Watercolor Garden

It has been said that bad things happen in threes. I have witnessed this phenomenon myself, but wish to focus more on the good things that happen in threes or multiples of threes in my life. While I thought it over, I was amazed how much this silly little even, odd, round number makes itself known.

This rambling list of three-bies was compiled today while I was running, uh, 3 miles, which generally takes me 39 minutes, today took 37, and I'm working toward 36 by thanksgiving. Then 33 by Jan 1. I don't think a flat 30 is doable for me, but you never know.

-God is three forms: Father Son Holy Spirit
-Family of three: Andrea, Kent, Myself
-3 Fish in the tank seems to be all we can keep in harmony. The three kill anything else we put in there in about 3 days time.
-3 Bedroom house
-3 vehicles in the garage. one is a model year '99 (3x33)
-3 bicycles in the garage
-3 tshirts I usually wear a lot more than the others
-Daughter is one of 3 grandchildren on each side of my family
-3 Bats in my attic
-3 miles is my favorite distance to walk or run
-15 miles (3x5) is my favorite biking distance
-3 minutes is as long as I care to swim.
-3 major distance accomplishments this year: 13.1 mile Mini Marathon took over 3 hours and something to complete; a 10k (which is 3.1 miles twice!); and 100k (63ish miles) bike ride.
-3 colors dominate my home (green, mustard, red)
-3 hours is about how long I can go without computer access and not feel disconnected from the world
-3 minutes is about how long I can watch 'news' without getting irritated
-3 is the number of items I frequently group together on a wall or table.
-3 windows need new screens
-3 cordless phones
-3 pairs of athletic shoes (2 for running, 1 for biking)
-3 favorite sweatshirts
-3 times I will repeat myself when making a request. Then I get irritated.
-3 shots of espresso in my starbucks beverage.

The list had other things as well, but I can't seem to remember them right now. My 30 minutes of computer time checking my 3 main places I check 9 times per day is now up...33 minutes ago.

There's no point to this post except casual observation of life. What number or multiple of a number seems to dominate your life?

Edited to add:
3 cycles: the number my dryer takes to dry a load of laundry
300: the number of dollars I don't want to spend on a new dryer.

I just LOVE sketch challenges. This is another one of Beate Johns'.

Papers: Gray, Martha Stewart Woodland Christmas. I got a LOT of this on clearance last year so you'll see this paper often during the upcoming season.
Supplies: stitched thread with adhesive (another el cheapo clearance item from Big Lots!) gold ribbon, wax seal.
Stamps: The image on the wax seal was stamped with a snowflake and christmas circle from The Stamps of Life November set called Joy2Christmas. I just received the actual stamps in my hot little hands!! OHHH they are wonderful!!! I've been playing with the digital images as brushes in PSE 8.0 and I love the flexibility with sizing you get with digital, but nothing compares to stamps and ink in hand!!! You CANNOT put a digital image into a hot wax seal and get that result!

Dust maybe.
Maybe not.
The orbs were the first thing I saw when I pulled the picture up on the computer.
And the hairs on the back of my neck stood straight up.
Just sayin'

I made some time to play today.

Stamps: Joy2Christmas digital stamps from The {Stamps} of Life
Papers: Misc patterned papers and coordinating cardstock. I think this is some of my DCWV stash...but you could do this with any mix of pattern papers which you have lying around.
InK: HP from my printer colored with COPICS. Yes, it will smudge if I am not careful. But, it does ok for my purposes.
Other: Stickles, fibers, clear adhesive backed circle for that Orb-ie effect. We've been chatting about orbs the last few days so it fit that it was on the brain to add one around where the star of the tree would be.

I'll share the orb filled photo I took in a bit.

I've had three of the most exciting things happen in the last week....well, in terms of paper crafting that is...


One: Last Sunday I took the Copic Certification class with Sally Lynn MacDonald. I'm not ready to announce to the world that I know all there is to know about COPICS but I'm really hooked on these things and I'll be practicing my heart out! Thank you SALLY!!! It was a JOY to meet you!

Two: I won the October Sketch Challenge at Our Craft Lounge with THIS CARD and THIS CARD. I'm getting a free stampset of my choice from Our Craft Lounge. Incidentally, Our Craft Lounge is the company who Marianne from COPIC designs images for...

Third: I got an email today from The -{Stamps}- of Life by Stephanie Barnard that told me I had won the digistamp color challenge for October. THUD!!! Are you kidding me???? The folks in the produce department at my local Walmart probably think I'm really odd!!! I got that email via my Blackberry and couldn't wait to reply!
HERE is the blog post where my card is featured. From Stephanie I will be getting the next two months releases of her digital images at no charge...Whooooo HOOOO!!!

Lostie Friends: Remember all those stamps we bought el cheapo at that store where we thought we'd get kicked out from "See Ds" when we were at GET CRAFTY??? Well, as I understand, See Ds became or was bought by Inque Boutique after that and Stephanie was a vital element to Inque Boutique. Now her creative genius is heading up her own company and WOW!!!


Thank you so much to all of you. It seems crazy, but I'm just shocked and amazed. I'm just a stamper and papercrafter! I've been AWOL from papercrafting consistently for over a year. I got so overwhelmed with all the new stuff that I backed away from all of it, I went back to work, quit going back to work, focused on some other goals in my life, and now adding back in the creative balance that makes my life fun.

I'm trying to figure out who I am creatively right now, but if you ask my husband, he'll tell you I'm a happier person when I'm in my studio.

Thank You SALLY, Stephanie, and the crew at Our Craft Lounge! You've made my week!

I started saving these game pieces because I enter the codes in for My Coke Rewards points, which I then donate to our school.

Anyway, just thought I'd shout out that I need the following game pieces to win a prize.

Pennsylvania Ave(50K) Green
Tennessee Ave (5k) Orange
Meditteranean Ave (50.00) Purple
Ventnor ave(25k) Yellow

*******I will split the cash prizes with the first person to show me proof they have the properties******

Yep. Life is REAAAAALLLLLYYYYY exciting in Southern Indiana!

Additionally, if you want to send me coke rewards codes by all means I'd be happy to take those as well.

I lost my template art last week and ever since then I've been considering a redo...my main concern was I didn't want to set everything up again or lose things. So, I just used a generic plain white template.

It's ok for now. Its like a house, sometimes you just have to start with white walls and go from there...

If anyone can give me 'blog decor for dummies' help, please do...I don't know the first thing about this other than posting and its not on my top ten list of priorities at this point.


Happy Tuesday!

Of course, as I was cleaning things up late yesterday, I had a chance to go away from what I'd made, then come back. Mostly what I saw all day was gold, silver, white, bronze etc.

Upon another look , there's just a little tiny bit of rosy red every once in awhile throughout the paper scheme. So, my nice crisp clean album got all smudged up...typical of me...
So this is where I ended yesterday afternoon. Isn't that nice and simple?

I needed dates for pages so I printed some on white cardstock, cut them out with my Creative Memories Cutting System (an oldie but goodie must have!). I layered them on gold paper circles cut with the cricut. No. I don't have a single circle punch in my collection. I quit buying punches because they all hurt my hands.

I just bought Worn Lipstick Red Distress Ink so I sponged it all over the number circles. I adhered them back to back and varied their placements for a tabbed look.

In my inspiration box I had a stampset from See Ds called 'holly doodles' so I randomly stamped a few swirls here and there on some of the pages.











I swatted at a rather cute, large, buggy kind of person being silly across the counter....





And stamped and smudged up the cover a little more. That little splash of Worn Lipstick red really popped the areas where it ended up.

I've really really put it all away in the inspiration box now. That box will also serve as Christmas card central, if I choose to make them this year, and where I'll get extra stuff when its time to put pictures and other stuff in the album. I swear I won't mess with it anymore...until Ali inspires me again..which should be any minute.

One of my favorites in the paper industry is Ali Edwards. She is amazing, as I've said before. I am not much of a scrap booker because I get caught up in the 'I'm so behind, blah blah blah mentality. She has an easy, insightful approach that speaks to me.

Read about Ali's December Daily here.
While you are there, get to know Ali a bit. She's all about remembering the silly, meaningful little day to day stuff that makes up life. These details often get lost if you don't really set aside short times to recall them. I like her snapshots of just 'stuff'. She's also the word of the year girl...remember 'Simple'? I've tried to keep that. I really have. I know when things got crazy, I would just say 'simple' over and over and it helped.

Today was gather materials day for December Daily. I bought some Martha Stewart paper packs and coordinating stamps WICKED cheap on clearance at Chez Wallace last year post-holiday. (please don't ask what that is..just think on it a bit, k?). Knowing how much I enjoyed the December Daily last year, I wanted to be ready to get going when Ali started her coaching this year.

I gathered up the papers, and coordinating basics and put them in a bin. I know soon Ali is going to start having us put things together. It was a quiet day so I thought I'd get going. You can click on the picture to get a closer look.

Step 1: Cut 6x9 front and back cover from photo mat board which I got FREE from my photographer friend. Its even gold!!!
Step 2: Cut 6x9 sheets from double sided pattern paper, and a front and back acrylic cover
Step 3: Out of scraps from the 12x12 pattern paper I made some odd sized sheets to slip in during the 25 days in December if I needed them.
Step 4: I did the cover title from Grunge Paper. I just got it so it was out on my table. I cut out '25 days' with my cricut and dabbed some gold pigment ink all over it. Then I just sprinkled a bit of gold detail embossing powder in a couple spots, heated it up and stuck it on the acrylic cover.

The guts are done. I'm going to add some of Ali's daily photo overlays to it later on, and it will develop over the month of December on its own. Last year's got sooooooooo thick.

My local scrapbook storeasked me today if I'd ever seen or heard of this company Studio 490. I hadn't, so I looked them up when I got home. Wow...the gallery samples are wonderful! And the stamps are right up my alley.

Of course, I don't have any of these stamps but was inspired to try the style. Its not to much of a stretch for me as I love sponged/distressed edges. I cut out some flower shapes from my cricut out of note tablet backing (my version of Tim Holtz Grunge paper, lol)and went to sponging, etc.

The main flower image has about 6 layers of stuff on it, including some dye ink. I finally gave up on a cutesy design and painted over it with lumiere paint and it mixed with the blue dye ink for a nice, coordinating effect. Then I outlined the shape with a dark brown copic marker, added my own dots and curled the edges around my paper piercing tool. The inner flower piece is the backside of notepad cardboard stamped with a linen background stamp and outlined with the copic. The leaves are also cut with my cricut accent essentials cartridge and i drew in the veins myself.

Typical of me, a patterned paper background, some bling and a generic greeting from a punched tag. I've also started decorating the insides of my cards with some pattern paper scraps if it doesn't weigh it down too much. This will be a hand delivered card if I give it away. I won't pay USPS to crush this one!

I like the Studio 490 line a lot, but I remember now how labor intensive these kinds of designs can be. It was fun to put my own twist on the inspiration of the company.

My gaudy flory-ey fru fru disappeared.

Anyone know why? How?

How to fix???? I don't wanna mess up my blog and how it's set up...but its blahhhh...

I made a Thanksgiving card.

Digital Stamps: Stamps of Life, Thanks 2 Fall
Paper: Olive, Peach, Pumpkin & Fall paper of source unknown.
Other: Copics over HP ink, joanne's ribbon