Just a quick share....

I DID get to make a card for this week's Mojo Monday sketch. I actually finished it earlier, but I didn't get a chance to post it yet. (See, I told you for some reason I never get them posted before Thursday...lol)

I used one of the first Papertrey sets I ever got--Take a Bough. I love all the little ornaments in this set And its so fun to stamp the little design on them in a different color lol. Instead of using the stamp for the string, I paper pierced one. I also stamped snowflakes all over the white background in sandbeige. You can't see it very well in the photo. But you can see it a little better in the photo of the inside where I did the same thing:

Thanks for stopping by! Hope you are having a great December so far! The kids all love doing the advent calendar :) Unfotunately, after Rhys' bout with mumps last week, it looks like all 3 of the others got it....At least we all got to go to Thanksgiving and get the tree up before they all got it, right?!

supplies: cardstock: diecuts with a view, stamps: papertrey ink, Ink: tsukineko, circle dies: quickutz

seasonal fun :)

well I had a great weekend :) Thanksgiving was fun and yummy :) Levi didn't really remember any about Thanksgiving from last year, so he was extra excited about all the fun. And I am pretty sure his favorite thing of all was the pumpkin cheesecake lol. (But who could blame him? hehe!) Miss Emma even got to have some the mashed potatoes and sweet potato casserole. And I am pretty sure she thought they were completely awesome :)
AND........ we finally got our tree up!!!! yay!! It took extra long since this was the first time to put our decorations in the new house and we had to decide everything. But it was so worth it. I LOVE Christmas time! Nothing more fun than sitting on the couch snuggled up with a blanket, looking at the tree all lit up :)

Then on Monday (so I guess technically that's not the weekend anymore, but anyway...) we had our much-looked-forward-to-yearly shopping trip. Everyone year my mom and 2 sisters all go out for our Christmas shopping--sans little ones :) ( well as much as possilble, this year Miss Emma and her 2 month old cousin Olivia decided to join in on the shopping). The older 3 all got to spend the day with Papa, which was of course super exciting. Leah even made lunch for Papa and all the kids. She was SO proud of herself. Anyway, with so much of our shopping being done online now, we don't always end up buying all that much except for stocking stuffers. But we still go every year :) And we always have a coffee break at Starbucks. It's a day full of shopping and talking and laughing and eating. Tomio always sends me off with plenty of money and asks no questions about what I spent it on :) In a way, its not a big deal, but I look forward to it every year. I adore my cuties:) and I LOVE that I get to spend 24/7 with them. But for one day a year, I really enjoy my girls' day out. And I so appreciate that Tomio gets that :) 

All this seasonal fun left me pretty much no time for crafting though. I did make some Christmas tags, but none of them are on the computer yet, so maybe I'll share them tomorrow. I don't think I shared this card yet though:

It's a really simple card, but I love how it turned out. This is actually the card I made for Tomio for our anniversary this year :)

Thanks for stopping by!! Hope you're enjoying getting into the holiday spirit as much as I am!

Oh, and I was wondering, has everyone but me gotten the Creating Keepsakes December issue?! I subscribed this summer and was told I would start receiving them from the December issue. That's supposed to come in November, right? Is this typical? (just wondering :) )

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