Here's what I have been doing lately...

I have been able to make some cards lately in between painting coats or sections on our porch. I haven't had any cricut time though. Poor bug is lonely! :( The cards I did make were fast ones so that was nice for a change. The "friends" card is 4x4 yellow cardstock. Then I cut a wave on a piece of patterned paper and covered up the seam with primas and brads. The butterfly is an idea I saw on SCS. It's made with a prima and brad and then I curled some wire around my piercer and wound that around the brad underneath the prima. It's super cute in person.

The purple cards I stamped all over and then I stamped with versamark and used pearl ex powders. I love the iridescent look! Then I used a large prima, a medium prima and a decorative brad in the center.

The card to the right I saw in a magazine. It's a large prima flower folded in half twice and then attached to the card. Then I folded a smaller prima in half to use as the base of the flower and then attached a button at the base of the flower. I used deco edged scissors and cut green cardstock for the stem. Then I mounted it to white cardstock and used the same scissors and cut around the green. The little white flowers are punched out and glued on. This is cute in person too. These cards I am using to send to pen pals on SCS. Fun fun fun!

Lima bean stuck in Hershey's hair...

I love this picture of Hershey! We were eating dinner one night and we had lima beans in our veggie mix. We all hate lima beans so we were giving them to the dogs. I tossed one down to Hershey and instead of catching it in his mouth, it got stuck above his right eye! Can you see it? He had no idea where it went! We had to pull it out of his hair! LOL So goofy!

Beaded Curtain I made for a client...

Well, here is the famous beaded curtain that I ranted about on SCS!! I hated this thing after about the 3rd day! Katie helped me do it and together we put in over 100 hours! We used over 22,600 beads! I never want to look at another bead! LOL

We originally wanted the curtain to be much fuller, but the doorway is almost 80 inches so it would have required 80 strands of beads. This is 53 strands on it now. We liked the spacing because it reminds us of a waterfall. So I lucked out and didn't have to make anymore strands!

We were also expecting them to hang perfectly even but since a lot of them are glass beads, they all have slightly different dimensions and getting them to hang perfectly even is impossible! So in the end, we love how it turned out, never made one before and will never make another! LOL

Another day of painting....

We did another few hours of painting this afternoon. We probably have another full day or two before we are done. Actually 3 because we have the upstairs shutters to do.
We went to a local park/lake this afternoon and grilled burgers and played in the lake. Katie and I looked for pretty rocks to use on a table we have that is iron and rusty. I plan on doing a mosaic pattern on the top with all the rocks we found. Of course we have to collect a ton more because it's a big table! It was a nice relaxing afternoon! Tomorrow we plan on going to Stowe on some nature walks and rock searches! Maybe some swimming as well. Should be a fun time. I will try to remember my camera next time! I forgot it today. :(

Greeting Cards for Vermont Soldiers...

I have been collecting cards for Vermont soldiers who are currently deployed to Iraq. I started almost a month ago and I have received over 300 cards to date from wonderful women I have "met" on SCS. One box with 268 cards was delivered to the Vermont coordinator last week who will in turn ship them overseas. I packaged the cards so that each soldier would get 4 different cards, with 4 different greetings on the outside like Happy Birthday or Thinking of You, etc. The soldier can then sign the card and write a little note inside and send that card to someone they care about back home. Greeting Cards overseas can be hard to come by. For the group who is receiving these cards, it is rare that they will find one to purchase over there. These cards are free and come in a care package filled with other needed supplies, like toothpaste or shaving cream. Each soldier receives a care package once a month from the Vermont coordinator until their deployment is over. So my goal is to have cards in each box every month!
When Jared was overseas, I sent him a box once a week but some soldiers as young as 19 don't get anything from home! That is why this program was set up. There are many volunteers who "adopt" a soldier and send him/her a care package once a month for their entire deployment. I think it's a wonderful program and I intend to do what I can to make sure cards are available to those who want them. Some of the cards I am receiving are made by children, and those are a favorite overseas!
If you would like to see the thread that I started on SCS, click on this link. http://www.splitcoaststampers.com/forums/showthread.php?t=265864&page=9.

Painting the porch...

Katie and I worked on the porch again today. Changing it from blue to green. It's been a long time since it's been painted. We've been in the house for 6 years and we've never painted it. I think the previous owners painted a couple of years before we bought the house! So the blue trim looks really bad! So bad that I am changing it to green! LOL. Even the white spindles on the railing are going green! We are really blending into the woods around us now! LOL. I tell Jared that we are camouflaged.
We managed to keep the dogs off the paint this time. The first time we painted, last week, we painted half the porch floor and of course the dogs had to walk on it! This time we finished the other half and we were able to keep the dogs off! We have the steps left to do and then the second coat on everything. Then we move on to the garage doors, lightpost, and mailbox post. My next project will be to re-stain the wood floors in the dining room and hallways! Not an easy job but one that has to get done, and I have always been of the mindset that "I can do it!" LOL. Most of the time I am right and have been able to figure things out that I have never done before...thank God!
Anyway, that was the majority of our day. We then ate dinner and walked to the creemie stand! Yum!
Off to bed; after midnight here! Good night!

Still working...

Well I am still working on my very first blog! Don't laugh at my layout and content; it's a new toy! LOL. I am learning all about Html. So far, I have learned that it takes a long time to add in all the elements I want! Well the copying and pasting doesn't take a long time but picking and choosing and re-wording things takes time! Anyway, I am sure in a couple of weeks I should be a little faster and my blog won't look so dorky! LOL