Pretty Poinsettia

This was the 3rd card that we made at today's Christmas stamp-a-stack. My original was made using Riding Hood Red for the flowers but we made them with Ruby Red which is very close to the same. I like that it's simple but the 3-D poinsettia really adds something. The leaves are the punch cut up and then I layered a red flower on top of a red with a dimensional in between. The dots are More Mustard from the 1/8" punch. Tiny little guys but they went on well using the 2 way glue pen. The edges of the top note are coloured with pastels.

Final Stamp-a-Stack of '08

The reindeer card was inspired by a swap I received at the Edmonton regional event. I like it because it is simple and does not have a lot of colouring. I used Dazzling Diamonds on Rudolph's red nose. Colours: Very Vanilla base with a Riding Hood Red layer. The edges are scraped with Chocolate Chip. The snowman card is similar to one I made a week or so ago. I just changed up the snowflake and sentiment which is on dimensionals. The colours are bordering blue and Night of Navy with silver cardstock layer and silver ink for the snowflakes. We will make these at a stamp-a-stack I am holding on Nov. 30. Hard to believe that November is almost over! Where does the time go?

Greatest Night EVER!

I have not stamped in days so I have nothing to show except these pics I took at the NKOTB concert on Tuesday night. It was the greatest night ever! Aside from my wedding and giving birth to my 2 kids this was definitely the BEST night of my life! It may sound childish but I lived out my teenage dream. I met the New Kids, gave them hugs (Joe was wearing the softest cashmere sweater...and I said to him "Ooooo, you're so soft!" Very mature! LOL!) and then to top it all off we ended up with tickets in the FRONT ROW! But wait...it gets better. During one of the songs (Games) Joe held my hand and sang to me. OMG. Boy was it fun to feel like a teenager again!

Tonight!

OK, I have resisted putting this on my blog long enough. It has been all over my FaceBook page but I have resisted posting here until now. I am so excited for tonight. I am going to see New Kids on the Block and I actually get to meet them. OMG. I feel 14 again. I will not go on at length about it (although I am certain that I could). Just know that I will not be stamping tonight and that is just fine with me! LOL! Hope you are having a great day.

Little Piece of "Heaven"

I decided that I should make some of these to show you exactly what they are. I posted the "recipe" earlier and decided since I had the stuff to make 'em...why not make 'em? Now, these are actually done with "hugs" instead of "kisses" but they turned out ok. I think that white and milk chocolate melt at different temperatures so they are not as perfect as they usually are but you get the idea. You can see how I "tested" one to see if the chocolate was soft enough but the m&m would not go down all the way so I heated them another minute or so. Hope you enjoy these as much as we do!

Something Different

Good morning. Today I thought I would start out with a post that's a little different. A recipe! Well, it's so simple I don't know that it can really be called a recipe. These are the yummiest little treats ever!

You need:
-small twisted pretzels
-Hershey's kisses
-M&M's (chocolate kind, not peanut)

Lay out some pretzels on a cookie sheet and put an unwrapped kiss on top of each pretzel. Put the tray in the oven at a low temp (about 200 or so) and let the kisses soften. It takes maybe 5 minutes or so but every oven seems to be a little different. Check them frequently the first time you do it so you know how long it takes. If the oven is too hot or you leave them in too long the chocolate will dry out. What you want is for the kiss to be soft enough so that when you place an m&m on the tip and push down the chocolate just sinks. When the chocolate is soft take the tray out and place an m&m on each kiss and push down gently. Allow them to cool and then store in a container in the fridge. These are sooooooo yummy and addictive! And they are a great treat to make with the kids. Let them have the task of unwrapping all the kisses - they love it! We really don't have a name for these and when I asked my kids what we should call them my 9 year old replied, "We should call them Heaven!" LOL! He's right! These are a great treat any time of year but we especially like them at Christmas.

Hard to believe that is right around the corner. I think we will try to get our lights up today while it's still fairly decent outside. But they will NOT be turned on for a few weeks. That is a real pet peeve of mine...Xmas lights on in November! And trees up! Are you kidding me? At least 2 houses on my street have their trees up! I find that a little weird. I usually put mine up around the end of the first week in December and that sucker is down on New Year's Day. Any longer than that and I think I would go crazy. Well, enjoy your Sunday. I hope to have some cards or scrapbooking pics to post later today.

Still sick!

This bug has made itself right at home in our house...hence no posts for nearly a week...again. Sigh...one day I hope to get back to daily posts. Anyway, we have had some testing done but no results yet. And then Jenna woke up with strange rash today so back to the doctor we went. Doctor didn't really know what it was and said it was probably nothing to worry about. Just wait and see...I am tired of waiting! She has been sick for 2 1/2 weeks! Oh yah, and to top it all off I got an eye infection on Thursday so by Friday morning my eye was pretty much swollen shut. As a result I had to cancel a stamp-a-stack event for that night. Sigh again.

Anyway, my hubby and son went to a hockey game tonight so Jenna and I slipped downstairs to do a little stamping. I made 3 cards in about 45 minutes. They are all pretty simple. The Christmas tree one is cased from page 37 of the catty -just used different colours. The red one is cased from my friend Jodie; I just love the simplicity of it. And that ribbon is amazing. The third one is a Leanne original. Just playing around. I really like how it turned out. I hope to do more stamping and some scrapbooking tomorrow.

Lovin' Silver

Well, apparently the flu bug has not left our house. I was sick in bed from Sunday afternoon until this morning. I sure hope that is the end of it. I got downstairs today to do some stamping. My first order of business was to create a Christmas card for one of my customers. She asked me to create a card that she can "mass produce". I made 2 different samples using the Cool Dude set. These are the colours she requested and they are beautiful. I added the silver as I thought it went well. We'll see if she likes them. Then I wanted to play with my Felt Flurries so I made another card with the same colours using the medium size white snowflake, a rhinestone brad from the Ice collection and some silver elasticord. I love it! I based the card on one of the sketches I printed off the other day. I highly recommend looking for sketches to use; it makes things so much simpler! The picture does not do it justice. We will make this card at my club workshop next weekend.

Baby Album

I made this 5x5 chipboard album tonight. Phew! That was a lot of work- those things have a lot of pages - I have only shown a few here! But I am so happy with the results. I will be giving this to my best friend whose son, Easton, will be 1 this month. She just doesn't have time to scrapbook with 2 little ones so I wanted to make her something special to put Easton's baby pictures in. The album was made using the Special Delivery Boy simply scrappin' kit from Stampin' Up as well as paper from the prints pack. I only stamped once in the whole thing. Used a bunch of phrases on vellum from the dollar store and the rest is all SU (of course!) I will be seeing Nicole next week for lunch (it was supposed to be this past week but I had to cancel twice because of sick kids!) We don't get a chance to go out as often as we used to now that we both have 2 kids. I plan to do some more stamping and/or scrapping tomorrow! (Woohoo!)

Stampin' Again!

Feels so good to stamp again! I made these 3 cards this morning. They are based on a Taylored Expressions sketch challenge. I have been copying and pasting various sketches over the past few weeks. Today I finally printed them off. This one was at the top of the page so I thought I would start with it. I really need to use up some of my prints pack papers as I have tons of it so this was the perfect way to start. This is a great layout for any kind of card. We are going into the city right away to look at new appliances for the new house but when we get back it's back to stamping for me!

Rub-Ons Promotion

Dates: November 10-30, 2008
Promotion Details: Spend $20 and qualify to purchase any Rub-Ons assortment at 20% off ($10.36 per package; regularly $12.95). Once the $20 minimum purchase has been reached, a customer may purchase as many discounted Rub-Ons as they would like. See the flyer for this promotion here.

Sick!

Ughh! What a fall this has been. I still have the last little tickle in my throat from my cold/flu (3 1/2 weeks now) and my kids have both been sick over the past week. Poor little Jenna has been sick for a week! A terrible stomach flu...not fun. I am hoping she is finally over it but we will see what tonight brings. We have yet to sleep through a night since last Tuesday. With all the illness in the house and a zillion other things going on I haven't had much time to stamp. I am almost done a baby board album for a friend, though, so I hope to post that tomorrow. I actually did have some time last night to stamp but I chose instead to clean out my pantry. It was such a disaster. But now it is so clean and tidy. I smile every time I open the door! I am slowly trying to clean out all the closets and "hiding" spaces so that when it's time to list the house I don't have as much work to do. The new house is coming along really well. The framing is done and they are working on the roof. Our roof is kind of crazy and very complicated so it is taking some time. There are places that are so steep one of the roofers is too scared to go up on it! I will post some pics soon. I am now off to bed as I have been up since 5am.