Scroll boxes

A friend of my daughter  in law's

is going through a hard

time so I thought I would make

him a scroll box.  Well, once

I get started it's kind of

hard for me to stop...

And as it turns out, for

some reason she never received

the one I sent her a couple

months ago!  So one of

the blue ones is for her

and the other is for my friend's

daughter.  I love how they

turned out.  Even though I'm not

good at "guy things"

I think it turned out pretty well!

Black magic

Black magic technique that is.

I wish they would have named

it something else!  Anyway,

so simple and so pretty.

the image is inked with

white ink and then coloured

chalk is dabbed over the image

wherever  you want it

to be. As you can see, I

changed colours in different

places.  I'm not sure I care

for the "halo" that is left

around the image, but that's

what  it's supposed to look like.

Chalk is a great medium to work

with, and easily changed if you

mess up, by simply erasing.

I used it quite a bit in my

Bible journaling.

This card is destined for

my friend Dianne. It's kind of

"our" verse, and we use

it in texting sometimes, while

wishing  each other a good day. 

Warmth!  It's supposed to be 

in the 40's today and tomorrow

with rain.  It is by  no

means a heat wave, unless you

remember that this is the 

beginning of January!!    

Everything that has breath

In case anyone is wondering,

I was trying to change the look

of the blog, but I noticed today

that the purple blacked out

the name of the blog.  They don't

have much to choose from that 

appeals to me and if you can

download from somewhere else

I don't know how.  Not that

I've looked into it that much...

One single layer.   Very simple.

The gems make it a little bulky, 

I suppose, but it will go 

through the mail just fine.

 I made a second card

but it's not dry yet.  It uses

white ink and for some

reason that takes forever to dry.

so that will be for tomorrow.

Sign classes start up again next

Thursday and I am looking forward

to that!

Brrr!

It is a cold morning today!

I guess it's to be expected in

January, but I was getting

used to having fairly mild

temps.  It even snowed a little

yesterday.  Or more accurately it

tried to snow.  The grass was

dusted when I got up and

every so often I would see

big fat flakes drifting in the sky,

but no real snow to speak of. 

Bring it on, El Nino!!

I made a square card which

I don't ordinarily do.  For

some reason they cost more

to send so this would be

a hand delivered card.  

Unless you want to pay more....

This punch design lends itself

to a square card, and I wanted

to try it.  Don't look closely,

I didn't get it even.  I can't

get something even with a ruler.

It's true.

But I figure it's handmade, so

as long as it's close that's

all that counts!

I'm looking forward to going to

dinner with a friend of mine, Dianne,

tonight.  We usually try to meet

once a week to catch up,

but with the holidays it's hard

to get that time in.

Bullet journaling

I've been reading so much about

bullet journaling on pinterest.

Since I am a huge list maker

and always have been, I've decided to

try it out.  I was wondering

how to separate different areas,

such as card ideas, from daily

tasks, appointments, things

like that.  I hit upon using paper

clips (which I have tons of

for some reason), and color 

coded ribbons which will be

recorded in the legend in the

front of the journal.  Now

all I have to do is collect

all those little pieces of paper

that are all over the house and

put them into the journal.

I am usually a messy writer 

(I envy my friend Sam who has

beautiful handwriting) so

I am going to do my best to

write slowly and carefully

so it's more readable.  It's pretty sad

when you write something and

can't figure out what you've written!

It doesn't make much sense to

 have a journal of things

you want to get accomplished,

remembered, etc., if you can't 

even read it!

The legend goes first,

I just got the pages out of order in 

the picture.  I'm not sure what

the other sections will

be yet, but I'm excited about this.

No more (hopefully) little

pieces of paper lying

all over the place.

What will I do with all those

post it notebooks I have?

I thought about getting a

journal that I could decorate 

the front of but was too lazy!

Flourishes galore

Happy Sunday!  I always look

forward to church to watch Sam

sign and also to try to sign 

some of the songs.  I  may have

gotten myself into something....

I told her that the next time

we sing "Happy day" that

I will stand next to her and

sign, since I know most of it.

They just sang it about 2 weeks

ago, so I figure I'm relatively

safe.  But since I opened my

big mouth, you  never know.

God has such a strange

sense of humour sometimes!!

I love this flourish stamp!  This 

technique is called triple

time stamping.  It ends up

to be really beautiful in

my opinion, but you have to be

careful to use a stamp that can

be easily lined up.  This is not

necessarily one of those, but

it came together pretty well.  I

think it looks so complicated, but

is so easy to do.  It's a kind of

card, in my opinion, that is said

to have a "wow!" factor.  So

easy, yet looks so hard to do.

I also love to blend

 distress inks.  It is so pretty.

I think if I make a card like

 this again, I might make 

the front smaller and add a

second mat behind it.  I think 

it would stand out more that way.

But it's OK the way it is, too.

Today would have been
John's 69th birthday.  I wish
he were here to celebrate with
us, but I know he's celebrating
with Jesus and all the Angels
in Heaven.  What a
birthday party that must be!

Happy New year!

New year's eve I get ready to

go to the store and the car won't

start!  It needed a new battery.  I got

roadside assistance to come jump

it and then some friends met me at

Walmart to take me  home while

I waited.  On the way home we

stopped at the local winery and

did some wine tasting so they

could get a late Christmas gift.

I've never done that before and

it was fun!  I'm not much of a wine

person but I did enjoy the blueberry

wine.  And I don't even like blueberries!!

No internet all day yesterday.  That was

annoying, but I need to keep these

things in perspective.  It came on

around 4 am.  How do I know

this?  Because my dog got me

up at 4 am....This is getting

very old.

But as I've said before, my muse

is active early in the morning (although

four in the morning is early even 

for her) so I got a chance to make

a couple cards I've had floating

in my  head.  This one is pretty much

blatantly copied.  Just a bit of

tweaking here and there, but the idea

is the same as hers.  You have

to get your ideas somewhere!

I love how this turned out.  I wish

I could have used the entire flourish

but it was just too big for the

card and would have covered the

"just because".  I need to use

kraft paper more often.  I like how

it looks, especially paired with black.

I hope everyone had a great new year's

eve and let's expect good things 

in 2016!  It's got to get better, doesn't it?!

You have to look for the good even

when it's hard to find....

Also, I've noticed that the blog is
posting at very early morning hours.
Apparently that's the server time
because I'm certainly not posting at 2
or 3 am, LOL!