anniversary card & calico beans

I made this anniversary card for my parents, who celebrated their 37th wedding anniversary on Thursday. I'll be giving this to them today at a family gathering on my mom's side. We're meeting at the park and it's been raining all morning, with no signs of it letting up.



Card recipe:
paper: white daisy and sweet leaf
stamps: cottage floral and Say It With Style, both from Close To My Heart
ink colors: sweet leaf, chocolate and crystal blue
Other: ribbon (archiver's) and itty bitty brads from Close To My Heart

For the flower on the sentiment, I did a second-generation impression so that it would be like a watermark.

I did make some calico beans for my dish to pass.



Here is the recipe:

Calico Beans
1/4 lb. bacon, chopped
1 lb. cooked hamburger ( I used turkey meat and nobody will know the difference)
1/2 cup chopped onion
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup ketchup
2 tsp. yellow mustard
2 tsp. vinegar
1 tsp salt (I usually omit this because of the bacon)
1 can butter beans
1 can pork & beans
1 can red kidney beans

Mix it all up and put it in a crock pot- cook for 2 hours. Easy Cheesy. I double this recipe and it fits perfectly in the crock pot.

Have a great Saturday!

book w/a view and a card

Had a wonderful time at the cabin.
Plenty of fun in the sun. Good food. Old friends. New friends.
Thanks again for hosting us Tara!
And, I found a perfect spot to read my book!
Now, to the card....

I have had this polka dot paper for so long and I love it so much that I've been hesitant to use it because I don't have anymore. I decided to be crazy and just go for it :)

I paired it with brown kraft paper, used my scalloped edge punch and added layers with dimension. I love the fact that the center of the flower has polka dots to match the patterned paper. I have been embossing lately and forgot how much fun it is to do.

P.S. Now that I'm looking at this picture, I noticed that the ribbons are slightly crooked....oops.

A close up of the layers.



R E C I P E

stamps: sassafrasslass
paper: brown kraft paper and polka dot paper from Wild Asparagus (I think)
ribbon: suede red ribbon purchased at The Scrapbook Shop in St. Paul the tiny polka dot ribbon purchased at Archivers in Eden Prairie.
techniques: scalloped edges from a corner rounder. Clear embossing using Versamark. Red embossing powder in Cranberry from Close To My Heart

On a personal note, our backyard fence construction begins today and I could not be happier to have a private back yard.

Hope you're having a nice week.

one last post before I go

One last card before I go for the weekend. I'm really liking the cottage floral stamps from CTMH.

Colors: topiary, sweet leaf both Close To My Heart
Paper: sweet leaf, white and hollyhock- all Close To My Heart
Embellishments: white brads and a square button- both Close To My Heart

I also distressed the edges of the sweet leaf paper with the Heidi Swapp Distresser

a birthday card that might get sent on time

Well, I'm just a few hours away from meeting my two friends and driving to Wisconsin to stay in a cabin for the weekend. There will be 6 of us total.

Thank you for your book recommendations. I plan to look into what you've recommended (Katherine- especially the book your friend wrote). I did pick up a few, what I hope to be gems, at the library today:

The Queen's Handmaiden by Jennifer Ashley (a book about the Tudors- I really like this genre)
Secrets of a Courtesan: French Trysts by Kirsten Lobe (sounds scandalous and perfect for a weekend read)
Morningside Heights by Cheryl Mendelson (an artsy couple living in Manhattan)

I'm hoping at least one of these are good in case I end up finishing Mademoiselle Boleyn.

And, I'm quite proud of myself....I am going to get this card out for my brother-in-law on time.

Recipe:

Paper- crate paper. Tag is a punch out, also from Crate paper.
Stamps- Happy Birthday from Happy Birthday by Close To My Heart
Embellishments- bigger brad from Paper Salon

Have a great weekend!

card and and do you know any good books?

I love how the stamp and this retired paper from Close To My Heart work together. The flower is from Floral Cottage (Close To My Heart). I stamped them in versamark, clear embossed them, cut them out and stuck a bigger brad in the centers. I curled up the edges a bit so they would stick off the paper a bit. I'm really pleased how it turned out.

And....I'm headed to the cabin tomorrow night for a girls weekend. Totally looking forward to this! I need a good book recommendation. I have one book, Mademoiselle Boleyn, but I plan to get lot's of reading done and would like a back up. Do you have any good reads you could recommend?

feel better soon

I don't really need a feel better soon card, but this sentiment seemed to fit perfectly in the white space and I love the font of it. I've wanted to find a way use the strawberry stamps. I distressed the edges of the two top paper layers with Heidi Swapp's edge distresser.

Card size is 4x4. The pot and one of the strawberries are mounted for height.

Recipe:

paper: chocolate and vanilla cream- Close To My Heart
stamps: feel better soon stamp is from Say It With Style- Close To My Heart and the strawberries and container is from Green Thumb by Paper Trey Ink

the rest of the story

Here is the rest of the card that I made for my dad.


Love the papers- they are both from SEI . The heavenly blue card stock from Close To My Heart was a perfect match. The Happy Father's Day sentiment is from CTMH's Say It With Style and so are the itty bitty brads.


This was part of our meal today. Smoked chickens. We seasoned them with thyme, tarragon red onion, fresh grown basil and beer and smoked with hickory chips. There were two of these.

We also grilled BBQ ribs. Can't believe I didn't snap a picture of those. They were great. We had cheesy potatoes in the crock pot, Red Lobster-like cheddar biscuits, corn and this frozen lemonade dessert. This picture is from The Food Network.

This recipe from The Neely's is worth passing on:

I took a short cut and used a pre-made graham cracker pie crust.

Frozen Lemonade Dessert

lemonade filling:
1 (14 ounce) can sweetened condensed milk, chilled
1 (12 ounce) container whip topping, thawed
1 (6 fluid ounce) can frozen lemonade concentrate, keep frozen

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

In a medium bowl, add chilled sweetened condensed milk and cool whip and fold gently. Add frozen lemonade and continue to gently fold. Do not let the mixture become soupy. Pour mixture into the pie crust and freeze overnight.

Have a great week!

Father's Day Teaser

Here is a wee image of the card I'm giving my dad later today....

And here is a photo of my husband at 7:30 this morning smoking what will become our lunch today.
Kind of a funny story on the smoker. Years ago we gave this smoker to my dad for Christmas. He recently gave it back to us to use because he didn't. Dusty is preparing lunch on this and we have guessed how this will play out....

We'll get a call in a few days from my dad saying "your mother thinks we should have the smoker back". And of course, my mom will not have had any part in this story but he'll use her as the reason to get the smoker back.

I'll post the rest of my card that I'm giving my dad tonight after he's received it.

Have a great day!

I'm in love

With my new camera!

We're heading to a family reunion today, so I am going to read up on the manual in the car.

I chose a Sony Cyber-Shot DSC-W150

And here is a card I made for some friends who celebrated their anniversary this past week.




Recipe:

ink: sweet leaf and orchid bouquet- Close To My Heart
stamps: flourish by Autumn Leaves, hearts are from the Heartfelt set by Close To My Heart
paper: white gloss and sweet leaf
ribbon: white and black stitched grosgrain

The hearts were all stamped separately and then mounted with foam. And I rounded the corners of the sweet leaf stock


Have a great weekend!

I want to go again

Yes!!!!!! I saw it and I want to go again. I think I'll buy it. That means its really good because I don't buy movies.

Still camera shopping. Got a couple of recommendations and I appreciate it. I've narrowed it down and I am going to do some consumer report research now. Should have a new camera in a couple of days if all goes well.

the day the camera died

So...... I'm pretty sure my camera is a gonner.

A few days ago it was acting funny- the LCD screen had wavy bright lines instead of a picture. Tried it again today and same thing. Thought I'd try taking the picture anyway hoping it was just the screen that's messed up.

Nope.

When I uploaded the picture of a cute little card I made tonight, it uploaded the same image.

Just for the visual...this is the kind of picture my camera takes now.

I really had high hopes of this 'correcting itself' from a few days ago, but i guess its not meant to be. I did not have camera shopping on my list of errands for Saturday but I guess I'll be adding it now.

Coincidentally, my sister's camera just died too. Weird.

Any recommendations on a camera? This was a Canon Power Shot A 75. Wouldn't mind upgrading a bit but still staying within a sensible price range. Under $500??

birthday card

June already? We're half way through this year already. Hard to believe.

A friend at work just had a birthday, so I made this card for her. She recently started a new venture and has an online store with great gift items, some that are earth friendly! Check it out, its called True Blue Friend Stop by when you have a chance!

I like this card because of the fact that it is an actual stamped card. I feel like I rely on patterned paper so much that sometimes I barely stamp on a card. Don't get me wrong, I like that look too, it was just fun to have the focus be on stamping.

Ingredients:

Stamps: flower is from Cottage Floral by Close To My Heart. The stem is from Sassafrasslass
accessory: buttons are from Close to My Heart
Ink: olive from Close To My Heart

Have a great week!