A Bit of Citrus

Howdy, folks!  (I have no idea where that came from, but I'm feelin' it today, so just go with it, k? K.  Good.  Moving on....)  I decided to play along with the Avery Elle AEI♥U Challenge this month using some brand new goodies from Avery Elle!  Woot!

For my card I used the Modern Leaves stamp set along with the super AWESOME Modern Leaves Dies.  (P.S.  I kinda love these things.  Just sayin'.)  I pulled out some of my Momento inks from Imagine Crafts/Tsukineko and went to TOWN on the sketch, dudes.






I love how the various green tones and the cantaloupe work so well together!  They are just such PRETTY colors!  I added varied dimension by adhering some parts flat to the previous layer and popping up the middle of the pieces with foam tape.  



Here is the sketch that Avery Elle provided to use for the challenge.  It was certainly a challenge for me, as I don't often have QUITE this much on a card, but I enjoyed the process very much and I love how it turned out!  So fun!

I hope you have a super fantastic citrusy-bright kind of day!  
Have a Happy!

It's Time for a Gourmet Sketch!

Yup!  We have a brand new sketch challenge for you over at Gourmet Rubber Stamps today!  This is a fun one because you can really do any direction you want with it!  I love those type of sketches... ones that really just get you started and let you take it ANYWHERE!  YAY!

I decided to flip the sketch on it's side for my card today and I played with some SUPER fun colors! It was fun. Just sayin'.


The Happy Birthday Truffles set is featured on my card (it's brand new and SUPER CUTENESS!) along with some fun May Arts ribbon and fabulous My Mind's Eye enamel dots! Love those things!


The image itself is stamped in Momento ink and colored with Spectrum Noir markers. I'm still working on my coloring, but I had fun playing with pinks for this one!

To check out what the rest of the team has created with this fun sketch, be sure to visit the rest of the DT blogs! These girls are pretty amazing, so you won't want to miss their fabulous designs!

Deb Felts
Jeni Allen
Jennifer Ingle
Kelli Palmer
Kendra Wietstock
Stephanie Lee
Taylor UsryGourmet Rubber Stamps Blog
As for me, well...tonight.... I DANCE! (Yup. Dance class tonight. Hopefully I will look mildly less foolish than last week. HA! Wish me luck!)

Challenging Gourmet Circles

Yup! That's what we are doing today. No. I'm not going to make you create a dessert with squid in under a ten minutes (although, that would likely be QUITE interesting), but rather Gourmet Rubber Stamps has a brand new sketch challenge and we are pulling out the circles for this one! Here is the sketch the Design Team is working with today!

And here is the fun card I created using this sketch and the gorgeous snowflake and sentiment from the Made of Snow Appetizer set!


I stamped the snowflakes carefully so they were in the proper direction to be tiled without overlapping. I love the pretty colors on this card! I used Tsukineko Momento inks and a bit of velvet ribbon from May Arts. I placed Eyelet Outlet brads in the center of each snowflake to add some extra punch!


To see more inspiration based on this sketch visit the other members of the Gourmet Rubber Stamps Design Team! You MUST see the cards these girls have created! They are INCREDIBLE this week! Seriously. Crafty crushes. Totally. Just sayin'.

Deb Felts
Jeni Allen
Jennifer Ingle
Kelli Palmer
Kendra Wietstock
Stephanie Lee
Taylor Usry Gourmet Rubber Stamps Blog
Have a great weekend! Happy Saturday!!!

Live the Life of Your Dreams

You know what. While not every part of my life is what I would call dream-worthy, I can say that I am very fortunate and blessed to be able to do something that I truly love. I work on a lot of design teams and, for the last six months, I've had the honor of Coordinating the Skipping Stones Design DT. I am a seriously lucky girl. This is the stuff dreams are made of! But, today, I close the door on one of those dreams to pursue others. Today is my final post as a Skipping Stones Design DT member and as the SSD Design Team Coordinator, as well. I am sad. BUT...this was my decision and I do feel it is the right one at this time. I LOVE Skipping Stones and I certainly won't be a stranger! Heather does amazing work and I wouldn't miss it for the world! So...that being said, I decided to go a bit sappy for this post, so please forgive me, as you may be drenched in it by the end of it all! HA!

See, here's the thing...many many moons ago sometime back in 2010, I was asked to be a guest designer for SSD. I had known Heather from back when we both lived in Colorado (funny...neither of us do now! LOL!) and I was already in love with her super fun stamps! When asked which stamps I wanted to use, I instantly fell in love with her quirky bra sets and, of course, Healing Wings. I say "of, course" because if you've followed my SSD posts you know that Healing Wings is my absolute FAVORITE SSD set of all time! I just love it! I loved it then and I love it now! Here is the first card I created for SSD using, of course, Healing Wings!


Yup. That's an old one! LOL! I've evolved in style a great deal since I made this card. So, I decided it would only be right to pull out that very same favorite stamp set and apply it to the sketch challenge for this week. I used the exact same stamps - but this one is a little more the Jingle you know and love now! LOL!


Yup. Same stamps. Same designer. A long couple of years in between the two! LOL! I love this card!!!!


So there you have it. My first SSD card as a designer, and my last. I do hope you will play along with the sketch challenge this week! I'm also entering this card into the Movement Challenge in the Moxie Fab World. I just love how the eye can easily move from left to right by starting with the grey ribbon tab on the left (May Arts, of course!), to the central focal point image, to the grey ribbon tab on the bottom right. Nice and easy flow!

I hope you have a super fabulous Tuesday and I hope this post wasn't too sappy for you. I just felt the need to share my feelings a bit. *sigh* Now...what great adventure might be coming next, do you think???? *insert HUGE grin here!***

Thanks a Bunch for THAT Road Rage Adventure!

Okay, so that's a loaded title. HAHAHA! Let's start with the Thanks A Bunch part and then I can tell you my story... Yes. I have a story to tell today!

First, a card!


I created this card based on the August Sketch from The Craft's Meow. I just love the sketch and had a lot of fun using three different The Craft's Meow Stamp Sets. I used Lovely Labels 14, Stitched Flowers, and Stitched Sentiments.

And here is the sketch that it came from.

I am also entering this in the Focal Point Challenge in the Moxie Fab World. I feel like all elements in this card come down to that right hand corner of focal point cuteness!


I fussy cut the fern so that I could have it partially behind the frame and then pop it out to really stand out on the front of the card. I love doing this with fun frames on cards! The beautiful ribbon is May Arts.


And now, for the story. Road Rage. I now know just how real it is, as last night we ended up at the Police Station after becoming genuine victims of a road rage incident. For reals, you guys. WICKED CRAZY SCARY STUFF!

Here's what happened...

We were on our way from Target to the pizza place to pick up a pizza we ordered for dinner. We exit off the highway (The new area where we live is ALL ABOUT the highways - they are everywhere and pretty much super necessary to get around.) and move onto the on ramp. All of the sudden there is a Honda Accord about two inches from our bumper. And that might be generous! This guy was REALLY close! So close, I actually said to The Hubbums, "Wow! That guy is like crazy close to you right now!" While looking I could see his hand waving and gesturing out the sunroof. I couldn't see it, but The Hubbums said that his OTHER hand was doing the same out the driver's side window...leaving exactly ZERO hands on the wheel of the vehicle, which, mind you, is still two inches from our bumper.

So...that's pretty scary to begin with. Sean continues to drive at appropriate speeds for the road we are getting onto. The guy starts SCREAMING from his car - I have no idea what he was saying, as our windows were up and, quite frankly, I don't think I want to know what he was saying. Then, once we are on the road, something hits our rear window (The Hubbums drives a Mini Cooper.). He had thrown something at the car. No clue what it was, but it hit the rear windshield and made a thunking sound. That was also very scary. Then the guy speeds up, comes up beside us and throws something ELSE - A soda bottle - full - at the driver's side. It hits the door. Thank GOODNESS the window was shut because I'm pretty sure he would have aimed from Sean's head! It left a rather substantial bottom-of-bottle-shaped dent in the door of the car.

So...at this point, this guy is extremely dangerous. He has verbally threatened us, well, at least, I don't think he was screaming really nice things at the top of his lungs. AND...he has proven an intent to harm. And, as I said, he threw that while passing us. Well, he wasn't content to just keep going at this point. And, I was already on the phone with 911 as he STOPPED his car in the middle of the road, blocking us from getting by (there was some on coming traffic so going around him would have been VERY dangerous at this point) and he GETS OUT OF THE CAR.

Yes. I am scared. I'm not going to lie. We had no idea what this guy was thinking at this point. He approached the car, screaming the whole way, and, ended up on MY side (the passenger side) of the vehicle where he proceeded to PUNCH the window beside my head. I was on the call with the Police at this point and I'm quite sure they heard just how concerned I was. Just say'n. He punched it hard enough that there was skin on the window this morning. For reals. Actually, thinking about it, I'm guessing his hand is in a rather substantial amount of pain this morning. That HAD to hurt! And I am REALLY glad I never even considered opening my window because with as angry as this guy was, I'm not convinced he wouldn't have hit me. Seriously, you guys...I don't even want to think about it, but it is/was so scary!

He got back into his car and then tried to BACK THE CAR into us. I know he was thinking he could say it was our fault for 'rear ending' his car, but at that point I was already talking to the Police, so they would have known exactly what happened. He kept moving his car forward and then backward again.

He progressed down the road a bit further, and, come to find out, we were getting closer and closer to the Police Station. The dispatcher on the phone gave me directions to the Police Station and we pretty much screamed into that parking lot. (Remember, we just moved, so we didn't know the station was there.) At that point, Sean had noticed flags and started driving toward them since that's usually a sign of some kind of authority. So, we arrived at the police station and the officers were on their way out the door when the other driver, who had conveniently passed the Police Station, decided to turn around and join us there! I thought for SURE he was history, so I was pretty surprised he followed us into the station parking lot!

He pulls up RIGHT NEXT TO US - driver's side, gets out of the car and immediately starts SCREAMING at the Officer! Well. That's one way to handle it.

He got all up in on officer's face right off the bat and that officer got all up in his face right back at him. Due to the screaming two more officers (two had originally come out to meet us) pretty much appeared out of nowhere to help deescalate the situation. At that point, we had four officers around, we were standing in front of the Police Station, every officer was fully armed and geared up (and I mean FULLY! We moved from the city to the burbs and I NEVER saw a Police Officer wearing as much gear as these guys were in the city! It was kind of weird, but at that moment, I was REALLY GLAD!). One very nice female officer came over to talk to us. She gave us a minute to stop looking all buggy eyed and asked what happened. Another officer, after calming the other guy down, asked the same of him. We never had to talk to him and I am REALLY glad about that. Our two cars were between us the entire time and he left several minutes before we did, which made me feel a bit more comfortable that he wouldn't follow us again, but I was still nervous. Heck...I was nervous driving to work this morning!

So...as it currently stands, we are waiting on the Police Report, but it looks like some kind of charges will be filed. We don't know what yet. We will have to go to court to tell our side of the story to get it all resolved and get the damage to the car repaired.

When asked why this all happened. Apparently he told the officer that we had cut him off on the highway. We didn't. If we did, we totally didn't mean to, but seriously...this guy didn't appear in the rear view mirror until we were already on the on ramp and he was suddenly two inches from our bumper.

AND...even if we had cut him off...seriously? This is how you react to that? I drive a LOT. I used to drive 100 miles a day to get to work and back (thankfully that is much less now! YAY!). If I assaulted people every single time I got cut off, I wouldn't have time to WORK, for goodness sake! That is simply not an acceptable reaction under ANY circumstances!

So...that's what happened. I'm writing it all down because I'll have to recount it again in court and I figured this was a good way to tell the story.

AND...Road Rage is real. It isn't a joke. I never knew it could be like this until now. This didn't happen in a city, a rough area, or any place that would be marked as dangerous...it happened in your average suburban American town - not far from the Police Station at that! Be careful out there and don't take these things lightly. I fear for what could have happened and I'm very grateful that this man wasn't armed with anything other than his vehicle and a couple of soda bottles.

Road Rage isn't a joke. It's real. And people can get very hurt or even killed. I was SO impressed with the defensive driving skills of my husband! I would have likely wrecked my car in that situation. It was NOT easy to evade this guy AND be slightly freaked out at the same time all while your wife is pretty much yelling into the phone at the emergency dispatcher trying to give them the location and 'play by play' action over the phone.

Be Safe.

Jingle Out.

Juicy News! Designs by Diana is turning THREE! {Giveaway!}

Diana Fisher is celebrating her 3 year blog anniversary by giving the anniversary gifts to YOU — the readers! Hop on through the Blog Hop to find prizes and inspiration along the way. Plus, there's a chance to play along with us! Use the sketch Diana made, link your entry back at her blog, and you could win a $30 shop credit to Scrapbook Circle. You have until April 30th to complete the hop and link up your sketch challenge entry to be eligible for the hop prizes! Here is Diana's awesome sketch!

Of course, this sketch was intended for a layout, but, because I don't follow rules well...I did a card, instead! I love how sketches can be totally used for different projects! The papers are My Mind's Eye and the stamps are from Skipping Stones Design. The gemstone accents are from Imaginesce and the flowers are from Michael's. A few old school Heidi Swapp photo corners were the perfect fit for the bottom border! AND...I am also offering a prize in celebration of Diana's blog anniversary! I am offering one person who leaves a comment on this post, along with a way to contact you, the Heartsong set from Skipping Stones Design! Just leave a comment to enter! You are welcome to follow my blog, however, it is not required to enter the giveaway. Find me on Facebook and Pinterest, too! They are both listed on the left! Thanks for visiting and have a great day! Diana, thank you so much for this chance to celebrate with you and CONGRATULATIONS on three awesome years! You are SUCH an inspiration!!! Here is the list of everyone playing along today! Diana is offering some GREAT prizes on her blog, as well, so be sure to check it ALL out!
ETA: The new blogger updates seem to be breaking my links. I have checked the HTML and they look fine, so I'm not sure what's happening. Please remove the part of the url in each of these that goes to Just Jingle to get to each of the blogs listed. It's worth it, I promise! Heather Leopard
Corrie Jones
Audrey Yeager
Antonia Krajicek
Shannon Bogan
Lisa Swift
Julie Tucker-Wolek
Jennifer Ingle
Tessa Buys
Ashley Horton
Sara Zenger
Diana Fisher
Jingle Out.

Teaching Me To Be. And a Call to Share Your Passion!!!

***Don't forget to check out my post HERE to join in my month long Blogiversary Celebration!***

I finally managed to do a layout on time for Diana's way fun sketch challenge! I really loved the sketch this time around, but, as per usual when I work with sketches, I ended up really making it my own. Due to the position of The Hubbums in the photograph, I flipped the sketch and I placed my circles a bit differently. Instead of using the strips in the sketch for journaling, I decided to create glitter dots, a glitter stripe, and a twill that coordinated with my layout idea.

Here is my layout.

Now that I am looking at it, I can't decide if I like the fire embellishment on there or not. It is there because I feel like it has meaning that relates to the idea of the layout. Hmmm.....that's a tough one. I'll have to think on it.

BUT....even with that thinking going on and such, I still TOTALLY love this layout and I am so excited to have had the chance to participate in the Sketch Challenge this week! The sketch inspired such a wonderful outcome for me! I love it when that happens!!!!

No. Seriously, folks. That is just wicked crazy cool. You know...when something just JUMPSTARTS you and totally gets you going in a direction that only could have been led by that single catalyst?! Does that ever happen to you? I mean at all in life...not just in making stuff. I know lots of my readers aren't scrapbookers, but we all have a passion for something.

A passion for art, for cooking, for fashion, for teaching, for learning, for writing, for caring for others, for ANYTHING! NO matter what your passion is, it is just the COOLEST THING EVER when you are inspired. I mean really INSPIRED!

Tell me about it! Or...better yet...write a blog post about it and then come back and link to your post here so we can all read about your passion and what inspires you!!!!

Oooooo!!!! I am so stinking excited right now! I really hope you take the time to share your stories! Thanks, Diana, for inspiring me, not only to create this awesome layout, but also to encourage others to share their passion! This is GREAT STUFF, folks!!! Okay. I'm just happy now. I'm typing at like super sonic speed, so you totally better not let me down! I want to see your passion! Blog about it! If you don't have a blog, just leave a really long comment if you need to! LOL! I want to know!!!

2 Sketches. 2 Cards. 2 Moms. Lotsa Happy!

Most of you can disregard this first part, but...

Mom, if you are reading please stop here! I don't want you to see your Mother's Day card! LOL! You can read this post on Monday, don't worry! ;-)

Okay...now...for the rest of you...moving on.

I decided to use two sketches for the two Mother's Day cards that I made this year. One for my wonderful Mom and one for The Hubbums wonderful Mom!

The first sketch is Laura's Sketch from 2 Sketches 4 You. I really like this sketch because it was a challenge for me. It made me go a different direction with my card and I really love the result.

Here is the sketch:



And here is the card for my Mom using the sketch:



I LOVE IT! I know...arrogant, but what can I tell you? Seriously? Isn't it awesome? No, really...I know, but I REALLY like this one! LOL! Here are some close up shots and such.





The supplies used:
Patterned Paper: Making Memories
Stamps: Hero Arts (bird cage) and Close To My Heart (sentiment)
Ink: Close To My Heart
Flower Accent: Prima
Glaze Pen: Sakura
Other: Ribbon and Die Cut

And here is the card that I made for The Hubbums Mom!

For this one I used the wonderful sketch from Card Positioning Systems! WAY fun blog, btw!

The Sketch:




I wanted something bright, cheery, and colorful and I think this fits the bill superbly! HA! I just said 'superbly!' That was fun! I should use that word more often. Sooo....yeah....here's the card and stuff.



Okay, I'm going to say it again. LOVE IT! Really, I was kind of on a roll the day I made these suckers! I totally felt creative again and was actually REALLY happy with my work! That made me SUPERBLY PLEASED! (hee-hee - told you it was a good word!) I stamped the tree and then cut it out and popped it up with foam dots. I then used the tiny bird from the Hero Arts stamp that I used on the card above and cut that out and popped IT up from the tree! Fun stuff! The buttons just add the perfect playful touch!

Here are the closeups of this one:





Supplies for this card:

Patterned Paper: Die Cuts With a View (Yes, I am anti stack, but the GREEN stack was WAY to awesome for me to not want it. At least I got it for free. I still cursed stacks as I pretty much managed to rip the whole 'deck' in half trying to get one sheet out. That's why I hate stacks. Love the paper, hate the binding.)
Tag: Emma's Paperie (I think?)
White Pen: Uniball Signo (if you don't have one stop reading blogs go to the store and buy one because you need it. That's all I'm say'n.)
Black pen: Zig Millennium by EK Success
Stamps: Pink Paislee (tree), Hero Arts (bird)
Buttons: I have no freaking clue. Sorry about that. I tried.

Soooo...what do you think? Do you love it? Because I totally do! HA! The good thing is that I know they will both appreciate them! I love it when people actually LIKE the fact that I take the time to make them a card! It makes me happy. Kinda like cupcakes only without the calories!

So, there you have it! Mother's Day Cards x 2! I hope all you Mom's out there have a fabulous Mother's Day with your families! I will be spending some time with my Mom and making fun crafts with my Kindergarten Sunday School class, so it should be a good day. I don't think the puppies bought me a Cuttlebug. Oh, well. What can I expect from kids with no thumbs? ;-)

Have an awesome weekend! See ya' on the Flip Side!