thank you row of houses

Hello my friends!  Hope you are keeping well!  I have something funny to share with you.  I noticed that house stamps are so in.  And I loved them but thought to myself really what am I going to use it for?  And it wasn't just a one time thought it was everytime I saw a house stamp I would think of how much I liked it but you know.  Than a little while ago I was at my friends place stamping together and she tells me why house stamps would be perfect for me, "for when your making thank you cards for Chad's clients"  My husband Chad is a real estate agent!  You know I am smart, and I have a fantastic memory but sometimes I tell you I am so blonde!  Doesn't it just make you laugh?  I am the person who should own EVERY house stamp!  So two weeks ago I was at my LSS and saw that she had the Hero Arts row of houses stamp and well I squeled with joy and bought it!  When making cards for my hubby he usually mails them so I wanted flat simple designs because nothing would be worse than a card arriving in pieces!  And I know that he doesn't want anything femine.  So that meant simple this time! 

thank you row of houses green, originally uploaded by AnitaRex.

And I made an aqua one:

And I made this one for the single guy my hubby worked with:

I am entering these cards into the Hero Arts challenge this month that is home and mother's day!  I actually entered a lot this month!  I really enjoyed this month's theme!  I am a little sad it's over, because well I will probably be making a lot more house cards in the future!  But I look forward to next month!

Yay my bee card from my last post made me a domestic diva on the EBTKS challenge blog!  That totally made my day! 

I wanted to share with you that I had a great weekend with my family last weekend!  The kids all had such a fun time too, all 10 of them! It was a lot of fun, but very busy!  We enjoyed big family meals every night in a different restaurant, we survived Chuckie Cheese (they don't have that here anymore!) and swimming,  swimming and more swimming!  I got a lot of shopping done!  I did buy some craft stuff, the prices are so much better and things are so much easier to find in the US even in such a small city!  But I didn't go crazy because I wanted new clothes, which I got!  And love!  I also got the kids such cute stuff too!  I am so glad we did it and I hope to again! 

From the weekend I do have a story to share with you.  On sunday night Chad took Ariel swimming with all the other kids but I stayed back to put Carter to sleep.  He was so tired and we thought maybe if he was sleeping before Ariel came back it would be easier.   The handle on the door  was one that you pull down so Carter quickly learnt how to open it and run down the hallway with glee!  So we would use the bar to lock it on top so he couldn't open it.  We had an adjourning door to my brother and sister in laws room and we were sitting in her room looking over the clothes she bought for her kids.  All of a sudden we realize that Carter is back in my room and he has shut the adjourning door!  My SIL goes out to the hall and realizes that the door is closed with the bar from the inside.  I went and told the hotel worker and she comes with this metal stick thing and is trying to open the door.  Carter is crying and his little fingers are on the door and he is trying to get out!  My friends ask me how I felt, if I was panicking!  I wasn't actually I felt so bad for him in there all alone, he isn't even two yet and he is my baby and I knew he didn't understand.  I didn't worry we wouldn't get him out I knew there was a way.  The hotel worker I think was more panicking than me!  After much trying by everyone with the metal stick thing they had to saw off the bar!  It took Carter a little while to stop crying!  I think this will be one of those stories we may always remember!

Another funny thing that happened is on sunday night I couldn't find my pajamas!  We looked everywhere in the room!  They hadn't taken the towels that day, what we think happened is that Carter threw it in the garbage in the room and we never noticed!  Oh well I needed some new ones, which I bought the next day!  :>  Hope your weekend is amazing!

a few more butterflies?

Hi!  I have had a wonderful day!  This morning I took my daughter to her music class, and than for some groceries.  Than I went to blog hop and checked the Hero Arts Blog and was thrilled to see that one of my cards was one of the Fab 5!  Yay!  You can see it here  Of course this makes me so happy, I love Hero Arts!

 

Today I have a few cards to share.  Yesterday on the HA flickr group the wonderful Michelle had the wonderful idea to cheer Jennifer McGuire up by having HA flickr members make and post a card for her!  Jennifer's husband was stuck in Europe due to the volcano!  I of course had to participate as well I love Jennifer McGuire, she is so amazing and I have had the wonderful opportunity to meet her at scrapfest last september and had dinner with her and a bunch of other wonderful HA ladies!  Here is the card I made for her:

 

 

After making it I realized that this card also falls into the EBTKS challenge!  There is still time to play check it out!  I made the grass by ruffling the ribbon at the bottom, I wanted this to be a cheery card!

I also used the HA digi kit Flutterbies again to make a few more cards.  The last few I sponged color on them, this time I colored them with my Derwent and Prisma pencils!  So fun! 

 

beauitful butterflies, originally uploaded by AnitaRex.

 

I love this card, I purposly didn't press very hard when I stamped the cling dots so that it would give that look, I really like it!  Oddly the blue butterfly is looking quite dark on the pic!  It matched the blue in the paper more IRL.  I have to say that the yellow and orange butterfly is my favorite!  Another card:

 

As you can tell this photo is darker.  I can't seem to figure out how to send more than one photo from my flickr at a time!  I used my new horizontal lines HA stamp that I won from Judy over in the HA flickr group!  And the metallic gems that I won from Vanessa's blog candy!  I have been quite lucky lately, I have won 3 blog candies in less than a month.  My husband won something too!  Actually my hubby is quite lucky he often wins!  His whole family is lucky, his aunt has won the lottery twice (not huge amounts but thousands) and I think his uncle too!  I don't usually win but I guess that has changed.  I am planning on doing some blog candy too soon in the near future...

Today was one of those days that I think to myself how lucky I am able to stay home with my kids!  After lunch me and the kids went for walk, Ariel rode her new bike.  And we went to the lake nearby and chased the geese!  After naps we all played in the yard.  After supper we went to the park and played there for a while and than walked the long walk home!  And of course after all that it was time for a bath!  The weather was perfect, hot but not overly!  I am really enjoying this spring! 

I am quite excited as we are going away this weekend!  We are going with Chad's whole family to a close US city, Fargo!  With 10 kids btw us all 3 hours drive is good enough!  Chad comes from a family of 4!  This is the first time we are all going on a trip together, other than the cabin!  We just never really planned it before so Chad's mom just did it and we all made it work!  We leave friday and come back monday!  I know the kids will all have a lot of fun.  And I will enjoy shopping.  I love to shop and all different stores!  I am excited also as I have called a few of the LSS and gotten there hours and locations!  Hope you all have such a great weeked!

 

buttons and mother's day

Hello!  Happy tuesday! Today I have two cards to share using Blooming Button bits by PTI, and that wonderful patterned paper from my last card!  I love this paper so much, the colors are quite me!  And the funny thing is when I picked it up I thought it was a bit much and thought to myself well I am sure I could use it somehow, now I don't want to stop!  Looking at my PTI set I realize I still have yet to ink up some images from it!  One being the flower on this card:

I am so pleased with this card!  I sewed with some floss the stem of this flower!  I was having such a hard time with sewing on the cards with the floss!  I emailed my wonderful blog friend Alice asking some questions and she emailed me back.  And than several days later my friend T came over and I was talking to her and she showed me what Alice had told me, seeing it really made it click.  Thanks you two!  I get it now and am thrilled and will be doing so much more!

I made this card at my friends place on friday!  I stamped each flower separately and cut them out, the pink one is poped up with a pop up dot.  I love the grey buttons on this!

It's been so hot over here!  We have been spending a lot of time outside!  On sunday after church and lunch Chad, the kids and I walked to the park, it's over 20 minutes.  We have such a great park!  Afterwards Ariel played with a neighbor girl her age.  We were a bit beat from walking so we were relaxing when friends of ours texted about getting together.  We cleaned the house and they brought supper!  They have 3 girls all close together and close to Ariel's age so Ariel had a fun day!  Funny story, all the kids were playing in the backyard.  I do have a fence but not on both sides yet (newer house we have to build it ourselves)  Carter is pretty good outside with Ariel in the back with me going in and out, we have a huge yard.  He usually just plays with a ball.  All of a sudden one of the kids tells us that Carter is in the frount.  T and I run as fast as we can to the frount of the house to see Ariel, and one of T's daughters running after Carter, who is giggling and halfway down the street!  My friend T had to run quite fast to catch up to him!  What a stinker!  He was barefoot while usually he is weaing shoes, I think shoes make him slower!

Yesterday it was even hotter, close to summer weather!  I called up a friend early in the morning to meet me and I rode my bike with the kids in a trailor to the park!  We had a picnic lunch with my friend L and her three kids!  We sat under the playstructure in the only shady place!  We also ran into another neighbor there whose little girl asked Ariel to come and play and the mother asked me.  Ariel went on her only second playdate with no me!  She had a lot of fun and behaved quite well.  Today it's not as nearly hot but that's okay!  I'm going to go for a walk later while Ariel rides her bike!  Hope you have great weather where you are too!

butterflies and mothers

Happy Weekend!  Hope your having a wonderful weekend! We sure are!  Spent friday night with some friends, loved seeing Ariel play with one of her girl friends seeing her play dressup and all that!  It's been a bit since we've hung out one on one with these friends and we had such a great time!  Today the weather was so hot!  It was quite welcome as we had nice weather all week but it was way too windy to go outside!  Took the kids to the park and they played a lot more outside!

I love this card!  I was inspired by Vanessa Menhorn, love her blog!  She recently was published on papercrafts current issue on the frount cover!  She is so talented, and generous, I recently won her blog candy!  Well I think this card was inspired by her as when I made this the issue wasn't for sale yet I was going on a small picture!  I loved the layour of her butterfiles!  The card:

butterflies and mothers, originally uploaded by AnitaRex.

Now that it's nice outside and sunny it's fun to take a pic in the sun, I think it shows the colors so well!

I based my colors on this stripey pp by kauser.  I love stripey pp, I think it's so easy for cardmaking when your stamping!  I stamped the background only where the butterflies are with cling dots by HA in white!  And I love the way I stamped the Happy Mother's Day going up the side!  I colored the butterflies with a sponge and my inks!

products used:  Ha Flutterbies digi, HA Cling Dots, PTI stamp, kauser pp, SU Kraft, Distress and other various inks, SU scalloped punch, corner rounder.

Looking through my pictures I realize that I have a lot of cards that I have made and haven't blogged about!  Will have to get on that!

Hope you have a wonderful rest of your weekend!

thanks for being my mom

Hi all!  Hope your having a great night!  Today has been a fun day, took my kids to stay and play at my church.  I volunteered there today also, it's so much fun for the kids as there are all sorts of toys, bouncers and such for them to play with!  And lots of people for mommy to chat with and well I love to chat!  It's also been so hot here which is wonderful but also just so windy!  It's not much fun to go outside with little kids in windy weather sometimes, although we did go to the park for a bit!  Tonight I got called in to work and had my preformance review and did great!

 

Today I have another Mother's Day card to share with you! I am entering this into the Hero Arts contest and Lucy Englands stiching one.  Playing with another newer Hero Arts stamp set of mine.  It's actually really funny that I love this set so much as well I am terrified of bees!  As in one of those people who run away from bees.  And it doesn't help much that people have been hearing of how I am scared and telling me that they understand and tell me how they were stung and how much it hurt!  My running has paid off dear friends as I have never been stung!  So here is my card:

 

thanks for being my mom, originally uploaded by AnitaRex.

This is a card that came along as I made it.  I had the idea for kraft with bees and using floss for there trail.  Let me tell you I really like doing the whole floss thing but I can't for the life of me figure out how to do just a single thread with a needle!  The sentiment is "Thanks for being my friend" but I just stamped "Thanks for being my" and than used the rest of the letters from the other sentiments.  I covered all the letters I didn't want with tape stamped it in the pad peeled off the tape and stamped it on the card!  Tricky but I wanted the same font.  At first I was going to leave this card as just the kraft but than thought to do the yellow, and than thought to clear emboss the yellow with the dots but than it came to me like a light to do black dot embossing!  How perfect is that?  The bees wings also have glitter on them, because you know that means they are nice bees and won't sting!

Products:  Hero Arts Be Happy, Cling Dots, Derwent colorsoft pencils, bazill cardstock, floss.

I do have a story to share with you!  Last friday I had a shift to work and Chad got some free tickets to the hockey game.  And a lot of our guy friends were going and bringing thier kids so Chad was going to take Ariel.  Our friend K was staying home with her little girl and said she would watch Carter, and than she also ended up watching her sister's son too.  K is also pregnant with her 3rd child.  K went to the bathroom and could here the kids giggling she figured she didn't need to rush, she had Carter who is 19 months, N who is 2, and M who is almost 3.  When she came out Carter greeted her covered in flour!  There was flour all over the kitchen and the living room!  The kids were also covered!  She thinks it was probably Carter who found it which doesn't suprise me, she says the kids were throwing it at each other!  Oh my gosh it's so funny!  I could just see those three monkeys and really from all of us those are our monkeys doing that!  It's so funny!  She said it was close to bed so she put them at the table and gave them a snack while she cleaned up!  Sadly she didn't get a picture as her hubby had the camera at the hockey game!

Hope your having a wonderful week!

my first ever hybrid card!

Happy Monday!  This week is going to be amazing!  And I hope for you too!  The rest of the weekend was nice, I dragged my sleepy bum out of bed on sunday to church and than spent the day with my parents and little brother.  My parents also invited  family friends over for lunch which was nice.  This also meant that my mother made a delicious meal!  My mother is such a great cook and baker!

Today I have my first hybrid card to share!  I am so late to the party, but oh well better late than never!  I actually won this on the caardvarks blog on my birthday!  I had a hard time figuring it out hot to use it in word and am thankful to Lucy England for emailing back and forth with me and helping me!  She is wonderful!  Funny how this week is hybrid cards on the Hero Arts blog!  I made this for there current challenge of home and Mother's Day!  I love the Hero Arts blog and the flickr group so much and encourage you to check it out!   Here is my card:

and the fun outside in the sun shot:

I think this may be one of my favorite cards I have made lately!  It's simular to another card I made but so much better!  I printed out 2 pages of these butterflies in more than a dozen sizes!  I just basically kept coping and pasting them over and over, making them smaller and smaller.  Than I used a small sponge and used some distress and other inks and colored them with it.  After that I used my blender pen and the inks and colored darkly the edges of the butterfly!  I cut them out while watching tv with my hubby.  And than spent several days laying them out and thinking about which way was best.  Than Carter came along and bumped them off and back to the drawing board!  :>  Which was fine since than I came up with the idea of stamping it with the cling dots with versamark!  This was a fun card to make!  And this digital thing isn't that hard and I hope to make more!

Hope you all have a great start to the week!  My kids have been playing well so I have been crafty today! 

monsters having fun

Hi there!  Hope your having a wonderful weekend!  We had a busy day over here!  This morning I took Ariel to the mall to see Strawberry Shortcake, she loved it!  I remember when I was little having strawberry shortcake dolls and watching the show!  Than I did a bit of shopping, picked up some new bathing suits for the kids, well two for Ariel!  In the late afternoon we went to the Y for a birthday party for three of our friends kids, a bunch of friends went together to celebrate for there kids!  It was a lot of fun the kids played in the play structure and jumper, had dinner and went swimming!  Carter is a little fish and falling head first into the deep water did not phase him!  And we were thrilled that Ariel is turning into a fish!  She does very well at the beach but in a pool there often is a lot of tears, and screaming!  She doesn't like the water to be too deep, but today she did amazing!  She even told us that she would like to do swimming lessons, before she refused!

 

Today I have two birthday cards to share with you.  They are both using my new Monster Fun set by HA, another one of my new sets.  Love this set!  I had to have it as I think it's so cute and thought it would be fun to make boy birthday cards, a lot of our friends have boys!  The first is a long card, I have never made one of these before but thought it would be perfect way to use most of the monsters! 

 

 

monsters having fun, originally uploaded by AnitaRex.

I don't know how to upload from flickr more than one card for a post, which is too bad as I fixed this card in flickr to be brighter!  I colored the monsters with my derwent and prisma pencils, the long card right on the kraft and didn't blend it, but the second one on white and I did blend it.  I was happy to find googly eyes at the dollar store as I think they are so fun!  I got a multi size pack but will be needing a new pack as Ariel has been using them too, it's so cute the drawings she has made with her characters having googly eyes, and even she has glued them on her coloring sheets on animals and it really looks cute!  The googly eyes has brought much joy to my home.  Even Carter enjoys finding them and chewing on them, I was all wondering what is that noise, Carter!  Of course I pull it out as fast as I can!

Life here has been busier since I have still been working more than usual, but this week it looks like only one shift so I look forward to crafting! The weather has been amazing and we have been outside a lot!  There is warning that it may snow again but it melts fast enough! I hope you all have a wonderful rest of the weekend!

Happy Easter!

Happy Easter!  He has risen!  I hope you have had a wonderful day celebrating!  We sure did!  Started the day at church with an amazing service!  Afterwards we went to my parents.  My children have been quite spoiled.  Yesterday my brother took Ariel to build a bear for the first time and she got a Chick since she just loves chicks!  She has been playing with her and is so very happy!  I find it funny that she does call her chickie but has named her Marlene!  Of course they have gotten a lot of chocolates but thankfully not a crazy amount!  My parents bought Carter a Little Tykes basketball hoop and he has been playing with it non stop, I think someone loves sports, someone is his father's son! And my parents blessed Ariel with a new bike!  My mother made an amazing turkey dinner, so good! Here are some cute photos I took, this one is from this morning after church outside my parents house:

Aren't they too cute, I just love there outfits!  Carter actually wore his hat at church and everyone loved it!

Another of them and Chickie Marlene!

I took this one earlier in the week with bunny ears!  In there matching outfits!

Carter and the ears:

Ariel:

Carter with his basket of eggs after hunting!  He looks so happy!

Forgot to take a photo of us with the kids but did get one with my parents:

And the new bike!

Hope you had a wonderful easter too! 

you're so special paper roses

Hi all!  Hope you have had a Good Friday!  Today I am thankful that my savior died on the cross for me, and for you!  Here in Canada (or at least where I live) Good Friday and Easter are holidays where no one works and businesses are closed!  And even monday is a holiday for some (lucky gov't workers!)  We celebrated Easter with Chad's parents and siblings and children.  It was nice.  I made my famous white chocolate brownie!  Chad's mom made turkey which is my favorite and there was A LOT of good food!  Ariel had a great time with her cousins and Carter of course found a lot to get into!

 

Today's card started with me just making the flowers and than the card came along.  The flowers took a bit for me to master them but they were quite fun to make!  I am entering this card into the Card Patterns sketch 57 and Kim Wilson's current challenge (make sure to check it out!)  And also the current challenge at Hero Arts for home and mother's day, I reversed the sentiment, rather than Happy Mother's Day outside I did what I think is a wonderful sentiment for a mother on the outside and stamped the Happy Mother's Day inside!  Anyways here is the card:

you're so special, originally uploaded by AnitaRex.

I saw on another blog this link for how to make these flowers  here but I made my different.  After cutting out the swirl I curved it around a wooden skiewer to make it more curly and than loosened it but not the middle and than made the flower the same way and than I found it wouldn't stay shut so I put glossy accents on the bottom and held it down for a bit until it was almost dry.  I did this all while watching lost!  Let me know if I explained this properly!  I did mine different as I found the paper ripped or bent I found wrapping it around a pen didn't make it small enough so I used the skiwer.  I stamped the kraft with HA cling dots and the middle panel with a light pink chalk ink with another one of my HA background's. 

From Kim's challenge photo I was inpsired by the circles on the cake for the actual flowers, the colors light pink and fuscia and of course the blue, and the damask I did in the light pink in the middle panel!  I like reading what inspires other people so I thought it would be fun to share also with you!

Here is a photo of all the kids from tonight, these are all my neices and nephews along with my kids also!  I had bought Ariel and Carter those outfits to have for church as I got different ones for Easter.  Than my Sister in law came into the store and also got her girls the dress before I told her that I had also, and than my other Sister in law came into the store when I was working and also picked them out!  I wasn't planning on wearing it but thought I should today so that they could match!  Funny how it works, eh?  I won't wear it on sunday as my kids wore it last week! 

Hope you have a great weekend, I will be back with more cute easter photo's of the kids in the next bit!