Christmas Pictures '08

Every year we take turns hosting Christmas where we have brunch and presents are exchanged. This year was at my sister's house. Only the kids got presents this year and only from Ouma and Oupa.

Uncle Timothy passing out presents to all the kids.

Jorden (2) and cousin Leah (3) playing afterwards.

All the cousins. What a fun time this was to try to get all of them looking at the camera! Ages 12, 10, 9, 7, 6, 5, 4, 3, 2! (yeah, we like to keep them close in age ;) lol)

Their Uncle Jared is outside with his nose stuck up against the window that is right behind us photographers.

The Lusk family, my parents/brothers/sister.
back row l-r: Lloyd, Dawn (parents), Caleb (3rd), Jared (baby of the family). Front row: Timothy (4th), Jennifer (2nd), Myself (1st)

The Hillman family.

Oupa and Ouma with the 9 grandkids!

There you have it. A look into my crazy family life! lol And i know I'm crazy as we are taking the kids (just our kids that is) shopping tomorrow!!

Merry Christmas

To all my friends near and far, I hope you have a very happy Christmas.

A Little Miracle

No, I am not talking about the little miracle that is always talked about at Christmas time but rather about baby Francesca Maria Bucci who was born with complications. Andrea over at Crafty Engineering is offer up blog candy for those that send a RAK to the family, please see her blog for more info on the baby and how you can send a RAK. As much as I would love to win the blog candy, the motive for making the card was not for that but for the family in hopes that it brings them a small amount of comfort.

This card combines a few challenges: Try New Technique 200 (faux silk with pop), color challenge 198 (so saffron, cameo coral & orchid opulence) and Sketch challenge 208. I used Flourishes Rock-a-bye Baby set for my image and JustRite Stamper's Brayton Font for the sentiment.

I did the faux silk with pop on the moon only. I stamped on tissue paper with black soot distress ink, let it dry, crinkled up the tissue paper and then cut it to exactly fit the moon that I had stamped on white cardstock. I used Helmar V2 Vellum Adhesive to attach the tissue paper moon to the stamped image. The spray soaked through the tissue paper just a little so it made the ink look 'softer'. As I haven't tried the Vellum adhesive on anything but vellum, I wasn't sure of the results but really like how it didn't run the ink but 'soften' it a little. I paper pieced the rest of the image with Spring Flower dsp and orchid opulence cardstock for the blanket. I attached the paper/cardstock with Helmar Acid Free Glue as those pieces were just too small for double sided adhesive. The image is on dimensions ( I know.. completely forgot about using Helmar Liquid Scrap Dots instead! It was midnight when I was making this card, think my brain was asleep!)

Used an artist pen to add all my Faux Stitching and some paper piercing in the corners of the main image panel. Black Rhinestones by Kaiserscrapbook were added to the corners of the cardfront. The sentiment was stamped on vellum paper and adhered to the cardstock with Helmar's V2 Vellum Adhesive. All cardstock/dsp was attached using Helmar Quick-fix Adhesive Runner.

stamp: Flourishes - rock-a-bye Baby, JustRite Stamper's Brayton Font; paper: cameo coral, so saffron, orchid opulence, white, spring flower dsp; ink: black soot distress; accs: black rhinestones, artist pen, helmar v2 vellum adhesive, helmar acid free glue, helmar quick-fix adhesive runner

Helmar's Count down to Christmas

Remember I told you about Helmar's count down to Christmas? Well today is my day! Here are a few snippets to wet your appetite and then head on over to the Helmar blog to see if you guessed right and to read all about it also check out the other design team member's days.



I know, I'm such a tease!! :)

Christmas Angel

Everyone has a Christmas Angel, right? It could be that neighbor down the street who snow blows the entire length of the sidewalk after every heavy snow (God bless that man!). It could be a package stuck between your doors from 'friends'. That fruit basket on the porch from the neighbor wishing you a Merry Christmas. The person behind you in line at the store covering the last few dollars that you went over. See Christmas Angels! (okay They are angels anytime!)

We've had a Christmas Angel/Angels this past week drop off a gift. And since we don't really have a complete clue to who they are, I decided to send them a Virtual Thank You card via my blog. Maybe someone that was in on this gift will see my post and share it with the other Angels.

Using today's sketch challenge 207, I pulled out a retired SU set, that I will never part with, Angelic. Stamping the angel in bravo burgundy onto very vanilla. Little dtp with the ink around her. Layered her on black and then again bravo burgundy which I distressed. Added some faux stitching on the tabs and design paper. Some brads on the tabs.

stamp: Angelic; paper: bravo burgundy, old olive, very vanilla, retired SU dsp; ink: bravo burgundy; accs: brads, distressing tool, artist pen

Once again, Thank you so much to our Christmas Angels. You don't know how much this means to us. Words just can't express our appreciation or our surprise at your thoughtfulness.

A Baja Breeze Christmas

I decided to take a small break today and do the sketch challenge 207 combined with the color challenge 197 (baja breeze, kiwi kiss, basic gray with opitonal not quite navy) (Infact I loved this sketch so much I actually did two cards, second card will be in a seperate post as it is special.)

Thomas Kinkade's Stonehearth Hutch was perfect for the sketch. Wanting something quick but stunning, I stamped the image in Baja Breeze on very vanilla. Colored in the windows with barely banana marker and added a little crystal stickles to the lights. Layered, distressed, add Ski Slope design paper for the background. When I attached the image to the card, I used Helmar Liquid Scrap Dots. I took a couple pictures this time to show you exactly what they look like.

Here is how I applied the Liquid dots to the back of the image.

Here are the Liquid Dots after 5 mins of sitting. After 24 hrs they will be completely set and you can try to squish down the image and it won't budge!

Here is what the complete card looks like:

stamp: Thomas Kinkade Stonehearth Hutch; paper: kiwi kiss, basic gray, very vanilla, not quite navy, ski slope dsp; ink: baja breeze; accs: barely banana marker, crystal stickles, distressing tool, Helmar liquid scrap dots

Speaking of Helmar, the Helmar blog is having a count down to Christmas with the design team members taking turns posting some kind of project using Helmar adhesives each day. Some very cool projects being shared there. And you never know when it will be my day so go check it out!

About Splitcoaststampers and a secret revealed!

Did you know that it is FREE to become a member of Splitcoaststampers known amoung the stamping community as SCS. But have you ever wanted to support SCS for all the hard work that goes into keeping the site running? How about joining the Fan Club? What is the Fan Club? It is a paid subscription that gives you extra benefits such as instant uploads, access to special forums and access to a special monthly gallery (opened on the 15th of each month with 2 new members) created by Splitcoaststampers Design Team fondly known as the Dirty Dozen.

What? You want to see what you are actually paying for? Well guess what? SCS has decided to give everyone an early Christmas present by opening up December's gallery to EVERYONE who is a member of SCS!! And for a limited time, you can become a Fan Club member for only $19.95 or gift someone else a Fan Club membership.

Okay, so you are probably going "why is she telling us all of this?" Well... I have had a BIG secret that I couldn't tell for the past 2 months and can finally tell!! Plus I LOVE Splitcoaststampers, it has helped me grow by leaps and bounds in my stamping mojo and I have made great friends there.

So IF you'd like to see more of this card:

that I designed, then maybe you should head over to the Dec. gallery to see who is being revealed this month as the newest Dirty Girls. It is a good one, let me tell you!!


Did you figure it out before you headed over?? :)

A Flower Soft Christmas

Update on little one. She is doing better somewhat... Only because we had her antibotic changed. She was having a reaction to it so I asked for a different one. Thankgoodness the doctor didn't put up a fuss and prescribed a new antibotic for her. She is like a new person now! Her reaction to the Amoxicillin is one I have only seen in movies. No, she didn't have a rash or the runs or anything you would normally think. She would become 'possessed' for 5-10 mins each night! Screaming, kicking, lashing out, tearing her clothes off. You could look at her and she wasn't in there. It was scary! (and something the nurse hadn't heard of being a reaction from the antibotic) Not only that but when she started it, she didn't eat at all. So the poor thing hadn't eaten for 2 days. She finally manged to eat some today when she wasn't ON IT as I didn't give it to her at all today.

Well i'm sure you've heard more than you wanted to about her reaction so onto today's card I was able to do for the Featured Stamper challenge. I changed the image, sentiment and left off a few embellishments that was on the orginial card that I cased. I went with Vintage Holiday as I wanted to use my Flower Soft topper that I had.

Using Flower Soft, I applied it to different sections of the topper to give dimension. (The topper is the door image). I then added a few layers, a bow and the sentiment at the top. The sentiment is the only stamped part of the card!

Holiday Eating Tips

Thanks for all the get well wishes for my little one. Today has not been a good day at all. I think I have held her for the most part. Usually when she sleeps, I can stamp but she isn't sleeping long enough today! Oh, well, they are only little once, right? Stamping can wait. (yeah, right!! lol)

My girlfriend sent this to me and I thought I would share it with you, my friends, since I have no creations to share today!

HOLIDAY EATING TIPS

1. Avoid carrot sticks. Anyone who puts carrots on a holiday buffet table knows nothing of the Christmas spirit. In fact, if you see carrots, leave immediately. Go next door, where they're serving rum balls.

2. Drink as much eggnog as you can. And quickly. It's rare. You cannot find it any other time of year but now. So drink up! Who cares that it has 10,000 calories in every sip? It's not as if you're going to turn into an eggnog-alcoholic or something. It's a treat. Enjoy it. Have one for me. Have two. It's later than you think. It's Christmas!

3. If something comes with gravy, use it. That's the whole point of gravy. Gravy does not stand alone. Pour it on. Make a volcano out of your mashed potatoes. Fill it with gravy. Eat the volcano. Repeat.

4. As for mashed potatoes, always ask if they're made with skim milk or whole milk. If it's skim, pass. Why bother? It's like buying a sports car with an automatic transmission.

5. Do not have a snack before going to a party in an effort to control your eating. The whole point of going to a Christmas party is to eat other people's food for free. Lots of it. Hello?

6. Under no circumstances should you exercise between now and New Year's. You can do that in January when you have nothing else to do. This is the time for long naps, which you'll need after circling the buffet table while carrying a 10-pound plate of food and that vat of eggnog.

7. If you come across something really good at a buffet table, like frosted Christmas cookies in the shape and size of Santa, position yourself near them and don't budge. Have as many as you can before becoming the center of attention. They're like a beautiful pair of shoes. If you leave them behind, you're never going to see them again.

8. Same for pies. Apple, Pumpkin, Mincemeat. Have a slice of each. Or if you don't like mincemeat, have two apples and one pumpkin. Always have three. When else do you get to have more than one dessert? Labor Day?

9. Did someone mention fruitcake? Granted, it's loaded with the mandatory celebratory calories, but avoid it at all cost. I mean, have some standards.

10. One final tip: If you don't feel terrible when you leave the party or get up from the table, you haven't been paying attention. Re-read tips; start over, but hurry, January is just around the corner.

Happy Holidays!!

Strep again and Doghouse

No, not me. My 2 yr old!! She's been sick since Sunday but never complained about a sore throat. Was eating but had a fever but her breathe stank! Well in googling "strep in toddlers", they don't have to have a sore throat to have strep! So back to Urgent Care we went this afternoon! She wouldn't let them do a strep culture but with all the symptoms I listed, they put her on antibotics. Hopefully she'll start feeling better soon as right now she just wants mommy and mommy just wants to STAMP!! lol

Now for a good laugh. Check out Beware of the Doghouse and make sure you share it with your husband! I did!! :)

Sleigh Ride

Yesterday was our Hometown Holidays. A wonderful day of holiday activities sponsored by the Christmas Committee and local merchants. We had plans for most of the day but was able to go take a Sleigh Ride!

The wait was 40 mins., the tempature was 25 degrees (F) and it was SNOWING!! There was hot chocolate, tea, coffee, hot apple cider and cookies while you waited and they also had fire pits here and there for warmth.

This was our second year taking the sleigh ride. (we missed last years because one of the kids was sick. Of course this year little one was getting a cold.) So we froze our toes off waiting for a 8 min ride that we totally enjoyed. Here are a few of our memories from last night.

This is the sleigh we took a ride on. The runners were decorated with greenier and Christmas lights. This is the best shot I got even if it's not our family in the sleigh!

Waiting for a family to disembark so we can get in. The snow was really coming down by now. I love how this picture turned out.


Kids are in, Daddy is getting in with little one, wait for me!

On main street. Just a little cold. The cape Allie is wearing, use to be mine! My Grandma made it for me when I was little and now my girls are wearing it!



sorry for the blurry picture, this was the best one out of the all the ones my oldest took of us.(the clear ones had us making faces of course!) Was hard to get good pictures on the ride. ;)

Helmar adhesives and Warm Wishes

Look what came yesterday:
My Helmar adhesive box!! Look all the fun stuff I get to play with and share with you! If you see something in the picture that you would like me to focus on, please let me know.

For today's Inspiration challenge, I had to dig into the box and use Helmar Adhesives on my card! The adhesive that I have wanted to try the most is Helmar V2 Vellum Adhesive.

Yes! I said VELLUM Adhesive. I already had MFT's Scarf For Three embossed on Vellum Cardstock sitting on my table. Luckly the Inspiration had a snowman in it so the image was perfect to use. I sprayed on the V2 Vellum Adhesive onto the backside of the image (used markers and white gel pen to color it in) now to wait 5 minutes. The adhesive becomes "tacky" and clear. It is repositionable so if you don't lay it down straight (which i did not!) the first time, you can take it off and lay it down straight onto the Tempting Turquoise.

I then used the Permanent Adhesive Runner to attach the Turquoise to the Real Red. I wanted some dimension to the entire image so I used Helmar Liquid Scrap Dots. This is a clear 3-Dimensional that you can control the dimension. It is touch dry within 10 minutes (fully dry in 48 hrs). Hard to get a good picture, it is the clear mounds in the top corners.

While it set up, I finished the rest of my card. Sentiment is stamped in distress black soot ink. Snowman charm is attached to the ribbon with gold cording. Snowflake Cuttlebug folder was used on the white cardstock.

stamp: MFT"s Scarf for Three; paper: white, real red, tempting turqouise, vellum cardstock; ink: versamark, distress black soot; accs: gold embossing powder, markers, white gel pen, charm, ribbon, cuttlebug, helmar V2 Vellum adhesive, helmar liquid scrap dots, helmar adhesive runner

Here are all the Helmar Products I used: Remove Cleaner, Liquid Scrap Dots, V2 Vellum Adhesive, Adhesive Runner - Permanent.
Wait! What's that Remove Cleaner doing in there? Well.. when I was all done with my card, I noticed sticky residue on my table. Now it may not have been from this card but on my table for some time (k, i just admitted I don't clean it off, huh?). But what a wonderful excuse to use Helmar Remove Cleaner! This Remove Cleaner cleans adhesive laden surfaces such as embroidery hoops, needles, frames, tabletops, quilting frames, stencils, screen printing pallets, etc! Not only did it take the sticking tape residue off my table but it smells like Oranges!! My area is not only clean but it smells good too!!!

Old Olive snowflakes?

The Limited Supply was a LIMITED SUPPLY challenge this week. Here was the list we were given:

1. The only image stamps/embossing you may use are snowflakes. Yup! Only snowflakes (or something that looks like falling snow). No snowmen, snowwomen or anything, just snowflakes! The same goes for patterned paper . . . it must be snowflakes!! (Get the idea?)
2. Your creation must be monochromatic.
3. You need to add some sort of “bling” or sparkle to your card. Stickles, rhinestones, shimmery paper or ribbon . . . make it sparkly!!
4. Last, but certainly not least . . . sentiments may be ONE WORD only!

I pulled out Rubbernecker Snowflakes and JustRite Harmony Classic Oval stamper. I wanted a different color for my card so I went with Kiwi Kiss! I embossed the snowflakes with Iredsecent Ice after stamping them in Olive Craft Ink. I sponged on Old Olive on all the vanilla pieces. I wanted the flowers on the JustRite stamp to be more like snowflakes so I filled them in with a glitter gel pen. Added bling in the corners by Mark Richards.

I used Sketch 205 for my layout.

stamp: Rubbernecker snowflakes, JustRite Harmony Classic Oval stamper; paper: kiwi kiss, vanilla; ink: craft old olive, classic old olive; accs: mark richard's cyrstal stickers, kiwi kiss ribbon, coluzzle, glitter gel pen, iredescent ice embossing powder

3-D Christmas gift exchange

Tonight was demo camp with the demo group, Creative to the Core, I am signed up under. This time of year we always do a gift exchange for those that wish to participate. The rules are that it has to be 3-D and at least under $5.00. It's always fun to make something, take it all covered up and then end up with something else. To exchange the 'gifts', we start out with our own gifts, we are then read a story where if a certain word is said, we pass to the right and if another word is said, we pass to the left. When the story ends, hopefully we didn't end up with our own gift and take turn opening up our presents!

I saw this cute little backpack on Tonya Klar's blog and proceeded to make it for the gift exchange. I used Baja Breeze paper and Garden Tea dsp along with the Baja Breeze striped ribbon. The backpack was just the right size for 6 gingersnap cookies from my first batch of Dipped Gingersnap cookies that I had made on Monday! I also made a matching booklet that you can see here when I made it for customers as I didn't get a picture of it. I used Pocket Silhouettes as the image on the front of the booklet.




So that was my gift that I whipped up today. If you have problems viewing the video on Tonya's blog, you can find it on youtube.com. Measurement directions are on Tonya's blog though.

So do you want to see what I got? Drum roll.........

This is how it was 'wrapped'. I saw the box as soon as I got there tonight and wanted it! So did 20 or so other ladies!! lol And this is what was inside it:

Isn't this GORGEOUS!! Karen stamped on vellum and attached it to the 'clothe' sides! Everyone was drooling over it, we even had to plug it in. But it's mine! All mine!! (insert evil laugh!)

Just another view. All I can say is WOW and Thank you, Karen! I love it.

Owl always love you!

Was able to squeeze in the color challenge today with a quick card using sketch 203 as I never got to that sketch when it was posted. The color challenge was black, sahara sand and vanilla. I decided to use the set "Owlentine" from Treehouse Stamps. They are watercolored lightly with Sahara Sand and the scarf is paper pieced with black cardstock. I decided to distress all the layers and distress the main image with Sahara Sand and Black ink. The sentiment comes with the set.

stamp: Owlentine by Treehouse Stamps; paper: black, vanilla, sahara sand; ink: black, sahara sand; accs: distressing tool

Like I said, a real quick card as I was busy getting ready for demo camp as we were having our Christmas exchange! It had to be a 3-D project and under $5.00 at least. What I made and what I recieved will be posted shortly.

Christmas card order

The week before I got sick, I got an order for three special Christmas cards. Needless to say I didn't get them done until this week! Here was the order: masculine tropical Christmas, special card for her mom & special card for her Aunt. No problem... except that masculine tropical one!

Only 'tropical' I have is flamingo stamps! So I went with them, drew on some Santa hats and added some 'masculine' christmasie colors. Happen to have Impression Obsession's Fall/Winter wreath set that had a little candy cane, ornament and poinsetta. Stamped those with versamark on the real red. Added some twine to the top. Sentiment is from Treehouse Stamps.

stamp: misc flamingo, impression obsession fall/winter wreath, treehouse sentiment; paper: real red, wild wasbi, white, dsp; ink: black stazon, versamark; accs: twine, prismacolor pencils, odorless mineral spirits, white gel pen, red marker

The next two 'special' cards I used Cornish Heritage Farms' Thomas Kinkade stamps. I made each one different so she can decide which one goes to her mom and aunt. For the Christmas Village, I stamped it right onto the Top Note die, colored it a little, added gold leafing Krylon around the edge. Then I covered it in Irredescent Ice embossing powder. To get the next Top Note layers, I used SU's retired Layer Ease. Used the notched corner punch on the sentiment and added gold cording to finish off the card.

stamp: Thomas Kinkade's Village Christmas; paper: purely pomegranate, always artichoke, black; ink: black st azon; accs: gold cording, irredsecent ice powder, yellow marker, top note die, notched corner punch, layer ease

For the Try New Technique, we were to brayer ink on glossy cardstock. Taking care not to muddle colors. Spray with Simple Green, let dry and end up with a 'speckled' background. I only used one color on my glossy, old olive in place of kiwi kiss. I had colored the image with Prismacolor pencils and blended with odorless mineral spirits. The lake was painted with Sky Blue Shimmerz. Stickles were added to the tree for the lights. Yellow stickles was added to the windows, star and light. My layout is cased from flowergal36's card Grandma's Teacup as flowergal36 was the Featured Stamper this week. I changed colors, images and added dots to my scallop. You can see how I decorated the inside of the card with the same dsp that I used on the outside.

stamp: Thomas Kinkade's Skater Pond; paper: kiwi kiss, chocolate chip, glossy, black, ski slope dsp; ink: black stazon, old olive; accs: scallop edge punch, prismacolor pencils, odorless mineral spirits, stickles, simple green, brayer, shimmerz