Sending Sunshine and Black Friday Deals

Hello Flourishes Shoppers! Before stores even opened on Friday morning, the “elves” behind the scenes at Flourishes were busy adding new items to the store’s sale page. EVERYTHING today and tomorrow is 25% off, which means anything on the sale page is being offered up at an additional discount for even bigger savings! Keep in mind, this sale is only 48 hours long – so shop early for the best selection! All you need to do is use the code BLACKFRI11 to get 25% off your entire order!

I made a card in the craziness of the week using Sweet Nature for you. A vibrant and cheerful looking card. This Spellbinders Picot Edges circles is awesome and in white even more so. There is some stickles on the flowers for a bit of sparkle yet its hard to see in the photo. The copic collections I used today for coloring are Poppy Collection and Evergreen. Hope you have a wonderful day creating and shopping!

New Dining Set.... Sorta

I promised I would post pictures of my latest project and here it is. DH's uncle bought some gorgeous material in Egypt for me a few years ago for my dining room chairs. And I am just now getting around to re-upholstering them, right before a major holiday I know crazy. However it only took me a week. This is what the chairs looked like before. See Ranger peeking out of the corner? hee hee
Below is a picture of the chairs with the panels removed. The material is stapled along the sides, top and bottom. Material is cut and wrapped around front and back of the back panel, and on the top of the seat. We counted about 250 staples per chair. EEK! When I said my hands hurt I was not kidding. These staples were really hard to take out. I had a baby ice pick to dig up under it, then a small screw driver to loosen it more then needle nose pliers to pull it out. I started that all on Monday, by Saturday morning when my mom showed up I had one panel left to do.
We started at 8 am with the first panel. Trying to figure out a routine and how you want to add this new material was a little tricky. We took a gamble on not cutting the material down the sides and instead wrapping it around (still stapling it) just not cutting and it paid off. Lot less cutting and seem to go a bit faster. Now the silly staple gun we rented was not the best however it worked and we got done with everything that evening. The only thing left to do was redrill holes for the seat and attach it back to the bottom. I had new cushions cut at the local foam shop, what a GREAT idea as now you don't sink down like you are sitting in a hole. ha ha Early Christmas present to me. My mom was awesome help and did all the stapling since I took them out. Thanks mom, and please don't edit my grammer. Yep she read my blog again and said I need to edit my posts better. Ha....

Hope you all have a wonderful and blessed Thanksgiving

CDS New Lantern and Secret Bench

Happy Thanksgiving Eve! Well today has been crazy as I was at the school today helping with the last of the Colonial days celebrations. I completely forgot to get my post pre-set for me and just now remembered. Clear Dollar Stamps new Templates are available today! You can see all the templates HERE or HERE.
This first one is called Secret Bench. The top of the seat lifts up and you can put candies or notes inside if you wish. The little pillow is made out of some chocolate squares with a scripture on the front.

Next is the template Lantern. This can be made either open if you have a baggie of goodies you want to put inside such as I have. Or you can added vellum or clear cardstock and add loose candy that way. The tag is from Antique ornaments with a bit of ribbon and silver cord.

Hope you have a wonderful Thanksgiving with family and Friends. Thanks for stopping in.

House Mouse Warm and Cozy Challenge

Welcome to House Mouse and Friends Blog Challenge 109 Warm Fuzzies. This challenge was brought to us by Vicki. Our sponsors this week (2 Prizes/2 Winners)DDD-3 Digi Downloads /Pizzazz Aplenty-$10 Gift Pkg Embellishments. Hope you get a chance to play along with us.
With all the cold weather and snow lately the hot chocolate has been in mugs across the table a lot lately. Infact we have gone through a whole deal of cocoa and it wasn't even the second week in November yet. ha! This house mouse is a new one for me and a gift from the twins. It is called Hot Cocoa Social. hee hee perfect! Used my MFT dienamics snowflake and added it to my ribbon bow with some silver cord and a button. This card speaks for itself on the warm fuzzies in more was than one. ha!

On another note finished re-upholstering the dining room chairs. My hands are hurting so bad from removing the staples but its worth the gorgeous dining chairs now. I will have photos for you later this week of before, during and after. Thanks for stopping in. Have a creative day!

CDS Thankful Blog Hop

Welcome to Clear Dollar Stamps Monthly Blog Hop, this month is Thankful. If you just arrived here from Shell's Blog you are in the right place. If you are just joining us head back on over to the CDS Blog and start at the beginning. For hopping along with us one lucky winner will receive a $25 Clear Dollar Stamps gift certificate for digital images! winners will be announced on Wed. Nov 23rd on the CDS Blog.

Simple card today as time is crazy at my house. I like how the sentiment is the focus though. I used Leaf Hellos for my card today. Added a bit of stickles to the leaf for fun. A button twine combo to tie it all together. Your next hopping place is over onto Jerusha's Blog. Have a creative day!

Birthday Surprise hop

Flourishes has a very special birthday today as it is Julie's birthday. What better way to celebrate with everyone from a far than with a blog hop of birthday cards for you. So head on over and wish Julie a happy birthday and see what everyone has created for Julie!

For my card the beautiful Orchids were talking to me so I colored them up in some girlie pinks from the Lenton Rose Copic Collection. These Orchids fit beautifully in our new Tailor-Made Classic Keyhole Die which is too cool! What card is complete without some pearls and lace to finish it off. This card is going out late to Julie however I know she will forgive me. :0) I hope you have a minute to wish Julie a happy birthday!
Be sure to stop by and see all the other birthday creations from everyone for Julie:

Jan Marie Caruso
Barbara Anders
Christine Okken
Cindy Lawrence
Danielle Kennedy
Dawn Burnworth
Sharon Doolittle
Stacy Morgan
Tammy Hershberger
Beate Johns
Cindy Haffner
Heather Jensen
Maki Jones
Silke Ledlow
Heather Jensen
Iwona Palmountain
Kathy Jones
Mona Pendleton
Yvonne Hagane
Laura Fredrickson

Snowglobe Gift Tag

Happy Friday! Flourishes is showing you a few last minute creations with the new sets from November. Don't forget the new release bundle ends today with the extra discount of 10% off the bundle pack.

This is a large picture so you can see the tag up close. Today I made a gift tag to show you with the Joy is in the Air set. I stamped the globe out on classic white paper then adhered that to some more paper to make the tag. Colored with a variety of the Copic Collections as you can see. The rim of the globe has liquid glass to make it shine and the snow has stickles for sparkle and yes again neither show in my photo. Sorry! Check out the fabulous creations from the DT today:

Christine
Cindy
Julie
Dawn
Danielle
Barbara
Tammy
Sharon

See you back here tomorrow as it looks like I have a post everday for the next week. Have a wonderful day.

Flourishes Mini Blog Hop

Over on the Flourishes blog we are doing a little mini blog hop with alterables. This summer at CHA a few of us fell in love with the Kaiser booth and the fabulous new alterables they came out with. This dress form below called Mannequin Die Cut had to be the favorite of all I believe. So we all decided to dress up and show you what we made.
For my dress form I have painted it in just some basic craft white paint front and back. Once this was dry I added scor pal tape to the back and actually layed it over my designer paper with all the edges left hanging out. I then took a knife and cut along the frame so that it was an exact fit for the wood frame. These gorgeous roses are actually not lavendar they are a caramel stone, however I sponged just the tips of them with some lavendar ink so you get the best of both worlds on color. Now you can add flowers in all colors just look at the variety! Here is a close up of the mid-section to see the lace and flowers closer. I just adore how this turned out. The wrinkled lavendar ribbon is perfect width as it doesn't hide the cotton ecru trim that I added at the waist and the same at the bottom. No dress is complete with out a few pearls.

This is a gift for a friend of ours teenage daughter and I know she is going to love it. Now hop on over to the girls and see what they came up with today! Miss Christine --- BLOG CANDY and Miss Cindy. Have a wonderful day!

Totally Stampalicious is going 3D

Totally Stampalicious is going 3D today with the challenge. This is the time of year when we're making little gifts for those special people in our lives so let's see what YOU'RE giving away this year. I used the adorable Poppi Cocoa for this darling stocking. It comes in red and green for a dollar at hobby Lobby. So I picked up a few as they make quick little gifts for friends children and it looks like I went to a lot of fuss. These will hold hot chocolate packages and a bookmark that I still have to make. The stocking is flet and really soft feeling which I like. There is liquid applique on the marshmallows and stickles on the penguins hat, however hard to see in the photo. Some ribbon and a few tiny bells added to the loop top and voila and easy peasy gift! Hope you get a chance to play along with us this week. Don't forget about our:
Stampalicious Dessert Menu
Level 1 - Vanilla Ice Cream - Buy 5 Get 1 Free
Level 2 - Strawberry Shortcake - Buy 8 Get 2 Free
Level 3 - Triple Layer Chocolate Cake - Buy 11 Get 3 Free

Day 12, The First Noel

Today wraps up Flourishes November Sneak Peeks and my 12 days of Christmas. Can you believe I still have more stuff to show you? Well it will have to wait as I am all tuckered out from all this. ha ha Flourishes new release is available NOW and don't forget about the New Release Bundle at the discount as that is for a short time. Great time to mention to hubby and friends your wish list from Flourishes!
This beautiful scene is The First Noel. I choose to emboss it in silver on brilliant blue cardstock. This fabulous cream blue stripped ribbon has been sitting here asking me to use it for a few months so here it is.

Be sure to check out the beautiful creations from the DT:
Christine
Cindy
Julie
Dawn
Danielle
Barbara
Tammy
Sharon
Some important release details:
**Your chance at winning the set of the day over on Flourishes Blog.
**Your chance to win the ENTIRE release by playing in our Snowy Delights Challenge.
**Don't forget about the Mystery Blogger, comment on each DT blog for your chance at the set of the day.

Day 11, Joy in the Air

Just about finished with my 12 days of Christmas. Today you get to see some new goodies from Flourishes called Joy is in the Air and our new 1,2,3 Create Kit called December 25th.
Santa's beard has some super fine flower soft that I was able to adhere without a huge mess by using the cool quickie glue pen (thanks for the tip Christine) then some sparkle is added using stickles to the chimney and snow. Is this not super cute? Dear Santa sentiment is from the new set Sentimental Christmas. Which is becoming a favorite sentiment set now.

Check out the gorgeous creations from the design team today:
Christine
Cindy
Julie
Dawn
Danielle
Barbara
Tammy
Sharon
Heather
Beate
Cindy
Some important release details:
**Your chance at winning the set of the day over on Flourishes Blog.
**Your cahnce to win the ENTIRE release by playing in our Snowy Delights Challenge.
**Don't forget about the Mystery Blogger, comment on each DT blog for your chance at the set of the day.
**Your chance at the set of the day in our Noon 12 Central Challenge on Flourishes Blog.

Day 10 part 2, Petals and Peace Gift Tag

Welcome to Flourishes noon time challenge and day 10 of my 12 days of Christmas. Today our challenge is tag your it. Create a gift tag for those beautiful gifts you are giving. I used the new set called Petals and Peace and our new Classic Keyhole Custom die! This is so exciting as this die is fabulous and so many options. Of course it makes for the easiest gift tags and perfect as I need more tags.

I took this photo with the tag laying down as that was the best photo without it looking all sideways. Ofcourse it is tilted in the photo so who knows what I am doing. LOL Anyways the sentiment panel is popped up on dimensionals for you. A few jewels and ribbon to finish it off. Hope you get to play along with us today!

Day 10, Petals and Peace

Happy Wednesday and day 10 of my 12 days of Christmas. Today is full of surprises as Flourishes unveils the November Sneak Peeks. Our SURPRISE? Flourishes Tailor-made Dies! This custom die creation manufactured by Spellbinders Paper Arts is sold as single die sets. The result is a tailormade die that coordinates perfectly with Flourishes’ stamped images. Classic Keyhole Template Die coordinates perfectly with our new Petals & Peace set, creating a beautiful cut and embossed shape every time!
For my creation using Petals and Peace with the Classic Keyhole die, I made a swag to hang or put on the front of a gift as I can't decide what I like more. It will probably go on the front of a gift as the tag as this would be so COOL! Each panel is attatched with the beautful Cream Iridescent ribbon that has a great shimmer feel to it. This center panel has the roses cut out and popped up on dimensionals, as does teh sentiment tag on the third panel. The roses were colored with Copic collections Lenton Rose, the background was using Creamy Collection, Bells and foliage colored with Sunflower and Evergreen. The foliage does have sparkles on them however not very easy to see in my photo.

Gorgeous creations from the Design Team Today:
Christine
Cindy
Julie
Dawn
Danielle
Barbara
Tammy
Sharon
Heather
Beate
Cindy
Jan Marie
Some important release details:
**The New Release Bundle is available for an extra 10% off the entire release.
**Your chance at winning the set of the day over on Flourishes Blog.
**Your chance to win the ENTIRE release by playing in our Snowy Delights Challenge.
**Don't forget about the Mystery Blogger, comment on each DT blog for your chance at the set of the day.
**Your chance at the set of the day in our Noon 12 Central Challenge on Flourishes Blog.

Day 9, Candy Cane treat box

Day 9 in my 12 days of Christmas, brings you to a project that my boys were sure I could make. They have been on me to make a candy cane shaped treat box for a few weeks so I went ahead and gave it a shot. Basically hand drew a 2 inch thick candy cane shape on scratch paper and cut it out on some classic white card stock. Then took a strip of card stock 11 inches long and scored 1/2 inch down one side adhered my score pal tape to the back, then began to wrap around the shape base. Cutting little slits in that 1/2 inch as it was curved around the cane. The 11 inch piece was not long enough to cover the whole shape, so I needed another little piece to wrap around and close off the candy cane. Then I cut out a few red stripes of paper to add to the side for the stripes. Some gingham red ruffled ribbon around the border at the top, add a few pearls and you now have a candy cane shaped treat box. Sheeshhh... the things I do for these boys. :0) ofcourse they then proceeded to tell me "See, we told you that you could make one" ha ha

This sentiment is from a new set at Flourishes called Petals and Peace that you will be seeing tomorrow! Today you have the chance to see a new set called Sentimental Christmas, so head on over to Flourishes Blog. Have a wonderful day!

Day 8, Christmas Thanks

Happy Monday and day 8 of my 12 days of Christmas. Today I have two Christmas posts for you, the first post is below with Totally Stampalicious challenge. House Mouse and Friends blog challenge today is brought to us by me personally. We get so caught up in the holidays that we forget to make thank you cards. So today's challenge is to make a thankful card, as simple as a sentiment saying Thank You on the front or inside. A couple of sponsors this week from: Simon Says Stamp and Pizzazz Aplenty (2prizes/2winners) SSS-$15 Gift Card to Simon Says & Pizzazz Aplenty-$10 Gift Pkg Embellishments. Be sure to check out the blog for linking your creations and the other DT creations.

Christmas cards are always nice however you also need to make sure you have enough thank you ones on hand. So I was going through my stamps of Christmas ones and the Swiss Ribbon always makes me giggle. Look at them wrapping that cheese, how stinkin cute is that? A little sparkle on the ribbon to match the sparkle on the snowflake that I made using MFT dienamics snowflake and voila, an adorable Christmas thanks. Hope you get to play along with us this week! Check below for the Totally Stampalicious post today!

Day 8, TS Anything Goes

Happy Monday! I have two posts today for Day 8 in my 12 days of Christmas. Today over on the Totally Stampalicious Blog it's anything goes Monday! Whohoo.... So I get to show you the adorable gift card I made. The boys thought it would be fun to make a card look like a gift and the sweet Deacon Elf be the gift tag. So here he is in all the sparkle and cuteness. hee hee And an easy peasy Christmas card to boot.
Don't forget about our delicious Dessert Menu that is going on. Haven't heard about it yet? Well let me fill you in on the details:
Stampalicious Dessert Menu
Level 1 - Vanilla Ice Cream - Buy 5 Get 1 Free
Level 2 - Strawberry Shortcake - Buy 8 Get 2 Free
Level 3 - Triple Layer Chocolate Cake - Buy 11 Get 3 Free
Added bonus: That's right our 4X6 stamp sets are now only $8.95! Happy Shopping!

Day 7, Christmas tags

Well I made the mistake of making my own gift tags at Christmas a few years ago and now that is all everyone wants. Never can I show up with a gift and a non hand made tag. So either I give less gifts.... or start early every year on my gift tags. ha ha This little one is easy peasy as the Joy is stamped out using Clear Dollar stamps Christmas Inchies. I cut it out and then popped it up on dimensionals using the Spellbinders Classic Oval small that is layered on Spellbinders Fancy Tags Two. Added a few jewels and some sparkle finished. Made about 10 of these since they were easy peasy ones to make! Thanks for stopping in, see you back here tomorrow.

Day 6, Wintry Welcome

Welcome to day 6! This was suppose to be a flat rate mailer atleast it started that way. Darling little bunny isn't it? This is Snow Friends from Clear Dollar Stamps. Stamped it out on a circle, layered him on another circle. Added some sparkle to my swiss dots piece and was doing fine for flat rate postage. However then I go and decide to add this sentiment tag with some felt snowflakes from my stash. Well that threw the whole single stamp postage aka flat rate mailer out the window. ha ha Oh well atleast I did try with this one. The sentiment tag has some piercing around the edges also.

See you back tomorrow, have a great day!

Day 5, Snowy Delights

Today is Day 5 of my 12 days of Christmas, which fits perfectly with Flourishes Pre-Challenge called Snowy Delights. This challenge is your chance at winning the Entire new release coming out next week from Flourishes. Check out the blog for all the details and linking your creations. Some fun was made with this card as I got to pull out a set with my favorite little tree scene from Cottage home. Just so sweet and such a simple scene with the path. I have colored them using Copics Sky collection and the single copic BG70. My sentiment is from Meet me Under the Mistletoe and the panel is cut out using Spellbinders Classic Rectangles small. Then framed with some beautiful sparkle all around. the lace and ribbon are hidden behind the panel a bit, however I do like how it came out. And yes you can see all my sparkle as I dumped a ton of the dazzling diamond dust on it to show up. ha You can see it though! Be sure to check out the fabulous snowy delights from the design team today:
Christine
Cindy
Julie
Dawn
Danielle
Barbara
Tammy
Sharon
See you back here tomorrow for another day of Christmas.

Day 4, O Little town of Bethlehem

Welcome to day 4 of my 12 days of Christmas showing. This vibrant and pretty scene is using the set from Clear Dollar Stamps called Little Bethlehem. I have to say that I have loved just about any nativity set or Bethlehem set I have seen. They are always a must have in my stamp collection, this was no exception. Kept this simple and let the color do a lot of the showcasing. I have framed it by cutting out the inside of my squares and layered them over the image. Finished it off with the bow at the top using Hot Cocoa sheer ribbon. My sentiment is stamped on the Spellbinders Nested Pennants with a single chocolate pearl to the top. Hope you enjoyed day 4, see you back here tomorrow!

Day 3 The Best Gift of All

Today is day 3 in my 12 days of Christmas showing. Have you gotten into the Christmas mood yet? hee hee This little beauty is using the wonderful Poinsettia Joy from Clear Dollar Stamps. I have yet to color it in anything but pink so far as I just love it with pink. The sentiment is a single stamp that is Jesus is the best gift of all. In cleaning the stamp room a few months ago this wonderful paper lace was found. It is in the shape of a large oval so I cut it in half and added it to the side of my base layer. Then some lace trim and twine was ran down the side to adhere my prima's to. A few pearls and some sparkle to the flower petals calls it good.
See you tomorrow!

Day 2 Christmas Spirit Challenge

Welcome to day 2 of my 12 days of Christmas. Today is Flourishes Christmas Spirit challenge 19 Round like a Wreath. We are moving this challenge to the Flourishes Blog, you can read about the challenge and changes HERE. We also have a surprise this month so be sure to check it out.

Making a round card is fun and I forgot how much fun till I started this one. These round shapes are using Spellbinders Standard Classic circles Large and Big Scalloped circles large. You know what is so cool about acrylic stamps? You can bend them into just about any shape you would like. Meaning this mistletoe border is from the set Meet me Under the Mistletoe and it is actually a long 3 inch piece. However when you wrap it around your acrylic block you can form a border like this. Just one of the benefits of acrylic stamps I think. The sparkle is not showing well, however it is all over the mistletoe leaves. The sentiment is from the set as well and I stamped it up on the Spellbinders Classic ovals small and then layered it on top of the Spellbinders Fancy tags two. I have to say that I love how this turned out and so simple! Now to just be able to photo it without it tilting to the side would be great. ha ha See you back here tomorrow and have a wonderful day!