Raining and Raining and Raining!

Hello - it's raining here in the California Bay area - and I love it. You see, this is a fairly rare happening here - sure, it rains a little, but not so much, and generaly by March it's all over -so when it rains, I HAVE to enjoy every minute of it!

Tomorrow I'm taking an Amuse Valentine Card class at Cranberry Hill in Sunnyvale. The super talented Tracy Falco is teaching, and she always has the most marvelous cards for us to do! I'll show you the cards tomorrow after class!

Back to watching the rain :)

Sunday

I didn't realize 90% of the movie "Letters from Iwo Jima" was in Japanese with subtitles, so is more a movie you have to "read". I am always working on a project of some sort when I watch TV, so I generally 'listen' to TV more than 'watch' it! Because of that I missed a lot of this movie, but think I got the gist of it! Thanks to Netflix it wasn't such a big deal!

I discovered My Favorite Things stamps recently, and my first order was just delivered. Obvioulsy I ordered this stamp set particularly for my sisters, so I made these cards today! I hope they get these before they see them on this blog! :)

Amuse Weekly Challenge

This week's Amuse Challenge is to create a window card - seems easy enough, but without the proper planning, the window doesn't end up where it's supposed to! It took 2 tries to get this one! It's still a little off center - but it will have to do!

Maybe 2 windows is too much? The rest of the sentiment on the inside is Sunshine!

Bella Time

I finally worked with the Bella's! I moved past my 'Mounting' anxiety, found some double stick tape and gave it a shot. It was O.K!

Here are my first 3 Bella cards! Fun, Fun, Fun!

Tools of the "Trade"

I like gadgets! I'm always ready to try (er - buy) something new!

You may have seen the Craft cutter lite advertised on TV - I certainly did and I bought it - and I'm not too happy with it. It doesn't cut clear through paper or standard card stock - you often have to pull it apart, and while that usually works well, from time to time it sticks and you end up with an uneven or ripped edge - I contacted their customer service and told them what was happening, it's like the blades are not sharp- the first person I was in contact with asked if Iwanted a refund or to have a new unit shipped.

I really like the idea of being able to make a lot of different edges, and I can't cut with scissors worth a darn, so I responded via another email that I'd like to have a new unit sent. A different person writes back, Why, what's wrong with the one you have -so I started all over again, and now, 4 weeks later, I still don't have a replacement unit and no one is responding to my emails!

I've been thinking about the Colluzle and finally decided I was ready to buy it after seeing
Lexi's review article at Craft Critique today. I stopped at the Michael's by my office, nope, they don't carry it any longer....figures! My local stamp store does have it, so I'll get it there - I was just hoping to use my 40% coupon! :)

Blog reading is how I came across Scor-Pal. Tracy mentioned it on her blog, and I thought it sounded like a good idea, and I have NO regrets on this one!

Photo Cubes

Have you seen this photo cube how to?

I discovered this yesterday and have spent hours making photo cubes ever since- for family, friends, my desk at work! Each side is about 2 1/2" square, they are so easy to make, you can make them and change them out all the time!

I made these two - one is of some of my favorite Amuse Holiday Cards and the other is some favorite shots of this past Christmas!

Try it, you'll like it!

Squares

This week's challenge on Amuse Addicts is to use Squares on your card. Here's mine!

All stamps by Amuse!

"Inspired" Challenge

The Amuse Addicts' challenge for this week was to make a card from something that inspired you!

Here's my card and the paper that inspired it!

Success!

Sometimes a plan comes together! I was able to spend yesterday making scrapbook pages to add to the book I made for my Mother's birthday last year. At the time I didn't have enough pictures of the new baby, now I do!

Here's what I came up with

Now I have a free day to work on something else -The Amuse Addicts Challenge is to create a card based on something that inspired you - hmmmm, that's going to be hard.

Time Flies!

You know how you start out thinking you have so much time you'll get a lot done - then the next thing you know hours have passed and you haven't done nearly as much as you think you have - that was me last night! I started out at about 7:30 pm - and the next thing you know it was nearly 11:30 and I only had 2 cards done- I like the ones I did, but I had such visions of grandeur of finishing several cards and a few scrapbook pages- oh well. Will try again today!

Here are the cards I made last night!

Weekend fun!

It's going to be a great weekend for me! Heavy rainstorms all weekend! Those of you who only like summer will think I'm crazy, but I really am a winter person! My favorite time of the year. I'm in for the weekend, all cozied up with the cats, good movies, good food and lots of time for stamping, cards and scrapbooks!

My first stamps were Amuse Art Stamps so I'm very partial to them. I also love their Elzybells - they're related so I don't feel like a traitor! I haven't ventured very far from these two stamps - but the Bellas have begun to catch my eye and I've bought a couple and I think I'm looking at a few more! I haven't quite been sold on the unmounted stamps, so that's taking some getting used to.

Ok time to stamp, stamp, and stamp!

The end of another week!

Tomorrow's Friday - it's been a short work week and that made it easy to get back into the work mindset after almost 2 weeks off! Next week will be a full week and that may not be so easy.





I made this card for a friend who could use a bit of extra cheer right now -I hope she enjoys it!

I got 2 of the 3 birthday cards and gifts in the mail this week - I have one more to do, but that one's local, so it should still arrive on time!

I'm glad tomorrow is Friday!

Happy New Year!

Welcome to 2008! It's the same old story, how did it get to be 2008? I remember the turn of the century and it seems like only yesterday - where have the last 8 years gone? What happens when you get older that makes the years go faster! I'm sure someone will do a study on that some day!

The Amuse Addicts challenge for this week was to use a stamp for something other than it's original intent. I thought about the new Valentine Cuckoo Clock (I'm Cuckoo for you) and came up with this New Year's Greeting!

Happy New Year!