My slightly crappy day ends up super sweet...

Today was a bit stressful at work... with all this snow (where the heck is Spring already?!) and trying to get dug out and to work, PC troubles from a power outage in the building last night during the storm, and some heavily pressing deadlines... well, the resultant crankiness was not at Defcon 4, but it wasn't pleasant. 

Things started to pick up after I left early to accompany my mother to an appointment. Afterwards we hit the local Ruby Tuesday's for a peppercorn mushroom sirloin with extra mushrooms, cheddar mashed and the new grilled green beans (yum!) with peach tea. (Although the peach bits kept getting stuck in my straw. LOL)  Sometimes good food and good conversation over dinner can change the color of the sky in my world. =)

Then I got home and my furbabies were so excited to see me.  It's hard to be too cranky with these fuzzybutts dancing in glee because Their Person is home. =)  Some puppy roughhousing and a few kitty snuggles later, and life was even better. 

After that I figured I'd pop online to check my blogger dashboard. I opened it up in Google Reader, and, lo and behold, I saw MY name in the middle of the screen. I actually won a blog candy draw!  Really. Me! Who never wins anything randomly drawn! I had to read it a couple of times, but I knew the comment was mine. I remember wondering if it was too meh when I made it. I wasn't feeling overly mushy-gushy that night, but I really wanted to wish Michelle at Stamps, Paper, Scissors and Donkey Smiles a happy blogoversary. (Her third!)  I thought the candy was pretty sweet, but dismissed the idea that I'd actually win it. I am shocked. Squee'ing in excitement, but shocked. 

So this:

(see here for more detail about the crafty stuff I won)

will be added to my crafty stash as I get started in earnest in my Crafty Year goals this coming weekend.  I can hardly wait! Yay!

Happy Crafting!

Tiddly Inks Birthday Project

A few weeks ago I volunteered (since I need the practice!) to make a birthday card as part of a project for Christy Croll aka Tiddly Inks.  She's collecting 40 cards from her blog followers for her friend's 40th birthday.  Sweet, huh?  She provided this digi and these background papers (now available on her site)

although she did say we could do whatever we wanted.  Her friend's fave colors are red and black.

I seem to be developing a "thing" for square cards. And having this box of dry-embossed DCWV cards is just too easy.  I knew I'd be covering up a lot of the embossing, but I liked the square idea too much. So I picked Retro Squares and created this:
(My camera lens has what I thought was a smudge but what may be something more nefarious, so please excuse the not-so-great photos. Sigh.)

Everything was prepped in Word and printed on cardstock... I picked some birthday and age-related quotations from one of my favorite websites QuoteGarden.com. (I found the site when it was so brand new it practically smelled like plastic shrinkwrap!)  I used my Chicken Salad font from the Pizza Dude, another site where I am a long-time visitor, and created a simple text box that I filled in with a red gradient to match the red background square, then used deckle scissors to cut it out.  I added a "Happy Birthday!" in a quote-shaped bubble text box. I picked one particular quote I really liked to repeat on the inside of the card.  (I wrote in "May each year that passes be your best year ever!" after I took the pictures.)

I colored and paper-pieced and cut out the digi. I'll admit I'm not in love with the background papers, but I found a way to incorporate them... I paper-pieced Kellie's top and skirt with them!  I loved the effect at that teeny size, although lesson learned: Use lighter weight paper and not cardstock when paper piecing, at least definitely at that small size. I also glittered up the boots with Frosted Lace Stickles and added Glossy Accents to the glasses.  Unfortunately something must have brushed across one because there's a tiny blemish, but shhhhh! Maybe they'll never see it. LOL  The card looked it needed something, so I ended up using that same Stickles all around the outer edge of the card.

Then I made a one-layer red square with the quote bubble, this time with her friend's name in it, printed that on 20 or 24-lb paper and glued it to the envelope, which you see in the first photo. Oh so matchy-matchy. LOL

So. Square cards and lots of dimension using foam squares. I'm detecting a trend. LOL  Actually... I used to create flyers and newsletters at my last job (the lack of that kind of creative outlet at my current job is what led me to start making cards in the first place) and working with the computer this way feels like I'm doing much the same thing, except in three dimensions as I cut out pieces and layer them up rather than having them all in one layer on the printed page.  Not that I haven't invested (somewhat more than I expected, quelle surprise!) in inks and stamps that I'm dying to delve into, but it's nice that all the fonts I've collected over the years and my Word skills aren't going to go to waste.

So... hopefully Christy and her friend Kellie like it. I do. =)

I'm nearly finished getting organized and finishing off the dreaded household 'stuff' that stands between me and some really good times in the craft room, so I'm expecting to be crafting and posting regularly soon and filling up my mom's digital fridge. =)  Til next time, happy crafting!

A sparkling 60th, but not in these photos...

It's been pretty stressful at work since my last post and I've had far too much "real" work to do at home to get much, if any, crafting time in.  Frustration!  Then two weekends ago I had to make up 55 little "you deserve a gold star" cards for one of the departments at work, and can you believe I forgot to photograph any of them?  Newbie bloggers, what are you going to do with us?  =) 

This past weekend came the project that tells me I will probably be investing in a better camera, or at least some decent editing software some day.... I had about 10 minutes to get pictures and the light was dying. White on white with dry embossing and shimmery paper is REALLY hard to capture. =[

My mom asked me to do a card for her friends for their 60th anniversary.  What I envisioned is not quite what I got to in the end, but I was not horrified by it (someday I will talk in terms of being "happy with it" instead of "not embarrassed by" and know that I've reached the next level LOL).

My mom is not the tricked out, flowers-and-ribbon bedecked, frilly sort of card person, so even though the card is for the recipient and not the giver, I wanted to stay pretty clean.  I decided to use a pre-embossed 5" white square base from DCWV.  Then I jumped on the PC and drew myself up a gray diamond in Word using some triangle shapes and a couple of lines, which I printed and cut out/embossed with a deckled rectangle Nestabilities die.  I used my Cricut to cut out a 60 from some shimmery pearl paper and then lightly inked the edges with Weathered Wood Distress Ink to keep it from 'disappearing' into the white background and pop-dotted that over the diamond background.  I used one of the fonts on my PC to make up a Mr & Mrs that would fit in a small deckled rectangle Nestie and cut/embossed that.  Pop dots galore and then I needed some bling because it was kinda boring.  Some clear "diamonds" in two corners and done.

On the inside, I came up with my own sentiment and typed it over the gray diamond shape (which faded out in the flash of my camera), cut/embossed with the same size deckled rectangle Nestie as on the front of the card and pop-dotted on. Then I added some "diamonds" to each corner to pull it together inside and out.

Followed by the photography disaster.  I can't tell you how many pictures of a washed out white square image I took since it was too dark inside for my camera to go without flash.  I ended up getting my best photos outside (you can see the snowy ground in the background LOL) as the sun went down. It was cold and really windy and I kept praying that the wind wouldn't rip my card out of my hand and blow it into the nearest slush pile. 

My mom liked it (although the objectivity of a mom is always questionable LOL) and her friend loved it, so I guess that makes it a success. Judge for yourself... 

Another front view that shows the dry embossed stripes better:

 

And the inside... which had the same pale gray diamond as the front behind the "60":

This post seems as washed out as those pictures, too.  Sigh.  Well, OK.. off to write a letter.  Do you think it's too early to start writing to Santa for a new camera and software?  =)