St. Patty's Day

Nope, we are not Irish in this house but I am, for really the first time, having fun with St. Patty's day this year!  I'm even going to make corned beef and cabbage...a little different from the traditional recipes but I'm doing it!

I also made these super cute Leprechan hats for my "kids" (Kyler, Scott, and Ashley).  They are a new template by Creations by AR.  I will say that while I like the way this looks it literally took me 'til the third time to get this right.  I won't go into detail but, needless to say, none of these are perfect but I don't think the kids care!  I used the SVG file and cut it out with my Cricut so the actual cutting time was really nothing.  The biggest problem?  I now have two open bags of Hershey's Kisses in my craft room.  NOT a good thing.  I think I need to move them out of here!

It has been a great last couple of days for me.  Well, Thursday I did not feel well at all and pretty much sat around all day but Friday was great!  And I know today is going to be a great day too!

Well, that is it for me today.  Be prepared for lots of posts next week!  Have a wonderful weekend! 

Thought of the day:  An Irish saying for you.  May the luck of the Irish possess you. May the devil fly off with your worries. May God bless you forever and ever.

Vote 4 Kyler!

Good morning!  Has your week been productive so far?

Last night Kyler and I spent quite a bit of time on his posters for his election.  You see, 8th grade class elections are coming up and he wants to be the secretary so he came up with a plan for the posters after brain storming a theme that would work for him.  His campaign slogan is Faith, Facts, Fun.  He plans on writing his speech to coincide with that slogan telling his classmates how those three things will work into his office.  Pretty cool, huh?

So for the poster I bought some neat shiny orange poster board.  Since Kyler wanted it to be in a triangle shape (think the trinity) Todd cut them for him.  Kyler then decided that faith is the most important thing in this theme so it went on top with facts and fun after that.  We cut the faith and 'vote 4 Kyler' on the Cricut (yes he helped), he found a Bible/cross clip art he liked, printed it off and cut it out.  We made a little 'notebook' with an old die from PTI and on the front we printed (in old english font) 'We the people of the 8th grade in order to for a more perfect union vote KYLER'.  Too funny, huh?  The soccer ball is a 3-D ball.  We just found a soccer image online printed out 9 of them, scored them down the middle and then attached them together and finally to the board...super easy!  Finally Todd and I bought some candy yesterday and made labels that say 'vote for Kyler' and then slapped them on some candy for him to pass out.  (Hopefully that isn't too over the top!)  Oh, and we popped up his name on the boards with foam tape so they stood out a bit more.

That was my fun yesterday.  It took much longer than I had anticipated but I think they look great and more important than that Kyler really likes them!  I hope you all have a wonderful day!

Thought of the day:  Today you have the opportunity to be someone's chief cheerleader or chief critic; which one will you choose?

Home of the Brave

What a fun way to start your day...with a smile! I hope it will last you all day through!

Today, I'm sharing a card that I had originally thought I was making for Jon but at the end I can't send it to him...it has glitter on it. In addition to that possibly being a bit embarrassing to him it could also compromise safety when it gets on him. Anyway, I was thinking of sending it to the rear detachment of his company. We shall see.

As you can tell this is a super patriotic card. I had a hard time deciding on the sentiment as the Cricut cartridge that I used (stand and salute) had several that would work. I finally decided on 'Home of the Brave'. Fitting for the military don't you think? The fireworks at the bottom are also from the same Cricut cartridge and then glittered up on the ends. I used this week's sketch by Carly for my layout and lots of WeRMemory Keepers for the papers, both patterned and cardstock.

I have to tell you guys about a great, FREE, Cricut resource. You will find it at Above Rubies Studio. It is called the Cricut Cutting Guide. It lists LOTS of cardstock/patterned paper manufacturers and what settings you should cut the paper on with your Cricut. I tried cutting that sentiment above SIX times before I just used the guide...the first cut at the suggested pressure, depth, and speed in the guide was perfect! If you own a Cricut and have problems cutting sometimes you should definitely check out that resource!

Well, that is it for me today! I hope your day is filled with lots of SMILES!

Monkey Birthday

Happy Saturday everyone! I love Saturday (especially when the sun is out!) but today I love it even more. We are going to a birthday party today for our friend's little guys 1st birthday. It will be cute I'm sure!

So Wren, the birthday boy, is quite the monkey (in fact mom is making monkey cupcakes for today) so I thought I'd continue the theme with my card and bag for his gift.

I found the image on the card when I was blog surfing the other day. I knew right away I would use it for Wren's birthday card so I purchased it, down loaded it and then colored it up to make this card! The layout is from Limelight Papercrafts challenge for this weekend but also fits the Totally Papercrafts challenge of One For The Boys and Stamp Somethings Digi Day challenge.

Then I decided I would use the green bag that has been sitting on my desk for awhile but couldn't just leave it plain. I had just downloaded a monkey SVG from SVG Cuts a couple of days ago and knew it would be perfect so I cut that along with 'happy birthday' and just threw the bag together. It is perfect for the gifts we got for him...a pair of shoes (he doesn't care for shoes but mom wants him to start getting used to them) and a cup that goes in the freezer and then keeps the liquid super cold...a frosty mug like dads. Fun stuff shopping for a 1 year old!

So, that is all I have for you today. I hope you have a super wonderful weekend!

Clearing the Clutter Challenge

Hello! Welcome to a very late Friday post! I wanted to be sure to post for our Clearing the Clutter Challenge but I just didn't have time to get something done to get a post up "on time."

So...how is this cutie card a CTCC card? Well, a couple of days ago I decided to clear off my stamping area a little bit (boy does it look better) but I just couldn't clear off this stamp and paper before I made a card with it so to further help me clear the clutter I went ahead and made a card! Good deal, huh? Anyway this cute cupcake shaped card is from My Scrap Chick and is an SVG file. Of course the image is the cutie Marci from La-La Land crafts. This card is very basic but I still think it has a cute factor for sure!

So...wanna see what Tana did for her Clearing the Clutter challenge post? Just go HERE to see! It is a neat one for sure!

Alright, I'm off to create for tomorrow's post! I'm looking forward to it, too! Have a wonderful Friday evening!

A Lot Of Bags...

Good morning all! How has your week been going? Are you ready for Christmas? I think we are. Just two more boxes to get out and we are all set. Yay!

When looking back on my day yesterday I was thinking that I didn't really get much done. I did take the kids to the assisted living place to carol (and then took my car of kids for hot chocolate...that was fun and one of the benefits of having kids at a small private school, you can get away with that type of thing...lol!), did laundry, and made 11 of the bags that you see above for Kyler's teachers (well, 10 are for the teachers the extra one is in case we forgot someone)! The bags were super easy though. Click on the photo to see them better. I cut them with my Cricut so all I had to do was choose the paper I wanted to use. Can you say easy button? I know this photo shows the more girlie type of papers but there are four male type of bags in the back for the four male teachers that Kyler has. I had bought a large bag of Ghirardelli chocolate through Ebates (with an 18% rebate!) a few weeks ago for this purpose. Each of the gift bags above has five candies in it (I'm happy to have a few leftover). The bags measure 4 1/4" x 3 3/8". I got the SVG file for these at My Scrap Chick.

Today is a pretty big day for our family. My oldest son, Scott, is going to an interview for an internship in Olympia and Jon is heading to the orthopedic surgeon this afternoon to see what is to be done with his fingers. I guess it will be another day of "praying without ceasing." I seem to be doing that a lot recently.

Anyway, I hope you have a super day today!

Happy Flower

Wow, it is Wednesday already. Can you believe it? Next thing you know it will be Thanksgiving and then Christ...never mind, I'm not going to type it. I plan on making a bunch of my gifts this year and need to get moving on it so if I ignore it the date will go away, right?

Anyway, today's card is an interesting one. First of all it is HUGE a whopping 6"x6". That is not a size that I would usually make but since I used my Cricut with my Sure Cuts A Lot and a SVG pattern from My Scrap Chick. With only a few cuts this one was easy to cut and put together...I love that! I did decide that it needed a sentiment though so I inked up my stamp then thought I should use my stamp a ma jig. In the process of putting my stamp down it fell out of my hand and landed on the flower...nice huh? Sheesh. If you look at it close you can see where I dropped it. Silly thing! Guess what though? I'm sending it the way it is as I know it will be appreciated. Now I'm having a hard time resizing the envelope SVG that I have to fit this card but I'll get it!

And, I'm sure you've noticed my new blog look. While I liked the other one I really like the caricatures that I've been seeing and this new look has a lot of elements of my actual craft room so it is so fun. Do you see my diamond earring? Yep, that is so me too...the only thing I wear is my diamond earrings.

Anyway, have a super Wednesday! Hope you get your entire to-do list done today!

Families Are Forever

Morning ladies! Just a quick card to show you today.

I needed one more Father's Day card but it didn't need to be a traditional Father's Day card so I took out one of my Cricut cartridges and cut the tree and sentiment. I did use a sketch for this card (I just can't seem to get away from them!). You can see that at the Moving Along With The Times blog HERE.

See? Super simple card but the tree and sentiment have some meaning behind them.

I hope you have a wonderful Wednesday!

Pennant Banner

Just a quick post today to show you what I made for the front of our house for Jon's graduation party. I knew when I got my Cricut that I was wanting to do this so I set to work on it ASAP. Jon's school colors are blue and white with a little red. I also figured I could use the banner for Jon's going away party so the red, white, and blue works great for that. All in all an incredibly easy and quick project.
I hope your week is going well! I'm also hoping to be back in my craft room this afternoon as I have SO much to do.

Have a wonderful day everyone!

The Day Of Teacher's Gifts

Good morning friends! Today is a big day for us...our family comes in town for our graduation festivities. It should be interesting to see how everything goes. On a sad note though...my grandpa and his wife are not coming. He was in the hospital last week and we found out he has pancreatic cancer. Your prayers are appreciated for them!

Today I'm just going to show you what I ended up making for the teachers. I didn't go with the purse from the other day. I decided to use my NEW CRICUT and make some boxes, load them up with candy and be good to go. Yep, I got a Cricut and I love it! I also got the Sure Cuts A Lot program and that makes the Cricut that much better! I've really enjoyed making these!So...top and bottom photos are obviously for Kyler's two teachers. I bought a big bag a Ghiradelli chocolate, caramel squares and loaded the boxes up with those and put in a coffee card for them as well.

Below, is a little box that I made for Jon to give to his math teacher. Jon has had the same math teacher I think for three of his four high school years. Mr. Johnson is one of the best math teachers and we are so thankful that both Scott and Jon had him. He is retiring this year though so no luck for Kyler. We'll work on getting Kyler in with Mrs. Faye though. The idea for the numbers and such on the box was totally Jon's. This is a little smaller box and holds about 6 pieces of Ghirardelli candy, no gift card though as this teacher doesn't care for coffee.

So, that is it for today. Tomorrow you'll want to stop back by as I'll have blog candy up for you all to sign up for. Don't expect me back here too much over the next week or so as with everything going on I'm not sure how much time I'll have.

Have a wonderful week!!