Happy Monday

Well, yesterday was Tatym's 1st birthday party and it turned out great! We kept it small and simple and had a blast! She had fun with our friends & family that were here and got lots of cool presents that are even being enjoyed by Keegan (he's 6 1/2)! LOL Funny how the big kids play with the baby toys just as much as the babies, if not more! :O)

I used a store-bought cake and decorated it with ladybugs using strawberries, blueberries, black licorice and mini choc. chips:


We had ladybug tiaras for the girls:


I made these helicopters for Valentines day and the kids loved it so I decided to make some for the party and just decorate the top with a ladybug and flowers:



We ended the party by going to the park and here's the party girl:


On a side note, here's a card I made as an example for the CTMH home gathering I had on Saturday. It's simple but cute:




It's been fun prepping for Tatym's party and I still can't get over how fast this year went by. I try not to think about it because I get all teary-eyed but it's been a great year! Now comes planning for Keegan's 7th birthday *gulp*! 7 just seems so big to me. Can't believe my first-born is turning 7 (in Nov.)...where is the time going? Geesh!!
Alright, I'm off to clean up from the party and get my house back in order! Crossing my fingers that I can do some creative stuff tonight!! HAPPY MONDAY!

Having withdrawls...

It feels like forever since I've had a chance to sit down and do some crafting of one form or another and I'm starting to get twitchy! LOL The good thing is that we're having a GREAT visit with my stepson which is why I'm so tired in the evenings that I veg out on the couch/bed and fall asleep early instead of doing my projects. I'm also prepping for my sweet baby girls birthday party this Sunday. I really feel bad for the 2nd child. I've always planned big parties for Keegan (my son) and gone all out for him and I haven't done nearly as much for Tatym! I figured that she's turning one, she's not going to remember the party let alone the decorations or what-have-you and I'm trying to be wiser with our finances so spending all the money on things that really don't matter seems like a waste at this point. We're gonna have presents, cake & ice cream, goody bags and a play day at the park so it will be fun! I just pray that we're blessed with nice weather!!

I've got lots to be thankful for this week and that's what I'm focusing on. I'm having fun with Taylor which I never dreamed it would be this good and I still have hopes that it will continue to get better. My sweet baby is turning a year old and she's happy and healthy and my little miracle baby. We've just about finished up my son's 1st grade curriculum so we'll be venturing into 2nd grade this summer (we homeschool all year) and my sister is coming to town this weekend so I get to spend some time with her! She's getting ready to start her 3rd year of dental school and she lives 4 hours north so as you can imagine, she's a busy little bee and I look forward to her long weekends or vacations!! I seem to get bogged down sometimes by negativity that is a constant drain in my life (those of you in a blended family might know exactly what I'm talking about) but it's so amazing when you can step back and see all the other blessings the Lord is giving around the hard stuff!

I hope you all are well and I try to sneak on here once a day at least to check out new postings by fellow bloggers so keep em coming! Happy Thursday!!!!
Christina

My kids are all together...and a card!

This is a picture of my stepson (dark, curly hair in the middle) and my 2 kiddos. Guessing from some of the comments I think people were thinking I was in the picture. I've been hinting and then not so subtly telling Taylor I was gonna whack his hair off! LOL He is looking a little girly but he says he doesn't mind! LOL

Well, my two kiddos and I made the 4 1/2 hr trip to pick up my stepson and 4 1/2 hr trip back home and thank the good Lord we made it in one piece. I was getting frazzled at the end because my sweet Tatym was DONE with being in the carseat and wanted nothing more of it! It's frustrating when the other parents won't meet us any closer (they only drive one hour to meet us and we drive 4-5 hours depending on how many stops we have to make for the kids) and it's getting old! I shouldn't complain considering for years they wouldn't meet us anywhere so we drove 5+ hours just to pick Taylor up! I thank God for whatever we get I guess! LOL The most important thing is TAYLOR'S HERE!!! Keegan and Tatym are so excited to see him and can't quit loving on him! He's here for 9 days so we got lots planned and we're going to enjoy him while he's here!

On another note I spent something like 3 hours last night working on cards for swaps. I cut enough paper for 10 cards and put together 5 of them. Here's what they look like:


I have 2 other sets of 10 to make on top of those and I'll post them later!

I pray everyone has a blessed Father's Day tomorrow! I'm gonna be teaching childrens' church and then spending the day with my little family and probably visit the inlaws! What a special day!
God bless!!

Birthday prepping

This is my gorgeous baby girl, Tatym! She was so excited to be playing outside today with her brother, Keegan and the 2 neighbor boys!

The next 2 weeks I'm going to be busy getting the finishing touches ready for my sweet Tatym's first birthday party on the 28th. I made these little boxes to put in the big goody boxes. I'll put some candy or gum in them. My son informed me that I have to make "boy" boxes because the boys can't have the girly ladybug goody boxes or the girly paper candy boxes! LOL He's a crack up!

This is one of the ladybug goody boxes:



These are the paper boxes I made using the youtube tutorial from chic n' scratch

Trying to get a head start!

Last night I decided to get a head start on my July cards because it's such a busy month. We have 8 birthdays and 4 anniversaries in July and I try to get a card sent to each person/couple! Here are 4 cards I made last night. (You can click on the pictures to enlarge them.) The last card isn't quite finished. I'm trying to decide what else I can add to it. Any suggestions??

4th of July blog candy

Check out Dianne at Paper Hugs! She's offering up some 4th of July blog candy! YUM!

A big thanks to Kim for the One Lovely Blog Award

Awwww...shucks, I feel so loved! Kim at Memories In Thyme left me this blog award today! I just love her blog, she's always got such cute things posted for me to "oh & aww" over! Thanks chicky!

Here's how this works:
1) Accept the award, post it on your blog together with the name of the person who has granted the award, and his or her blog link.

2) Pass the award to 15 other blogs that you’ve newly discovered.
Remember to contact the bloggers to let them know they have been chosen for this award.

Here are my choices (in no particular order):

1. Angela
2. Marie-France
3. Jamie
4. Abbie
5. Sarah
6. Kelly Jo
7. Laurel
8. Yvette
9. Kristen
10. Aaron
11. Jaime
12. Deborah
13. Pamela
14. Dianne
15. Amy

I love my MIB!!

For those that don't know, MIB stands for Man In Brown! :) AKA the UPS guy! LOL Yesterday he visited my house 3 times! Ok, so one guy was actually a Fed Ex guy but the other 2 visits were from my UPS guy! It was a great day here! First package to arrive was the birthday decorations I ordered for my daughter, Tatym's, first birthday! Such a bittersweet moment! On one hand I can't wait for her to hit all the milestones especially talking and seeing what she's gonna look like as she's getting older and all the fun stuff I plan on doing with her like tea parties and spa days and all that great mother/daughter stuff. BUT, on the other hand, they grow up soooo fast that I just want to freeze time and keep her this baby and also my son, keep him young and innocent! It gets harder and harder to watch them grow up but I feel unbelievably blessed to have two amazing children that are happy and healthy and just the best things in my life! So, enough mushy stuff before I cry! LOL Here's box #1 filled with party stuff! We're doing a ladybug theme for her party so I got cups, plates, mylar balloon, blowers, tiaras, invites and thank you cards and goody boxes and stickers! I only bought a little of each and I'll go to walmart and buy coordinating stuff MUCH cheaper!
Here's the box:


Plates:

Napkins...aren't the ladybugs so cute??? LOVE THEM!


Next package I got was just my ink cartridges I ordered from Dell so I didn't snap any pics...boring stuff but still fun to get packages! LOL

Then, to end my day with a bang came my CTMH mystery box AND my new Nikes! I haven't bought a new pair of workout shoes since my son was like 2 and he's going on 7 now! LOL I started walking everyday for 2 weeks and was getting horrible shin pain so I broke down and bought these ADORABLE Nike Shox! Mind you, I have huge feet and tried shoes on in Lady Foot Locker and Big 5 and the biggest they carry is an 11 and it was just a wee bit too small so I had to order online and get an 11.5! Talk about big shoes! LOL Here they are:


Onto the best part...my CTMH mystery box! I was so impressed and stoked about the first box I ordered that I couldn't pass up this 2nd one! For those of you that don't know, CTMH is offering a deal-of-the-day and everyday is something new. 24 days of the month if you buy a stamp set you get the DOTD free which has been things like a ribbon spool, flowers, sassy strands and what not. 6 days of the month they offer up these mystery goody boxes that are full of various products that you get 50% off. This box had $80 worth of products in it and I paid $40 for it. Here's what I got:
Dimensional Elements Numbers

Abundance Level 2 paper pack and Stickease

Because of You stamp set, Salutation booking stamp set, a package of various shades of brown brads and Heartfelt Ribbon Rounds

The Life Delights Memory Showcase which comes with an accordian album, stickers, paper and embellishments to make a complete album.


So yeah, fun day here at my house!!!! To top it off I had a great day with friends! We had our homeschool co-op yearbook signing party at the park and the Lord blessed us with an amazing day of gorgeous weather! My son had fun playing with his friends and I got to chat with the other moms. Sadly I had to say goodbye to my dear friend Bonnie who is moving away to Alaska this week! They're a Coast Guard family and are being relocated! I hate to see them go but I'm excited for their new adventure and look forward to lots and lots of pictures! Next we hung out at one of my best friends' houses for awhile then came home (bringing her son with us) and proceeded to have a HUGE water fight with my son and his friend while my daughter napped! We then had their whole family over for a BBQ and playtime! It was a really great day and I have the massive sunburn to show it! LOL NOW, hopefully I can get some creative work done tonight since I have to work tomorrow!

Father's Day

Just a quick post today, I'm not feeling too great this morning and hoping and praying it goes away soon! I hate getting sick!

Last night I finished up making my Father's Day cards. I've come to realize that I have such a hard time making masculine cards and need to get some more practice on it! I don't add a lot of extra embellishments to them because I really figure that guys could care less about that kind of stuff but then the cards just seem so plain and boring to me! Oh well, it's the thought that counts, right?! :)

My dad is in prison and has been there since I was like 8 or something and they have specific rules about what kinds of things can be mailed in so I had to do a very plain card for him:


I made this one for my stepdad:


And this one is for my grandpa:

Scrappin Machine

I'm so excited! I bought the first mystery goodies box from CTMH the other day (can't wait for the 2nd one to get here that I orderd this morning) and it arrived on Monday FULL of fun stuff! I got 3 stamp sets, a pkg of stickease, 2 scrapbook kits and two spools of ribbon...can't remember if I'm leaving something out but anyways, I was in hog heaven! :) Last night I was watching some Gilmore Girls (LOVE THEM) and worked on one of the scrapbook kits! It's nifty because it came with everything, including pictures of the layouts so if I didn't want to think of my own way to place the pictures and stickers then I could just copy the example they had (which I did on a few of these pages)! I got 7 layouts done and had to force myself to put everything away around 1am! LOL I'm such a scrapbook junky!

Here are the layouts I did! The pictures are of my little family! My stepson Taylor, he's 12 (11 in the pictures), my son, Keegan, he's 6 (5 in some of the pictures) and my sweet little Tatym who will be turning 1 next month! Of course my DH Josh, who I personally believe is THE world's best husband and father! The Lord blessed me so far above anything I could have ever dreamed of for myself and definitely better than I deserve! I feel like the luckiest woman alive (most of the time LOL) because of my hubby and kiddos! God is good!!

Cards galore!

Another night of watching movies...well, I guess it's not really a movie. I've decided to watch Gilmore Girls from the very first episode to present season so I was watching Season 1 disc 2! Oh if only I could be as quick-whitted as they are! LOL I do realize that no one is that quick with the comebacks all the time! Any-who, I managed to knock out 7 cards in the process. One of them, my first card of the evening didn't turn out as well as I would have liked. The glue smudged on the stamp so when I added glitter to it, it made the word "friend" hard to read so I had to try again. Here's the smudged card:


Here's the 2nd attempt at that card! It's a belated birthday card for one of my closest friends, Dea. She's the most amazing girl I've ever met and I'm so thankful the Lord placed her in my life!


The rest of the cards are ones I made just to have on hand! You can never have too many made up and ready to be handed out!! This one is my favorite of the bunch of them:



And here are the rest:

Gift Card Tutorial

Ok, making a tutorial is a lot harder than I originally thought! My stinkin camera has issues taking pictures inside so I'm still trying to figure out lighting and all that fun stuff so forgive the cruddy picture quality!

Start with 1 piece of cardstock cut to 4 1/4 x 11".

Score at 3", 5 1/2" and 8" and fold like this:



Next:



Next, push the two inside pieces together:



Then cut about 1/4" in from each side and 1/4" down (sorry that doesn't sound right but you can see the picture) to make the opening for the gift card to fit in the pocket:




Now, to decorate the holder you can do whatever you want. With mine I cut the bottom piece of cardstock to 4 1/4" x 2 3/4", the middle piece of cardstock was cut to 3 3/4" x 2 1/2" and the top, decorative paper was cut to 3 1/2" x 2 1/4". I layered them on top of each other after putting a strip of ribbon around the outside (about a 12" strip of ribbon) so that it could be tied to close it.


Hopefully that was descriptive enough. It's quick and easy to make. Any questions, feel free to ask!!! Happy Crafting Everyone!