LET IT SNOW-Scrapbookpal Design

Good morning. I sure hope your Thanksgiving and Black Friday were filled with lots of laughter, good food, friends, family and deals! Can you believe we are SUPER CLOSE to DECEMBER? YIKES! Well this month the wonderful Scrapbookpal sent me Winter Woodland to use and show you all some projects. I usually try to go a bit out of the normal box for the carts but I loved this saying and really wanted to make it for a special person in my life. So let's get started!

Here is your supply list:
Seven 1.25 by 1.25 wooden blocks
White acrylic paint
Basic Grey sanding tools
Xyron X
Mini glue dots
Expression
12X12 mats
Winter Woodland
Glaze pens in red and green
DCWV Christmas Combo paper
Pearlescent paper
DCWV Green Adhesive backed paper
Sticko Shimmering silver dots

Directions:

• First buy or cut 1.25 by 1.25 inch blocks of wood. Paint them white.
• Second Cover all sides of the blocks with various patterned paper; adhere using Xyron X permanent adhesive. Use the Basic Grey sanding tool in a downward motion to smooth the edges.
• Cut shadow/blackout LET IT SNOW at 2 inches on page 62 in green adhesive paper.
• Cut LET IT SNOW in white at 2 inches from pearlescent paper
• Discard SNOW, layer and adhere LET IT
• Cut letters S,N,O,W at 1.5 inches in green using font/shadow and white using font
• Layer and adhere using Xyron X
• Adhere to covered blocks
• Cut snowflake4 REAL DIAL SIZE at 1.5 inches from page 35 TWICE
• Layer and adhere with mini glue dot-adhere to block
• Using glitter chalk and glaze pens accent all adhered pieces and patterned paper
• Accent blocks with shimmering silver dots
• Display and enjoy!

30 days of Thankfulness: November 25th-27th

November 25: Yesterday I was thankful to have a warm home with yummy food, good friends and lots of memories.

November 26: I am thankful for ONLINE SHOPPING and FREE SHIPPING! Got the two of the four carts I wanted for 27.99 each shipped! YAY!

Nov 27 I am thankful for Christmas decorations. Jon always knows how to cheer me up, we put up the tree and decorations inside last night and they just make me smile!

30 days of Thankfulness: November 19th-24th

Nov 19th:

I am thankful that my little brother GOT THE JOB and will not at this time be joining the military. THANK YOU ALL for the prayers!

Nov 20th:

Today I have two things to be thankful for. I am thankful for books, I love to read but when I do I am oblivious to the rest of the world and for the Cricut Card Fairies who have sent close to 700 missions so far! I love those girls!

Nov 21st:

Today I am thankful for those friends in real life that you don't talk to forever but can pick up RIGHT where you left off no worries or issues. I am also very thankful for my virtual friends who keep me sane during the day, without them some days I would never talk to another adult until after 4 pm!

Nov 22nd:

Today I am thankful for my little girls voice, her laugh, her smile, I just want to bottle it all up. I am also thankful for my brother, SIL, BIL, cousins and inlaws, without them we would not be here. Two weeks from today C turns THREE!

Nov 23rd:

I am thankful for the fact that I have feelings even if they do get hurt like this morning.

Nov 24th:

Today I am thankful for Cassie and ALL my MOMS club friends, without ALL of you I am not sure what C and I would have done up here, we would be hermits and very unhappy I am sure so thank you!

Blog Awards from the amazing Fern!

I am blessed to know this super fab lady. Her talent and eye for design stun me every single time! I love her style and how sweet she always is. I would never have known she was super shy until she told me. She ALWAYS has a sweet word and encouragement for anyone that needs it. Thank you sweetie for blessing me with your friendship and these rocking awards! First up is this one:



To accept this award I must: Thank the person who gave it to me! FERN I love it!!! Thank you so much!! I am so honored!
And because this is a very special award because it comes with a wonderful $5 gift certificate from The Digi's with Attitude Store
I just have to follow a few simple steps.
In order to qualify for the $5.00 Digi’s With Attitude! Gift Certificate you must state 3 things that makes you different from everyone else and you must nominate 5 blogs. Lastly, you must display the Blog Award Badge (above) in your sidebar and link it back to the Digi’s With Attitude! Challenge Blog.

OK so three things about me:

1. I am a die hard COKE ZERO drinker. I do not drink coffee but boy if I do not have this in the morning I am a grouch!

2. Due to lack of experience I am rather shy in real life around women. I have always had guy friends, grew up Army, trained and led Army guys so being around ALL women is a little intimidating to me.

3. I love and hoard clear stamps and do not really know how to stamp LOL!

Five blogs I love:

Here is NO way I can choose so ALL my followers please accept this award and link back to me!

The second award she blessed me with is this one:
For this one I just have to list eight things about me. Since I listed three above I will just list five more, I am not that interesting I promise.

4. I have always wanted to learn to sew/knit/crochet but I do NOT have the patience so I just covet anything everyone else makes!

5. I am an Elementary Education trained teacher turned Army officer turned Iraqi War Vet turned SAHM to a very spirited almost three year old little girl who is the light of our worlds.

6. I have commanded the Cricut Card Fairies for going on three years now and we are almost at 700 missions. That is 700 people that we have helped in their time of need! Amazing!

7. Hubby and I have been married six years next month and have NEVER lived near our families and as much as that stinks I truly believe it has made us stronger, that and being separated by war and continents for the first 18 months of our marriage. If we can get through that I am sure we can get through anything. Being away from family we had to grow up, figure it out on our own and work things out, no running to Mommy like I see lots of my friends do still today.

8. I dislike summer. I know I am strange but I would much rather be COLD (can always put more layers on) then be hot. I think this comes from serving in Iraq since before then I loved the heat not so much after you suffer through 120 plus degree weather with 60 pounds of extra gear on LOL! I love winter though, it is a time to slow down for us plus C's birthday is then. My favorite season is FALL though! Gorgeous!

Now I need to pass this on to Eight other blog! Oh boy! YIKES!

1. Lynne at Scrapthiscraftthat
2. Sheryl at Sheryls Crafting Corner
3. Karel at One by One the Flamingos are Stealing my Sanity
4. Penny at Light Whimsy
5. Jamie at Bits of Paper
6. Barb at CraftyGirl
7. Kim at Memories In Thyme
8. Amy at Scrapping Mommy

Everyone have a very Happy Thanksgiving!

Dont forget NEXT weekend we have TWO blog hops going on. I am participating in ONE but I am sure both will be fantastic!

CCFA Blog hop winner!

This took me ALL day on and off to find someone that followed the rules. Even though the winner missed one blog I am done trying to find someone so here you go! Random.org picked number 41 which is TEACHERMOM! Please email me with your mailing information so I can get this cart out to you ASAP! Congrats!

Cricut Card Fairy THANKFUL blog hop!

COMMENTS ARE NOW CLOSED AS OF 538 AM EST on November 22. Thank you for hopping with us. I will pick and verify a winner for the HK cart sometime today and post a new post, so come back and see if it is you!!!!






Welcome to the Cricut Card Fairy Blog Hop. This month we are practicing being thankful for all the blessings in our lives. What are you thankful for? Do you stop daily and thank those around you for blessing you? Do you appreciate the small things in life? I sure hope so! With that in mind my wonderful fairies have put together some awesome THANKSGIVING/THANKFUL themed crafty items. Along the way there will be opportunities for inspiration, and blog candy. So make sure you hop all the way through, leave comments on every blog, and then a comment here on my blog when finished. I will be giving away a BNIP Hello Kitty Greetings cart to a person that comments on ALL the blogs and here too! Happy hopping! If you are interested in becoming a cricut card fairy (we send cards to anyone that needs a lift, currently we have sent close to 700 missions out in a little over 2.5 years! AMAZING! If this sounds like something you are interested in please email me your cricut messageboard name and email address to cricutcardfairyarmy at gmail dot com.

For this hop I made a simple layout for my good friends KarelJ's blog challenge, it does double duty. All month long I have and will continue to take time each day to post what I am thankful for that day. But when all is said and done I am the most thankful for two very special people in my life, my wonderful best friend and husband and our lovely spirited daughter. Of course I am thankful for ALL my family and friends but I celebrated these two in my layout. Enjoy! Your next stop is SCRAPPING DEB!!!


Here is the order in case you get lost along the way.

Caitlynsmommy: http://crystalscraftycreations.blogspot.com/
ScrappingDeb; http://tidbitsplace.blogspot.com
AJoy713 http://adreatravis2008.blogspot.com
RachelMutchler http://trickut-rachelscrafts.blogspot.com/
Kisatrtle http://www.kisatrtleskreativekorner.blogspot.com/
ScrappyJess http://scrappyjess.blogspot.com
PennyLight http://lightwhimsy.blogspot.com
KarelJcreations http://karelj.blogspot.com
Shellie http://shelliescreations.blogspot.com/
GRKIDDO http://ginathorntonstamping.blogspot.com
JamieFitzgerald http://www.jamieisacraftymomma.blogspot.com
Iluvsnowmen http://wandaswhimsicalwonders.blogspot.com/
blondemommy26 http://blondemommy26.blogspot.com/
SherylGreene http://sherylscraftingcorner.blogspot.com/

How I like to distress-for Frosted Designs!

Crystal decided to alter an 8X10 artist stretched canvas for today's project. She used the distress techniques of lots of ink, paper crumpling, and distressing/tearing the edges of her photos and accents. Even the canvas is distressed. She first painted it brown, removed some paint with a textured cloth, added some silver, scraped some away with a nail file and the ran the same nail file around all edges of the canvas for some more definition.

30 days of Thankfulness: November 18th

30 days of Thankfulness: November 18: I am SO THANKFUL for my vanilla, stable, no drama life. I love it! Give me boring over dramatic any day!

After reading the news this morning from the past few days I love my simple, uncomplicated, vanilla, boring and stable life! We are so blessed and I am glad to be reminded of it today!

Cricut Card Fairy Blog Hop coming soon!

Mark your calendars, there is a great hop going on this weekend. We will have 14 or so blogs participating featuring things they are grateful/thankful for and amazing projects along the way! Come and hop along with us Saturday and Sunday! A little turkey told me that there is a cricut cart to be won!

30 days of Thankfulness: November 17th

30 Days of thankfulness: Today I am thankful for my parents, without them I would not be the woman I am today or the Mom I hope to be. I love you both and admire your 30 plus year marriage, that is the example I hope to set for Caitlyn. These days in our society marriages come to an end too quickly and are treated with flippant disregard. You have taught me that marriage is a life long commitment and although it is not always perfect it is worth it to fight for it. You taught me to be responsible, self sufficient, strong, voice my thoughts and opinions and to be giving and kind to others. Dad you taught me to always remember and acknowledge the kid in my soul, Mom you taught me to be kind and respectful to others but to always stand your ground. I appreciate everything you all have done for me. I love you!

30 days of Thankfulness: November 15th and 16

I missed yesterday but

November 15th I am thankful for yummy dinners made especially for me by DH. He made my all time favorite and pretty time consuming dinner. I really appreciated it. He originally made it for our first date anniversary but it kept in the frig for yesterday!

November 16: I am thankful for two things: rain and fall leaves. Rain because we need it and I consider it an 'excuse' to calm down and breathe and fall leaves because they are beautiful and give my daughter hours of joy and fun!

30 days of Thankfulness: November 14th

SCROLL DOWN FOR A COOL TUTORIAL FOR FROSTED DESIGNS I DID. You can make your own pushpins/tacks with bottle caps!

Today I am thankful for first dates. This date seven years ago DH and I had our first date. We were broke college students and it was a rainy and cold Friday night. We ordered Pizza Hut pizza, and watched two movies at my apartment. Little did I know such a seemingly innocent date would lead us to where we are today. My life truly turned a corner on that day. I love him more than I did then and hope to have 50 more first date anniversaries or more! SHMILY!

Show me Sunday November 14- Bottle cap Push Pins

This is my first tutorial for Frosted Designs. I hope you like it. Please let me know what you think!

Happy Sunday! I hope you all are enjoying your weekend! I am so excited to be here and show you how to make your own bottle cap push pins. Now this idea is NOT originally mine, it came from Hip Chicks but I loved it and wanted to share it. Please excuse my messy Basic Grey work mat, I had to take all the pictures myself! Here we go!

For this fun project you will need the following items:

• bottle caps
• a hammer of some sort
• Glossy Accents/Crystal Effects or Diamond glaze
• a circle hole punch that coordinates with how big your bottle caps are (mine were one inch)
• FLAT backed plain pushpins OR tacks
• Patterned paper scraps
• E-6000 adhesive

Step ONE: Using the hammer of your choice flattened the bottle cap. You can also make these without flattening the caps but in my experiment they looked better flattened.

STEP TWO: Centering the design you want on the pushpin, use your circle punch to punch out pattered paper.

STEP THREE: Apply a thin layer of crystal effects/diamond glaze/glossy accents to the entire bottom of the bottle cap. Make sure to cover it all and remove any air bubbles.

STEP FOUR: Gently lay your patterned paper circle in the bottom of the bottle cap while adhesive is still wet. Gently push down to make sure it adheres and to remove any air bubbles.

STEP FIVE: Apply a generous amount of glossy accents/diamond glaze/crystal effects to the top of the patterned paper. Make sure to cover it all but do NOT overfill. Set aside and let dry overnight at least!

STEP SIX: After the glossy accents/diamond glaze/crystal effects has COMPLETELY dried flip the bottle cap over. Using a small drop of the E-6000 adhesive to the back center of the bottle cap.

STEP SEVEN: Adhere the FLAT SIDE of a tack/push pin to the E-6000 adhesive. Allow to dry.

This is what it should look like while drying.

Front when all finished!

Back view. You could also use flat tacks but all I had were these clear pushpins. I did not want to buy anything for this project!

And finally the side view!

This is a side view on the cork board. Again if you use the flat silver tacks you will not get as much protrusion.
Finished product!

I hope you enjoyed this tutorial. These were so fun and EASY to make. You could also add buttons, ribbon, flowers, glitter or whatever other embellishment you wished. Make a set of four or six, place in leftover foam from product packaging, wrap and there you go easy peasy Christmas/whenever gift for a favorite friend. I love them. They add so much pop to your cork boards! Thanks for learning with me!

Winter Woodland Scrapbookpal.com

Good morning. I hope you all are doing great. Scrapbookpal.com was gracious enough to send me Winter Woodland Cricut Cartridge to create with this month. Well you know me, always trying to think outside the box. This time it is no exception. I needed a gift for one of Caitlyn's friends. I made his sister something similar and did not want him to feel left out. It will hang up in his room. I hope he likes it.

Now down to business.
Ingredients:
Green card stock
Yellow card stock
White card stock
brown card stock
cloud paper
Scraps for leaves

1. Cut out trees on page 36 from white card stock at 1/75, 2, 3, and 5 inches.
2. Cut the shift of the same trees in the same sizes.
3. BEFORE you adhere the shift image color the white card stock to the desired colors. I used my Bic Markers orange, red and brown to get a fall look.
4. Adhere the brown trunk to its respective tree.
5. Cut off the bottom "snow drift" of each tree, layer and adhere to torn Swiss dotted hills.
6. Using leaf punch and scraps punch out about 18 leaves and randomly adhere with mini glue dots.
7. I hand cut all three clouds and ran them through the D'vine swirl cuttle bug folder.
8. Ink with French Blue Cats Eye and Stardust Clear glitter pen.
9. Adhere with foam tape.
10. Hand cut yellow sun, ink with orange chalk ink, use border sticker to make 'rays' doodle with Bic markers.
11. Cut Shadow FONT "Nathan" at 2 inches in white card stock.
12. Cut FONT "Nathan" at 2 inches using cloud paper.
13. Adhere together using Xyron 150.
14. Using doodlebug stickers create barn scene at top of hill. Adhere elements with foam tape.
15. Frame and enjoy!

30 days of Thankfulness: November 12th

Nov 12: Today I am thankful for something that others see as a bad attribute in my personality. I am thankful that I am able to handle and initiate if necessary confrontation. Our neighbor's car alarm has been going off 2-5 times a night for two weeks. I am DONE! I am ANGRY! I am going to confront him today. Do you know how hard it is to get an almost 3 year old back to sleep when she is excited and thinks there is a fire truck outside (don't know why!). Sometimes confrontation has to happen and I am grateful that I was taught how to do it and get results (Thanks Mom and the Army!)

30 days of Thankfulness: November 11th

Day 11: I am thankful for every single military personnel that has fought, will fight, or is fighting for our freedoms. To all my fellow Vets, thank you!

Today we celebrate all those past, present and future and their loved ones. Those that signed a check up to and including their lives so that we can remain the HOME OF THE FREE BECAUSE OF THE BRAVE! Happy Vets Day, thank a military personnel, without them you would not be here!

30 days of Thankfulness: November 10th

Today I am thankful for something very minor and selfish. I am thankful for Coke Zero (by the case!) and chocolate. It has been a rough week just with her whining and without these two things today I would be a BAD Mom. I am also thankful for gymnastics so she will wear herself out and NAP. What are you thankful for today?

30 days of Thankfulness: November 9th

30 days of Thankfulness: November 9th
I am thankful for crafting, it makes me more mellow, happier and less stressed which leads me to be a better Mom, wife and friend!

Crafting may be expensive and take up a lot of space but it is my addiction and that is perfectly fine with me. I do not buy the expensive clothes, shoes, purses or go to the spa. I do not wear makeup and do not want a new car. So crafting and all that comes with it is my sanity. We all have to have a vice and this (plus chocolate) is mine. Plus I am storing amazing memories for Caitlyn and our family. I love being creative so this helps me too. What is your vice? What are you thankful for today?

30 days of Thankfulness: November 8th

November 8th I am thankful for a warm house. It is freezing out and I am so thankful for a warm house, cozy warm blankets, jackets, heating pads etc that keep us warm!

Are you playing along? What are you thankful for today?

30 days of Thankfulness: November 7th

Today my blessing is a strange one. I am so thankful for swift and knowledgeable emergency personnel. My culdesac was full of excitement last night as two ambulances and a fire truck came screaming and flashing into it. Apparently something happened with our newer neighbors. They were all here for about an hour. Although the sirens/lights woke my house up and Caitlyn did NOT go back to sleep (this was at 245 am) I am so happy that there are still people in the world with the calling to help others in need. I am pretty sure all is well since they left without lights or sirens but I am not sure. So what are you thankful for today?

Unscripted Sketches GUEST DESIGNER! Sketch 80

WOOHOO! I am so happy and honored that the amazing Design Team at Unscripted Sketches asked me to be the guest designer. My layout is NOTHING compared to the amazing talent you will see there but I gave it my best shot. These pictures are from December 2009, WOW how the kids have changed (only one is mine the other is her BFF). I challenged myself to use BORDER punches on this one and I think I did OK. I am trying very hard to use what I have. Pretty simple layout! Hop on over to UNSCRIPTED SKETCHES and leave all the amazing DT sisters a little love! Enjoy your weekend!

30 days of Thankfulness: November 6th

Today I am thankful for lazy weekends. We have been so busy lately (we always are during the fall) and it has caught up with us. Being so busy coupled with little to no sleep made us all a little under the weather so I am super thankful we have nothing that HAS to be done this weekend and can relax, sleep, rest, relax, sleep rest LOL! We all need it! Happy weekend you all!

My first FROSTED DESIGNS Design!

I have a BIG announcement to make! I MADE THE FROSTED DESIGNS DESIGN TEAM!! YAY! I am so excited to be part of this amazingly talented and SWEET design team! I have worked with some of the ladies before on the Practical Scrappers Design Team so this will be nice to get reacquainted and also meet new friends with the other designers.

So this week the challenge was to use an OVERSIZE PHOTO (at least half of the page). Well I do not have many of those but I did have this ONE photo of my family from when I was just 18. It was taken right before I went off to college and my little brother started high school. I love this picture, it is one of the only ones that I have professionally done of my little family. I am also trying with inking and distressing so bare with me LOL! Here is my FIRST ever Frosted Designs project! Please make sure you go and check out the other amazing items that my talented sisters made for this week! You can check them out HERE and make sure to enter the challenge also!

Box and bracelet

Here are two more things that I made for Sandy in the swap. She does a LOT for Breast Caner Research and fundraising so I thought this was pretty appropriate for her. The little box is from Michael's I think, painted all of it, covered in pretty paper, inside and out. Stamped a sentiment for the inside top lid and embellished. I stuffed it full of crochet lace and other goodies but she could use it for anything she wished. I also handmade the bracelet but it was too snug so she will have to redo it (Sorry Sandy!). I liked how both of these came out. Thanks Sandy for taking the pictures since I forgot!

30 days of Thankfulness

Every single day this month I am posting here and on facebook what I am thankful/grateful for that day. I am trying to celebrate the little things, as I believe it is a given that I am always thankful for my family, friends (real life and virtual), health of everyone around me, shelter, security and God. So I am going to focus on the small things that I forget sometimes. As we go or at the end I will print off all the days, find pictures and make a mini to enjoy all year long. I sure hope you join me! You can comment on this single post all month long! Let's get started!!!

November 1, 2010- I am thankful for beans and buckets since they can keep Caitlyn entertained for hours!

November 2, 2010- I am thankful for LONG naps when needed.

November 3, 2010- I am thankful for MEDICINE to help my baby feel better. We are really truly blessed to have all the modern medicines that we do right now!

November 4, 2010- I am thankful for rainy days, they give me an excuse to stay home in PJs and not feel guilty!