Fun with Wild Rose

I started off with a challenge to myself to use my Ribbon Originals that I hadn't used yet, and this is what I ended up with! I started off with an approximately 80/20 fold of a standard size card cut longwise in Mellow Moss, then I added a layer of Bravo Burgandy. I put on the recollections paper and wrapped it with my ribbon but it seemed plain, so I stamped happy, and birthday from the "happy joyful birthday!" stamp of small sayings and sponged a little creamy caramel over it and put it under some hodgepodge hardware.

When it came to the main image I stamped the rose, but it seemed so lonely and I couldn't figure out how I wanted to fill in the blank part. I remembered using french script on a previous card and I liked the way it looked, so I stamped off french script in bravo burgandy, and then stamped linen on top of the whole thing in creamy caramel, and sponged the edges with creamy caramel.

The card kept popping open, so I thought I would add some photo turns to hold the clasp down, only I mounted them on the wrong side of the card, so my flap wasn't staying shut, but I already had holes so i didn't want to take them out. Instead I exchanged them for the triangle clasps and added another brad on the opposite side to hold it closed, and it worked! It still opens very easy yet stays closed otherwise.

I think this is another into my box of favorites!

New Favorite Card!

I created this card from a sketch challange on SCS. I was trying to use only scraps and pieces that I had in my scrap folders, so I used pieces from the hostess Simply Scrappin' Kit Friends and Flowers, and used Bodacious Bouquet for my main images. I also used the words from a Take Three stamp on the flap (you can never have too many thank you cards!). I intend on sending this in for a SU contest, so wish me luck!

Family Photos

Today Drew and I took our yearly family photo. It's a little bit late, but it's done!! It was pretty cold out this morning, and I was the photographer as well, so I had to focus, set the self timer and then run back to position before it went off. Cosworth wasn't cooperating, especially with me running back and forth so he looks pretty goofy, but at least he was eyeballing the camera. We of course had to throw in a fun one, just for kicks! I think its actually my favorite though, because it shows just how we usually are. Happy end of 2006 from the White house!!

Altered Frappuccino Bottles

As stated in my previous post, I've been working on Christmas gifts this week. I've decided to make altered frappuccino bottles for gifts for my coworkers and I finished one up last night! Here is the finished result:

The box is decorated using Holiday Thyme paper, and the Like it a Latte set. I used hodgepodge Hardware, and stitched grosgrain ribbon to decorate the front.


The bottles are decorated with more Stampin' Up! Holiday Thyme paper, non SU vellum quotes, and tags were made using the large and small tag punch. Each tag opens up to reveal a little saying or directions. The bottles have hot cocoa mix, marshmallows, candy canes (stirring sticks), and Mint Chocolate M&Ms. Yum!! I will hopefully finish the rest of them this evening and will get those posted as well.

Wow, what a week!

This has definitely been the worst week I've had in a while. It started off working an extra day Monday, where I proceeded to try and set the clinic on fire with a forgotten bag of popcorn in the microwave. I'm sure everyone was wondering why their animals went home smelling like burned popcorn. I'm still trying to get the smell out of my clothes.

Tuesday was rather uneventful with the exception of the huge dog that needed radiographs, and then I had to try and lug him around under anesthesia after he soaked himself in urine from the premedication. I smelled wonderous. At least Cosworth was impressed when I came home!

Wednesday I darn near spontaneously combusted. I forgot to put the recycling out, there were two crazy dogs, one barked all day long, the other paced. While coming out of anesthesia, the pacer did a huge number 2, and paced in it before i could get her out of there. She then proceeded to pace all over my feet, and rub on my legs, leaving me again, smelling wonderous for the day. I was about to cry then. I came home to process some photos that were intended for DVD photo albums for Christmas gifts when I relized I forgot to turn in my STAP form for school which will save us $260 on my class fees. Thats when my gasket blew.

Drew called me in sick on thursday, so to speak. He called and let them know that I really needed a day off to catch up. I'm still behind on Christmas, hadn't even started homework yet, and the house is a disaster. They called me later and gave me the day off. I spent all day doing homework and processing photo and working on Christmas stuff. On a happy note, I lost 3.5 pounds this week.. yahoo!

Friday, concluded the week (I hope) by me waking up with an odd rash on my hands. Fluid filled bumps and alligator like skin. It must have been stress induced, and I wouldn't be surprised. I ran some errands, and processed some more photos. I was doing that when my computer froze up and wouldn't do anything. No Ctrl Alt Del would work, I couldn't unfreeze it, just stuck, so I was forced to reboot by holding the power button. All rebooted fine, started up, opened photoshop, and proceeded to open my pictures folder.... "the disk in drive F: is not formatted". Oh no.

Sure enough, the harddrive crashed and my pictures folder is missing. All 200 some odd photos I processed, gone. All of our Spain Pics, Gone. Thankfully I had backed up a couple of months ago, so about 75% of the pics are saved, but the rest... gone. I'm running a recovery program to hope that I can get the ones that are lost on the Harddrive back.

A few good things happened this week. I got our renters insurance taken care of, and my camera equipment covered. I've got TWO Stampin' Up orders coming, one personal, one for stamp club, and I am almost done with Christmas gifts, except for the Christmas photo ones. Hopefully everything else goes without a hitch!

That is the story of my week. I hope yours was much better! :)

Happy Holidays!

-Jen

As One Ends, Another Begins.

Somehow I managed to sign up for two math courses that overlapped each other (Math 012 and Math 107), one being a prerequisite for the other. They only overlap by a month, so while one course is finishing, the other is just beginning.

I'm happy to announce that I will be passing Math 012 with an A. I was quite pleased with the results since it had been so long since I'd taken a math course. Unfortunately that class doesn't count towards anything, but the other one does. We've had one test in Math 107 and I found out today, that I got 100% on it!

Next week brings us to a proctored midterm and I'm very nervous. I hope I'm ready. Now that Math 012 is finished I can concentrate on keeping my postings up and ahead on my homework in 107. While I haven't been behind, but I like being ahead, it makes me feel like I have some room in case i get too busy, or something comes up.

However, so far, my adventures back in to school have left me extremely happy. I only hope it continues on this well. Maybe I will reach my goal of becoming a veterinarian someday. I just have to keep on trucking along, preferably racking up A's as I go.

-Jen

Challenge for today.

There was a fun challenge posted on POTN (Photography On the Net) yesterday to post a photo of a screw in one way or another. I was already in bed, so I decided to give it a shot today (no pun intended). These are my takes, though the "hot" one was somewhat inspired by another guys photo. My original intention was to have it red and hot at the top and fade into cold blue at the bottom, but I couldn't get photoshop to cooperate with me so I left it as is. Unfortunately it ended up very similar to the other guys photo. I don't think he was impressed, but I wasn't purposely trying to copy his photo. Well, you can't win them all.

It's always fun to have ideas given to you to take pictures of things you wouldn't ordinarily take pictures of. It helps spark creativity and get you thinking about what else you can photograph. I think I'll be searching through all of my drawers now for odd stuff that looks like it would make an interesting photo.

My first blog

Well, I figured it's time to jump on the blog bandwagon. I've seen so many exciting blogs that I thought I would start my own that included my favorite hobbies, Stampin', Scrappin', and Photography.

First a little introduction.

I'm Jen, and I've been scrapbooking since I graduated High School in 1998. My aunt gave me a Creative Memories scrapbook along with some supplies to get started and away I went. I stopped for a while due to finances, and other obligations. Two and a half years ago I got married and I had many reasons to start up again, so off I went full steam ahead.

Since I liked scrapbooking so much, my mom thought I would be interested in Stampin' Up!. She had recently signed up to be a demonstrator and mailed me the information and catalogue for me to peruse through. Boy was that I mistake (or not)! I wanted everything I saw, so I signed up to be a demonstrator in August 2005. I work as a veterinary technician, and I also go to school, so I do Stampin' Up! classes and workshops in between things. Usually not more than one or two per month. I do spend many evenings in my craft room creating away however. Card making and well, everything else that stays still enough for me to stamp it are now passions of mine as well. I spend a lot of time at www.splitcoaststampers.com gaining invaluable stamping knowledge and getting tons of ideas.

In order to scrapbook it is helpful to have photos to scrap. I have always loved taking lots of photos, but in March 2006 my dear hubby let me buy a Canon Digital Rebel XT, and my photography passion has also taken off. I love all aspects of photography, but my favorite is nature and animals, as well as macro photography. This is where most of my concentration is, but I'll take photos of whatever gets in my way.

I'm not sure how I find the time to do all these things, but I manage, and I love it! Hopefully this blog will inspire other people as I have been inspired by them.

-Jen