Do you know what this means?

This is what we woke up to this morning . . . my backyard . .



I'm sure it doesn't seem like much if you live anywhere east of Seattle, Washington . . . but it's enough in our little town on the peninsula to close all schools in the area. I think we have about 3 inches in our backyard. It's our first real snowfall of the year.



The funny thing is that yesterday morning we woke up to the ever-so-slightest dusting of snow . . . it was just enough to make everything look white . . . and as soon as my kids woke up they donned their snow pants, mittens, hats, coats and braved the elements! They played in that dusting of snow for over an hour. As soon as the sun came up it was gone! They scraped the 'snow dust' off the picnic table to make a snowball, they made snow angels on our back patio, which actually turned out great considering there was not even enough snow to measure!

So, they're really happy this morning. They just got up and are already outfitted and playing outside with the neighbor girls (and it's only 8:00a.m.!!)!



So . . . . do you know what this means? Yep . . . it means the kids will be playing outside ALL day in that wonderful white stuff and I can scrap!!!!! Thank you, Mother Nature!!

My sweet son . . .

(the one seen in my header of this blog, walking on the beach) will be 3 in March. I created this invitation today for his upcoming birthday party. I know, I'm a little early, but I thought I'd better come up with something now so I have plenty of time to cut out all the little pieces, etc. I love this paper pack (Good Times) and this stamp set (Star Struck) from CTMH!! My first time using both!



This is the inside of the invitation . . . I used It's a Party (CTMH) . .

Art in the Park . . .

is a great walk in the woods! My SIL and her kids were here in May and we took this walk for the first time. So very cool! There is so much to see and if you aren't paying attention you'll miss things. Anyway, here's a layout I did today. I used Rustic Trails (stickease), Lazy Days (green B&T), Free Spirit (stripe) and Giggle Caps. The strips from the Rustic Trails stickease were a last minute addition, which meant I had to go back and add some goldrush to tie the rest of the layout into the strips. But I really like the way it turned out.

We took this walk again at Thanksgiving when my sister and her family were visiting and it was fun to notice some of the new additions during our walk! Enjoy your walk through my layout!







The kids loved the "shirts" . . although we thought they were kinda creepy!!



The rings around the trees were very cool . . . amazing how they can get some of that (heavy!!)stuff so high up in those trees! Sorry . . . I have tried and tried to shrink this photo and it will not get any smaller . . . :(



Here are the kids goofing around by one of the sculptures!

2 more cards

Here are a couple of cards I made this weekend. The first one uses all CTMH (except the ribbon) . . the stamp is the March SOTM "Simple Beauty".

The second card uses non CTMH scraps (!!!) and the CTMH Because of You stamp set. Enjoy!

So far . . so good . .

One of my resolutions was to use my scraps . . .well, I made 8 thank you cards last night to send out to family/friends for Christmas gifts and I used ONLY scraps. Thought they turned out pretty good, although the pictures are not so good . . blurry this morning for some reason.

These were whipped out pretty quickly . . I did all 8 cards in about an hour, so, it's not my best work, but I was pretty thrilled to use up some blank card bases that I've had sitting around for 2 years and some scraps. I added little embellishments here and there to dress them up a little, but really kept them pretty simple. I used my SU Thank You stamp from Artfully Asian, so all of the cards have a little bit of the Asian feel to them (LOVE LOVE this stamp set!). And . . now I can send out our thank you's . . whew . . done for another year!

My Bellas!

Yeah . . my bellas came in the mail the other day and this is the first chance I've had to sit down and play with them! I was so excited to make something with them . . .these are my first attempts. I'll post more when I've got time to put more thought into them . . but these stamps are so cute! Let me know what you think. I had to use my stickles and some "bling" on all of them . . they just scream out for "bling", don't you think?

"Winobella"


"Cosmobella"


"Bubblebella"


If any of you want check out all of the fun bellas, the website is http://www.stampingbella.com/ They are just too much fun! Happy stamping!

Serendipity . . .

is the "Heart of Winter" constant campaign special for CTMH and it is sooooo much fun! I made these 3 cards today (2 of them were scraplifted from the CTMH bb) the other one is my own creation. If you want to order this paper/stamp set, please feel free to email me at jeanihill@tfon.com, but hurry, this campaign ends January 31, 2008!

This is the card I created:



These are the two I scraplifted from another CTMH consultant:

Another Silhouette card . . . somebody stop me!

Made this card the other day for a good friend who just had surgery. Had intended to submit this one but changed my mind.

Valentine's Day cards

Well, I've finally been able to make some time (steal some time is more like it!) to play around with some of my new products. Just got my Silhouette paper (Creative Basics) from CTMH and I LOVE LOVE LOVE this paper! It is so perfect for Valentine's Day cards. . .looks so nice with black and red! Here are a couple of cards I made this morning:

Thought Orchid Bouquet looked nice with the black on this one (scraplifted this one off the CTMH bb - thank you!!):

I really like the red glitter on the heart on this card . . . I love playing with glitter but it makes such a mess! Probably would have done the red rhinestones on the bottom corner differently, but I was trying to cover up an "oops"! Oh well . . it works, I guess!

I don't know if you can tell or not from the photo, but I embossed the hearts on this one and then tried stamping on our (CTMH) twill ribbon ~I really like how this one turned out. I think I might try this card again and use white embossing powder on the flourishes . . might make them stand out a little bit more.

Welcome Moe!

Tomorrow is my birthday and when I got home from work tonight my husband and my 2 boys had a surprise for me . . . Moe!! Our new little kitty! Isn't he sweet . . .





My 5 year old son has quickly bonded with Moe . . .playing with him ever since I walked in the door (and before that, I'm sure!).





So, welcome, Mosey, to our home. Hope you'll be happy here (and not traumatized by our 2 year old)!!

Scrap Happy in the New Year

One of my New Year's resolutions is to be more organized in my scrapbooking area and USE MY SCRAPS!! I sat up until 12:30 am (Happy New Year!) sorting out my scraps . . and as I was picking through tiny pieces of paper and trying to decide what to save and what to toss, I kept telling myself "this is insane, Jeani . . .throw them away!" . . .but I couldn't. You know how it is . . especially with sentiments . . you just need a small scrap of paper to stamp your sentiment on and then you need a small scrap to back it . . so, needless to say, I ended up keeping most of the scraps I had accumulated over the past year. But, I RESOLVE TO USE MY SCRAPS IN 2008! You heard it here first, now hold me to it!

So, my first card of the year (for my Dad's birthday) was made entirely of scraps (except for the card base which was leftover from a card class). I thought it turned out pretty good. It's hard to keep the manly cards simple . . I still had to add a little ribbon, but I think it works!