I'm Baaaack!

I think I'll start off with my card, then save the Weekend Update for last so those who don't want to stick around can just quietly bow out! This is another one of my prototype Christmas cards. If you don't know, I have handmade all my Christmas cards since I started stamping, and also make them for my mother. Well, I've sort of set the bar and now everyone wants a hand coloured card! YIKES! And then that friend tells two more friends and then they want a card too so now I am making about 70 cards to meet the demand! That means I'm always looking for something that is not tooooo time consuming....remember I DO have a full time job!


Stamping Bella's Holly in a Jar is one of my 'definite maybe' cards for this year. I love it....it is simple, yet festive and has just a bit of bling. All required elements! I will certainly be making a few of these for my eclectic stash this year! I coloured it with copics and added some glitter, clear glaze pen on the berries and a couple rows of ranger glossy accents to highlight the rims of the jar. The holly leaves and brad is from MM and I bought the package a couple years ago. I likely won't be able to find them again so may have to substitute a leafy punch for my stash cards but who's gonna look at those anyway ;)!

Now for the Weekend Update...just like SNL! Yup, I'm back from my whirlwind weekend in Toronto. Drove up Friday after work (well, i did wangle a deal with my boss to let me leave early) and met Paula at the Hilton. Surprisingly, I found out she was also stuck in the same traffic as I was on the QEW and only about 10 cars behind me. We got our room, changed, walked around a bit and landed ourselves at Red Lobster for dinner. Paula ACTUALLY coloured when we got back to our room, not me, I flopped on the bed and let the work week silently leak outta me. It is my Friday night ritual....do nothing but chill out and let myself detox from the work week.

Got up early the next day to head to the festival. Paula tried to tap into a couple of free wireless sites with her iTouch on the way, but me....I was in my glory with my new iPhone with anywhere anytime access! SO HAPPY! We met Emily and Ryan just outside the entrance and I got my 'exhibitors' tag and headed to our booth. It was a small cozy booth and I saw some familiar faces (you know who you are...love you ladies!) and met some new ones! The booth was all pretty in white and pink with many samples (including many from yours truly) hanging around. Paula and I took turns at the demo table and walked the show when we were not at the table. Just way tooooo much fun. I came home with some new rubber too so by next week I should have some previews of the new release to show you! All I can say is they are soooooooooooo cute!!!!!!!!!!!!! Along with the new release I also spotted some new Lulu's and even a new Bella! And can you believe I forgot to snatch my fav Lulu of the bunch!!!!!!!!!!! Do you know what that means? It means i must place an order! Oh so sad....NOT!

After the show we went for some dinner then I met Mark at hotel #2 because he was running the Toronto Good Life Marathon Sunday morning. Usually I see him off at the start, but for this race the runners were bused up to North York and they ran their way almost down to the lake and then back up to Queens Park so I was only able to see him at the finish. Now the good wife that I am, did get up at some weird early hour to take a pic of our Chatham group before they left the hotel. From left to right is Mark, Heather, Jenni and Mike. I wished them all luck and said I'd see them at the finish. That left me with a good chunk of the morning to chill and relax some more, but before heading to the finish line I got myself a car charger for the iPhone anticipating catching up on blogs on the way home. No such luck, Mark's leg cramped up pretty bad so I was stuck driving home! He still came in at 4 hours, even with injury so that was pretty impressive! Now me, I don't even walk the stairs to my second floor office! The only exercise this bod sees is in my right hand when I'm colorin'...LOL!

So that's it folks, my weekend in a long drawn out nutshell! If you are still with me, don't forget to play along in this weeks challenge....anything flowers or nature and oh my, I have so many ideas but so little time! There are sooooooooooo many stamps that can be worked into this challenge there is no excuse not to play!

You deserve to be queen for the day!

This is THE perfect sentiment to go along with Felicity Whitelace. Isn't she all pretty in pink with the little bluebirds holding up her veil! Now that I look at it again I think I should have coloured that veil more translucent so it actually looks more like a veil instead of an attachment of her dress! Oh well, next time, but now you've got more ideas!

Actually, she is kinda reminiscent of me on my wedding day....LOL!...now i did NOT have bluebirds of happiness holding up my veil, but i did wear a very tailored but full skirted dress and I remember the photographer sitting me on a chair in my parents house and draping my dress over the arms of the chair to take a photograph. I seriously felt like a princess and to this day I still absolutely love my wedding gown and bouquet of fresh white roses, orchids and freshia. It was the late 80's, just after Diana married Prince Charles and I wanted a huge kick-butt bouquet that trailed to the floor just like hers! I still remember it being very heavy, GORJUS and fragrant! Ah, the memories!

Anyhow, I finished this card by cutting her out with my nesties and mounting her on some Memory Box paper. I added glitter and liquid pearls to her dress (to represent pearls!) but I wanted MORE glitter so used the curly leafy flourish stamped in an essential glue pad and sprinkled with glitter. She was coloured with prismacolor pencils and gamsol because I wanted a soft open airly look to her dress that I find difficult to do with copics.

I hope you like her!

Our challenge this week over at Stamping Bella is another theme....flowers/nature....oh! I have so many ideas and so little time! And if you are gonna be at the Creative Festival on Saturday I'll see ya there! FOUR MORE SLEEPS!

It's a girl thing

Seriously folks, could you ever see a couple of guys doing this? LOL! Not in my house that's for sure. Aren't they the sweetest!

I love the Lulu's and these dolls are called Ruby and Rose. When I first saw them my initial reaction was that there was a LOT of black and how am I gonna color them. But now that I have done a couple my entire view has changed. They are super easy to color and I enhance the black areas with my black copic marker. It gives a nice velvety finish and the perfect alternative if you don't want to use the black glaze pen. I also like to use nice deep rich colors on them and that makes them the perfect image for copic markers.

colors used:
E0000,000, 00, 11
R01, 22, 32, 81, 83, 85, 89, 35, 37
Y00, 15, E27, BLACK

IF I were to part with this card (LOL!) I'd have to hand deliver it or put it in a bubble mailer because I incorporated two of my fav things that I lifted off two of my fav stampers. The button with bow is somewhat of a trademark on Joanne's cards and I'm always admiring her gigantic bows, and the sentiment on the cardstock ribbon can often be seen on Paula's cards. I tell ya, our Bellarific Babes are the best and all of them are my go-to gals when I need some inspiration.

Now for some personal updates...yesterday I finally caved and got an iPhone 3GS...OMG, can you actually be in love with a piece of hardware! Well, I can...I'm a bit of a gadget freak and if it's out there and if it's hot I gotta have it. I have been pining over these since they came out but I could not justify the price in Canada. I've had an iTouch since they were introduced and do love it, but to get to the net or email I was always in search of some wireless network to tap into! NOT ANY MORE! With my phone I am ALWAYS connected! Soo excited! Yesterday we were playing with it and I can create a voice recorded message and then email it....hahahaha....I told the boys I was gonna regularly send them a message saying "this is your mother! this is your mother! stay out of trouble!"....hahaha!

Finally, if you have not read Emily's blog lately, Paula and I will be at the Creative Festival in Toronto on Saturday. I'm a long time fan of this show and have been attending on and off for almost 20 years. There is something for everyone and covers every craft imaginable. Stamping Bella is setting up a booth and Paula and I will be there all day Saturday doing make and takes and answering any and all of your questions! AND...if the sheer presence of Paula and I isn't enough to temp you (LOL!!!!!) Emily will be selling a pre-release of her new line!!! Now THAT has to be a good reason to come. I'm soooo excited!

It is Bellarific Saturday!

It is a good day today folks....I am well on the mend and feeling much better and thanks for all your well wishes! I don't get sick like this too often so I like to take the opportunity to whine about it when it hits me! LOL! I still have a good cough and lingering head cold but the worst is thankfully behind me!

The other good thing going on is that my boys are home from school for the Canadian Thanksgiving weekend! WHOOOHOOO! For my American friends, the Canadian Thanksgiving is a MUCH lower key event than what goes on in my neighboring country. There are no big deal football games and no pre-Christmas sales or anything like that. It generally involves just a turkey or ham dinner with family and/or friends. This weekend, because of a whole lot of travel getting the boys home and back, the family dinner will consist of just the four of us. That's okay though, after not seeing them for a month I am looking forward to some quiet family time just to catch up on what has been going on and 'pry' into how school is going. (Ya, I'm a snoop) And even though I did not shed tears when they left does not mean I am not happy to have them home, but just for a FEW days...LOL!


Okay, now that illness and holidays are out of the way I'll get on to this weeks Bellarific 'Saturday'. Our theme this week was anything baby! Oh BABY, I've had this idea in my head ever since the ketto clothes line was introduced and I'm so glad I kept it under wraps so I could use it today. Let me tell ya, I created SEVERAL ketto clothes lines with various articles on it until I came up with this one. Folks, the possibilities are ENDLESS! I decided to go with pink! Having raised two boys I always look forward to making something pink so on this card I used two of the images from Ketto's babylingerie set. Then I created a 'sign' with the think pink sentiment using one of my long rectangular nesties and a scrap piece of paper for the stick.

But it didn't stop there! I thought what about making some thank you cards! What a nice gift this would be for a new mom to give her a cutie patootie card with some co-ordinating thank you cards she could use! These are super fast and easy to do up! I stamped an image from the Ketto Babyfood and Bottles set on an inchie and colored them with copics. The copics work FABULOUSLY on the inchies! Then I simply mounted them with some co-ordinating scraps of paper onto a 4" square card and done! They were fast and easy and you could whip up a dozen or so in no time at all. AND, if you did not know this, Stamping Bella sells envelopes to fit a 4" square card here!

Gosh, if only my friends were still in the baby making years of their life I would SOOOO be making these for them...oh well, too late for them, but maybe grandkids! YIKES!!!!!!!!!!! NOT YET!!!!!!!!!!! We aren't QUITE that old....or I AM not that old!

Have a nice weekend everyone....for me, tomorrow I'm cooking a turkey!

More Christmas!

It's a good think I had this one coloured up, otherwise I might have been MIA for a while. I have been one sick babe these past couple days...i think I've slept 40 of the last 48 hours. I'm not a pretty sight right now! My parents were over yesterday and my mom brought me some potato soup as well as a greek spinach pie and a lasagna so I don't have to worry about cooking for the next few days. As much as I hate being sick, I am relishing in the extra rest.


This is an image that some of the ladies in the Toronto class may have gotten a sneak peek of on Saturday. I was having a copic block one night last week so I pulled out my pencils to bring Stella needs a prezzie to life. I love my copics with their rich bright color, but I also love my pencils to get the soft glow that you can't do with copics. I finished her up the other day, fortunately before I got too sick, and added some stitching, glitter and clear glaze pen to the stripes on the presents. It is amazing what a bit of glitter will do! I coloured her to match a sheet from the Cosmo Cricket Jolly by Golley collection. I think that is what gave me the copic meltdown....the cosmo cricket paper is very soft and muted and it takes some work to achieve that soft muted look with copics.....lots of greys would have been needed and I guess I wasn't in the mood. I also used the happy holidays sentiment and mounted BOTH the sentiment and image on the block before stamping. If your block is big enough, it is much easier to get both lined up evenly that way.

Well ladies, that's it for today....I'm heading back to the sofa under the blanket. It is a clear indication that I am sick when I cancel my hair appointment! YIKES! I may have to stay home for a few more days until she is able to squeeze me in.

Now don't forget to play along in this weeks challenge over at the Stamping Bella Blog. We have been given some creative freedom with no sketch and have to make a card with a baby theme! I LOVE making baby cards so we'll see ya Friday with what I come up with.

WOWZER...what a day!

In all my excitement about my classes at Bella Central I almost forgot about my regularly scheduled Sunday post! I do have something coloured up, really I do, but I just haven't found time to mount it yet. I should get to that by Wednesday though so don't go too far!

Toronto was a blast....that little store was just BURSTING at the seams....I saw some returning faces and got to meet some new ones and came home with a big bag of goodies. I caved and bought the Bella Bindah's. After seeing Paula's here, I was just like a kid and HAD to have them too. Seriously, if you have not seen these in real life, you don't know what you are missing...they are STUNNING, the page fillers are nice heavy super clear plastic and those flaps keep everything nice and tidy. I like tidy, and I like my stuff organized. I'm not saying it always IS organized, but one day I'd like it that way.

Tonight I'm gonna show you one of the cards we did in class and it is another one of the new releases from the Green Bean Baby line. Those little (or big!) faces are a dream to color for someone like me who loves to color faces. Little Coco with her cupcake is as cute as can be. Because this was a class card I kept the copics to a minimum so this is a nice easy project for those who want to get started, or don't want to spend a zillion hours coloring like I usually do! LOL! Don't get me wrong, I'm not whining...the time I spend colouring is a true labor of love.

The paper I used here is October Afternoon from the Roadmap collection and I really like the red and turqoise combo with the crisp white paper, not to mention the polka dots and stripes! Gosh, I left this card at the boo-tique but I may have to color up another one just for me.

Copics used:
E0000, 000, 00, 11
R20, 24, 29
E30, 41, 43, C0, 1
Y000, BG01, 05

Have a nice evening, what's left of it. Me, I'll be hitting the pillow very soon!

Are you Kimmie Reid?

I'm Lindabella!

LOL! That is how I met Kimmie at the Stamping Expo in Novi Michigan this past summer. I thought if I said I was Linda Heavens, she would think....ya so...whatever! But throwing that 'bella' at the end of my name solidified my identity! HaHa! Well, we chatted, we gazed at some of Paula's cards and she was really sweet and so easy talk to even for a quiet gal like me. Yes, I am kinda quiet and shy around peeps I don't know too well.

Well, after our initial meeting I emailed her and said we were having a stamping day at my place with Paula and the Michigan gals and a couple local gals and she was more than welcome to join in since as luck would have it, she only lives about an hour away. Well, she not only came but she came with RUBBAH! HER OWN RUBBAH! Yes, Kimmie is now the proud owner of Kraftin Kimmie Stamps and I am thrilled to be part of her PREMIER BLOG HOP!

Check out that look in her eyes! Isn't she saying...why are you dressing me like this when I could be playing with my frogs! Okay...gonna digress!....beware, it's a story coming!...I LOVED frogs as a child and i remember when we went up north as a family when I was young and I would catch a frog.....like a BIG one to bring home....i would make a little house for it, nurture it, feed it bugs and stroke it like it was my own child. Well, one morning I went outside to check on my frog and it was gone. I was horrified! My parents tried to console me, but then a few days later I found my frog....it committed suicide on a rose bush and it was all dried out hanging from its lower jowl.....OMG....the tears that flowed on that day! Lesson learned.......nevah take an animal from its natural habitat! I nevah caught a frog and brought it home after that day. (but I would catch tadpoles, bring them home, watch them turn into baby frogs and then release them back into the creek where i found them!)

Sorry for the digression, just had to share (be nice to frogs)...back to the card!



This little cutie is named Lillith and the frog sitting at her feet is a separate image that comes along with her. I stamped the frog first, masked it, then stamped Lillith. She was colored with the following copic markers:
E0000, 000, 00, 11
BG0000, 000, 01, 13, 15, 93, 96
RV10, 11, 29, 32, 34, R20
Y000, 11, YG05, 11, 17
E41, 43, 29, 31, 33, 35, 37
N3, 4

If you want to see more of Kimmie`s images and start from the beginning, start here on Kimmie's blog, and if you are just hopping along you will want to head on over to see what Elaine has in store for ya next.

Best of luck in your new venture Kimmie, there can never be enough rubber in this world!

Good Morning Sistahs

I really wanted to say GOOOOD MORNING VIETNAM!!!!!!!!!....but I thought maybe not...especially because I live in Canada and it is highly unlikely I have any readers in Vietnam.

Alright, its a little early and I don't think I have totally waken up yet. It is an exciting Bellarific Friday today because we have a new babe....and she is PHENOMINAL! Her name is Jeanie Witmer, otherwise know as The Spotted Chick. I LOVE LOVE LOVE her cards and I know you will to.


The Bellarific challenge this week was to make a card with a Halloween of Fall theme. Since I recently used my only two Halloween images I pulled out Chefabella cooking her Turkey and Apple Pie. I love the Basic Grey Indian Summer paper and couldn't resist using it here. Do you all know that it is Thanksgiving here in Canada next week. Our boys will be coming home for the weekend...geeze I think I'd better do groceries....I don't think we have been to the grocery store since they left!

I colored her with my copics, added a bit of shading around her with my prismacolor pencils and blended it out with gamsol. I left the nestie in place and sponged the edge with some Versacolor Bisque ink (another one of my favs!). You'll also notice I attempted some stitching again. I seem to learn a lesson on paper stitching every time I try it. On this card it was 1) don't use my edging foot on tight curves....it doesn't do very well on the curves and I'd be better off using a foot that allows me to see the line I want to stitch on (do you know I have about 40 different feet for my Bernina!), and 2) if you really make a mess on one curve, it will dictate where you put the bow! LOL!

Copics used on this card:
E000, 00, 11, 31, 33, 35
E44, 47, 49, 50, 51
E42, 43, RV11, 32, 34, 69

Finally, ONE MORE SLEEP! and I'll be at Bella Central tomorrow....CANNOT WAIT to see everyone again. It is really the happiest place on earth!