You were perfectly fine . . .

Cocoa, anyone?

Last year, one of K's school friends gave her a cute cardstock holder filled with several packets of hot chocolate mix. I wish I'd saved it to copy!

But today, I found a pattern for an accordion purse that would serve the same purpose. Very cute!

Here's a photo of the finished purse:

and here it is opened:

I used Holiday Red and White Daisy cardstock, and some retired Christmas patterned paper. It could definitely use some more decoration, but I like it simple too. Here's a link to the blog with the tutorial to make this project.
  

Back to School Treats

I found a really cute pattern for Halloween treats on a fellow consultant's blog and decided to try them out. When I'd made one, I realized that with a few tweaks, those treat holders could look just like paper lunch bags--the perfect back-to-school gifts for my daughter's 4th grade class.

We kept it simple--so it would still look like a lunch bag, and so my daughter could do a lot of the assembly herself. We love how they turned out!

I altered Lori's measurements slightly--the main piece of cardstock is 3 3/8" by 12". I scored the cardstock at 4.25, 5.25, 6.25 and 10.5.

I used CTMH Brown Bag cardstock, Indian Corn Blue cardstock (for the birds) and chocolate ink. The stamps are Storytime lower case alphabet and School Fun (both retired). To make the edge of the "lunch bag," I trimmed that edge with Fiskars "stamp" paper edgers. The little birds are popped up on foam tape. We stapled mini packages of Skittles inside each treat holder, and closed the tops with dotto removable adhesive.

We'll deliver them tomorrow. :) K is very proud. I love that!!
  

YOU ROCK Album Instructions

I love doing creative stuff: scrapbooking, writing, knitting, paper crafting, you name it. But I find that two obstacles keep coming up over and over: not a lot of time, and not a lot of money.

Sometimes, I let these obstacles keep me from having a creative outlet for days or weeks at a time. However, I know that I feel better and more balanced if I carve out the time to make something. One thing that makes this easier sometimes is finding projects that others have created before me, and adapting them to make them my own.

I found instructions for a 6x6 CTMH My Creations display album on the consultant website, and decided to do just that--adapt them to fit what I wanted to make. My hand drawn instructions and cutting guides are below, and the photos of the finished project are in my last blog post.

This is a really simple, easy project--I completed mine in an afternoon. It could easily be used to make a regular 6x6 album, or even adapted for an accordian album. I made it a priority to use only 1/2 of a CTMH Level 2 paper pack, with a couple of extra sheets of colored cardstock, one ink color and one stamp set.

The display albums make great gifts too. With one Level 2 paper pack, you can make 2 display albums--one to keep and one to give. Not too much time, not too much money, but a great finished project that you and your family/friends can enjoy.

Instructions:

Page 2:

Page 3:

Page 4:

Feel free to email me if you have any questions. If you want to check out the products used to create the album, check out the online catalog and idea book here.

Enjoy!
 
 
  

You Rock Album

Did I get the dishes done today? Um . . . not yet. But I did put together a really cute album of pictures from my trip south with K last summer.

I found a pattern on the Close To My Heart consultant website (thanks to Melony for creating that!), and adapted/changed it to make it fit my style (and my current supplies). I've been a consultant for CTMH for years, but the last couple of years have been so busy, I got kind of out-of-touch. Lately I've been making an effort to open up time for creative stuff, and I'm having a lot of fun putting my supplies to work.

Below are more photos of today's project.

Inside front cover and pages 1-3:

Pages 4-7:

Pages 8-11:

Pages 12-15:

Pages 16-19:

Pages 20-23:

Page 24, inside back cover and back cover:
 
 
  
To make my album I used:

• My Creations Display Album (6" x 6")
• 1/2 of a Level 2 YOU ROCK paper pack
• YOU ROCK stamp set
• Outdoor Denim ink pad
• 2 extra sheets of Outdoor Denim cardstock
• partial extra sheets of Pansy Purple and Indian Corn Blue cardstock
• 1 sponge (for inking the paper edges)
• 13 white brads
• 6 Just Blooms white paper flowers

Thanks for checking out my project! Email me if you'd like cutting diagrams and instructions, or need to order CTMH supplies.

Christmas Card-o-rama

Made some cards over the weekend, with Close To My Heart papers, stickers and ink. I have a lot of work to do if I want to make use of all the creative supplies I've accumulated over the years!

My baby is reading now

Yes, I know. I mentioned this already.

But it still blows me away. Not so long ago, I wondered if my only child would share my greatest passion: escaping into the world of books. She didn't seem interested in reading more than a picture book at bedtime, and even then it seemed more about the togetherness than about the story.

We would regularly take trips to bookstores and read together, but she seemed to gravitate toward all the gimmicky stuff they sell in bookstores these days. The Disney Fairies books got her interested in chapter books, which was more fun, but she was still not interested in doing the reading herself.

Then came the start of 1st Grade. Her teacher told the kids she expected THEM to read to US, their parents, for 20 minutes each night. We sat down with a Strawberry Shortcake early reader, and . . . she read the entire book to me. Gasp! Who knew?! The entire time I'd been reading slowly, following the words with my index finger, and despairing that she was even listening, she'd been taking it in.

Now she's devouring the Rainbow Fairies and the Magic Tree House books. Last week in the car, I asked her a question and she was reading so she ignored me. Ha! Like I said before, I know this will annoy me in a few years, but right now? I'm all verklempt.

In other news, I've finished a few projects--two baby sweaters, and four baby blankets, and probably some other things I've forgotten. Here are some:

Henry's Blanket:

Kate's Sweater:

Sally's Blanket:

Kate's Blanket (with Kate in it!):

Matthew's Blanket:

Sally's Sweater (with Sally in it!):

Blogus Interruptus

Hmm. It's been so long since I updated my blog that I had to email for my password. Ah well. That's life.

What's up now? Well, I've done a little more knitting, some unexpected crocheting (for the 2 nieces and 2 nephews I earned during 2007 alone!!), some writing, some working, and--you get the idea. For awhile I stopped believing I had anything to say. (If my husband is reading this right now, he's choking on his AMP energy drink . . . Poor dear, I always have plenty to say to him!)

Worth mentioning: My daughter learned to read!! She has begun to ignore me while engrossed in Magic Tree House books. I know this will annoy me in a few years, but right now I'm so glad about it that I'm all verklempt. It's disgraceful, but there you are.

Also, I've changed careers again. You don't want to know. Suffice it to say that when I don't post for a week or more, that's why.

I'll have photos of projects I've finished in the last couple of years (cripes! It's been years!) soon.

It's good to be back.

Where did Jen and La suddenly go?

Went over to JenLa for my evening fix, to see if Laura "SuperSoaker" Alpaca had further interview material with Jen, but their address is bringing up a generic webpage instead of theirs. Which gets me to thinking: I sure hope that all of you who added Jen's cool Olympic buttons to your blogs and webpages saved them to your OWN server first. Otherwise, that kind of unexpected spike in usage can get a page shut down really fast.

La and Jen: We're missing you guys--come back soon!

Stitches West, anyone?

I did manage to sign up on time for Stitches West this year (is it just me, or do the signups for this seem unnaturally far away from the actual event . . . ? I just don't usually plan that far ahead for, well, anything.).

Having been out of the loop for awhile, I would so love to hook up with others who are going. Drop me a line if you'll be there.

I'm signed up for three classes too:  Friday afternoon is "Two Hands, Two Colors" with Sally Melville (chosen because I'm determined to learn how to do this; I currently hold both colors in my left hand and drive myself batty). Saturday morning will be "First Choices" also with Sally Melville (so I'm really hoping not to find her annoying in on Friday afternoon . . . ). And Sunday all day will be "Norwegian Mittens" with Beth Brown Reinsel.

I've never taken a knitting class before, so this should be interesting.

Hope you've all been well; I've missed being in touch.

Scarier than Halloween

Want to read something truly scary? Put down the Stephen King and try some James Dobson. Go ahead--I'll wait.

My favorite part is where he says:

"What did Karl Rove say to me that I knew on Monday that I couldn’t reveal? Well, it’s what we all know now, that Harriet Miers is an Evangelical Christian, that she is from a very conservative church, which is almost universally pro-life, that she had taken on the American Bar Association on the issue of abortion and fought for a policy that would not be supportive of abortion, that she had been a member of the Texas Right to Life.  . . .

"[but] Karl Rove didn’t tell me anything about the way Harriet Miers would vote on cases that may come before the Supreme Court.

"We did not discuss Roe v. Wade in any context or any other pending issue that will be considered by the Court. I did not ask that question. You know, to be honest, I would have loved to have known how Harriet Miers views Roe v. Wade. But even if Karl had known the answer to that and I’m certain that he didn’t, because the President himself said he didn’t know, Karl would not have told me that. That’s the most incendiary information that’s out there and it was never part of our discussion."

Please. This kind of dissembling is right up there with "I didn't leak Valerie Plame's NAME . . . I just leaked that Joe Wilson's wife was CIA, so that doesn't count." Or, "It depends on what your interpretation of the word 'is' is." Come ON people.

My other favorite part was where Dobson said he'd gone for advice and counsel to Chuck Colson. Any bells ringing here for those of us old enough to remember the 70s (or at least the Redford/Hoffman rendition of them)? Yeah. Chuck Colson is a felon who served time for obstruction of justice committed while serving as White House Counsel to Richard Nixon. How charming. A few months ago when the notorious "Deep Throat" Watergate source was revealed to be Mark Felt, Colson was quoted "disapproving" of Mr. Felt for his disloyalty to Nixon.

According to Colson, telling the truth is BAD, breaking into offices and stealing information/bugging is GOOD, lying to the American public that pays your salary is FINE, as long as you are being loyal to someone--even if they are corrupt and committing crimes. OK. Golly, I can totally see why people would call this guy for ethical advice.

WTF is going on in America today??? I want my rational reasonable non-religion-soaked country back!!!

P.S. Did anyone catch Laura Bush popping out of one of her tea parties to comment that the criticism of Ms. Miers sounded like sexism to her? When did Republicans start believing in sexism again? I thought they'd announced (probably on the flight deck of a ship just outside San Diego harbor) that racism and sexism have been magically eradicated, so we don't need those pesky affirmative action programs (not to mention Title 9) that threaten to keep Biff and Skippy (or was it Scooter?) from taking their rightful places in the beer-soaked fraternities of America's finest universities.