It's the Pumpkin-in-Chief, Charlie Brown!

Hi, guys!  Halloween and Election Day are rapidly approaching!  My family and I went to The Rise at Old Westbury Gardens last weekend.  The proof that it is an election year is that we got to see pumpkins carved of President Obama and Mitt Romney!  I thought I would share them with you today and some others we were lucky enough to see.  There were 5000 carved pumpkins there.  It was truly amazing.

Seeing this pumpkin of the late great Gary Carter was very touching to me. He was my favorite Met!

My favorite Monkee, Davy Jones

I hope you enjoyed seeing these cool pumpkins. If you are in NY and can get to see this cool event, I highly recommend it.  My family and I will be making this a family tradition for sure!

Enjoy the rest of your weekend!

So Thankful For You, Babci

Hi, guys! Hope all is well.  Today I am sharing a card I was asked to make for my friend to send to her husband's grandma. They call her Babci, which means grandma in Polish.  I understand she is a very special woman who lives far away and loves nature.  I thought I would make leaves using my Tim Holtz Alteration dies and Distress Inks.  I embossed the sentiment to add some shine.  I colored the leaves by using an ink pad I made last Christmas.  Tim Holtz had showed the technique on one of his 12 Tags of Christmas.  My ink pad was rather dry, so I used ink refresher spray on it, and just applied the pad to paper and got this great patchy look.  I then cut the leaves out.

Supplies:
Stamps: Inkadinkado
Paper: Gina K Designs (Brown)
Ink: Distress Inks, Adirondack Espresso
Misc.: Scalloped Rectangle Punch,  Computer Generated Name, Tattered Leaves Alteration Die

What a fun card to make and hopefully it will make Babci happy.

I hope you know that I am very thankful for each one of you who visits.  I love this community and the sharing that takes place. What blessings you all are to me!  Enjoy your day, my friends!

The Itsy, Bitsy Spider

Hi, guys! Today I am sharing two Halloween cards I made.  The first one up I made for my friend Erich's nephew,  Alex.  I decided to go with spiders as he is a little boy and lots of little boys like creepy crawly things.

Supplies:
Stamps: Papertrey Ink, Impression Obsession
Paper: Gina K Designs
Ink: Distress (Black Soot), Distress Seedless Preserves, Versafine Black
Misc.: Clear Embossing Powder, Brad, Alpha Stickers

For this next one, I used other creepy crawlers and some funny (dare I say cute?) spiders.  I used a white gel pen to accent the eyes of the dangling spiders and the BOO sentiment, and added some googlie eyes for some fun.

Supplies:
Stamps: Papertrey Ink, Stampin' Up, Vap! Scraps
Paper: Gina K Designs (White), Recollections (Bright Orange)
Ink: Distress (Black Soot), Versafine Black
Misc.: White Gel Pen, Googlie Eyes

These were fun to make.  I am not sure if I ever told you, but Halloween cards are among my favorite to make.  I can make some cute, or funny, or some rather gross and it is all good.  Something for everyone.  Hope to find time to make more this week.

Hope you have a great day!

Bon Anniversaire, Mon Amie!

Bonjour, y'all!  I was doing a French-inspired birthday card for a friend of mine today.  She is one of my Jane Austen group friends, and she spent time living in France and speaks French as well.  I thought it would be fun to use some of my French stamps for her card.  I thought this image reminded me of my friend very much with her stylish, sleek look and the short coiffed hair. I have a set of French phrases by Clearly Impressed that I used for the outside and inside of the card.  The inside reads "Bon Anniversaire."

Supplies:
Paper: Stampin' Up
Stamps: Hero Arts, Clearly Impressed
Inks: Black Archival, Distress Inks
Misc.: Oval Punch

I sure hope she will enjoy this card as much as I enjoyed making it for her.

Hope your day is a good one!

Sending Love Your Way

Hi, guys! Hope your day is going well.  Today I am sharing a card I made for a friend.  Her dad passed away.  When I started making this card, I did so with a happy heart. I wasn't working on a sympathy card when I first started it.  I was taking Jennifer McGuire's Kick Start online class, and that day they were focusing on play time, and just allowing yourself time to work with different inks and mediums or embellishments, etc.  I took out all my spray inks and was spraying and using water to make a fun background on a sheet of watercolor paper.  When I got to making the card, I saw a sky of blue and let it inspire me to make this card.  I thought the sentiment of "Sending Love Your Way" would be a lovely way to show my friend how much we love and care about her.

Supplies:
Stamps: Hero Arts
Paper: Gina K Designs, Watercolor Paper
Inks: Distress Inks, Distress Stains, Dylusion Spray, Perfect Pearl Mist
Misc.: Memory Box Butterfly Die, Martha Stewart Butterfly Punch, Gems, Thin white ribbon, Organdy White Ribbon, White Embossing Powder

I wish you a great day ahead and hope you take a moment to enjoy those special in your life.

A Mermaids' Tale and Tea

Hi, guys! My husband and I got to take my niece Amanda to see her first play the other day.  It is called "A Mermaids' Tale" and is being performed at The Triad NYC.  Our friend Heather Edwards is the musical director of the show.  It was fabulous!  Amanda was thrilled to be up front and even got on stage with a mermaid. What a great introduction to the theatre!  If you are in NYC and want to spend a fun afternoon, I suggest you stop in and see it.  The Triad is at 158 West 72nd Street.  Be prepared to laugh and smile as the cast is amazing.  The mermaids even posed afterwards with the children. Here is a picture of Amanda with the lovely mermaids.

My niece and I have been going to tea since she was 2.  She is now 8 and a regular tea shop fan.  We took in Alice's Tea Cup for brunch before the show.  Amanda and I normally go to another location, but the one we went to was only a stone's throw away from the show, so we knew we had to eat there. My hubby wasn't complaining as he LOVES their food, especially their veggie sandwiches.  Here is a picture of him diving right in.

Here is a picture of my brunch of eggs benedict over scones with chicken hash.  It is not to be believed!

The food here is amazing, and how they treat the children is a major plus. From the fairy dust sprinkled in the hair to the fun children's menu, not to mention the amazing Alice in Wonderland motif of the place.   Spending time here with Amanda is one of my favorite treats.

If you love tea, great food, or even Alice in Wonderland, I would highly recommend you visit and experience some of its magic! These are all my personal opinions and I have no connection whatsoever to the restaurant, other than I wish I could eat there more often!

Hope you have a fun filled day!

Happy 2nd Anniversary, Jane Austen Style (and Hubby Style)

Hi, guys!  Today my hubby and I are celebrating our second wedding anniversary.  Both my husband and I decided to take off work and enjoy time together.  To start the day, we gave each other cards we made for each other.  I am very touched that he takes the time to make me a card for the holidays since he knows how much I love them.  The card I made for him used the Papertrey Ink Jane Austen stamp set.  I figured what better love story is there than that of Mr. Darcy and Elizabeth Bennett. The sentiment inside I used was "You must allow me to tell you how ardently I admire and love you" from the same stamp set.  I wanted to try a shabby chic look for the card after taking the Jennifer McGuire Kick Start online class where one was demonstrated.

Now I will share the card he made for me.  I think it is awesome and told him he is a card maker at heart but just doesn't know it yet.  He is very witty and fun, and decided to incorporate the date of our marriage in the card by using the clock.  We were married 10-2-10.  He then put a second hand with a small arrow pointing to it to signify the "second" wedding anniversary.  If that doesn't say thought and planning, I don't know what does.

He didn't need to use any stamping in this card, and even incorporated our invitation into it.  He loves the look of the torn papers that I do, but I still can't convince him it is OK to rip pages out of old books, so he photocopies the words out of the old dictionary and then tears it.  The book lover in him can't help but cringe inwardly when I rip apart stuff.  It is so funny.

Off to celebrate and enjoy the day!  Hope your day is filled with fun and lots of love too!