Debi's Crazy Life;

Sorry about the long delay with out any new post. Our family just returned Sunday from a 2+ week vacation to Florida. This post will mostly be blah, blah, blah about my trip so if you are only interesting in the stamping part of my life you might want to skip this post, though I have a second one with todays Elzybell challenge that I will put up just as soon as I am done with this one. I have spent the last several days doing what seemed like a mountain of laundry, grocery shopping and catching up with everyone. Does it ever seem like your vacation makes you need a vacation? Anyway we had a wonderful time. We spent the first week of our vacation on Sanibel Island, at the beach or mostly anyway because our 2 day drive to get there turned into 4 1/2 days. We started out on Good Friday in 2 vehicles because we were bringing Matt (our oldest son) his car, which is finally on the road. We ended up staying the night near him and having breakfast with him on Saturday morning before we ...

Football season is always the busiest time of the year for my family. Our second son Daniel has been playing football since the age of eight so the months of August, September and October are consumed by practices and games and all the other fun stuff involved with the season. Our daughter Jessika has been cheering for our PopWarner team for 3 years now so that involves once again, practices, games, competitions and good grief CHEER HAIR! I can only imagine what my life is going to be like when Ellie starts cheering and Manny starts playing. This weekend was homecoming. Homecoming at my children's school is near and dear to my heart since they attend MY hometown high school. Homecoming in our small town is one of the wonderful things about living where I live. It starts out with the spaghetti supper Friday night then continues with the Varsity girls soccer game, bonfire and dance. Saturday begins with a 5K walk/run race and parade then concludes with a Varsity football gam...

No time for stampin' because today was the first day of school! (Well I did actually do some stampin' but I'm not sharing it until tomorrow) Yipee! You missed seeing me doing my happy dance in the middle of the driveway. Probably a good thing you missed it because it probably wasn't pretty. My friend MaryPat was a little sniffly as her youngest daughter got on the bus with mine. He daughter is my baby girl Ellie's best friend, they looked so cute this morning as they got on the bus. I wish I could show you how adorable she looked but as I have told you all before until the adoption is final I can't share. This first picture is of my handsome young man Daniel on the first day of his sophomore year of high school. Can't believe how grown up he looks! Princess Jessika heading off to third grade! First time on the big kid bus and first year in the elementary II. She did okay getting on the bus at 6:55 this morning, bet it won't be so easy next week...

There is nothing like a brand new stamp set to bring out your creativity! So I pulled out the new Fresh Cuts set again today to see what else I could do with it. I really like the collage look of this main image. I stamped it in blue bayou classic ink, sponged the edges with soft sky, and when that wasn't quite enough I dragged the image across the stamp pad. I colored the flowers with a real red marker and did the leaves with a mellow moss marker. It doesn't really show in the picture but I added some highlights with the white gel pen. What I used: Fresh Cuts stamp set Blue Bayou, Soft Sky, Whisper White card stock Soft Sky Prints designer paper Real Red wide grosgrain ribbon Large and small oval punches, ticket corner punch Real Red and Mellow Moss Stampin' Write markers, white Signo gel pen sponge Now I gotta do some braggin' on my kid. Daniel has had his braces on for FOUR long years. So... drum roll please........... tada! $3700 24 payments 42 office visits ...

I don't know about where you are but here it is a beautiful spring day. Not a cloud in the sky, mid sixties with a light breeze. As far as I am concerned it doesn't get to much better then that. I dashed off this card rather quickly this morning because my son Daniel had a Lacrosse game. They lost, badly I might add but at least I wasn't freezing my butt off sitting in the bleachers. I did this card to satisfy a couple of challenges. These colors really appealed to me. I am not real big on "peachy, pinkie" colors but I really like them with the basic gray. I embossed the flowers with silver (yes, I know it looks gold in the picture but my camera is messed up) embossing powder then sponged groovy guava to darken the edges. Only the bottom layer and the second layer on the main image is actually designer paper. The middle strip and the back ground of the main image are stamped with groovy guava on blush blossom card stock then sponged with groovy guava. What...

This is the view out my garage door this morning. We got hit by a nasty nor'easter this weekend and are buried in about 14 inches of fresh snow. That is on top of all the rest of the snow we got last week, not to mention the 4-6 we are supposed to get today. Didn't even make it to church yesterday and school is canceled this morning. We have a ton of shoveling to do and really need to get my van unburied, since it hasn't moved since Saturday, but right now the view is lovely.

I finally got a chance to stamp this morning instead of my usual Black Friday Christmas shopping. It has sort of been a tradition that I take one of the boys and go BUT (gasp!) I have already finished my shopping! Can you believe it? Guess I don't have any excuses to not do some baking this year, huh? Because I haven't been able to get out much this fall I actually did most of my shopping online this year. Alright enough bragging, back to stamping. Today's card was all about snowflakes. Since everything here is covered with snow, it sounded like a good way to start. Very simple. I stamped the greeting from Many, Merry Message in real red ink of confetti white card stock. The snowflakes from Snow Burst are stamped in going gray and basic gray. I used the mat pack and piercing tool to add some interest in the corners. Layered the white on basic black, added some basic gray taffeta ribbon then added the layers to a basic gray card body. Wish I had some red glitter ...

In my continuing search for the perfect Christmas card, I made this card. And no it is not the perfect card but it now brings my total up to 67 cards so I can't complain. What I used: Snow Burst and Many Merry Messages stamp sets Blue Bayou, Basic Black and Confetti White card stock Blue Bayou, Soft Sky and Basic Black classic ink pads silver brads, silver cord and blue bayou double stitched grosgrain ribbon two way glue pen and dazzling diamonds glitter, sponge What I did: I started this card by masking off an oval, the mask was cut from a scrap of card stock using my oval coluzzle template and cutter kit. I then sponged inside the mask using soft sky ink. I stamped some snowflakes in soft sky and some in blue bayou ink. I removed the mask and stamped a couple more snowflakes in blue bayou. I stamped "be merry" in basic black ink and added the silver brads. The main image was then layered on basic black and a blue bayou card body. I added blue bayou double stitc...

to have a jack-o-lantern this year because Jessi already looks like one. She lost another tooth last night bringing her total on currently missing teeth up to a total of four. She only has the center teeth on the bottom, with gaps on each side and no front teeth on top. Of course today is picture day at school!

Todays stamping is something a little different, it is called a treat slider. When you pull the ribbon the treat, in this case microwave popcorn, slides up. These are really easy to make. I just I measured the card stock by wrapping the card stock around the popcorn package. I removed the card stock from the popcorn, then punched a whole through both layers in the top for the ribbon and slid the popcorn right in. The background is wheeled in whisper white with the whimsy wheel. I created the main image using Autumn Harvest and used a couple of masks when I stamped the images so that they would overlap comfortably. The greeting is from a retired set (sorry) All Year Cheer III but it is the only Halloween greeting I currently have. The main image is watercolored with various reinkers then layered. I added a black vintage brad and did a little paper piercing on the pumpkin pie layer. I added a strip of pumpkin pie and whisper white card stock across the bottom with some black gro...

I need a little boy birthday card so I pulled out my Circus Train stamp set and the paisley background stamp. I love this set but never seem to use it enough. I tried a new color combination for this card; Chocolate Chip, Blue Bayou, Real Red and River Rock. You all know that I have been having a real hard time with River Rock because it just seems too green to me but this color combo really worked. I didn't do anything really fancy for this card but I did extend the smoke stack and smoke above the main panel but layered the main panel as usual. The main image is water colored using classic ink and an aquapainter. The background layers are stamped with the paisley background stamp and embellished with red eyelets and red gingham ribbon. The greeting is from the Hugs & Wishes stamp set. Now on to the bragging portion of our program today. This weekend we all went down to visit my oldest son at college. He is attending Messiah College which is outside of Harrisburg, ...