Friday, May 22, 2009

I Feel So Blessed

The internet is a powerful thing, I have found so many wonderful friends through the world wide web. I'm blessed everyday to connect with woman around the world who love the art of scrapbooking as much as I do. These are funny, warm, caring women who struggle with everyday life, motherhood, and marriage just like me. There are days when we connect over kids, recipes, friendship issues, and loss. True friendships can be built through the keyboard and screen.
The MB's and blogs are the modern day equivalent to the long letters my Gram used to get in the mail from her friends. The beauty of the web is that I get to keep up with these girls everyday, I know how they are feeling on any given day and I get to share what I am feeling. There are a lot of naysayers who think the web is only a dangerous place, but for many it's a life line to women around the world who are mothering at home all day alone or who are stuck in a town where nobody really "gets" who they are and the hobbies they love.
I was given this super cute friendship award from two amazing women Danielle and Debbie. Check out their blogs I guarantee you will come away with a smile on your face and in your heart. Thank you ladies!



The guidelines for the Lemonade award are:
Comment on this blog.
Cut and paste the award logo and use it in your own blog.
Nominate 5 blogs you feel show great attitude and gratitude.
Link to your nominees within your blog post.
Comment on their blogs to let them know they've received the award.
Link back to the person who gave you the award to show your appreciation.

And here's a little about the Friends award:

These blogs are exceedingly charming. These kind bloggers aim to find and be friends. They are not interested in self-aggrandizement. Our hope is that when the ribbons of these prizes are cut, even more friendships are propagated. Please give more attention to these writers. Deliver this award to five bloggers.

I choose:
Emily Pitts - she has great designs, yummy recipes, and makes me laugh
Kirsty Wiseman - she is honest, loving, hilarious, and takes amazing photos
Christyn Holmes - she inspires me everyday
Becky Olsen - this is a woman I look up to in a million different ways
Sharyn Tormanen - she has great ideas in all different areas and her photos are brilliant

Wednesday, May 20, 2009

Scrappin' Away

It's blazing hot here, and due to the fact that heat and I don't mix, I am slow to post this week. I just wanted to pop up these layouts I made. The first one was for the Studio Calico scraplift challenge... it's my lift of Scarlet's "Simple" layout. I'm really happy with the way it all came together, that Sassafras Anthem paper is rockin' but I wasn't sure how to use it... all become clearer once I cut it up and really started to play with it. I was finally able to use the soccer rub-on from Basic Grey that I had been hanging onto for the last three years! I loved that set, so much so that I accidently adhered part of it to the bottom of my foot yesterday!


This second layout is something I've been wanting to document for some time, it's the beautiful flowers that bloom every spring in our yard. We have a house that will be 50 years old this summer and these bushes and trees have been here since the beginning, I feel so lucky to have such mature and beautiful landscaping in a state where it takes that long to get "real" trees! This yard was the whole reason we bought this house, it called to us and we just grin like cheshires every time we pull into the carport and see the apple tree and yard spread out before us. I was thrilled to use some of the wonderful buttons April sent me on this layout, they are so cool and I've been saving them until now!


Please excuse the poor quality of these photos, I was talking on the phone while taking them, apparently chatting and still photography don't mix... who knew?!


Oh and I finally got my sewing machine working again, I just needed some English instructions and all is good, as you can see I went to town with it on the above layout!

Hope you are all having a great week.

If you get a chance take a stroll around your nearest garden center, I did that with my dear friend Emily yesterday and it was just so refreshing to be surrounded by new growth and beauty and I came home with lots of ideas for the parts of our yard that need a little TLC.

Sunday, May 17, 2009

Studio Calico Challenges

I love Studio Calico for so many reasons but one of them is that there are tons of great challenges to be found there! Each and every challenge helps me to think about scrapbooking in a different way. The current challenge on the blog is to scraplift several layouts from April and Scarlet.

I started with April's layouts, both of which featured some fantastic use of white space!




Off to work on lifting Scarlet, she is a genius with patterned paper pairings(that's a tongue twister)! I hope some of that will rub off on me!

Wednesday, May 13, 2009

The Perfect Summer Dessert



It's finally warming up here in the Rocky Mountains and to celebrate I wanted to share with you this fantastic dessert recipe that requires no baking, meaning no heat in the house from the oven, but yet gives you something warm to put over your ice cream... that's the ultimate combination for me, something warm and gooey over cold ice cream!

Ala PW I took some photos along the way to spice up this post. So with no further ado... Summer Berries with Dumplings... adapted from a Martha Stewart recipe

1 pound frozen berries, I used mixed and strawberries
1 tbs = 1/2 tsp fresh lemon juice
6 tbsp + 1 tsp sugar
1/4 cup water
1 cup all purpose flour
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/8 tsp salt
2 tbs butter, melted
1/2 cup milk (could use buttermilk and leave out 1/2 tsp lemon juice)
1/8 tsp ground cinnamon

In a medium skillet cook the berries, 1 tablespoon of lemon juice, water, and four tablespoons of sugar over medium heat for 14 minutes, a little less at sea level, until they are slightly thickened and bubbly.

While those cook combine the flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, and two tablespoons of sugar in a large bowl with a whisk. Add in the milk, 1/2 tsp lemon juice. and butter...stir until just combined, there may be a few specks of dry flour still, don't worry, if you go too long the dumplings will be tough. *here I used lemon juice as the acid normally found in buttermilk, you can omit the lemon juice if you are using buttermilk*


When the berries are ready divide the dumplings into six big dollops and space evenly in the pan, sprinkle them with the remaining sugar and cinnamon. Cover the pan tightly with foil and turn the heat down to low for 15-18 minutes, you will know the dumplings are done if they are "dry" on top, meaning the dough does not come off on your finger when poked.

Serve over vanilla ice cream and enjoy!

We have also cooked this on our grill along side steaks and it works great!

Tuesday, May 12, 2009

They Didn't Ask Him

This weekend, while eating hot dogs outside our local Lowe's, we saw our neighbors, now I would like to point out that we live right next door to these people but only ever see them out at restaurants, or in this case hot dog carts! After enjoying our lunch and chatting for a bit they asked us if it would be okay for them to move their boat down to the back of the yard along our shared fence line. I appreciated them asking because their yard is the only one that we really see due to having just a chain-link fence separating us.

"Sure no problem." I replied.

 Well, by that evening the boat was moved and someone at our house isn't happy about it... 

Edgar is not pleased at all by this turn of events. He spent a good half hour barking and growling at the boat, sometimes quietly sneaking up on it and then exploding into a barking rage. The boat was unfazed... this infuriated Edgar even more, by the time we cornered him and brought him inside he was shaking with anger. I guess the neighbors should have asked him!

Thursday, May 7, 2009

Patti Picklicious Cards


I am truly blessed to have a wonderful friend named Kirsty Wiseman. I had no idea she was a scrapper when I emailed her on Facebook, all I knew was that she had one handsome red Dachshund and I wanted to tell her so. Later on she made a comment about me being an SC Girl and I thought... oh she must subscribe to Studio Calico too...this is where that dog from the V8 commercials comes and knocks me on the head... um no, she is on the SC Design Team, DUH! (In my defense I had just joined SC) Anyway, I have had the pleasure of chatting with her via the internet and learning more about her life and the fab Patti Picklicious CD's she designs, they are amazing! I had the pleasure of playing with her first release today and I thought I would share some of the cards with you...





Her CD has even more designs, greetings, labels and the cutest little Patti girls. Check it out, it's fantastic, and it will turn you into a card maker in no time!

Tuesday, May 5, 2009

A Door Is Closing



The LSS that I have worked at for almost two years is closing, my heart is breaking.

This photo borrowed from my dear friend Christyn's blog.

Monday, May 4, 2009

Thickers Anyone?



So I love the foam Thickers by American Crafts, but I am always running out of letters that I use frequently or I don't have the color that I want... my solution... make my own!

Yep, that's right folks, you can make your very own Thickers all you need are 3 simple supplies most scrappers have then follow the easy three step instructions and you have custom thickers!

Supplies Needed:
Die Cut System, I use QuicKutz
Acid Free Foam Sheets, I buy these at Hobby Lobby
Adhesive, both Pioneer Glue Stick or Kokuyo Dot N' Roller work well

Instructional Steps:
Step 1: Unfoam your QuicKutz for the best cut.
Step 2: Cut the letters you need
Step 3: Adhere the letters to your layout

It's super easy and you can achieve a custom look that's all your own!

Sorry if I sound a little like Billy Mays, I keep seeing ads for his new show while watching Deadliest Catch and I think his pitch lines are getting stuck in my head ;)

Sunday, May 3, 2009

This Little Guy



Hans has been part of our family for 9 weeks now and he has started to act like the puppy he is...
he plays tug of war with Eds
he steal my socks when he thinks I'm not watching
he eats more than one bite of food at a time
he enjoys getting up for a midnight snack
he can go up and down the stairs by himself
he digs in the yard
he barks at the neighbors, but only when I am not home
he gets excited when I come home

It's amazing to watch him learn to trust and come out of his shell it's still an ongoing process but these little steps have been huge hurdles for him.