Card Making for Beginners

So what did you all think of the cards yesterday? 

Did you try any for yourself?

Give it a go. Invite your best girlfriend over and while you visit throw together a couple of cards. You will be surprised at how quickly they go together.

Here are some I threw together while visiting with my sweet friend.

With boys are birthdays tend to get a bit "Wild and Crazy".

I thought these rub on monkeys would be great. They are from a zoo set but hey, this works too.

Just add a touch of ribbon for some texture and you are done.

I picked up a small pad of quotes and sayings for all occassions. One tip my sweet mother in law gave me was that any quote can be turned into a saying on a card. It was simple to just round the edges of some scraps of paper, add a ribbon and finish it all off with one of the sticker quotes. A note just to shay 'hey'.

She had also picked up some of this paper from the dollar store. I think it may have even been discounted- she IS one of the most frugal ladies I know after all!

I used my 3.5 inch scalloped punch and a smaller punch to make the sunflower then added a gem to the center. Simple but I think it is just right for a "just because" kind of note.

BTW: I purchased my large punch with a 50% coupon as a "splurge" to make Christmas tags but it has been handy and ooh, so fun for many other projects too. Go ahead "splurge" on one for yourself. You will love it.

A week of cards....

My mother in law has a nack for making simple yet lovely cards. 

Whenever you get one in the mail from her you can just feel the love that went into making that card.

It always brings a smile to your face- but more so when I discover yet another little secret of hers. 

A little snip here.

A bit of sparkle there.

Top it off with a witty note and 

VOILA, you have a "made especially for you" card from a sweet lady.

Now my cards on the other hand are...well... *ahem*....let's just say not quite that good. So this year I wanted to improve on that. It makes me feel good so I thought I could make some of my family feel good too. There are lots of times to send a quick Thank you note or a note to say "I'm thinking of you". I would have sent lots more had I already had some cards on hand.

I also realized of late that some people think Birthdays for adults are big deals too. They want to have the rest of us do special things for them as well. Apparently it IS a big deal to have your grandchildren wish you happy birthday....even if those boys say Happy Birthday and quickly pass the phone off.  

So mom, I have learned my lesson and plan on making a bigger deal of birthdays this year. After all, without Nov. 3 I wouldn't have a great mom like YOU!

Sooooo, I spent some time making cards of all sorts. Some Thank you's, Sympathy's, Birthdays, and Just because's. Now I have a basket full just waiting for the right moment to send a sweet note to someone special and let them know just how special they are to me.

This next week I will be sharing some of the cards I have made thus far. 

Now, I know there are lots of great, fantastic card makers out there. Mine won't be anything like those.
These cards are for those of us more simple minded ladies.

Not to mention those of us who only have so long before school is out and the kitchen has to reopen.

Let It Snow

The glitter words didn't work out the greatest but it was a fun experiment. Just a little pattern paper, snowflake stickers, glue and glitter.

Since I did this around Thanksgiving I just couldn't help the Gobble Gobble. 

I thought it was silly but it became Dear Hubby's favorite.

A remnant piece of brown, ric-rac, and turkey stickers.

One of my sweet nieces favorite color is orange. It's so crazy but she loves the color. I thought of her when I made this card. What better than a simple Happy Birthday sticker in ORANGE of course, of set with a rainbow ribbon.

See what I mean....

SIMPLE!
Now, I am ready to go. I'm sure I will have more elaborate ones soon, I'm having too much fun making them to not expand. ;-)

As for the insides.....I leave them blank most of the time. More room to write my personalized note just for them!

Have fun and let me know what you come up with!

Craft room Reveal!!

I am so excited to finally be able to show you this!

Remember this....

Yeah, kinda rough. It took all my time through November (thus the reason for no posts) but it was worth it.

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Yep! That is my finished guest/craft room. Ahhhh, it feels good. We worked so hard to finish this. My dear hubby endulges me enough to understand my need for a personal retreat. Not to mention somewhere to focus my creative juices. Now I can retreat to my corner of the world anytime I feel the need.

I was worried about the bright yellow but I have grown to love it. It is bright and cheery- perfect for a basement room. I pledged to have one room of my house that had no blue in it. I also wanted to coordinate with the bedspreads I already had. This is what I came up with.

Yellow, soft green and black and white.
I still need to do a few things, like paint the window trim, add decor to the walls and sew the curtains.
Right now they are just draped up there. I had to test them out. I am so visually oriented that it makes a difference for me to see something in place to picture the end result.

We were going to put a twin/full bunkbed in this room but it quickly filled up. We opted to switch the boys beds around and put one of the twin beds in here. This was we still have lots of room for visiting family and friends but I don't feel boxed in.

The queen bed set was a steal on KSL.com. It would probably look better in black with silver knobs but it is such a nice piece I can't bring myself to paint it- yet.

I used the bottom drawers of the dresser for my gift bags and tissue paper. Ahhh, storage. It's heavenly!

And this?! Well, THIS is my corner of the world. It is all mine, to craft, sew, ponder, create and refocus.

Come on over anytime. I have a chair waiting just for you! We can create and visit and have a dandy ol' time.

In the corner I have my "cutting corner". I still have some work to do here as well but it's a work in progress.

One of the things we planned for was to have enough closet space to put all my projects and supplies. I figured if it overflowed it was time to get something done or done-away-with.

I used a clear shoe organizer to put all my scissors in. I may put my stamps in it too....

On one side I have my fabric sorted by shades. This is mostly the sewing side of things.
Oh, and that middle row is full of projects to finish or start. All those plans I had but never got to before my room was finished. Now they are just waiting their turn.

The drawers were on sale at Michaels on Black Friday; 50% off plus another 25% off coupon. I grabbed a couple for myself then some for mom and mom-in-law Christmas gifts.

I organized all my stickers in mine.

The back wall holds misc craft supplies. Beads, jewerly making supplies, wood crafts, paint brushes, glue guns, balloons, gift wrapping, birthday party supplies... All sorts of fun stuff.

On the other side is my paper crafts. Ribbons, buttons, paper, punches, stamps, cutters...it's all there.

Above are boxes of pictures. Something yet to be organized.

I love everything about my room. We even managed to clean up the soon-to-be family room just outside my room so the boys can play Lego's and games while I craft. I can craft when I want and when I am done I just close the door. It will be nice too to hide things in when family comes to visit. No peaking!

Yep, just my little piece of heaven here on earth.

I LOVE IT!!!

Happy New Year!!

Can  you believe 2011 is in the past and 2012 is upon us? Where does time go?

Never mind, it IS one of my 4-letter words.

 T. I. M. E.

It ranks right up there with L. I. F. E. and a few others. ;-)

With littel boys that like to wake everyone, especially mom and dad, up at 6 AM we have long abandoned our New Years festivities. We might stay up till 12:00 after tucking the little ones in but not always. 6:00 comes awfully early and sleep is too precious to miss.

Instead of New Years traditions I thought I would share a couple of our Christmas traditions.

Each year we let off red balloons and sing Happy Birthday to the One whose birthday it is. This year we also sang Silent Night. My boys are great even though they HATE to sing.

They do love to watch the balloons float up.

Of course mom and dad rather enjoy it as well.

There is just something about watching that red balloon get smaller and smaller and smaller.

The boys thought we should let them go one at a time so we had a great trail of red balloons. It was cool to watch them get caught in the jet stream and suddenly start floating the other direction. We even had an airplane fly over head. Wonder what all those passengers thought to look out the window and see the balloons next to them. We are near the airport so the plane wasn't too high yet. Kinda made us chuckle. Imagine seeing a balloon from and airplane window, high in the sky.

Matthew LOVES this. I made sure to get extra balloons so that he could keep one for himself.

As evening approached we made sure Santa's reigndeer were taken care of too. We laid out a great buffet of oatmeal with red sprinkles for Rudolf and his friends.

Each year we give the boys a new pair of PJ's to open on Christmas Eve night. Mr. J thought he was ever so smart that he knew the plan. Little did he know mom threw a kink in his plan. Instead of PJ's they got comfy sweats. *UHH???*

Surprise! Mom still has a few tricks.

Of course Mr. M still got PJ's. He needed them and the sweats just fall down on him anyway. They just don't make clothes for the skinny kids anymore.

Then just before bed we set out our treat to Santa. Now I realize that Santa has to maintain his figure and all but we thought he would enjoy some homemade bread and jam for a change. We added the orange to take along his way and a glass o cold milk to wash it all down with.

I think it was a hit cuz the only think left in the morning was a few crumbs.

We had a great holiday season. I hope yours was too!

Merry Christmas!

Dear blogging friends. I know I have been a bit MIA of late. Life got a bit out of hand there for a while but never fear I have great plans just around the corner. I let things slip a bit in the name of sanity preservation. Then Pinterest caught my attention. Now the holidays. I decided to relax until after the first of the year then return with a vengence. I also had to revisit why I started blogging. 

Some of my dear friends suggested that I start. It was for family but since I had so many other things to share and few of my family followed my blog it became a journal of my creative outlet. I sough ideas to make my house a home on a budget; tips for cooking, cleaning, sewing, and most of all crafting. I began to wonder if I wanted to continue blogging. Then I realized I have missed it. 4growingboys has become so much a part of me. I also realized it gave me an excuse, a reason if you will, to complete the projects and ideas I pinned or found on other blogs. Last year I amazed myself after posting all the 52 projects I had completed through the year. It was fun but even more amazing to see what I had accomplished through the year. So with all these things in mind I have lots of plans for the coming year. 

First off, I will be starting my 52 projects again. It's a goal to focus on one project a week. Whether big or small. I will most likely be posting them each Monday. Keep an eye out for that. 

I am also planning to scrap 365 pages. I usually do several pages at a time but I want to average a page a day. I will post the pages I have done each week as well. My pages are often simple by comparison, I'd rather the pictures speak for themselves but maybe someone will be inspired as well. We love to look back through our albums. The boys ooh and aah over their own faces. I have fallen a bit behind so hopefully I will be able to catch up this year. I also have a bit of paper scrapping to finish before tying it all into the digital scrapping.

So whether it be sewing, paper crafting, home decor, cooking, gardening, or scrapbooking you are sure to find lots of ideas in the coming weeks and months. For those of my followers that have stayed with me- THANK YOU! It fills my bucket each day to see new comments from all of you. You make my day just by saying hi.

So, for now MERRY CHRISTMAS to all. May you have the peace of the season in your hearts and home. I love this time of year. It is truely the BEST time of the year. Enjoy your holiday season. Keep your family close and love them like there is no tomorrow. I send all of you my love. 

Join me in January for new and exciting things!