Connie

Graduation

My Daughter and Son in law both graduated yesterday from Duke University with a Masters of Divinity.  We are so proud of all the work they have done to get to this point.  So excited to see what God has in store for their lives.

I went with Blues on both the cards since that is the school colors but I went a little lighter on my daughters, trying to give it more of a feminine look.  I used Foil papers for the crosses on both cards.

The little cross charm was cut from the same paper as the sentiment tag I just added some brown ink to make it look more like a charm then paper.  Added a gem to the center of the cross.

Since I was able to hand deliver the card I put a little extra dimension using foam tape and a trick of rolling double sided tape that Kittie shows here . It worked perfect for attaching the smaller cross to the bigger cross, I used a little wider tape than she did on hers so it gave a little more lift. I just love the embossing that is on the die I used to frame the crosses.

Spellbinder -- Cross Collection and Decorative Labels 28 dies
DCWV -- Primrose and Foil Paper
Cuttlebug -- Corner die
Our Daily bread designs -- Mini tags die and Mini tags sentiment stamp
Offray ribbon
Gem

On my son in laws I went a little more rustic. I embossed the background with copper embossing powder.

I added a metal accent to the center of his cross too, but since I used foam tape on his also and the whole just happened to be the same size the gem went all the way through so it is flush with the blue cross.  Sorry about the shine on the copper embossing, I just couldn't get a good picture.

Spellbinders -- Cross Collection and A2 Distressed Edges dies
Our Daily Bread design -- Rustic Beauty collection paper (wood)
Ki -- Bronze metal accents
DCWV -- Foil paper

Thanks so much for stopping by today,

Connie

Simple Things

When my sister came to visit she brought some more goodies from her craft stash that she didn't think she would use anymore and asked if I wanted them..... This tag is one of those items, thought it had such pretty border around it so all I had to do was add a little stamped topiary, a stamped sentiment and some ribbon and it was done :)

Stampin up -- Simple Somethings stamp set, colored w/markers
Paula Deen - Tag pad
Stamps of life -- Minis 4 circles sentiment stamp
BasicGrey -- Picadilly paper
Martha Stewart -- Border punch
Edge distresser
Offray Ribbon
Jute

Hope you have a terrific weekend!! Thanks so much for stopping by,

Connie

Pinterest Inspired

I am hoping it is ok that I am sharing a project I made that I found on Pinterest.  There was no way to email her on her blog and you can no longer leave comments on it either to get in touch with her.  The only thing I could see was not to reproduce her pictures and I am hoping that means share her pics, these are photo's of what I did.  You can see her lovely project HERE .  My leaves did not turn out anything like hers that's for sure, but I did love how she used all different fabrics, I love the scrappy look in quilts so I think that is why it appealed to me.

I used my Spellbinders Circle die in size 3 3/4 inches to make the Yo Yo's, but you could use a small cup saucer to draw around on your fabric, I forgot to write down what the size was after making the Yo Yo's but they were under 2 inches.  I also used different buttons too, a few of them are the same type but I tried using different ones.

Here is a closeup.

My friend really liked it for her birthday present, now I am thinking of making myself one, but this time I may just cut out some leaves out of felt with my dies and hope they would do ok through a washing :)

Thanks so much for stopping by today, I really appreciate it,

Connie

Country scene

I have a country scene card to share today on the DiesRUs blog.

I think this scene would work for any Horse lover or person that just loves the countryside so it can be for male or female on your card making list.

I wanted my card to be a shaped card so I did a top fold on my card, here is a picture of how I laid the fold onto my die, I used removable tape to keep it in place on the bottom while cutting.

I sponged the background (card base) again like I did in my bird card, I thought I would share a picture of the background in progress, I sponge the top of my template that I made and then move the template in another area and repeat all the way down. The background looks a little pink in this picture but it is cream cardstock I was working on.

I wanted a little dimension on my scene so I added Scotch Permanent mounting tape that I cut in small pieces to add to the back of my cut out of the tree. You can see my background scene on the top left there, I had added the two different greens to show rolling hills.  I ended up moving the horse down a little bit farther than what you see in that picture because it looked like he was standing on the fence.

You wouldn't have to do a shape card to make this little scene you can just add it to any card base.

Dies R us no longer carries the Memory Box Debutante Frame or Orchard Tree Frame, I am so sorry about that, but I would like to suggest a couple others that you could also use.
Memory Box Forest Tree Frame or the Memory Box Woodland Tree Silhouette.

The following are the dies I used for this project.

Poppystamps Stitched Landscapes

DiesRUs Horses

Impression Obsession Country Fences

 

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Thanks so much for stopping by today!!

Connie

Day out

Sharing some more pics of our day out to see the baby geese.  But come back tomorrow and I will have another post for Dies R Us.

My Hubby loves this view and when we were walking by and the geese were swimming up to it I took this pic.

We also went to another lake that was close by, didn't see any geese at this park but pretty lake views.

My Hubby got a little different shot of it since he decided to go down the hill to the waters edge to get his shot, I just stayed up at the top :)

Hope you all are enjoying a fun weekend, especially all the Mother's, hope your having a wonderful day celebrating all you do for your family!!

Thanks for stopping by,
Connie

Daisy's

Ok so I know the coloring isn't really true to Daisy's but I wanted to color a little more than just white and so that's what I did.  This time I changed it up a bit and colored the image with my colored pencils and blended the colors with mineral spirits.

This ended up being a 5x7 inch card, but the image panel would fit on an A2 size card if you didn't want to go for a larger size card, this will be going to a friend at church so I will be hand delivering it.
Here is another view of  it!  I sponged some inks through the background die and shaded around the image also!

Stampendous -- Daisy Thanks, colored w/pencils
Taylored Expressions -- Designer mini tags die, Many minis occasions sentiment stamp
Spellbinders -- Labels 8 and Exquisite Labels 11 dies
Flower stickers
Distress inks -- peeled paint and scattered straw

Hope you have a wonderful weekend!!
Thanks so much for stopping by,

Connie

Stitch by Stitch

Today is my nephews wife's birthday.  She has just started to cross-stitch and asked for some advice to get her started. I wish so much that we didn't live so far from family it sure would have been fun to share with her in person how to do it and sit and stitch together :)  I had won this stamp and die set from Taylored Expressions so it is the first thing I thought to use for her birthday.

Using the MISTI to stamp it sure did help.  I used my Specturm Aqua markers to color the stamp itself before stamping it onto my paper.

For the sentiment and the floss I used another set that I got free from Cardmaking and Papercraft Magazine. This crafty paper worked perfect with the stitched theme of the card too :)

Taylored Expressions -- Embroidery Hoop die and Stitch by Stitch stamps
Spectrum Aqua Markers
Sew Pretty Vintage stamps -- sentiment and floss
Die-namics -- cross-stitch rectangles die (sentiment tag)
DCWV -- Crafty paper

Thanks so much for stopping in today, I appreciate it,

Connie

Candle ring/Wreath

Hi, I am sharing another post over at the Die R Us Blog today.

Mother's Day is fast approaching and I have a gift idea for you. I am using this for a candle ring but you could also use it for a small wreath too, I will share that later.

Here it is with the candle.

I started out with the Sizzix Flower Clivia die.  I used yellow cardstock and added Viva Inka gold in the color Apricot to the tips of the leaves as shown in the picture. I used a makeup sponge to apply the Inka gold because you are not to touch it with your fingers you can contaminate it and it will go bad on you. You can also see that I did a bit of shaping of the petals with my McGill stylus set, I used the 3mm end and the mat they also sell.

Next I cut the stamens out of white cardstock and colored the bases and the tips with two different colors.  after rolling them up, I glued some Sunshine yellow flower soft to the petals by dipping into my craft glue and then dipping into a bowl of the flower soft and shaking off any extra.

I wanted some smaller flowers to go with the set so I chose Impression Obsession Spiral flowers dies this is the smaller set they also have the set in Large too :)  after cutting out in cream cardstock I added a bit of Tea Dye distress ink to the tips of the flowers, then using a Quilling tool, but you could use tweezers, I rolled the flowers and glued them together with glossy accents, that glue seems to dry quickly of all the wet glues and it doesn't burn your fingers like hot glue would.

I wanted a little bit of green under the flowers but all my leaf dies were too big in comparison to how small these flowers are so I started looking for what else I could use and I came upon my Poppystamps Valley Snowflakes dies that were just the right size.

Before gluing on the Clivia flowers using a Hot Glue Gun, I laid them all out around the wreath to get an idea of where I wanted them.  In the process of gluing them on I had a bit of a hole left and instead of making another flower I decided to add a Memory Box Leavenworth Butterfly trio die and I just love the look and was happy for the mistake!!

Here is a top view of the ring.

Closeup, you can see a little better in this photo that I bent the leaves a bit for the Clivia flowers and added a bit of chalk to the centers of the leaves.

I promised you a picture of how it would look if you would like it for a wreath instead.

TIPS:

My tip for today is if you don't have a die that will work in your project like I didn't have the kind of leaves I wanted for my smaller flowers look for dies to use that are meant to be used in a different way, you can even cut apart pieces that you have die cut and just use portions of a die cut.

The Grapevine wreath measures 6 1/4 and I found mine at Hobby Lobby but I am sure you can find one at any craft store.  I also used gems on the butterfly.

Here are the dies I used, all the links are above in the description.  

 

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Don't forget to check out the Challenge blog to have the chance to win a certificate to get some dies from the store!

Thanks so much for taking the time to stop by today and let me know what you think.

Connie