Little Princess cards blog candy giveaway

Please head on over to "Little Princess cards blog", as she is having a blog candy giveaway over there...leave a little lovin' there too :)!

Inky Hugs,

Catherine

Fun at my parents cottage

My 3 children and I went down for 4 days to my parents cottage, which is about 3 hours away and sadly my dh couldn't come with. See the options were either:

a) he comes with us to the cottage and not come to my sisters wedding, which is a 7 hour ferry ride and 9 hour car trip later.

OR

b) he can come to my sisters wedding, and not goto the cottage with us!

So since I knew I would seriously need him at

my sisters wedding, I opted for him to stay home while we went to my parents cottage for the 4 days.

The first picture is of my dad holding my dd, as we first arrived and decided that we needed to go for a walk after our 3 hour car trip down to their cottage.

Here is E* at the playground, on the teeter totter which he just fell in LOVE with as soon as he saw it...even though

he hasn't been on one before and had to be on every single time we walked by the playground or saw the playground.

My dd and her new hairstyle :( *sniff, sniff* wearing the BEST rain suit from Mountian Equipment Co-op. You can let your child play in puddles, even sit in them and they will be BONE dry when you get them inside to change them. I LOVE THIS SUIT :)!

My dad with my dd on the adult swing set at the playground, the swings on this set are too high off the ground for the kids to sit on or to even try to get onto to swing. My dad really had fun with the kids I think...he was always busy with work and we hardly saw him. Since he had his heart attack almost 2 years ago, he has been able to spend more time with the

kids and he just retired :).

This is one side of the beach we are staying at, amazing isn't it even in the fog :)!

E* sitting on a bench along the shore :)!

E* and my dd M* sitting on the bench

together

"Common' Momma!" she's saying to me so I will hurry up to goto the playground to meet our friends there.

Finally, off to the playground...

My handsome oldest fella...not biased or anything :p!

that is it for now, don't want bore you with my 100 or so other photos of our trip to the cottage...

Inky Hugs,

Catherine

Hair crisis

See, I thought my children were in good hands with my dh while I went grocery shopping last Wednesday night...I had a shock of a life time when I got home. I got home, started unloading the groceries when my dh came out to tell me that something happened while I was out...thinking someone got hurt I asked what happened. He said no one got hurt, but that E* (our middle guy) wanted to see his sisters ears and from past pictures you knew that she had about shoulder length hair. Well, he called her out to see me...there she stood with a Mullet, if you don't know what a Mullet is it is a hairstyle that consists of short hair on the sides and long in the back! Then it hit me, SHE'S IN MY SISTER'S WEDDING PARTY IN 3 WEEKS...that is when I lost it...

Then I had to leave to get the rest of my groceries in, there were no words to describe how I felt...I couldn't believe what happened...and my dh and my middle guy were in serious trouble.

I told my dh that if a hairstylist couldn't fix her hair that he will be the flower girl and wear her dress!! He told me it is okay, that it will grow back in time and that the hairstylist could fix it...little does he know...

I called the hairstylist at a cool new children's/teen hair cutting place called Beaners, asked if they could help me out...but no one called me back. I went to bed so upset!

The next morning I dropped E* at school, took my oldest over to Julie's house for a playdate while I went to get the hair fixed.

As soon as we got there to Beaners, the hairstylist said oh boy did he ever do a job on her hair...I don't know if I can do much for you but let's see what can be done. We put M* up in a flashy pink ride on motorcycle chair, while the hairstylist took a lo

ok to see what she could do...then she says "wow he even did the back!" I looked at her, asked her to repeat herself because I could have sworn she said he did the back of her hair too...sadly that IS what she said. He took 1 chunk of 2 inches off the middle of the back of her hair, luckily it wasn't too far up the back of the head and all we had to do was bring the bottom of her hair up to match where he cut up to. The hairstylist said she could do her bangs, that the sides she couldn't do anything with...but on a good note at least Mullet's are all the rage, lol, I looked at her and said "On a two and a half year old?"

So now here is what we have to work with for my sister's wedding...and yes I do know that one pigtail is 2 inches shorter than the other one. We will have to figure something out, although I was looking forward to seeing my dh wear her dress and be a flower girl :p!

Here is my dd and her dress...this was a month before this hair trauma occured.

Inky Hugs,

Catherine

Who said you couldn't use Nature to self soothe??

Here is my middle guy, trying to self soothe himself by cramming as much as he can between 3 big boulders at the beach. Poor guy, felt a little over stimulated this weekend at my parents cottage I think and so he had a hard time with all the changes:

~daddy wasn't with us

~new place

~new people

~new smells

~new sounds

~new bed

~new food

Now on to more pictures for you to enjoy from our time at my parents cottage :).

Inky Hugs,

Catherine

Val's chalk project question

Question:

Do you have to put some sort of finish over it after to keep the chalk from smudging and if so what?

Answer:

What was suggested for us to use was a small quick spray of hairspray over your chalked image, yep you read it correctly :)! I did say hairspray, and no it doesn't seem to matter as to what brand...I was also told you could use a Matte finish spray on it too. Hope this helps :)!

Inky Hugs,

Alpha Beta Card Sorority gals crafty night out :p

Last night was our gals crafty night out, it was Val's turn and my turn to teach a class...sadly mine was a quick and easy and painless to do. I think it actually worked out because Val's project for us, was long :)!

Before we did our project with Val, she talked about the color wheel and how certain color's look really good together. How the color wheel works, that sort of thing but the BEST part of this project would have to be the fact that we got to use chalks to color in this stamped image. It is something I haven't done to this extent, but I have used chalks before but wasn't truly happy with how my projects turned out.

However, Val changed my mind about chalks last night and I am glad she did :D! Thanks Val :D

! Gorgeous project right??Head on over to her blog and check out what other amazing projects she has done, leave a little lovin' there too ;)!

I did do my project first, but had to wait for the pics to upload...so I decided to talk about Val's project first :p. I found this neat template online (can't remember where I got this one from, sorry), and thought it would be great f

or putting treats in on a door knob or you could let it hang on a wine bottle with treats in it too.

Here is theother angle of my project, so you can get a better idea of what it looks like :)!

Then once we finished our projects, cleaned up a bit and put our crafty stuff away we had AMAZING treats to eat provided by Yvonne and Julie. Yvonne made the BEST EVER oat cakes, and Julie made the most AMAZING pumpkin muffins with chocolate frosting in and on top of them. Thanks gals for the treats :)!

We also did our monthly card swap, this months card theme was to make a Christmas card. Forgot to take a picture of mine, but here is the card that I got from Kim...GORGEOUS card :).

Here is another angle of Kim's card, to give you a better idea of what this card looks like :)!

Inky Hugs,

Catherine

Autism Learning Felt blog giveaway

Over at the blog called "Autism Learning Felt" you can enter to win a weighted fleece or cotton blanket...apparently these blankets help calm children with Autism. Sounds neat, head on over to her blog and check it out...

Inky Hugs,

Catherine

La-La-Land Crafts new stamp store in town

Please, head on over to check out the new blog set up and the new stamp company called "La-La-Land Crafts", they also have a sneak peek as to one of their new stamps :)! On top of them being a new stamp company, they are also having a Blog Candy giveaway too, so hurry on over and check them out.

Inky Hugs,

Catherine

Lookie, lookie what I got in the mail thank you Tracy

Today, I went to check my mail and take a look what treat I found in my mailbox :)! I got this adorable card from Tracy H. , I opened up the card and look what fell out of it...these gorgeous flowers she made. Let me tell you it made my day :D! Thank you so much Tracy, can't wait to hoard them away...I mean use them. *tee hee ;P*

While I am on here posting about this card, I am

going to have to ask her if this is how the gold cardstock came or if she did something special to it.

Inky Hugs,

Catherine

what I have been upto....

1) Hurray our cousins are here to visit for almost a month, so here we are visiting with them over at Nana and Poppy's house where they are staying.

2) The first week they were here we went on hiking adventures and a picnic with Aunt Diane in Hemlock Ravine by the heart shaped pond.

Then we went to Aunt Diane's house for a tea, to admire her garden and to have a playdate...the fun we have at Aunt Diane's :)!

Here are some flowers from Aunt Diane's garden, you can't write a

blog post about her garden and not show you some of her flowers :).

3) That weekend we went to Aunt N

ancy's house for a pool party, with Nanny and Grandad...plus, several of the other cousins.

4) The next day after church, good friends of ours were home visiting for their daughters 2nd bday and we were invited over for a visit. This cutie pie is my husbands goddaughter.

5) This past Thursday morning, my friend watched my 2 kids while I took my middle guy to another appointment. Then we came back to the beach for an hour, so that E* could play with his friends for a bit.

6) That same afternoon we went to my Nephews 5th "SPACE" themed bday party. Here is a picture of my niece in her space suit :p!

Think that covers it for now, will be back later on today with crafty things :)!

Inky Hugs,

Catherine

Cool Space card for my Nephew

My Nephew Gideon turned 5 the other day, but we had a bday party with all his cousins and a few friends at Nana and Poppy's house. Anyways, the theme was "Space" and so I just HAD to create a really neat card for him...one that he could play with later too :)! So here is what I came up with, but I am thinking one needs a bit stronger magnets for it to really work.

So I stamped out, colored a rocket and then I used my glass finish stuff to make the rocket look cool and shiney. Then I attached a small round magnet to it using some glue, while I waited for it to dry I made the rest of the card. once I stamped out all the stars, I felt it needed a neat looking planet to sort of pop off the page like the rocket but still be stationary. I used dimensionals on the back of the planet, once I got it cut out and colored in :)! Now, once I got the card made, I added a second magnet to the inside of the card so that you can "slide" your rocket all over the card (carefully) so I didn't have to use a slider kind of card.

Here is a different angle of the card, so you can see how the planet and rocket sort of pop off the page...I am happy with how this card out and so was my nephew :)! Just have to find better magnets :p!

Inky Hugs,

Catherine

Win a EZ view desk top

Go on over to http://andreawalford.com/?p=2674 and check it out :)!

There’s several different ways to enter the draw to win the EZ View Desktop. The more options you choose the greater your chances of winning:

• Visit The Original Scrapbox website and choose your favorite product. Once you’ve done that come back here and leave a comment and tell me what your favorite is and why you would like this product.
• Post about this contest on your blog. In your blog post you need to post a photo of the EZ View Desktop by right clicking on the image and then selecting “Save As”, this will allow you to upload the photo on your blog post. You may use photos of the desktop from my blog or The Original Scrapbox. Feel free to copy and paste the information above into your blog. Please link back to my blog and also to The Original Scrapbox, and of course come back and leave me a comment in the comments section of this post with a link back to your blog post.
• You get 5 extra entries for each friend you refer who then posts about the contest on their blog. Just have your friend post an entry, come back here and leave me a comment with a link to your friend’s entry that says something like, “I told Becky about this contest and she posted it on her blog (include blog post link)”. This friend will also be entered into the contest according to contest rules.

Inky Hugs,

Catherine

Also, please mention that I sent you :D, and blog about it too!

You know you are addicted to Stamping when....

So, I was doing some Blurffing tonight and I came across Iheartart blog which had this posted on it...just had to share it with all of my crafty people who read my blog *am hoping I still have some readers :P*.

YOU KNOW YOU’RE ADDICTED TO STAMPING WHEN…

” you are eating your zuchinni, onion and pesto fritatta that you just made and thinking: *these colors are SO pretty, they would make really nice DP!!!* YIKES!!!”

“it’s a beautiful sunny hot day – and instead of going outside and enjoying the weather – you check out the daily challenge and run up to your stamping room to make a card!”

“you prefer buying stamping related stuff than clothes”- GUILTY as charged!

“You realize you no longer have a guest room, in fact it’s become a rubber room.”

“you are at the gym and take off your bra to put on your bathing suit and a PRIMA is stuck to your Bosom!!”

“There’s glitter in the washing machine.”

“You drive hours to go to a new craft store.”

“your ‘manicure’ consists of black ink, FabriTac and glitter.”

“you stalk the employees as they restock the stamping aisle.”

“you would rather give up Chocolate for Lent, than give up stamping.”- for all my fellow Catholics

when you “keep an envelope in your purse with cardstock color chips just in case you see a SS when you are traveling, or just going to Wal-Mart for groceries.”- I DO THIS ALL THE TIME

when “your husband sends you a link to a stamping blog that he ran across when doing research at work! What on earth was he researching!?!?!?!”

“Vacations are planned around class schedules at a stamp store two states away.”

“When going on vacation you scope out where all the local Scrap/Stamp store are and make hubby take you to each one.”

“You can’t invite friends over due to the embarrassment of all of your rubber room stuff overflowing into every room of your house.”

“When your boss asks you if you have an extra stamp in your purse and you don’t know why he would want one. But you ask “what kind” and he says “Um, a postage stamp” Oh yeah there are other kinds!”- In this case CHRIS would be “my boss”!

“you update your artwork blog more than your family blog!”- GUILTY

Enjoy!

Inky Hugs,

Catherine

Fiesty, Frugal, and Fabulous vinyl letter giveaway

Please head on over to the Fiesty, Frugal, and Fabulous blog and check out the vinyl wall lettering blog candy they have up for grabs ...they are just gorgeous :)!

Inky Hugs,

Catherine

Mojo Monday sketch challenge #95

Today, I decided that I had better get back at blogging here...or I will be flogged I think :p! Anyways, I decided to start with MojoMonday's sketch challenge and here is what I came up with...I used a new stamp set that I received as blog candy and it is a CTMH stamp set t

hat came with a kit called "Tickled Pink".

I stamped the image of the flower out, then I stamped it out again and yes I did cut out every single petal...then attached them using

dimensionals. I just love how this flower turned out :)!

Here is the side view of the card, so you can see how I cut out every petal of the flower and used the dimensionals on them. It made the flower look a lot better, then leaving it as a single layer :)! The patterned paper I used is by Cloud9Design, called Cinnamon Stick...beautiful paper that I picked up from Michaels.

Inky Hugs,

Gift for my brother and sister inlaw for their Bdays

I found this great wooden picture cube that can spin around at Michael's and thought that it would be a great bday give for my Brother and his wife for their Bday, I am also on a mission to find something else for them. I altered this cube, this isn't how it came...it came so you could alter it or leave it be I suppose.

I then found some gorgeous paper to use for the lid of the cube, and then found some other paper for the sides. Lol, then I realized that the sides were going to be a whole lot harder to do than I thought. Plus, I am a newbie at this altering other things...and am in serious need of a lesson or two from my local altering queen Julie.

So since the sides were harder to do than I thought, I thought I would make it easier :p! I got out my tole paints, then painted the sides of the photo cube...then I put a layer of "Hodge Podge" over what I had painted. Turned out really nice :)!

Inky Hugs,

Broken Flip flop story

*Sniff, Sniff*! The other night my dh came into our living room and asked me if we had any sandwhich meats down in our freezer, I told him not unless he bought some. I then told him that if he wanted me to go grocery shopping that I would go, not really actually wanting to go that night but I knew he needed meats for a sandwhich for work the next day. So, off I went child free (which is nice) to get groceries but then when I got into the van I realized I forgot my reusable grocery bags. I run back into the house and got them, see I am forever forgetting them and I didn't want to pay 5 cents for about 4-5 plastic bags.

I get there to the grocery store, all is well so far...I go inside and got about a cart full when trouble snuck up on me and nabbed my flip flop and broke it. Okay, so it wasn't actually trouble who broke my flip flop...it was the fact they were getting kind of old and I did know I needed a new pair. Now, I am stuck there with half an order of groceries with a broken strap of my flip flop (they sort of look like the one's above), and I don't have anything with me to fix it until I get home. So there I am walking funny to get the rest of my groceries, kind of like a slide/drag...nearly decided to take them off to do the rest in my bare feet but I thought they would kick me out. What would you do in my situation???

I then remembered about the cheap sandals one can get in the clothing section, I shuffle over to the aisle and found a great new pair for $4...so off I scooted awkwardly to the cash to pay for my order and to get the new pair of flip flops on my feet. I was kind of sad though about the pair that broke, because they were my favorite pair...

Will have some crafty things posted for you in the next couple of days, sorry I haven't been here posting as often as I would have liked to be but have been busy with taking my oldest son to DVBS. So will be back!

Inky Hugs,

Update

Just wanted to pop on by to give you an update on my middle guy, this is now week 2 on new dose of meds and it is AMAZING the changes we have seen in him over the past two weeks. I am so happ

y, and very exciting too :)!

To give you an idea of the kinds of changes I am talking about:

~He can tell us now without too much trouble what is bothering him

~He can ask for help if he needs help

~He is talking a whole lot more

~He is hasn't had as many meltdowns, and when he does have them he can calm himself down within minutes NOT hours

~He doesn't stim as much anymore either, only if his senses are overloaded or he is very upset

~He is more helpful (telling his sister who is 2 to use her big girl words or to listen to his words)

~He is telling us he loves us, without any prompting

The list just goes on and on of the good things that have been happening with him :)! There is something we didn't think was such a HUGE problem which has become more evident that he is on the meds. He is seriously lacking in the area of socialization, he is at about a 2-3 year old level we think! He has no idea how to act in public, what is appropriate to say, how to start/finish conversations, he doesn't really know how to ask other kids to play with him ( he will introduce himself, then tell them all about who is in his family and then by that point the kids have given him a weird look and run away). He doesn't understand why sometimes people don't want to talk to him or why they don't want to play...we are at the "why?" stage with him when it comes to socialization. He also doesn't know emotions, by that I mean he doesn't know how to read people's faces and tell you how they are feeling...or why they are feeling that way.

This just breaks my heart to see, but it means I have to create a program for him over the next week or two to help him learn all of these things and more. We also have to first figure out how he learns, he is a very visual learner and have used social stories for him but they don't work. The pictures have to be so simple with one to two words on it, then for some reason things click...but now here is the tricky part. How do you teach someone all the socialization skills they need when they are 5 years old by inch by inch pictures??

Inky Hugs,

Passion for ProMakers image by Ruth

I was looking over on the blog "Passion for ProMarkers" and I came across this beautiful image that I just HAD to make a card from, Ruth made this image and what an amazing job she did too. If you want to use this image, please go on over to the blog and get it from there don't take it from here and please give credit where it is due. so here is what I came up with using this image :)! The sentiment is a Unity stamp, and it says "Meditate.Live purely. Ben quiet. Do your work with mastery. Like the moon, come out from behind the clouds SHINE" by Buddha

Inky Hugs,