Freshly Made Flower

Happy Wednesday! Half the week is now over. Yay!!  I wanted to join my friends at Freshly Made Sketches again this week. I love the sketch Kim created for us. I was going through my box of things I needed to use and found this little tag and the embossed background. I was like hmm....seems perfect. It was a quick card to put together, but I love it!!  Cards with lots of white space are just so, well, FRESH!  Ha!! 

It is so cold here, much colder than we are used to this time of year. It seems like we didn't get a lot of time between super hot and "winter" to go do some outdoor things. I'm hoping it warms back up a bit! I hope you are staying warm if your weather is like ours. Laila closely monitors the temperatures and any chance of snow, so she's jealous of those who already have some. :) 

Have a great rest of the week. 

Freshly Made Leaf

I'm back! I have missed being part of a team for a while, so I asked my Freshly Made Sketches ladies if I could try to join back in. I am hoping to keep up this time now that Laila can be a bit more independent. We shall see how it goes. :)  This week's sketch is from the awesome Linda and I had fun playing around with it. I used some old Stampin' Up! supplies that you might recognize. I believe that the leaves set actually came from Linda, so it was perfect.

Have a wonderful Wednesday and be sure to check out the inspiration from the other stampers and come play along! 

Freshly Made Sketches 371

Hello! We've made it to Wednesday! That means it's Freshly Made Sketches day. Jen M is our hostess this week. I think Jen likes square cards, which are my nemesis, but I made one. :) She kindly sent me some stitched square dies at one point, so I figured it was a great sketch to use them! I had pulled some Valentine's kinda stamps this week to play around with, so I used this cute cow from Avery Elle for my card.

I'm still not back to stamping as much as I'd like. Weight Watchers takes time since we are cooking more and then I'm also trying to declutter on top of that. My poor kitchen!!!  Laila's still having a ton of issues at school (already got a note today), so I'm already researching homeschool curriculum. Just so much going on. One day things will calm down, right? Maybe? 

I'm off to shower and then call and see if I need to pick Laila up or if I can go to the dentist as planned. Fun options, huh? lol I'm not sure which one sounds better. 

Keep on keeping on...  repeat, repeat, repeat

Freshly Popped Sketches?

You guys! I am a mess. I have been trying to join in with the ladies at Freshly Made Sketches again to see if maybe I could get myself together enough to be back on the team. Yeah well.. I made my card on time, but did I get my blog post done? NOPE! lol Laila was home sick on Tuesday and then yesterday I had a root canal, so here we are...  Better late than never though, right??? Even better, this is the Kindred Stamps Wacky Holiday set for this month celebrating National Popcorn Day. Since it isn't until January 19th, I might can crank out a few cards to send! Maybe..  Jen T made our sketch this week and I think you should be like me and try to play along!

Now I'm off to find a snack. I started Weight Watchers and it's been fun figuring out foods. I did lose 5 pounds my first week, so at least I know I can do it! The anniversary of Eli's passing is coming up on the 14th, so I'm trying to be gentle with myself since I am a total emotional eater. At the same time, this is important for my health, so I'm also trying to stick to good choices with a few treats here and there. I mean Santa DID leave me some chocolate...  :)

Warm Wishes Hedgehog

Happy New Year! I'm so sorry it's been so long. I struggled to make it through December and the holidays, but I'm working on getting it together now that we've survived those. I started Weight Watchers and am back on medicine for my depression. That whole I can make it without them phase was NOT a good one. Yikes! I hope the new me can get back into my card making and I started with this one. I used the sketch at Freshly Made Sketches and would also like to enter the As You Like It and Cute Card Thursday challenges.

We had a nice holiday in Kentucky with my parents. It felt rushed to get ready to go up there and the 18 hour drive was SOOOO LONNNGGGG, but I'm glad we went. My dad's health isn't the best and while he did finally make it onto the liver transplant list, we aren't sure what the future holds. He gets a little better, then a lot worse, then better... it's exhausting for my poor momma. Laila was so sweet with him and I loved watching her with him. 

I'm off to clean the kitchen and do another load of laundry. The guaranteed parts of life, right? They'll always be there for you. lol 

Thankful Tree

Sunday. Everyone ready for some football today?? :) We are making chips and queso and Arnold Palmers (the non-alcoholic kind). I've been doing a little stamping and wanted to play along with the Cupcake Inspirations challenge. I love this challenge and try to play when I can. This time it was football related. :) I used espresso paper, but it seems to look black in my pictures. I also used the sketch at Freshly Made Sketches. I was hoping to actually play along with the team, but I didn't get it finished in time.


I had a busy week. Laila's teacher needed help two days, I had my library volunteer shift another day, and then the school garden club had one of the leaders out so I filled in there as well. I think Thursday was the only day I wasn't at the school doing something. This week I'll be there Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. It's nice to help out. Laila is still struggling, so that's been hard. It's very mentally exhausting and I've been crying a lot. Send good thoughts that things get better. I do think that she's better overall, but we still have a ways to go. A boy from her class brought her some snails this week, so they are now friends. lol

Freshly Made Sketches 319

Hey guys!  Talk about behind... I was the hostess over at Freshly Made Sketches this week and I never did get my blog post done over here.  It has been a rough transition back to school for Laila. Add in that yesterday was the anniversary of Eli's death and that I joined this crazy home organization challenge and well....I've been a busy mess.  I like to stress/angry clean, so it was a perfect week for that. My kitchen and pantry are almost finished and it's so nice. So anyway...

One of the things on my list this year is to use up some of the card kits that piled up on me. I am starting with this one, so this is my first project with it. I got some awesome new inks for Altenew for Christmas and oh boy do I love them!  Four shades of gray and they are beautiful and stamp so well.

I hope you were able to join us and I apologize for being so late. I hope to get back to creating once I finish up the kitchen. I just haven't felt creative at all lately, so I've poured my energy into other areas. It makes me sad, but creativity just seems impossible to force. I may try to color a little today just to get my fingers inky.

FMS318: Blah Bunny

Hey strangers. I finally got myself together enough to make a card. I loved the sketch that Linda had for Freshly Made Sketches this week so I played along. Yesterday was nuts, so I missed getting it on the blog and ready to go. This card pretty much sums up my December, especially this week!  My mom always sends me money for Christmas, so this hilarious set from Honey Bee Stamps was part of her present to me. :)

Now I'm off to clean and do more baking. Brownies and blueberry muffins today. Wishing you all peace and calm as we head into the final stretch of the holidays. 

FMS 314: Santa

Oops! I managed to make a card (an awful one, but oh well) for Freshly Made Sketches and forgot to post it! I love this old Naughty or Nice set from Stampin' Up!  The Santa is so cute. I need to go back and add the naughty or nice sentiment to it somewhere I think.  Narelle's sketch is awesome, so try to come play along after your Thanksgiving nap!

Have a wonderful day! F

FMS309 Thankful Leaves

Time for a new sketch at Freshly Made Sketches. I had a difficult time with this one. I wasn't have a good day mentally yesterday and that really impacted my creativity. I did finally get something that wasn't totally awful, so I decided to go ahead and post it. I'm trying to get better about playing along again and they won't all always be masterpieces, right? lol  Linda is the sketch designer and I am absolutely in LOVE with what she did with the sketch. Be sure you jump over to the FMS page and check it and all the other DT cards out.

My card is also for Ceal's challenge over at the Splitcoast Falliday Fest challenges. She asked everyone to use an acrylic block on their background. I used the Stampin' Up! D block and distress inks for mine. I did mess up my original background, so I die cut the area and moved it to a new front. 

Laila had an awful day at school yesterday that included kicking her teacher. They did a reflection discussion at school over it and she did apologize. We talked about it more at home and decided to do something nice for the teacher. We decorated a bag and added snacks and then also made her a card. I was hoping our success on Monday would keep going, but it was the total opposite yesterday.  She did do good in specials at the end of the day, so that was a plus. That's been one of her biggest problem areas, so that was good to see. We'll keep working and seeing how things go.  We've always been told that it gets worse before it gets better, so... 

FMS 308: Witch Way is the Candy

Hey! Checking in with a new challenge at Freshly Made Sketches today! I got to design the sketch for this week's challenge and I think it's a fun one. :)  I love making cards with the focus on a Polaroid-like piece. I bought a die last year that cut one, but it got mixed up in a friend's things and spent the past year hanging out in Minnesota. She recently visited again and now it's back in Texas. So... I thought I'd base my sketch around it.

I think I am now obsessed with this witch stamp set. I can't stop coloring her! Sandy Allnock has an awesome tutorial on the MFT blog, so I spent time this weekend coloring along with the video. This was my first attempt at following her.  The shadows are much better than I do, so it's been fun to learn about how to color more realistically. Not that green skin and purple hair are realistic, but you know what I mean... ;)

I hope you'll come play along with us this week! 

FMS307 with Neat & Tangled

It's time for a new sketch at Freshly Made Sketches. One of our fearless leaders, Jen T, is our sketch designer this week. She must have known I was trying to figure out how to get more use out of my circle frame dies! :) I just got this cute new set from Neat & Tangled, so I thought my cute foxes would be perfect to add.

Neat & Tangled has their own challenge called Little Tangles and I wanted to enter my card there as well.  This month is to make a matching inside or envelope. That was super fun!

Isn't that cute?  I love decorating the inside of my cards as well, so I'm planning to do that before I mail it out. I just ran out of time yesterday.  Now I'm off to see what kind of crafty fun I can get into today!  

Freshly Made Sketches 304

Here I am late as always. lol Yesterday and today have not been my best mental days, so I'll blame it on that. I did actually get a card made for our new sketch at Freshly Made Sketches. I'm still working on getting back in the groove over there. I thought I would once school started, but then Harvey and the delay. Maybe this week will be the week. :) Narelle has a great sketch and I used one of Simon Says Stamp new sets for STAMPtember. It's a month long celebration of fun, so be sure to check that out. I love this cute kitty singing her heart out. I'm sure she's probably fake singing and secretly plotting how to eat that bird on her head, but we'll pretend she's singing Jingle Bells.

I know there's so much you can do with the sketch, so come join us! 

Today has been an amazing day in our butterfly garden. I think the butterflies are loving the cooler weather as much as I have. They've been flying around all day and it was such a pick-me-up.  I am hoping I can get out there and work in this week while we are out of the 90 degree temperatures.

I'm off to finish getting Laila's stuff ready for tomorrow. Yikes! Wish us luck!

Freshly Made Sketches 303

I just realized that I forgot to do my blog post for Freshly Made Sketches. I worked on my card to take my mind off things Tuesday, but I guess I didn't get to the posting part.  Karren really challenged us with this sketch!  Who doesn't love a challenging challenge, right? :) You get to put on your creative thinking cap and that's what I did. I had pulled one of my card kits from Simon Says Stamp from my stash to attempt to use it up as much as possible this week, so I worked on a design using that and only that.  I think it turned out okay and I hope it's close enough to the sketch.

I know Texas is getting a lot of news coverage, but we are fine.  We were some of the lucky ones in our area who didn't flood.  All of my friends here are fine as well. School is still delayed and next Thursday is the best case first day.  Laila's principal's house flooded and was still full of water as of yesterday. I'm sure our school will be helping with that as much as we can. The school itself did not flood, so we are thankful for that. There is just so much devastation around the area that it is almost unreal right now. It will be a long time before anything is close to normal again. But, we are lucky. So lucky. If the worst thing facing you is waiting in lines for hours to enter a grocery store, that's not much you can complain about when people lost their lives and homes. Things did begin opening back up yesterday, but some will be months coming back. It is just truly heartbreaking. 

It has been amazing to see how the community, both individuals and businesses, have jumped in to help. We've gathered supplies to take to temporary shelters twice now and their needs were already met before we could get there. Restaurants are closing to focus on making food for first responders. Churches quickly opened up as shelters. People with boats and lifted trucks assisting strangers. I know on our local group a truck owner picked up a pregnant lady having contractions five minutes apart and got her to the hospital so she could give birth. Political and racial divides went out the window and it has been people helping people. We need more of that. 

I'm off to make coffee and turn on the news for a bit. Have a good week and keep sending good thoughts this way. 

Hugs. 

Freshly Made Sketches 302

Jumping in and playing along with Freshly Made Sketches this week.  I saw the sketch and had an idea, so I tried to find time to see if that idea translated well to paper.  I am happy with how it turned out.  I had the watercolor background in my stash waiting to be used, so yay for one less thing being stored. :) I've been trying to use more vellum lately too as it's been sitting unused for a while too. I hope you like it!

Before I run off and get ready for playgroup, I thought I'd share pictures of Laila's school.  

 This is the library.  It is amazing. I wanted to just move in!

 I took this when we were walking in.  It's neat because all the grades have their own hallway.

 Her classroom.  They are still waiting on tables for the room.

She made herself at home.  She was pretty overwhelmed, but she did hug her teacher by the end of our visit.  I hope she's excited to go on Monday.  I'm a bit nervous about figuring out drop off and all that, but Jason took off all next week.  I'm happy to have backup! 

Freshly Made Sketches 300

Can you believe that we've now had 300 sketches at Freshly Made Sketches and been going for 6 years? Crazy!  I have struggled to remain a part of the team lately, but my amazing teammates keep me around anyway.  It's such a supportive group and I'm thankful that Lesley thought enough of me and my cards to ask me to be on the team.   I hope you'll come play along with us this week.  We will have the winners as usual, but one random participant will win all the cards made by the team.  I know I'd love to have them, so come play!

I love this big poinsettia stamp from Stampin' Up! and it seemed perfect for the sketch.  The sentiment is from another set that I know both Jen Timko and I love, Bright Hopes.  I hope my flower looks okay.  My lightest marker ran out and I had to try and finish with it barely working.  I need to get a refill quickly as it's one of my most used ones.  

I'm off to have coffee and wake up.  I hope to see you in the gallery!

Freshly Made Coffee

Back today with Freshly Made Sketches and that technique I promised you.  :)  I did struggle with this week's sketch because tilted panels make me a bit nuts. lol I tried a Christmas card, but I did the "shape" first and it was most of the card front once I put it together.  Then I saw the backgrounds I'd made last week and thought I'd try one of those.  It is made using a technique called Shaving Cream Stenciling.   I know we used shaving cream back when I first started stamping, but this was a fun new take on it.  I forget what colors I used now, but I know Bermuda Bay and Lucky Limeade were two of them. I'm also adding it to Simon Says Stamp Work It Wednesday.  I love this coffee set by them.

I hope you'll take time to come play along with us!  And go try that technique! It's awesome!  I might have to do more today with my new plaid stencil I used on yesterday's card.  

Happy Wednesday! 

Freshly Made Sketches 296

Back with a new card for a new sketch at Freshly Made Sketches.  I don't usually make square cards, but I tried this time. I love yellow and black (or gray) together so much.  It's just so elegant and really makes a statement. I used two Simon Says Stamp sets from past card kits.

I hope you'll join us! Have a great rest of the week. 

Freshly Made Sketches 295

On a roll!  Scary, huh?  :)  I had some free time since Jason was off for the holiday, so I thought I'd try to play with my pals at Freshly Made Sketches.  I loved Narelle's sketch and it paired perfectly with Unity's Be Inspired challenge on Facebook which was hearts and polka dots.  I got this little stamp to use for Laila, so this will be for her.  She's already asked for it of course. :)

I hope all my American friends had a nice holiday.  We didn't do much, but sometimes that's nice.  Any day that includes a s'more is a good day in my book.  Now come on over and play along with us!