Bee My Friend -

Alota has released more BUGS!!!! I just love these bugs and the new images are really really wonderful! Just wait until you see the patriotic line!!! (mine are on the way to me he he)

I love this set of bugs.. how sweet cutting a rose for a friend. And is actually called "The Cutting Rose Bugs" I colored with my copics, then used Shimmerz to give the rose and the bees some sparkle. That was hard to capture on film... I also stamped out the image twice and cut the rose out and pop dotted it off the main image to make it stand out front.
For my card I started with a really pretty shimmer card stock I found at Joann's last week called Jemstones. Reminds me of Bazzill Bling... heck may be the same stuff but it was on sale at Joann's 6 for 96cents.. so I really liked this one ;0) -Then the pattern paper is GCD Studios Cloisonnne collection, really pretty colors in this collection. I matted each pattern with a white card stock and then sewed together with a shiny white thread. I created a band across the middle with one of the patterns and two pieces of EK Success scallop border punches. The buttons are from SEI, love that they are little flowers.

The sentiment is from Heidi Grace - "bee my Friend" how perfect is that!! It is a clear epoxy sticker that I backed with a scrap of the Jemstone card stock.

Hope you like my Bee card -and that you will take a minute to see all the new bug images at Alota Rubber Stamps! Oh my they are too cute!

Well better get outside and feed the donkeys and make sure all the water buckets are full for the day - It is suppose to be 101 degrees here today so I like to make sure every bucket is clean and full at the start of the day. Then I'll go out again mid afternoon and make sure they still have water.

Hope you have a wonderful Monday -
HUGS and-

The first MICHJAY Challenge and of course Donkey Day!

I am so excited this is the first of the brand new MichJay Challenge!! Ok.. so it is a personal challenge between me and my Buddie JayJay (http://www.stempelelfejayjay.blogspot.com/), we were chatting at how wonderful it is so many can do the wonderful 3-D items so easily - and after a while decided that we just needed to step out of the box of cards and challenge each other. So once a month we will hold the MichJay Challenge! JayJay got to pick the first template for us to use and found this one at http://www.create4fun.nl/ and I just think it is soooo cute! It is a little gift watering can.

I made the can with the template, using a dotted BoBunny paper, after gluing it all together, I
colored up one of my favorite Alota Rubber Stamps :0) - from Michelle's Sweet Little Donkeys set, with my Copics, then cut out with a small border around it. I gel pen stitched around the entire watering can with a white gel pen. (this would have been so much easier to do before I put it together, sigh) I then added an EK Success border punched piece of white paper with tiny little heart buttons. I think it is really cute!!! Now that I have posted mine... I can't wait to see Jay Jay's!!!

Ok.. Now Donkey Day!

First we need to announce that Coffee and Toffee are officially sold - I am not crying yet as they are not quite ready to go to their new home yet... fences are being put up. And I can see and visit them any time I want :0) The new next door neighbor purchased them....

How about an update on Macie and Cheyenne? Well we have said all along that Macie would be next to have her baby... man she is wide! But you know I think Cheyenne may give her a race to the "finish line" she is actually showing a lot more signs.... they both are probably with in the month - Yes I know this is not a nice photo of them... but hey I wanted you to "feel" for them.
Wow.. guess it is just update day... How about an update on my sick little girl Rosie? Well we really stuck with her meds for over a month this last time and feed her all the best as much as we could. She is doing so much better - still needs to put on a bit more weight and time will tell if whatever virus or worm she has comes back.. but so far she has had lots of energy and is holding her own! I love this girl so much I want to cure her!
Now for the baby update!!!

Cali is doing so great, she is getting bigger each day and loves being out in the big pen with all the adults. My only problem with her is... well... she keeps putting her head where it doesn't belong behind her Mom and getting... well messed on - so her head is always a yucky mess - I clean her up and come out later and there she is again - she'll learn at some point I guess. I hope.

Mirta... now this girl is soooo tiny! She isn't growing hardly any! Tiny Tiny Tiny! But man is she adorable! And Super friendly!!
Here is a great photo of Cali and Mirta together - these two will be great friends! They are 1/2 sisters - so I am sure they will have a few tiffs now and then, but I know they will Buddie up and be great partners and have fun together. Sorry the photo is a bit blurry... camera kept fogging up this morning.
Hope you enjoyed! And yes I realize there isn't a Libbie photo... she was not wanting her photo taken this morning - I think we are getting into the terrible teens here... you should see my chair cushion she got a hold of.... bad doggie! :0) Can't stay mad at her -

Have a great Saturday!

HUGS and

Just Magnolia's Summer!

That is right it is summer... well maybe not by the date of the calendar, I think there is still a week until it is technically summer but it is HOT and school is out - so it is SUMMER! Just Magnolia's is celebrating summer today - that is the theme - make a summer card with any Magnolia image.

Ok, I made my card at my Crop last weekend... it really didn't seem that bright at 10 pm after an entire day of coke and chocolate... but now... Warning: Please put on your shades - ;0)

Well since there is a Summer theme, I figured Tilda in her swim trunks and float tube was the best choice - Around here in Texas, floating the rivers in inner tubes is the thing to do when it starts to heat up... not me - give me an air conditioned room with a view and I am much much happier. But Tilda looks like she is ready to have some fun. All colored up with my Copics and stickled wings.

My card started with a white card stock base, the pattern paper dots is from I think American Crafts - the orange is the back side of it... love that! For my waves I used a piece of Heidi Grace shimmer paper, then EK success border punch. I inked the edge to make the waves pop. I created a "sun" with a circle of yellow shimmer paper - inked with orange ink. Seemed kind of boring so I found a chipboard yellow flower in my stash and centered it on my sun.
I also found a sun charm in my stash, so I hung it from the center of the flower with a jewelry spacer and chain. Love the charm it is two sided... one with the happy sun face -
And the other with the words "Made with a Smile" love that!
My "SUMMER SPLASH" is cut with my Making Memories Slice - For a finishing touch I doodled the edges with a white gel pen.

I warned you that is was bright - Oh well summer is bright and sunny right? Now for some prettier summer cards make sure to visit the JUST MAGNOLIAS blog and see the other DT's work... much more calm and relaxing! LOL And why not join in? A great prize again this week!!

Long list for me today - I have to go to the post office and the grocery store - I didn't make it there yesterday on MIL shopping day - her list was long and I just got to tired of shopping before we made it there. So out I go again today :0) Hope you have a wonderful Friday - what do you have planned for the weekend? Any thing special?

HUGS and-

InStyle Happy Fathers Day -

Why is it that "men" cards freak us all out so much - I really stress and stare at these cards for a lot longer than I do any of my frilly - flowery - bling - cards. It just hurts sometimes to not do more. But most men in my life just do not understand or like all the layers and fluff. So for this Father's Day card I decided to keep it very simple with very little as embellishments and layers. It hurt.. yes, but I think it turned out ok -


This is InStyle Stamps "Stan" - isn't he just a handsome cool guy? LOL But Stan has some good news with him... HE IS ON SALE! And we all love sales, pop over to InStyle Stamps and see there are other images on sale this month too!

So Stan here is colored with Copics, I decided that I would use all Papertrey Ink card stock and matching pattern paper, love the colors - good think they were side by side in the pack cuz I don't know that I would have purposely put them together and I really like them together. The dotted band across the bottom is pattern paper from Papertrey as well - looks like a ribbon here in the photo.

I cut out the "Happy Father's Day" with my Slice and the new Words and Expressions cartridge. I high lighted the edges of the words with the new Smooch moonlight. Then also doodled the edges. It was so hard to stop - I could see a flower, or some bright bling... but now I forced myself to stop :0)

Hope you will check out the other stamps and that Stan made you smile -

Today is MIL shopping day. For those that are new to my blog... once a week I take my MIL out to run her errands and try and throw a few of my own into the list. We hit everything from the Mall - to the bank, post office - Target - and of course craft shops! Then end up at the grocery store before heading home. So I better get my day going and get ready - she has a really long list today and we need to be home at a decent hour today as we are suppose to go to dinner with our new neighbor tonight.

Have a great Thursday!

HUGS and-

Alota PCP Blue Birthday Challenge -

A new Papercraft Planet Alota Group Challenge has started - and this time it is DT member Susan's turn to host - she decided a color/theme challenge so we are asked to make Blue Birthday cards. Helene, the owner of ALOTA RUBBER STAMPS, just sent me a few new stamps... and one is this adorable new bug stamps called "The Sterners" named for her daughter's family... they just had an adorable baby boy! Welcome ALAN!

So I knew I just had to color up and use this new stamp... but the theme was a birthday card. Well I stretched the theme just a bit - LOL This is a Happy BIRTH-day card!

I started by coloring my image with a chalk background and my copics, then I stickled the bugs wings. I sewed down the image to a Daisy D's solid blue paper, the same paper I used as the mat on the white card stock base. I found a scrap white with blue dot paper in my stash, gorgeous sparkled dots! I think this is DCWV.. I think. The border is a new EK Success punch, then used a satin blue ribbon as a band.

My sentiment is computer generated, then three felt flowers with jewelry spacers and mini brads. I like my BIRTH-day card...

I hope you will stop by and visit the Alota PCP Group - and join in on our challenges.. Helene sends out some wonderful prizes to the winners!

Well off to get Wednesday going - Hubby is back at work today so I might actually get some of my chores done today! LOL Have a wonderful day -

HUGS and-

Two for Tuesday! A Spoon Full of Sugar and some Just Magnolias!

HI! Today I have two post in one for you! It is Tuesday so that means it is A Spoon Full of Sugar Day and the new Monthly Challenge from Just Magnolias is today! YEA!

First A Spoon Full of Sugar ok?

Today the challenge was a sketch... by ME!

I started my card with a white card stock, and then used the gorgeous SEI Mimosa collection stack papers, love the glitter on these, and the colors are so bright and cheerful. Following the sketch I matted and laid down everything - Love when the stack comes with solids as well... that is what I used for the mats... I sewed everything with a simples stitch, the band across the middle has a Fiskars Apron Lace border punch top and bottom.

My image... I pulled out one of my Hanglar images... I so love these! This was stamped and sent by a special friend.. HUGS! I colored her with my Copics... and then used my Rubber Tapestry grass stump to add some grass to the image. I high lighted her with my white gel pen.

The flowers are EK Success Retro punches from the same collection of paper, then Martha leaf punches, that I drew a vein on with white gel pen. I cut a chain and hung a butterfly charm from the jewelry spacer and mini brad in the center of the flowers. I hope you will go and check out all the DT cards at A Spoon Full of Sugar - I can't believe how gorgeous they all made my simple sketch look! REALLY go and look! So pretty! This week is another great prize and I can't wait to see all the cards with the sketch!

Now to Just Magnolias!

You are probably wondering why is she running a Just Magnolias on a Tuesday? Well this is a special Challenge an EXTRA challenge you could say - We were thinking that doing something a bit more, something out of the box or card you could say.. this is straight from the challenge site:

"Now, because this is a special challenge with an extra special prize the theme is a bit more challenging but we know you can all do it! This month the challenge is to alter a container - ANY container - for example a recycled paper bag, a empty box of chocolates, a custom made box, a canvas bag, a tin, a plastic tub - even a photo album. So you don't have to go out and buy something specifically to alter, we all have bits and bobs that can be altered for the challenge. The only specification is that you must use a Magnolia stamp on the project.You have two weeks to enter, the challenge will close at 10pm on Tuesday 30th June and the winner will be picked by Random Generator.This challenge is separate from the normal weekly challenge which will continue to run each week as usual."

So you have two weeks for this one and the prize is going to be a special prize.. We have a full time sponsor for the challenge!!! Simon Says Stamp monthly challenge! Heidi from Simon Says Stamp has very generously agreed to sponsor this monthly challenge and the prize is .........
a whopping .......$50 voucher to spend on what you want in their store! How cool is that!!!

Now to my Altered item - I found a "recipe" box in the Target Dollar section - except it was on clearance and I got it for a huge amount of 25 cents! Now ask me why I didn't buy more than one? DUH! I just saw it and was excited that I could alter it and rolled away...

So I glued paper from Making Memories all over the box, folding the corners as tight as I could. I then ran a red ribbon around the top of the bottom section of the box. I was going to leave it at that and it just needed a bit more... so I punched a border out of a dusty blue card stock with the EK Success zig zag border, I followed the embossed stitch on the border with my white gel pen to make it pop more. I ran that across the bottom of the top of the box. Now the papers where really white... too white, so I inked all over the box with a light brown ink to give it a more "aged" look.

I colored up a cute Tilda for the corner, and because the paper had the cute strawberries all over it, it was a perfect time to use the Magnolia strawberries with her... now are those big berries or what?! I cut them all out and placed them on the corner of the box with glue dots. The Strawberry charm was sent to me by fellow DT member Rach!! How absolutely perfect was it for this box? So I hung it from some chain and then used a spacer and a brad to attach to the top like a pull chain handle. LOVE that!

The word Memories is metal and is from Making Memories and has been in my stash forever. I know this is a recipe box... I have lots of them sitting around and no recipes in them... so this box just at the end of making it switched to a cute little memento box -

Hope you enjoyed it and now RUN over to Just Magnolias and see all the unbelievable items that the rest of the DT came up with - WOW!

Whew! Sorry this one was so long - and you get a gold star if you stuck with me until the end... but had two pieces of business and didn't want to leave anything out - :0)

Have a wonderful Tuesday!

HUGS and-

Flowers for the Stampavie Challenge!

The Stampavie DT Challenge is today! And I think this week EVERYONE should join in! The challenge is to add flowers to your card. UH Hello... don't we all do that most of the time anyway? So all you need is to use a Stampavie Sarah Kay, Rachelle Anne Miller, Lelo Designs or Leere Aldrich image and then have flowers and you qualify for one of Heidi's special prizes... she really goes all out to make a special "gift" for the winner each challenge.

Now for my card - I pulled out a Sarah Kay and lots of pink and girlie flowers.... and then looked at it all and thought... hmmm all of this is really comfortable - easy to put together. So I decided to challenge myself to do something different, and different colors. So I went through all of the images and decided that Nature Boy from Lelo Designs would be a bit harder to make all girlie. And boys can have flowers on the card too, right?

I then went through all of my papers and found this K&Company paper that looked more "manly" with flowers. I colored up Nature Boy with my Copics and then decided that maybe he was sitting in a field of flowers enjoying Nature - I added Flower Soft to the ground of the image, now it was an entire field of little flowers!
My card started with a white card stock base, and then the solid from the K&Company collection. I matted the image with a yellow from the collection, no thinking if it all matched, it came together so it must! Love that LOL. The flower paper has so many wonderful flowers I cut out three of them with leaves, as well as using it as a background paper. I ran a white satin ribbon as a band across the middle, put it all together and then pop dotted the cut out flowers and leaves. I then remembered that I had these label tags that were also made to go with this collection, so I pulled out one and stamped my Hero Arts sentiment and then doodled around! It all came together so fast!

Love the dimension this card has.. and the Flower Soft really makes you want to touch ;0)

I do hope you will visit the Stampavie Blog and check out the challenge - this is a two week challenge so you have some time, but please don't forget it ends June 28th.

Reporting on my crop now... we had lots of fun - lots of laughs and although we didn't get as much as we all planned done it was all good! Well all but my Sister... she came saying that she wasn't prepared just wasn't going to get anything done... and then she got 4 really adorable pages done for her scrapbook ---- Well Done Sis! Maybe you should be unprepared next time too.. LOL! And then everyone got a chance to visit the new babies... lots of ooohing and ahhhing there as you can imagine!

Well better get things moving this morning... Yesterday I wasn't really active... late night Crops LOL! Hubby is off today and so I am sure there is a list to make up for not getting as much done yesterday - He has a lot of outside work, I made sure my list was more inside... I ain't no dummy it is going to be 101 degrees today! I will be taking lots of water out to him though -

Have a wonderful Monday.. and don't forget to visit the Stampavie site!

HUGS and-