Wishing You "Well"

Sometimes you just need a pretty card - And there are some really "pretty" images that are new from Alota Rubber Stamps - now these images can be used with our cute stamps too, but they are perfect for just a simple card. You can see all of April's new images HERE and they include flowers, beach and baby images!



For my card I started with the new "Magnolia Blossoms" image - just love how versatile it is! I stamped it onto a Daisy D's sky pattern paper, then colored with my Copics. I matted it with a brown coredinations card stock and sewed around it with a zig zag stitch over and over. My background pattern paper is from Graphic 45, it is matted on green card stock and sewed down as well, I then used a Martha Stewart border punch with a scrap of white card stock.

The well is one of my all time favorite Alota Rubber stamps "Wishing Well". I have always loved it, and use it for many different cards. And the sentiment "Wishing You Well" is well.. perfect! I colored the well with my Copics, then cut out and put onto the card with pop dots.

Hope you like it.... Can't believe it is already Thursday - wow this week has flown by! Hope you are having a good week and have a great weekend planned.. it is almost here!

HUGS and-

A Hee Haw Birthday Card -

Now only if we had a Hee Haw Birth around here! Lacey is really taking her time! Just goes to show you, they are in control and what she did last time may not be her plan for this time. LOL So I am still waiting for a donkey baby - So until then I played with my new High Hopes Brayden stamps... they finally came after waiting for nearly 3 months! Almost as bad as waiting for a real donkey!
Brayden is colored with my Copics - cut and doodled around the edges. I used a cream colored card stock as the base with a BoBunny green dotted paper and a Happy Birthday pattern paper from Imaginisce, front and back of the paper. I inked the edges of everything. The sentiment is also from High Hopes - fits well.
I ran a pretty satin ribbon across the middle, with one of my MIL crocheted flowers and Martha Stewart frond punches. A jewelery spacer and mini brad to hold it all together.

Now not only did I decorate the inside of the card as well... but I colored up a second Brayden image! I made him holding the birthday cake... I love how you can put what ever you like into his "hand"! Same papers are used inside as the front, and the sentiment is from Hero Arts.

Was fun to make a card just for fun, and especially a card with a Donkey theme -

So what are you working on this week? Me I am trying to get ahead just a bit on some DT work. Sticking close to home, this swine flu thing has us not eating out and just running around like normal. All of the schools in our area are closed, and there are many sick people that are being tested. There are 6 confirmed at this point here in Texas - I know three are in the area, hundreds being tested and are sick. And now sadly I hear on the news this morning that there is one death to a baby in Texas. I feel so sorry for the family - I don't think everyone took this too seriously at first, but now things are looking like they had better start.

Hope things are healthy where you are and you are well -

HUGS and-

A Spoon Full of "Sneak Peek"!!!

Today's card is a two-fer... yes - My Spoon Full of Sugar Card is also a super early sneak peek! The theme for Spoon this week is Blue and Green!

A VERY special sneak peek for you today from Club Anya and The Greeting Farm...a BRAND NEW Miss Anya set is going to be released on the 15th of this month! How exciting is that???

Even better? ONE lucky winner is going to receive this stamp set when the contest ends on Thursday evening. The WINNER will be announced THIS Friday, May 1st..that's almost TWO whole weeks before the actual release by the time the mailman delivers it!!!

All you have to do is play along with our little game this week! Head on over to the Club Anya blog to THIS post to start the game and to go over the official rules:

You will need to stop by certain Team Member's blogs on certain days to be given a series of clues. The official schedule is posted on the Club Anya blog. Each team member will be giving you a special sneak peek of this ADORABLE new set, and a clue for you, in the form of a letter in the alphabet.

Once you have collected ALL FOUR clues, you will have to DE SCRAMBLE the letters to form a word. Once you guess what the word is, you will have until Thursday, April 30th, 2009 at 8pm CST to email Jessica with your guess. At that time, all of the correct guesses will be entered into a contest to WIN the BRAND NEW MISS ANYA SET!!!

I just love these new images, they Are so cute! For mine I had just received a new paper stack from K&Company, inside was this great new shower paper, just perfect for this new image! The umbrella's are also part of the stack, I just cut them out of the paper. Her coat and all of the umbrellas are covered with dimensional glaze. My sentiment is from Hero Arts. I hope you like my sneak peek, and now you need to run over to Club Anya for more details, make sure to check out the other DT hints this week and win some prizes!

(so did you pick up my clue letter?)

You also need to see the wonderful Green and Blue cards from the DT at Spoon Full of Sugar! Wow these girls blow me away each week, cute cards!! And this week another great prize from Alota Rubber Stamps!!

Hope you have a great Tuesday!

HUGS and-

Smile Piggies.. You can still win the blog candy!

Happy Monday - my Crop on Saturday was a lot of fun... late night, but lots of laughs and I got lots done! Yesterday was an odd day - during the night we got new neighbors, they seem like they are really nice, and will be great neighbors, but her horses well from by back porch across my mini donkey pens look like they are 30 or 40 feet tall! And they jumped our fence in the night Saturday - so yesterday morning was an early start and well getting to know our neighbors! They are really big horses - 17.2 hands tall average of the 11 of them. (and no I am not for sure how tall that really is.. LOL) But lets just say their backs stand way over my head! And pastured next to my mini's they are giants! Gorgeous animals.. show horses.

How about a card today? And a reminder it is not to late to sign up for the Stampavie Newsletter! And by doing that you can get in on some fantastic candy... see last Thursday's post HERE for the details and the direct link to the newsletter sign up is HERE.

My card is from Stampavie Rachelle Anne Miller - Happy Piggies and they just make me smile! I colored them with my Copics then cut them out with my Nestibilities Circle, matted with a white scalloped circle.

The card is some yummy new papers I just got from Yellow Bicycle - Baby Girl Safari line. I used my Martha Stewart border punch top and bottom and sewed everything down with a pretty light pink opalescent thread. The sentiment is a Heidi Grace epoxy sticker - I then doodled the edges of the Piggies image.

My flowers.. oh I love these things I do hope my MIL is going to make me some more! :0) And for those that have asked she is working on getting me the pattern. The leaves are Martha Stewart frond punch, and the center is a sugared brad from Creative Inspirations.

And don't be too shocked... but I decorated the inside of this one too! My scraps were laying there on my desk so I just put them together and attached them to the inside.

Hope you have a great Monday... me... working this morning - then grocery store and hopefully they eye doctor this afternoon... I am out of contacts and they won't sell me anymore until I have my eyes checked! I hate that, but oh well one of those "rules" you can't fight - LOL

HUGS and-

Donkey Day and UP Libbie! and how do you like my blog?

First... I feel so much better.. I feel like "I" am back to my blog! THANK YOU SO MUCH SARA! for helping me get things all cleaned up and soooo pretty on my blog!

It is going to be a quick post today... sorry... I have a few friends coming over today to "play"! We are going to craft all day and long into the night! But don't get sad that there are not many photos of Donkeys today.. as I think there is a very good chance we will have to break into regular scheduling this week with something "NEW"... yes we are getting kind of close here!




Now I know you are all thinking... FINALLY.. Macey is going to have her baby! But NO... she is not ready yet - very very very wide, but not ready yet. Cheyenne is standing behind her and yes, she is gonna have a baby a month or so after Macey.


Lacey is who we are keeping a very close eye on!!! Funny.. We thought that Macey might be first, then I counted the months and realized that no she couldn't be, then we just new Vicki would be first as she really was getting just huge and seemed to start to show signs... but then here came Lacey... yes she is starting to show actual signs - and because when she had Rosie she went from no signs to having a baby in just a day or so.. we are keeping a really close eye this time. But then again she could be just fooling us for all the special attention ;0) I'll post as soon as something happens......


How cute is this? Ok, so I had a "cookie" in my hand and she was trying very hard to reach it... she has unbelievable balance!

Oops... I held her there too long LOL Those ears just kill me!!! When she puts her head back they stand straight up on her head, and I think they fold out and get even bigger!!


She is really too funny - that face, those ears, and she knows she has personality and uses it baby! I need to get a photo of her when she greets someone new. She runs all around you two or three times at high speed, then out of no where flips upside down and stretches out 14 feet long and freezes - tummy rub please... I am usually laughing so hard I forget to get my camera and snap a photo... I'll work on it this week.


Well gotta go get tables set up and things ready... I am so excited to have my friends come and play today! OH man wouldn't it be cool if Lacey delivered today with them all here! Probably not.... ;0)


HUGS and-

We are InStyle for another BLOG HOP!

Yes it is time again for another InStyle Blog Hop!! And this week the DT have been "contained"!! We were all asked to make some sort of container... but before that here are the details about the Blog Hop -

Chatting will start on the InStyle Stamps forum at 11:30am EST, and will stay open until 11pm EST (or as long as people want to chat). Link for the forum:http://instylestamps.com/forum/

And here are the other important details :0)

1. The blog hop will run from 12pm EST to 11pm EST on the ISS forum (see link above). There will be mini contests with prizes throughout the day on the blog hop thread on the forum.

2. If you could please visit the ISS blog to vote for their favorite DT project, the designer of the project with the most votes will win a prize. No pressure to vote for me... but I would just love to win!! LOL

3. After you vote, they will need to leave a comment on the ISS blog post with the poll on it in order to be entered to win the grand prize for the customers. Yes, this is where you get the chance to win... and we love prizes that say GRAND PRIZE... and I would love for it to be YOU.. one of my readers ;0) The polling system we use doesn't keep track of who did the voting, so if they don't post a comment, they won't be in the drawing. (it really isn't complicated, you'll see when you get there)

4. The contest will remain open until 11:59pm EST on Saturday, April 25th, and that the winners will be announced on Sunday, April 26th.

Here's the links to all of the DT, the blog and the main website:

Virginia / ISS Blog: http://instylestamps.com/blog/
ISS Home: http://instylestamps.com/

Cathy http://www.cathy-cunningham.blogspot.com/

Jodi-Ann http://inkedinspirations.blogspot.com/

Joy http://daiseyfreak.blogspot.com/

Kim D. http://craftymakes.blogspot.com/
Kim G. http://www.craftsbykim.blogspot.com/

Maria http://www.stampininspirations.blogspot.com/

Mary http://mycardz.wordpress.com/
Melissa http://mmedesigns.blogspot.com/
Michelle http://www.donkeysmiles.blogspot.com/ (ME)
Risa http://malieta-lifessimplepleasures.blogspot.com/
Sandy http://stampinsandy.blogspot.com/
Silke http://bastelzauberin-bastelzauberin.blogspot.com/
Taylor http://musingsofanaddict.wordpress.com/
Vicky http://vickygina.typepad.com/

Now for my Container.. (that you are going to run over to the ISS site and vote for wink wink LOL)

I really didn't know what I wanted to do... I was going back and forth on a few things.. then everything just came together... First I found the cute white enamel bucket/basket - on sale! And the very next place I found this adorable bath set.. on sale too! And the wording on the bath set were just perfect for one of my favorite ISS images - Sheree !

I colored her with my copics and LOTS of Stickles for bubbles! Cut it out with my Nestibilities inked the edges. I ran one piece of pattern paper across the bucket, and then put the oval on as well. My flowers are white flowers that I colored with my Air Compressor and my Copics. Love that they can match so well that way. I added a sentiment of "ENJOY" with my label maker, and a ribbon that matched to perfectly with my colors.

A close up of Sheree...

A close up of the goodies... A bottle of Vanilla lotion, two fun packages of bubble bath, a envelope of bath salts and of course a little rubber duckie!

Look how fun the packages are of the bubble bath... they are made to hang - I forgot to take a photo of the bath salts... it reads "Women are like tea bags they don't know how strong they are until they get into Hot Water" I love that! May have to use that on a card one day!

Ok that is my container... I do really hope you will join in on the HOP.. and follow all the links to see the other DT creations... and if you happen to vote for me... THANKS!!!

HUGS and -

Just Magnolia's NUMBER 2!

This week for Just Magnolias it is a color challenge!

I love color challenges, and this one is a great combo...

PINK and GREEN!

First I want to say thank you to all of those that joined in last week! Wow I think I can speak for all of the DT of Just Magnolias...we were thrilled that so many have played along with us!

For my card this week I pulled out one of my new Spring Club Magnolias - I just love her... colored with my Copics all in shades of pink and green of course, and high lighted with my white gel pen.

For my card I started out with a bright light green card stock as the base, then the papers are from K&Company -love the glitter on the floral paper! WOW really sparkles! I matted it with a scrap of pink card stock and the image is matted with a piece of the green that I ran thru my Cuttlebug to emboss. I sewed everything down with some really cool thread. I so wish you could see that it is pink and green.. oh what do you call it... you know it is pink for a while, then turns to shades of green. Well it is really pretty and perfect for this card! LOl

I used a green butterfly ribbon across the middle - and then found these cute pink dragonflies in my stash... and I thought oh well.. they are cute not butterflies but cute. Then a couple of days later I found out that this Tilda is a dragonfly!!! How funny huh? I thought she was a butterfly, but then when you see the butterfly Tilda you see the big difference! I still love this one though, and now my embellishments go perfectly! I added 6 pink dew drops on the image and then the sentiment.

Do you love it or what??? While going thru my stash to gather stuff for a LSS garage sale (which I missed BTW darn it) I found a stack of some rub ons from Fancy Pants - I started to put them in the sale stack then saw this - and new it was too cute and fun for this card.

Make sure to go over to JUST MAGNOLIAS and see all of the DT's work - wow these girls are so talented I still pinch myself that I can "play" with them! And once again this week there is a great prize!!!

Ok.... I have to go and finish a project I have been working on all day - There is a blog hop later today... SO it will be a two post day for me - see ya a bit later :0)

HUGS and-

STAMPAVIE LEERE ALDRICH BLOG CANDY!!!

You ready to win a great prize?

How about a whole bunch of really fresh new images?

This blog candy will be for

ALL TEN IMAGES FROM THE STAMPAVIE LEERE ALDRICH COLLECTION!!

There will be one week to enter our Leere Aldrich blog candy give away.
Winner will be announced on May 1st in our brand new Stampavie Creations Newsletter

To qualify for the huge Blog Candy give away all you have to do is follow the link and sign up for our newsletter! On May 1st just before the newsletter goes out one random name will be drawn from the subscribers list to be our winner and be included in the newsletter! That is our only qualification, but if you would like to share our Candy news on your blog that will be very appreciated. :0) Thank you very much!

The newsletter will be full of fresh project ideas, tutorials, interviews, prize winners, competitions, and even recipes! You know you are going to want it! It is gonna be great!

If you would like to see some of the Leere Images - check out our projects our

DT members came up with:

Claudia

Diane

Jay Jay

Jessica

Heidi

And for my project....

I went just a bit Leere Aldrich crazy! I love it!

This project was totally inspired by and for my niece Talisyn! End of school year and she wanted to remember this school year and her friends with a book for them to write in - a sort of Autograph book for elementary girls :0) LOL I am sure she will add questions for them to answer and then drawings too - she is a real little artist!

I started out by getting a Bind-it-All he he just had to have the perfect reason to get one and this was it! Well that and they were on sale, I had a gift card in hand and well it was PINK! So I just HAD to buy it! I used two piece of scrap chipboard - and covered both sides with papers from DCWV Nana's Nursery Girls and sanded the edges to make them smooth. Cut white card stock to fit and then punched all my papers - wow like butter I might add!

I then stamped out nearly all of the Leere Aldrich images... and colored them with my Copics - I did this pretty quickly I think all of them were colored in less than 45 minutes! Cut them out roughly. Then used the Nestiblities Labels one and cut out a larger green print, then an smaller one out of white. My MM Slice was used to cut the "My Friends" out of scraps from the inside covers. I doodled just a bit - and the glued some of the Leere Aldrich images and the Label down.

This is the back... with one of my favorites from the collection!

This is one of the back inside cover corners -

And this is the front of the book inside - I doodled the edge - but I left the rest empty - you know how important it is to little girls to add their special titles and thoughts themselves!

The very last thing was the millions of miles of ribbon I cut and tied on the spring coil.. really wasn't that much, but I did want it to be really full and frilly!

I really had fun with this.. I sure hope Talisyn will love it too -

I do hope you are going to join in on our Blog Candy and sign up for the Stampavie Creations Newsletter! I am sure you are going to love the newsletter - and if you see your name as the winner you will be really happy you did!

HUGS and-

Cheers!!

Today I toast you! Cheers! This is Marti from InStyle Stamps - isn't she pretty! When I first saw her I couldn't figure out how to use her - I don't drink so the ideas were just not there. Then I thought well she could be toasting with anything - so my Marti is drinking lemon aid with a cherry LOL :0) and I think she is a great congratulations card!
I colored her with my Copics and then gave her dress a light coat of Shimmerz Candle Light paint. Love that stuff! She is then cut out with my Nestibilities Oval, then stitched around the edge with the green Spica Glitter pen. And the sentiment is from my Label maker - that thing was so worth buying!

My card is Bazzill Bling card stock more shine, both the green and the grey! I didn't want a lot of patterns so I found one piece of K&Company paper that matched perfect, and yes.. more bling and shine! Gel Pen stitching around the outer edge, a simple grey satin ribbon border at the bottom, then I cut apart a flower from my stash and stacked it to place on the corner of the card - and yes.. the glitter tips were part of the flower and ands even more sparkle! A button center and done!

You can find Marti - HERE And make sure to look at all of the new images that have been added! Oh my there are some really cute one! Also many favorites have been added to the digital list - fast and you can color up so much sooner! OH OH including some digital papers! If you happen to make a purchase... mention that MichelleO sent you please... :0)

Well I have to go and finish a project I am working on.. big post tomorrow! Hope you will be back then!

HUGS and-

A Spoon Full of Tea Bag folded Donkeys?

It is Tuesday and time to get a Spoon Full of Challenge! This week is a great Sketch by our DT member Caryn!

As soon as I saw the sketch I was excited! It was perfect to use my brand new Tea bag folding stamps from Alota Rubber Stamps!!! And I had this plan to mix two different stamps. I love how it came out.. and not just because the Donkey is named "Michelle's Donkey" LOL~

If you have never tried one of Helene's Tea Bag folding images you just must! They are very addicting - you stamp 8 of the image, color and then follow the instructions for folding, they just slip together and just a few dots of glue they make a circle of images!

Along with MY Donkey.. he he I added the Daisy! For the center for my circle I added a pink felt flower with a button tied with a pink ribbon. I really do love how this came out and I think I will redo this with different background paper - because I am not happy with how the entire card turned out. It doesn't look quite as bad in person, the photo has made the colors look odd.


I used DCWV glitter papers and sewed everything down - I think it is the vintage lace that is wrong - the color on it is not really that dark.. oh well. I then added four flowers and brads with the H and I letters. Again.. I think next time I will do simpler papers just too much going on here - L0L

Make sure to hop on over to the Spoon full of Sugar Challenge and see the other DT cards - theirs really rock! and there is a great prize again this week!

Well long list today... better get started - Hope you have a great Tuesday!

HUGS and-

Today is the second Stampavie Challenge!!!!

It is time for the SECOND Stampavie Challenge!

Thanks to all of you who joined our first challenge. We are really happy about every entry. And we would love for number 2 to have even more! And this week we are doing a surprise box... yep and if I know Heidi.. this will be a really great surprise box full of goodies!

This time we have “A color challenge - Use Pink & Brown (& Green optional)” And I know how much we all love using pink and brown.. so this one isn't a hard one!

You will have time to join the fun until May 3rd (we are a two week challenge)

There are only a few rules to follow:

use a Stampavie image for your work

link your work (posting) directly to Mr. Linky under the current challenge to be entered for the prize

please link back to our challenge in your posting

My card for the challenge I pulled out one of the adorable Leere Aldrich images... the name of this one... "Sisters" hmmm wonder where I got the sentiment idea?

Started with a dark brown card stock base, my papers... well I am just so proud - I went through my scrap box!! So that also means I don't know the names, but all of them are pink, brown or green! I used a Martha Stewart border punch down the left side - and cut the green circle out with my EK Success circle cutter. I inked the edge of everything. And found a brown ribbon with a pink thread for a band across the middle - big pink button and a little piece of green satin ribbon. My sisters are colored with my Copics - and inked the edges. I then doodled the edges of the card with a white gel pen, and added some high lights to the image. For my Sister's sentiment - I cut out the letters with my Making Memories Slice -

I do hope you will find the time to join us at our challenge - we would be thrilled to see the number grow!! And I know you have a Stampavie image... Sarah Kay, Rachelle Anne Miller, Lelo Designs and Leere Aldrich - you can look HERE to see if yours is a Stampavie image.

Hope you have a wonderful Monday - it is beautiful here! The rain this past weekend did wonders already!

HUGS and-

Spring Blossoms -

I just love this Sarah Kay.. ok I know I say that about all of the Stampavie Sarah Kay images, but this hat is just fabulous - with those curly pony tails. I have colored her with Copics and cut with my Nestibilities Oval. I then inked the edges with a green ink.

Now what do you think of my card - I got a bit vintage, this K&Company paper with the Sarah Kay just seems to go that way. The base of the card I Bazzill Dotted Swiss - the pattern paper I just one piece of paper that I cut a few of the petal to come over pop dotted oval. The post- card is one I had in my stash from a scrap of paper, I inked the edges so it looked a bit more worn. I added a pretty antique gold butterfly that a sweet Internet friend sent me, then with a fine wire I added a heart charm and a bell.... Love the bell - this card dings! I felt it needed something on the bottom left corner to go opposite from the charms - found this lace and just used a small piece of it so it didn't go across my leaves.
Then I just popped on a Cloud 9 epoxy sticker for my sentiment. I have really been using these things lately... lazy - but I really like the wording on them.

Hope you enjoyed my Spring Blossoms - I really enjoyed going out of the regular box for this one and doing something different for me.

So you have great plans for today? Me.. not really just a quiet day at home. Weather is suppose to be nice today after all our much needed rain - we didn't get the rain they predicted for yesterday - but all total for Friday and Saturday we got just over 4 inches - we are thrilled with that! We should see more green growing this week in the donkey pens - of course as soon as it starts popping up they are gonna eat it, but hey that is what they need ... green grass!

Have a great day - HUGS and-