fu-e-la...

 A normal conversation at our house....

Levi-"Mama, what does fu-e-la mean?"

me: "ummm...what?"

Levi: "fu e la--like in the song!"

me: "I'm not sure...what song are you talking about?"

Levi: "You know, the one you sing...won't let satan fu-e-la, I'm gonna let it shiiiiine!"

The light bulb goes on in my head.

"oh, you mean won't let satan fuuuuu(I make a blowing sound) it out! You're not going to let satan blow out your light shining for God."

Levi: "Oh. Ok.~this little light of mine...." :)

I'm so thankful for little joys each day. I can honestly say it is never dull~ he he :) Hope you had a great Thanksgiving! We'll be celebrating on Saturday here.

Thanks for stopping by!

raspberry suite challenge

Another challenge-yay! Alot of colors to incorporate in this week's challenge. But I really like all of them. And, after working on the card for this challenge, I found it much easier for me to use green on a card, where ususally, for some reason, I seem to struggle with green.

There is almost not stamping on this card. But there is some :) I used Damask Designs to stamp a subtle pattern on the butterfly. It's not really obvious, but it looks so much cuter than just plain. I also made little antenna for the butterfly with wire and popped him up with pop dots. I really like how the purple and the light green go together-so yummy:)

I thought I would go ahead and post this card too. This was going to be my entry for the challenge, but I liked it better with just the white embossed butterfly instead of the aqua. And since it didn't have all the colors

I made the other butterfly one. I had so much fun with these colors and the butterflies, I think I will make a few more as a set :) But I think I'm going to need some more butterfly stamps-he he :)

Thanks for stopping by!

Lucy's Color Challenge

I love all of Lucy's cards :) They are always so PRETTY. And since I'm always checking out her lovely creations, I knew I wanted to participate in her color challenge. I LOVE the colors she chose. love. So I was really excited to get started on the challenge. That's when I discovered that while I make cards with these colors all the time, I pretty much always use either white or cream too...It took me a little bit to get out of that way of thinking lol, but once I did, I had fun :) Here is what I made:

I used 3 different stamp sets for this card- Papertrey's Damask Designs and Butterfly Kisses (not for the butterfly, lol) and Verve's Thankful Blossoms. I paper pieced the butterfly after stamping it on the pink so the antenna already be there. And once again, I wished I had Polka dot basics from Papertrey...I always end up choosing something else instead lol. ( I think in a way I wonder if it would be easier to have one big polkadot background stamp, so that I wouldn't have to try to line them up to stamp the full background. What do you think? Do you prefer the strips like Papertrey has or a full background? Which would you recommend?!)

Anyway, thanks for stopping by! I hope your week is starting out well :)

supplies: cardstock: papertrey ink, stamps: papertrey ink and verve ribbon: papertrey ink, label die: spellbinders

just a quick share....

well....a case of the mumps= no Christmas tree yet and a quick post. Rhys came down with the mumps on Tuesday. We thought it mght be the awful flu since it started out as a high fever, but much to our surprise it was the mumps...(here in Japan mumps vaccinations aren't standard...). He is doing much better now, but it has made for a busy, mixed up week. And no Christmas decorations yet. Leah is pretty sad about it, but she hasn't complained. She did make some of her decrations and a paper tree out of scrapbook paper to decorate her own room though :) Now that's my girl :)

I do have one card to share. It's got lots of my faves on it--butterflies, text stamps, scallops and brown :)

I don't know how well you can tell in the photo, but I stamped Papertrey Ink's text background stamp on the pink base. (sorry about the lighting in the photo!) I also stamped on of the other text backgrounds on the butterfly's wings. Then I chalked the edges of it's wings with some light pink for extra definition. The butterfly is from Quickutz. I think I have 3 or 4 different Quickutz butterflies, but I don't think it is quite enough :) Besides, you can never have too many different butterflies, right?!

Anyway, thanks for stopping by! I hope you are having an illness-free week :) (do you even know of anyone who has actually had the mumps?! lol)

supplies: cardstock, stamps:papertrey ink, diecuts: Quickutz, pattern paper: diecuts with a vie, other: gems from stash

Why is it...

that I always seem to post my Mojo Monday cards on Thursday? lol It doesn't matter when I actually create it, I will never get it posted before Thursday...:) So here is what I made:

I love these colors :) Something about dark brown with burgundies and pinks--it makes me think of delicious, rich chocolate :) So as soon as I started putting the base of this card together, I knew what iamge I was going to use. I used white embossing powder to make frosting pop. I the subtle but rich touch the damask stamp has on the burgundy when stamped in Versamark.

Thanks for stopping! So glad I got a chance to play along this week :)

supplies:cardstock: bazzill basics, paper reflections, worldwin stamps: papertreyink, "happy birthday" stamp-pink cat studio, ribbon: papertrey ink

Not quite Christmas...

Well, no tree yet. But Tomio told Leah that we would be putting it up next week, and there's not much chance he'll disappoint his princess lol :) I love hearing the kids talk about how much they are looking forward to Christmas. And you never know what they will remember the most. Their stockings are usually filled with tons of different kinds of candies and treats. Also the past few years I have been getting just a small figurine or toy to put in too--almost as an afterthought. I didn't know it was that big of a deal to them, but just today I heard them talking about what they had gotten each year and wondering what toy would be in their stockings this year :) So I guess I better be sure not to forget to get something this year!

Again, I wish I had something Christmas-y to share, but I don't. ( I must make something Christmas-y this week!! I must! :))

This is a layout I made a little bit ago when I was just starting to get into 2 page layouts. We go see the Cherry Blossoms every year, and I always have way too many pictures. So I thought this was a good way to get lots on my page.

I don't know how well you can see it in the photo, but I did some machine stitching around the edges. I also did some paper piercing around the title. Simple, but there were so many photos I didn't think it needed too much other stuff going on :)

Thanks for stopping by! I hope your week is starting out well :) I made some yummy apple butter so we got to have homemade apple butter for breakfast, so I'd say that's a pretty good start for our week :)

supplies: cardstock: paper reflections, pattern paper: basic grey,chip stickers: basic grey, brads: basic grey & doodlebug, buttons: autumn leaves, die cut letters: quickutz

a thank you card.

It's officially very cold now lol. I am happy to say that our new house does seem to have much better insulation than our last one. YAY :) that was one of my main requests lol. The plan is to put up our Christmas tree this weekend, but it depends on Tomio's work schedule. Apparently they have had some "issues" at work , which means more work for Tomio at home :( We're all looking forward to it though-it's our first Christmas in our new house, so we get to decide where everything goes :) so fun! And I have Miss Emma's stocking all made and ready to go :)

With all this Christmas talk, I wish I had a Christmas card to share, but unfortunately it is a thank you card　　　　　　　　　　　　　　

Almost everything here is PTI- again :) Since I wasn't sure I *needed* the bird stamps, I wanted to try to used them on several different cards. And I have been so pleased I got them! They are so cute, and really can be used on just about any type of card. I stamped PTI's text background on berry sorbet cardstock for the background. Then I stitched on the two scallop borders for extra interest. I really love the look of sewing on cards, but my sewing machine has been very tempermental lately so I haven't used it much. I *think* I got it calmed down :), so you might see alot more stitching on my next few cards!

Thanks for stopping by! It's almost the weekend-hopefully ours will be full of Christmas-y fun. When do you put up your tree? Is it a big event at your house? We usually spend all day decorating the house :)

supplies: cardstock, stamps:papertrey ink, ribbon: stamping bella, buttons:autumn leaves other: scallop punch:fiskars, machine stitching

a new challenge!

I realized that I haven't been participating in many challenges lately. So when I found this one at Embellish Magazine , I thought it would be great one to try. I've mentioned before that trouble I have with most greens lol. But, I discovered I LOVE how it looks paired with the coral and brown!! Such a yummy combination :)

This is what I came up with. I have had these owl stamps for about a year, but I haven't used them nearly as much as I would have thought, so I was glad for a chance to use them :) Most of the other supplies are from Papertrey. I used the Cuttlebug swiss dots folder on the Berry Sorbet. I love how crisp it turned out! I really enjoyed doing this color challenge, so hopefully I will get to play along each week :)

Thanks for stopping by!!

supplies: cardstock: papertrey ink, label dies: spellbinders,  text stamp: papertrey ink, owl stamp: october afternoon, sentiment: stamping bella, ribbon:offray, twine:papertrey ink. buttons:green-autumn leaves, brown-papertrey ink embossing folder: provocraft, gems: hero arts

never thought I would see the day...

I love Rhys :) He's my well-intending, often-misunderstood, sweet big boy :) But... he just doesn't like to clean up, and if he does, well, it will pretty much take all day lol. So, yesterday when I was putting together Leah's new dresser and he was supposed to be cleaning up his room, I was not at all surprised to hear "....no, it's not clean yet Mama". Then came the surprise. "what were you doing?" I said. "....I was reading...my Bible" Rhys replied. I can't tell you how surprised and proud I was. You see, up until a couple months ago, he wanted just about nothing to do with reading. It was just too frustrating for him and took too long. We did reading in school, but it was always slow and not very fun for all involved lol. But we kept at it, slowly seeing progress. And this was huge for him. So who knows if it will happen again, but for once I was actually happy with what he did instead of cleaning his room :) 

It's nice to see you're actually helping them learn :) It was a good day.

This is a recent layout I made of my boys : ) gotts love 'em :) (but I don't think I will ever understand them lol)

                                                        

                                    

Some fun Fancy Pants stamps and some Prima papers. I like the way the distressed edges of the craft paper looks with the "live it up" stamp.

Thanks for stopping by!

supplies: cardstock: paper reflections, pattern paper: prima marketing, diecut letters: Quickutz diecut heart and wings: bosskutz, diecut labels: spellbinders, stamps: fancypant, buttons: autumn leaves

the weekend

This was the first weekend in a long time that Tomio didn't have to do work at home. So Saturday he went golfing :) I was glad that he got to go, especially since pretty soon the weather is going to be way too cold. Sunday we went to church and then Tomio found out that his friend from work had just had a baby, so we went to visit them. That was of course fun because who doesn't like to see newborn babies?! :) By the time we got home though, it was already evening, so that was about our whole weekend. Nothing too exciting :)

I didn't really have much scrappy time at all. I had hoped to on Saturday, but Miss Emma had other plans lol. I did finally get some pictures off my  camera of the cards I made the last couple of weeks.

This is pretty much all papertrey :) It's simple, but I like it. I love the damask designs for the background! Especially in the versamark. I stamped on the the flower with the text backgrounds to add some interest. I really like stamping the pattern on the flower--I will definitely be trying that again. Spring Rain was one of the first colors I got from papertrey, but this might be the first time I actually used it though. It's such a nice shade of light blue and I love how it goes with the Dark chocolate--so yummy :)

Thanks for stopping by! Enjoy the last bit of your weekend :) Its already Monday here and back to real life lol :)

supplies: cardstock, stamps, buttons: papertrey ink, ink:tsukineko, flower:prima marketing, label dies: spellbinders, scallop border punch: fiskars, embossing folder:provocraft, other: gems

fall party fun :)

 We ended up having our fall party later than we first planned, due to unexpected bouts of the swine flu :) But since it is just all the cousins getting together, the timing is pretty flexible. They had SO much fun! I was having trouble getting Leah's costume to work out with what we had, so Daddy came to the rescue and they went and got one :) Daddy also put the finishing touches on Levi and Rhys's costumes in the morning before he went to work :)

Here is Goku :) Daddy drew on the circle for him. He was SO proud and kept telling everyone about it. Here is Levi with Rhys, er, I mean Goku with Vegeta :) Daddy drew the lines on Rhys's costume too. I LOVE how they really made the costume come together!

                             

                                        

Leah was a nurse. She made her own hat since the costume didn't have one. I think she was supposed to help Levi and Rhys when they got hurt fighting lol.

Miss Emma was a butterfly :) I was sure she wouldn't fit ths outfit anymore, but I thought I should try it just in case. I was so happy it still did!

They are all already discussing what they want to be next year lol. At least it gives me time to think of how to make their costumes if they decide early :)

Thanks for stopping by! I should have some scrappy stuff to share tomorrow. Hope you have a great weekend.

sports and a card.

Well, the kids had a blast at Sports day. They got to try out several different sports and see what they liked. Rhys was somewhat skeptical of rugby, but it turns out he thinks its pretty cool :) Leah said she really liked tennis, which is yet another thing she has in common with her daddy :) Levi did really well too. I was afraid he would need me more, but stayed and listened to what the teachers said. He was glad they spoke English. I told him the kids would too, but he informed me afterwards that "lots of the kids didn't speak like me" lol. Everyone was exhausted and went to bed early afterwards. I took my camera, but I am so sad I didn't even get one single picture :( But it was just impossible to hold Emma while going  from each of their groups and take pictures with my Canon. (it really doesn't work one-handed, I tried...) I'm glad they had fun though, and it was cute to see how proud they were when they told Tomio about all they had done.

I've been swamped lately and haven't had nearly enough time to create thing like I would like :( But I do have one more card that I made I can share:

Lots of Papertrey again :) This is my absolute favorite Christmas set--Merry and Bright from Papertrey Ink.

SO versatile and so much fun to mix and match the trees. LOVE it :) I thought it would be fun to try some different colors for a Christmas card, and I really like how it turned out. The polkadots are a stamp from Fontworks. I like the little bit of interest it adds, but unfortunately using it makes me think I might need to get the Polkadot Basics from PTI...lol  Does anyone have that set? Is it as useful as it seems?

Thanks for stopping! I hope to have more crafty stuff to share soon. It's almos the weekend-yay!!

supplies: cardstock, ribbon, button, Christmas stamps and sentiment: papertrey ink, polkadot stamp: fontwerks

pink it up!

I've been following Mary's blog for awhile because she always has such wonderful cards :) I always love her Mojo Monday cards!! Anyway, I saw about the pink it up! challenge they were having at the Paper Pals blog and thought I would participate. I love idea and of course I don't need much encouraging to make something pink :) So here is a pink card I made:

I {heart} pink and brown together :) And I used all 3 of my new Papertrey Ink stamp sets on it--

Fun :) (Btw, I was really glad that they didn't require us to use Stampin up! stamps for the challenge. I have yet to get some, though I would like to!)

Thanks for stopping by!! Had to keep it short ans sweet today--I have 4 kiddos to bathe, feed and get to bed early to get ready for a fun "sports day" at school tomorrow. And it looks the cold weather decided to come just in time for it too lol... :)

supplies: cardstock, stamps, button, twine-papertrey ink, other: spellbinders nestabilities label, fiskars scallop border punch, gems-hero arts