a scary story?

I almost thought I wouldn't get to post today. I was having a mini melt down :)I'm not computer savvy. At all. But, I do all the computer stuff at our house (well, I am the one who uses it 90% of the time!). I set it up, connected it to the internet and all that. Well, my itouch is dying. Don't really have any idea what the problem is. And in a last attempt to see what I could do, I had it connected to my computer and was trying to get the internet to connect on  the iTouch. Somehow I totally messed up my internet connection on my computer. I was freaking out getting mad at myself heehee.BUT, in the end, I did manage to get everything back to normal. PHEW :) That's my little scary story for Halloween heehee :)

I don't have a Halloween card though. So how about a Christmas one? I can't wait to start making lots of Christmas cards, so I didn't :) They are my favorite kind of card to make :)

This isn't my typical style of card. A little bit shabby, vintage? Maybe? I *think* I like it lol. I stamped some text on the red. Then I layered on the label and then the tag. I stamped some damasks on thte tag first. I stamped some flourishes on the tree before I wrapped the ribbon around. I stamped some different text on the trunk. Then I finished off with some machine stitching and a sentiment. It was fun trying something a little bit different, though I don't think I'll be making this kind too often :)

Ok. I'm off to bed for the night. Oh, but I *did* get some crafting done today~yay :) Thanks for stopping by!!

more butterflies

It was a very dark, cold rainy day here today. I hear a typhoon's coming through. We stayed in most of the day. We did venture out for some sushi for dinner though :) We take up a whole little booth with our family of 6 now :) Everyone likes sushi and it's always nice since everyone gets to order what they each want.

This picture of Rhys and Emma was just so cute I had to share it:

Rhys ADORES Emma :) She loves him too and they play together well too :)

I loved how the red butterfly card I made the other  day, so I thought I would try one with opposite colors. I think the blue was actually too dark, though. I used mostly the same supplies too. The woodgrain background, butterfly dreams, turning a new leaf, and polka dot basics 2. 

 I colored the butterflies with copics and the pearls to match like before too. I don't love it as much as the red one, but still pretty nice :) I really REALLY hope I get some crafty time tomorrow. We'll see. Do you have crafty plans for the weekend? Or at least something else fun?

Thanks for stopping by!  Hope you have a sunny day!:)

a card and a cut.

First for the card :) I made this awhile ago and didn't get a chance to share it. I made it when I was trying to figure out ways to use my Green Thumb stamp set that I like, but seem to have trouble actually using.

It's a pretty CAS card, but I like how it turned out. I don't use alot of black well, anything really, but I think it helped to make everything else pop :) The verse is from Verve. I added a pearl to the center of each flower.

Now for the cut. I'm sure you probably noticed from the pictures I post of my cuties that Rhys and Levi have rather different haircuts.Rhys's is quite short, with a soft mohawk in the middle. This is done by Tomio. Once upon a time it was done by me, but after a few comments I received, it will forever be done by Tomio....Levi's hair is quite a bit longer. We tried doing it shorter (we meaning me trying AND Tomio trying), but he has a huge cowlick in the back which sticks up when it is short and will only lay flat if it has alot of extra length. So after that, it has basically just been left to grow out since it was buzzed last fall. Here is what it looked like: 

We decided to take him to Tomio's "hair place" and have them cut it and go from there. But to be honest, (and this from a person who always said they didn't like longer hair on boys), I like it longer on him. I do. And Tomio knew that when he took him in. So this is what he came back looking like:

Sorry, I know thes aren't the best pictures. It was late at night, but I wanted to go ahead and get some pictures. That and Levi informed me I hadn't gotten the "after" picture to go with the "befores" :) I'll try to get more pictures of the back too if I can. Tomio said that after much discussion, he would either end up with quite short, a bowl cut(!) or what he ended up getting. So there you have it. :)

Thanks for stopping by!! Tomio has a long weekend, so hopefully we'll be doing some fun things :)

a unity card :)

I was working on layout today, and I discovered a few things.
1) Choosing which pattern papers to use takes just about as long as everything else put together
2)There are about 62 different shades of pink, 38 of which I own in some form, and none of which match the color pink in my photos
3)The time you get your 1 year old down for her nap and sit at your desk, is the time your caring husband will offer to help you do that_____ you've been asking for, so you'll just have to stand up again

4) When you finally DO choose said pattern papers, you'll end up not using the ones you like best, just in case you find the *perfect* layout for them later

I suppose these could all just apply to me, but I'm pretty sure they are universal :) So I haven't finished my layout yet, but I do have a "Unity" card to share. I just LOVE these stamps!!

So many of my current favorites on this card :) I started with a Hero Arts layering paper in Carnation, which is just the perfect shade to use Spun Sugar distress ink on. So that is what I stamped the woodgrain background in. This is my favorite PTI background stamp by the way, because it is definitely the easiest to use, and hardest to mess up :) After I cut out the Quickutz label, I stamped it with Damask Designs in Old Paper distress ink. I inked the edges too. Then I stamped this adorable Unity chair and cut it  out. After that I decided it should have a pattern to it, and I stamped this on top. I stamped the lamp on Hibiscus burst cardstock and paper pieced it on. I also used a Stamp-a-ma-jig to get the placement of the my sentiment and the lampstand just right. That's really handy little tool :) I think I'm going to be using it alot more. I finished off with some machine stitching down the side of the label before adhering it to the base.

Thanks so much for popping in!! It has suddenly gotten quite cold here, so I'm off to dig out everyone's heavier coats. I did already get everyone's clothes switched from summer-y to winter-y, so I'm not too far behind :) Have a wonderful. crafty day :)

too soon!

Ok I suddenly realized just how soon everything is!! lol :) Halloween, Thanksgiving, Christmas...seriously, all of them are just around the corner. Aahh! But really that's a happy "aahh" :) I love all the wonderful things that we have around the end of the year. Lots and lots of fun. We actually put up our tree and decorations around the beginning of November(!), and I LOVE that. LOVE having Christmas decorations up. And as an added bonus, we are rearraning our living room this year before we put up the decorations. I suppose that might not be something fun for everyone, but I always loved rearranging furniture and changing things up. Kind of feels like you moved to a new house lol. (Tomio and I both seem to like changing around where we live, since we are now living in our 4th house since we've been married....) Anyway, I'm excited.

Sorry I don't have a card today, I was actually looking through my layouts seeing which ones I have shared, and I couldn't remember about lots of them. How sad is that?! Trying to come up with a system that helps me remember which ones I've shared and not. (any ideas? :)) But when I was looking through my files, I saw these super cute pictures of Levi from his 4th birthday, so I thought I should share those :)

Seriously, could he be any cuter?! (yes, I'm a big Friends fan. have all the dvds heehee)

 This is Tomio's garage, byt the way. You can cool "Mini car", but his motorcycle is behind it. I don't know if you can tell, but in the back on the right you can kind of see the coke fridge I may mentioned a few times :)

Alright, off for a day of  school...well, teaching, not attending. Thankfully :) Hope you are having a super fun week so far! Thanks for stopping in!

Papertrey October Blog Hop Challenge

I'm SOOOO excited to get to participate again! I've only managed to actually participate a couple of other times. I LOVE this snowman stamp, so I am happy for any chance I have to use it :)

But, the first thing I decided I wanted to do for this card was the pattern paper I stamped. I started out with the sweet blush and stamped it with Tsukineko Opera Pink. Then I randomly stamped the snowflakes (well,  not really randomly, I actually thought about where to stampe each one, but you know what I mean :)) Then I heat embossed them with white sparkly embossing powder. For the snowman, I stamped him in versmark too, but I embossed him with ultra-thick white embossing powder. Then I stamped his face and arms with timber brown stazon.

The brackets are from 7 gypsies and I have had them in my stash for awhile lol.  I stitched some Bo Bunny double dot cardstock pieces on the sides to finish it off.

Thanks so much for stopping by! I hope you are enjoying the Papertrey blog hop :)

how about a layout?!

I know :) You really might not think it from what I usually share here on the blog, but I am very much a scrapbooker...at least as much as I am a cardmaker.So I thought I would share a layout instead today. These photos are from a couple years ago(!) But I just love them :)

These are just pictures I took of Leah and Rhys being silly. What I love is how you can see just how much they *do* love each other :) When Rhys walked by when I was making this layout and saw these pictures, he said "that's when Leah still liked me"....I thought that was so sad though! Really of course, they get along the same, but Leah is a little more shy about gving him hugs and kisses than she was then. Rhys I think still likes them, even though he's a boy :) I really like these papers. They are from a K& Co Valentine's paper pad, but I thought they were perfect. I don't know if you can see it very well, but I stitched all along the wavy line. I didn't have a scallop border that skinny, so I actually cut a Quickutz "bead" border and then cut it in half. It was a little tricky to get it cut evenly though.

I finished off with this cute tab die from Quickutz and some Fancy Pants felt. I love adding stitching to my felt shapes :) Oh, and can you see that I stamped a music background on the peach-y piece? Just something to keep it from being too flat :)

Thanks for stopping in! Are you ready for a new week to start?! I *think* I am. :)

tired...

phew. That was a really long day. A good day, but long. It was a little tougher looking around the "thrift shop" with Miss Emma on my hip. I did manage to find a stroller that she would stay in for a little while. I got a whole bunch of clothes for the kids this year and next. It's great to be able to get decent American clothes for them all there instead of trying to find some half way decent Japanese kids' clothes that aren't way overpriced :)  I spent the whole day today doing laundry though. I was so glad it was nice day so that they all actually dried.

Ok. I'll be honest. I *love* how this card came out. heehee :) Everything just came together like I pictured, and that really doesn't happen all the time.

I used Hero Arts layering paper for the base and stamped it with a music background in Worn Lipstick distress ink. Then I stamped the flourish in Walnut stain distress ink. I used my favorite butterfly stamp again and colored it with my copics. I also colored the white pearls with my copics so they would match. I love this Quickutz label too. I like how it is a little more "pointy" than the Spellbinders Labels 8 (which I do still like too :)) I stamped the scripty text in Old paper distress ink. Both the music and script backgrounds are from Cornish Heritage Farms. The sentiment is from the same set as the butterfly."Birthday" is really on top of "girl" in the stamp, so covered the Birthday with tape and only inked girl first. Then I stamped birthday by covering girl with tape when I inked up the stamp and taking it off when I stamped on the card. I'm often scared to stamp my sentiment on the actual card for fear that I will ruin a perfect card with a silly mistake. So most times I end up attaching my sentiment seperately. But I decided to be brave for this one--heehee :) Glad I did :)

Thanks for stopping by!! I hope you're having a fun and restful weekend! I still have some clean laundry put away :) At least its already folded though!

a little organizing...

I didn't really get to make anything again today. But, I didn't really mind. I actually spent the afternoon reorganizing my scrapping/stamping area :) It was originally inspired  by my new Unity stamps. I wanted to find the ideal way to store them. Then that led to wanting to make everything cuter. And to have the things I use the most, the most accessable. It ended up taking pretty much all afternoon. That includes alot of time just thinking about what I should do, and of course taking time whenever Miss Emma wanted :) I think I like the end result though! I'll have to use it for a few days thought to make sure I like the new placement of things. I moved all my distress inks so I could to them much more easily. I realized those are the ones I reach for first. It can be fun getting all your goodies organized and looking pretty :)heehee :)

I made this card last week. I wanted to try to use stamps that I kind of have trouble with or don't use very often. And that would be this watering can. I'm glad I used it though, I think it turned out cute. I stamped the text background on top after I had stamped the flowers and watering can. Then stitched it onto some blue Hero Arts layering paper. I used Simply Chartreuse for the base. I used Wild Honey Distress ink for the watering can and I think it matches the Summer Sunrise ribbon pretty nicely. I think I want to find distress inks that coordinate with all my PTI colors :) If you know of some good equivalents, please let me know!

Thanks for popping in! All the kids are in bed early tonight because we are getting up early to go to the English library and a "thrift shop" they have at my old high school. They are all excited. Last time Levi and Rhys were able to find some batman toys, so they are hoping for some more great finds :) I hope to join everyone else in going to bed early too if I can. I hope you have *super* day!!

my first unity

I did get to play with ny new Unity stamps some more :) Happy sigh. This is a really simple card, but I love how it came out.

I used my new background stamp first, and then inked the edges. Such a fun grid pattern. Then I stamped the flower and sentiment (I was going to link to the flower set, but it seems to be out of stock-sorry!). Finished off with some stitching. Having so much fun with these. I can't wait to make some more cards heehee :)

Ok, I have to put Miss Emma to bed, but I wanted to share some Unity fun :) Hope you have a fabulous day!!

Happy mail :)

Well, just another day of costume making and studies. Made Levi's boots and "stabbies" for his gloves. Because, of course, Batman has "stabbies" his gloves :) Lots of everyday stuff....but I also got some happy mail! I *love* happy mail. A little bit of this:

and this:

This was my first every order from Unity. I was super excited anyway when  I was waiting for them to get here.But wow :) I think I'm in trouble. I {heart} all of them. They are all so cute. And they stamp SO well. I got to do just a little bit of playing with them. The backgrounds are great. And do you see those cute sofas?! I'm pretty sure I'll be ordering from them again quite soon. Oh, and they have great overseas shipping too. Which is a big deal to me.

Ok, I'm off to bed. Hope to have some Unity cards to share tomorrow :) Tomio's work finally calmed down a little after today, so he won't be having to bring any home for the next few weeks anyway. yay :)

A new week.

Sometimes I'm amazed at the difference in the amount of stuff I can get done on somedays compared to others. I mean, they do all have the same number of hours...But for some reason, some days I'll get SO much accomplished and still have time to sit and relax, while other days I'll barely get the basics done just before I get to bed....Why is that?!!? I'm not sure at the moment, but I'm trying to figure it out so I can have more of the days where I get everything done...:) Oh, but I DO know that whether I actually do get everything done or not, it is very important to get in some crafty time. Otherwise, I can be sure the next day I won't be quite as...chipper :) (you know what they say about a happy Mama....)

Lots of different stamp sets on today's card. I started by stamping the base with Polkadot basics 2. Then I stamped some flourishes it in Fresh snow ink. I also used the same flourish on the label and some more background stamps. I don't think you can tell in this view, but I stamped a big Damask on the chocolate circle. The butterflies are from Butterfly dreams (of course :))  I stitched around the edges with my machine before I adhered it to the card base. There was so much going on already that I didn't add a sentiment on this one.

Thanks for stopping by! Is your week starting of well? Mine't not bad :), and I hope to just make it better and better :)

just stuff....

I didn't get to create anything today. Tomio is swamped again with work and has claimed my scrapping desk for his work. (Admittedly, his "hobby" place at our house is his garage, and there really isn't any place for him to work there :))... I did spend almost the whole day upstairs with the kids (have you tried to get some work done at home with 4 wild kids running around? apparently its not *quite* the ideal situation) I worked on costumes some more. Both Rhys and Leah were very pleased with their boots I made them. Just a few more finishing touches left.

Two days in a row, strange men have come to our house asking if they could look around. Ok, that sounded alot creepier than it really was :) Our new house DOES look...different :)Especially when the garage door is open and you can see all the cool stuff Tomio has in there including my...er, our coke fridge. Anyway, the first guy thought he had seen our house on TV. I said no, but it was in a magazine once when they did an article on Tomio :) And then the guy today said he was building his own house right now and wanted to use ours for insipiration. What can you do, right? I  know Tomio was pretty pleased that other guys "got" how cool our house is :)heehee:)

Ok, so no card today. But I have some pictures of my "peeps". That's what I call them. Whenever I want all of them to come, I say "hey PEEPS" and they come running :) Emma has picked up on it too. When I finish making lunch and start to call them all down, she will go to the bottom of the stairs and say "PEETS! PEETS" :) I love it :)

Just some pictures of my peeps all enjoying the nice weather we have had these past few weeks. Rhys is actully rolling down our driveway....for whatever reason :)

Thanks for stopping by! I hope you got some crafty time this weekend :) I intend to make up for my lack of crafty time tomorrow. heehee :)

sewing, sewing...

Well, I didn't get any crafting done today. But my sewing machine sure did get a work out. I spent the whole day working on Halloween costumes. And boy I am glad I started months ago. I thought I was "almost done" with them. Haha. NOW, I am a closer to being actually almost done. I'm not that much of a sew-er, really. I cross-stitch ALOT, and of course I saw on my cards and layouts :) But I'm not that into actually sewing clothes or bags...So it is all the more special and rewarding when they like what I make them. Rhys *loves* his Flash Gordon costume and was dying to wear it today. I said yes, since I figure the more use they get out of it them the better, right? I'll be sure to post some pictures of all 3 of them when they are officially done :)

I do have a card that I made earlier this week to share :)

I used more Hero Arts layering papers on this one. I wasn't sure if I would like them after being spoiled with my Papertrey thick cardstock-heehee. But they are really nice. I stamped Damask Designs on the blue with Broken China Distress Ink. Then I stitched it onto the pink, which is also from Hero Arts. I stamped the text on white cardstock with Spun Sugar Distress ink and diecut it with Spellbinder label 8. Then I stamped the flower from Green Thumb in Spun Sugar on top of the text.Then I stamped the sentiment in black on top of that. After that I attache the ribbon and then the label, to the base.

Thanks for stopping by!! Everyone else here is asleep, so I'm going to join them :) Hope you're enjoying your weekend!

cookies and cards

The cool, rainy, wet, weather continues here. It has been that way for the past few days. I'm pretty sure it's the reason for the 3 batches of cookies we baked and finished off already this week. But it's baking weather, right? Definitely would be worse *not* to bake something :)

Ok, I have another scripture card today. I'm really loving my woodgrain background lately. It's one of the easiest backgrounds from Papertrey to use, I think. And it goes with everything :). I cut the Quickutz label from Papertrey kraft carstock and stamped it with tin types background. Then I stamped the leaf image from in Walnut Stain distress ink. It took almost a year(!) after I got my distress inks to actually use them much at all, but I don't think I could stamp without them now. Love them :). I knew I wanted to stamp the verse in white on top, but white never shows up very well for me. SO, I stamped it on a transparency and covered the whole card front with it. I folded the sides over and ahered it on the back. Then I added the cream strip at the bottom,  stamped with text. Finally, I stitched down the sides with my sewing machine. It was a little trickier sewing over the transparency, definitely good to have it adhered down first.

Thanks for popping in! Miss Emma is letting my know just how sleepy she is, so we'll see if we can get her to take her nap :) It's almost the weekend ~yay :)

too much internet?

My kids LOVE *love* getting books from the library. Leah reads books like nobody's business --really just about anything:) Rhys likes reading 2nd grade level ones, while Levi likes to have me read him lots of picture books. His current favorites are this one:

and this one:                                    

  

He'll tell me which one he wants me to read by the title. He'll either say "Let's read Click Clack Moo!" OR, "Let's read GOOGLE, GOOGLE, quack". :) And no matter how many times I read it the proper way or Rhys tells him, he never says "giggle". Now I'm pretty sure when I was little, the word giggle was alot more familiar to me than the word "google". And I'm also pretty sure I can thank the internet for that....:)

ANYWAY :), I have a card for the challenge at Embellish magazine today. The challenge is to use the colors red, pink, yellow, and brown. And to use felt. Here is what I came up with:

I honestly just don't use alot of red. I noticed I don't even own much read cardstock at all. But I really like the way the red looks stamped on the pink cardstock. The music stamp is from Cornish Heritage Farms. I stamped the label with Polkdot Basics 2 in Old Paper distress ink. The pink flourish is from Turning a New Leaf. For the flowers I used Papertrey Ink felt (yum!) that I diecut with a Quickutz flower. But instead of using the centers that came with it, I used some Fancy Pants felt buttons. I finished them off with some red baker's twine. Oh, and the sentiment is from Verve. I love all their wonderful Scripture Plain Janes.

Thanks for popping in! I hope you gave a SUPER day :)



cute pink labels...

I went through my cabinets and  put cute little pink labels with red letters on all my canisters and tupperware. It really only started with me needing to have a place to put my new salt...but then I had to make sure it wasn't confused with baking soda. And then the sugar looked like it needed a label, since the salt beside it looked so nice. And then, of course I had to find a container (and label...) for the cocoa...and the cornstarch. I *think* I might have gotten a bit carried away. But it did inspire me to straighten the cabinets with all of Emma's bottle supplies in it too :)

Something a little different for today's card. This one basically started with me wanting to try to use some summer sunrise paper and the Wonderfully Whimsical stamp set. But I think it turned pretty nice.

I stamped the music background in brown to kind of soften the look of the bright summer sunrise. I stamped the house from Wonderfully Whimsical and colored it with my copics. I stamped the text background so to give the green some more texture. I just hand cut the hills and layered them on. Then I matted it on the dark chocolate base and stitched around the edges. Oh, the cloud is from Fancy Pants. I added some red stitching to give it some definition and tie it to the red in the house. I love all the different little sentiments you can fit on the sign :)

Thanks for stopping by! Hope you are having a crafty week :)heehee :) If we get enough sun today, I'm hoping to wash my sofa cushion covers....exciting :)

holidays

Since we homeschool, and Tomio works long hours at work, whenever he has a day off from work I give the kids a day off from school. I love that I can work it into their schedules that way :) But I think it has caused a bit of confusion for Levi. He knows that we don't have school on "church days" or the days Daddy is home, but he hasn't totally worked out the difference in "weekends" and "week days". The fact that Daddy staying home makes it a "holiday"  apparently means Daddy has the power to make any day a holiday :) I realized this when, on Saturday, Levi asked "Did Daddy make it a holiday today?" :) Rhys just said "It's SATURDAY..." But Levi just replied "I know...but did Daddy make it a holiday?! He can make anyday a holiday!".... I explained to him a little more about weekdays, but I don't mind his lofty ideas of his daddy right now :)

 I think I need to stop myself from using these butterflies for awhile :) But I just can't~hehe :) A pretty simple card, I did some background stamping. And I thought it was time for a big bow :)

I wasn't sure if I would like this Summer sunrise color, but I like it goes with the kraft. Of course, I like how just about everything goes with kraft... :)

Thanks for stopping by!  I hope your week is starting off nicely :) Tomio actually made it holiday today(heehee), so we all went out for doughnuts. That started off our week quite well :)



sweet peas...

We've been having much cooler weather and lots of rain. Today started out that way too. But by the time we got out of church it was actually hot. Everyone started peeling off all their extra layers :) I should have known though, since I thought about getting out all the kids' warmer clothes...

Another "flat" card for today. I didn't actually plan it that way :). For most of my cards I often just start with one idea of something  I want to do and go from there. This one started with the flower image I felt like using :) After decding that and thinking a little bit, I started out by stamping the wood grain background on kraft with antique linen distress ink. I really like how the colors look, a little bit more interesting than just the versmark I think :) I stamped the Sweet Peas in momento black and colored them with copics. I diecut it with a Quickutz label and then stamped the sentiment from the same Sweet Peas set. I adhered it to the Bitty Dot pattern paper and stitched it to a panel of Hero Arts Carnation layering paper (I'm really loving this color of pink right now--seems to be just the right shade :))

Thanks for popping in! I hope you're enjoying a lovely weekend :)