Paradise Found for MDS Monday

I had fun doing my page this week for MDS Monday!  The theme was to follow the sketch (below) and make it PLAYFUL and COLORFUL!  Well, if you know anything about me, you know I love color!  I am not one that wears dull clothes .... or if I do have on black, I usually have a pop of color somewhere!  I like bright colors and my wardrobe and my cards are a testament to this!

I decided that the pictures that would look the best with the challenge would be my Hawaii pictures.  I visited Hawaii in 2005 (I think) and 2008 with Ashley.  Well, finding those pictures turned out to be a challenge since back then, I printed most of my pictures from my camera.  But, I forgot I had saved them on Shutterfly so I was able to access them.  If you have never been to Hawaii, you have missed a beautiful place.  The flowers there are the most gorgeous I have seen.

This page was so easy to do.  I used a pre-made template and just dropped the pictures in.  The background is from the download kit called Paradise Found and I just recolored it to Turquoise.  With all the beautiful pictures on the page, I didn't think embellishments were really needed.  I added the flower behind the text and the Hawaiian girl (from the same kit).  The title (Hawaii) is actually a punch called Smitten Alphabet that I love.  I use it a lot.

SKETCH

The first time we went, Ashley had just had eye surgery but she thought she was "good to go."  Well, the day after we were there, she had problems with one eye so we had to go to the Army hospital to get her taken care of.  A few days later when we went to Maui, she had problems with the other eye so we had to find an eye doctor in town.  She ended up wearing dark glasses during the whole trip!  So, it is pretty easy to tell which pictures are from the first trip and which are from the second!!

 Here are a few pictures from the trips.

If you watch Hawaii 5-0, this building is their headquarters and is seen in most episodes.

Ashley enjoying a fruity drink - 2008

Ashley & I at the luau.  It was dark so no glasses!

USS Arizona Memorial

Ashley reading the names at the Pearl Harbor Memorial (USS Arizona)

USS Arizona

sunset

Ready for the luau!

Stampin' Up Info

Project Life is a great and easy way to scrapbook your memories.

And now Stampin' Up is offering you a chance to win ALL the items in the Project Life by Stampin' Up! line!



Check it out HERE!!  You can either enter your contact information or use your Facebook account to sign up.  The contents ends at 11:59:59 pm Mountain Time on November 30, 2014.  At the very bottom of the sign-up page, there is a spot to enter a link if someone referred you.  I'd love for you to enter my link as the referring source.  Here is my link:  http://bit.ly/1DrFedm  (just copy and paste)


Here are this week's Weekly Deals.  My favorite Framelits Dies are on sale this week - Word Bubbles!!  You can order online by clicking the tab at the top of this page.








Also the Holiday Supplement is now available for ordering.  Check it out HERE

What is really hot right now is the Star boxes from the Holiday Supplement.


Inside the kit is everything you need to make 26 star boxes in varying sizes and it includes fabulous
embellishments and die cut words.  The only extra thing you need is glue to attach the embellishments.  The star boxes themselves have sticky strip already applied.  They are easy to make and fun to decorate.

Under the Tree DSP with Festival of Trees

I have another Christmas card to share with you today.

There is so much you can do with the Festival of Trees set!  I paired it today with a framed embossing folder.  This folder is retired but there is another similar one in the catalog (pg 227) called Fun Frames.  The DSP on this card is Under the Tree DSP which is a heavier weight paper.  I originally bought this DSP to make boxes with the Gift Box Punch Board but I love the country look of the paper on this card.  I tied some red and green yarn around the card stock.  It is retired but you can still order the green and the white Sweater Trim in the Clearance Section.

Unfortunately, Stampin' Up gave us some bad news today.  They are experiencing significant delays at their west coast ports due to a breakdown in negotiations with union dock workers.  These delays impact items coming from China and include the Wonderful Wreath Framelits Die (which I am waiting on), the Curvy Keepsake Box Die (I have ordered that for a customer) and the Tree Punch.  How dare they strike when we need our stuff for Christmas card making????  Hopefully, negotiations will be worked out very soon!

Little Letter Thinlets

I really like Stampin' Up's Little Letters Thinlets.  They are easy to use - especially with the Magnetic Platform and the Big Shot.  And they are a good size without taking up the whole card.  They are just 3/4" high.  I used them to make both of the cards below.

For this card, I used the negative are of the letters to spell out JOY.  The DSP is from the stack of decorative paper that is in the Holiday Catalog and the little pine cones are from Lovely As A Tree. The embossing folder is actually one I've had before SU came out with their Stylish Stripes.  They are both almost exactly alike.  I really like the traditional red, white and green in this card.

For this card, I embossed the white card with the Stars embossing folder (Holiday Catalog).  I punched the star using the Itty Bitty Accents Pack.  The word "season" is from Everyday Occasions Photopolymer - one of my "go to" stamps for Christmas.  The strip of DSP is from the stack in the Holiday Catalog.

Birthday Celebration

I had a nice birthday dinner celebration with my family at Firebirds.  And I received some beautiful birthday cards.  Here are a few of the beautiful hand made cards I received:

from Marianne - love this stamp set!

from Margaret - another flower favorite!

from Judy - These die cuts are so pretty!

Don't you love this sentiment (from Judy's card)

Joyce did a great job making this origami dress.

This is funny.  The first card I received from the NC Demos, made by my downline, Deb Michael.  Then on my birthday I received the second card in the mail from Deb!!  Love it!

from my upline, Carol Bartle

from Tina Lesson, one of my NC Demo friends.  I have this stamp and haven't used it - need to get it out and stamp.

Angela, Mom, me and Marianne at dinner

MDS Monday Challenge

A little late posting today but give me a break .... it's my Birthday!  (Not that I'm counting the years any more!)  I am going out to eat tonight at Firebirds with the family but other than that, nothing special planned.  Just doing what I feel like doing today and not doing anything I don't want to do!

I played around with My Digital Studio today creating a page for the MDS Monday challenge.  Another tricky one this week.  The first challenge was to change the size of patterned DSP when you fill a punch with patterned paper (DSP).  The way to do this is fill a punch (or photo box) with DSP; then double click on the shape and you can zoom in or out on the patterned paper by clicking on the "plus" and "minus."  The next challenge was to insert a picture in a group of photo boxes.  To do this you select the photo boxes you want to fill; group them together; then drag your photo in.

I can't tell you how many times I aligned these boxes!  Every time I thought I had them all lined up, I'd look again and see a "boo-boo."  Just don't look too hard or you might see one but I think I got them mostly aligned!!

So what do you think?  I love this picture of the peacock strutting and showing his beautiful feathers.  I took this several years ago at Fort Sam Houston while Marianne and I were visiting Ashley.

Suspended Festival of Trees

Whew!  Just finished pulling the Steelers through to a Monday Night win against Houston Texans.  We didn't look so good at the beginning of the game and let Houston score on us twice right off the bat with a touchdown and a field goal.  Even the fans at Heinz Field were booing their team!  But then the Steelers woke up and got three touchdowns and a field goal in less than three minutes at the end of the second quarter to turn a poor start and a 13-0 deficit into a 24-13 halftime lead.  I was whooping and hollering with Sammie trying to sleep on my lap.  She didn't know what was going on!!  We ended up winning with a score of 30-23.

Here is another "suspended" card using the Festival of Trees this time.  You can get the directions for the basics to making the card from yesterday's post.

Don't let my husband tell you he doesn't like cats!  Check this out:

Suspended Stars

Happy Monday!  I had a nice relaxing weekend.  Sonny and I went to the movies on Friday and saw The Judge.  It was very good - I would recommend it.  Saturday night we went to some friends house and played cards.  And Sunday, I got a lot of Christmas cards made.  I still have a lot to go but at least it is a start.

This is a fun card.  I guess you could call it Suspended Stars.  The starts are suspended between the top and bottom pieces of cardstock (which is covered with DSP). This card uses the stamp set, Bright and Beautiful.

Suspended Star Card

Inside of card

You cut your card base at the normal 5.5" x 8.5"; then trim it down to 5.5" x 5.75" and score at 4.75".  From the piece that is left over, cut a strip at 1.5" x 5.5" for the bottom.  Stamp your star and adhere it at the top to the top piece of cardstock and to the strip that you cut for the bottom.  The star holds the top and bottom together.

I have made a similar card to this one using Festival of Trees which I will share with you later.

MDS Monday Challenge - Herringbone Background

I missed the MDS Monday challenge last week since I was out of town so I wanted to try and do this week's challenge.  Well, what a challenge it was!!  We were to create a Herringbone Background . This was a new one for me and it took quite a bit of time to create.  I tried it first with different DSP's in autumn colors but it was just too busy.  Then I tried in-colors - not the look I was going for.  Then I decided to keep it simple (stupid!) and just do black and white patterns - that did the trick!  I got most of the papers from the Night and Day DSP.  To do the herringbone technique, you create a square punch and elongate it making it into a skinny strip.  Then you insert your paper.  There is a step-by-step tutorial by Juanita Golson on mydigitalstudio.net  if you are interested in trying it.  I did a lot of cut and pasting and when I got it the way I wanted, I "grouped" the items and saved them.  Here is what the page looks like with out the embellishments.

Here is the page after I added embellishments:

This picture was taken last week at the hockey game in Pittsburgh. Looks real, huh?   I posted the picture a few days ago and had a friend ask me how we were able to get in the box with the players!  Well, sorry to spoil it but this was actually a cardboard cut out.  Just wish we had the pull to sit down there with the players!!

I used a lot of elements from the Game Day Kit and I recolored the burlap ribbon to Crushed Curry. Check out the other pages using this technique here.

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I love Fall!

One of the things I missed when I lived in Texas was the changing of the seasons.  The season I missed the most was FALL.  I love the fall colors when the trees start changing and the crisp, cool air.  We have had our A/C off for about a week now with the windows open and it is great!  It is driving Bogart crazy but that's ok - he's kinda crazy anyway!!  When we were on our trip last week, I think we were just a tad early to see much fall foliage but we did see a bit.  My favorite was this tree that I snapped as we drove through the Pittsburgh country side.

Aren't the mix of colors gorgeous?

This picture below was taken from the front seat of the truck showing the trees lining the road- not too bad.

We took a tour of Heinz Field - where the Steelers and the Pitt Panthers play football.  This picture shows some beautiful trees in the players parking lot.

The foliage is just starting at the top of these trees.  This is a view from the stadium of one of the many bridges across one of the rivers (Monongahela, Ohio or Allegheny???)  It was a drizzly, foggy morning.

Tomorrow is Stamp Club and we will be doing several cards and projects.  Keeping on the same topic as fall, here is one of the cards we will be making:

I used Cajun Craze and Very Vanilla card stock and the News Print DSP.  I stamped on the DSP using Gorgeous Grunge and the acorns from For All Things with Crushed Curry, Cajun Craze and Soft Suede inks.  The leaves were made with a retired die from Stampin' Up.  After die cutting them in Cherry Cobbler, Cajun Craze, Crushed Curry and Tangelo Tango, I spritzed them with water, wadded them up and then smoothed them out and dried them with the Heat Gun.  I used one of the Autumn Wooden Elements (Holiday Catalog) that I sponged with Soft Suede.  The sentiment is from For All Things and the ribbon is Tangelo Tango.

New Photopolymer Christmas Stamp

We had a great trip but as always, it's good to be back home and sleep in my own bed!  We left home Wednesday morning and drove to Ft. Belvoir to pick up Ashley for our drive to Pittsburgh on Thursday.  Thursday started out a little rough - Ashley was supposed to meet up with her classmates to go to the State Department.  She thought they were meeting at 6:30 but turns out, they were meeting at 5:30 a.m.!  Sonny got up and took her to the Metro and as it turns out, she arrived before anyone else!  After she finished up for the day, we hit the road for Pittsburgh arriving there about 6:30 - just in time to find a parking spot downtown and a short walk to the Consol Energy Center to watch the Penguins for the first hockey have of the season.  It was a great one - high scoring.  The final score was 6-4 with the Pens winning.

I didn't get the message that we were supposed to be looking to our right!

Final score - 6-4 PENS!

This was a cool mosaic of Mario Lemieux (former player and now owner of Penguins) of a collections of photographs that have been pieced together.

The Pittsburgh PENGUINS!

No Neck Sharon!!

Stampin' Up has released a beautiful Christmas stamp - as seen below.  Gentle Peace Photopolymer stamp was designed to work with the Blendabilties to create the stained glass look.  Just when I thought I didn't need any more Christmas stamps!  This image is just gorgeous!

Here is a LINK to the flier with details.





Here are the Tuesday specials for this week.  They will be available through next Monday.

Darling Doily Thinlits Die [133736] $24.95 $18.71	Decorative Window Gift Box [132146] $4.95 $3.71	Floral Frames Framelits Dies [127012] $26.95 $20.21	Mustache Framelits Die [133741] $7.95 $5.96
Perfect Print Numbers Bigz Die [133726] $24.95 $18.71	Spooky Treats Designer Template - Digital Download [127588] $12.95 $7.77	Tiny Triangles Textured Impressions Embossing Folder [133740] $7.95 $5.96	Truly Grateful Wood-Mount Stamp Set [131730] $27.95 $20.96