What Are You Doing for the Next 97 Days?

President Gordon B. Hinckley, president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, died Sunday, January 27th at the age of 97. Several of us have taken the challenge to read the Book of Mormon in 97 days as a tribute to him. Would you like to join us?

A Simple Birthday Card

I have the plague, or at least something closely resembling it ... okay, it's really just a bad cold. But, it's wearing me out and I needed to make a birthday card. It needed to be simple, since this cold has robbed me of all creative ability. So, I grabbed Fun and Fast Notes and my watercoloring box. The cake is painted with Watercolor Wonder Crayons, Twinkling H2Os, and Liquid Metal, with glitter glue added to the flames. The brilliant blue Twinkling H2O is almost an exact match to Tempting Turquoise so I used that for the background, with Groovy Guava as an accent. The ribbon is from the Sherbet Ribbon Originals.

I bought the Pretties kit last summer but have barely touched it. The flowers and pearls and beads are so pretty they intimidate me. But, this needed something, and the beads on the hatpin seemed like the perfect touch. (I did say simple, not plain.) Now I need to find some bubble wrap to pad the envelope I'm mailing it with. It's a good thing I bought some $.17 stamps, I know this one will need the surcharge!

I placed my personal Sale-a-bration order at 12:17 a.m. mountain time on the 1st. UPS says it will be here Tuesday. I can't wait! And the Sale-a-Bration sets are die cut, I'll be able to play right away. Hopefully I won't have too many tax returns to do this week! Have you decided what Sale-a-Bration sets you need yet?

Happy, Happy Birthday!!!

I haven't been able to do much stamping this week and I can't even blame it on work, because I haven't been doing much of that either, my granddaughter shared a nasty bug with me that's really thrown me through a loop. Fortunately, I don't have a lot of work to do, so I'm spending the weekend relaxing and telling the bug to leave. Relaxing to me means playing with paper and inks and punches and stamps, so I may have more to show you tomorrow.

This altered "J" is a birthday gift for a friend of mine. It's amazingly easy to make, and I like the way it turned out. I got the J at Michael's, they have several different types of alterable letters. I cut pieces of Petals and Paisley Designer Paper (which just retired, but we do have some beautiful new designer paper) into 1-1/2" strips and adhered them diagonally with a glue stick. After that set for a bit I turned it over, trimmed and clipped the paper and folded over onto the back. Then I cut a "J" out of turquoise cardstock just a teeny bit smaller than the chipboard and adhered it with the new Tombow Mono Multi Adhesive. I added some flowers made with the 5 petal punch, tempting turquoise and pretty in pink cardstock with tempting turquoise brads, and some tempting turquoise 1/4" grosgrain to finish it off. Hopefully she likes it.

The same friend requested a real life example of a waterfall card. I'd never made one, but I'd been told they're much easier to make than they look, and I was fortunate enough to have an example card that my very first secret sister made me. There are excellent directions for making a waterfall card here on SplitCoastStampers.

I made this with one of my favorite all purpose retired stamp sets, Mini Mates, using Real Red and Brilliant Blue classic ink, and a Real Red marker on whisper white cardstock. The cardbase is Brilliant Blue with a Real Red mat and the individual squares on the waterfall are matted on Real Red, Brilliant Blue and YoYo Yellow. It's finished off with Real Red eyelets and a little piece of Real Red ribbon. If you haven't seen one, as you gently pull on the ribbon the little square flip up one at a time to reveal the bottom message. Here it is fully open: