Happy Birthday to ME!

YUP...today is my birthday and I am not at all afraid to say that I am a whopping 53 years old....you know what that means...one year closer to retirement. My g'friend dreaded turning 49 this year and I say...hey it's all good! Another birthday is just a good excuse to get myself something I don't really need. This year I think it is going to be that Singer 160th anniversary sewing machine that Paula talked about here. She sent me a pic and over the weekend I slipped in front of my hubby and said in my sweetest voice....don't you think I need one of these for my birthday? When you throw in the 'B' word how can he possibly say no...not that he ever would...but it just makes the 'game' more fun.

Speaking of the weekend, we were back on 'tour' with Dave Matthews and on the way home we realized we drove around the entire shore line of Lake Erie! We started in Chatham and drove east to Toronto. Dave played to the crowd there for sure belting out all of the fan favourites. Then we headed east crossing into the US in Buffalo, NY en route to Cayahoga Falls, Ohio. A very different crowd there, much older and the set list was very eclectic and so different than the night before. Blossom Music Center is a beautiful venue tucked away in a heavily wooded area. It really is a peaceful place and if I were ever temped to park my butt on the grass somewhere, that would certainly be the place I would do it. From there we headed back to Chatham by way of Detroit! An entire loop of Lake Erie!

In honour of my birthday, it is only fitting that I colour up a birthday card! This is Stamping Bella's Ramona loves cake. Me and cake, not so much...if I'm gonna indulge I'd much rather eat an entire bag of potato chips or some really good keilbasa...yes, I am more salty than sweet.

At the risk of repeating myself, she was stamped on bella's BESTEST paper and coloured with copic markers, topped up with some prismacolor pencils. To make that cake extra yummy, I added some 'icing' with liquid applique. Don't forget about our masculine challenge this week and be sure to keep checking out the sneak peeks over at bloggabella.

As I always do, I'll leave you with a couple pics from the weekend....

Dave rocks Toronto

inside Blossom Music Center - LOVE it...reminds me of an old wooden rollercoaster

Blossom, view from the lawn.

And that's it! For the non-Dave fans...I'll be giving you a break because we don't have another 'date' until he plays DTE in July.

Bench Buddies

Have you been enjoying the little sneak peeks that are going on over at Bloggabella? Well how 'bout you see something done up in colour! This is Belinda and Bernadette, the Bench Buddies!

I am not kidding when I say that one on the left reminds me SO much of my friend Colleen. If you have been around for a while, you might know her as my Vegas partner in crime. And when you're sitting next to her it won't be long before one arm is wrapped around your neck and the other is holding out her camera to snap a picture. Just to prove my point...and you can see she is much better at posing for these shots than I am!

Back to the card, as always I stamped it on bella's BESTEST paper and coloured these gals up with copic markers...a LOT of markers... Then I used pencil for the tufts of grass and shading around the image. You can't really see in the picture, but Colleen loves bling so I added some black spica pen to her belt. Finally some ultra fine flower soft added a bit of texture and colour to the grass.

We all know how Emily likes to surprise us so I'm not exactly sure WHEN these will be available, but you can be sure that once she starts revealing those sneak peeks it won't be long.

Twirly Birds

Happy Bellarific Friday, and just plain old HAPPY FRIDAY works too! I can't believe how busy my days are after a week vacation.

But never too busy to relax and immerse myself into some colouring. These are Stamping Bella's Twirly Birds by Vicki Boutin. Sentiment comes from Jane Davenport's Birdie Jane.

I may have mentioned that I scored the entire set of distress markers when I was at Kitchener's scrapfest and that is what I decided to use on these little birds. Start small I say! For you local shoppers did you know you can get them at Pickle...and you online shoppers can pick them up at Stamping Bella. Do I like them....OH YA! I used a smooth water colour paper and just a bit of ink directly on the image and then blended it out with a watercolor brush. Easy peasy! Then I finished them up with bit of pencil for highlights and shadows and sponged the blank areas with versamagic chalk ink. For a first try, I was pretty pleased with the result and can't wait to experiment more with these markers.

Next week our challenge is all about the men in our lives. So you got it, make something masculine!!!! I've got an idea in my head already and it won't be the typical image you might think for a 'guy' card...but I'll have a perfectly good reason why I chose it! I'm so looking forward to getting it done I just may work on it tonight!

That's it folks...not much else to blab about today.

On the road again

No card today so if you are here for that you might want to come back in a couple days. However, if you are even remotely interested in my non-crafting adventures you can stick around because this is a TOTAL NON-CRAFTY post.
 

You might recall last week I was taking a hiatus from my blog and that is because hubby and I were 'on tour' with one of our mutual fav bands Dave Matthews. We do have musical interests aside from Dave that don't really cross paths but this is one artist that we both enjoy so we take advantage of it and venture off to cities we might not otherwise visit.

This trip took us to Houston, Dallas, Atlanta and Charlotte NC. Hubby spends a good deal of time working in Houston but this concert was in an area called the Woodlands which is a distance from his office in a beautiful tree lined neighborhood with an outdoor mall...there was even a Tiffany's there which sadly I didn't get to.

 

The first night i met my cousin Vinney, okay, so he is not my cousin but his name is Vinney and we had the best time sitting with him. I will never forget his face and throwing his arms up in the air hugging us when Dave played one of of the crowd favorites. 

While Vinney was younger than us we did meet another couple sitting near us who were more our age and they were from just outside of New Orleans.  He is an engineer by trade but plays drums in a band as a side hobby....obviously Carter is his guy and he never took his binoculars off of him.

 

The next day we head to Dallas for concert #2 and shock of shocks we sat behind the New Orleans couple and ran into cousin Vinney in the crowd.  See, despite what some of my friends might think, we are NOT the only people who 'follow' Dave from concert to concert.

Before heading to concert #3 in Atlanta we spent an extra day in Dallas to take in some sights. First on the list HAD to be the JFK Memorial in the old Texas book depository, the grassy knoll and the spot where JFK was assasinated. Ya, that is hubby standing on the 'x' where Kennedy took the second bullet to the head. I was just over 4yrs old when it happened and although I don't recall the events of the day I do vaguely remember the funeral. The thing that struck me most about the exhibit is how security has changed in the 48 years since his tragic death.

Our second tour of the day was at Cowboy Stadium. Cousin Vinney told me that Dallas was one rich city and if this stadium is any indication of that, he is bang on! This place makes Ford Field in Detroit look like a dump and I thought Ford Field was pretty nice. Of course, that is speaking from someone who does not like football at all...(and even after the tour, I still think that Ford Field is still pretty nice) For any of you Cowboy fans out there you might appreciate this pic of hubby taking the players walk out onto the field. He really liked this pic...must be a guy thing.

Me, I was more smitten with my lace scarf and swarovski studded belt that I purchased at Wild Bill's Western wear

Now we were off to Atlanta. Our flight was delayed due to weather and when we finally got there Hertz rented more cars than they had so another delay. When we finally got to our hotel we were tired and found a pub that we thought we be nice and quiet but it ended up being karaoke night! Free entertainment!

We didn't have much time there but did manage to get to the Georgia Aquarium. The huge aquarium was quite impressive, but overall I think I like the Shedd in Chicago better.

 Finally, I just can't leave without posting a couple of my fav concert pics....see ya in Toronto Dave!

Keep calm, and eat a cupcake

Oh how I love that sentiment that comes with Stamping Bella's Flynn needs a cupcake! I even think I know who might get this card.

I actually coloured her up a couple weeks ago, but didn't overly love the papers I picked out so I set it aside. Then our sketch challenge came along, and I had this piece of green check paper sitting on the table next to Flynn when the stars aligned and everything came together for me! Gotta love those random things that just happen sometimes.

To nobody's surprise, I stamped her on bella's BESTEST paper and coloured her up with the following copic markers:

E000, 00, 21, 11, RV000, 00, 11

R21, 24, 29, 39, YG01, G43, 46

YR30, E50, 51, 31, Y23, 26 (all on the hair)

We've got a colour challenge for next week and I'm pretty sure it WILL be a challenge for many....YELLOW, BLUE and BLACK....hmmmm....can't wait to see what everyone does with this one!

Speaking of next week...this babe will be taking a blogging break for a week....don't miss me too much, okay!

Linda.



Birds on a Wire

A little something different today...very Tim-like, very masculine, very artsy. I started with Stamping Bella's Journal your ART out THINKING BIRDS as my inspiration and stamped them with VersaMark ink onto some heavy weight smooth surface paper

Then using the tip of a small straw that I cut on an angle I picked up some Indian Corn embossing powder and carefully sprinkled just the heads of the birds, then I added detail black to the remainder of the bodies and tapped the paper from underneath to spread out the powder and cover all areas. The remaining powder was discarded onto a scrap piece of paper for later use.

Then I used a VersaMark pen/marker and inked over the birds again and repeated the process, except this time for the heads I used the discarded embossing powder from the first step, then added black detail again. I repeated this process one more time, and where I thought it needed it, I did it again. This is a closeup look. It almost looks enameled with the three layers of embossing powder. You can click on the image for a larger view....but trust me, it is A VERY COOL blend of black, bronze, with specs of white.

Once the embossed images were totally cooled and set, I sponged on distress inks....antique linen, rusty hinge, vintage photo and walnut stain. Using vintage photo I stamped the 'weeds' (a Tim Holtz stamp) in the background because I thought it looked too plain otherwise.

For the background piece I started with a piece of smooth ivory cardstock and again sponged on some antique linen, rusty hinge and vintage photo. Then I ran the piece thru my Vagabond with, yes, a Tim Holtz embossing folder and sponged on some walnut stain onto the raised portions of the result.

Because the embossed background was too wide for my focal image, I cut it and removed about a 1/4" then repieced it. The ribbon hides the seam...pretty brilliant eh! I do have good ideas sometimes!

Well, that is it about it....I mounted it up with a few layers and I think this is a PERFECT masculine card! If you are interested in more of my masculine cards, click on the 'masculine' label below, or the masculine label in my sidebar. I really do try to label my cards into categories, especially when I post Christmas or Masculine cards.

That's it! Pretty simple actually and it almost took me as long to write this post as it did to make the card! But don't tell the 'man' who eventally gets this card, let him think it took you/me HOURS to complete! We girls have to keep our secrets!

Linda.

Happy Mother's Day!

Well all you Mom's out there, what did you do today? Me, I putzed around in my yard, harvested more moss, put together a couple cards, cooked supper (yes, a mom's day never ends!) and tended to a nasty bite on the back of my leg behind my knee. I got bit by something yesterday which I think was a mosquito because it itched (but never hurt), and today it is swelling like crazy and it's hot and seeping at the bite mark. I still am pretty sure it was a mosquito because over the past two/three years I have been getting more and more sensitive to mosquito bites....I have several scars on my legs to prove it!

Nasty bugs aside, I want to show you the card I made for my Mom this year. She is a pie baker extraordinaire and when I saw this Karen Lockhart stamp last year I just knew that I had to make it for her.

I kept everything quite simple with no ribbons or bows, just a bit of glitter and the colour was carefully chosen to match her kitchen in warm gold tones. I even added some hand drawn brick to mimic the outside of their house.  All very personalized and I know she loved it! She even pots geraniums on her deck in the summer. Everything about this image just screams everything wonderful about my Mom.

In other 'family' related things...you remember I mentioned I bought iPhones for the family....well this is the card I got from my boys today....too funny! It made giving them those phones all worth it!

Finally, I may (or maybe not) have mentioned that I have been obsessed with moss lately. Well this is what I have been busy doing for the last three weekends...harvesting and transplanting moss! Taking it from the from the front of the house, which will get a makeover in the next few weeks, and moving it to the side of my house between the bricks in the sidewalk. Moss naturally grows there, however the gaps had gotten so large and the lack of soil between them made it impossible to grow moss. So I scraped out all the large pieces of mulch and stone between the bricks, filled it in with soil and transplanted moss bit by bit from the front of the house to the gaps between the bricks. In a short time, with a bit of water and some cool nights I should have a wonderful moss filled brick sidewalk!

Hoping all you ladies out there had as wonderful a Mother's Day as I did, doing the things that make you feel happy and fulfilled!

Berry Flynn

I know I'm gonna sound like a broken record, but....holy mackerel batman, I'M TIRED! It seems that since I got home from Chicago every night and weekend has been busy with something...and that doesn't even include the things that make me happy like colouring or planting moss between my bricks in the sidewalk to make it look all martha-ish. (ya, even though she is a criminal, I'm a closet Martha Stewart fan....can't help it...the woman has good taste)

The latest glitch in my free time is that I moved my boys off their blackberry plans with Telus and onto a family plan with my carrier, Rogers....not only that....I got iPhones for the entire fam and upgraded mine! How's that for a good mom! That's what I told them...I was a good mom and got everyone (including the hubby) an iPhone for mother's day! I would pretty much say, they owe me BIG! The downside to all of it is that I was the only iPhone savvy user...the kids picked up on it quickly, but hubs needs some tech support. Fortunately he spends a lot of time on my iPad so for may things I can just say...It's JUST like the iPad!!!!!!

In the midst of all this havoc I DID manage to get in some ME time and coloured my little fingers off with a season of Criminal Minds playing in the background. Stamping Bella's Flynn's BERRY happy day is just ONE of the three that got inky.

YES...she was stamped on bella's BESTEST paper and coloured up with copic markers and prismacolor pencils....here are the markers I used:

E000, 00, 21, 11, RV0000, 11
R21, 24, 29, 39, YG01, G43, 46
YR30, E50, 51, 31, Y23, 26 (hair)

Next week our challenge is back to one of our classic timeless sketches donated by fellow babe and sketch princess Ebru. But until then...check in on Emily's blog, to see this week's entries and comment and/or submit a card to Em for a chance at some bella buckaroonies!

Good luck with the sketch and happy stamping!