Small Creations

Happy Mother's Day

2010-05-09T08:44:00.002-04:00

(by and from Montana)

Alice

2010-03-22T13:14:00.011-04:00

Was in the mood to make some Alice in Wonderland themed pieces:

Below is a set of 5 coordinating cards. All rubber stamps used for the above and below pieces are from Oxford Impressions.

The central part of each card was created on thin cardboard coasters(thank you Kaz). Then just mounted on coordinating papers.

The other month Little Black Scrap Cat gave me this award and I totally forgot to blog about it. But I am now :) It's a happiness blog award. I'm to list 10 things that make me happy and then send the award forward to 10 blogs that make me happy.

10 things that make me happy:

1. My family.
2. Montana, Montana, Montana.....especially his laughter and dancing.
3. Raspberry Tea
4. Art
5. Beautiful weather...the kind where you can open your windows to let the fresh air in.
6. Good health
7. Good friends like my buddy Kaz who are there for you and won't ever sugar-coat a situation knowing that honesty is the best thing ;)
8. Kings of Leon
9. Photos...the memories of certain days, events and moments.
10. XOXO's from the two most important guys in my life. (yes, i know that #1, 2, and 10 are basically the same but they make me the happiest).

I am supposed to pass this award on to 10 blogs that make me happy but there are way more than 10 blogs that I would have to list and it would be very hard to name just 10. So I pass it on to everyone.

That's it for now....later.

The Artistic Mother

2010-03-04T13:22:00.005-05:00

My friend Shona Cole is the author of this amazing book "The Artistic Mother". I love this book and have been going over and over every page in it. It is a great read and has fabulous artwork in it. To quote the back of the book......'Don't go another day without bringing together your two passions: Motherhood and Art'. The book does a wonderful job in showing how to do this with great tips and ideas . It is a very motivational book and I love how Shona creates art for and about her children. Her style is so unique and I always adore seeing her artwork. I was very honored to be in her book as an artistic mother. And I will say that Montana loved seeing himself in the book, lol. You can see the book and some inside pages here at Amazon.

The book also has a 12-week workshop with different projects and other prompts to follow each week. Trudy Callan is heading up a group for people that have the book and want to follow the 12-week workshop in the book. I will be joining in and creating and sharing my take on each project. You can read all the details of the group on this blog post of Trudy Callan's if you have the book and are interested. It starts Saturday, March 6.

My friend Kaz put forth a challenge on her forum to create something with the theme of 'Home is where the heart is'. I haven't did a piece on wood in awhile so I enjoyed creating this. Montana was only 4 weeks old when the pic was taken and he is the little love of my life. The pic below was taken the other week in his classroom. Everytime I ask him to smile for the camera he does this look now and opens his mouth. Makes me laugh everytime.

I know in an older post I had mentioned some funny things he does....did. I figured I would share a few of his latest things.

1. There is a Kmart commercial that says "there's smart and then there's Kmart smart". He never says it right. His version is "Kmart smart is Kmart smart". But what is really funny is he only says the phrase in two situations: when he sees the commercial and when we are in Walmart....lol.
2. When we go shopping he has to open all the freezer doors and draw people on them.
3. When leaving the house one day I had questioned myself aloud on if I remembered to shut the garage door. So I went back around the block to check and Montana thought it was funny. Now, everytime we leave, he will wait till we get around the corner of the road and say 'momma, did you shut the garage door?'. You don't know how many times I have turned around to check on that garage door even though I knew I had shut it.

Hope everyone is having a wonderful week :)

Week #?

2010-02-25T22:28:00.011-05:00

While Walking

I was supposed to title my posts with the week number but that wasn't a good idea since I don't have a clue what week number we are on :) The above piece uses rubberstamps from Red Lead. The little pixie girl is one of my favorites and I have used it many times.

Other Curiousities

Unconditional

Blue Whisper

The above three pieces uses images from my favorite door collage sheet. I have used these images before but had to use them again since I never tire of them. The little eggs are also from Retro Cafe Art.

Grow With Love

The above atc was made with supplies from Retro Cafe Art from the Jenni Bowlin line(stickers, rub-ons, grow card). The little nest is also from Retro Cafe Art.

Love 44

The atc's above and below are fabric atc's that were made for a personal trade.

XOXO

I recently got a branch and birdie die-cut...love them. I have used them in some of the pieces above and in the card below.

Remember Me

Have a great weekend!!!

p.s. I have emails to respond to and will be replying to them this weekend.

Week 3

2010-01-21T23:02:00.004-05:00

Well I managed to get a little something done for this week.

All rubberstamps are by Oxford Impressions. The piece below is kind of crooked and off since I had to take a pic of it.

Week 2

2010-01-08T23:00:00.004-05:00

January 8

The Edge

6.5 x 10 inches on a resin coated book page. You can click on pic to get a bigger version of the piece.

Week 1

2010-01-01T20:59:00.010-05:00

January 3:

Uncertain Love
Circles and script are from Paperbag Studios. The heart is my own carved stamp. I finally decided to add the blog follower thing so I will be adding all the blogs from my old list there so that I can see when they are updated easier. If you follow my blog this way I don't think it updates you if I add to the same post...sorry about that. It will update you when I start a whole new week.

--------------------------------------------------

January 1:

Happy New Year!!!
Wishing all of you a very happy new year and I hope that it brings lots of love and happiness to each of you.

All of my post titles this year will be the week number and I will add to that week as I go along creating. So if I make something this week it will be added to this post but above the last thing i showed/said...if that makes any sense, lol. Hopefully I will get back to creating soon since it has been awhile.

2009-11-18T12:07:00.008-05:00

Been making some Christmas cards, tags and atc's. Above is one of my favorite stamps from Red Lead. She is so precious :)

Below are some little To/From gift tags. Very quick and fun to make. All the rubberstamps and supplies(charm, leaves vine, ribbon, and gold trim) for the tags(below) and the cards(above) can be found at Red Lead.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I am sure you have noticed that I have gotten hooked on adding fabric to my cards and other stuff. Here are some fabric atc's that I made. There are some other bits added but mostly fabric.

The backgrounds are fabric sheets from Retro Cafe Art. Kristin already has them sized for atc's which makes it even easier to make them.

The birds and the corkscrew thingy below that I used as a tree are also fabric along with the egg(all from Retro Cafe Art).

I know that I have emails to respond to and I will be doing that tonight. Thanks for your patience :)

Have a wonderful day!

Happy Halloween!!!

2009-10-31T12:52:00.006-04:00

(all rubber stamps used above are from Oxford Impressions)

Here is Montana in his halloween outfit. He is a Clone Trooper from Star Wars.

Have a fun and safe halloween weekend. Thank you to everyone that wished me 'happy birthday' through facebook and emails. Also thank you to all the awesome cards that were sent :)

The Winner.....

2009-10-06T08:29:00.003-04:00

I put all the names in Montana's halloween bucket and he drew a name from it this morning before school. The name he drew was:

Evidence of an Artistic Life

...big congrats! Please email me your mailing address. Thank you to everyone that entered.
Have a great day!

Rubber Stamp Giveaway

2009-10-02T17:05:00.006-04:00

"Little Ladies"

I had to take a pic of this outside so there are some shadows on it. Rubberstamps(girls) are from Oxford Impressions. The couch and 'ladies' are from Retro Cafe Art.
----------------------------------------------------------------------

I mentioned in my last post that I would be having a giveaway. Below is the 'Wonderland' rubberstamp plate from Oxford Impressions. If you would like a chance to win this rubberstamp plate then just leave a comment letting me know you want your name entered. I will announce the winner on Tuesday.

Have a great weekend everybody!!!

Some halloween and other stuff

2009-09-29T10:33:00.009-04:00

I couldn't resist...I had to turn the little girl above into a witch with wings for halloween. I know these pieces are kind of crooked but I kind of like the quirky crookedness of them :) The little girl is from Retro Cafe Art.
I took the white metal house apart for the pieces above and below. For the top piece I bent the hanging part of it into a heart and painted it with red paint. The postcard, nest and eggs on these two pieces are all fabric and can be found at Retro Cafe Art also.

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
I Love Red Lead:

I always forget how much fun it is to create on tags. These are all rubberstamps from Red Lead. The little pumpkin charm in the first tag is also from Red Lead.

Below is a page where I used Red Lead fabric images and it is only one page from a book that I made. It appears in the new Somerset Memories Autumn 2009 issue in an article about the bind-it-all(i love that little machine).

----------------------------------------------------------------------
Paperbag Studios October Challenge:

I got to pick the theme for the October challenge and surprise, surprise........I picked 'halloween'. All you have to do is use a Paperbag Studios rubberstamp and make sure that whatever you make is 'halloween' themed. Upload it and post a link of your piece to the Paperbag Studios blog challenge post. Here are two samples below that I made.

Now I know you guys can think of some awesome ways to incorporate those Paperbag Studios rubberstamps with a 'halloween' theme. Make sure to share your creations with Roben-Marie at the 'October stamp challenge' post. I know she can't wait to see what you come up with using her stamps :)

---------------------------------------------------------------------
Thank You

I had put a collaboration together for a challenge called 'With One Image'. All of us made pieces that used the same vintage image. I was thrilled to see it appear as an article in Somerset Memories Autumn. I am so thankful to the people that I invited who took the challenge and created such beautiful pieces. You can see their pieces in the article and you can visit their blogs. Thank you to Kaz Brown, Carlene Federer, Dawn Rice and Shelly Hickox. The article would not have made it without all of your beautiful contributions.

--------------------------------------------------------------------

p.s. Friday I will be posting a rubber stamp giveaway :)

Linen Paper

2009-09-17T17:36:00.003-04:00

Both of the main images on the above and below pieces were stamped on linen paper. I use the fine linen paper(25% cotton) that can be purchased at an office supply store. I love how the image stamps with a little bit of a worn/weathered look and it can also look like it has been stamped on fabric. (If these stamps were stamped on regular paper they would be more solid and much darker.)
The woman stamp is from Stampsmith and the little angel is from Toybox Rubberstamps.
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------

Can't believe halloween is almost here...a little over a month. So I have started to make some halloween cards. Will post some of those cards next time. All rubberstamps(numbers and girl with wing) on the piece below are from Red Lead.

Thanks bunches for stopping by :)

Back in the Saddle

2009-09-09T00:43:00.005-04:00

Well I am trying to get back in the groove of creating and hopefully blogging more often.

Made the above two cards using the fabulous rubberstamps from Stampsmith. The stamped images are colored in with Photo Twin Markers.

A few posts ago I had made a card using this flower(above) Paperbag Studios rubberstamp. I really liked it and decided to make some inspirational marble coasters. I used the Marble Coaster Kit from Tilano. The transfer is very easy to do and each coaster has a different colored flower and a different quote on it. All quotes and stamps are from Paperbag Studios.

Have you seen the new calendars that Stampington has out? My very talented friend Carlene Federer is in a couple of them and she is having a giveaway over at her blog. All you have to do is leave a comment on her blog and you could win a gorgeous calendar....so go, go now and leave a comment on Carlene's blog :)

On a side note: Thank you to all the 'happy birthdays' for our cutie pie Montana :) He had a wonderful day. Thank you to everyone that has emailed me about my Guest Artist appearance in Take Ten. I loved doing it and it was one of the hardest challenges for me to do. And thank you to all the concerned emails about my blog absence.

Hope everyone is having a wonderful week.

Happy Birthday!!!

2009-08-05T12:57:00.011-04:00

Can I please rewind time so that I can go back to these days(pic below)..........his baby days. Montana turned 5 today and time has gone by way too fast. I figured I would show some funny Montana pics(from over the years) and his most said things lately.......at least to me they are cute and funny :)

How cute is that expression on his face...like he is actually getting away with something, lol. I just recently got this pic from my sister(it's her purse he is sneaking into) that I didn't know she had. I love it.
Below is Montana's train station. Can you guess what all that white stuff is? I always have baby wipes on hand to clean my stamps. Montana decided that he had to take every single wipe out of the box and shove it into the train station.
I posted the fridge pic before on my blog a long time ago. I had to show it again. He had thrown his shoe into the freezer and this is the pic I got, lol. He still likes to puts stuff in the fridge...only now it is toys and not his shoes.
We had painted a huge chalkboard on one of Montana's walls but it only went down so far....you can tell where the line originally ended. You can see where Montana contributed to the chalkboard, lol.

Montana's Favorite Sayings:

1. "Check this out".........he says this all the time but mostly if we are at the store and are near the toy section.

2. "Barnacles"..........it's a Spongebob thing. He says it when something doesn't work out. Kind of the same as 'darn'.

3. "Look, space monkey in the sky"......he says this when we are playing and he wants to distract me so that he can run off so that I have to chase him, lol. Not sure where he got the phrase though.

4. "Okay, okay, sheesh!!!".........he says this after I tell him twice to do something.

5. "wait for it".............yeah, he says that one, lol.

and the best one of them all:

6. "You're fired!"...........he says this to me when he doesn't want to do what I am telling him to do. For example the other week he didn't want to go to school and I told him he had to go and to get in the car. He didn't want to do it and says 'you're fired', LOL...guess he was trying to fire the driver. The funny thing is that daddy has never ever been 'fired'.........only me, lol.

I made this canvas with a Tilano kit. They have lots of different kits that are very cool with different platforms to work on. This was the canvas kit and I was able to transfer this pic of Montana onto it and then do added decorating to it.

These are just some different views of the canvas.

Hope you enjoyed learning a few things about our precious boy on his special day.

2009-07-12T00:41:00.013-04:00

I got to be the guest artist over at Sunday Postcard Art again and I chose the theme of 'fabric'. The above piece is all fabric. The egg(fabric) and the background right behind the egg can be found over at Retro Cafe Art. Kristin has the best fabric sheets over there and such a variety. I used my die cut machine to cut out the heart and swirl from fabric. A big thanks to my buddy Kaz for sending me the gorgeous gold-tone fabric, the lace and the beads........thank you ;)

These next three pieces are paper and fabric. I originally had these scanned in but wasn't happy with what my scanner did so I went back and took pics of these pieces. Love these rubber stamps.

All of the main images are rubber stamps from Stampsmith.

I received the above award from the talented Kelly Lish. I am supposed to list 7 facts about myself. I am sure I have probably mentioned this stuff before but here goes:
1. I am left-handed.
2. I was born on halloween.
3. I have never had the chicken pox. And yes, I know that it is worse if you get it when you are older. I have four other siblings and none of us ever got the chicken pox.
4. I am a Nascar fan.........go Tony Stewart!
5. I love mangoes.
6. I am only 5' 1" tall(or maybe I should say short, lol).
7. I am very bad when it comes to emailing.

2009-07-04T00:40:00.002-04:00

The background on the above card is wax paper. Alot of times I have wax paper under my pieces, when I am creating, to catch all the ink and paint. I saved this piece of wax paper and sewed it to some white cardstock. I love the feel and look of wax paper when it has all my leftover mess on it :) The little cake diecut is from Retro Cafe Art.

-------------------------------------------------------------
I am the featured artist in the August issue of Craft Stamper which is a U.K. based rubberstamping magazine. Have to say 'thanks' to Katy for inviting me to participate. It is always an honor to be asked to do these type of features and means alot. Thanks bunches.
--------------------------------------------------------
Please have a fun and safe holiday weekend. Happy 4th of July :)

New Paperbag Studios Stamps

2009-07-01T08:41:00.008-04:00

Below are the new images from Paperbag Studios that have been released today.

The winner

of this UM stamp sheet from the previous posts comments is:

ute said...
Audrey,your new projects are so inspirating, wonderfulI love all images, please include me to the Paperbag Studio für sheet.Your little sunshine is so lovely and you are a sooo great mom,enjoy this moments :-))

--------------------------

Thank you so much to all of you for the wonderful comments and for entering the contest. Ute...please email me with your mailing address so I can get these awesome new stamps in the mail to you.

---------------------------

Here are 4 more pieces that I created with the new plate.

Hope everyone is having a great week. Later :)

Just a few things...including a give-away.

2009-06-24T17:15:00.000-04:00

Sneak Peek & Give-away

There will be 7 new Paperbag Studios rubberstamps released next week on July 1st. Above is one of my samples and I used one of the new images on it(the heart & circles w/stitching). The give-away is for the UM sheet that has all 7 new images on it. If you want to be entered for the new unmounted rubberstamp sheet being released next week then leave a comment on this post. Anybody can enter. I will announce the winner on July 1st and will show more of my samples with the new images on that day.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Facebook

I never thought I would join but this cowgirl roped me in and now I am over there quite a bit. This friend and this friend have got me hooked on some of the games over there. If you are a member of Facebook look me up over there. And if you aren't a member, go sign up...you might like it :)

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

....more Acey Deucy

The two images below are from an UM sheet called the Medici Collection that is no longer available.

-------------------------------------------------------------------------
Summer Fun

I get a package of 100 water balloons for $1. It takes me an hour to fill them all up. It then takes only about 10 minutes to bust them all. I love seeing him laugh, have fun and chase us trying to hit us with them. Good times!
Thanks for stopping by. It is always appreciated :)

Don't forget to leave a comment for the Paperbag Studios um stamp sheet giveaway.

Acey Deucy

2009-06-12T09:59:00.009-04:00

I was making some samples(not shown here) with the re-release of some Lynne Perrella Acey Deucy rubberstamps for an assignment for Stampington. I really love the Acey Deucy line and pulled out other images in the line that I have had.

These stamps are timeless and they are the kind that I could never get rid of. If you are looking to start collecting these stamps or to add to your collection you can visit Stampington( <--scroll to the bottom to see the other lines) to see what they have available.
Stamp Diva also has a very good selection of Acey Deucy rubberstamps.
There are some images that aren't available anymore. I only wish that I had gotten more of them when I first discovered the line.

Anyways, I am off to have more fun with all the Acey Deucy images that I do have. I will post more with them in my next post. Have a great weekend!

2009-06-07T01:09:00.011-04:00

The theme this week over at Sunday Postcard Art is 'vintage bathing beauties'.
Last week it was 'happy birthday' but I am just now posting my postcard for it. Happy belated blog birthday to the fabulous ladies of Sunday Postcard Art for providing such fun themes each week.
-------------------------------------------------------------------
Since I was working with these little cake images from Retro Cafe Art , I decided to make some birthday paper & fabric ATC's with them. Below are the three that I made and they use fabric backgrounds from Retro Cafe Art also.

----------------------------------------------------------
Paperbag Studios will be releasing 7 new rubberstamp images in a few weeks so be on the lookout for those. I have already been playing with the new stamp sheet and will post some things in a week or two.

-----------------------------------------------------------

Happy Birthday to the coolest person I know.......the awesome and talented Carlene. Thanks for being such a good friend. <-- and yes Carlene, I know...short on words, lol.

Numbers

2009-05-24T01:53:00.007-04:00

A little something for Sunday Postcard Art where the theme is 'numbers'.

p.s. Kristin is having a 'name that mannequin contest'. Go check it out and help her with a 'name'.

2009-05-14T22:11:00.004-04:00

The theme over at Dans ma maison is 'wood'. Even though I am late in participating I just couldn't pass this theme up. Above is a pic of the wood pieces I assembled for my little house. In Somerset Workshop I used this shape but it was an original old fence top. This one is a replica that is cut from wood and I have many of them to work on now. And here is my piece all done. And yes, I am obviously stuck on doing the 'things on strings' bit in my pieces :) You probably can't tell but those balloons are tied around the handle of the wagon on the image.

-------------------------------------------------------------------

Roben-Marie/Paper Bag Studios has the May stamp challenge up and it is to use this background paper. Of course you have to use a Paperbag Studios rubberstamp also.

I created this trio of atc's using the downloadable background and tried to keep them simple so that the background could be seen. I used script rubberstamps from the Reminiscent UM Sheet. And the little boy images are from the Dream Notions UM Sheet. Hope that you Paperbag Studios fans will participate.

Above is Montana who was so happy to show me the little garden at his school. He is such a cutie-pie :)

2009-05-07T13:29:00.008-04:00

This piece is done on canvas and the top pic has got shadows/glares since it is such a sunny day here in Florida. The bottom pic is more of a true color and shows the the decorative tacks that I put on the sides.

These are more of the tall card format that I love. They measure about 3.5 inches wide x 9 inches tall. You might have to click on the image to see them better.

The one above "Every photo tells a story...what is your story" is my fave.

The above images I used in my previous post and I just had to use the rest of this collage sheet with them since they are so pretty.

Top and bottom pieces are paper/fabric pieces made to hang. I used fabric images from this sheet.

For the first time I tried my hand at adding little beads to a fabric piece and I really enjoyed it and like the look. Next time I will have to do more beads...I had to start slow for now :)

***All images(collage and fabric), rubberstamps, gold decorative butterfly, tags, canvas, clear circle(used on hanging butterfly) and white pearl beads are all from Red Lead***

A big Happy Mothers Day to all of you!!!

Butterflies

2009-04-26T01:55:00.015-04:00

Thanks to Sunday Postcard Art for asking me to be the guest artist this week. I chose the theme of 'butterflies'. These first two 4 x 6 pieces is what I made for the theme.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Do you know what these are below?.................
....they are matchbooks. I made my own templates in various sizes. This particular template is actually atc sized. Stampers Sampler is having a call for matchbooks and if you need a template they have one available here. Their template is smaller than mine though.
The matchbooks are really quick and fun to make and they would be great to trade with other people. They would be very easy to mail in a regular envelope as long as you aren't embellishing them. The pics above and below show them open with paper inside.
Even though matchbooks are horizontal I really liked the vertical look. So I will be making lots of these little things in different sizes to trade.
Above is just a little fabric atc where I was trying to do the zigzag stitch on the edge but I really messed up one corner. I really need to keep practicing :)

***All collage images and rubberstamps in this entire post are from Red Lead***

One last thing, re: my previous post of 'rusty tin atc's'. On the first atc the rusty grid/wire type of stuff originally started out as latchhook material. I used a rust solution by Modern Options on it to make it look like rusty wire.

p.s. to my buddies Carlene and Kaz...........is this post wordy enough for you two :0)

Rusty Tin ATC's

2009-04-21T00:00:00.006-04:00

The base for these atc's are little rusty tins. I got mine from Retro Cafe Art....this page...but I had to cut them down to atc size. I used a razor knife to cut the rusty tins.I love the look of the rusty tin and tried not to cover too much of it up since that would defeat my purpose of using it.
All of the angel collage images are also from Retro Cafe Art.

p.s. To Kaz(a great friend)...thank you bunches for the two blog awards.

Sunday Postcard

2009-04-05T01:56:00.008-04:00

'Swan Lake' is the theme this week over at Sunday Postcard Art.
These three 4 x 6 postcards that I made are my take on the theme.
Swan, postmark, background and script rubberstamps from Oxford Impressions....this plate(<--click there).
Ballerina rubberstamps are from Stamp Francisco. The ballerina stamps can be found here, here, here, here and here.

Someday

2009-03-30T10:03:00.011-04:00

***updated 3/31 with info about Paperbag Studios 'Stamper Appreciation Promotion'. Details at end of post***

An Artist Someday

4 x 7.75 inches

words and numbers rubberstamp by Red Lead

(click on image to enlarge)

______________________________________________________________

Stamper Appreciation Promotion

Calling all rubber stampers…Paperbag Studios is hosting a Stamper Appreciation Promotion during the month of April and we hope you will join in! Paperbag Studios will be giving away books, gift certificates and art supply packets during the promotion! Come join in and show us your awesome talents!! To read all the details for this please go to the Paperbag Studios blog. I know there are alot of Paperbag Studios fans out there so go get those stamps and put them to use and enter the giveaway. All you gotta do is create a card or project using Paperbag Studios rubberstamps, upload it to the PBS Gallery and then make sure to leave a comment on the Paperbag Studios Blog so that Roben-Marie will know that you have entered the giveaway.

A Little of Everything

2009-03-24T12:00:00.006-04:00

All 3 of these pieces are done on wood.
The house one of course is my favorite.
All collage images on these three pieces are from Red Lead.
As you can tell, my picture taking skills have not improved, lol.
For once I am trying to get some cards made to send to friends so I have been making some Easter cards.
On the card above and below I have used this material called Natural Sinamay. I used it for the background on this book cover. On these two cards though I painted the Natural Sinamay with acrylic paint. The top one has brown acrylic and the bottom is painted with blue acrylic. Love this stuff!
**Collage images on the above two cards are also from Red Lead**

More easter cards.

These are paper and fabric bits and pieces put together.

All 5 of these use fabric images from Retro Cafe Art.

Below is my favorite one. It will be on it's way to my very special friend Debbie Kaste.

Below is another digital kit that Roben-Marie has put together based on a background that I created.

If you do any type of digital art you must check out her online store.

And of course you know that I always save the best for last...my Montana :)

Below he is wearing his new pair of swim trunks. Had to show this pic for my buddy Kaz who will get a kick out of them. They are of his favorite person.......SpongeBob SquarePants.

Some pics on his bike...which he loves and has so much fun on.

Okay, that is it for now. That was a long post, so I thank you if you made it through it all, lol. Have an awesome week!

***Edited***... please know that Montana does have a helmet. At the time these pics were taken he was done with his bike riding and had taken his helmet off when I asked him if I could get some pics of him sitting on his bike. Because his bike still has training wheels on it, he was able to just sit on his bike and pose for these pics. Thank you for the concerned and caring emails :)

Birds and Nests and Eggs, Oh My!

2009-03-09T00:20:00.001-04:00

I was making some things with some goodies that I got from Red Lead Paperworks this week and saw that what I was making fit the theme over at Theme Thursday. On the piece above I turned my eggs into balloons. Both the top and bottom pieces are done on book covers. (You will have to click on the pics to see them larger.)
I think I have officially found my most favorite collage sheet of birds, nests and eggs. There are two different versions...........here and here. I especially love the silhouette of the little girl and bird fountain on them.
If you saw the log baby post where I made many cards with one stamp, then you will notice I did the same with these three cards. I used this stamp in making them.

**Supplies: rubberstamps, collage images, ribbon, buttons, lucky & grow bingo cards are all from Red Led Paperworks**

Thanks for stopping by and have a great week!

Marie

2009-03-02T15:22:00.011-05:00

Just playing around with the new Marie Antoinette rubberstamp plate from Oxford Impressions.

Hope everyone is having a great week :)

p.s. Did you see my new blog banner? I have to thank Roben-Marie for creating it. I wanted a more updated picture of my precious little Montana and I think she did a fabulous job with it....she is the best! And she made it using the Urban Gate digital kit that was based on one of my backgrounds.

Stamp Francisco & Their Giveaway

2009-02-19T06:00:00.003-05:00

***Details about the giveaway are at the end of this post***

If you get Somerset Studio then you have seen the 'With One Stamp' section and if you get Stampers' Sampler then you have seen the same idea but it is called 'DPOV'(different point of view).

I decided to do a blog post with the same concept: using one rubberstamp and making various cards with it.

The stamp I chose is by Stamp Francisco and it is the most darling little boy image. Click here to see the original image. It is actually a Christmas stamp.

I decided to make cards showing how the stamp can be used throughout the whole year.

You might have to click on some of these for a better view.

Besides using it for all the different holidays/occasions you can make tons of 'sentiment/quote' cards with the image.

If the cards look crooked, don't worry, it is just my poor picture taking skills, lol. I usually scan them in but had to take pics this time.

My favorite card: the 4th of July one a few cards up :)

***Giveaway Details Below***

Stamp Franciso has a new blog and they are having a giveaway with some great goodies including the Log Baby rubberstamp that I have used in this post. Go check out their new blog (<-- <--click there) and enter their fabulous giveaway on the Feb. 19th post. You could be the lucky winner of some awesome rubberstamps, collage sheets and other goodies. Make sure to read the giveaway rules and Good Luck!

Oxford Impressions Fairy Sweets

2009-02-03T11:19:00.011-05:00

These were all made using the latest rubberstamp plate from Oxford Impressions called "Fairy Sweets".

And of course a few pics of my little sweetie :)Have a great day!

Montana Holiday Pics

2008-12-31T00:38:00.014-05:00

Montana helped decorate the tree this year and he did the bottom half or as far as he could reach. Above is probably the smallest cluster of ornaments he did but below is what most of the bottom half of the tree looked like. There were clusterS of 5-8 ornaments everywhere, lol.
The pic below is not clear at all but I had to show it since it was our tree topper made by Montana. Most of the kids in the class were wrapping the pipe cleaners around the cone like the green one is but Montana got really creative and stuck the pipe cleaner ends inside the button holes :)
And below is a pic of Montana's baby Christmas tree that he had to put beside the regular one.
Montana decorating holiday cookies.

The snowman masterpiece :)

Later that same day, Montana was jumping around and doing little flips and I got this pic of him laughing.

Christmas Eve at my sisters. This is Montana and his cousin Braedyn. It was purely coincidental that they were dressed similar.

awwwwwwwwwwwww....the hug :)

Not going to bore you with a bunch of opening gift pictures so I am showing his two favorites. The first is a Geo Trax accessory. He got quite a few accessories and track for his Geo Trax that takes up almost his whole room. Will have to take a pic of that one day.

And the Leap Frog Tag reading system. I think it is the coolest little gadget. It is a pen that he can run over the words and it reads them or he could have it read the whole page. He can also touch anybody or thing on the page and it will say something. He can have up to 5 books stored in that pen. His favorite is the SpongeBob SquarePants book :)

That's it for now.

HAPPY NEW YEAR TO EVERYBODY!!!

New Paperbag Studios

2008-12-07T10:22:00.011-05:00

Paperbag Studios has a whole new site and it looks awesome. They just came out with a new half sheet of rubberstamps called 'Stitched and Tied' and here are two cards I made using them. It is a half sheet of elements like the button, safety pin, some zig zag stamps, string, etc. You can see the new plate here.

And if you are into digital, Paperbag Studios has a whole new digital section and gallery. I am showing the below digital kit as I think it is so cool that it was made from one of my backgrounds. Roben-Marie did a beautiful job with the kit(and all the kits) and the whole new site. Oh, and there is also a new Paperbag Studios Blog.

p.s. Thank you to Marva and Sheri for blog awards they gave me.

Also, I know some of you know about our dog that passed away very unexpectedly. Thank you so much for the heartfelt emails. They are much appreciated. Hugs!

Hope everyone has a great day.

Catching Up

2008-11-25T09:47:00.015-05:00

Since I haven't blogged in awhile this will be a long 'catch up' post. First I have to say thanks to Rosie and Linda of Awfully Big Art Adventure. After seeing my Chunky ATC's they did a challenge on their blog and because of circumstances I was not able to participate at that time but now I am catching up with the chunky atc's and catching up with their other challenges. Above uses one of my favorites images(from Retro Cafe Art). I adore that little angel image. Below I did a chunky ATC with one of my fave pics of my own little angel :)
And speaking of Chunky ATC's, you will see an article I have on them in the new issue of Somerset Memories(Dec/Jan). I invited a few people and challenged them to decorate the blocks by using family images and journaling. You will be able to see blocks by Carlene Federer, Gayle Martin and Kristin Hubick in the article. Below is just a small snippet of the article showing one of my chunky atc's using a pic of my grandmother.

Okay, so back to Rosie and Linda's challenge blog.......after the chunky atc's they had an 'inchie' challenge and I have to say that I could never do inchies, that is until this weeks challenge of doing an 'altered tin'. Below is my altered tin and it originally is one of those tin gift card holders. I have used the image below before but couldn't resist using it again. I am a dog lover(we have a toy poodle).

Below is a pic of the inside. The bottom portion is another collage. The top is where I finally did some inchies. The best part is that they are magnet inchies so they can be put on the fridge :) All the dog collage images are from Stamp Francisco.

If you haven't checked out Rosie and Linda's blog then you must visit it. I will definitely be participating in future challenges they have.

For awhile I have been seeing cupcakes everywhere and finally made one myself. The other month I found these small ceramic bowls at Target. They were 2 for $1 and they were perfect for making the cupcakes. I did a very simple Christmas themed one. The little girl at the top is a rubberstamp from Oxford Impressions.

Last month in the Stampington Post Script newsletter I had some Christmas cards and ornaments. Below is a mini clipboard ornament. You can find the plain mini clipboards at A.C. Moore. They are 3 for $1. To see the set that I made for Stampington please click here. You will be able to see better pics and instructions which are simple.

Of course I had to make one with Montana and a pic of his first winter.

I also made a set of Christmas cards for Stampington. Below is one of my faves and I have made a few. Just something about the tree and the white leaves that I like. To see the set I made for Stampington please click here. When you go to the link you can click on the pics to see them bigger.

Below are three fabric/paper cards I made using some door images from Retro Cafe Art. The door images are fabric...love them.

"Future"

"Live Simply"

"Peace & Love"

If you got the Nov/Dec issue of Somerset Studio then you saw the article I had with tall Christmas cards. I had so much fun making the tall cards that I am still making some. These look totally different than the ones in the article but they are the same size. They measure 9 x 4 inches. I really like working on this format since it is very hard for me to work on a perfect square format.

"Happy Holidays"

You will have to click on the pics to see them bigger.

"Merry Christmas"

All images are from Retro Cafe Art.

"Joy"

I think my post is finally done :) We wish everyone a very happy and safe Thanksgiving. After Thanksgiving we will be putting up our Christmas tree. Montana will have so much fun :)

Can you guess...?

2008-10-04T00:00:00.006-04:00

Above looks like some type of rusty wire right? Well I made it too look like that but it is NOT wire at all. Can you guess what this originally started out as? To find out what this started out as and to see my latest piece using it, please go to Lucrecer Braxton's fabulous Art Slam blog. <-- <--yes, click there and then scroll down a wee bit :0)

Below I painted the same mystery material with different colors of acrylic paint.

Chunky ATC's

2008-09-25T13:05:00.013-04:00

***I have been having computer issues on and off lately. So if you haven't seen me around or I haven't emailed you back...the computer is the reason. Hopefully everything is working fine and I will be able to catch up with everything and everyone this next week***

Now for my post :

I call these 'chunky atc's'. They are cut from wood. The face of them measure the same as an atc(2.5 x 3.5) but they are 1.5 inches deep so you have some sides to play with. Above are the plain pieces of wood. They are cut from a 2 x 4. The real dimensions of a 2 x 4 are actually a 1/2 inch off so the face of a 2 x 4 is actually 3.5 inches wide.
All you would have to do is cut every 2.5 inches along a 2 x 4 and you will have what I call a 'chunky atc'. I also make sure to decorate them like atc's in that they don't have things sticking out or other pieces attached like arms or legs or anything protruding to change the size.
Above I did some green crayon drippings on the piece which you can see on the side and I also used some little tacks on the image of the girl. I even attached some lace type fabric behind the image.
A 2 x 4 is very inexpensive. I think when I got mine it was $2.75 for an 8 ft. piece. I was able to cut around 38 of these out of that one piece. So I have plenty to decorate and trade with friends.
Below is something I like to do. It is the top part of the above chunky atc. I paint some of the wood with brown colored paint and then I carve into it with a sharp tool. It reminds me of when I was young and would carve initials into trees.
.......and why am I talking about Chunky ATC's. Because a 'chunky atc' is one of my projects in Somerset Workshop where you can read about them and see a different one that I did for the issue. I got my issue the other week and it's available now. The little pic in the bottom right of the cover is also one of my pieces done on wood.

Other contributing artists in the magazine besides myself are:

Tena Sprenger

Jill Marie Shulse

Shona Cole

Marsha Williams

Linda Trenholm

Thanks so much for stopping by and also for being patient while I get this computer back on track. Later :)

p.s. before I forget, all the little girl images used above are from Stamp Francisco....from this collage sheet.

Bingo

2008-09-02T12:34:00.005-04:00

The 'Bingo' children's song popped into my head when I started to create these. They were done on vintage bingo playing cards. The collage images are from Stamp Francisco. (the collage images are more black and white then what my scan shows.)
I gotta thank my friend Barbara for the blue leaf on the top piece. Thanks Barbara, I use them very sparingly, lol.

...more halloween

2008-08-29T13:39:00.013-04:00

The five atc's above were for a few personal trades. They use collage images from Stamp Francisco and also rubberstamps(spider & ink spots) from Stamp Francisco.

For the card above and below I wanted to use these ladies from the April in Paris rubberstamp sheet from Oxford Impressions for a halloween theme. Suzanne also has some collage sheets that I used. My fave is the one with the frames that look like old book pages that held pics.

I have been making samples for the latest stamps out by Stampington. I think they are all so cute and I wanted to use the dinosaur below for a halloween card. All other stamps on card are also by Stampington.

Last but not least....this little mummy is one of my favorite halloween stamps. It's by Penny Black and it is just the cutest. I made an atc(above) and a matching small envie for it below. Scroll stamp also by Penny Black. I gotta thank my friend Gisele for sending me those little envies last year...i love them. They are the perfect size to tuck a little atc into :)

Thanks for looking. Have a fun and safe holiday weekend.

Woodworks

2008-08-14T11:43:00.007-04:00

Above is a 7 inch tall piece of wood. And below is the piece of wood after I decorated.
Isn't that collage image just the cutest...I love it. It was perfect for this piece and who it is made for(a great lady who loves dogs and the number '11' on the piece is a hint). The collage image is from Stamp Francisco. For direct link to collage image click here. They have the cutest dog collage sheets. Of course they also have other animals...I am just partial to dogs as we have a toy poodle.

So anyways, if you got the Stampington Post Script newsletter then you would have seen a piece in it called 'Magic' and if you clicked on the link for a preview of the next Somerset Workshop then you might have noticed that I will be one of the artists. My section is called 'Woodworks' and all of my pieces are done on wood. If you click here and scroll down to the bottom of the page you can get a peek of a few of my pieces in the book. The other artists in the book are fabulous and do such great work and I can't wait to see it. You can pre-order it and it will be available Oct. 1st. When/If you get it let me know what you think.

On a side note: my little one goes back to school on Monday and I am so sad :o( The summer went by way too fast. Okay, just wanted to say that. Later.

Little Ones

2008-08-07T00:30:00.005-04:00

***sorry for the shoddy picture taking skills that I have***

This is a fabric and paper book that I put together. My first one...an actual fabric and paper book :) I've did other little fabric pieces but not an actual book.
Above on the right side page is a transparency that was stamped on and then the edges were burnt and then sewn onto the page.
You might have to squint for the above pic, lol. You can click on all the pics if you want to see them a tad bit better.
Every single collage image, including the children, birds, spools, jewelry, buttons, eggs and doorplate, is from Retro Cafe Art.
I have to interject here for a second and say a huge thanks to Martha who has always answered my questions on sewing ... and trust me, I have lots of questions, lol. I love all of her fabric art. Make sure to visit her blog to see it.
Below is the front of a small accordion book I made. The main panels are sewn on white canvas and then attached to the page.
And below is a pic that will probably have you tilting your head to look at it :) I used more of my faux rusty chipboard pieces on this accordion piece.

And now for my halloween contribution for this post. Below is an oversized pocket holder that measures 6 x 4½.

And the piece inside meaures 6 x 4 inches big. Collage images on this piece and the accordion book are also from Retro Cafe Art.

And look at this cute little guy below. My sister gave birth to him two weeks ago and he is just the cutest. His name is Chase and he is their second son. My sister will have a great story to tell Chase when he is older........the story about his daddy passing out in the delivery room, lol. Patty.....I'm not laughing at you guys, I am laughing with you. Love ya!

P.S. To Paula R. If you are reading this(since i don't have an email address for you) I received your awesome package and I love every. single. thing. It was such a surprise and so thoughtful. Thank you from the bottom of my heart :)

Happy Birthday!

2008-08-05T02:37:00.008-04:00

I just can't believe that it has been 4 years already. Our son is just growing too fast. It feels like it was just yesterday that I had him. I made the above card real quick and did a photo transfer. I love that pic of him.

We love him with all our heart and more. I still look at him and think 'wow, I have a son'. Rick and I were together for 8 years before Montana came along and he is the best thing to happen to us. I could go on and on and get all mushy and stuff but I think you guys know how we feel.

Below is a layout about my song for Montana that was published some issues back in Somerset Memories. It is very special and the center section is what I use for my avatar. Those are his little footprints when he was born. The song is 'The Day Before You' by Rascal Flatts. And if you don't know the song you can play this video and read/sing the words along. There isn't a real video for the song so this one will have to do. I am pretty sure that you will like the song. I listen to it all the time and it always tugs at my heart.

If you remember a few posts back I told you how we go to a pottery place and Montana paints pieces and then they get fired. Well here are some of his finished pieces. Check out those colors. I can't find the little duck he did. He must have hidden it somewhere.

Thanks to everybody that has already emailed me to send happy birthday wishes to Montana. They are so appreciated!

Have a great day!

Overdue Thanks

2008-08-04T10:14:00.003-04:00

I have quite a few people to thank for giving me various blog awards. I am always surprised and honored when people give me them. So thanks to: Seona(so nice & sweet), Anne(dear friend whose been there through it all ;) love ya), Louloupi(my dear french friend, hugs), Gillian(such a creative and wonderful person), Thea(wonderful paintings and other art to look at), Louve Bleue(fabulous new blog to me), Svenja(ahhhhh, my friend Svenja who always helps me out when I am in need of ledger papers and always shows such pretty bits and baubles on her blog--just the kindest), Christine(the master at stamping, love everything she does), Heather(who always makes me smile with her comments), Thealie(love her blog and what she creates).

I also have to say thanks to Kaz(my wingman, lol) for giving me more than one award. Kaz I know you are waiting for me to say something clever and ingenious to crack you up, lol. I thought really hard and was going to say that movie line about 'excellence' but decided not to. So this is what I have to say to you my friend: Let's stop with the small talk and go take down tweedledee and tweedledum and make them cry in their cornflakes. <--hee hee, top that, lol!

Thanks to everyone that also leaves me comments not only about what I create but also about Montana :) Which by the way, there will be a Montana post tomorrow.

Have a great week!

Halloween already?

2008-07-19T16:00:00.013-04:00

I am posting these before and after pics of my halloween page just for my good friend Lucy ;) who asked to see my background before I added everything else to the page. I have to thank Roben-Marie for her encouraging words as I have been using more acrylic paints and trying not to rely on papers for my backgrounds all the time.

Above is the finished page. The woman image is a favorite of mine. I love stamping her on old book pages. You can find her at Stamp Francisco. If you need the direct link to the woman stamp then click here. You will probably be seeing more halloween pages on my blog(I did them last year also) since I love the holiday and I was born on that day :0)

Below is the reason it has taken me almost two weeks to post. I am really slow when it comes to the whole sewing thing. I started out sewing on my cards and figured that I should actually try and make something. This is my first endeavor. I love these little birdies and you can make them for any occasion or holiday. The birdie template is from the book Last-Minute Patchwork + Quilted Gifts <-- <-- <--I love the book :) Below is a pic of some of the birdies I made just trying out different patterns of fabric.
And of course I had to make a halloween themed birdie below.
Hope you guys are enjoying the weekend.

p.s. I haven't forgotten about showing Montana's painted skateboard after it was fired. I am waiting till after I pick up some other ones he did when we went to the pottery place last week. So far he has done a skateboard, a bird, a racecar and a shark.

New PBS Stamps

2008-07-07T00:36:00.004-04:00

In case you didn't know yet, Paperbag Studios has a new unmounted plate/7 stamps available that was just released last week. If you click here you can see the new stamps and also some samples that Roben-Marie and I made using the new images.
Above was done on stampbord and below I used more tyvek by sewing it onto the card and then burning it away with my heat gun.

All rubberstamps by Paperbag Studios.

p.s. I have to thank Carole for the latest blog award going around...the Brillante Weblog. Thanks bunches Carole :)

Mixed Media Monday

2008-07-02T01:10:00.004-04:00

I haven't participated in any challenge blogs in a while so I decided to do Mixed Media Monday this week. The theme is 'dance'. I have been playing around with tyvek which is the same material that the soft priority mailing envelopes are made of. For this card I painted and stamped on one side of the tyvek with Lumiere paint and then sewed the whole piece of tyvek over the card and then took my heat gun to it and burned away whatever I wanted. Below is a close-up(once again i am not good at pics) that shows the left side of the card before I added the embellishments. You should be able to see the holes burned away and how the tyvek crinkles up from the heat gun. You will have to click on the pics to see them larger/clearer.

The stamp images(3 separate stamps that were masked off) are by Rubber Baby Buggy Bumpers which is now sold by Stamp Francisco.

p.s. I also want to wish everybody a happy 4th of July :o)

Rust, Rubberstamping, & Pics

2008-06-28T02:16:00.018-04:00

I have lots of chipboard that has just been sitting around. I also have had the Sophisticated Finishes antique rust kit by Modern Options sitting for too long. So I decided to use the kit and rust up some chipboard and paper. I even rusted up some of the Tim Holtz grungeboard. Now I have a use for my chipboard and it looks and feels just like rusty pieces. The two pics below show all the pieces I did. By the way, the kit is very easy to work with.
In the pic above, if you look at the piece in the lower left corner....well that was done by first rusting up a piece of paper. Then I used one of those cuttlebug embossing folders and ran it through the die cut machine and it gave it that cool textured look. The cogs are chipboard from Cosmo Cricket.
Below are some cards using the most recent plate from Oxford Impressions. And of course I had to put some of the rusty pieces to use on the cards :)

(that little guy embellishment in the card above that is in the lower left corner is from Retro Cafe Art)

Below is a little house book kit that actually has four pages but I didn't put all the pages together. Instead I split them up and made one of these little houses that can stand. I have two pieces left over and will be able to make another. It is also from Retro Cafe Art along with that adorable little window on the front and the collage image on the inside.

I needed to make a couple of baby cards and these stamps from Layers of Color by Laura Campbell were perfect :)

If you are signed up for Stampingtons newsletter then you saw the tray below that I created. I have to say it was one of my favorite projects and I have to thank my dear friend Lucy for providing the pic of her adorable daughter. You can click here to see other pics of it and instructions.

Of course I always save the best for last :0) I did some major cleaning in my room and cleaned off this desk so that Montana could have his own little art desk to create at. I also had to make sure to use one of those large white rolls of paper to go over the desk to prevent him from drawing on it. So you can see his art so far, lol. You can also see some of his little supplies. On the right you can see some 7 Gypsies rubberstamps. He loves them since all he has to do is press down and they stamp. They no longer belong to me, lol.

And below you can see him really concentrating on his creations.

Sorry about some of the pics but the lighting at the time just wasn't that good. Hope I didn't bore you with this post as it was kind of long. Thanks for all of the wonderful comments that are left here. They are so appreciated.

Have a great weekend!

Still here.

2008-06-21T01:16:00.017-04:00

Well I was sick for a few weeks and then I actually got better only to get the most wonderful stomach virus. Actually the whole family ended up getting it but we are all better now. I received my issue of Inspirations and I am so excited as the card on the cover is mine :) The next 7 pics are of little decorated houses. I can't remember the last time that I signed up for a swap but I couldn't resist making little houses. This is for a swap hosted by Sarah. All my houses are the same shape, just different heights. Some are paper and some are fabric. Please excuse the crookedness as these little things kept sliding around on my scanner.

You might have seen the below journal if you are signed up for Stampington's Post Script newsletter. I made 3 different journals using the Angela Cartwright papers and transparencies. The journal below is my fave. You can click here to see all the papers/transparencies and the other journals I made....you will have to scroll down some.

Montana is out of school for the summer and I am so happy as I love having him home. This past week we went to the marine science center and the pic below is Montana coloring a lobster. I know the pic is blurry but it cracks me up as this is his 'cheese' face. I think he learned the whole 'say cheese' thing at school as I never say that to him when taking pics. So whenever I say 'Montana, look at mommy and smile' he will turn and say 'cheese' and give me this scrunched up face look. Love it!
We also went to this pottery place where you can paint pieces and then they will fire it for you and you pick it up the following week. Here is Montana working very hard at painting a skateboard. He had to paint a skateboard because his cousin was doing one. That face with those lips make me smile. I think he was saying 'shhhhhh' to me, lol.
And below is a close-up of his painting. After we get it back I will post a pic of how it looks after being fired. The colors should be much more vibrant and shiney.

Well that is all I can think of for the moment. Have a great weekend!

2008-05-21T09:08:00.011-04:00

Trying to catch up. Been sick -- still sick.

Collage images are from Retro Cafe Art Gallery and I think it is obvious that my favorite collage sheet at the moment is the Lucy collage sheet.
p.s. you will probably have to click on these to see them larger since they uploaded differently for me.

Below was from the other week on the playground slide at the beach.

Above are the two peas in a pod(Montana and daddy)...both with their long hair, lol. Montana's hair has since been cut short. And oh, how daddy hated to see that, lol.

Hope everyone has a great day. Later :)

ATC Shrine

2008-05-01T23:25:00.010-04:00

First of all, I am not good at picture taking. These pics are the best that I could do :) Kris Hubick has these very cool atc shrines over at Retro Cafe Art. I just had to try one out. It comes in pieces and you assemble it which is great because it makes it easier to decorate. I wanted to keep the decorations simple so that any atc would look good in the shrine with the white rub-ons. I then put the shrine together permanently with gel medium.

The next two pictures show how an atc is showcased in the shrine and how it's a perfect fit with no falling down. Now I can have this adorable little piece right on my desk and display a different atc whenever I want.
The collage image of the child is also from Retro Cafe Art. Oh and do you see that white thread on the right hand side of the atc? For some reason whenever I sew I have gobs of thread hanging everywhere and it ends up all over the floor. Because I don't want to waste anything I am putting it in my creations :)
p.s. Dawn B.....if you are seeing this, that little atc(atc only) will be in the mail tomorrow to you :)

Hope everyone has a great weekend!

2008-04-16T01:37:00.004-04:00

Blue April

7 Stories

(Collage images are from Paper Whimsy. All rubberstamps are by Stampington & Co.)

WS & Thanks

2008-04-09T11:04:00.008-04:00

Above is for Wednesday Stamper. Theme this week is 'arrows'. All rubberstamps(arrow collage stamp that looks like houses at the bottom, cupid with bow and arrow, staples, and quote) all by Stampers Anonymous.

I need to thank the following people for giving me the "Arte Y Pico" award. All who are great people and if you have time you should visit their blogs for inspiring things each of them creates. So thanks to:

Karen Brown....LOL, <-- <-- that is all I do when I talk to her. She can say one word and I will bust out laughing. Oh, and she makes the most wonderful pieces.

Lorri........so creative and always has lots of fabulous atc's to check out.

Lucy Edson........my friend and inspiration for wanting to scrapbook more. Even if you don't scrapbook you will definitely find inspiration on her blog. She has the most beautiful layouts.

Gillian.......a truly genuine and sweet person. Her blog always make me smile when I visit.

Nancy James......I am sure most of you have seen Nancy in Somerset Memories. She is so nice and is always making great vintage pieces.

Laura Campbell.......'layers of color' is the name of her site and because I love lots of color this is a definite fave of mine. She has a great sense of color and everything she creates is awesome.

I think I mentioned everyone that nominated me. If I forgot to list you(please forgive me) just let me know.

Thanks and have a great day!

Stampington Project of the Week

2008-04-04T18:52:00.012-04:00

(pic above and below photographed by Vanessa Spencer for Stampington & Company)

If you are signed up for the Stampington Post Script newsletter then you saw this project that I created. These are two pics that are from the Stampington site. I had so much fun decorating this little box. You can see my project by clicking here.
Can you see Montana carrying this little lunchbox to his grandmother to give to her on Mother's Day :o) I think it would be too adorable and a great gift.

I love these collage sheets and made some card tags with them. I used the 'Watercolor Venice' and the 'Ava's Eyes' collage sheets. All of the tops of the tags, the hearts and filmstrip were made using the sheets(by cutting and using punches/die cuts). The butterflies and postage stamps are from the sheets also. All of the rubberstamps are by Stampington & Co.

All these tags are going in the mail tomorrow to some very special people.
As always, thank you for stopping by and have a wonderful weekend!

And the rubberstamps go to....

2008-03-31T20:00:00.006-04:00

Liz F. said...
Gorgeous work as always. You are so creative. My fave colors are Archival Mustard, Distress Fired Brick and of course Versafine Onyx Black.
3/29/2008 9:26 AM

I wrote each persons name on a slip of paper and threw them all into Montana's beach pail and Liz F.'s name is the one Montana pulled out. Congrats Liz!!! Make sure to email me with your address. My email is available on the left sidebar.

I would like to thank each and everyone one of you for taking the time to leave a comment and answering the question. It was fun to read everybodys 'favorites' and I now have a list of new colors to check out.

As for my favorite colors...my favorite color inkpad is probably Colorbox Chalk Yellow Ochre. My favorite acrylic paint is Fresh Foliage. Montana's favorite inkpad(this week, lol) is Adirondack Lettuce by Ranger Ink.

Thanks again and have a most wonderful week!

New Stamps & Blog Giveaway

2008-03-27T00:26:00.009-04:00

I've been having so much fun playing with the new Paperbag Studios rubberstamps.
All three of these pieces use stamps from both of the new unmounted sheets.
There are two new unmounted sheets available. One of the sheets has the frames that I used for the bottom two pieces, so make sure you check those out on the site. Now for the blog giveaway :o) Thanks to Roben-Marie, owner of Paperbag Studios, I have an extra unmounted stamp sheet. We thought it would be fun to have a giveaway. The "Scrap & Journal Tools" unmounted stamp sheet shown below is for the giveaway.
To enter the giveaway please leave a comment answering this question: what is your favorite color inkpad or your favorite acrylic paint color....the actual name. Anybody can enter...yes, even international. There is no right or wrong answer. I just thought this question would be a great way to discover some new colors. Someone will be picked randomly. The giveaway ends Monday March 31st at noon(eastern time) and the winner will be announced the same day at 8 p.m.(eastern time). Good luck!

Crusade No. 18

2008-03-20T12:07:00.015-04:00

The crusade this month over at the GPP Street Team blog is to 'cut it out'. To design and cut a stencil or rubberstamp. I am sure some of you could guess that I would be carving some cogs since I love them and can't seem to find any cool cog rubberstamps out there. The top five stamps in the pic below I made for me. The smaller black cog I did years ago and still like since it has gotten some wear and tear and looks battered up when stamped. For the numbers rubberstamp: the numbers are significant and it was intentional to have the numbers backwards when stamped.

Now if you look right above you will see the 'M', train and face which were all made for Montana. He loves circles so I had to do the circles around his initial. That face is supposed to be the Iron Giant and Montana would have me draw it all the time on his papers and chalkboard. He is still in the scribbling everywhere stage but finally started to draw the Iron Giant the other week. He would draw it really huge. After seeing this post of Michelle's(look at the bottom of her post), I got the idea to take one of his gajillion drawings of the robot and resize it on the computer and then make a rubberstamp of his own drawing. So below is his little version of the Iron Giant, which by the way is a great little movie and I can't believe that it has already been 9 years since it was released. Montana is 3 and loves it and can do the scenes along with the movie, lol.

Edited: Michelle mentioned the 'perfect mini-circle trick'. I made my solid mini circles with a japanese screw punch. You only want to push it in about 1/8 of an inch. Just enough to give you a good outline of the circle. Then you can come from the outside of the circle with your carving tool up to the outline you just made and the pieces will pop out around the circle to give you a perfect solid circle shape. That is how i made my circles. If you have those round metal mini tins you can use the bottom or lid in the same manner to make a perfect solid circle. Even older cookie cutters that have the sharp edges would work by pushing them into your stamp material. (I think cookie cutters now are a little more rounded and not as sharp.) So anything that you can find that has a sharp outline that you can press into the block would work in getting a perfect outlined solid image. Hope all that made sense :o)

2008-03-10T12:32:00.012-04:00

Above is a page I did for the ever so patient Jane :o) It's 8.5 x 11 and the color is a tad off in that the dress is more white in real life.

(on a side note: Happy Birthday Suzanne!!!)

Inspiration + Mess =

2008-02-25T19:08:00.007-05:00

My Inspiration

(one of my favorite pics taken last year)

plus my mess

(I won't even post what the whole room looks like)

...equals these pieces in the newest issue of Somerset Studio for the 'With One Palette' article. Besides being my inspiration for all of these pieces, Montana also helped me out with them. For the alphabet blocks he did all the scribbling for me :o)
My scan of the page is a bit off but Stampington did an awesome job with how it appears in the mag and with the colors being spot on. I gotta thank Sylvia Bissonnette since according to the photo credits she did the pics.

Thanks for all the emails I have received for it and thanks for all the encouraging words everybody leaves me.

p.s. Thanks to my friend Kris H. for another 'you make my day' award. Kris, you know I feel the same...hugs! :o)

p.p.s. gotta thank Gillian since I just saw she gave me the award also :o)

New Oxford Impressions

2008-02-20T20:23:00.015-05:00

Suzanne has a new rubberstamp sheet over at Oxford Impressions. I love this set and made these cards using the new stamps.

I think I was staring at Suzanne's adorable pink egg card for so long that it got stuck in my head and I ended up creating this blue egg card.

Below, I turned the egg stamp upside down to make balloons :o)

p.s. Gotta thank a few more people for giving me the 'you make my day' award. Mary-Beth gave me the award last month. Gretz and Linda also just gave the award to me so 'thanks' to all of you :o)

The Hoops

2008-02-15T20:30:00.011-05:00

Are you signed up for Stampington's newsletter? If so, then you saw these embroidery hoops I decorated. And if you didn't get the newsletter then click here to see my project. These were so much fun and I have been making more. I am not used to using 'red' but when I got the French-Inspired Home book I was so inspired to use some bold red colors and fabric which are shown on the cover and throughout the book. It is a great book with lots of pretty pics and some projects that I want to try and make like an apron and 'tool kit wraps'. If you make some of these hoops, make sure to use something like batting on the back of the fabric when sewing the central part. I am sure everybody already knows this but I had to learn the hard way(i am new to sewing, remember) when I didn't back it with anything and thought that one little piece of fabric would hold everything, lol....now I know better. And to put a different spin on the monogrammed hoops, I made one for myself with a pic of Montana to hang in my room.Have an awesome weekend!

Journal Stuff

2008-02-11T16:06:00.001-05:00

This months crusade over at the GPP Street Team blog is to 'make a journal kit'. Below is a pic of my favorite tote to carry art stuff around. You can get a better idea of what it looks like here(the updated version)...mine just happens to be green(my fave color) and black. As you can see there are plenty of pockets and has enough room to hold my journal also.
Below you can see some of the contents which are things that I use all the time. My oil pastel crayons are a must have since I use those all the time. There are some little paint jars of my fave color combination right now(green, white, and blue). Let's see...walnut ink, a few of my favorite stamps, number/letter cards, pieces of scrap paper, pens, foam brushes, rub-ons, brads, some punches. Some other things not shown are my favorite brown and blue gel pens, a block for unmounted stamps, stapler and of course some baby wipes to clean my hands of all the crayon colors.
And below is a journal page I just did with my supplies. It is about Montana's first day of pre-school last year. The right side of the page is a piece of the shirt he wore on the first day. I added some alphabet ribbon in the shape of an 'M' and the whole shirt piece flips up to show all of my jounaling of my thoughts and emotions of that day.
If you haven't played in the GPP Crusades then this is a great time to start. It is an easy and fun topic and it is great to see what other people have in their journal kit.

Have a great week!

Longest Post Ever

2008-01-17T17:12:00.001-05:00

Yep, this is a pretty long post of what I have been doing. I finally made my own journal and of course it will be about Montana. It is hard for me to scrapbook the pages that i visualize in my head so I decided to try and relax and just mess around when doing these pages. The book is made by using the button hole stitch and measures 6 inches by 8 inches.

Above is a view of the different kinds of papers I used for the inside pages.

And above is my first spread. You might have to click on it to see it bigger since it is a double spread. I can't believe how terrible my handwriting has gotten. It used to be neat. I need to start writing more. I didn't draw that train on my own. Montana has a train cookie cutter set and i used it as a template.
I know most of you know what these things are above. I was given a ring of discontinued laminate chips the other year and they have just been sitting collecting dust. So I decided to put them to some use by making these:
They are notepads. I have been using fabric lately and wanted to make some notepads using fabric covers but I also wanted the notepads to be real sturdy and not bend. I create the covers on fabric and then sandwich the laminate chip in between the cover and another piece of fabric. I then sew the fabric together with the laminate chip inside. Then I use the scissors for the decorative edges. You can see in the above pic what I am talking about. I took a pic with the pages showing. I have been going through all of my paper scraps to use as the inside pages. It is a great way to lessen my scrap pile. Also these pics show the little pads held together with ribbon but that was only so i could scan it flat. I am actually having them held with some silver rings.
The one above I made for myself :o)

I couldn't forget about Wednesday Stamper. The theme this week is 'kings'. The boy stamp is by Stampers Anonymous. The dots and king chess pieces are by Green Pepper Press.

Below are some cards I made with some collage images from Retro Cafe Art Gallery. At first I wasn't sure what to make but then Kris mentioned that the cupcakes would be perfect for birthday cards...now why didn't I think of that :o) The last one is a valentine one though.

Let's see...what else. Oh, i gotta thank a few people for the 'you make my day' award that is going around. Thanks to Deb, Joanne, Sanja and Kaz.

I know I have to catch up on emails and blog visiting and will do that soon. Montana has a 4 day weekend and I am so glad. I love having him home with me :o)

p.s. Debbie K....I haven't forgotten about you :o)

Hope everyone has a wonderful weekend.

Hodgepodge Post

2008-01-03T01:01:00.001-05:00

This weeks Wednesday Stamper theme is 'gothic arch'. I have to say that Beryl Taylor and her beautiful gothic arch book has always been my inspiration for these arches. The first time I saw her arch book was on the cover of the Winter 2005 issue of Cloth Paper Scissors. Then in 2006 her book Mixed Media Explorations came out and I got to see her arch book even more up close. After always admiring all of her beautiful work I decided to make an arch in the tall slender format and I used paper and fabric for it. I decided to turn it upside down so that I could hang it up. It measures 5" x 10" and the stamps are by Stampington. Oh, and if you are a huge Beryl Taylor fan like I am then get the new issue(Jan/Feb '08) of Cloth Paper Scissors because she is in there.

The other week I got my comp issue of the above book: Altered! Art Projects and was so excited to see my hanging hearts on the cover. Even cooler was seeing my 'shake and bake' buddy Carlene also on the cover with the funky and fun cowgirls shadow box. (if you have seen Talladega Nights then you know 'shake and bake', lol)
And here is my Lil Helper.........he can fix things and is also an artist in the making :o)

Have a great day!

Merry Christmas

2007-12-25T00:02:00.000-05:00

Here is a pic of Montana last night. I love that smile. He wouldn't put the little hat on for me but he did for daddy....hmmmmpppphhhhh :o)

Below is the last thing that I will be making for the year. The pic was taken before I added holes and ribbon for it to be hung. I made it for my sister and that is her little cutie son on the piece.
I hope everyone has a wonderful Christmas and Happy New Year. Thanks for all the visits and comments that are not only left for me but also for Montana. It means alot. They are always a joy to read. I have met so many wonderful people through my blog and have made lots of new friendships this year and I hope to meet and be inspired by many more of you in the coming year. Many blessings to all of you.
XOXO
(hugs from me....kisses from Montana)

See ya in 2008!!!

WS & More Xmas Cards

2007-12-07T10:55:00.000-05:00

Theme for Wednesday Stamper this week is 'toys' so I had to use this adorable little image. All background stamps(swirls, tree, and childhood words) are by Stampington.

Below are more Christmas cards that I have been making.
The card above and below use rubberstamp images by Oxford Impressions.

The card above and below use more images from Kristin's collage sheets. I decided to use some of her little children images to make some gift tags that were quick and easy.

And below is a quick card that I made cuz I wanted to try out the bird/sparrow die-cut for the Sizzix.

Hope everyone has a wonderful weekend!

My Muse

2007-11-28T10:58:00.000-05:00

The theme this month over at the GPP Street Team blog is 'muse'. I think anybody that visits my blog already knows who my muse is...........my little Montana :o) I won't go into all the mushy details about my feelings and all but he is my muse and inspires me all the time. I created the above with one of my favorite pictures of him where it looks like he is in such deep thought. You might have to click on it to see it clearer.

Below is a picture that his teacher took of him when they were at recess. I love the expression. When his teacher gave me this picture I was inspired by him and the colors, hence the similarity in the page and picture colors.
p.s. If you happen to get the latest Somerset Memories you can see a page I did with Montana's baby feet and my song for him(on pg. 70). That page actually came about from one of Michelle's earlier Crusade themes last year...I believe it was Crusade #2. My little blog avatar is a section of the page that was pub'd....love those little baby feet :o)

Hope everyone has a great day!

2007-11-22T00:38:00.000-05:00

Happy

Thanksgiving!

and please be safe if you are going out tomorrow for holiday shopping.

Cards & the Stampington Post Script

2007-11-14T01:47:00.001-05:00

I am never good at getting Christmas cards made on time and in the mail. This year I decided to try and get some made and sent out. I just hope it doesn't end with these that I have made so far, lol. I made a few little house shaped Christmas cards and think I will make more of them since they are fairly easy to make.
These first three cards all use rubberstamps from Oxford Impressions. Suzanne has a brand new winter plate out and it is awesome. I stamped the little boy and girl with Stazon and colored them in with the photo twin markers.
Above I just colored the tree branches with a green colored pencil and highlighted with a white gel pen.
All of the collage images below are by Kristin Hubick and can be found here. She has new Christmas collage sheets that are too adorable.

The main image below isn't from one of her Christmas collage sheets but from one of her halloween collage sheets. I scratched the witch's hat out that the little girl had on and then put a rub-on over it. I also put one of the little santa hats on her. It's my favorite card :o)

Are you signed up for Stampington's Post Script newsletter? If so, then you got the latest one with my little project showing the little holder using a library pocket. You can go here to see it if you didn't get the postscript. Below I made another holder(like the postscript project) and made an atc to go in it. The bottom pic shows the holder apart and then the atc.

Thanks for all the get wells for Montana. He is all good and healthy now. Hope everyone is having a great week.

p.s. if you have a problem figuring out the pocket holder in the postscript just email me and I will help as best as I can :o) Have a great day!

Happy cough cough Halloween

2007-10-31T11:22:00.000-04:00

Well this halloween outfit was thrown on haphazardly. I had to be quick since Montana is sick...poor little thing. You can tell just from those eyes that he is sick :o( It just breaks my heart to see him sick and not being able to participate in Halloween. We were going to take him to the mall to see all the other kids dressed up but he is just not up to it. He had so much fun last year at the mall but there is always next year. Anyways, this outfit was worn for no longer than 5 minutes. He put it on for me to at least take a pic of him.
Hope everyone has a fun and safe halloween. Thanks to everyone for the 'happy birthdays' here and in emails. Also thanks for the cards and goodies :o) Now I gotta go cuddle with my little outlaw and make sure that he gets better soon.

2007-10-21T22:39:00.000-04:00

I couldn't pass this weeks theme up over at Wednesday Stamper as it is one of my favorites................'children'. All the main images used above are rubberstamps by Artchix Studio. They were stamped with Stazon and then colored in with Photo Twin markers.

Below is another page for my personal halloween book :o) The baby collage images are by Kris Hubick. See more of her collage sheets here.
Hope everyone has a great week!

2007-10-05T12:09:00.000-04:00

Another halloween page cuz that is all I know how to do right now...halloween themed stuff. The cute witches image was sent to me from Lorna. I adore this image......thank you Lorna!

I recently got tagged with the latest that is going around. The tag is the middle name thingy. And yes, I am going to skip this tag also but only because my middle name is sooooooooo long. It has almost 10 letters...yikes :o) I am always making excuses for these 'tags' but I need something easy like a 'true/false', 'yes/no', 'left/right' answers kind of tag, lol. I do need to thank a few people for tagging me: Deb Trotter(<---if you haven't been to her blog then go visit now) who does the most awesome western art. Jo...who I believe somehow knew my middle name and tagged me on purpose because of it, lmao. And last but not least the ever so sweet Ilka. Thank you ladies for thinking of me!!!

Friday Fiver

1. What's your favorite cereal? I hardly eat cereal but if I had to choose it would be Honey Bunches of Oats.

2. What is too gross to eat in the morning? I can't think of anything, lol.

3. What time do you go to bed? Lately at midnight.

4. Where do you put your keys? On the kitchen counter.

5. What vegetables do you love? cauliflower and broccoli

Hope everyone has an awesome weekend!

Montana Monday

2007-10-01T12:03:00.000-04:00

I don't know if you guys have heard of Postman Pat but it is a kids show based in the U.K. and it is aired here only on HBO. But according to Postman Pat's website NBC is supposed to be airing the show starting on Oct. 6 which I am hoping the products will be sold here soon cuz I can't find any Postman Pat stuff . Thanks to Jo(<----thank you, thank you, thank you) who lives in the U.K., because she mailed Montana a surprise......Postman Pat and his truck and also a Postman Pat backpack. Montana loves Postman Pat and he goes to the website to watch little snippets of the show and to play games and to color. Every morning Montana has to pack up Postman Pat and Jess(the cat) into his Postman Pat backpack and they ride to school with us. Then I have to explain to Montana that Postman Pat will be safe with me until he gets out of school. When I go to get Montana he grabs the backpack and checks it and takes it inside the house where we usually make it in time to catch the last 15 minutes of the show. And when it is bathtime for Montana.......well Pat and Jess get to take a bath too. We have to make little rafts out of Montana's alphabet letters(made to float in water) for Pat and Jess to sit on. And then of course when it is bedtime Montana has to put Pat and Jess in the truck and then to bed, lol.

Hope everyone has a great day!

by the way....Montana's shirt says "I do my own stunts"....how true that is.

This, That and Friday Fiver

2007-09-21T21:30:00.000-04:00

A few more halloween pages for my book. I can't remember if I mentioned but these pages measure 7 x 9. The top page uses more collage images by Kris Hubick(the car and label). Rubberstamps: Poppy Pods by Stampington, Script by Oxford Impressions and Road to Nirvana by Postmodern Design. For the page below the main rubberstamp image is by Anima Designs.
And while we are on the subject of halloween you have to check out what my friend Carla made for me. She made me the most awesome halloween purse.........click here, for real <----click there :o) Check out the rest of her blog for all kinds of pretty vintage stuff. Another cool thing...........you have to go to my friend Patti's blog and see what she did to the tree in her yard. She is so brave to handle a chainsaw. Me, I stay far away from them. Anyways, scroll through her blog and check out the tree from beginning to end.

I was tagged by Jennifer and Kim for the 7 facts or odd stuff again but can't think of more things to add to the list I did a while back. Then I was going to list some stuff or quirks about when I am creating but really couldn't think of anything that interesting................I know, how boring am I :o) Anyways, thanks bunches to both of you for thinking of me.

Now for Friday Fiver. I always see Sarah doing this list on Fridays and she was so kind to remind me of it since I wanted to do it too and she sent me the link to where you can get the list each week.......found here.

Friday Fiver

1. Who do you look up to? honestly........I can't think of anybody

2. What is the last thing you cleaned? the dishes

3. Do you measure with a ruler or do you eyeball it? both.......I used to always eyeball things until I measured what I did one time and couldn't believe how off I was so now I do it both ways depending on my mood

4. What do people compliment you on? my son

5. What is behind you? the kitchen

Hope everyone has an awesome weekend!

New Paperbag Studios

2007-09-06T00:24:00.000-04:00

New stamps have just been released from Paperbag Studios. Roben-Marie did a whole makeover on the site with easy navigation and it looks great, so go check it out.
All of these pieces use the new Paperbag Studios rubberstamps. I just created these today but if you go to the gallery section of the site then you can see many others that I created including a house acrylic book. There's also lots of other great samples from the rest of the design team.
Roben-Marie also created a flickr group to upload creations using rubberstamps by Paperbag Studios. Here is the link to the flickr group. It's easy to sign up. Have fun :o)

Montana Monday

2007-09-03T10:06:00.000-04:00

Montana started Pre-K last week and the pic above was from his first day. As you can see he is sporting the 'Cars' backpack and shoes. He was such a big boy and did very well the first day while I was at home twiddling my thumbs and constantly looking at the clock doing a countdown till it was time to go pick him up and then there was Rick who was calling me all day to see if I heard anything about how he was doing, lol. That was the first time ever that we had left Montana in someone elses care and boy was it scary but we made it :o)

Have a great week!

Some Halloween Cards

2007-08-29T01:32:00.000-04:00

Top two cards use collage images by Kris Hubick. Her collage sheets are sold here and her store will be back open soon. The vintage labels in the three cards below are by Melissa Frances. If you have an A.C. Moore near you they sell them in themed packs like halloween, Christmas, coffee/tea, baby, etc. This weekend I will be making some halloween cards using rubberstamps as the main image.

I gotta say 'thanks' to a few people. I got the "Nice Matters" award again...this time from Debbi Baker....thanks Debbi :o) I also got the "Rockin' Girl Blogger" award again and this time it was from Evie. Thanks Evie and by the way I could not find a link to your blog.

To Amy H.....thanks for coming out of lurkdom again :o)

Oh and to Polly(if you are still visiting).........have you got started on those halloween cards yet :o)

Have a great day everyone!

2007-08-18T01:37:00.001-04:00

I love halloween......love, love, love it. I love that my birthday is on halloween. I love to go and find Montana an outfit each year(by the way, Marcy, if you are reading this I am going to try an outdo last years costume). I love all the candy...especially candy corn. And I love seeing all the kids dressed up in all kinds of fun costumes. The other week I won a halloween collage sheet from Kris Hubick and she sent me a few extra sheets as an early b-day present. So now, I am having fun making my own halloween book...just for me. I don't know how to draw but I have to say I am proud of that colorful lopsided cake that i drew and colored for the first page at top, lol. I think it would be cool to have a cake in real life like that for halloween. I had fun with the bottom page. The Mona Lisa image and hat are from one of Kris' collage sheets. I can't remember where I got those little glasses.
There have been alot of blogger awards going around and some people have named me for a few of them and I wanted to thank them.
Thanks to: Kathy W., Linda F., Nancy James and Svenja for giving me the 'Rockin Girl Blogger' award.
Thanks to Dawn for giving me the 'Nice Matters' award.
Thanks to Ethel for giving me the 'Thinking Blogger' award.
I know I am supposed to pick people for these awards now but there are just too many awesome, fun, beautiful blogs and there is no way that I could just pick a few. Thanks to all these ladies for thinking of me and thanks to everyone for all the lovely comments that get left here.

One more thing: anybody watch Last Comic Stading? I just have to say that I was so disappointed to see Matt Kirshen leave :o( He was my favorite. I went to the website to see the full 5 minutes of his set from this past week and I still think he was the funniest.

Have a great weekend!

2007-08-14T00:23:00.001-04:00

This deep edged canvas was made for my friend Lindy :o)

2007-08-10T02:00:00.000-04:00

"Make Some Noise"

is the latest crusade over on the GPP Street Team blog. I really wanted to use my song for Montana("The Day Before You") but I guess Rascal Flatts didn't make a video for it cuz I can't find one nowhere. I did add a playlist on my right sidebar(i hope it stays working) that has the Rascal Flatts song and some other faves. If you are bored you can always click on one of those songs to listen to :o) It is only a small list so far. Below are 3 videos(edited: it is 4 videos now since I had to add one more) that I wanted to show for Crusade No. 11.

Lifehouse is one of my all time favorite groups....love them. So of course I had to play one of their songs......the song below is for Rick ;o)

Christopher Walken is an awesome actor.....and he can dance :o) . One of my all time favorite videos below.

And finally, the song below is just one of those feel good, makes you happy no matter what mood you are in, want to get up, dance and sing and just have an all around good time. What else can I say except it makes me happy everytime I hear it.

Edited: okay, this is really the final one :o) Forgot about this song. My sister appreciates this song as much as I do..............ahhhhhh memories, lol. The song is 'Insensitive' by Jann Arden.

Montana Monday

2007-08-06T00:20:00.001-04:00

Edited: I just added the above pic since in the other ones you really can't see how much Montana has grown. This is the only one I could find that was decent enough off my digital(that needs to get replaced). I took alot more pics but with the regular camera. Anways, here is the little guy just growing by leaps and bounds.
Here are a few pics from Montana's big day. Yesterday he turned 3. We had the party at my aunts and the top pic are some balloons at the top of the screened in pool. He looooves balloons.

Above is his 'Cars' themed cake. If you look at the green section of the cake above you will notice that there are no white streaks at all. Below is a pic of the first thing Montana did when he saw the cake. He grabbed the car and started to do spin-outs with it, lol. You can see the tires digging into the cake making white streaks :o)

Below are just a few pics of some presents he got.

You will see the above present assembled in a second. It was from my sis and her family.

I have to show the bottom pic for Auntie Cris :o) He also got some trains and more 'cars' toys and some clothes.

And below is that station all assembled that Montana couldn't wait to have put together.
So that is just a few of the pics. It was a great day and alot of fun. I don't have any Montana pool pics since everybody was in the pool except for him. So no waterbug pic this time. Thanks to everybody for the happy birthdays to Montana. And I know I sound like a broken record but thanks for all the recent comments on my blog.

Have a great week!

#561........

2007-08-02T02:25:00.000-04:00

yeah, I will be honest and say this will probably be unfinished project #561, lol. I don't have quite that many unfinished projects but you know what I mean :o) I am always starting little things for myself and then get sidetracked and end up starting another project. So this will be a page in my quote book/journal (you will have to click on it to see it bigger). The plan is to do the pages first and then spiral bind them with that little bind-it-all machine. I do love quotes so I am hoping that I will get far on this one............we shall see :o)

The local stamp store just got in the cutest stamps. They are by Kodomo Inc. If you go to the site you will see an image on their home page which is one of their papers. That is where I cut out the branch that I used here. The little owl and leaves are by the same company. I also got a little bird set which is adorable. If you click on "Asian Rubber Stamps" and then click on "Animals", then scroll all the way to the bottom you can see the stamps I am talking about. (I would link the page for you but it doesn't link correctly to that particular page.)

Thanks for all the get well wishes. I am feeling better. If you emailed me while I was down and out I will be getting back to you soon. Have a great day :o)

A little of everything....

2007-07-26T01:20:00.000-04:00

so I have been sick and just lounging around not creating anything. Montana was sick for the first time ever last week and I thought I would get by with flying colors and not catch what he had but I wasn't so lucky. I got what he had but worse. So he is all better and I am trying to get better now. I figured I would make a post about some random things and also things I like. Oh, I know I haven't did Montana Monday in awhile but rest assured there should be something on August 6.....some birthday pics. Our little guy turns the big

on August 5th. Where has the time gone. He is growing up too fast. I think Rick wants to get him a Cars bed but we will see. I would like to personally thank my friend Cris for that one, lol. She sent Montana the Cars movie and at first he didn't care for it.........now he has to watch it every. single. day. He loves it. He already has Cars little boxers, shirts, toy cars and used to have the shoes but outgrew them. Why am I picturing his room painted red with a big white lighting bolt going across the wall.

Okay.........change of subject. Figured I would make a little list of places I like to visit. You guys will probably know most of these but I am behind the times.

1. Did you know Sandra Evertson has started a blog? She has the line of stamps that are fun and whimsical over at Stampington. If you have a minute go visit her(click on her name) and welcome her to the blog world.

2. Have you heard of Skype? This is how I talk to my buddy Jo if I can. There is a five hour difference between us so sometimes it is hard to get on the same schedule. I am in the U.S. and she is in the U.K. It is free and it's just like you are talking on a phone. All you need is a headset and to download the program....easy peasy.

3. This womans blog just cracks me up. She has got a great sense of humor. I think by far one of my favorite posts by her is this one....I've read it quite a few times. Then the updated post to it.

4.What about Trash The Dress? I love this concept. ( Patty, if you are reading this you definitely need to go get your wedding dress and get some pics done getting all muddied up.) Is 'muddied' a word....anyways. You guys have to visit that blog and look at the pics and when you get to the bottom make sure you go to the next page and just keep paging through cuz there are some beautiful pics. I love the underwater ones.

5. The Scribbler? Okay, this one I didn't pay attention to at first cuz I was lazy and was just drawing circles and lines. But then a light bulb went off and I actually tried to draw a pic and when i was done i clicked the button and let it do it's thing and it was pretty cool..............okay, sometimes it doesn't take much to amuse me.

6. Audrey Woulard Photography? All I can say is 'wow', 'amazing' and 'wow' again. I enjoy visiting this womans blog and site and seeing the amazing pictures she takes of children. She truly captures their essence.

7. I don't watch much tv. There are only a few shows that I watch regularly. There are alot of new shows coming on but I usually always miss the premieres and if I miss the premiere than I just don't bother to try and watch it. But I did manage to catch Saving Grace cuz I really like Holly Hunter. I really liked the premiere and will be keeping up with that show.

8. Last but not least............I actually saved the best for last. How in the world did I not see this before:

you can go to the Project Compassion website and go the gallery and see all the other paintings and read more about it.

so those are some things that i like :o)

Guess what..........it's almost the weekend. Hope you guys have a great one.

2007-07-17T00:33:00.000-04:00

'Mail Art' is Crusade No. 10 over at the GPP Street Team blog. I decided to pull out my oversized deck of playing cards to decorate and use as postcards. The deck of cards measure 5 x 7 but i wanted a slightly smaller palette to work on, so I cut them down to 4 x 6. I decorated the numbered sides and on the flip side I will add the address label and postage stamp and mail these off to some people.....gotta go find some addresses now.

Have a great week!

Two More Little Books

2007-07-12T14:04:00.000-04:00

Here is the little flower chipboard book that I decorated. I didn't scan in all the pages but you get the idea.
All the white space is where the pics would go. All the paper is by Basic Grey.
I showed the above pic cuz there are tabs sticking out from the pages that spell out 'Sugar & Spice'. That is why the cover says 'and everything nice'.
Below is the accordian book that I made for Claire. All the paper for it is by Basic Grey also(my favorite paper company, I am addicted to it). The closure is a magnet closure.

By the way, i know my photo taking backgrounds are kind of funky but I am not good at taking pics. Almost everything I show is scanned in so getting pics of these little books was a challenge for me. Hence, the reason why you see the white quilty background that this book is sitting on, lol.
The tabs on this book spell out the word 'loving'.
All of the photo images are rubberstamps by Paperbag Studios. I love this rubber stamp plate and haven't used it in awhile. I love photoimage stamps.
After I stamped the images, each one was colored in with phototwin markers.
And the brown shading on each image was done with an inkpad.

Oh wait, there are some other stamps used. Like the above 'observations' and the parenthesis and dotted circle are all by 7 Gypsies.

Clear/Transparent Book

2007-07-09T00:36:00.001-04:00

I have been seeing alot of these clear little books being made and just had to make one also. This one was made for the local stamp store owner. They are very easy to make. You might have to click on some of the pics to get a better view.

Above are the first pages. As you can tell the theme of this little album is "Home" and there is a place to put pics. All paper is by Cosmo Cricket.

I love these cute little chipboard pieces like the little house, the sun on the previous page and the little birdie(that is my favorite)..........all by Maya Road.

I showed above and below by themselves so that you could see the clear pages a little better.
Obviously, you can cover as much or as little of the pages as you want.

Okay, if you go in the stained-glass section of the craft stores you will find Styrene Blanks. There are 2 to a pack and they measure 8 x 10. They are very easy to cut. I use a utility knife to make a couple cuts through and then you can just snap it apart. After you cut the styrene blanks you can use a little sandpaper to smooth the edges and round them also. I made another book where all the pages where house shaped and used all styrene blanks for the pages. Also where the styrene blanks are located is a pack of thinner bendable material and that is what i used for the inside pages of this book. Those can be cut very easily with a paper trimmer and you can use a corner rounder if you want very easily on them(on the thinner material that is). Oh, for the covers(thicker pieces) a crop-a-dile punches through them with no problem. I hope all that made sense as I tend to ramble all out of order.

I have two other books to show that I also made for Claire....she is the stamp store owner. But I still gotta resize them and will show them later in the week. They aren't clear books....one is a flower chipboard book and the other is just an accordian one.

Thanks for all the warm welcomes back.......you guys are the best!!!

p.s. To Amy H..........thank you :o)

Happy 4th of July

2007-07-04T00:38:00.001-04:00

(best scan i could get of this piece. there is a glare from the transparency.)

Have a safe, fun and wonderful 4th of July :o)

Much Needed Break

2007-06-04T00:48:00.000-04:00

I am going to be taking a break from my blog for a couple weeks. I will still be visiting everyone and checking emails...................just not going to post for a bit. I will leave you with this very long entry of pics of some stuff I made recently and of course some pics of my cutie pie :o)

Below are four notecards made with the Sandra Evertson line of very cool and whimsical stamps from Stampington & Co.

And below are pics of what happens when mommy tries to cut the hair. I can't believe I am even showing these but they are going up just for Carlene :o) Usually I get his hair pretty straight(or at least I think so) but this time Montana was squirming so much that I really didn't see how bad it was till I was done and stood back to look. Next time he is just going to have to grin and bear it and deal with a real hair stylist.

And in every pic the crookedness looks totally different.
Look at the seriousness of the face below :o)

How 'bout that funny face above...........just cracks me up.

Below is a chipboard train book that I decorated with pics of Montana and just some simple journaling to go with each page. There are alot more pages than what I have shown....just figured I would show just a few of them.

And last but not least are two cards below using the Oxford Impressions rubberstamps.

Have a great week!

Later :o)

2007-05-26T00:50:00.000-04:00

For Wednesday Stamper.............theme this week is 'games'. This is done on a 5 x 7 canvas board with various inks and acrylic paints. Chess pieces are by Green Pepper Press and the little words are by JustRite Stampers.

Have a wonderful holiday weekend :o)

2007-05-23T00:35:00.000-04:00

1. I made the above little fabric square about 1.5 years ago and i believe i used my mothers sewing machine....can't remember and can't remember if i ever showed this on my blog. After i made this little piece i just had to have my own sewing machine because i wanted to incorporate sewing into the things i make. So Rick got me a sewing machine Xmas of 2005 and i just pulled it out of the box a few hours ago................how sad is that. Kind of like the screen wire i just had to have and it is still rolled up unused. Kind of like the pieces of thin metal i just had to have cut up immediately(a year ago) to make something and i still haven't made it. Kind of like those clear xmas bulbs i wanted one year cuz i wanted to make some cool ornaments and never did..........i think you get the pic, lol..........unfortunately Rick does too cuz now he calls me on everything if i have some sudden desire to get something else. I was supposed to pull this machine out last year for a project but never did. So anyways guess who had to show me how to thread it and give me a couple of pointers. No, it wasn't Montana since he was already asleep but i bet he could operate it better than me, lol. It was Rick who showed me how to work the machine. Well, the basics that is. And i know he didn't appreciate it when i did something wonky with the machine and went and woke him up to come fix it for me, lol.

And why am i all of a sudden using the sewing machine. Well the theme for cards this month at the local stamp store is fabric so i decided to play. I have to make four cards and the above is the only one i have did so far. I know the fabric is crooked on the paper but i like that....at least that is what i am telling myself :o)

2. Ilka tagged me to show my work space but I didn't take a pic. I showed pics of my room last year in this blog post. It pretty much looks the same except for the last pic in which that area is alot cleaner and there is another desk that i work on that isn't shown.

3. And lastly........remember this post where i donated the piece for the charity auction. Well, i found out how much it sold for...................$325..............how awesome is that :o)

2007-05-18T00:45:00.001-04:00

Above are some atc's and a matching envie. Stamps are by Stampington & Co. and Green Pepper Press. I absolutely love those little chair stamps(also by GPP). Below are 3 things made with the latest plate from Oxford Impressions.

And below i made this little book with stampbord and used fabric for the covers. All stamps on this are by Paperbag Studios.

I used the little tool thing(don't know the proper name but can be anything sharp) to scratch out the sun.

Lots and lots of 'thanks' to all of you and your wonderful comments that you leave. You guys are the best!

Have a great weekend :o)

Hokey Pokey

2007-05-12T01:04:00.000-04:00

This is for Wednesday Stamper. The theme this week is 'turquoise'. Scroll stamp is by Penny Black and the quote is by Hampton Art. That quote pretty much sums up my mood right this second, lol............it cracks me up everytime i read it. :o)

2007-05-05T00:57:00.000-04:00

above is for a journal where you had to choose from a list of printed words. i chose the words 'child' and 'dreamer' to make 'child dreamer'. left and right side together measure about 8.5 x 11 inches. and below is a little decorated wooden heart made for a friend. stamps are by Stampington & Co.
I was also tagged by Kris to list 7 weird things about me. and i am pretty sure i did that one a while back, so in it's place i will do the habits/facts one that is going around. hope that is okay Kris :o)

1. fact. I am the oldest of five kids. there is only a 6 year difference between me and the youngest.

2. fact. i really don't like touching raw uncooked meat.

3. fact. the longest i have ever been away from Montana was for 6 hours.

4. fact. it's taking me forever to think of 7 things and i am only on #4.

5. fact. i am left-handed.

6. fact. right now i can hear a boxing match on tv.

7. fact. my favorite sound now and forever is Montana's laughter.

no habits to list, they all are on the 'weird' list i did awhile back. one habit that i used to have: whenever i made Rick tea, I would have to stir it 100 times.........don't know why, just had to. Rick knew this and would sometimes start talking to me and i would lose count and have to start over. Thank goodness i broke that habit :o)

I just noticed that my friend Pen had me on her list for the Thinking Blogger Award. Carlene also did too awhile ago. I am supposed to list 5 blogs myself but hope it's not a bad thing if i don't. There are too many awesome blogs out there to only list 5 :o) Many thanks to both of you though xoxo

hope everyone is having a wonderful weekend.

Montana Monday

2007-04-30T12:24:00.000-04:00

well it's been a month since i did Montana Monday. These pics were taken last month when we still had some cold days and i finally got them developed. remember the other month i showed a pic of Montana but he was only touching the tree.....well here is the tree hugger pic. He is really doing some hugging here.and in most of the pics, at least outside ones, he has a stick in his hand.

above is a scrapbook page of Montana and oh my gosh, yes, finally Rick(i figured that when i mention Rick, that most people probably think 'who is Rick', lol, since I have never shown a pic of him). Montana gets his hair from Rick........that dirty blonde fine hair. He has his eyes also..........green, and on some days they even turn blue. You can't see all that in this pic but they are two peas in a pod...especially when Montana's hair grows out and gets really long. By the way, the pic in the layout is from 2005...the first time Montana went to the beach.
and this little chunky canvas i made to sit in my artroom. it's a pic of Montana when he was only 2 weeks old. (all rubberstamps on this piece are by Stampington & Co.)

Have a great Monday!

Small Creations

Happy Mother's Day

Alice

The Artistic Mother

Week #?

Week 3

Week 2

Week 1

Happy Halloween!!!

The Winner.....

Rubber Stamp Giveaway

Some halloween and other stuff

Linen Paper

Back in the Saddle

Happy Birthday!!!

New Paperbag Studios Stamps

Just a few things...including a give-away.

Acey Deucy

Numbers

Butterflies

Rusty Tin ATC's

Sunday Postcard

Someday

A Little of Everything

Birds and Nests and Eggs, Oh My!

Marie

Stamp Francisco & Their Giveaway

Oxford Impressions Fairy Sweets

Montana Holiday Pics

New Paperbag Studios

Catching Up

Can you guess...?

Chunky ATC's

Bingo

...more halloween

Woodworks

Little Ones

Happy Birthday!

Overdue Thanks

Halloween already?

New PBS Stamps

Mixed Media Monday

Rust, Rubberstamping, & Pics

Still here.

ATC Shrine

WS & Thanks

Stampington Project of the Week

And the rubberstamps go to....

New Stamps & Blog Giveaway

Crusade No. 18

Inspiration + Mess =

New Oxford Impressions

The Hoops

Journal Stuff

Longest Post Ever

Hodgepodge Post

Merry Christmas

WS & More Xmas Cards

My Muse

Cards & the Stampington Post Script

Happy *cough cough* Halloween

Montana Monday

This, That and Friday Fiver

New Paperbag Studios

Montana Monday

Some Halloween Cards

Montana Monday

#561........

A little of everything....

Two More Little Books

Clear/Transparent Book

Happy 4th of July

Much Needed Break

Hokey Pokey

Montana Monday

Happy cough cough Halloween