Friday, November 18, 2011

Baby Shower with the Cricut

Last Saturday we were able to Bless my daughter Katie and her husband Adam with a Baby Shower.  My daughter Danelle, Adam's mom Tina and I planned a baby shower with their baby room theme in mind.  The theme is Knights and Dragons.  Well, knights and dragons is just not a theme that you can find anywhere.  So, I got out my Cricut and my Paper Dolls Dress Up cartridge.  Silly me, I don't have a pic of the invites.  And to be honest, time got away from me and not everyone got one!!  Gotta love Facebook events!!  We had over 40 people at the shower and believe me, Bryar was blessed.   Here are a few pics from the shower.


For the Knights and Dragons theme I went with shields. We used all black and silver tablecloths, napkins, plates, etc.   I hung the banner with black and white twine and mini clothespins. 


I made a pile of mini shields and stamped each one with a B.


These cupcakes are so YUMMO!!  Who likes coffee????  Well, you all know that I do. 

1. I took a chocolate cake mix and replaced most of the water in the recipe with coffee and a some Kahlua coffee syrup. 
2. I then folded some of the Kahlua syrup into some cool whip and used a tip to put the cream into the center of the cupcake when it cooled. 
3. I made a chocolate buttercream frosting and added coffee to it.  
4. Sprinkle on some toffee Heath bits.
Overkill, nah!!


Wish I could say that I made that cool shield for Bryar's wall with my Cricut.  but no, my daughter Danelle had that made for him.  How cool is that?!!   Baby Bryar was gifted with so many fabulous gifts, so many fabulous handmade items, I was blown away.  This quilt was made by his great grandmother.


And a pic of both of my pregnant daughters.  I will be blessed with 2 more grandsons, bringing the count to 4 and 4.  We are so blessed. 


My daughter Danelle is my fabulous photographer, and here are a couple of my fave pregnancy photos of Katie and Adam. 


Isn't this T-shirt the greatest?  A gift from his mom. I love it!!


And there she is.  


Now, just a note:  I was so busy working on this shower that I skipped out on Guylou's Christmas with a Wreath Challenge this week.  You will want to head on over to the Challenge and check it out. I know she has some new images to play with. 





Friday, November 11, 2011

Anita Be Stampin Blog Hop and Release

It's Anita Be Stampin Digi Release and Blog Hop day.  Are you ready?  All of the new releases are now available over at the Anita Be Stampin Store.  We are celebrating by having a Blog Hop.  There is so much inspiration along the way, you will want to visit every blog to check it out.  One lucky person that comments on every blog will win the entire new release. How fun is that?  Now if you came here from Anita's fabulous blog then you are on the right track.  If not you will want to head back to the ABS Challenge Blog where all the fun starts.  Now time for my creations.  I played with two of the new images. The first one is Sandy Clause.  


And the second image is called Elfira. 


Both of these sentiments are from AmyR over at All That Scraps from last years Christmas sentiments.  


Thanks so much for stopping by today!  The next stop on the hop is Dee's Blog.   Remember to leave a comment on every blog on the hop by Sunday, Nov. 13th at 12:01 am CST for your chance to win all of the ABS digi images released today.  Here is the list of all of the stops on the hop today, just in case you get lost along the way:








Monday, November 7, 2011

Something other than a card!!

My hubby and I have been hitting the little auction on Friday nights.  One thing that I have been bidding on are pictures and frames. I have so many ideas in mind for them.  I have been wanting to make a chalk board for my kitchen wall.  This is what I came up with. 


As you can see I haven't hung it yet, but I wanted to share it!!  So, the question is.....should I add white paint to the frame and distress it?  Or leave it as is?  Want to see how it started?  Well of course you do!! I bought this picture for $5 at the auction.


I tried to rough up the glass using steel wool, next time I will use a fine sand paper.  Apparently the paint adheres better that way.  I cleaned the glass with rubbing alcohol and taped off the frame.  I used spray paint chalk.  And gave it about 3 coats.  After waiting at least 24 hours I cured the chalk board with chalk and then wiped it off.   Yesterday I bought chalk paint in the can, my friend Laurie says that is the way to go.  We will see!!!  

Sunday, November 6, 2011

It's Your Birthday

It's your birthday.  Starla, it's your birthday!! 
 Did you come by way of Gina's fabulous blog?  If not you will want to start back at Vicki's blog so you won't miss any of the hop.  Starla is having a bog hop to celebrate her birthday, her 1 year blogaversary, and her belated celebration of 100 followers to her blog.  She has asked a group of blogger buddies to join in the hop and help her celebrate.  I was happy to be asked and happy to hop along with Starla and this great group of crafters.  What Starla doesn't know is that Guylou has created a special image just for Starla.  Starla loves everything fairies and so she has requested that we all use a fairy image.  So happy birthday Starla, what's better than to have an image named after you. 


 Now you will want to check out the rest of the hop.  Your next stop along the way is Tracy's blog.   If you leave a comment on all the stops along the way I know that Starla has some great blog candy for the winners.  If you get lost along the way here are the participants. 


                      Brenda ~ you are here

Friday, November 4, 2011

Thankful with a Turkey Twist

The holiday season has began.  It seems though that Thanksgiving gets somewhat lost between the hoopla of Halloween and the commercialism of Christmas.   I love how Thanksgiving comes earlier in Canada.  It seems there is more time to reflect on what you are thankful for before jumping into Christmas.  Don't get me wrong, I love Christmas, but it is good for us to stop and be Thankful for what God has given us.  When you walk into stores and the Halloween candy and costumes is just one isle away from the Christmas decorations you wonder where Thanksgiving went.  I think we all need to take some time to be thankful for God's goodness.

 We are having a Thanksgiving Challenge over at Guylou's Inimitability with a turkey twist.  I used the image, Leah cooks a Turkey.


For this card I used some paper from my stash, the Happy Thanksgiving block is from The Cutting Cafe and the Taste and See stamp is from Layers of Color.  


I hope you will pop over to the Challenge Blog and check out all the fabulous inspiration from the Design Team.  You will have until 10:00 PM EST on Novemeber 17th to play along.  And don't forget to have a turkey somewhere on your project.

I am going to add this to the following challenges.
Dutch Dare Card Challenge has a Give Thanks theme.
Moving along with the Times has food as the challenge.
My Mums Craft Shop has with Thanks.

Wednesday, November 2, 2011

You is Kind

One of the best movies I have seen this year was The Help.  Loved that movie.  Regina over at The Cutting Cafe has brought us a cutting file with those words that really were just so inspiring.   You is Kind, You is Smart, You is Important.  Wow, if we could just teach all our children those things when they are young they would all be self confidant when they grow up!  I got my inspiration from a blogging buddy, Craftdee Donna.  She had found these little notebooks and altered them.  I found the same ones recently and used one for today's project.  We are featuring Large Circles over at The Cutting Cafe this week.


Well now of course, I used some My Mind's Eye paper, my lacy circle and regular circle nestie.  I inked it with some Tim Holtz walnut distress ink.


I used my cropadile to place eyelets for my brown dotted sheer ribbon to tie through.   That butterfly is from a set from Close To My Heart that I stamped with Stazon onto a piece of plastic packaging then cut it out. 


Now, my pen doesn't quite match. Before I give this away I will find a pen to match it.  


I am going to add this to the challenge over at Cooking it up with Katie it anything but a card. 

Tuesday, November 1, 2011

Anything Goes at Anita Be Stampin

It is time for another challenge over at Anita Be Stampin.  The challenge is the easiest of all challenges. It is an anything goes challenge.  For this weeks challenge I used an old favorite.  I used Rosie's Sweets.  Every time I use these stamps I just want to tell you how high quality they are.  I just love them!  And you get so many stamps in the package.  I pulled out some gorgeous papers from the My Mind's Eye Lost and Found Collection.  Of course my Copics and some seam binding.  


I also pulled out one of my favorite tried an true tools, the cropadile and put an eyelet on both sides of my front open card to pull the seam binding ribbon through.  


Sometimes you have such gorgeous papers that you just don't want to cover them up.  That being said, I really let the paper showcase this card.  Here are the Copics I used to color Rosie up.


You will want to head on over to Anita Be Stampin and check out my teamies creations.  While you are there you may want to scroll down and check out the Design Team Call Anita is having.  

This is today's second post so you might want to scroll down and check out the Challenge over at the Outlawz.