Stamps, Paper, Scissors

The migration...

When they first landed in their new home, they were young and brash, and clean, oh so very clean. (They smelled nice too!) They endured the trip from their previous home with stoic acceptance, bidding farewell to their fellows without tears, accepting that this was the natural order of things. This was what all their brief lives had been leading up to, and they were finally able to fulfill the purpose for which they were created.

Once they arrived, they were settled quickly into their new homes, in pairs, as was their custom. They all awaited the moment when they would finally emerge into the light.

And slowly, pair by pair, they left the four walls of their domicile and fulfilled that purpose. For most of their kind, life would be an endless round of departing in the morning, traveling around for a day, then at the end of the day being taken to a different place and waiting there for a few days until they took a trip to the place of cleansing, and finally arriving back to their domicile, all to be done over and over again without ceasing until time and stress took their toll and they were finally finished, washed up, and discarded. It was a hard life, but one that they accepted.

But what was this? What? When some of them arrived at some households, they found an entirely different routine. Instead of leaving on a morning and travelling around for a day, they were subjected to days and sometimes (the horror!) even a whole week of travel. Sometimes the travel took place outside, without the benefit of shoes to protect them from the dirt and harsh conditions. And sometimes when there were shoes, the conditions become so noisome and fetid that when they were finally released from their travel, they were odorous and filthy. And even then their troubles did not end, for instead of being taken to await cleansing, often they were unceremoniously dumped into inaccessible locations, where they lay emitting fumes and cursing those who put them there.

And so, one by one, and two by two, these socks migrated where no foul odor would ever touch them, where the wicked (children) cease from troubling, and where no hole or careless big toe could ever hurt them again. They went to the place where socks go to remain hidden and inaccessible for the rest of their lives. It's called the Bermuda Socktangle.

The center of the Bermuda Socktangle is in Redford, Michigan, located in the home of the Tinklenberg Family. More socks have disappeared in the Tinklenberg house than in any other place in the world. Socks know when they've found a good place to live and they also know when they have found a bad one. And the Tinklenberg house is definitely a bad, sad place to live.

The children missed their socks when they disappeared, oh yes, they did. "Where are the knitted ribs that kept my feet warm, oh so very long, long ago? Where is the fuzziness that tickled my toes? Where is the feety odor that assaulted my nose? Whence have they gone? Oh, brave socks of white (well, once they were white!), blue, and green (and orange and red and pink and...well, you get the picture!) Their like shalt never, ever be seen again! Mom, do you have a pair of socks I can borrow, just for today?"

Alas, the Mom's socks also disappear, but she also has pairs of socks that are older than her children that still serve her faithfully. She sits alone at night, listening to the washing machine chugging away, knowing that even though she has put every sock she could find in the machine, that there were far too many singleton socks and socks that were thrown away due to holes (how could they stand to wear them with such big holes in them?), so that the chances of her children finding a matching pair of socks to wear to school the next day were pretty slim.

So today, the circle of life will begin again, as the Mom departs for Target, there to again purchase socks for her children, bringing them home to live in the drawers for a brief time, then it will be back to the same dysfunctional sock life that causes so many socks to depart into the Bermuda Socktangle. Pray for socks, everyone. Pray for them. Ask not for whom the washer chugs, it chugs for thee.

How to wish a ninja happy birthday....

It's a puzzlement.

How do you wish a ninja happy birthday?

Do you say, "Happy Birthday and may you find much gold as you kill people this year"?

The reason I was wondering this today was that today was Will's birthday. Yes, the boy with the wayward finger is getting older at a rapid rate.

For some reason, which I cannot fathom, Stampin' Up! has not come out with any ninja stamps! What is up with that, eh? It is a puzzlement.

So, when making a card for a ninja lovin' boy, what do you stamp?

I decided, after noodling this for a while today, that my best bet was to make a punch art ninja, in particular, Hiro from Will's favorite Wii game, Mini Ninjas.

Mini Ninjas is a totally addictive role-playing game that has really fabulous graphics and a cast of extremely cute little ninjas. It's a game I have been  playing too, just because a) I am a kid at heart and b) it's what Will is into right now. He has finished the game a number of times already since Christmas, so he enjoys mentoring his much more inexperienced mother in the intricacies of the game.

So after much fiddling around to get something that looked decent, I finally achieved a decent looking Hiro. Lookie:

Ingredients: Stamps - Inspired by Nature; Paper - Green Galore, Real Red, Basic Black, Blush Blossom, Going Grey, Basic Grey, Brushed Silver; Ink - Green Galore, Glorious Green; Other -  Basic Grey Taffeta Ribbon, Basic Black & Creamy Caramel markers, white gel pen, dragonfly brads (dunno source); Punches - Notch Corner Punch (retired), Small, Large, and Wide Oval punches, 1 1/4 & 1 3/8" circle punches, Large Flower punch, 1/2" circle punch, Curly Label punch, Round Tab Punch, Butterfly punch, Photo Corner punch

Was William impressed by this amazing feat of punch art skill?

I'd have to say, "not really." The first thing he did when he opened it was to shake it and see if any money fell out. Yep, he's a ninja all right. There is no money in there, young ninja. Otherwise, the horrible carpet you are kneeling on would have been replaced a long time ago. Children are expensive, especially around their birthdays. So after spending all the money on your presents, there is none left to buy carpeting or put inside of cards. But, as you can see, if we had had new carpeting a few months ago, it would have gotten nasty blue ink spots on it anyway. Because of some ninja with a marker who wanted to know what was inside it. Ninjas are curious that way. Might as well wait to buy carpeting until the ninja is not so curious.

However, the ninja was much more pleased by the presents he opened after the card, especially this one:

For those not in the know, it's a Nintendo DS lite, a gizmo Will has been campaigning for for many months now.

He was excited.

For those not in the know, this is what a ninja looks like when he is about to jump for joy.

I foresee that this is going to be a good thing, particularly since the accessory kit we bought for it has headphones.

'Cause I don't know about YOUR ninja, but mine can be pretty darned loud, when he's not in stealth mode.

And he's almost never in stealth mode. But that's okay. I love him just the same. Observe the hair. Nice and clean and free from inhabitants. Observe the fingers, none wayward, all standing nicely in a row. Dang, he's cute.

And all I can think of is how much he looks like my dad.

Dad is the kid with the big grin, third from the left in the middle. And yes, those are all his brothers and sisters. Grandma was a woman of character and great fertility. There are two sets of twins in that picture.

I can't imagine thirteen kids, especially if they were all as loud as this one.

But at least he's quiet...for a little while.

Life is good. Ta!

Redesigned Coaster Calendar Kit now in store!

It was a long and winding road to get back to you with this kit, but I finally finished it. Phew! Lookie:

The new color scheme is Bashful Blue, Old Olive, Rose Red, and Pumpkin Pie, specifically chosen because I liked the felt flowers, have a bunch, and wanted to use them up! Each kits flower assortment for the front embellishment will differ slightly.

 

I changed the stamp set on this page to the new one in the Occasions Mini catalog, but you could still use Love You Much if you liked.

Colors of the Irish flag now!

The one thing that was hard with this new Prints paper is that many of the patterns had a white background and that made it harder to balance with the white calendar page.

 

And there it is. Ready to order!

In other news, so far I have taken off 9 pounds using the Wii Fit Plus. I'm really happy about that! My goal is to be healthier and have more energy plus it will be nice to look less like the Pillsbury Dough Girl or the Michelin Lady!

Well, must be off...I have a final exam to work on, as well as the birthday of the boy with the wayward finger...he will be 11 tomorrow! Presents to wrap and cupcakes to bake. Saints preserve us!

Ta!

Thank you Chocolate Fairy!!!

I have been remiss.

An enchanting package arrived for me shortly before Christmas, and I admit it...I never said a word about it, though I've been meaning to.

This package came from someone who wishes to remain anonymous, but who calls herself (or himself) my "Personal Chocolate Fairy." This isn't the first package I've gotten, but it had been a while. The note inside explains:

Along with the card, was a STINKIN' CUTE way of packaging up some chocolate.

And I really meant to take a picture of it in all it's glory, before I tore into it in search of chocolate goodness.

But...I didn't! I'm so ashamed!!!

One day, in a frenzy of chocolate-deprivation, I opened one of the cute little containers. And since I had opened one, I figured I might as well keep goin'. Und so I did...:

And it wasn't long before....

All the chocolate was gone. All before I had a chance to thank my Personal Chocolate Fairy and show you the STINKIN' CUTE chocolate conveyance she sent me.

So today I did the only thing I could do...I made one myself:

Ingredients: Stamps - Tiny Tags; Paper - Sending Love Specialty DSP, Real Red, Chocolate Chip, Pretty in Pink; Ink - Chocolate Chip, Real Red; Other - Large Oval punch, 3/16" corner rounding punch, milk carton BIGZ die, small heart punch, Medium Jewelry Tag punch, 1 1/4" Chocolate Chip striped grosgrain, Pretty in Pink 1/4" grosgrain, Chocolate Chip 1/4" grosgrain, 1/16" punch, pearl cotton

Isn't it just STINKIN' CUTE?!?!? (YILM!) Or maybe I should say YMPCFLM! (Yes, my Personal Chocolate Fairy Loves Me!) Thank you, oh Chocolate Fairy, for the delish chocolate AND the cute project idea!

For the process of recreating this, I pretty much just took measurements and figured it out on my own. But the original idea was from Becky Robert's blog, Inking Idaho. She had made a milk carton container long before we had a milk carton die and sells a tutorial for it, which evidently my personal chocolate fairy (MPCF for short!) may have bought or seen and MPCF created a smaller version of this to work with the milk carton die.  I would offer you a template for the one I have done, but I don't want to violate the CODE, man! This is Becky's idea and unless she says I can, I don't want to step on her toes. I've had it done to me and didn't like it, so I suggest you step on over to her blog and take a gander at her wonderful work.

I would suggest though, NOT using the vanilla paper with the small hearts and flowers I used for one of the milk cartons. The back has large areas of heavy glitter glazing over some of the flowers in the pattern and this stuff does not take kindly to be scored and folded. It cracks badly along the score lines...better to use another pattern without quite so much glitter glazing. I ended up making a small belly band for those cartons, just to keep the whole thing from bursting open at the corners.

So once again, thanks again to My Personal Chocolate Fairy. Your present was very much appreciated!

Gotta run and pick up Ems from karate. Ta!

Twas the night of the blog hop, and all through the house...

Not a creature was stirring....

Not even a louse...

The bedding was washed by the mother with care

To kill any lice that might be hiding there.

The boy with wayward finger was nestled all snug in his bed

With the hair nearly shaved off the top of his head.

And his mom lay exhausted, wide awake in her bed,

While visions of buggies danced round in her head.

She hoped that these buggies were only just visions

And to her nightly prayers she made these revisions

"God bless my family, thank you for this house,

But God, please make sure that I got every louse!"

'Tis a thrilling tale, dear readers, and I wish to do it justice. But for those who are here just to look at pretty cards, I will spare them the grisly details and get down to business:

Ingredients: Stamps - Garden from the Heart, Well Scripted, Itty Bitty Backgrounds, Woodgrain; Paper - Pale Plum, Mellow Moss, Very Vanilla; Ink - Basic Grey, Pale Plum, Mellow Moss, Perfect Plum, So Saffron; Other - Ticket Corner Punch, Top Note Die, Bashful Blue 5/8" satin ribbon, Antique Brass Jumbo Eyelet, dimensionals, Aquapainter, sponge wedges

Isn't it GOJUS?!?!? (YILM!) I love this set and it was relief to turn from the bright reds of Christmas and Valentine's and do something soft.

And now for my tale of woe and hardship, so skip on out if you don't want to know:

As if I didn't have enough to do, gentle readers, I took my kids out to the optometrist to pick up Emily's new frame for her glasses and decided to kill two birds with one stone and get Will's hair cut. It had gotten very long indeed and since he has a sensitive scalp, I decided instead of trimming it myself with my Wahl hair cutting kit, I would pay someone else to have it done.

Well, obviously it didn't get done by someone else, because they pointed out to me that from the looks of his hair, he probably had head lice. Oh joy. It's not something I have ever experienced before, but I have now. Maybe. Because I'm not sure that he had them...the women at the hair cutting place didn't sound like they had seen them before and I will say that his hair was not very clean because he is at a bath- and shower-resistant phase of his life.

So I stopped on the way home and bought a kit at the drug store and proceeded to come home and do a radical cut on his hair. I chopped it back with the scissors first, then started progressively going down the ranks of attachments for the Wahl trimmer until finally I was on the #2 blade, which is only about 3/16" of an inch, if that...maybe more like 1/4". Then I went through the process with the kit, slathering on the shampoo, letting it sit for 10 minutes, then washing it off, and putting gel on his hair to make it easier to use the comb they give you. And then combing through his hair for about 40 minutes, getting anything off his scalp that might be there. I didn't see a single louse, not one. So I'm not totally sure he had them. The stuff in his hair was all bright white, which is not the usual color of nits, so it's possible that his hair was just dirty with some stubborn dandruff. But better safe than sorry.

Of course, I looked at the girls' hair and my husband's hair and he looked at mine and we don't have them, thank goodness. The girls took showers and used some tea tree oil in their shampoo just in case.

Then I had to wash ALL his bedding and treat his mattresses, wash all the clothes that were in his room on the floor (and his room was a mess too so there were plenty) and his coat and his hats. I had to spray stuff on the car upholstery. Then the next day, when they okayed him to go to school, I spent the day cleaning his room and vacuuming everything in it, plus vacuuming the living room really well, including all the furniture. Then, of course, I threw out the vacuum bag because the nits can hatch in there and there you are again.

Of course, the school sent home a notice yesterday and today my son experienced the usual nasty name calling. And the stupid thing is that he had to have picked them up from someone else in his class who probably still has them or if they got rid of them, the parents never told the school. Nice. I told him to say, "My mom said I must have gotten them from someone in my class. Mine are gone now...what about YOU?" The teachers caught those who were being unkind and forced them to apologize. Yay school. But I doubt it does much good...at least until other kids in the class end up getting them as well.

All I know is that I get to spend the next 2 or 3 weeks checking heads and that the boy with the wayward finger is going to be keeping his hair very very short for a long long time. And that every time my head feels a little itchy, I jump about 2 feet. Yuck.

Send in the Freaks!

Isn't it rich?

Aren't we a bunch?

Bringing you freaky good things,

As you eat your lunch...

Send in the freaks,

There ought to be freaks....

Don't bother THEY'RE HERE!!!!

Yep, it's that time again! Da freaks are in da house and ready to bring to you many freaky good Valentine's ideas! If you just landed here from  Erin Blair's blog, you are in the right place! If you are starting here, fear not, you will be able to completely do the entire circuit, just procede onward!

Well, just ask anybody. ANYBODY. And they will tell you that JanTink doesn't just do what everyone else is doing at the time. I mean, if you were thinking that you were getting tired of looking at the usual Valentine's day stuff, or you've seen plenty of things made with supplies and whatnot from the Occasions Mini and you are looking for something different, you are in the right place! I mean, I did use SOME stuff from the mini, but I figured there would already be a lot of that going around on this tour and as wonderful as I am sure it is, variety is the spice of life! And I meant to provide something different, 'cause that's how I roll, yo!

So first, I figured I'd show you yet another way of presenting some candy to your favorite neighbor. This little number is perfect for doing what around October 31st is called "Boo-ing" someone, except this time it's Valentine's Day. Lookie:

A closer view:

Ingredients: Stamps - Well Scripted; Paper - Real Red, Pretty in Pink, Sending Love Specialty DSP; Ink - Basic Black; Other - Bigz XL Pennant Die, Scalloped Heart of Hearts Sizzlit die, Wide Oval Punch, Eyelet Border Punch, Antique Brass Jumbo Eyelets, Very Vanilla 5/8" satin ribbon, Basic Black gingham ribbon

Isn't this STINKIN' CUTE?!?! (YILM!) And it holds a good amount of candy...at least it did... until this picture was taken, anyway! This is the smaller triangle on the pennant die...two of them back to back and adhered on the scalloped edges. Simple enough that you could easily churn out many of them, yet very elegant as well. Sigh...I'm just amazing, aren't I? (YILM!)

But pink and red...everyone does those at Valentine's and I found myself wanting something...something DIFFERENT. So I went off on an entirely different tack for my next project! Lookie:

Ingredients: Stamps - Holiday Best; Paper - Bella Blue DSP, Bordering Blue, Very Vanilla, Watercolor paper; Ink - Bordering Blue, Pretty in Pink, Night of Navy, Barely Banana, Very Vanilla (Craft); Other - Wide Heart punch, Ticket Corner punch, Wide Oval punch, Finial Press Textured Impressions folder, Styled Vanilla Hodgepodge Hardware, white gel pen, Pretty in Pink 5/8" satin ribbon, aquapainter, sponge wedge, dimensionals

Is this not GOJUS?!?!? (YILM!) The heart is made with a piece of watercolor paper embossed with the Finial Press folder, then punched out with the Wide Heart punch. I then used my aquapainter to highlight the raised areas with ink, and washed a gentle layer of Barely Banana to give it a softer look to match the Very Vanilla cardstock.

Yes, yes...I know I'm just getting more amazing as I go on, don't I? (YILM!) But I have saved the best for last, yes, I have!

I was in my usual panic mode when it came to this blog tour, because I have been working hammer and tongs on a test for my medical transcription school. It's due TOMORROW, so I have had my head down working hard at it and hadn't allotted much time for figuring out what I would make. I didn't want to do what everyone else did, because for some reason I feel compelled to come up with something entirely new and wonderful when I do these things...IT'S A DISEASE!!! And so as I was staring in despair at my stamp sets, my eye was caught by a very unlikely source for Valentine's Day cheer...but as I thought about it, I thought how apropos it would be! Lookie:

Ingredients: Stamps - Beware Pirates, Woodgrain, Itty Bitty Backgrounds; Paper - Brushed Gold, Soft Suede, Bermuda Bay, Very Vanilla, Melon Mambo, Crushed Curry, Basic Black; Ink - Soft Suede, Rich Razzleberry; Other - Vintage Brads, 3/4" & 1/4" circle punches, Wide Oval punch, Word Window punch, Modern Label punch, horizontal slot punch, Cropadile, Basic Grey magnetic snap, Melon Mambo dotted grosgrain, sponge wedges, white gel pen, Rich Razzleberry marker.

Yes, this set, Beware Pirates, got me thinking about Pirates of the Caribbean and how it really is a love story, not just about Will and Elizabeth, but mostly about Davey Jones and Calypso. Yes, there is a lot of romance, and tragedy...sniff......and broken...broken HEARTS!

It's so sad to think about how those two star-crossed lovers just got all messed up in their understanding of each other and their feelings...and I got to thinking about that and how, underneath it all there was this very important object that everyone was after...and I got such a great idea, that I made this card.

What? You don't get the point? Well, you gots to open the card, mateys! Avast there! Open the treasure chest and see what's inside!

Yes, I really did have to do it!

It's not EXACTLy anatomically correct, but it's fairly close. Though not as icky as the movie. Didn't want to make you lose your lunch, now!

Well, now that you've had a gander at the inside of me treasure box, I'll be passin' ye on up the line to me fellow crew member, Wendy Weixler! Arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!

 

A card for a tweenage boy

My son, he of the wayward finger, had a roller skating birthday party to go to today for a friend of his from school.

"You can make a card for him, Mom, and put a $20 bill in it. That's what he wants."

Ummmm....no. My mother taught me it is the height of bad manners to tell people what they have to give you and how much it has to cost, but it's even worse manners when it comes to money. It's a funny thing, though; when I hear a kid say that, I automatically take $5 off the amount I mean to spend. If William's friend had not specified the amount, he might have actually gotten that much. Heheheh... His mistake.

I have nothing against giving money, as long as it's in the form of a gift card...that way I don't  have to burden the mom of the child with the task of taking something back that Alex or Jordan or whomever got too many of. And by giving him a gift card, at least I don't have to worry about him taking it to the corner store and begging some passerby to go in and buy him a pack of cigarettes...some kids start awfully early.

But I still had to make a card. It's wasn't like a girl's card, which I have a stack of around here, but instead a card for an eleven-year-old boy. Too old for little animals with party hats in bright colors, but old enough for "cool" cards, which I really do like making. I just wish we had more stamps geared in that direction, particularly in the greetings department.

So, since I have only one of the "extreme" stamps (which I am going to rectify soon) plus the Extreme Essentials set, I decided to go ahead and use them again. My standard MO for the greeting has been to use the "You Rock!" from Just Jawing, but I felt a bit tired of that. How many times can one say, "You Rock!" before it gets old, particularly if you are required to come up with a number of "cool" greetings over the school year? I didn't want my kids' friends to compare notes...I could just hear it:

"So...Emily's mom made you a card huh?"

"Yep."

"I got one too. Did yours say, 'You Rock!' on the front?"

"Yeah, it did...doesn't she have anything else?"

So I got creative! Lookie:

Ingredients: Stamps - Extreme Guitar, Extreme Essentials, On Your Birthday; Paper - Sahara Sand, More Mustard, Ruby Red, Garden Green, Antique Brushed Gold; Ink - More Mustard, Ruby Red, Garden Green, Really Rust, Chocolate Chip (Classic and Craft); Other - Large & Small star punches, Vintage Brads, Chocolate Chip 1 1/4" striped grosgrain ribbon, Clear EP, Confetti Cream envelope, Round Tab punch, My Way punch, Timeless Type Sizzlit Dies

Absolutely ROCKIN' cool, eh? (YILM!) I omitted the "YOU" from my usual greating, then below it stamped the "On your BIRTHDAY" stamp from the set of the same name, except without the "On". The colors were just randomly pulled from my Color Carousel and I love the way this turned out. But that's not all:

 

Once again, my half-envelope to hold the gift card.

So once I completed this magnificence, I took it upstairs to photograph it and get it ready for the party. I showed it to Dan, who thought it was quite cool. Then I managed to get Will's attention long enough to sign it.

"So, do you think  your friend will like this card?" I said.

"I dunno!" replied Will, his eyes still on the samurai warlord he was trying to defeat.

"Well, what about YOU, do you think this is a cool card?" I was pushing my luck.

"I said, "I DON'T KNOW'!" Will said, in that voice that boys his age use when they want to convey that you must either be deaf or stupid so they will have to say something loud and slow so you will get it, and by the way, shut up so they can finish killing that warlord.

At this point I wisely gave up. After all, *I* know it's a cool card, you know it, Dan knows it...and the birthday kid will undoubtedly think so as well...or maybe his mom will, whom I was more interested in impressing anyway. Eleven-year-old boys aren't usually worth the effort of trying to impress; at least, the only thing they are usually impressed by are loud bodily noises and I wasn't going there. Ta!

Put another swap on the blog

Cook me up some chocolate and pralines

Go out to the car and clean it up and walk the dog

Wash my compression socks and sew my old blue jeans....

Oh hai! You have returned to see my other swap! Welcome, welcome! I have some limited time before I have to go fetch children from school...early today, because the boy with the wayward finger has become the boy with the achey tooth. So this boy is going to the dentist and maybe then he will find out why I am constantly nagging  him to brush his teeth when he is told he has a cavity and is going to have to have a filling put in. Looks like this boy not only had to attend the School for Children with Wayward Fingers, he is also signed up for a lifetime enrollment in The School of Hard Knocks. You can't tell him anything...sigh. Which means he will miss tutoring and also means I will be driving like a bat out of Hades just to get back to pick Laurel up in time from the bus stop. The life of Mom the Taxi.

In the meantime, I have my Wii Fit Plus to do today, which I LOVE. Really. I feel so much better after I have exercised with it. I *do* work up a sweat (which tells you how out of shape I was when I started). And thanks to that and some lifestyle changes, I've already taken off 5 pounds!!! Not only that, it's FUN. And there is enough variety that I am not bored. Once spring comes and it gets warmer outside, I'm going to add walking to my routine, but in these cold days, it's great to be able to exercise INSIDE.

But you didn't come here for that, you came for more samples of my Stampin' Powahz. Behold the card of GOJUSNESS and rejoice:

Ingredients: Stamps - Good Neighbors, Tiny Tags; Paper - Welcome Neighbor DSP pad, Bermuda Bay, Melon Mambo, Chocolate Chip, Pumpkin Pie, Whisper White, Old Olive, Crushed Curry; Ink - Chocolate Chip, Bermuda Bay, Melon Mambo, Old Olive, Pumpkin Pie; Markers - Chocolate Chip; Other - Medium Jewelry Tag punch, small heart punch, Pinking Hearts Border punch, Chocolate Chip 1/4" grosgrain, linen thread, dimensionals

GOJUS!!! (YILM!) Let me tell you something about this set: even with the clear mount stamps, you still are going to want a Stampamajig to get it lined up right. Otherwise, lots of fun to play with!

Okay, time to succumb to my body's demand for yet another nap...curse the bronchitis...curse it! Ta!

There comes a point...

just about in the middle of January, where I say, "Okay, Mother Nature, you've made your point...winter is cold, wet and awful. So now...just STOP IT ALREADY!!!"

I was just outside scraping a bit of snow off the driveway. Dan didn't get out and run the snowblower after the last snow, so there is a bit there on top of older ice and packed snow that wouldn't come up the last time he ran it, so since we are supposed to be getting a thaw pretty soon, I didn't want piles of slush turning to ice. But I didn't make it all the way down the driveway 'cause I got tired. I really don't want to overdo it, so I stopped.

ANYWAY I'm sitting here in the big man chair with my laptop, trying to stay awake long enough to post this. It infuriates me to have to devote so much lovely child-free time to naps, especially when I went to bed on time last night. Grrrr..

But back to the point...which was???? Ummm....oh yeah! I got my Controlfreaks swaps back on Monday, for Pete's sake, and it's time to open the vault to reveal my GOJUS creation (YILM!) Lookie!:

Ingredients: Vintage Vogue, Very Vintage Jumbo Wheel, Tiny Tags, Solid Stripes; Paper - Pale Plum, Rich Razzleberry, Basic Gray, Old Olive, Very Vanilla; Ink - Rich Razzleberry, Pale Plum, Basic Gray; Other - Eyelet Border Punch, Medium Jewelry Tag punch, Scallop Trim corner punch, 1 1/4" Old Olive striped grosgrain, linen thread, VIntage brads, sponge wedge, dimensionals

I know, I know! It's GOJOMACIOUS!!!! (YILM!) This color combination was totally inspired by a hoodie we gave Emily for Christmas that was grey and purple...and when I was sitting in my stamp room, bashing my head against the table in a feeble effort to force some Mojo to come out and she came down wearing it, it was like a gift...the rest, though was all my genius! (YILM!)

And yes, I ended up taking a nap halfway through composing this post...you wanna make sumthin' of it! Eh?

Back tomorrow with more genius...if I can stay awake, that is! Ta!

Finally!

It's been a frustrating month for me. I know you are all saying, "Awwwwwww...poor Jan!"

It's been frustrating not just because of my health, or Christmas, or problems getting kits out and instructions emailed, but because I preordered all this nifty stuff that you are now able to BUY and I have had very little time at all at all to play with it other than getting swaps out the door.

But the other day, as I finished one more page of the revised CC kit, something in me just rose up and said, "I'm frustrated as heck and I'm not going to take it any more!!! I must stamp with something NEW!" So I pulled out all the new stuff and sat and stared at it for a while. Nothin'. NOTHIN'!!!! ACK!

So I did what I do often when faced with a mojo squeezed so dry that it would rival Bounty paper towel as the "quicker-picker-upper". I headed over to Mojo Monday and looked at this week's sketch:

 

And in due time, with much deliberation and steeling myself to cut into GOJUS paper, I produced this, my masterpiece. Lookie:

Ingredients: Stamps - I {Heart} Hearts, Well Scripted; Paper - Sending Love Specialty DSP, Real Red, Chocolate Chip, Pretty in Pink, Very Vanilla; Ink - Chocolate Chip, Pretty in Pink; Markers - Chocolate Chip, Real Red, Sakura Stardust Glitter pen; Other - Pretty in Pink corduroy button, Bold Brights brads, Pinking Hearts border punch, Perfect Polka Dots Textured Impressions folder, Real Red 3/4" Dotted grosgrain ribbon

I know, I know GOJUS!!! (YILM!) If you're curious about the ruffled border, you need to visit this post to see the step by step tutorial to create one like it. And I have to say...it's been a while since I threw so much pattern and texture into one card. I would expect this not to work, but it surprisingly does!

Reminds me of an outfit I sewed myself in high school...it was a total gypsy look with a full skirt made out of a red, yellow, and blue patchwork fabric and a gypsy blouse made out of yellow fabric with little red flowers with the final touch being a little blue bolero vest with red edging and while the patterns should have clashed and looked horrible, it actually was a huge success! Hey, it was the 70's and I got lots of compliments on it!

Of course, you wouldn't catch me dead in it today! Which is just as well because...cough...it wouldn't fit anyway, LOL!

So I'm back in the saddle...though I'm going to try to not stay in it for long periods at first...because I like being healthy! I spent much of this afternoon sleeping, so hopefully I have made up for any deficit. I took my last Z-pack today and hope to be in stampin' trim this week. Ta!