My First Chipboard Album

Hello all. I hope that you had a blessed Christmas and New Year. Like most of you, I took a break from blogging over the holidays. There was so much going on and while I was working on many craft projects (one I will show you today, one I can't show you until the intended recipient get their package), I just didn't have time for everything and editing pictures and posting to the blog just had to take a back seat to everything else.

But now the holidays are over and I am confined to the couch because I did something to my neck and shoulders so I cant move around very much... Not the greatest of things to happen, but hey, it gave me a perfect excuse to work on getting some pictures edited and some blog entries posted!

This Christmas, I wanted to make as many Christmas gifts as I could, but to be honest, my husband and I were away for the first week in December on a missions trip to the Dominican Republic, and then I spent an entire week making all of my Christmas cards so I got a bit of a late start to the gifts. In the end I made a gift for my sister (the mixed media canvas I shared earlier), a gift for my grandma, some small gifts for my little 4 year old cousin, and a gift for another cousin and I gave something to my mom that I had made quite a while ago - just a small part of her overall gift. Today I am going to be sharing what I made for my grandmother. 

My grandma loves handmade gifts and she loves photos of her family, so I thought I would try my hand at making my first chipboard mini-album. This was a holiday for branching out of my comfort zone!

Anyhow, I used a number of Cosmo Cricket papers that I received from my sweet cousin Christy, over at Christy Gets Crafty, as well as some lace and burlap flowers, some recollections brads and gems, as well as Q&Co gems and pearls. Other papers I used came from a blog giveaway - I don't know where they came from. I also used some paper doilies from the dollar store and paper flowers from Michaels - Calypson Tin flowers and Recollections flowers.

I would definitely make one of these again - however, I would NOT ever use scalloped edges again! They are a pain in the neck. I think I spent more time cutting down patterned paper than any other part of the album... but otherwise I enjoyed making the album - my apologies to my relatives for Facebook-stalking you to find enough pictures to go in the album. :)

First Mixed Media Attempt

Hello all. This morning I thought I would share a quick picture of my first mixed media attempt. This is a Christmas present for my sister. I used a canvas from Hobby Lobby, DIY Modge Podge, Paper scraps, a few cardstock embellishments, and brown, baby blue, gold, and white acryllic paint. I used a foam paintbrush to adhere the paper and cardstock to the canvas and then a 1 inch paint brush for the paint. I also used some napkins/papertowels to give the paint some texture. I still need to paint the sides to finish it off so my sister can hang it up, but I was pretty pleased with my first attempt. I'm working on a second one for her new home as well.

And Finally.......

A bit about our Dominican trip. Sorry it has taken me so long to get this up, but this month has been incredibly crazy!

We had a wonderful time in the Dominican. We stayed with the primary translator for the Bible Institute classes and his family. It was really wonderful being able to spend some time in fellowship with them and were so blessed to find out they both spoke English! So I was able to spend some nice time with the wife. They have a live in helper who made THE BEST food ever. I am pretty sure I gained 5 pounds just in the 3.5 days we were with them! They have this awesome way of making oatmeal (they add All Spice) that made it taste like no oatmeal I'd ever had....Actually, all of her food was delicious and hubby was very proud of me. I tried many things I had never had while I was there. :)

On Thursday two brothers from the church drove us to the resort we would be taking a short stay to rest. We had a gorgeous room with an awesome view though, and it was all-inclusive so all of the meals were included in the cost of the room, so that was nice. I spent several hours out on our balcony in the sun reading and enjoying the warmth.

There was a bit of excitement when I slipped getting in to the hot tub out on our deck at the resort - thank goodness hubby caught me just before my tailbone slammed in to the concrete. I wrenched my ankle and we thought I had broken my toe - almost the entire top of my toe and the knuckle turned this deep purple.... the next day we spent a bit of time in the ocean though and the salt water seemed to help the swelling and bruise dissipate much more quickly than I expected. It's still sore but thankfully no break! And I contracted a weird virus that made me spike a fever between 100 and 101 and get those shaking chills every night for about 6 straight nights (two or three in the Dominican and then probably 4 more days once we got home). Thankfully, I have been on the mend for the last week or so. I still am really drained of energy but the fever, sore throat and chills are gone, PTL!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas...

Okay, so I am a little late to the sharing our Christmas decorations... December has been a busy month for us, we were gone for the first week on a mission's trip (which I still need to post pictures of, Sorry!), so we didn't put the tree up until a week after we got back. I'm still in the process of putting together our table for New Years Dinner (that will be when we celebrate Christmas with my parents and some other family), but I thought I would share some of what we had put together. I try to keep everything with a similar look and feel and color scheme because we live in an apartment and everything is so close together, that I don't want it to clash. Anyhoo, here's our home (or at least what I'm going to share with you - there are certain rooms that will not be seen by anybody until I get to cleaning them out....) :)

I still need to take pictures of our tree... as soon as our living room is fit to be seen, I'll do that. :)

Hope you enjoyed a little look into our home. :)

Border Punches Product Review

I like border punches. I think that they add an extra finished touch to cards. What I don't like is how expensive they are. With that said - you definitely get what you pay for when it comes to buying cheaper versions versus the more expensive brands.

Two Christmas's ago, I requested a Fiskars notebook border punch for Christmas from my hubby. It has been very easy to use. It doesn't have a plastic cover over the bottom to catch the punched paper, but I've realized that I don't really like that plastic piece there. You have to empty it after each other punch before the space gets too filled to be able to continue punching, which can get time consuming, especially when you are trying to do multiple cards at once. All in all, I have really liked the way the Fiskars border punches are built.

Then, a little over a year ago, my MIL bought me a recollections border punch. I was excited, because I only had one at that point. However, I was only able to get about a month of use out of it before the springs on one side of  the punch popped out of allignment and the punch got jammed. My hubby tried to "un-jam" it, but broke the plastic lever in the process. Then during a black Friday sale at Michaels this year, I tried another one, got about 1 week of use out of it this time and had the exact thing happen. I haven't tried to "un-jam" it though, because I am hoping to take it back to Michaels with the receipt and get a refund.  Ultimately, they are a few dollars cheaper than the Fiskars brand, but much more awkwardly and cheaply made. Also, these have a plastic door on the bottom that catches the scraps - which ends up causing the situation mentioned above. Overall, I am not a very big fan of the Recollections border punches.

Over the last several months, I've found that TJMaxx has been selling EK Success punches for about 50% of their price in the regular craft stores (with an even big price difference between those sold online) so I have slowly been buying them when I see a pattern I like. I haven't bought very many because, like most stores that sell overstock, there is a reason that they were overstocked, but I have found a few good border punches, including the Christmas tree one that I had been scouring TJMaxx for throughout most of the summer. It is normally 15/16 dollar punch on the EK Success website (It doesn't look like they sell the Christmas tree one there anymore), and I got it for only 3.99, which I was pretty happy about. Also, they are much more sturdily made and have a nice little feature that I haven't seen on any other punches. You can compact the punches to be flat (It works kinda like a hair straightener. You push the top down and then slide a button on the bottom to lock the punch in place). This makes storage much easier so that you can stack them on top of one another, which you can't really do with most other brands found in craft stores. (Note: EK Success punches do not have a bottom door over the punch section to catch paper remains.) I really like that the TJMaxx where I live sells the border punches because it has enabled me to buy some of the better punches for a really low price. 

Well, I hope that short review of these three different brands has helped. Has anyone else tried any other brands of punches that they like? Any other experiences like the ones I've had with the Recollections border punches?

My Brother-in-Law's Birthday

So, I have no idea what it is, but every time I go to make my BIL a birthday card, it always ends up looking like it is for a little boy. This year was no different, except I made another one. :) I did really like how the original one turned out though, there are a few little boy birthday's coming up in my family/friend spheres, so I think I will use it for one of them.

Supplies:
Paper: plain Recollections 8x11 card stock, Cosmo Cricket paper pack
Embellishments: American Crafts Thickers, Studio 1 orange bakers twine, Spellbinders circle and scalloped circle dies
Image: (need to look up)

It's My Birthday

Okay, so this post is a wee bit late in coming. As some of you know, I've been having some rather severe health problems the last couple months brought on by a nasty virus that will not go away, so for my birthday I was rather sick, but my hubby still was very sweet and brought me home flowers and some lovely gifts from Michaels and some other crafty things from Amazon. A few days later a package from a dear friend, containing 4 Cuttlebug embossing folders and then the next weekend he took me to Fredericksburg and sat with his ipad in the back of a small craft shop I have wanted to visit for 2 years now while I wandered and picked up a few crafting goodies.... It has been a rough month and I am still not over whatever it was, but I still am amazed by all of the ways that the Lord has blessed me with a dear husband who worries so much about me, dear friends who are continuously thinking of me and keeping me raised in prayer... So thank you dear friends and thank you honey for a wonderful birthday.

I don't really usually like to buy paper packs with Santa's in it, but the little Christmas pack was so cute and there are only a couple of Santa pages, and since they were 60% off I felt like losing 4 to 6 pages would be a huge loss.