Heads Up!!!

Hi friends.  I'm popping in briefly with a heads up on a sale!!!!  The owner of Heart & Soul Rubber Stamp Co. is going to retire and she is having a closeout sale.  All unmounted stamps are $1.00, no matter what size they are. I'm sad to see them close. (Though I do wish Sue a wonderful retirement.) This has been a favorite company of mine over the years.  She carries a lot of Christian stamps, but has many others too. 

Also, she wants to sell her stamp company, if she can find a buyer/buyers, so check it out if you are interested.

I'm not affiliated with this company in any way.  Just a very happy customer. :)  I thought some of you might like to shop at the sale and maybe there's even a buyer for the company here.

Inky hugs!
Shelly

Caught

Hi friends.  Today I'm popping in to share a Valentine card with you.  The image and the sentiment inside the card are both from Deedee's Digis.  They have a progressive monthly challenge at Deedee's Digis, which sounds like a lot of fun.  The January digi set is free, so it's easy to get started.  I gave the penguin googly eyes for a bit of extra whimsy.

Here you can see where I added some "shine" to the water.

And here's the sentiment inside the card. :)

Challenges:
Deedee's Digis - Jan. Digi of the Month Challenge
Digitally Sweet Challenges - #125 Anything Goes
Eureka Stamps Challenge - #125 Hearts
Fairytale Challenge - #110 Something with a heart
Sister Act Card Challenge - #91 Anything Goes
Word Art Wednesday - #168 Anything Goes

Blessings

• Today marks the third anniversary of my daughter's community outreach ministry!  
• Our little electric fireplace.  It sure warms our home well on a chilly night.
• Learning some new Bible study helps on the computer.

Have a fabulous day!!!

Inky hugs!

Shelly

Christmas Gift Idea #2

Hi friends.  Today's gift idea is a fun way to give money.  I saw this idea on several different blogs and really liked it. Hubby helped me make a bag header in Word.  Then it was just a matter of rolling up each dollar and tying it with ribbon. I nestled the money on a bed of red, shredded paper, stapled the header on to the plastic bag and it was done.  See Christmas Gift Idea #1 here.

Challenges:
Hiding in my Craft Room #176 - Freestyle!
Paper Creators Crafts #33 - All About Christmas
We Do Doobadoo - Get Festive
QKR Stampede #115 - Anything But A Card

Blessings:

• My MIL is doing very well after a bad knee injury.
• My niece has grown in the Lord so much this year.  
• It's back to being warmer here!  The cold weather is very painful for the Trigeminal Neuralgis in my face.

Have a wonderful day!!!

Inky hugs!

Shelly

Christmas Gift Idea #1

Hi friends.  I hope that those of you who are American had a lovely Thanksgiving.  We sure did.  Did any of you brave the Black Friday sales?  I did my shopping online and found several good deals.

I'm hoping to share a series of Christmas gift ideas, that will make your gifts a bit more unique, yet are quick and easy to make.  Today I'll share the first one and I hope that this busy season and my health allow me to get back on here soon with my other ideas.

I packaged two pairs of soft socks, a nail file and some nail polish on a bed of red, shredded paper in a plastic bag and cut a topper to fit the bag size.  I stamped the words with alphabet stamps and stamped the flourishes.  I added a few touches of color with markers and used Stickles to add some sparkle.  I inked the edges, stapled the topper on my bag and I was done!  As I look at this picture, I wish I had taken the tag off of the pink socks. :(   This gift isn't my original idea.  I saw it online somewhere and thought it was a cute idea.

Challenges:
Completely Christmas #40 - Anything Goes, Something beginning with S - My S thing is Stickles.
Hiding in my Craft Room #176 - Freestyle!
Paper Creators Crafts #33 - All About Christmas
We Do Doobadoo - Get Festive
QKR Stampede #115 - Anything But A Card

Blessings:

• A cozy, warm home.  (We've been hit with cold temps even here in Florida.)
• Our friends were uninjured in a bad car accident.
• White chocolate - My special holiday treat.

Have a fabulous day!!!

Inky hugs!

Shelly

Timely Advice

Hi friends.  Living by the woods, as we do, brings a variety of interesting critters to our door step and it seems like my little dog, Princess, encounters most of them.  I guess it's the Terrior side of her.  Her latest encounter was with a large Blue Land Crab.  These crazy crabs climb the stairs up on to our back porch and that's where Princess found one today.  She wanted to play chase with the crab and the crab wanted to give Princess a good pinch.  Thankfully, hubby saw this happening and intervened before Princess got pinched.  These crabs are actually rather shy, unless they get cornered.  They're about 6 inches across and live in burrows that they dig about 5 feet deep.  They go to the ocean, which is 5 miles away, to deposit their eggs.  They're pretty amazing critters.  Okay, lesson is over. lol  I love nature and find things like that fascinating.

Today I have an art journal page to share with you.  I started art journaling in the beginning of 2014 and absolutely love it.   For this page I started with an old book page, which I smeared some paint on, stenciled a bit and then stamped the number background with three different number stamp sets.  I adhered some of the awesome watch faces that I've been hoarding, a time theme postage stamp, and an hour glass and sun dial that I stamped and fussy cut.  I put some dimensional crackle gloss on the hour glass to make it look more real and antique-like.  I adhered some watch and clock hands and some tiny watch gears.  I used some bronze Twinkling H2O's around the embellishments.  I typed and printed a quote I like.  I finished the edges of the page with some sepia ink.  Sorry, I don't know who makes any of the stamps.  They're all unmounted stamps from my stash.

You can see the details a bit better in this close up shot.  It's so fun to just do this for the shear joy of creating.

Linking:
Art Journal Every Day
Artistic Inspirations - #113 Make Your Own Background
Creative Every Day
Fantasy Stampers - #21 Time Flies - Stamps used: 3 different numbers sets, hour glass & sun dial.
Not Just Cards - #4 Anything Goes
Make My Monday - Numbers
Scrapbook Blessings Club - #31 Anything Goes
Scribble and Scrap - #29 Anything Goes
Sunday Sentiments
Treasured Times Stamps - #26 Anything Goes
The Order of Opus Gluei - #193 Time


Blessings:

• The constant, heavy rain has finally stopped.  
• I found an excellent sale on some clothes I needed & I had a gift card.
• Online shopping.  
• Hubby found some paper craft magazines for me at a garage sale.
• A husband who steps in and runs errands seeing I can't.

Have a terrific day!!!

Inky hugs!

Shelly

Creative Blog Hop

Hello friends.  My very creative and uplifting friend, Susan, over at Faith Words Faith Expressions invited me to join this blog hop.  Be sure to hop over and see what Susan has going on at her blog.

This is a flip card I made for a birthday using the fun spinner from the Spinner2stamp set by The Stamps of life.    If you haven't tried their stamps yet, I highly recommend them.  They're super quality clear stamps.  None of that sub par stamping that you get with low quality clear stamps.  (I don't work for them, just love their stamps.)

This is a zendoodle I did.  I mostly use my doodles on cards or in my journals.  Some I color and some I just leave black and white.

This is a journal spread I did about being a wife and mother.  The journals I share with others mostly contain Bible verses and quotes and art experiments.  My journals where I write my prayers and  private feelings are kept just between me and the Lord.

4. How does your creative process work?  I work on things in bits and pieces.  I never finish a  project all at one sitting.  Partially because I am in too much pain to sit and work on something that long and partially because I like to work on things in stages and come back the next day with a fresh perspective.

This is a background that I have started.  It's not at all what I was aiming for, but I ended up liking how it turned out.  That's the fun of experimenting.  You'll see this background again, either for a journal page or card.

Blessings:

• A phone visit with my sister.
• A friend is home from a long hospital stay and doing well.
• A gorgeous Monarch butterfly in my yard.
• Sweet newborn calves.

Have a fabulous day!!!

Inky hugs!

Shelly

Bling It Up!

Happy Monday, friends!  I hope this is the beginning of a great week for you.  We've had some slightly cooler weather here in Florida the last few days, which has made it feel more like Fall.  We're really enjoying that.  Did any of you get creative on World Card Making day?  I didn't actually get a card finished, but had lots of fun playing with paint and glitter to make backgrounds.

This card was difficult to capture in a picture due to the mirrored silver card stock background.  The poinsettia was made with the Spellbinders Layered Poinsettia die set.  I highlighted the gold petals with silver ink.  The leaves are cut from silver card stock.  The flourishes are made with the Sizzix Flower & Accent Set.  Again, I highlighted the gold card stock with silver ink.  The corners are made with a Stampin' Up punch.  The letters for the greeting were stamped on silver card stock, embossed in gold and punched out.  I used a typewriter key alphabet set by Rebecca Sower.  The finishing touch was lots of bling.

Challenges:
Crafty Hazelnut's Christmas Challenge -#197 Something Beginning with P - Poinsettia
Crafty Hazelnut's Christmas Challenge Extra - Anything Christmas Goes - Oct. 2014
Gltter n Sparkle Challenge - #105 Anything with a B - Bling
QKR Stampede Challenge - #107 Anything Goes
Sentimental Sundays Challenge - #227 Bling It Up
We Do Doobabdoo Challenge - #16 Christmas
Weekly Christmas Card Challenges - #45 Layer It Up
Word Art Wednesday - #152 Anything Goes

Blessings:

• Friendship :)
• A family picnic - even the dogs came along.
• A devotional book that I'm learning so much from.
• You Tube Craft Tutorial Videos

Have a terrific day!!!

Inky hugs!

Shelly