Busy Busy Busy

Gosh, things around our house have been keeping us hopping for the past week or so. I've had a few side jobs I've been working on and then I've been trying to complete a few personal projects as well.
So, here is one of my personal projects. Glen's cousin, her daughter and son live about an hour away from us and Claire occasionally sends us notes. During the summer, we're pen pals - because it's always nice to open the mailbox and have HAPPY MAIL! She is a doll. She makes us cards for holidays (yep, this is my crafty kid buddy!) Imagine our surprise when we got a note in the mail on Friday from her. She got ALL A's on her report card this semester, is playing soccer now and having a great time doing it. I thought this House Mouse stamp was perfectly sweet to make a card with and send to her with a note of how proud we are of her.
So, here's the final product.

House Mouse Stamp: Apple Delight
Cardstock: Packaged Pre-striped Red Card & Envie
Accent Cardstock: Black metallic swirl & Light Blue
Heart Buttons & Flower Ribbon from my stash
Tonight I'm working on one of the chipboard albums I was hired to do and then onto a Thinking of You card and 8 Easter cards for the kids. Need to get on the ball there and get those done and into the mail. :o) Sure hoping to make a bit of creative progress this week now that our Spring Cleaning is complete (even though Momma Nature threw us a curve ball last afternoon and gave us 2" of snow).
Thanks for stoppin' by today - Happy Craftin'!
Min

Life is Short - Eat Dessert First!

Thought I'd share a card I quickly put together last night for Ant's Birthday. I love the Fluffles stamps. I think this one is one of my favorites. :o) Papers are from my stash as well as a few birthday brads I had.
Happy Craftin'!
Min

Spring!

While the calendar says Spring is here, good ole' Mother Nature isn't really ready to let us have the weather and the flowers quite yet....so, I created a little bit of Spring with paper. Here's the final product of the Flower Chipboard album, hot off the studio table.

Materials Used:

Papers: We R Memory Keepers Papers - Nonsense Collection, White & Light Blue Cardstock

Cricut: Dreams Come True, Joys of The Season, Sports Mania, Storybook, Stretch Your Imagination, Walk In My Garden & Design Studio

Cuttlebug: D'Vine Swirl, Swiss Dots, Floral Screen, Textile

Prima - Got Flowers

Miscellaneous: Chestnut Roan Chalk Box, Orange Chalk Box, Googley Eyes, Buttons, My Favorite Things Stamp - Can ya Dig it stamp set "Love Grows", $1 G-Stamps, Stickles, Pop-dots for dimension, Raffia, Making Memories Copper Brads

Font: Computer Font printed & MCPT used w/Prism pencils

Thanks for stopping by and checking things out.

Happy Craftin'!

Min

HAPPY SPRING!

Now if only Mother Nature would hurry up and bring on the spring weather!!
In honor of today being the first day of spring, here's a quick photo of the cover of the Flower Chipboard album I've been working on. Not the greatest photo, it's much brighter and fun in person (I'll try to photograph with a white background when I take pics later), but you get the idea. Hopefully tomorrow between NCAA tourney games & cleaning/laundry I can get a few good photos of the entire album.

Paper is We R Memory Keepers, Nonsense collection, flower pot is Cricut WIMG, Circle is George, embossed with D'Vine Swirl Cuttlebug folder. Bloom Where U R Planted was computer generated, colored with Prisms & MCPT. Album has a total of 12 pages including front and back cover. Happy Spring - hope to have more photos tomorrow!

Happy Craftin! Min

Creative Chaos

Howdy All - I've been so bad blogging the last few days. Unfortunately, I don't have anything crafty to share today either - I've been working on a few jobs lately (Baby announcements for my 'cuz Teri who is having their first baby girl next week - YEAH! and several chipboard albums for hire and a class in April.)

Add to that, the SPRING CLEANING BUG that bit me last weekend (yep, I spent just about the entire weekend CLEANING!!!) and if I haven't told you about our new vacuum, you would understand WHY we have the Spring Cleaning Bug. We ended up getting a Riccar canister vacuum a few weekends ago and like Glen says, "It sure sucks". I say it'll suck the white off rice! Funny how this new vacuum is like having a new gaget or gizmo in your studio. Never thought I'd get this excited about a Vacuum.......In anycase, that pretty much sums up what's going on at The Kaymin Kantina!

However, I will share a photo from last summer - because we don't have kids, our cats are our kids. This was Tucker at 3 am the day Glen and I were leaving for Aruba. She'd attached herself to my carry-on (Yah, I know, hard to tell where the cat stops and the bags starts....).

I do hope to have something to show you in a few days. I'm also getting ready for my Entertaining at Home Party next weekend, so I have a few projects to get wrapped up for that as well. Looking to getting the girls together and welcoming SPRING!!

I hope everyone had a nice & safe St. Patty's Day yesterday and are finding creativity and happiness in the warmer weather as the flowers begin to bloom and the grass starts to get green again. Spring, here we come!

Happy Craftin'

Min

TGIF!!!

Boy, this week sure has taken its sweet ole time, hasn't it? I've been working on several projects lately - a few chipboard albums I was hired to do, a few cards that need making and a little knitting too! So, here's one of the cards that I put together. I'm really am trying to use stuff that's already in my stash.....so, thanks to the 365 Cards Blog Challenge "Just The Scraps", all the papers and the ribbon came from my stash basket. The image is thanks to Aprile who hosts the MCPT Challenge each month. This little cutie came in my happy mail envie from Aprile along with my little 'Go Green' Lizard.The next project, well, this is my 'watching tv' project. Since my studio is in our basement, I usually scrap down there when I'm doing laundry, for an hour or so each night when time permits and during crummy weather. I'm not much for just sitting and watching tv - my hands have to be doing something and that's where my knitting comes in. I have to thank my mom for getting me started knitting, gosh, 6 years ago. A family friend was a home ec teacher many years ago and she re-taught my mom to knit. When I saw the neat scarves my mom was knitting, I had to learn too! It's fun to have a hobby I can share with my mom. Every year for Christmas I always try to find her some fun yarn she can use throughout the year. Every year she always makes me a pair of hand knit socks. They are the best socks in the world (I'll have to take a pic of the pair she made me this year). Anyway, we try and take a knitting class together every so often. The last class we took, we learned to make the felted slippers. Okay, I digress. Anyway, a few summers ago, I was in the yarn shop and found this great beach/market bag pattern. The reason I like this pattern is that in the summer, the last thing you want to be knitting with is wool. These cotton market bags fill my knitting void made with 100% cotton yarn. The Pink & Orange one I made for myself has been to Long Boat Key Florida, Puerto Vallarta Mexico, Aruba and I'm sure will venture to many more beach locations. So, after all that blah blah blah :o), here are the three bags I've completed this week. Playtime, Beach Bag Blue and Key Lime Pie. Don't you just love the names? I love how these projects SCREAM Summer!!! You can get your very own resuable market/beach bag at my etsy store. Handmade, 100% cotton and boy do they stretch. These cute little fellas can easily fit 2 large beach towels, sunscreen and a book or magazine with room to spare.
Thanks for stopping by! Have a fabulous weekend & Happy Craftin'!
Min

Go Green!

I've been having so much fun with making cards lately using stamped images, I decided to participate in the March MCPT Challenge Aprile on the Cricut Message Board is hosting. So, this was the image for March. Isn't he cute?!

All paper is stuff I have in my stash. I used the cuttlebug floral screen embossing folder on the two green squares. Peeled Paint stickles on his dots. Used MCPT technique to color the image. Also inked card with ColorBox Chestnut Roan. Copper Brads Making Memories from my stash too.

These are two other cards I wrapped up this weekend too - of course we had to have at least one Bella! Both cards are made from stuff that's in my stash. This one is for a friend of mine. Isn't it cool?

Stamp is Craftabella - printed paper & green paper is We R Memory Keepers. Cardstock is WorldWin. Diamon stickes used to highlight image. MCPT technique also used. Cuttlebugged the green with D'Vine Swirl folder. Inked with Chestnut Roan Color Box ink. Ribbon is from my stash - was from Michael's a few years ago. Added a little bling too in the corners.

This is the card I made for my mom and dad's anniversary. Flowers are $1 G-stamps, stamped in Dew Drop Turquoise. Blue paper is Stampin' Up, can't remember the color name. Silver crinkly paper is something I've had for a while. Ribbon in from Joann's. Flower centers and leaves are stickled with Aqua and Diamond. Other Bling is from Michael's - their generic rinestones. Used the MS punch for the bottom. Inside has Happy Anniversary stamped on punched blue CS.

Happy Weekend - hope it was a good one for you!

Min

Weekend Catch-up

So because it was so darn cold again this weekend, we pretty much stayed inside. So, in between loads of laundry and other odds & ends, I was able to get a few LO's for our album done and some cards too!

Here are a few of the LO's I did - All were challenges that were posted over at Scrap Friendzy - if you need some inspiration or just want a challenge - this is the place to go. These girls have the best challenges!! This was one I finished on Thursday or Friday, but just hadn't had a chance to photograph it and post it. The challenge was to use US in the title somewhere. My girlfriend Susan got married this past summer and her photographer took a great photo of Glen and I dancing. It was a perfect fit! The colors are the color scheme she used for her wedding. Green Printed paper is Heidi Swapp. Flowers & Leaves are new Primas I found a few weeks ago at Michaels. The lace is actually the lace I used in her shadow box and had just enough left over for this LO. Talk about planning!! Swirls were cricut cut - I think from Calligraphy as was the "US". Scalloped punch was the MS punch. Brad in the center of the flower is from a brad pack I had. Lace has also been since fixed, just hadn't taken a new photo. For some reason adhesive just doesn't like this lace.

This challenge was to use at least 10 hearts on a LO. This layout was from our First Anniversary, a very laid back day in comparison to our Black Out Wedding Day.

The paper and stamps are Little Yellow Bicycle. The hearts are Heidi Swapp Ghose hearts backed with LYB paper scraps. White mesh was something I had in my scrappy bin. Journaling is behind the photo of the beautiful roses Glen got for me. And yes, the third photo in the layout is Glen and Tucker napping. It was the perfect day for that as had full tummies after a fabulous dinner and with the rain falling outside, a nap was a given.

This was also a challenge - it was to use bright colors, scallops, ribbon and staples. The page is actually much brighter in person......A photo from our Honeymoon. The scallops were designed in DS (Plantin Schoolbook cart) and cut from Archivers exclusive paper from this past summer. Page Title was welded in DS and cut with OA, the upright feature. Pink, Orange & Green paper is Coredinations paper. Calypso primas, orange ribbon from my stash. D'Vine Swirl Cuttlebug embossing. Brads & staples were from my stash. Journaling is behind the photo.

This was a color challenge--Use Red, Yellow and Blue. A perfect fit for the photos we took the other night. Scallop was from AE and welded in DS. Boxing Legend was Base Camp and also welded in DS. Papers are standard Cardstock from my stash. Photos are triple matted. The bling in the corners of the photos and on the title were little 'be-be' like embellies I picked up from Michael's some time ago. Journaling is behind the top photo.

And last but not least, a celebration of our First Married winter! This was a sketch challenge. All papers are from Reminiscence and were sparkly & glitterly all on their own. Title is cut from Opposites Attract in sparkly white using the opposite feature. The title was also shadowed. The Snowflake O in Snow was from Accent Essentials, modifed a bit with DS. Other snowflakes were sizzix cut snowflakes with a silver metal brad like embellie over them. Brads are from my stash as well. Page title includes a little bling you can't really see, but boy is it there. I tried photographing this one with a flash, but there was so much bling and glitter that you couldn't really see the LO. Journaling for this one is also behind the photos. So, that's it, productivity from the weekend - I'm really trying to get 'caught-up'. This was certainly a good start for me. Thanks for stopping by today to take a look!
Happy Craftin'!
Min