An ending and a beginning

The ending:  I retired from my full-time job yesterday.  It was emotional.  We had the lunch, we had the happy hour.  I cleaned out my desk.  Amazing how many boxes of STUFF we accumulate after 17 years on the job.  I have no idea where I'm going to put all that stuff I had at work but I will find a place.  I feel good about retiring.  It was time for me.  Time to start something new.

The beginning:  Of something new.  What is it?  I don't know yet.  The one thing I do know, is it's going to be what I WANT to do, not what I have to do.  So what do I WANT to do?  Oh geez.  Let's make a small list:

• Knit
• Learn to crochet
• Scrapbook more often
• Make more cards
• Sew stuff.
• Take walks
• Take pictures
• Ride my bike
• Visit friends
• Travel
• Sleep in
• Make stuff from recycled materials
• Repurpose stuff 
• Get a tan
• Spend more time with family

I do have a bucket list, but I'll share it later.  

My plan for this blog is to just share what I feel like every day:  crafts, gardening, cats, travels, whatever.  I just want to share ME.

That being said, here's what's happening today.

My Roma tomatoes are happening!  They are getting big and red and yummy.  Yes, I picked a few early just to have the taste of a fresh tomato in my mouth.  Yum!  There's nothing like the taste of a homegrown tomato!

This is one of the shawls I'm knitting at the moment.  The pattern is Piper's Journey and the yarn is from Quince and Co.  Here is an unsolicited, honest review of their pattern and yarn:  The pattern is well-written and I would recommend it for an advanced beginner.  The yarn is so soft, so light and yummy!  I love the feel of it as I knit and I can't wait to see the finished product in this color and yarn weight.  Pics later. 

Goober will not stay out of the Alyssum.  He's squashing it!!

Coming soon...  ME!

So much has gone on in my life in the past couple of blog-absent years.  My upcoming retirement from my current job has given me opportunity to think about how the second half of my life will be, and I intend to share it with the blogsphere. 

You have been warned. 

Secret Santa Swap questions

I'm participating in the Secret Santa Swap over at the Flirty Apron Swap and we all have to answer some questions for our Secret Santa. Here are my responses:

What are your hobbies? Knitting, sewing, embroidery, stamping and cooking.

What are your favorite colors? I love bright, fun colors. Think Mexican art. Our living room, dining room and kitchen are being decorated in the modern Mexican theme.

Do you collect anything? I collect Peeps. Not just the sugary ones, but stuffed ones, too. Anything with a Peep on it. Chicks or bunnies.

Are you allergic to any fibers or animals? No, but I've never touched an aardvark so I'm not sure I'm not allergic to them.

Do you have any pets? We have four cats: 3 orange tabbies and a Bengal.

Coffee, Tea, or Chocolate? I have to choose? Coffee, definitely, but chocolate is a close second.

What do you like to read? I love a good murder mystery. My favorite authors are Dean Koontz and John Grisham. I've recently gotten into knitting mysteries.

Do you prefer Cookies or Candies as a sweet? Cookies. Definitely cookies.

What is your favorite holiday treat? I love anything pumpkin. Or peppermint.

Describe your favorite holiday tradition. We don't really have any traditions.

Did you believe in Santa as a child? Yes. Love Santa.

When do you open presents? Usually on Christmas Eve, then we can go visit friends and family on the 25th.

Do you put up a tree and when? If not, how do you celebrate? I try to put the tree up right after Thanksgiving.

Does your tree have a theme? Yes, and it changes from year to year. My favorite one is fantasy. I covered the tree in fairies and lots of sparkling things. It's all about the sparkle!!

What has been your favorite gift to give? to receive? I love giving things I've made. I also love handmade items from others. Knowing someone spent time making something with me in mind just makes my heart sing.

My new table runner

Here's the table runner I got from my swap partner, Sharon. Isn't it pretty? I love it on my dining room table.

Flirty Apron Table Runner Swap

I'm in a swap over at the Flirty Apron Swap.  We are doing table runners.  I'll post pics once my swap partner gets her runner but here's a sneak peek:

Hee hee, you only get to see fabrics for now!  See you soon!!!

I'm baaaaack!

Wow, has it been a year and a half? Sheez.

I've been in a knitting stupor for the last couple of years. Haven't made many cards in that time, but I've been loving my knitting and knitting friends.

I've decided that the blog will be more of a "what I'm up to" blog. Could be knitting projects, coffee with friends (that involves knitting) and just general stuff - like what websites I find inspiring or funny or SHOES!

So, put me back on your blogroll. I promise to update fairly often.

This is me at age 8 dressed up as a Cotton Candy girl. My sister and I were baton twirlers. (Geez, even at age 8 my thighs touched.)

HM in a teacup

I did this card for the House Mouse Monday Challenge a while back, but I forgot to submit it. Duh! Do you love House Mouse? If so, you need to check out that site. Lots of inspiration, challenges and blog candy. Yahoo!

I colored this cutie patootie image with my Copics. I used the Morrocan Screen cuttlebug embossing folder for the background. The sentiment is from Stampabilities.

I used blue and lavender gems around the inner scalloped circle. Another quick card. Love those quick cards!

See you tomorrow!

Cupcake Love

Here's a quick and simple card for Valentine's Day.

I used the big cupcake called "frosting only" and stamped it on two different types of cardstock and simply paper-pieced it. Cuttlebug swiss dots background. "Much Love" stamp is from Michael's dollar bin.

I love pink and black together. What is your favorite color combo for Valentine's Day?

No pantyhose!

These two stamps crack me up. If I have to wear pantyhose, I'm not going. haha! This woman looks like how I feel sometimes. Don't you just want to SCREAM sometimes????

This card is made from another of Kerry's sketches. She is the master of sketches and I appreciate all she does. Yes, Kerry, I do! This was a super simple sketch. Stamp the same image three times. Mount on a strip of cardstock. Stamp your sentiment and then mount on cardstock (or not). I chose to mount. Duh.

I have no idea what occasion I'd use this card for, but it's kind of fun. I'll put it in the bin of cards for sale at work.

Thanks for coming by today. See you tomorrow!

Spam

I've been getting a lot of spam comments lately. Some not so nice. Sorry about the word verification thingy. I know it's a pain.

Some dancing ladies

Well, I'm back. I've been away from papercrafts for awhile because I've been onto another project or two. I've learned to knit and it is all-consuming right now. I love knitting. The projects on my needles right now are 1) sock, 2) handwarmers, 3) a cap and 4) a scarf. What can I say? I like to start projects! I'll be posting my knitting projects once they're done. On to cardmaking... I've had these three images colored for ages. I do that a lot: color images. I store them in the same folder as I store all my uncolored stamped images and when I want or need to make a card, I reach in there and pull out something appropriate. Tonight, I wanted to do something colorful, so I took out these ladies. They are from a special edition kit by Odd Bird Planet. The stamps are kind of like paper dolls. You choose a head then a skirt, then some boots. It's really fun. I colored these images with my Copic pens. Please don't ask me what colors I used. :) The yellow area was stamped using a big background stamp by Odd Bird Planet. I used a sketch drawn by Kerry. Once you look at her awesome cards, scroll down to the bottom of her blog and see her sketchpad. There are some very cool sketches in there. Just what you need for a little inspiration! That's what I do when I can't make a card - I get a sketch! Well, thanks for stopping by today. I'll have another post tomorrow and the next day and the day after that and the day after that for quite awhile. I've been busy. See you tomorrow!

Something new for 2010

See that button up there? At the top of the posts and below the header. Yes, that button. It's a brand new website my friend, Nicole, made. It's all about going through the alphabet, a fortnight at a time, throughout 2010. We're starting with A and going all the way through Z, baby!

Check out Nicole's blog. She tells you all about A-Z in 2010. Click HERE first, then HERE.

Then click the button up there. There are some amazing ideas there. Go to the Groups and see what categories you can plan with. There's even a template to help you plan out your letters. Sound fun? Confusing? Tempting? Click the button!

Get your butt, and your family's butts, off the couch. Go have an Adventure. Bottle your own wine. Catch a fish. Deliver meals to seniors. Elevate your feet. Fly a kite! Get the idea? There are lots of things you can do to enrich your lives over the next year by going through the alphabet. Leave me a comment if you decide to do this. I'm really interested to see how many people join me in this endeavor. Rock on! 2010 is going to be awesome!!!!!

Winter Box

Hi everyone! I'm really getting into this winter season. I'm so so happy that it is raining here. Southern California is always in a drought-state, so any rain we can get is welcomed. We really do live in a desert, so it doesn't rain much ever. But enough about the rain already.

These stamps are from the Winter Wonderland collection over at the Paper Garden Projects store. Aren't they just the cutest? I got these cute little boxes from the Dollar Tree store. This was a super easy project. I measured the box. Each side was 2-3/4" square. I cut a strip of the striped paper from the Frosted Winter paper kit and used a dark red piece of paper from the same kit for the lid. I'm sure there must be an easier way to make the lid from one piece of cardstock, but I couldn't figure it out. Just one of those days.

I stamped the images on white cardstock as well as on colored cardstock. I paper-pieced the images on the white cardstock and then cut out the whole image and adhered it to the box with tacky glue. I accented the snow and colored the faces with Copics. I added some dimension to the box lid with some Liquid Pearls. See? Wasn't that easy? Oh and I tied it off with a simple bow. Ta da! Try one for yourself. This would be a great way to wrap a box in a unique way for that special gift for someone.

Oh and the secret word is CRUNCHY!

Have fun at the blog hop!!

It's Winter

It's winter and what better way to celebrate than to make a card. Hey, any excuse for me to make a card is good in my book. This card uses the Frosted Winter paper kit from Paper Garden Projects. I love, love, LOVE the papers and embellishments in this kit. I especially love the colors. The stamp I used is one from Eat Cake Graphics in a set called Winter Wonderland at PGP. There are three stamps in the set and this is just one of them. Images were colored with Copics. The snow was done with white opal Liquid Pearls with glitter sprinkled on while the liquid pearls was still wet. Card is 5x7. Cuttlebug swiss dots embossing folder used for the blue background piece. Come back tomorrow to see the next cute project I made with the other two stamps from this adorable set. See you then!

The Knitted Purse

I've been on a hat kick lately. Ever since I took the knitted hat class at Yarning for You in San Marcos, I've been making hats like crazy. This is one I started and about two-thirds of the way through, it became a purse. Why? Well look at that sucker! How many people do you know who have a melon big enough to fit in this hat?! It was a huge calculation error on my part. I cast on 99 stitches (!) for a size large hat. Well, let me tell you something sister, that is one LARGE hat! So as I'm about to frog it, (rip it out - RIBBIT), Cindy says I should make a purse out of it. So instead of wasting all that time and effort that I had already put into it, I made a purse.

When it is closed up, you can definitely tell it used to be a hat. It's just shaped that way. Instead of going through the rest of the decreasing rows to make the top of the hat, I continued knitting even and added the second color for the top of the purse. The darker color yarn is what was left over from making Tony's beanie that I didn't take pictures of, darn it.

I made the I-cord with the same yarn as the hat. There are two I-cords that I wove opposite in the gusset. The gusset was made by doing a pattern my niece, Danielle, showed me. You knit the row, but you do a yarn over with each stitch. That means there are double the amount of stitches on the needles. Then the next row, as you knit it, you drop off the yarned over stitch. That makes a big opening in the row. That is what I used to thread the I-cord through. I'm sure there are better ways, but I am a beginning knitter and that is what I thought to do. Here is what the purse looks like all opened up. You can see that I threaded the I-cords opposite in this picture. I didn't really know what I wanted to do with the ends of the I-cords, so instead of just tying them together, I stacked some buttons and tied it off. It gives it a little weight and interest, I think.

I do have to line the purse. Since it didn't start out as a purse pattern, the bottom of the purse here is a ribbed pattern meant for the bottom of hats/beanies and is stretchy. I'll sew a nice fabric liner and put it inside so the purse doesn't stretch out.

I'm going to be making baby hats and booties for my next projects. Two people I know are having babies, so I'm thrilled to be able to knit something for them.