Today's special....frogs n' dogs

I had a vision of Billy in his pet shop and had to get it on paper. Yes....these are the kind of things that go on in my head in the wee hours of the morning.

I inked up the Billy image with the frog on his head, but instead of coloring in "hair", I colored it gray to look like a rock.

I used acetate and scored it on my Scor-Pal to create the tanks. I also used acetate for the door. Such a fun set to play with!
Thanks for stopping by!

Such a tweet...

Does anyone else remember this cute set from an SU mini a loooong time ago? I always regretted not buying it, but finally got my hands on a set!

I decided to try and incorporate some chipboard on my card today. So far, I'm not sold on this stuff. It seems to be all the rage these days, but I just don't get it. If anyone out there has some chipboard tips for me, I'd love to hear them. How do you utilize it??

I decided to emboss mine for a little shine. I smeared it across my black craft pad and dunked it in clear embossing powder. I must admit that it came out pretty nice and definitely gave me the "shine factor" that I was looking for.

For the peacock image, I used Purely Pomegranate, Not Quite Navy and More Mustard. Then I went over parts of the image with my blue and red Sakura glaze pens. I added clear Stickles to the middle of the large feathers for some sparkle.

The background paper is from SU's Bali Breeze collection and the yummy velvet ribbon is from another SU mini catalog. I've been hoarding it forever and finally used up the rest of it!

That's it for me today. Have a super weekend! Don't forget to share your chipboard tips with me.
Hugs,

Fool your family Friday!

Not sure what I'm talking about? Click here to get up to speed! Chicken Nuggets

"I don't know any kid who doesn't like chicken nuggets. Just don't tell them what's hidden inside!"

• 1 cup panko (Japanese breadcrumbs)
• 1/2 cup flaxseed meal
• 1 Tablespoon grated Parmesan
• 1/2 teaspoon paprika
• 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
• 1/2 teaspoon onion powder
• 1 cup broccoli puree*
• 1 large egg, lightly beaten
• 1 pound boneless, skinless chicken tenders
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• nonstick cooking spray
• 1 Tablespoon olive oil
  

1. In a bowl, combine the breadcrumbs, flaxseed meal, Parmesan, paprika, garlic and onion powder and mix well with fingers.
2. In a shallow bowl, mix the vegetable puree and egg with a fork.
3. Sprinkle the chicken tenders with the salt. Dip the tenders into the egg mixture and then in the breadcrumbs until completely coated.
4. Coat a large nonstick skillet with cooking spray and set over medium-high heat. When the skillet is hot, add the oil. Place the chicken tenders in the skillet in a single layer and cook until crisp and golden on one side. Turn and cook until the chicken is cooked through, golden brown and crisp all over. Serve warm.

My family LOVED these! When I served these for dinner I got four "terrifics" and one "fantastic!". How often have you heard that at the dinner table?! My daughter dipped them in Franks Red Hot Sauce and my son dipped them in Ranch dressing.

* To make the broccoli puree, I bought a bag of pre-washed, pre-cut broccoli florets. I steamed them for about 6-7 minutes and then put them in a food processor / blender until smooth. (add water a teaspoon at a time to get a creamy texture)

Want to be a guest designer?

I'm totally floored right now! I sent over a couple of Billy and Lily cards to Melissa over at the uber-fabulous Pink Cat Studio, and it looks like I've inspired her to create a contest!

Click here to read about it and play along!

Color Inspiration Challenge #13

Kristina's back this week with another color challenge.

Our color palette was River Rock, Whisper White, Wild Wasabi, Purely Pomegranate and Regal Rose.

I had to make an anniversary card for my husband today - nothing like waiting til the last minute! Tonight we're going to PF Changs for dinner - Yummy!

For this card I used the Regal Rose and Purely Pomegranate patterned paper in SU's "Bali Breeze" collection. The green polka dot paper is a scrap by American Traditional Designs called Earth tones.

I ran the card front through my Sizzix machine with the Cuttlebug "Swirls" embossing folder and then punched out a hole with my 1 3/8" circle. The sentiment is two different stamps that I inked up with a marker and put together to create my own phrase.

Gotta go....lots to do before my hot date tonight!

For my customers...

I always like to put a little thank you note into my customer bags before I deliver their orders.

These were the cards I made for my customers this month. Card dimensions are 3 x 3".

The base is Purely Pomegranate with Taken with Teal behind the Bali Breeze patterned paper. I just love these colors together - so warm and cozy.

Billy's Room

It's almost 3am and I'm WIDE AWAKE...

What's a girl to do? How should she pass the time? Well, stamping out a bunch of tiny images, coloring them in and cutting them out seemed like the perfect thing to do in the wee hours of the morning.

A few days ago, I was inspired to make Lily's room with my super cute stamps from Pink Cat Studio. You can click here to see that card.

Billy was feeling a little left out, so I inked him up and this is what I came up with. What do you think? His Mom made him clean up his room to get ready for his play date with Lily.

The wallpaper is from SU's "Jersey Shore". His toy chest is Close to Cocoa cardstock that was sponged and adhered with dimensionals. I did his puzzle name frame on the front to look just like the toy chest that my grandfather made for me when I was kid. Still have it :-)

The letters were done with a special setting on my Cricut machine with the "George" font cartridge. I used black Fun Flock on the pirate hat and colored everything else in with my Copics.

I have to get up in 3 hours to set up for my garage sale today, however I think I'm past the point of no return. Guess I'll just make myself a latte and see what weird infomercials I can watch on tv...

Thanks for popping in! Have a wonderful weekend!

Welcome to Fool your Family Friday!

I recently purchased this cookbook by Jessica Seinfeld. For those of you who are not familiar with it, every single recipe in the book sneaks in a healthy serving of veggies.

I'm sure that most of you Moms out there can relate when I say that my kids are SUPER picky eaters.

I've been a vegetarian for 21 years, so I'm used to making a separate dinner for myself every night, but over the years my kids have gotten pickier and pickier (is that even a word?).

I'm so sick of the pleading at the dinner table and throwing out uneaten food! Can I get an Amen?!

I've decided to start using this cookbook on a daily basis and my family will be the guinea pigs. I'll share a new recipe each Friday with the "Midnight Scramper" seal of approval!

Without further ado, here is what we had for dinner tonight. It was a huge hit! I doubled the recipe and EVERYONE went back for seconds.

"Buttered" Noodles

"Simple buttered noodles make most kids very happy. In this version, they're getting their veggies, too."

8oz. of your favorite pasta noodles (I used Penne)
1/2 cup of butternut squash puree*
1/4 cup of nonfat milk
2 Tablespoons of butter
2 Tablespoons of grated Parmesan
1/4 teaspoon of salt

1. Bring a large pot of salted water to a boil. Add the pasta and cook according to package directions until al dente.


2. Drain, return the pasta to the warm pot, and stir in the squash puree, milk, butter, Parmesan and salt.

YUM-O!

* To make the butternut squash puree, just steam it and put it in a blender or a food processor. I was able to get about 3 cups of puree, which I pre-measured into 1/2 cup servings and froze to use as needed.

I bought my butternut squash at Trader Joe's in the refrigerated section by the salads. The squash was already cubed, pre-washed and ready to cook. Couldn't be simpler!

Color Inspiration Challenge #12

It's Thursday, and that means it's time for another color challenge from Kristina!

This week we had to use Sahara Sand, So Saffron, Whisper White and Wild Wasabi. Is anyone else going to miss Wild Wasabi as much as me when it's gone?
For my card, I used the snail image from SU's "Bugs and Kisses" and a sentiment that I got a while back from Hambo.

That's it for me tonight - not feelin' the mojo....

Have you ever wondered...

what Lily's room looks like? And do you wonder what she's doing in her room today? She's painting a picture of her favorite little guy, Billy!

After playing with all of my Billy stamps from Pink Cat Studio this last month, Lily was starting to get a little lonely.

I got this idea in my head last night while I was trying to sleep and had to get it on paper as soon as I woke up this morning. Don't you just love it when the vision you have in your head actually makes it on to the paper?!

I had fun making this card, but wasn't quite sure how to go about it because I've never done a card with a "scene" before. The wallpaper is a scrap of paper that I had left over from a class I taught at Easter time. I used my Scor-pal and scored the patterned paper every half inch to add a little texture.

For the easel, I just cut a long strip of Chocolate Chip cardstock, folded it and added some gold brads. Then I took another piece of Chocolate Chip cut to a small rectangle and scored it at 1/8" and 1/4". I folded it over and that became the tray on the front to hold the painting. Since this easel belongs to Lily, I thought it only fitting to have a gold embossed crown on top.

Lily was colored in with my Copics and for the painting, I took a scrap of white Bazzill bling paper and used my SU markers and an aquapainter to watercolor Billy. Here's a close up.


Such a fun card to make! Hope you like it! Thanks for stopping by.

Makeover Challenge

I've been a stalker of Andrea's blog for a few months now. Each Monday she has a challenge called "Makeover Monday" where you take a card that is made without any Stampin Up products and re-do it with ONLY Stampin Up products.

I had 20 minutes of alone time last night and decided to finally play along. This is the card that I decided to makeover - not that it NEEDED any making over.

I decided to use the "Mixed Bouquet" set for the main images and background. This set was retired before I had a chance to buy it and I finally got my hands on it at a friends garage sale. I finished the card off with the 5/8" Chocolate Chip grosgrain ribbon and Stickles.

That's it for me today - the kids and I are off to the library.

Swap Time!

I know I promised to share all of the cards from my swap group last week, but time got away from me and I didn't have a chance to take photos until this morning. Sometimes there just aren't enough hours in the day!

I decided to use the pirate image from my Billy set by Pink Cat Studio for my swap card this month. If you have a chance, you have to check out the new Billy set that was just released. It's called "Dress Up Billy" and it is adorable! Okay....back to our regularly scheduled programming....

For this card, I stamped out pirate Billy and his dog with black Staz-On and then colored them in with Copics. Then I cut them out and adhered them to the front of the card with dimensionals.

For the top part of the card, I tried to repeat the eyelet and laces pattern that was on Billy's vest. I used my SU natural hemp twine for the laces. I used my SU markers to color the images in the circles before I stamped them out. (To see a tutorial on how I cut out the circles and centered everything perfectly, check out this post.)
I knew that I wanted to have some kind of gold on the card, but didn't seem to have a stamp or embellishment that would work.

I'm a visual person, so I don't have my stamps stored in their cases. EVERY SINGLE one of my stamps is displayed on glass shelving on all of the walls in my workshop. (you can see a bit of it here)

When I couldn't figure out what to use for the gold accent on this card, I sat in my "spinny" chair and scanned all of the walls of my room, trying to think out of the box a little.

Can you guess how I made the gold nuggets / coins??

These are the coal buttons for the snowman in SU's "Cold Play" set. I Versamarked them all over the bottom of the card and embossed in gold. Mission accomplished!

Here are the cards that the other gals in swap group made this month:

Janice's card and envelope Katrina's card

Wanda's cardDarlene's card
Janelle's card
Donna's card
Marty's card

For those of you who haven't heard, the Stampin Up retired list was released at midnight yesterday! Click here for the list!

HAPPY FATHER'S DAY

I feel so lucky to have a husband who has made it possible for me to stay home and raise our children. It was a really big change to go from two full time incomes down to one after our first was born, but the sacrifice was SO worth it. Even though I feel like I'm going crazy at times, I am thankful every day to have the opportunity to be the kind of Mom that I always wanted to be.

In addition to all of the spoiling that will be going on in our home today, the kids asked me to make Daddy a special card with SU's "All in the Family" set. This card gave me the perfect opportunity to break in the Stamp-A-Ma-Jig that I got in the mail yesterday!

The card base is Not Quite Navy with More Mustard as an accent color. Everything else used was from the scrap bin - gotta love that! I did paper piecing on the outfits and used my Copics to color the faces, hair, shoes and kitties. The kids were really happy with the way the card turned out and I think my husband will get a kick out of it.


This is the card that I made for him - from me. Since he's such an AMAZING provider and works so hard everyday, I thought it would be cute to use his work shirt as my inspiration.

Some cat butt love...

Kristina just posted her color challenge for the week! *happy dance*

Here's my entry for week 11
Don't you just love making cards when there's a theme involved? It makes it SO much easier to get the creative mojo flowing. Obviously this card is for a cat lover! The image is by Stampola and is appropriately called "Cat Butt Love". The patterned paper is from the "Stella Ruby" collection by Basicgrey.
I decided to have another go at a gate fold card and this large heart on the right side of the card interlocks with the smaller heart on the bottom left. That way the card stays shut - major pet peeve.
I used liquid applique on the "ankles" of the girl kitty to make them furry.
Here's what the inside looks like.
Thanks for popping by!

A little get well humor

for my thoughtful friend who couldn't make it to my class on Sunday because she was sick. She called the night before to let me know that she was sick and didn't want to come and chance my kiddos getting sick. I thought that was SO considerate of her - not to mention that she probably didn't feel much like stamping anyways.

Don't you just hate it when someone comes over to your house when they know they're sick! Next thing you know, you have sick kids who have to miss school and a sick husband who has to miss work. And as all you mothers out there know, WE can't get sick because WE have to take care of everyone! Okay....I'm done ranting....Thanks Linda for not bringing cooties to my house! I love you for that!

On to the card - The chicken noodle soup can is from a company called "Stamp Happy". I discovered them at the rubber stamp expo a few years ago and they have all kinds of pop culture and unique item stamps. Unfortunately they are a very small company and don't have a website, so I have to stock up when I see them at the expo.

I stamped out the soup cans in black craft ink and then embossed with clear powder to give them a little dimension. I cut them out and popped them up on dimensionals.
For the background I sponged Taken with Teal, So Saffron, Certainly Celery and Rose Red. I was inspired to make this card after I saw a bag in the $1 store that looked just like it.

The sentiment is my favorite part of this card! Would you expect anything less from that sassy Monica at Hambo?! I've had this stamp for awhile now and have been waiting for someone to get sick so I could use it! Isn't that terrible?!