Courtney: You know what? I’ve acquiesced to your idea. Why don’t you just leave it alone?
Larry: Wow. Did you just use the word acquiesced in a sentence? Good job, babe.
Monthly Archive for March, 2006
CBT in this case would be everyone’s favorite chatty bank teller. I’ve posted about her once, here. Let me tell you, though, she’s so chatty that she deserves another (if not weekly) posting…so here goes…
Note to the chatty teller at the bank: I don’t care about your dog. Now don’t get me wrong, I love pets. I have two of my own. One of which is an adorable puppy. You know the difference between me and you? I don’t bother you with a million stories about how wonderful she is. That, I save for my blog. All I want you to do, especially on a Monday morning when I have four transactions, is to process my damn deposits. I don’t need to hear about how the dog likes to chase birds…how you just “don’t know what he’ll do if he ever catches one“…how your kids can’t feed the dog because he’s a little scary and a lot bigger than them…how you don’t ever take him on walks because he’s so strong…how when you tried to take him on a walk and he just pulled your arm out of your socket…how he broke his collar…how he was exhausted from your walk…or about how he stole some bacon from your breakfast table. While this may be interesting to…well to you…it’s not interesting to me. I just want to leave my deposit, get my change, cash my check, and be on my merry way. One last tip…when someone gives you a blank…vacant…nobody’s home…stare…they’re not listening to you…in fact, they’ve given up on pretending like they’re listening to you…that’s the prime time to zip your lip.
I realize Christmas was four months ago…and I therefore realize that the timing of this picture isn’t exactly ‘current’. Nonetheless, I feel the need to share it with you.
Take a close look…that’s Larry…sitting on Santa’s lap…in the grocery store…it was taken this past Christmas. The reason behind the photo? Whenever I send him to the store to get something, he always brings back stuff we don’t need. Diet Coke. Peeps. M&Ms. Cookies. This is why I rarely ask him to go to the store. If he goes for one thing, he comes back with three or four extra things. Things that we can do without. Well, one day in December I sent him to the store (I can’t even remember what for, now)…and he saw Santa. He asked if he could get his picture taken…with Santa…Mrs. Claus…oh and can the elf be in the picture, too? He apparently told them that he was getting the picture because his wife always yells at him for getting stuff at the store that we don’t need. They apparently thought that was funny. Me? Not so much. I think that’s the last time I sent him to the store by himself…wait a minute…maybe that’s his plan…
In the big Idea Book & Catalog there are clear checkbook covers…and they are way cool! You can just stamp and/or decorate a piece of cardstock, slip it in the clear cover, and you have a fabulous (and personalized) checkbook cover! It makes me happy to pay bills because that means I get to look at my cool checkbook cover. *Please note that this is the point at which I am falling out of my chair laughing hysterically at the absurdity of being happy about paying bills*. Okay, so they don’t make you deliriously happy about paying bills…but they are fun!
They’re not all that expensive, and you actually get two in the package…perfect to make one for yourself and a friend! The other awesome thing about having a handmade checkbook cover is that when I get tired of the one I have, I simply stamp a new one, and I’m good to go! That’s precisely what happened a few days ago…I got bored with the one I had had for the past six months, so I got to workin’ on a new one. Here it is:
Even though there’s no stamping involved, I think this turned out very cute and quite ’spring-like’. I used some leftover pieces parts from the Island Blossoms Simply Scrappin’ Kit (Level One Hostess). Let me say, I love love love these scrappin’ kits! I made a 25 page 6×6 book, several cards, and this checkbook cover with one kit…and I still have more stickers and a few 6×6 sheets of the designer printed paper. What a deal! The colors I used are: Tempting Turquoise, Certainly Celery, and Barely Banana. I used the Crafter’s Tool Kit to do some paper piercing around the little squares, and a silver brad in the center of the big flower. There’s also the direct to paper technique in celery around the edges. This went together really quick…and it makes me smile a little when I pull it out of my purse…but only for a second…until I realize that getting it out of my purse means I’m paying yet another bill…
Pixel had her 16 week checkup last week…complete with spaying and final shots. She now weighs 18 pounds, and the vet said everything is lookin’ good! Her shots are up to date through next year, and the worm test came back negative. I wanted them to give her a “calm the hell down” shot, but they assured me that she will naturally calm down as she gets older…I’m still waiting to see the results on that one.
Let me tell you…taking your beautiful little puppy to get cut open is a surefire way to make you feel guilty. She went in all unsuspectinglike, and when I went to pick her up she strolled out looking like they had fed her marijuana all day. Moving swiftly was not something she was in the mood to do, and her eyes couldn’t have been more glassy. Once we got home I tucked her in on the couch to rest. The vet assured me she’d need tons of rest and that she’d be pretty calm and would probably sleep a lot. I guess if they had just cut out my insides I might be inclined to sleep a lot, too. She spent the rest of the evening sleeping under her leopard print blanket. I spent the rest of the evening being thankful that even though there’s no shot for it, she certainly had been calmed the hell down.
Okay, back to the whole guilt thing. Our poor baby had such problems going to the bathroom for the next two days. We’re talking whine and bark and cry while going. She’d just look up with this pained expression…an expression that seemed to say, “Do I have to do this? Isn’t there any other way?” One time after taking her out to potty, Larry was telling me how he felt terrible that she was in so much pain that it made him want to cry. So here we are, two puppy parents, feeling guilty that we rid the dog of the parts that make her have a menstrual cycle. Guilty to the point that we are about to cry when she looks at us in such pain. I kept thinking that if we’re going to cry over getting our dog fixed, what in the world are we going to do when we have a child in pain? Not going to be an easy thing to deal with, I’m sure.
Luckily the painful phase of her surgery passed within a few days…and she is, of course, back to her normal (ornery) self. And while it was nice to have some peace and quiet for a few days, I’m glad to have the real Pixel back! We had her in for a checkup and the vet said her incision is swollen but otherwise looking fine. It’s swollen because we’re not “limiting her jumping and activity enough“. Well please, tell me how exactly we’re to keep the dog (that runs the house) from jumping and running for two weeks? They may as well have had us solve quadratic equations…at least there would have been a possibility of success!
We all love the look of stitching, right? But, how many of you actually take the time to thread a needle and stitch something on a stamping project? I can promise you that I will find a million other ways to embellish a card or scrapbook page before I’ll bust out a needle and thread. I’ve also seen those handy paper stitchers…a friend of mine had one, but it just never worked quite right for her. Let’s not even get started on the odds that I’d dig my sewing machine out of hibernation just to do a little stitching on a scrapbook page. The odds of that? Nil. A technique that can be your new best friend? Faux Stitching. I recently learned it and am lovin’ it! Here are some step by step directions on how to fake your stitching:
The items you’ll need are: the paper piercer, piercing template, and squishy (technical term, I know) mat from the Crafter’s Tool Kit, and the white uni-ball Signo Gel Pen (page 223). The gel pen can be used for this technique along with being a great way to write on dark cardstock!
Line up the template and poke holes following the template. You can do a zig zag stitch or a straight stitch…a short stitch or a long stitch. Just poke the holes where you want it to look like it’s the end of the stitch.
In the example I’m doing a zig zag stitch…this is what it looks like when all the holes are poked. I did every other hole in two neighboring lines on the template.
Now simply connect the dots with the white gel pen!
This is how it looks when all the stitches are drawn in. Sometimes it’s necessary to go back and re-poke the holes if the gel pen has settled any ink in the holes. That will make it look all the more authentic because it looks like the stitching actually goes into the paper.
Here’s the finished card! I used some leftover pieces parts from the Island Blossoms Simply Scrappin’ Kit (Level One Hostess Freebie). The card base is Tempting Turquoise and is stamped with the speckle background from Itty Bitty Backgrounds in turquoise ink. The stitching is done on Certainly Celery. The flower is a self-adhesive sticker from the Scrappin’ Kit. I put a silver brad in the middle to give it a little somethin’ (another technical stamping term), and added some turquoise grosgrain on the side.
You’ll want to be careful to allow the gel pen to dry completely…it only takes a few minutes. I do the stitching part, finish the card, and then go back and adhere everything. Smeared gel pen lines will not look like stitches, I promise!
Here you have the projects we did at a workshop this weekend. Following each one is a description which includes the products and colors that were used. To follow (later today in a separate post) will be detailed directions on the Faux Stitching technique that is mentioned on a few of the samples.
This project uses an empty mint tin that’s covered in designer paper in the inside and stamped paper on the cover. I used Only Orange paper with Real Red (Direct to Paper technique), a strip of designer paper, and a Pink Passion stamped C from the Whimsical Alphabet. I also used a silver brad to add a little embellishment! The card was measured to fit directly inside the tin so it can be given as a gift…then the tin can be reused by the recipient. The card is done in Green Galore, Pink Passion, and Whisper White. The stamp set used is Festive Four. The basket and eggs are colored in with the Stampin’ Around Markers. To accessorize the card I added Crystal Effects to the eggs and sprinkled some Microbeads on while it was wet. The stitching on the card is done using the Faux Stitching technique.
I love how this card turned out…it uses three different stamp sets, but in true Stampin’ Up! style, they all coordinate perfectly! The stamps used are: Favorite Teddy Bear, Tag Time (egg at the bottom), and Loads of Love Accessories (the eggs in the wagon). Since buying the Favorite Teddy Bear set I have had so much fun finding things from different stamp sets to put in the little wagon! If you own this set I encourage you to experiment with your other stamps…who knows what you’ll come up with? The colors involved are Bashful Blue, Certainly Celery, and Whisper White. It also uses the Layer Ease to do the matting of the bear picture.
This one uses designer paper for the majority of the background…these packages of paper can go a long way if you’re using them on cards! I used the stamp set Birthday Banter (which I only bought for the “floral moo moo”). The accessories involved on this one are silver brads and google eyes which were attached with Crystal Effects.
My mom did this card. I felt the need to clear that up right away because it uses Cameo Coral which is NOT my favorite Stampin’ Up! color. Luckily having two of us means we can show off a variety of colors instead of always gravitating to one color combo (or avoiding a certain color combo…like coral and tan). She used the Seaside Sketches and Wonderful Words stamp sets. The colors are: Barely Banana, Cameo Coral, and Close to Cocoa. She used the heavy duty watercolor paper because when coloring in the sketch she used the Wonderful Watercolor Crayons and Aquapainter. This card also features the Faux Stitching technique.
This is a 6×6 scrapbook page we did as a demo…our hostess has a son named Carter (hence the tag). It uses So Saffron, Taken With Teal, and Certainly Celery…along with a piece of designer printed paper from the Level One hostess Simply Scrappin’ Kit. I did direct to paper in the Taken with Teal around the edge of the page, and ‘Carter’ is stamped in Taken with Teal using the Classic Alphabet…it’s then framed with a piece of pewter Hodgepodge Hardware. The giant C is one of the Spring Mini Catalog monogram stamps, and it’s stamped in Certainly Celery on Certainly paper.
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