Michael's Coupon

40% off one item through May 10

20% off entire purchase through May 10

enjoy!

Enabler Alert!

For those of you within driving distance of Mooresville, NC (just north of Charlotte up I-77) you will want to make plans to come up this weekend! Stamper's Alley is having their Annual Used Stamp Sale and you can get some wonderful stuff at bargain prices. There are alot of stampers signed up and bringing in their used stamps and other items to put in the sale! So mark your calendars for this coming Saturday, May 3, 10am - 4pm. The sale will be held on the porch and be sure to bring cash or checks, no credit cards are accepted for the used items. There will also be Make and Takes and a discount drawing on shopping inside the store. Gather up some friends and come spend the day! (Please no strollers or small children - space is pretty tight both inside and outside of the store at this sale)

Also, Rochelle over at her Impressions blog needs some input. She is considering starting an online store and needs your help, so stop by and offer your suggestions!

I hope you are having a wonderful day so far!

Beautiful Flowers

I just found this site, she has some really beautiful cards and even instructions on making flowers with your Nestabilities. Check it out - Mainly Flowers - you will love it!

Thanks all around!

I am flattered and honored that not one, but TWO wonderful bloggers saw fit to present me with the Arte y Pico award! My friend Shirley at Card Art, Etc. and Pam at Made by Me both thought I was worthy of this award and I send big thanks to them both!

The rules are:

• Choose 5 blogs that you consider worthy of this award for their creativity, design, interesting material, and also contributions to the blogging community, no matter what language
• Each award has to have the name of the author and also a link to his or her blog to be visited by everyone
• Each award winner has to show the award that she has been given
• The award winner and the one who has given the award have to show the link of "Arte y Pico" blog, so everyone will know the origin of this award
• Show these rules

So, my five choices are: Jenn Balcer, Oodabug Alley, Airborne Wife's Stamping Spot, Pink Lemonade, and Out to Impress. These ladies are inspiring to me in more ways than one and I hope you will agree.

I have more thanks - for blog candy this time. I won several in the last few weeks and am very grateful - free stamps are always fun! They came from Angela at the Unity Stamp Co., Dee at StampinCuzILuv2 and Julie at Need to Stamp. So, I have a lot of new stamps to play with thanks to you wonderful folks and I hope to have some things to post soon. I joined a couple of swaps on SCS and also have to get stuff ready for the Used Stamp Sale at Stamper's Alley on May 3, so I have plenty to keep me busy!

The cutest little cupcakes!

No, not rubber ones, edible ones! They are adorable and look fairly easy to make - check this out:


Cupcakes on a Stick

If anyone makes them and needs a taste tester just let me know, I am available :-) Enjoy!

New 50% off Michaels coupon

I found this link to a 50% off Michaels coupon and had to share it with you all! Enjoy!

Michaels coupon

Backwards tape measure anyone?

I found this a few weeks ago at an online woodworking store, after searching everywhere for one and thought maybe someone else might be looking for the same thing. I have the large tabletop Tonic guillotine cutter and the ruler is at the top, but not on the base. It has one in the center on the base but it's only divided into quarter inches and sometimes I need eighths or sixteenths. This is a self stick ruler that reads right to left and I stuck it on the cutter on the base at the top. It makes it much easier for me to see the smaller measurements and it isn't thick at all, so it doesn't interfere with the paper.

Here's the link - Right to Left Tape Measure.

Want to make someone's day?

An online friend of mine is in need of some cheering up and I thought perhaps some of you might like to help out. We all make loads of cards, now here is our chance to make good use of a few of them. Email me (link on the left side) for more details, it is going to be a surprise!

An Alternative to PayPal??

This is totally not stamping related but I found this and thought I'd share it with you. I don't know about you but I have had some issues with PayPal in the recent past and this seems like a much better way to transfer funds. I did a little research and it is legitimate, founded by reputable people and investors. Right now they are offering $25 if you sign up and that's for real, too. PayPal is a good thing but it's nice to have alternatives, right? So, here's the button if you want to check it out and sign up:

Sketch from Out To Impress

I thought I'd give a Sketch Challenge a try for a change and I saw this one on Julie Koerber's blog, Out To Impress :

Here's my version:

I changed it up a little by putting the sentiment in the top right corner so it wouldn't cover up any of the flowers and would be a little more balanced with this image than if I had put it in the bottom left corner. The flower image is by Penny Black, colored with Copics and a little sparkle added with Spica Glitter Pens. The sentiment is by Hero Arts, and I used the Fiskars border punch for the scallop. Enjoy!

A card for my sweetie

I made this the other day for my sweet hubby. I just felt like I needed to let him know how much I love him and that I appreciate how hard he works to keep our life comfortable and make it better. I gotta tell you it was hard to make a card without flowers or pink! It does have one little touch of pink, but not enough to make it girly. You can't really tell from the photo but the patterned paper is very shimmery, again, not enough to make it girly. He liked it :-)

Recipe: Sentiment - Michaels $1 stamp; Scalloped squares - Marvy punch; Heart punch - EK Success; Copc markers; Clear rhinestones colored with Copic markers; Ribbon slider - Cuttlebug die; Ribbon - Hobby Lobby; Patterned paper - Reminisce Bring on Spring.

Really clever punch ideas!

Check out Stacy's blog, she has a couple of excellent ideas for your punches! How do you guys come up with such cool things?? I have a flower punch, I punch out a flower.... that's about as creative as I get with punches. I guess I will have to see what I can come up with! I have added these links to My Shared Items on the left and I there may be a couple more new ones over there, too. Enjoy :-)

A party in my mailbox!

Look what I got for braving the nasty, freezing weather all the way to the mailbox (ok, so it's not that far, but I'm just sayin') - it was SO worth the trip! Nettie won the blog candy a few weeks ago and bless her heart, look what she sent me as a thank you! I don't want you all to think it's necessary because it isn't at all and it was very sweet of her to do this, I love it!

Isn't it beautiful? Look at that cute cover, all of those divider tabs and even a pocket in the back with PostIt Notes in it! She even included extra pages and out extras in the most used sections - brilliant! She included a card made with some of the paper that I sent - she sure did better with it than I ever could. Thank you, Nettie - you are the best! I will put it to good use, I promise. Now ya'll go on over and visit Nettie's blog and see what wonderful creations she has. I have to go write in my new address book.

Another Michaels Coupon!

Here you go - and it's 50% off!

Michaels Coupon

Stampendous

I have a few minutes before a brand NEW episode of CSI comes on, at last!, so I thought I'd post some cards I made as samples for Stamper's Alley. I was lucky enough to find one - only ONE - Fiskars Threading Water Scalloped Border Punch at a Target in downtown Charlotte and had to use it immediately! Brenda (Stamper's Alley) has ordered some and hopefully they will be here soon.

Recipe: Stamps - Stampendous (flowers), Cornish Heritage Farms (Polka Dot Backgrounder), MFT and Cat's Pajamas (sentiments); Cuttlebug Swiss Dots Embossing Folder; Copic markers; Prima flowers; rhinestones - Hero Arts; Scor Pal used for lattice scoring in the last card; Fiskars Threading Water punch (obviously); misc. ribbon.

Be sure to check out my Shared Items on the left - I add something new every couple of days and there is some cool stuff there. Many talented bloggers on the Interwebs these days!