Cards from the workshop last night!

 We had a fun workshop last night, making cards and scrapbook pages!  We used the Find Your Style stamp set, which is only available for a few more days! It's the January Stamp of the Month, and I really love it!  I promised to post the pictures of the cards, so here they are!

 The circle card above has a butterfly that looks like it just gently landed on the card! A couple of sparkles give it just a hint of bling!

 We used the stamp set from the Wings Workshop Kit to make the pink damask background for this card.  Adding a tiny pink bow to the shoe gives it a bit of dimension.

 And the third card is straight from the Inspirations catalog.  All 3 cards would be great for many different occasions, but will we be able to part with them?

Will Wings Work for a Boy Page Too?

 I've really enjoyed creating with the new Wings paper pack.  When I first got it, I looked at each patterned paper & wondered what pictures I could use with it.  It's a bit sophisticated & elegant, so I figured it would work mostly with girl pages (as most of the paper I am drawn to is).  But to my surprise, I thought it worked well with these portraits of Ryan at 18 months.  The burgundy chair that Ryan is sitting in worked great with the burgundy damask pattern in this paper pack.  I think it has a kind of old-world-library kind of feel to it.

The two page layout

Left hand page features buttons, photo turns, and ribbon from the black mini-medleys embellishment pack that comes with the Wings Workshop Kit.

I did some dry embossing on the black cardstock background and covered a chipbaord letter with cardstock.  I also like the big corduroy brads that come in that mini-medley pack.

The Sick Life....

When Ella started Kindgergarten in August, I wish I had started a sick calendar to record who was sick when & with what.  I don't know, maybe if I had the documentation it would be even more depressing to actually know for sure our ratio of sick days to healthy days!  I would have to say though, that there have been only a handful of days when all four of us have been healthy in the last 5 months!  Ella brings some bug home from school, passes it on to Ryan, who passes it on to me or Cean, who then have to take care of the other sick parent. That has been the pattern since the end of August, and the past few days have been no exception!

Ella is the sickest I have seen her - ever!  She's had a fever & the stomach flu, followed by an even higher fever accompanied by chills, sore throat, coughing, sneezing, runny nose, and an ear ache!  I feel so bad for her and hope that it passes as quickly as possible!  When I called her school to say she would be out sick today, I found out that half her class is out sick as well.  Ryan, who didn't even have time to get past his cold from late last week, has already caught this cold and has a runny nose & cough also!

So, now you know where I am this week and what I'll be doing :)

Lasagna in the Crock Pot?

I saw Jerry Seinfeld's wife, Jessica, on Oprah several weeks back.  She has a new cookbook about cooking quick & healthy meals for your family instead of ordering take-out or picking up fast-food.  Personally, I go through spurts where I cook a lot and then go through times where I'm just not in the mood to cook.  Despite my cooking ruts, I do tend to make good use of my Crock Pot.  I LOVE cooking in my Crock-Pot!  I have several "go-to" recipes and I would say I probably use it almost one a week, year round!  But when I saw Jessica Simpson making LASAGNA in a Crock-Pot, I was taken aback!  Can you really make lasagna with it?  How does it turn out?  How do you get the lasagna OUT of the Crock-Pot?

Well, let me say, it was just as good as a regular lasagna and it was quite a bit easier to prepare as well!  You still have to brown your sausage or ground beef on the stove top.  And if you choose, you could still make your own tomato sauce.  But I went super easy and used bottled spaghetti sauce.  The thing that really makes it easier is using those non-boil lasagna noodles.  Although, breaking them so that they fit into a circular pot was a bit of a challenge (good thing I love putting puzzles together!)

 The house smelled great as it cooked and the only thing that took a bit of getting used to:  a triangular pieces of lasagna on my plate instead of a square piece!  I will definitely be making this again!  Jessica's recipe can be found on Oprah's website (here).  Bon Appetit!

My Shelves "runneth over"!

 With all the great sales on Cricut Cartridges during November & December, I picked up several new cartridges and prompty outgrew my current space for storing them!  (Maybe I should start USING them more?)

 I found this nifty "double-wide" storage box online and got one to see if it would help.  The package says it will store 8 cartridges & keyboard overlays.  I like to store the booklets with my cartridges, so I found that the box only stored 4 cartridges along with their corresponding overlay & booklet.

So, I gained a little bit of space, and now I'm at full capacity on my shelves.  I've decided that if I want a new cartridge, I will have to choose which cartridge needs to go in order to make room :)

January Workshop Friday, 1/28

Just thought I'd post some info about my next workshop!  It will be on Friday, January 28th at 7:00 pm.  There is a choice of doing a 2 page scrapbook layout OR 3 cards.  We'll be using the new paper packet called "Wings" and the January Stamp of the Month stamp set to make very elegant butterflies.  Here are the pictures of the layout.  At the end of this post are more details on the workshop.

This page is actually the 2nd one, but somehow it showed up first! It fits 3 pictures sized at 4 x 4

The Wings Workshop Kit comes with black & white ribbon that you could use.  I used a plaid ribbon from my stash since I felt it matched my photos better (Ella is wearing a plaid skirt).  The half circle is a Dimensional Elements chipboard piece...

I used Dimensional Elements chipboard & sponged it with Juniper ink.  The butterflies were stamped using Juniper, Sweet Leaf, and then Black at the wing tips and around the edges.  The bling flourish I purchased at a scrapbook expo.

Had to bling up the butterfly with Sparkles!

Tone on tone stamping turns cardstock into a subtle patterned paper!

At the workshop you can make either the 2 page scrapbook layout, or make 3 cards.  In lieu of a supply fee you’ll need to order either the Wings Workshop Kit or the Wings Level 2 Paper Packet.  This will give you the paper you need for the workshop, plus you’ll have leftover materials for future projects.  If you’d like to come to the workshop without placing an order, the supply fee will be $10.  This option is only available for making cards.

Please RSVP for the workshop & to order any of the needed items.  Orders will need to be placed by January 18th in order to arrive in time.  *Please note:  There are 2 additional items on the layout above that you can bring if you have them, or purchase along with your paper if desired.  They are the Dimensional Elements chipboard circles and the Sparkles.

January Stamp of the Month Blog Hop!

Welcome to my first post for 2011!  I have set a personal goal for myself this year to finish up all those "almost done" projects that I've started and not quite completed.  So I'm hoping to post some of those completed projects here on my blog so I get an extra sense of accomplishment that way ;)

Now onto paper & stamps!!  I instantly fell in love with the January Stamp of the Month when I first laid eyes on it!  Along with the stamp, I used the new Wings paper to make the scrapbook page above.  I was really happy with the end result!  It may be hard to see in the little photo, but if you can double click on it and enlarge it, you'll see that I used the butterfly stamp and the word beautiful to add a subtle pattern to the green cardstock in the background.  This page is one of 2 that we'll be making at my workshop on January 28th.

Follow the Blog Hop HERE to what other paper crafters have created with this adorable stamp set pictured below.  Maybe you'll fall in love with it too!