A Tribute

It's been thirteen days now since my mom unexpectedly passed away in her sleep on July 6.  I knew I counted on her, relied on her advice and wisdom, appreciated the selfless, generous things she did for me... I called her all the time for the most mundane things- like paint color and ant problems and especially parenting, but she didn't mind and had such a knack for common sense (that not everyone has I must say!)... but I didn't realize I banked on her always being here.  The morning my dad called at 6am it was the last thing I expected to hear- I didn't even seem to be a joke, just NOT POSSIBLE. 

I'm here at their house in Michigan now, helping my dad in any way I can (which is helping me too) and it still doesn't seem real.  But, my faith is stronger than I realized and I am comforted by all the things my mom loved:  family & friends, sunshine, gentle breezes, ripples on the water, birds at her feeders and the gorgeous blooms in her flower beds. 

Please, for me, take a moment to figure out who your rock(s) is/are in your family and hug them tight, express your love and appreciate evey moment.  I'm so very fortunate to have had the mom that I did and to be left with so many memories and no regrets, no words unspoken, no gesture unappreciated. 

Rest in peace mom. 
~Kristin

Cute story and a card

I have a cute story, I think, that I thought I'd share. I don't believe I have mentioned it but I had noticed about 1-2 months ago that I was missing my two favorite embossing folders. The Manhattan Flower and the Elegant Bouquet. At first I didn't really look much because I assumed they'd turn up. Then I started looking harder and harder and couldn't find them anywhere. I was nearly sick worrying that I'd accidentally thrown them away.

Anyway, fast forward to this week during one of the many snow days we had where my kids were cooped up at home. Well on this fine day they were actually playing nicely together and not bickering- so when my DD came to me all official-like saying she was a private detective for her brother (the boss- of course!) and she wondered if I had a case for her I happily played along. I couldn't think of anything that needed investigating so she said "what about those things that are missing?" So I gave her details about the last place I saw them, how long they'd been missing etc which she dutifully recorded in her little hand-held notebook her brother provided her (along with the walky talky she had clipped on her waistband) and off she went.

Well lo and behold, didn't she just find those stinkin' things after about 5 minutes on the case! I kid you not- they were right in the basket I keep next to my Big Shot which I swear I had checked not once but twice while looking for them! WOO HOO! I was so excited that I swore the next card I made would utilize at least one of them. Well, here it is.

So that leads me to this card. I like how it turned out- don't think I've ever embossed a Top Note before. But it isn't an over-the-top WOW for me. Not sure why. I think the colors and use of brads are casual, but the glitter is a bit too much maybe. I kind of wish I would've left it off and maybe just distressed those edges for a softer, warmer look. Maybe next time. I do love the brads though!

So thanks for stopping by and for bearing with my story above!

~Kristin

SUO Supplies

Stamps: Well Scripted

Colors: Barely Banana, Kraft, Chocolate Chip

Accessories: Big Shot, Elegant Bouquet Textured Impressions embossing folder, Barely Banana Brads, Top Not die, wide vanilla organdy ribbon, Dazzling Diamonds

Snow Much Fun!

Sorry I've been a little unreliable lately. I've been snowed in with family, getting house stuff done, and scrapbooking some- all of which are keeping me from making cards as much. So, for this post I have a variety of things to show you. A card my 8 year-old daughter made, a scrapbook layout I completed recently and finally some snow pictures. We got approximately 12-18 inches over the weekend (hard to tell exactly how much with the strong winds that piled up major drifts!) and are expecting 8-10 more inches today and tomorrow. We've probably gotten 4 more already today. It is just beautiful!
So here's the card my daughter made. The other night while I was making my CAS card she decided to make something of her own, but worked really hard to not interrupt me since I was out of MOJO and almost out of time (translate that to me low on patience!). She picked the colors and layout, stamps and even cut the butterflies all by herself. The ONLY thing I did was tie the ribbon and give her the correct "sandwhich" for the Big Shot. I'm so proud of her and she was proud of herself!

Here is a 12x12 layout I did of my son winning the championship in Biddy Wrestling when he was five. He even said it was OK to put his actual metal on the page (although I was strictly forbidden from cutting the ribbon so it would not add bulk to the album.) This layout, the paper and stickers and chipboard, all came from a kit I bought in scrapbook store at some point. I liked the colors and sports theme, but am disappointed in the quality and the fact that there is only one of each piece of patterned paper. Makes me appreciate SU's Simply Scrappin' Kits even more! Here are closeups of the individual pages.

And finally, a couple of snow pictures from our beautiful Ohio weather! My hubby is a kid himself and always helps the kids make a snowcave in the biggest drift they can find. This time it happend to be right off our back deck. They made it big enough for all four of us to easily lay down inside- complete with a ledge built in next to each person to stow our beverages!

Here was the view out my front door yesterday morning! It was a beautiful drive taking the kids to school- albeit only 4 degrees!
Have a great day! Stay warm and thanks for stopping by!

~Kristin

Phew!

Wow, I haven't been here since Thursday and my hits are showing it. LOL! Sorry for the long delay. It's been a weekend let me tell ya! Long story short we had a very near tragedy with our puppy; my DH's football team won their first football playoff game!; and my sister let us know she is expecting! WOOHOO! I can expand on these after the real reason you came here, a creative fix, but for now here's what I've got. The colder it gets the more I get motivated to scrapbook, so here is the layout I did this weekend.

This layout is a sketch from Lyssa's blog: Song of My Heart Stampers. I loved this sketch and was excited to use it, even though it meant serious cropping of some great photos... but what better way to focus on the really important feature of a picture?! For this one I used some parts of a new-to-me Simply Scrappin' kit that I've been so anxious to use- Hoppy Memories. This kit is retired but I can honestly say that all SU Simply Scrappin' kits are AMAZING!! I'll have to count someday but I am willing to bet I have at least 20 differnt SS kits!

This is the second half of the spread which is why it has no title. This sketch is from a challenge on SCS back in May. You see, there is this awesome gal on Splitcoast who hosts a weekly Scrapbook sketch challenge. She has a huge gallery of wonderful scrapbook sketches, so when I need one I just head over there and scroll through until I find something that would work with the pictures I've got. This is an amazing resource! CLICK HERE to view this gallery.
The specific one I used is the right side of this one. This side of my layout is a little lacking on detail but the colors are pretty bold and I thought I'd better leave well enough alone.

So about my puppy... oh my! This sweet little face is only 3 months old and she is a little Houdini! She has managed to get herself into and out of some tight spots... until Friday. I went out to our kennel to feed her (and the other 3 dogs) and when I open the door to the building she was hanging by her hind haunches caught in the wire fencing that is supposed to keep her in! It appeared she might have been like that all night!

OMG, it was the most horrible site- her front legs couldn't touch the ground, her back legs couldn't touch she was wedged so tight she was cut in numerous places. The worst part was her little tail wagging as soon as she saw me and I had to leave her to run for help and wire cutters! I felt terrible. Anyway, when my kids and I finally got her out her back legs were so grotesquely swollen she couldn't move. I wish now I'd taken pictures, but at the time I thought she wasn't going to survive and I really didn't want to have those horrible images. She slept the entire day and night after we took her in the warm house and lo and behold, early the next morning she was up walking around! By the afternoon she was running, albeit limping, all around our property. Today she was romping and wrestling with her sister and mama! My poor kids- we prepared them for the worst- but they were so thrilled to see her moving my son said "either this is a miracle or she is one tough dog!" He wanted to change her name from Crystal Ann (long story) to Miracle. I told him if her name gets changed her new name will be "Stupid"!

This dog has already been into mouse poison at about a month old (because she escaped), and today she cut her mouth while playing somehow and she swallowed a squirrel tail that was tied to a string so the string was hanging out of her mouth while she was running. I had to pull it out and let me tell you it was disgusting! Who knows what that would've done had she swallowed the entire string. Isn't she a cutie though?

As for the other news, yes football season will be at least one more week long (go Cats!)... and while my parents and sister were visiting this weekend my sister gets a call from her husband who wants to talk to my son. They talk a while and when they hang up my son says "Mom, I think Uncle R just told me that our cousin is going to have a baby brother or sister." And I say "what do you mean you think? Is she or isn't she???" Now he's confused and not so sure. Well, sure enough, that's how we found out they are expecting baby number 2! WOOHOO! We're so excited for them! I told my sister I hope she has a boy so she can experience first hand just how different they are-having a boy is a whole different world.

So if you read this far (wow, you deserve an award!) now you know why I've been away and hopefully this makes up for the last few days of nothing!

Thanks so much for visiting,

~Kristin

PS- My supplies are SUO (Stampin' Up! Only) as always, but I'm just too tired to type them out. If you have any questions just let me know.

Who doesn't love a good puppy picture??

Since I've been working on something special with an Aug. 30th deadline I decided to share something else with you. Here are 9 other reasons I've been so busy lately!

Stop by again, I'll be sure to have something stamp related posted! Have a great day,
~Kristin

Phew!!

What a weekend! I'm afraid I have no stamping for you right now (maybe later this morning) but I did promise I'd show one First Communion picture from this weekend. We had a wonderful weekend- full of family, friends, fun and food! We enjoyed beautiful weather and even had a belated Easter egg hunt on Sunday and a walk in the rain through a nature preserve close to home. Everything was so nice and we are so grateful to our loving families who shared this special day with us!

I'm exhausted! My house is a wreck and I have a class to prepare for (this Thursday if you are interested please let me know ASAP!).

I hope you had a wonderful weekend as well! Thanks for stopping by... I have a much slower week (I hope) so I will surely be posting a bit more regularly once I get back in the swing of things!

~Kristin

Valentine's Projects

Since I'm busily working on swaps today I thought I'd post my kids' Valentines they did this year.

I didn't have enough of the small cello bags or they would have both made the same thing. Those bags with toppers were much easier, I must say! My daughter could've done them by herself but I did the Big Shot work and the stamping. She put them together. She really wanted to color something so below you'll notice that she put the skunk from Pun Fun in each one as well, with her name on it. They say "I stink you're sweet".

The pillowboxes were tougher. My son didn't like trying to fold them on the score marks, so I did that plus I tried to just use glue and double sided tape to close them for efficiency, but they were not sticking well. He put the M&M's in them and made the tags, but that's about it. Stinker!

They did each make their own Valentine's Boxes this year. They both wanted Robots so out came the foil and paper punches.

A New Dress

This weekend we spent the night in Columbus at a hotel where my husband had been for a Coaching Clinic. Yesterday before we left to come home we spent the day shopping at two of the big local malls. While I wasn't wildly successful looking for some updates to my own wardrobe, my daughter WAS!

Our first priority was to pick a dress for her upcoming First Communion that would double as a flower girl dress in May. SUCCESS! For the wedding she was told to get a dress from the expensive Strassburg Children's store- so I'm very glad we can use it in April for her First Communion and get 2 uses out of it! Feels better considering the money those dresses cost! We were told to get cotton so she had three choices. I let her choose knowing that if she wasn't happy with it there may be last minute tears or worse at either of these events (if you have a little girl who is at all particular you'll know what I mean!).

Anyway, this is the dress she chose. It is very plain and simple, and not my first choice, but it also doesn't flair out at the waist which is why she loved it. The other two did and were a NO from the beginning (although, I must give her credit- she was concerned with what I thought and is always so considerate that I could've talked her into my first choice if I really wanted to!).

In her mind, the best news of all is that she finally got her ears pierced! She's been asking for a long time and had a deal with her dad that she'd get them done when she could quit biting her fingernails. It probably took a year, but she has QUIT! I must say, I wish someone would've convinced me to quit that young (I was probably 25 before I stopped!).

So to bore you a little longer, here are a few pictures of her in her new dress!

My Father-in-Law- a legend!

I mentioned on my last post some family news that was exciting. I don't have my card ready yet so I thought I'd just share this quickly.

On Monday we had the honor of being invited to the Wilson Football Factory where all the NFL and Super Bowl balls are made. (Oh my gosh, I just found this video.) This factory is in Ada, Ohio and my Father in law worked there for 44 years! He was an excellent employee, showing dedication and an amazing work ethic, and so was honored by having the street in front of the factory renamed to Charles Moore Turn. The word "turn" was chosen because the position he maintained for the entire 44 years was that of a "turner" which is the most physically demanding job in the entire process!

On Monday we enjoyed lunch at Wilson, a press conference with at least 6 TV news cameras, a tour of the factory for the family and cake! The Mayor of Ada also declared Jan. 19th to be from now on called Charles Moore Day! Here are a few photos of the exciting day: first is Charles with the plant manager, a big dog from Wilson and a representative from the NFL. Second picture is of three of the grandsons holding the new street sign in front of the new Super Bowl balls, next is my family, then my FIL holding one of the SuperBowl balls, and my daughter in front of a bin of Super Bowl balls.

Here is the local newspaper's story (photos aren't working apparently, but they used the first one below that I took- does that make me famous??). Here is another story I've found.

All in all, it was a memorable day!

Stop back, I'll have a card in a little bit!

~Kristin

First day back to school!

So today is my kids' first day back to school. They were so excited! They are always ready to go back, even if we are starting 2 weeks earlier this year! I was happy for them- they are lucky to enjoy it so much and be good learners. They picked their own outfits out so I kept my mouth shut, and just took pictures. They both insisted on wearing their new tennis shoes since they are forbidden to wear them prior to the first day!

Now that they are back, and mama's got some extra free time, I plan to do more stamping! In fact, I've already started. So here's a card I made for this week's color challenge over on SCS (CC179) to use Old Olive, Elegant Eggplant and Taken with Teal. Yes I know it didn't say anything about using Kiwi Kiss also, but I just couldn't resist. It's an illness I tell ya! It just happened to be on my desk and looked so darn good with these colors that it begged me to use it. :) Anyway, as I mentioned on my upload to SCS, I am an asymetrical person (take that however you want) so to make a symetrical card never comes naturally to me. However, I really like them when I do. This one in particular reminds me of a fellow GSG gal, Becky Carafa. Her style is very clean and simple and just easy on the eye.

Anyway, I did end up putting the Styled Silver ribbon slide on there, off-centered of course, but overall it is still a symetrical card I feel. The angle of my photo doesn't show it much, but the butterfly and the label punch behind it are both raised on pop dots, as well as the main panel. Also, the background olive piece is stamped with the Stitched background in Taken with Teal. So, hope you like it. I'll be back with more tomorrow!

Stampin' Up! Supplies
Stamps: Flight of the Butterfly, Stitched
Paper: Old Olive, Taken with Teal, Kiwi Kiss, Whisper White, Elegant Eggplant
Ink: Taken with Teal, Elegant Eggplant
Accessories: Eggplant grosgrain, Styled Silver Hodgepodge, label punch, dimensionals

Has it been a WEEK already?!?

Well, you know my excuse- too busy! Our final baseball game is tonight (tournament finals) and then we'll be going camping nearly all next week so I can't say things will get much better around here (SORRY!). I did, however, complete a scrapbook page last night, just one, after our ball game got rained out. I am starting a brand new album for my son since his last one is totally full and I was at the end of a year. This is the first page in his next album. Unfortunately, the pictures weren't all that great (pretty crummy in fact) so I came up with a way to still save the memory for him but not focus on a bunch of dark blurry pictures: A Pocket!

The bottom half of the page is a pocket with a handful of the best crummy pictures I could find all matted and labeled with a tab. The paper is something old from my stash (and I mean OLD!) and there is absolutely NO STAMPING on this page- a rarity for me! All the solid cardstock is from SU as well as the black brads everywhere and the tab and star punches. By the way, the pocket idea is a hit with my kids. They've both been really interested in checking out this page today!! I guess interactive pages are where it's at!

The journaling is on a pennant that I made to replicate the look from the patterned paper, and it says "Just for fun in the winter we like to have our very own Family Fun Night! We play hot potato, follow-the-leader, basketball etc. No wonder you 2 think it's dad's gym!"