Good grief.....

I have SO neglected my poor blog. I must confess to being addicted to a photo app on my iPhone called InstaGram and spend way too much time taking and editing pictures. Enough of that for right now, will post some of my creations on another post. Meanwhile, here is the newest addition to our family....little Morgan Elizabeth.....born 3/12/11. She is such a little sweetie!!

I think it's finally SPRING!

The weather has still been a little unpredictable here, but I think we've seen the end of winter (I hope!) By the middle of the week we should be in the high 50's and maybe even 60 a few days!! WooHoo!!! Made a trip up to Archiver's with my girlfriends today to check out the new Tim Holtz stuff.....awesome stuff, but too much to buy in one day. I would have "broke the bank"!! So here are a few things I've been up to lately. The first two are my latest skinny pages for Rande Hansen's grungy themed book. I had so much fun making these.....got out the papers and paints and just went to town!

The little girl on the blue page is one Rande sent me awhile back, so thought it would be fun to use it in her book.....isn't she cute?

This is a tag I made for the March ATT monthly mailer. The tag was painted black then I clear embossed the floral stamps, painted over it with green paint and rubbed the green off the embossed areas. The birdcage is from Tim's die, painted silver and the bird is grungeboard covered with printed tissue tape colored with alcohol ink.

This tag was for the March birthday on ATT. Love the new metallic, pearly sprays from Ranger.

These charms were for a swap on ATT too. Had to make 30 of these babies and the ones I got back were great!! I love swaps!!

These charms were for a steampunk swap on the ArtCharms group. Had to make 30 of these too and I just loved the ones I got for this swap too. One of these days I need to actually MAKE something with the hundreds of charms I've collected from these swaps over the years.

This is a box I made for the February monthly mailer. The theme for the month was using Tim's fragments. I painted the box black, colored the fragments with alcohol ink then attached them to Tim's images stamped on glossy paper. I used tissue tape around the sides of the lid and filled the box with lots of little goodies!

These last three tags were for the ATT February birthdays. The blue tags have a detachable pendant and the orange tag has a magnet attached.

It's a cold, cold February....

We have had quite a winter this year. I will be ever so happy to see spring arrive. The only good part of all this is that I no longer have to drive to work in the snow. In fact I've been pretty much hibernating these last few weeks.

This is a valentine I made for my PaperWhimsy friend Gale Blair for an exchange on our Facebook Art Friends group. No pressure here....I get to send to Miss PaperWhimsy herself!! I love this pink ruched fabric. I have it is a pale green too, but seem to always use the pink.

I finally received a package from my friend Sally in France that was mailed on November 30th.....and look at the condition it was in when it arrived. It was practically shredded and in a USPS envelope with a note of apology stating "We Care"!!!! Fortunately, Sally had packaged everything so well that everything inside survived the trip despite the post office. Even the lovely crystal on her card was unbroken.

This has been the view from our front porch. In fact this was about three inches ago. We are running out of places to put the snow. I figure if we get more snow before some of this melts, we won't be able to get to the mailbox. (Especially after the efforts of our wonderful snowplow driver!) Ah well, hopefully spring is not too far away. Meanwhile, I will be keeping warm by the fire!

What I've been up to lately.....

These are my latest contributions to the skinny book swap I have been in for the last year. My partner this month was Trinka....she likes women's faces, numbers and old maps. I used an old piece of ledger paper that one of the pages I received had been wrapped in. I stamped one of my favorite stamps and added butterflies for a bit of color. Below I used a vintage map of Paris for the background and collaged with some French items. I only have three sets to make.....I will be sad to see this swap end, but oh is my book going to be fabulous. Will have to post photos of the completed piece.

This tag was for the monthly mailer swap on the AllThingsTim Yahoo group. We were to use crackle paint and create a primarily white item. The suggestion was to also use Tim's snow mixture....white UTEE, clear UTEE, glass glitter and glossy accents....FUN and MESSY!

These valentines were from a class at Archiver's a couple of weeks ago. I took another one last week, but need to take photos yet. These were really cute and easy.

These two tags and pendants were for the January birthday girls in the ATT 2011 birthday swap. I've been hooked on these since taking Tim's class last summer.

I don't know what I was thinking at Christmas (obviously wasn't thinking at all), but I totally forgot to take photos of the things I made for gifts. I made each of my daughter-in-laws and my oldest granddaughter personalized "junque bracelets". I made another bracelet for the daughter-in-laws using a vintage looking silver piece resembling an old silverware handle. I also made painted tennis shoes for the three little granddaughters and decorated plastic paint cans for the little boys to put their little odds and ends gifts in. Can't believe I didn't get any pictures.....that's what happens when you wait til the last minute!! Ha, I know....no one is surprised that I would wait til the last minute!!!

I also just sent in 30 valentine charms for a swap on the ArtCharms group....will get a photo up on those and my own junque bracelet soon!

Farewell my old chair.....

Well, my old chair finally gave up.....it was a sad day. I love my chair....although it looked much better in the family room with the ottoman before it was banished to the garage to await pickup. I have held the grandbabies for hours while they slept and spent many, many Sundays relaxing and reading the paper in the comfort of my chair. I couldn't find anything I liked nearly as well, so I settled for a nice green recliner/rocker. No ottoman and no pretty (albeit threadbare) leaf print fabric...and it's not big enough to have the little ones sit next to Grandma. Ah well, nothing lasts forever....farewell my old chair!

Here's Becca Rose checking out the new chair....the delivery guys weren't even gone before she had to test it! I must say, everyone seems to like the new chair except me....well, I don't really dislike it....just can't take the place of my old one!

I decided to change up the Christmas decorations a bit this year. Instead of my santa's on the fireplace I decided on an arrangement of snowmen and reindeers and sparkly stuff. I like the way it turned out....so much that I left it for awhile after taking down the rest of the decorations. Had a hard time taking down my little tree on the fireplace too. Now we just have cold and snow to look forward to for a few months.

Now this is a motley crew if ever I saw one.....Grandma and Grandpa and all the grandkids! Next year we will have one more little one to add to the crowd!

Sweet little Becca Rose was in her first Christmas program. At 22 months, she was the tiniest one on the stage and although she was a bit baffled by it all, she sprang into action for the Jingle Bells number!! She was adorable!!

Wow, am I running behind.....

....no Christmas decorations up yet, nothing wrapped, gifts I need to finish, etc, etc, etc! I did manage to finish a few more Tim tags though and an overdue birthday swap for the ATT list.

I love this snowman tag....the overlay is a piece of plastic packaging that has been embossed with a snowflake embossing folder!

You can't tell in the photo, but this one is all gold and shimmery....I really like the rosette.



This one uses white ultra thick embossing powder on the numbers to look like vintage paint.

This is a tag and card for Nancy Crissinger's birthday. I used a clear shimmer spray with distress inks for the background on the tag.

And this is a picture of all the cool stuff I got from Tim for posting a comment on his blog....cool, huh?? I love the craft scrubbie....it's great for cleaning ink and glue from your hands....not that I ever get ink and glue on my hands!!!

Trying to find time to create!

It seems this time of year I always realize I have too many plans and not enough time!! I don't know how I managed to do all the holiday things I did when I was young......it seems old age really slows you down! I have so many things in various stages of completion and I know I will soon have to start prioritizing and deciding which things will wait til next year!

One thing I have really been enjoying is Tim Holtz's twelve days of Christmas tags. I have only managed to finish three of them, but I hope to at least get to a few more before time runs out for this year! For each of the tags I had to improvise for items I didn't have, but that is half the fun! You can see Tim's tags here . The man is SO talented and creative. AND lucky me, he gives away a ton of prizes over the twelve days and I just found out I WON!! And all you have to do to be included in the prize drawings each day is to leave a comment on his blog. WooHoo!!

Here is a Christmas card I made using a new Cuttlebug die. I hope to make a few more like it.

Here is the birthday gift for my friend Sally in France. This is for the birthday swap on the ATT list. I still have one more to make for this year....think I may do something similar.

Close-up of the pendant......



Now I'm off to do some shopping and take a cool bracelet class at the local bead store. (I'm thinking I'll make a few for Christmas gifts!!!)