Celebrate with Cake/MOJO433

Good Morning everyone or afternoon if your not on the West coast! I hope your day has been all that you hoped it would be so far.  I intended to have this card and post up yesterday after noon, but time got away from  me.

We had another house showing and I needed to make sure everything was neat and tidy.  I'll be so happy when we have a Sale Pending sign out. I'm sure some of you have gone through this and know how stressful it can be some days.  We did have a couple who really loved the place, but unfortunately, could not get financing. I really felt sad for them, but hopefully they will find another house within their budget.

Here is a quick Birthday Card that I created using the MOJO Monday433 sketch. This card will be going out to my DIL in Maine for her birthday in March. I used SU's Birthday Bouquet DSP and an older Sale-A-Bration stamp set, Big Day.  I embossed the Blushing Bride piece using the Hearts folder (ret) and cut the small hearts from the framelits, Hearts a Flutter (ret) and added some small Mossy Meadow buttons.

That's it for today. I'm off to whip up a card or two. Have a wonderful day and stay CRAFTY!

Crafty Hugs,
BernieB

Sympathy Cards

Hello everyone. I hope your weekend was wonderful and you had a chance to do something CRAFTY!

I did. I was able to work on some Sympathy Cards on Sunday afternoon.  A woman at church heads up a Prayer, Care and Visitation outreach and occasionally needs Sympathy and Get Well cards. So I was on a mission to bless the ministry with some.

This was a little bit of a challenge for me, since I wanted to keep them one layered.  As most of use know, too many layers and embellishments cost more to mail. I certainly wanted to make them go regular 1st. Class Mail to keep the cost down. I think I succeeded.  What do you think? 

The cards I'm posting today are Sympathy cards. I will bee making another 4 or more as the weeks go by. I did use "Thinking of You" on several of them, but they will have a sympathy sentiment inside.

I actually used Mossy Meadow ink on the tree and sentiment, but it did not show up. :0(

The flowers were colored using Pool Party ink and a Blender Pen

I used some faux "wink of stella" on the flowers and foliage.

I used the one of the Gorgeous Grunge stamps for the splatter.

That's about it for today.  I'm going to hopefully, create some Get Well cards today so I can hand them off tomorrow to Mona the coordinator of the outreach.

A confession.  I'm taking a big step of faith here giving these cards to Mona. I'm usually okay sending my family and some friends my cards, but I don't usually share them with people I don't know. It's a lack of confidence on my part as a crafter. I am getting more comfortable with it, though. ;0)

Have a great day and as usual, go do something CRAFTY! 

Crafty Hugs,

BernieB

SU stamps:Serene Silhouettes,Wetlands,Gorgeous Grunge,Thoughts and Prayers#2,Bloom with Hope,Happy Watercolor. All papers and inks by SU.

Feeling Sentimental Birthday/ Seize the Birthday

Yesterday I created another birthday card.  This is for one of my sons whose birthday is in March.  I still have one more to make for my DIL who's several days after his. Our family has birthdays every month of the year, so I'll always be needing and making birthday cards!

I used the Seize the Birthday sketch to create the card . The black/cream paper and the main image, from Feeling Sentimental, are retired. I used the birthday sentiment from Crazy About You on the front and the sentiment on the inside is from, Fabulous Four.

I will be out and about today doing errands, so it looks like not much crafting today.(insert sad face) I hope you will be able to enjoy the evening and do something CRAFTY this weekend!

Crafty Hugs,
BernieB

*Very Vanilla CS, Basic Black CS,Bermuda Bay CS,Basic Metal Buttons

Happy Birthday to You/ RS#199

Hello everyone.  Today I'm posting another Birthday card that I made for one of my daughters who has a birthday in February.  There's nothing like getting a card made almost a month in advance!

I played along with the Retro Sketch challenge using one of my FREE Sale-A-Bration stamps, Perfect Pairings along with the SU stamp set and matching punch, Sprinkle of Life / Tree Builder Punch.  I really love the Sprinkles of Life set and don't know why I haven't used more.  I hope to remedy that during the next several months.

That's about it for me today.  I have several more cards to do before the week is out and hopefully, will post one by Saturday. Stay CRAFTY my friends!

Crafty Hugs,
BernieB


*SU colors used: Blushing Bride CS, Mint Macaroon, Whisper White,Crumb Cake, Primsode Petal Ink, Baked Brown Sugar Ink

Balloon Happy Birthday/MOJO432/Seize the Birthday

This card measures 5" x 5"

Today I was able to play along with MOJO#432 and Seize the Birthday . I was in need of a Birthday card for one of my older GD's and the sketch fit the bill for the papers and stamps I had in mind. 

The die cut balloons were cut using my Cricut Explore and Nate's ABC cartridge. I ran them through my Big Shot using the Perfect Polka Dots EF.  Adding bling to the sentiment and balloons, I felt, added a feminine touch. The balloon strings were stamped off with Basic Grey ink. I had seen this idea over on Pinterest and it worked perfectly.  Both the image and sentiment used were included in the May 2015 Paper Pumpkin monthly kit. 

That's about it for this post. I hope you can take some time out of your day to do something CRAFTY!

Crafty Hugs,

BernieB

Back and Ready to Create!

Well hello everyone! I hope 2016 is treating you well so far.

I've been MIA since December 16th! It's hard to believe that it has been that long. Below is an explanation for my absence and some photos. I'll try to make it short. :0)

I did get involved with finishing up Christmas Holiday cards and mailing extra packages before I was off for Boise on the 24th. We had a wonderful time visiting my oldest son and his family, but boy was Boise, ID COLD!!! I don't think it got above 18 degrees while we there.  My hubby and I headed out on December 30th. (insert sad face) and celebrated a quiet New Year in San Marcos at home.

But, the major reason for the absence was that I participated in fast. For the past 10 years I have started my New Year with 21 days of prayer and fasting. I was introduced to this at our church in North Carolina and have continued every year since. Our church here in S California also starts the new year the same way.  As I was seeking the Lord on how I would approach the fast this year, I felt I was to forgo my card making and Blog entries.( although, I made several cards to send to family members which I'll post here.) This would allow me more time to seek the Lord for His direction and wisdom for certain decisions I needed to make. I also included a Jewish Fast, which only included breakfast, dinner and skipping certain foods. I must say, it was a refreshing time and I have definitely have seen a difference in my walk with the Lord and answered prayer.

Birthday Cards

Here are the two Birthday cards I recently made. The one below was for my good friend and the other for one of my daughters.

On both cards I used SU's new DSP, Birthday Bouquet.  The cards were CASEd from  Stampin' Up. The one above from the new Occasions catalog and the tag card from an older Stampin Success.

Below are few photos taken during our Christmas holiday in Idaho

Snow for Christmas morning

My beautiful DIL, Susan and GD Esther

Amelia decided to make herself comfortable in the trunk

My son, Ross playing his fiddle for us

Esther testing out her new skates at the local rink

Well, that's about it for today's post.  I hope to be back "up and running" tomorrow playing along with some sketch and color challenge blogs.

Crafty Hugs,

BernieB

*Stamps: Flower Patch, Bloom with Hope, Butterfly Basics, Flower Fair Framelits Dies

Hi from S California

Just thought I would post today, even though I don't have a project to share. Like most of you, this time of year is busy.  Since I'm no longer a Stampin' Up! demo, there is no driving force to "drive" a business to "pay" for my crafting goodies by posting 3,4,5 times a week.  It's actually been a breath of fresh air!

I finally got all my out of state packages wrapped and mailed yesterday. YEAH!  I arrived at the PO about 8:45 am, waited for them to open the windows at 9. I am happy to report,  I was out by 9:15!  Of course, there was a long line behind me, but everyone seemed to be in a decent Holiday mood. The Post Office promised me they would be there by Christmas. I'm praying they will. Ah, there's nothing like procrastination this time of year!

I was so happy to have played along with Merry Monday and Christmas Card Challenges this past year, though.  It was nice to sit down and have almost all of my special Christmas cards made.  I hope I'll have the same drive come January 1st...  ;0)

I hope your preparations are done or close to being finished.  We won't be going to the East Coast this Christmas.We are visiting my oldest son and his family in Boise ,which we are excited about. It's always such a blessing to spend time with family, especially children and grandchildren.

Well I'm off to get ready to go to lunch with a friend.  I hope to be able to create sometime today and have a post or two up by the weekend.

Make it a great Wednesday and go do something CRAFTY!

Crafty Hugs'
BernieBee