Important Numbers Tin

I made this a while back when I was teaching classes at my local scrapbook store which is now closed! I painted the tin, like an altoid tin, black and then adhered two layers of cardstock and then patterned paper. I took a metal rimmed tag, stuck a flower brad in it, wrote "important numbers" on it and attached it to the ribbon using wire. I made little curly cues on the ends of the wire around the bow. There are brads on each corner of each card and then they are tied together with ribbon. Phone numbers are just ones that I like to have on me in my purse! Thanks for looking!

Made some cards yesterday!

I managed to make some cards yesterday. All inspired from SCS. The one with the five circles going across is a card sketch and can be found here. The others were inspired from the tent topper cards found here. I used SU solid colored cardstock, and K & Company patterned paper. On this first card, I cut out all the scalloped circles on my cricut. The center circle was also cut on my cricut using the Mini Monograms cartridge. I used bronze brads and chalk ink and the stamp is from All Night Media. The colors I used are Chocolate Chip and So Saffron.






On the second card, the circles were cut the same way and I again used bronze brads to highlight each of the points of the patterned paper which was punched using the Tonic Border System scene here. I used Crystal Effects to make the punched areas stand out more.


















The link to this sketch I mentioned at the beginning of my post. I used circle punches this time instead of my cricut and I used the cricut just to make the oval tags (Tags, Bags, Boxes and More). I found the fiber from supplies I purchased awhile back and discoverd that it matched perfectly! I used a edge distresser from Making Memories found here to distress all the edges on the circles and layers of cardstock and patterned paper. I love this card!

Christmas Card Keeper

I don't know what else to call this besides a keeper. If you're like me, you keep all those cards that people send to you for the holidays but don't know what to do with them after the holidays are over. I thought this was a great idea to keep each years cards all together and neat! They are no longer thrown away, or stashed in the box with ornaments! Here's how I made it....

I took two large pieces of chipboard and covered them with Christmas patterned paper (front and back of each board) and then on the front I added brads and a prima flower and rub on words. I then punch a hole in the top corner of each board and then in each Christmas card. The largest card will determine how large your chipboard covers need to be. I then strung them all together with coordinating ribbon and viola! I made this one two years ago and now I have to make this years "keeper."

Valentine Tin

Came across this DVD tin Valentine that I made last year for Jared. I covered the dvd case completely with red cardstock and then used several layers of patterned paper on the lid. The word LOVE is made of chipboard letters that I inked to match the color of the paper. They are attached to a piece of chipboard that is also covered with patterned paper. It is then hinged and attached to the lid. It lifts up to reveal some journaling underneath. Inside the tin are several pages that I folded in half to create a book. I punched two holes in the center and thread ribbon through to hold the book together. On each page, I used rub-on words and letters, ribbon, brads, metal slides, and chipboard letters.

Valentine Tin cont....

Valentine Tin cont....

Thank you, Siobhan!

Hi Siobhan!


Thank you so much for my goodie box! I was thrilled when I opened it!


I will post pics when I get home from shopping so everyone can see! Super cute!


See you later.....


PS...it's snowing again today, so you may see some more pics! ;)

Merry Christmas!

It's the day after Christmas! I hope all of you had a wonderful day! Drop a line and tell me what your day was like! I am dying to know!


Our exciting news is that Lauren lost her first tooth last night! It's the tiniest tooth I have ever seen! The tooth fairy left her a dollar in quarters! She is very excited about that!


Everyone enjoyed their presents. Not too many since Disney was their Christmas present. But they did get what they really wanted and they are all happy. We finally broke down and go a play station 2. We never thought we'd have one in the house but they totally love it! Who wouldn't, right? LOL Katie is enjoying her game, Burn Out 3, Little "J" loves that one too but he also enjoys Kingdom Hearts, and Lauren likes her Nemo game, although she enjoys watching Mom play it! LOL. It sure is entertaining them during their vacation!


We had friends over for Christmas Eve and then we went to visit some family for brunch yesterday. We had a great time catching up with everyone.


No snow for the last few days. It's been a little warmer and we actually had some rain which melted some of our snow and I'm not too happy about that. We are supposed to get a few inches tomorrow though, so that will be nice.


I have to catch up on the blogs I visit and then I will post some pics maybe later. Have a wonderful day!

Got a BooBoo!

Well this hasn't been a good week for me and accidents! LOL. Two nights ago, Jared and I are getting ready to go upstairs to bed and he turns the lights and tv off in the living room. He hands me two ice cream bowls and I have a full cup of water in my other hand. I turn around to go to the kitchen, and my eyes weren't adjusted to the darkness and I tripped over this little Japanese table that we set up in the living room to eat dinner. It doesn't always stay up so it's not something that I am used to walking around. It's sort of like a square card table but the legs are really short and it actually has a heating mechanism underneath so when you put your legs under the table it's nice and warm. We don't use it for heat anymore just to eat on. So anyway, I thought I had walked around it but I walked right into it and fell on top of it. The bowls and my cup went flying across the room and I was so stunned that I actually fell that I didn't move for a minute. I realized that I was laying on the table like superman!! I cant' even tell you how much that hurt! My right arm is bruised underneath from my tricep to almost my wrist. My right shin is bruised from just below my knee to above my ankle, my left leg is okay and my right arm is sore but no visible bruise. Jared was like, what are you doing???? The table is there!!! I was like DUH!!! All night long my arms and leg stung. Needless to say, I didn't get much sleep. Funny now but not at the time! LOL

Added Elements!!

Oh I have had a lot of fun today already! I have added quite a few new things to my site. I have changed the layout and colors first of all, and I have added some cool slide shows. On the left side of the screen (below the Blog Archive), you'll see Past Projects. I will add more pictures later.... You can see a selection of Katie's Purses below "Inspirational Places". She has started her own business and is doing very well so far! That's a pretty cool slide show! Also on the left side a little farther down, you will see another slide show of my furry kids. There are several different ones in addition to what was already there.
I have to finish some shopping today. Every year I get mixed up and can't remember how many presents I have purchased for each child, so this year I made a list and I see that I would have made the same mistake and purchased more for one child than the other two! Oops! So I have to fix that problem today! It's a whopping 17 degrees, so I will have to dress a little warmer today! LOL. Snow has finally stopped, well at least the nor'easter has, but we have had a few flurries today. You wouldn't believe how much snow is out there right now!
Anyway, I will be back later this afternoon, possibly with more pictures!

Good morning!

Well it's after 12 now.

How are you? Going to clean up my craft room today and maybe post some pics of things I have made. Today was indeed a snow day for the kids so Jared has them shoveling off the back deck and I think we are going to make ornaments today! Maybe some cookies. I will post later....

Snow day tomorrow!

Yay! A snow day! Kids get to stay home tomorrow because the roads are going to be such a mess. Maybe we'll make some cookies or some ornaments....maybe I will work on my Disney scrapbook pages....

I'll post tomorrow....have a great night!

Up to date pictures of Jazz

Here's current pics of my Jazz. Awe! I just love him! Such a good boy! On our

trip to Florida, (which we drove), he was so good it was almost like he wasn't there! We took one of the center seats out of the van to make a large area for him to turn around and lay down, and he was quiet the whole 9 hours the first day and then another 9 hours the second day until we reached Georgia where we stayed for 5 days. We're very proud of our big boy! :)

It's still snowing!!!

I cannot believe it is still snowing!! This morning, it was coming down two inches per hour! So by 10 o'clock we had 8 inches! We had a brief dry time during which time I snow blowed the driveway. That took me 45 minutes! I was exhausted! Then we had an hour of sleet, which then turned back into snow. We are supposed to get about 18 inches when all is said and done! I love it! So fun! LOL

I forgot that I had something funny to tell you.....last Friday Lauren stuck a tiny, tiny silver plastic bead in her ear!! Three years ago, she stuck one in her nose and I had to take her to the ER and have it removed. That wasn't fun. So anyway, she stuck this one in her ear this time (yes, at 5 years old!) She came into our bedroom after putting her in bed and we were watching tv still and she said that something was in her ear. We asked her what and she said she didn't know but that something was in there and it hurt. So we jump out of bed, upset at her, and asked her what she put in there. And then she fessed up. We tried everything and nothing worked. I ended up taking her to the ER (about the same time at night as the last time, as a matter of fact), and they checked her ear and siad that it wasn't in a dangerous spot and they said we could leave it in over the weekend and go to a specialist on Monday. So that's what we ended up doing. They were the best doctors I have ever dealt with at the ear nose throat office. They were so sweet and gentle and did things very slowly and explained everything. When the assistant wanted to take a look and get it out, she started crying and said no. So the doctor said we could take a break and she climbed out of her chair to get in my lap and as soon as she got in my lap, I tapped her butt like a love pat at the same time as patting her back, and she farted! Yep, in front of the assistant. So that lightened the mood! He left the room and came back with the doctor. He looked in her ear but when it came time to get it out, she didn't let him touch her, so he said, well we have to do this down the hall on a bed.....so off we go down the hall.....doctor and assistant were replaced with a nurse guy, and another assistant. Then a female nurse comes in and then the doctor and the other assistant came back. Lauren is looking at them all and started to freak! They had her lay down on the bed. The female nurse held her head, I laid across her legs and held her hands and the doctor stuck the tiniest tweezers I have ever seen in her ear and within seconds he pulled it out. Immediately Lauren jumps up yelling, let me go, let me go!!! It was pretty traumatizing. You'd think she would learn from the last time! What is it with her and beads??? We have since told her not to stick anything in her body and we are very specific about mentioning all her orifices! LOL

Funny stuff to tell you about, but I have to catch you all up when I get back this afternoon! I have to get my Christmas shopping done!

Have a wonderful day!!!

My yard in the winter

Here are current pictures of my yard! It's going to get a lot deeper this weekend! Brrrr

Oh Siobhan, you're so funny! You crack me up!
These pics were taken in Florida when we went on vacation last month. Where I am, it's colder than cold! Expecting a nor'easter this weekend.......somebody said 2+ feet of snow!

Beach Day

My family building a sand castle.....

or is that a snowman? LOL. Started out as a big pile of sand and then my youngest added arms. Then they decided it needed hair and that was followed by seaweed all over it!! LOL

Disney 2007

I just love these pics! So pretty and had to share!

Animal Safari in Georgia

Had to add these fun pics from our vacation last month. This is at the animal safari in Georgia. We rented one of their vans and drove through the park feeding this ginormous animals. I love the pics we were able to get! It was a blast! I think my favorite is the giraff. Very gentle and has the longest eye lashes ever!!! LOL

Long Time No See.....

Wow, what a horrible blogger I am! I haven't updated since this summer! I have so much to post and so many pics, where do I start?!!! I have to look through my computer and find the best pics. I have let so many things slide that mean a lot to me because I have been trying to get my business going. We also went on a 2 week vacation last month! So I apologize! I will get my butt in gear from now now and try to keep my site updated!

Snowblowing our driveway

Wanted to add a couple of winter scenes for Kris.....my pen pal! She loves the snow, as do I. I know that sounds crazy coming from a person who grew up in the desert but I always wanted to live where it snowed! This is from a storm we got in November 2002. The picture on the left I like because of the tree hanging down in the middle and the other picture is of the house. I took this picture from the street I believe.... I love all the trees we have in the front that allow the privacy!

Concert on the Waterfront...

Went to a concert the other night featuring the USAF Rock band from Washington DC. They were really awesome!! It was down on the waterfront in Burlington. Aren't these pictures great? It was a little cool that night, about 60, and breezy but it was beautiful!

Haven't posted for a few days....

But a lot has been going on....Can't tell you the whole story now since it's about 11 at night, but I will give you a little and then tell you the rest tomorrow. Quit my job on Friday after chasing my paycheck around town while my boss drove all over the place telling me to meet her at a specific location and then leaving before I got there! I turned around on the highway 4 times before I finally met up with her. Quit right on the spot! (With Jared on the phone listening to me!)
So I am starting my own business! I got business cards made up and printed yesterday and I am designing my brochure now. I am just about done and all I have to do is get it printed. I already have some good leads on jobs so I am really excited!
Other than that we have other things going on....school is starting next week, Lauren started soccer today..how cute and last night we moved furniture around, which is always fun. Makes us feel like we moved! LOL. We took couches from the basement and swapped them with the ones in the living room. Several times I thought the couch was going to come down the stairs and squash me! We did minor damage while moving them around but nothing that cant' be fixed or just overlooked! LOL. Little dings here and there on some walls and doors. After a while we didnt' care, we just wanted it done!
So anyway, that's been my last few days. Will tell you the rest of the story tomorrow.... Goodnight!

Finally a fishy card!

Finally made a card with my fishy set! I love how it turned out! I put the blue cardstock through my Cuttlebug to get the cool embossed circles. I love how it feels! This card took some time but it was worth the frustration in the end. I used watercolor pencils to color the jellyfish and then used my dove blender to blend all the colors together. I also used watercolor pencils around the edges and blended it. Then I put in 4 brads. I cut 1 inch strips of green to lay under the blue and tore the edges. Then I poked 4 holes and threaded coordinating ribbon through and tied knots. Had to use my son's finger to tie the knots! LOL. The tag is tied on using a piece of fiber. I've never been able to make a cute boy's birthday card but I think this one would do! Too bad I don't know any boys who are having a birthday soon!

I love pink and brown...

Here are some cards that I was able to make last week or so! I love this color combination! I used all Stampin Up colors. On this first card, I used my Cuttlebug die cuts to cut out the flowers and butterflies. I also cut out the scalloped circles with my CB. I used three different colors when I cut them out. I stamped the flowers first on vanilla cardstock, inked the edges and then mounted it to pink cardstock. I then pieced together all the flowers and butterflies and adhered them to the card front. The flowers on the scalloped circles have micro beads in the centers. The butterfly wings are folded up to add dimension. The pink scalloped circle is on pop dots and then adhered to the cocoa scalloped circle. I stamped the same flowers on the the cocoa cardstock, tore the bottom edge, inked it and adhered it to the pink card front. I love how this one turned out.

This next card, was easy. The flower stamp is fron Hero Arts and it comes in a set of three. The stems are phrases, this one is "thinking of you." I inked just the stem part in cocoa ink and then the flower part in pink ink and stamped the flowers in a row on vanilla card stock. The bottom edge is torn and inked. Then adhered to two shades of pink card stock and then mounted to the card front. I used coordinating ribbon to go around the card and then tied some knots with other colored ribbon. Quick and easy! Love that!




This card took a little longer to do....again using all the same colors of paper and ink. The small sqaure on the bottom right corner is popped up from the card and is a shaker. I used a tiny piece of memory glass and foam tape and micro beads, which are hard to see but they are in the right corner at the bottom. I used my Cuttlebug again for this one to cut out the scallop square in the center. Another fun card but it did take me a while.

Wicked storms yesterday...

Yesterday the weather was unbelievable! I was driving home from work along some back country roads and all of a sudden, I look ahead and I see this hazy area about 10 car lengths in front of me. I had no clue what it was...sort of looked like fog or smoke and it went from the sky to the ground. Actually it looked like steam rising from the road. The cars in front of me were slowing down and I kept thinking, "what is that?" When I got close enough I realized that it was rain and when I reached that area, which took all of 10 seconds really, it was like a blanket of water coming down, like sheets of rain instead of drops. It was so bizarre.....the rain wasn't like sprinkles that slowly turned to hard rain, it went from dry to down pour! The cars in front of me immediately slowed WAY down and as if the cars in front of me disappeared, I could no longer see anything ahead! Then the wind picked up and here came the hail......huge hail the size of large marbles just pelting the van. My wipers couldn't go fast enough! I tried to call a friend and she didn't pick up so I left a message and I had to yell in order to hear myself; the hail was hitting so hard and fast. People were pulling over to the side of the road to wait it out because literally you could see nothing; no dotted lines, no lanes, no cars, no houses, nothing.....in broad daylight! It was the freakiest thing ever! Trees were coming down in the middle of the road! I finally made it through that patch of rain and then the rest of the ride home was constantly interrupted by road crews chopping trees up that were in the middle of the street and fire trucks were everywhere trying to clean up and take care of downed power lines. The rain was off and on but it looked like a tornado came through which is very strange for Vermont! The picture is of a house less than a mile from me that is surrounded by trees, much like our house. There are several trees on top of this house around the perimeter of the house. It's hard to tell what you are looking at but it's the only picture I have right now. I came home to no power. It was still daylight so I gathered all the candles I could find. Thank God I was a PartyLite rep! LOL. Since we have a well and not town water, our pump (run by electricity) wasn't working so we couldn't use the sinks or toilets! Our phone was down too so we had to use our cell phones. We were told it could be two days before we got power back so we decided to go get ice and empty our refrigerators. But before that, we cooked dinner on the grill, chunky soup in a big pot! LOL. After dinner and it was getting pretty dark, Katie and I left in search of ice. Our closests stores were closed so we had to go to another town which wasn't hit by the storm and got tons of ice and a second cooler. We drove home and just as we got out of the van and opened up the back door to get the ice chest out, the power came back on! 10:00 at night and we drove to get all this ice and ended up not needing it! LOL. So we all went to bed! Today our phone didn't start working until late this afternoon. My friend came over and she took me into her neighborhood where this house is. It's simply amazing to see trees that are 50+ years old toppled over like twigs! Tomorrow I am going to take a little drive and see what other people are dealing with. We were incredibly lucky and had no damage to our house. Our house is surrounded by trees as well, that are just as big as the ones in the picture so it's quite scary to think that it could have been us! We were very lucky!

Been a while...

Boy, it's been awhile since I last posted! I have been so busy with work and home that I haven't had time for much of anything! I did manage to make some cards about a week or so ago! And I took some more pics for my pen pal, Kris!

This bridge is in Stowe on the mountain road. There are so many bridges in Vermont and this is one of the pretty ones!

Off to the river...

We all took a ride to the river today! We took Jazz with us; figured he'd have fun. So we loaded up in the van and was gone for 7 hours! We collected rocks for our table project, and the kids swam in the river. Jazz even laid down in the water close to the edge to cool off. At one point, he walked straight in and wasn't expecting the floor of the river to dip down and he ended up having to swim cuz he couldn't touch the bottom anymore. He turned around and faced us and the look in his eyes was hilarious! He was panicked! We were all laughing; poor guy! We all had a good time though. Here's some pictures...