Happy Holidays!

I just wanted to check in and say hello to all my readers and friends.  It has been a pretty rough week and while I did manage to stamp, it was sympathy cards and I didn't feel like taking pictures and posting those.  A family who has a son with SMA lives near us and last week the dad was tragically killed in a car accident.  Little Cooper is in the hospital battling pneumonia as well, so it has been a hard week for the family.  My heart is just broken for Crystal.  Her Jason was the same age as mine and I honestly just don't know what I'd do without mine. If you start seeing a lot of thinking of you cards on my blog, they are going to her.  It's always good to get a little note to let you know that people are thinking about you.  

We did have an exciting event here at home.  Laila finally got to try some real food!   We started her off with avocado and she really seems to like it.

If I don't get a chance to check back in before the holidays, I hope that each of you has a wonderful Christmas.   Hug your family tight because you just never know what life has in store for us.

Happy Birthday to Me!

It feels like ages since I last posted.  It has been a very emotional time for me with all those beautiful children being murdered and I just haven't felt like stamping at all.  Normally I turn to creating when my mind is troubled but it just wasn't happening this time.  I did manage to make it into my room to get my card made for Freshly Made Sketches this week.  It was not easy for me to make, but my sweet friends Anne Marie and Mindy were kind enough to let me bounce ideas off them via our phones.   It's good to have friends like that when your mojo is missing.    I made a birthday card because today is my birthday. :) 

When I saw the sketch I automatically thought Fun Flowers, but then I couldn't find my die.  I couldn't come up with anything else since I had my mind set on a flower, so I grabbed my scallop circle punches and put this simple flower together instead.   I wanted to add the banners, so I moved the sketch around to make that work.  I hope Tui doesn't mind.  :)    I did use a new product from the upcoming Spring catalog, the honeycomb embossing folder.  It's pretty neat, huh? I like it a lot!  

Monday finally saw an end to her throwing up, but now my poor Jason isn't feeling well. He fell sick yesterday on his birthday.  :(  The good news is that my mom arrived yesterday to stay for two weeks, so it will be nice to have an extra set of hands around.  I'm so happy that she made it down for Laila's first Christmas!    I just hope we don't end up passing any of our sickness on to her.   

Club Card and a Funny!

With Laila being sick, I'm running a bit behind on preparing for club.  I finally designed a card to go along with our ornaments today and got it all ready to go.   I'm not sure we'll have time to do both, but we'll see how the night goes.   I saw a fun sketch at Create with Connie and Mary and while I wasn't able to stamp and enter it, I still had a great time with it.

My Happy Hour set seemed neglected so I thought I'd pull it out and make something fun. With the way this week has been going, I could use a cocktail.  lol   Maybe I can treat myself on my birthday next week!  :)

I'm pretty sure my Old Olive went into shock when I pulled it out to use it today. I remember back in the day when it was THE green to use.  I think both it and Chocolate Chip are probably a bit depressed these days.  

Now on to the funny...  

Jason and I were cleaning out some drawers and found this "gorgeous" Valentine that I made him back when I first started stamping.    It's very special that's for sure.  I tried right?   It's good to look back and see how far I've come with my hobby and how much using Stampin' Up! almost exclusively has helped as well.

My sweet girl isn't throwing up today but she is pretty tired.  She fell asleep playing in her bouncy seat today.  I think her tooth is starting to push through the gums a bit more so she has been pretty fussy today.  I am not a fan of teething so far that's for sure.

FMS65: Cupcake Cutie

Here's my buddy Linda's fun sketch for Freshly Made Sketches.  I used a few new things including a new DSP from the upcoming catalog and a stamp from SAB. 

Just a really quick post for me.  Laila has been sick all day and we are exhausted.   I almost forgot to type this up and schedule it before I tried to get a little rest.   I'm sure it is going to be a long night.   Those darn stomach viruses are the worst!

MDS Santa Page

I just had to scrapbook this awesome picture.  :)  I'm not even close to catching up on her book yet, but I skipped ahead to play along with a challenge on a new MDS Facebook group that I joined.  They taught us how to add a picture into multiple photo boxes and it was new to me and pretty fun!   I keep playing around with this page, but I might leave it like this.  Maybe...

FMS64: Birdie Love

Time for a Freshly Made Sketch card again!   Cindy created this fun sketch for us this week.  There's so many possibilities that it took me ages to decide on something.   Now don't laugh when you see my card, okay?  When I say that I'm OVER Christmas, I mean I'm SO OVER Christmas.   :)

Oh yeah...Valentine's Day!!!!  :)   I have been making Christmas cards since July and I think I'm done with them for this year.  I hope anyway.   I admit that I'm a bit of a Grinch this time of year anyway, but 5 or 6 months of Christmas cards is more than enough.  

Now if I can just finish my holiday shopping!   Are you finished yet?   I just have stocking stuffers left.  Jason and I both have birthdays coming up, so I do have to go shop for a gift for that and the ingredients for a cheesecake since that's his favorite.   It's getting so crazy out there that I don't even want to leave the house. I love Amazon and become more thankful for it every year.   

Yikes.   I can't believe we'll be starting solids soon!   I keep telling her that Santa will be bringing her an avocado in her stocking.  Jason put together her little highchair and we put her in it for a test run.   It made me cry a bit.  This is all new stuff to us and every little milestone is just amazing.  

Perfectly Penned for Club

Wow you guys!!!!!!   I see that I went over the 200,000 views mark this week.   That's crazy!!   I appreciate you all visiting and seeing what's going on in my little corner of the internet.  I have a few cards that I'd love to send out to a few of you, so leave me a comment and I'll pick a couple random folks to send one out to!  

Are you like me and have a favorite sketch that you go to a lot?   This one from Try Stampin' on Tuesday is quickly becoming my favorite. I was working on some ideas for club cards and wanted to do one where people could pick their sentiment.  I like having a choice because some folks might need a birthday card while others need a thank you.   Perfectly Penned will work for either of those AND this layout.   Win, win!  Thanks to Glenda for her gorgeous inspiration.  

Santa was going to put these cute leg warmers in Laila's stocking but he sorta dropped them off a bit early.  :)   She's really discovered her toes now so she LOVES grabbing them.

Fabulous Dinosaur

Laila decided to take a long nap today (after not sleeping that great last night of course) and I had a bit of time to go play along with the challenge at Fab Friday.   I love the sketch and am glad I had time to play.  I don't know what's up with my horrible picture taking lately, but I'll try to work on that.  I think I moved my light tent the wrong way and it is not working out.   

Still working on cards for the younger folks and still trying to use up some of my hoarded DSP.  I used some old Halloween paper, Pick Your Poison, and embossed it with the chevron folder.   I love embossed DSP for some reason.   Do you ever do that?   It looks pretty cool I think.  I kept it pretty simple since I didn't know how much time I'd have to finish it, but every dinosaur card needs a bit of distressing!  :)  

After seeing all the other moms going on and on about Sophie the Giraffe, I finally broke down and bought Laila one.  She must be quite tasty as she likes to gnaw on her.   She seems like a dog toy to me, but what do I know?   :)