February Swaps

Good afternoon, y'all!    I pray that y'all are having a wonderful, fun filled and crafty day!    It has been raining here in my neck of the woods most of the day, with lots of heavy wind.    Seems like when it's rainy, I kinda have a rainy mood.    So, the best place for me today is right here, getting caught up with some projects for y'all to see.    I have been busy here lately, but today, has really been a lazy day for me.    I think I have been trying to refuel, since a great weekend.    We had a very full day at church yesterday.    It was just a great day to be in the presence of the Lord!    So, today has been a slow day, with plans for a busy week ahead.

I have gotten all my swaps for the month of February in the mail, some have already reached their destinations and some are still in the mail system hoping to be received tomorrow.    I made a card, a tag, artist trading cards, and ornament.   I did make pics of course, and I want to share them with you.

The above two pics are of my atc.   It was supposed to be "pastels" in hopes of Spring being just around the corner.    I stamped my image in Memento london fog, which is gray.   Then I used my water color pencils and a blender pen.    I stamped my sentiment and when all was dry, I took three of my little Studio ink disks and just lightly touched the edges all around to color the background and then I used a lot of my glitter glues to get the bling going.   hahaha  Gotta bling!

The above three pics are of the "green and Spring" card swap.    So the green is my background and I also used my green water color pencil on her dress.    I used a new stamp I had just gotten, and I do love the elegance of her.   I stamped the sentiment, added a little bling and then I brushed the whole layer of the lady with a coat of Deco Art Glamour Dust, Ice Crystal Paint.   Love, love, love it!    It is a new product I had just gotten and I will be using it a lot!    I put a couple of purchased stickers and some stick on gems.    If you will notice in the pic below, I also added some hand made flowers.   The flowers were cut with a die that is about the size of my thumbnail.   Then I used a quilling tool to roll the tiny flower and glued it.    Then I cut the little leaves to go with the flowers.    They really are so tiny.    I will make a pic of the flower with a dime and show you later on.    Click on the pics to enlarge and hopefully you can see the tiny flowers better.

This is a pic of all my swaps together.    I hope you can see the tiny flowers on the card above.    There is an ornament between the card and the atc.   That is the ornament I made for the ornament swap.    I'm in this with a friend and we do this each month and we are having a great time with these.    The ones I have been making are themed for the year and I'm calling them "Victorian Ornaments".    I am searching for victorian style, free images and using them for my ornaments.    I love them and they are fun to make.   This one was to have a tea pot on it for a sign of "hospitality".    It is two sided, with a diff pic on the back.   I am so mad at me, that I did not get a pic of the ornament by itself.   I could just smack myself.

The above four pics are of my tag swap.    It is the brick wall technique.   I have already showed you one that I had done earlier for another swap that had gotten lost in the mail and the purple one was a replacement for my friend.    This is the one for this months swap.    I am so in love with technique!    I cut my tag on my Cameo Silhouette.    It is from the Silhouette Store.    I enlarged it and cut two layers and ran a layer through my 5 inch Xyron and stuck the two layers together.    I lightly inked the edges of the tag with a brown ink disk.   Then I took a piece of white Georgia Pacific paper and stamped my crackled background with olive green and then I stamped my rose.   I colored the rose with several diff colors of water color pencils.  After it was dry,  I cut it in brick fashion, being careful not to loose the placement of each piece.   After I got it glued down and that dried, I then added a little faux stickles for sparkle and bling.   I stamped my sentiment and then put my ribbons and threads through the loop and it was finished.   Then I had fun with my GooseBumps!    I just love the Goosebumps!    I loved making this months swaps!    I hope you enjoyed looking at them.

As I leave you this evening I ask, "What have you done today?"   Has today been important to you in any way?    Every Sunday at church, one of our Ministry Leaders will ask the congregation what today is?    There is one faithful saint that he will always call on to tell him what today is.   She will always say, "This is the day the Lord has made; we will be glad and rejoice in it." Psalm 118:24

I pray that y'all have been able to say that you have been glad and rejoiced in today!    Every day is not going to be a perfect day, or live up to our expectations.   But, when we have a proper perspective on every day, we can always find something great in it.   Every day of your life and mine has been given to us by the Creator of the day!!!    I don't know about y'all, but I cherish that!   God created the universe in an orderly and reasonable manner.   Much thought went into creation.    With that in mind, have we all been glad and rejoiced in this day?    I sure hope so!    God really had all of us in mind when he spoke the universe into existence!    Let's determine in ourselves, that we will be glad and rejoice in every day that God allows us to be a part of!   Sounds like a plan!

God bless y'all!   Thanks for stopping by and I hope y'all make plans to visit again, soon.

Hugs and much love, Patty

Tag for a Swap

Howdy Doody Folks!!!    I sure hope y'all are having a great week.    I know that many of our friends are still dealing with horrendous weather.     I keep praying for all of y'all who are trying to make it from one day to the next with all the snow and cold you have had.    We have had a lot of "much" below normal temps, but we have been very blessed in our neck of the woods to have missed out on most of the "precipitation" weather.     For that, I am so thankful, but I do still keep everyone in my prayers.    I just know that spring will eventually make it.    When it does, I promise not to complain "too much" about it getting to hot or being hot. You have my permission to remind me, later on, if I do start complaining. ggg

Since it's been cold and I don't like to be out and about in the cold weather, I have been in my craft room more here lately.     And, I have been having a ball!!

This is a tag I made for a swap.     The tag I made and mailed off in January, did not make it to the person I mailed it to.    Thank you USPS! gggg    My friend was very gracious about it and said I did not have to make another one to replace it.     I love getting the little packages of artsy goodness in the mail, and I also love sending them.    So, I wanted to make another one for her.    And I must say, I am so happy I did.    This was a new technique to me and I am hooked!

 

This is called the "brick wall technique".    I know I did not do it exactly like the was the tutorial called for it to be done, but, that's ok, as far as I'm concerned.    We all have the creative freedom to put our own spin on something and I did on this tag. 

 

 

A brief description of how I done mine is, I actually cut the purple tag with my Silhouette Cameo.     I cut two tags and put one piece of it through my Xyron and then put the two pieces together.    I love the feel of a beefy tag.    I took my white card stock and used my fav "crackled" background stamp, then I stamped my rose.    I used my water color pencils and colored it in.    I then took a lite fuchsia ink disk and tamped it down over all of the white area.    I then cut it in strips a little less than 1/2 inch.    I then cut the strips in brick fashion.    Being real careful not to mess up the pieces and keep them in order.     Then I took my black ink disk and inked all the edges.    The black was a real deep contrast, but I thought it worked really well.    After it all dried, I started at the bottom and worked myself up to the top.    Placing each piece and leaving a little space between each piece and each line.    Then I stamped the word "love" up in the right hand corner.     After that dried, I put my threads through the hole at the top and laid it in my spray box and I sprayed it with Goosebumps.     I really love the looks and feel of Goosebumps.    Well, there you have it, my tag.    I hope you enjoyed seeing it.    I certainly had a ball making it.

Be on the look out here, because I have a whole lot more stuff to show y'all in the near future.    I just can't get it all uploaded fast enough.    So, keep checking back from time to time.    Ok.

John 3:16. For God so loVed the world thAt He gave His onLy bEgotten SoN, thaT whoever believes In Him should Not perish but have Everlasting life.

As I leave you tonight, I leave you with warm Valentine wishes!     Did you know that God gave you and me a Valentine?     It's in the verse above.     Can you see our Valentine as you read the Scripture?    Oh, it's there!     Yes, I know you see it.    Had you ever seen it before?    Do you have any idea how much you and I mean to God?    We mean so much to Him that He gave us a special Valentine.    Jesus Christ is our Valentine!    Thank you, Father, that you loved us enough to give us the very best that You had to give, Jesus Christ!

Happy Valentines Day to all of you!!! Much love and hugs, Patty