Thursday, October 29, 2009

Batter Up!

Just playing with my new changito stamp! No sketch or anything fancy.



Have a great Thursday!

Monday, October 26, 2009

Another card...I'm on a roll!

This next card was (once again) inspired by a weekend sketch challenge from Beate over at Fresh & Fun

Here is the sketch:



And here is my card:



This weekend I went on a cardmaking spree...so lots to share this week!

I also want to make a few treats for coworkers before the end of the week. But I don't have a lot of time so they will probably be something simple. I can't believe it is already almost Halloween! This year is FLYING by!

Sunday, October 25, 2009

Weekend Sketch Challenge

When I need inspiration...I almost always head off to find a sketch. Beate, over at Fresh and Fun, posts a new weekend sketch challenge each weekend. I like hers because they generally don't have TOO many layers. I'm layered challenged. Don't ask me to mix and match too many papers! LOL.

Anyways, this card was inspired by this weekend's sketch challenge.



If you look close...you'll see my boo boo. On the right side of the card when I put the card front on, there was a bit of white still showing of the card front. So I tried to trim it, but then the card was uneven. So then I trimmed some more...till it was even...but then the edge isn't as wide as the others. Sigh. Also, not sure if I want to add a single brad to the top left or not. Seems a little bottom right heavy. Thoughts?

On a totally unrelated note - yesterday was my lucky day. On Friday my car had stalled so I had plans to take it to the mechanic on Saturday. We live in the boonies and in an effort to not come to a complete stop (and have the car potentially stall on the way to the mechanic) I did kind of a rolling stop at the stop sign. You can easily see beforehand and make sure noone is coming. Well, what I didn't see was the Sheriff coming from the other direction. Oh...and for a change I did NOT have my seatbelt on either. I see him start to flip a U-turn behind me so I immediately grab my seatbelt and fasten it on while he's turning around. He pulls me over and asks me if I know why he pulled me over. I fessed up. He said as long as everything checked out he'd let me off with a warning. He asked for insurance (which of course I couldn't find a current one but I have insurance). He went back and ran my information. He came back and told me that he could ticket me for the insurance but he wasn't going to, he told me that he was going to ticket me for not wearing a seatbelt...but my seatbelt was the same color as my shirt and he must have missed seeing it...and he let me off on the rolling stop. Whew. Drove away with NO tickets! :-) What I'd like to know...is when did they start accepting high school kids into the Sheriff's department? I used to shit my pants any time a cop pulled me over...but it's hard to get scared of a kid who looks like he should still be in high school! LOL. They don't instill that basic sense of fear that a veteran officer does.

Anyways, that's my exciting weekend. They didn't find anything wrong with the car. So I guess I just drive it and pray it doesn't stall any more. Not good when I drive 2 1/2 hours a day. Maybe it is time to get AAA. I have towing on my insurance but I have to pay for that up front and wait for them to reimburse me.

Hope all is doing well.

Friday, October 23, 2009

Finally...a CARD!

I finally got around to making a few cards yesterday. Unfortunately, they all are the exact same design...so really only have one to share. There were a few people at the quilting retreat that were extra nice and I wanted to send them a card. I hope that this is appropriate for them. :-)



I found the design for a quilt block and then used paper to create it instead. Lots of little pieces of paper and glue. What a messy situation! I wouldn't want to create more than a few of these. But I do like how they turned out.

Monday, October 19, 2009

Another Quilt Completed

Well, it hasn't been 'quilted' yet...but the quilt FRONT is done (and as any quilter knows that's the only part that counts! LOL)

This is the quilt I started at the retreat. I saw the pattern in a magazine and loved it. I thought it'd be simple. Well, apparently I need to get someone to go with me and smack me upside the head when I think ANYTHING is simple. :-) Actually it wasn't difficult...but it was time consuming. And now that it's done I realize that I really probably shouldn't use it in MY house (all that white with two boys and three dogs...). So it will probably be a Christmas gift for someone. Just not sure who yet.



Next up? My first rag quilt. And a Christmas wall hanging.

I was hoping to get some cards made this weekend but that didn't happen. I spent Saturday catching up on rest. And Sunday was catching up on housework, homework, grocery shopping, and taking the kids out to a movie and dinner. Therefore, no cards to share. Sorry!

Jane

Tuesday, October 13, 2009

Weekend Endeavor

I spent this past weekend at a quilting retreat. I sewed from 2pm till 10pm on Friday, 8am to 10pm on Saturday and Sunday and from 8:00am to noon on Monday. I went through 3 spools of thread (considering I'd never used a complete spool yet...to go through 3 amazed me).

The ONLY thing I completely finished was a tote bag. Needless to say, I am really REALLY proud of this bag! LOL. I had picked up the pattern at a recent quilt show. It LOOKED easy and I thought it'd be a nice quick project for the retreat.

Well, quick turned into an ALL day project on Sunday. If I did it again it'd be much quicker, but the instructions weren't very clear and there were no pictures to help. At one point I was ready to cry (after I realized I sewed the handles on incorrectly...and I'd sewed them on REALLY well and was going to have to rip them out). Instead I started laughing and I laughed till I cried...and got the other lady at the table laughing as well. We were rolling around and couldn't stop. But the bag is FINISHED.





I also started working on another quilt. This one has 120 blocks to it and on 60 of those blocks I had to sew white strips on all four sides. I spent Friday and Saturday on it - then Sunday took a break from it because I was sick of it and thought I'd work on my EASY bag (so NOT). On Monday I laid it all out, pinned it, and got the first three rows sewed together before we had to pack up. So it's in the works.

A very productive weekend and a lot of fun. Unfortunately, at some point you HAVE to come home. They have another retreat in March and I can't wait to go have more fun. :-)

Sunday, October 4, 2009

Simple Changito & Baby Horney Toad

First...a card to share...


I really like the color combo (kind of a aqua blue and red). I used my cuttlebug and nestabilities again to cut out the circle and scalloped circle and to emboss the circle. This close up shows that better.

And on to things unrelated to cardmaking...remember a posting a few weeks back where I showed a picture of my son with a "horney toad" and I talked about the babies and how cute they are? Well, my son comes into the house again a couple days ago with the smallest baby I've ever seen. He/she has to be a newborn (are they new'born' if they hatch??? hmm).

Here's the baby:


And here's the adult for comparison:



After he caught the baby he wanted to save it to show to daddy. So we put it in a container with about an inch of dirt in the bottom. He quickly dug himself into the dirt and all but disappeared. About an hour later my son comes out and he's sure that the critter has escaped because he's drug his fingers through the dirt and he can't find him. I look in the container and see what looks like a clump of dirt. I gently touch the clump and it scurries out of the dirt. He was too cute. After we showed him to Dad we let him loose again.

Boys...they are just too much fun. :-)