Monday, September 21, 2009

A Man's Heart



The inside says:
A Lion sleeps in the heart of every brave man.  -- A Turkish Proverb




I made several of these because they are appropriate for men for lots of different reasons.
I MIGHT be getting the hang of men cards thanks to Animal Kingdom.


Friday, September 18, 2009

Going Home

Our Cricut Card Fairy Army Commander has moved to a new home and I am sending her a "house warming" card.  I thought it would be nice to use one of the many birdhouses on my cartridges.  So, this is the card I got done today.  I have been busy packing and getting things ready to go. Tom will be home not long after I leave and I need to leave the house clean for him and leave him some things to eat.  Cleaning up the craft corner that I haven't had to straighten since he's been gone will be a job.  I've got stuff everywhere!



And the inside:

Thursday, September 17, 2009

Counting Down to Gone

I'm only a few days away from departing for the U.S. and meeting my new grandbaby.  I'm going crazy waiting for the day and I've have been really creating a lot of things in the process of waiting.... to keep my mind and hands busy.

Okay, I'm very proud of this one. It's paper pieced from George and some joining in DS. The background is some paper from the Cricut TBBM packet and I chalked in the sunset sky. It's inked, popped and dropped, threaded, tied, and clipped..






My husband has a shirt with this saying on it and it really deserves a card, so I made one today.




Wednesday, September 16, 2009

Wednesday Whimsy

This is the last of the Cow Series cards.  The feeling down cow.



Inside:



The Happy Birthday Cow

Herd It Was Your Birthday





Using the scraps from the butterfly window I did yesterday, I finished this one.
I like it better than the first, which is often the case with me.

Tuesday, September 15, 2009

Tuesday's Tulips

It's Tuesday and I have power and internet.  After nearly 24 hours without internet, I am back up and running.  I realize how terrible it is not to have internet, to be able to contact people, read the news, interact with IM and email.  I felt lost, grumpy and whiny.  But, that's all better now.  These are the two cards I got done today.  I decided I needed to do only one thing difficult and one thing simple.  This first card is a mosaic card which I have never done before, but I went to "Carol's Cards"  a blog that I follow and I totally scraplifted this from her.  HERS was gorgeous and I tried to follow her format.


After I published this card, I decided I really hated it.  So, I changed it to this:





 


This second card was simple and I followed a simple format for it.


And the inside

Monday, September 14, 2009

Scraps & Stamps

The power was out in my building today so I couldn't use my cricut.  I've had to go down the street to use my internet and have kept the computer off so I could come down and load up my cards for the day.  Frustrating to not have power and from what I can read on the Italian sign on the door, it will be out again on the 15th. :0(

So here are the cards I created today without the cricut.  I got out my punches, stamps and scraps.


This card is just a scrappy fall card.


I had a digistamp/clipart thing that I had printed but not colored and cut, so I spent some time doing that.  It is suprising how just cutting paper can be so calming. This is the inside:
Scarecrows, corn rows
Pumpkins on the vine
Leaves curl, wind swirls
Fall is right on time





In this picture I was frustrated because I just couldn't get my camera to take a straight picture! Grrrr

So, that's it for my stampin' scrappin' cards.  Ever feel like you get worse in your talent as time goes on?
Lately, I feel like the more cards I make the worse I get instead of better.  Some things improve and other things start to fall apart. Ugh.

Sunday, September 13, 2009

Super Sunday!!!!!!

Super Sunday!  A day for Worship.  A Day for the start of the Football Season.  A day that my DH is sick, sick, sick in Brazil.  Maybe he has H1N1 but he'll never go to the Dr.  He's alone and sick in a foreign country and there is nothing I can do for him.  So, since I have been working on these "man cards" I put together a couple that I think a man would not mind getting.  Simple with a little humor.  These are NOT original ideas, but they are MY cards.  SYI for the bug and a wonderful woman named Ruth Howard who creates fun cricut cut files.  She created several nursery style animals on her site and she allows free downloads of the files.  Most of these created in George, which I have and love, so I downloaded her crab.  Then I used it for this get-well card.  Click here for her blogspot  (Ruth Howards Blog)



And the Inside:


A closer look:


I liked this card because of the absence of the crab, which I thought was funny on my paper pad after I finished inking the crab for the front of the card.


This picture was hard to take... without the flash it was too dark, with the flash, the plastic that I put around the jar to make it look more like a jar, flashed too bright. 



I hope my DH feels better soon.  It is so lousy to be sick in a hotel far away from anyone to care for you. I know because being sick in Italy while Tom was in Mexico, Brazil or anywhere else is NO FUN.
Lots of prayers Tom.  I love you!

Saturday, September 12, 2009

Saturday, The National Day of Encouragement

Win a Cricut Cartridge!

Cricut is giving away one of its cartridges for their 100th anniversary promotion.  Yipppeee!  I really hope I win one!  I really really hope I win one!
 
Winter Woodland Click here to see what the catridge can cut!
 
I slept in late this morning and now I'm not in any hurry to do ANYTHING. It's Saturday.  If every day wasn't just exactly the same as the day before I'm sure I would be excited about it being Saturday.
There's a marathon of "The Secret Life of an American Teenager" on. 
 
It's the National Day of Encouragement so I will have to find someone to encourage today.  http://www.letsencourage.com/  I had a plan but it didn't work out.  So another plan will have to be
worked up.
 
 
 
Onward and Upward,

Friday, September 11, 2009

Freaky Friday

Have had allergy attacks all day so I've been moving slow and only got ONE card done in an entire day... and it's not even that good, but it's okay.


The inside says:
Behold the hippopotamus
we laugh at how he looks to us
and yet in moments dank and grim
I wonder how we look to him
by Ogden Nash

It's appropriate for a kid or a man.  It's just a sad little hippo, trying to hide in the weeds.
The Hippo is from Animal Kingdom and the paper from the Animal Kingdom paper pack.

Going to go sleep!

Thursday, September 10, 2009

A Joy-ous Day

Joy Sikes had a wonderful card on the cricut boards for autumn. It was beautiful and I wanted so bad to scraplift it. So, I made this card.  It's okay, but it's not beautiful or thoughtful like hers.  I have got to get the hang of the printed paper combinations.  I think that and her techniques are what made her card so beautiful.  Anyway, this is my version in Winter.



I liked the little bits of red that I added in places like the snowman, the flame and then the red bird.  Those are the bright little bits of color that you like to see in the dead of winter.










I also have been struggling with "Men" cards.  So, I created this Zebra card for a man on the Cricut Fairy list. I liked it because of finding the Dr. Seuss quote that went with Zebras. 



Wednesday, September 9, 2009

Friendship Quote

Let us be grateful to people who make us happy, they are the charming gardeners who make our souls blossom.


..................................... Marcel Proust
 
That was my friendship quote for the day. I am SO grateful for people who make me happy.  I have two dear friends that I have leaned on this week that make me happy.  So, THANK YOU, Lynda, Vicky & Carrie.
I got hugs from them via email this week and it was almost as good as being there.   Friends let you open up your heart and pour it out to them.  They let you share a secret that you don't want to tell but you don't want to keep either.  They really are the gardeners that tend to our souls. 
 
So, I think I will get busy with Friend cards today.

Tuesday, September 8, 2009

Brazil Blues

Tom is off to Brazil and so I am alone..... and keeping busy as best I can with creating cards.  I'm behind in the Cricut Fairy Army cards and so I had to get several done.  Plus, I had signed up to do a challenge on a blog and I didn't read the instructions right.  I created the Flaming O card and it wasn't about Flamingo's, it was about using ready-made embellishments.  So, I started over, but since I am "blue" all I could think of is how much some flowers would cheer me up. I don't think MY flowers would win a challenge, but I did enjoy them very much.  I have several kids on the fairy list that need "kid" oriented cards.  I'm not very good with that.  I also have a man card that I have to work on.  Those are the hardest.... do men really care about the cards that they get??   I don't have an answer for that... it's just out there.

Flower & Friendship Card for Challenge
The Friendship tag is chipboard and several of the flowers.
Some flowers are from George, added a corner brad.


Bird & Friendship Card, also included in Challenge
The bird is chipboard, the flowers are from George, the red frame & stems from Home Decor.
The Friendship is chipboard.


Monkey Fun (for a kid)


The Palm Trees are from SYI and the Monkey from New Arrival.  I chopped him all up and turned him and flipped his parts to make him swing from the tree with a sign.  I saw someone's card on the cricut boards where they had a stamp that looked like this.  I don't have a stamp.


This next card I totally scraplifted from a card made with felted flowers.  I just doubled up the paper then folded each petal.  I don't remember where I saw the card or to whom to give the credit.  I like it okay, it wasn't too hard to do and I can get it in the mail quickly.  The colors are my favorite.







And one for my nephew for Halloween.... Jolee's stickers and Lyrical Letters.  The Happy Halloween is computer generated.
.

Friday, September 4, 2009

Gettin' Busy

I was a designing fool today.  I sat down with my DS this morning and designed 5 cards and layed them out according to the colors that I was going to need cut.  I did really well with 4 of them, but the last one I ended up needing to cut more pieces.... more because the cricut messed up than my designing enough cuts.

Tom had some favorites among these cards.... and his choices surprised me.  He liked the Snowman and the Frost on the Pumpkin cards the best.  These are the days work.


Snowball Snowman


Snowball Snowman Inside


Frost on the Pumpkin


Fall Tree & Pumpkins


Pumpkins with Wheat Stalks


Funny Reindeer

This last one was my favorite because besides the fall colors, I really love Spring

I didn't put any of these on the Cricut Boards yet because I don't really think they are "worthy" of the boards.
I might add one or two to the gallery.   It was a good days work.

Wednesday, September 2, 2009

Wonderful Wednesday

The Cricut message boards have been full of fun for me lately.  Lots of interesting posts and some of the most incredible work I have ever seen.  Susie B had made a Tic Tac Snowman and I loved it, so I made one of my own and this is my version.


I was also invited to a card challenge.  I've never done one before so I thought I would try.  The subject was "Flamingo."  But when I saw the word, all I saw was "Flaming O."  I made a card from that perspective.  I don't think it will win the challenge but I'm pretty sure it will bring a laugh! 




We also got mail today from home.  It's always nice to get mail from home.  It was mostly bills and junk mail catalogs, but just having it all to sort through and look at was a blast!  That reminded me how many wonderful friends I have so I did this card:




Hope your day is cheery and bright!
Onward and Upward - Pen

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