Happy St. Patty's Day!

Well I am not Irish, but my hubby is a little and that makes my kids a little, so I guess I can be a little for today too! To celebrate today we continued our tradition of Shamrock shakes for lunch and fries, and I made corned beef, boiled potatoes, carrots, rye bread, green river soda, and sauerkraut for dh. Such a YUMMY dinner~! I even splurged and bought dh some Guinness for his Irish meal! It was the perfect meal to make today as it was 60 degrees and the boys wanted to play outside so dinner simmered and we played outside! I am SO loving this GORGEOUS spring weather!! I only wish it was staying! Someone said there's a NASTY rumor of the S word coming back this weekend! : (
Here's our yummy shakes and the boys enjoying them!



Have you done the "Animal House" challenge at SNR yet??? If not you have till midnight tomorrow to get it done! Melissa has an AWESOME RAK for the winner! Here is my card I used the house template and a combination of Sassafrass Jungle Bungle and Me Likey papers. For the windows and door I used Sassafrass chipboard letters, and then I used the frame that is left on the sheet after you remove the letters and cut the thin strips to use a piece for the top of the chimney, window ledges, as well as a piece for the door handle. The triangle above the door is a photo corner from the Sassafrass sticker sheet, the roof is made by cutting the decorative edge off one of the sheets of paper and cutting between each circle and then layering them on the roof, the plant is cut from a piece of paper, and the edge of the roof is one of the decorative edges from a sheet of paper as well. This was really fun to make ! I haven't decided what theme this card is going to be, but I am thinking it may be a birthday or moving card. I hope you create one and play along with us!
Well I am going to take advantage of the fresh air pooping the boys out early tonight, and hubby being gone for the night and go and have some fun creating!

TFL!
Valerie

It's March...

...6th already!!!! YIKES!! Time sure does fly sometimes!

1 week from today my house will be filled with lots of family celebrating the boys' 5th birthday! 5 years old already wherever does time go???! So the boys have decided that they want to have a space themed party this year, and well the crafty side of me instantly kicked in and I began dreaming up the decorations, games, invites, food, you name it I was thinking it! LOL!! But reality and financial costs set in and I have wisely (in dh's eyes) scaled back my out of this world plans! So I broke out my good old CuttleBug and made the invites-1/2 store bought 1/2 created by me. I even broke out some silver embossing powder that I have had since possibly the late 80's!! You ask did it even work and I say yes it did!! I read a funny thing on the container-to heat embossing powder hold paper over a light bulb till powder melts!! Can you even begin to imagine how LONG that must take to do?! I do plan to retire that container and get some fresh and probably better quality powder soon, but in a pinch and me not wanting to add any more cost to the invites it worked good enough. So here is the front of the invites I forgot to take a pic of the back , but I will do that one soon.
My next project I am working on for the party is a Happy Birthday banner made with rocket ships I cut with my Cricut! I can't wait to finish this little project up!

So next up are my last two LO's for the House of Serendipity. The first was you had to choose one of the color families listed and create a LO using that color family as the dominant color of the LO. I chose the blue/green family and had fun using my Sassafrass Jungle Bungle. I just love this picture, and it was too funny I had this LO out on the table and Joseph saw it and said "Mommy that's me laying on the sidewalk in the park so I could get a better look at the sun and clouds!" That was a year ago I took that pic!!

And here is my entry for this week, we had to choose a sketch and keep our LO very similar to the sketch.The BEST story behind this is last night I went to a crop with 2 of my girlfriends and the store had LOTS of new product from CHA winter!! And I couldn't wait to use my new finds! I was SO distracted with all the yummy goodies I almost lost concentration and focus to finish this LO! LOL! I guess I need to get out more!

OK so have you been over to Paper Popsicles lately??? Well if not why??! There is SO much going on there right now! First we'll start with everyone's favorite BLOG CANDY!!! YES you heard right! You can get this YUMMY RAK

by simply doing this:

How do you get entered to win these?? Leave a comment and become a follower, add a link to this post and the CANDY photo on your blog!! Hey why not do a challenge or two with us, I mean you’re here anyway! What’s in there? Papers by Pink Paislee, KI Memories. Luxe Designs, s.e.i. , Fancy pants; 5 sheets of alpha stickers; overlay; chipboard album by Maya Road; paper frills by Doodlebug; Sassafras Lass buttons; Jillibean Soup journaling sprouts, Rub-on, stickers….. whew
Randon winner will be announced on April 3rd!

So make sure to head on over TODAY!

Also have you been loving the Cheeky Radish digi images? Do you love the ease of the Paper Popsicles shaped card templates? Well if you said yes this may interested you!

We need some designers…..
Paper Popsicles is looking for creative, fun, and enthusiastic paper crafters to work with our digital stamp images and our shaped card templates. Your digital creations will be used on the What’s the Scoop? a division of Paper Popsicles blog, as well as in the Paper Popsicles store and gallery, plus SNR Card Universe.

Design Team Requirements
Create 2 cards weekly incorporating our digital products
Being very active on our blog and at our group at SNR Card Universe by leaving comments, participating in blog events, participating in swaps…
Visiting our followers blogs at least weekly, commenting and encouraging them to “play” with us
Posting events, projects and information weekly on your blog supporting our themes and other events
To apply, please send the following items to melissa@paperpopsicles.com
Full contact information (name, address, phone number, and email)
Link to your blog and online galleries (Please include any user IDs necessary)
Attach 4 stamped (does not need to be a digital stamp) and/or shaped card projects that you like the most out of your work
A short paragraph on your paper crafting experience, including any current or prior design teams However, you do not need any previous experience to apply
A short bio about yourself – just introduce yourself to us and tell us a little about your life
Submission deadline is Friday March 12th at midnight.Term starts on Monday March 15, 2010 and goes until July 15, 2010.Designers will receive free digital stamp images and shaped card templates with the possibility of other items when available.

Melissa, Lynda and Tricia rock and are great to work with so make sure to give this call a try and have some FUN with the images and shapes as well as get exposure for yourself!

Well since I had a late night and I am still battling an upper respiratory infection on top of planning our big bash I should sign off, do the dishes and get to bed!

Have a GREAT one!

TFL!

Valerie

Exciting Stuff!

Yes I know it has been forever! Holidays are crazy especially when you leave 2 calendars to be made till the VERY end! My resolution this is to do 1 month at the end of each month to avoid that AGAIN! And if I don't do it then I just don't make the calendar! I was in such a RUSH and finishing them literally minutes before we had to walk out the door on Christmas Day! Talk about cutting it close! I didn't even get a chance to get pictures of the pages I made! I will have to go to my parents and grandparents to get some pics of the finished product.

So I don't think I ever shared the sad news that Paper Popsicles was closing its doors and re-opening in January on the blog only. Well the BIG day is almost here! That's right this Friday they will open a whole new and improved site, and the store will still have those AWESOME Cheeky Radish images and the shaped cards as well! And I am SO excited to share that Melissa asked me and a few others to design with the first new shaped card for the new site! I saw this cutie and a million ideas jumped into my head instantly! He or she is available on the new site for FREE!! My first card is a big brother card for a friend who just had a baby and her little boy LOVES elephants, so how could I not make him a card! I used some fun Sassafrass paper on this guy and some fun twine to hold the sign around his neck! I cut the first elephant shape out of the pattern paper and cut slightly inside the outline of the template, and for the cardstock elephant I cut slightly outside the outline of the template to give the shadow to the elephant. I freehand cut out the ear for the elephant, and bent it slightly and attached the ear to the elephant.


For the next card I copied 3 elephants onto my page and had each trunk over lap a tail in front of him to create 3 elephants marching in a row. I cut them out and then using a circle punch cut out and attached the red circle to the back which I then trimmed the excess from, used a star punch for the stars, black glaze pen for eyes and a mouth, and Copic marker to make nails. I again freehand cut out some ears for each elephant and attached them the same way. I then took a Popsicle stick and cut it down to create a pole and cut out a cardstock flag and used my ALL time FAVORITE DoodleBug mini rub-ons. I used my trusty Zip Dry to attach the pole to the lead elephant's trunk and there you have elephants on parade!

Now aren't they just the cutest??!! So head on over to What's the Scoop? and get yours today! And don't forget to share what you create! Don't forget this FRIDAY they start all the new fun as well!

Well I need to get moving as I still have some things to do before work tonight, but I will be back with more fun stuff!

TFL!
Valerie

Catch Up Time!

Sorry I have been neglecting the blog lately! But I am back with a whole bunch of things!

First off I did the My Mind's Eye blog challenge this month, and had so much fun using the fabulous sketch!

Next up is the Paper Popsicles blog card sketch. Another great one by Tricia!
And my card using some of my favorite My Mind's Eye Christmas paper!

Then there is the Paper Popsicles Thursday Layout sketch by Lynda this week.
And here is my take of the sketch using some Sassafrass paper.

{I just LOVE the smile on his face}

And here is my layout from last week's sketch. Some more My Mind's Eye! Are you noticing a trend yet??????

And then here are a couple layouts I did for an online crop Scraptacular had last week! It was a GREAT kick start to get back into scrappy mode!

{Yes you're right that IS more My Mind's Eye! I have pulled out my stash and I am actually using it! I never want to use my favorite paper, but after a couple pieces got bent corners I decided I better start before it gets ruined!}

Well I hope you have enjoyed the eye candy and I hope to see you play along with the Paper Popsicles sketches!

TFL!

Valerie