My 2011 Favorites!

Happy New Year!  I have been planning all week to go through this year's blog posts and pick out my favorites!  I really thought I did a lot less posts in 2011, than in 2010, but guess what?  Last year, I did 200 posts.  This post will make number 203 for 2011!  In going through the posts to pick out my favorites, I also realized, I did make a lot of cards!  Last year, I just couldn't narrow it down to just 12, well ... this year is no exception!  Last year, I showed you my top 36 and that is exactly what you are getting from me this year!  Let's get to it ... my top 36 favorites each with a link to the original post.  (Just click on the title under the pic to go to the original post).  Enjoy!




I Heart Ewe!





The Top 10 Reasons I Love You!




Don't Forget I Love You!



Whale You Be My Valentine?



Pretty Floral Prayers!




Everything Beautiful!



Celebrate Spring!



O Lord My Glory!

  



Chicks Rule!



Some Bunny Loves You!



Together 'Til We Croak!

 

Chickadee, Chickadoo!





To One of My Favorite Peeps!





You're So Tweet!




What A Blast!



Crazy for Daisies ... And You!

 





Life's A Breeze!





Count Your Age by Friends!

 





Ready ... Set ... Blow!



You're Our Top Dog!



Good Things Come To Those Who Bait!



I'm Bananas For You!




Happy Birthday To You!



Got Lemons?

 



Popping By To Say Hi!



With A Cherry On Top!



Love is Everything!



Brewing Up Wishes!



Sun Up to Sun Down!



Witchly Wishes!



Pumpkin Girl!



Reindeer Holiday Cheer!



Season's Tweetings!



Sending You A Little Christmas!





Santa's Little Helper!



Wishing You Peace, Joy, & Cheer!

Wow!  That is my 36 favorites ... in cards.  But, I think I must add a pic and link to my favorite 2011 project!  Enjoy! 

Shadowbox Gift

We had family here visiting this week, but I did get time to do a little cleaning in my shack.  Boy, did it need it.  It is now clean and ready for me to start again!  And I will be doing just that.  So, hopefully, I will be back in a few days with some new creations! 

Hope you get everything you hope for in 2012!
Happy Stamping!
Tina

Saturday's Sketch Share!

Happy Christmas Eve!  Traditionally, my family (my parents, my mom's 5 sisters and their hubby's, and me)always got together at my aunt's house on Christmas Eve, cooked the big dinner (turkey and dressing with all the trimmings), and opened all the presents.  And then on Christmas, Santa came at my house, and then we were back to the aunt's house for leftovers and enjoying the day together.  As a grown up, some years, the tradition continued where the main Christmas celebration was on Christmas eve, but this year, the celebration will be tommorrow with family, Gary's daugter and son, the son n law, and two of the grandkids.  A small group but a great dinner planned: spinach salad with strawberries, steaks, twice baked potatoes, and asparagus ... yum, yum! 

O.k. let's get to today's share.  I will be showing you my card, Debbie's card and the sketch.  This is Donna's week to participate, but she got a "pass" because her son is home this week and this will be the last time she will get to see him before he leaves for Afganistan in March.  He is a Marine.  And my Godson, who I am very proud of!  Today's cards ... enjoy!  

My Card



Debbie's Card




The Sketch



Yes, I went with a square this time.  I wanted to do a little take-off of one of the tags I made in my tag class, and I knew I would need a bigger space for my reindeer to fit, so I had to go with the square choice.  The sketch has a square where the main image goes.  I contemplated about putting a square here that would cover up so much of the paper, but in the end, I love my idea of adding the vellum square, embossed in snowflakes behind the reindeer!  Don't you?

Debbie and I are taking next week off of doing the shares, but I will be back one day next week to show you my favorite cards I made in 2011!

I hope you have the merriest of Christmases! 
Tina

P.S. Happy Stamping! 

Pink & Greeen!

Happy Day before Christmas Eve!  I can't believe Christmas is just about upon us.  There are a few things to be done here before the family comes, but I wanted to share two more cards I made.  Pink & Green, yes those colors you could say are two of my favorites, but when I think of the color pink by itself, I think of my mom, her favorite!  And then green, well, that is definitely my hubby's favorite.  Both cards were put together with no sketch in mind, which as I look at them now, is probably why I really am not crazy about either one.  They are o.k. and they will have to do!  Let me show you and you can be the judge.  Enjoy!

Another card with my favorite 2011 set.  This time I used a couple of the embellishments for the ornament.  I like this one pretty good.  What do you think?

Recipe:
Paper - Ornaments were Imaginisce (in my stash, I think from last year), Pink is from Pink Paislee Snow Day line (backside), Cardstock White, Red
Stamps - My Favorite Things Ornament Set, Mom is from Verve
Ink - Tim Holtz Distress Ink Barn Door Red
Tools - Spellbinders Scalloped Oval, Cuttlebug Dotted Swiss Folder, Stampin' Up Tag Punch
Other - Ribbon, Dot Sparkler Stickers from Stampendous, Rhinestones from Queen & Co.

Next ... 



This is the one I am not that crazy about.  I think the candy cane girl is cute, though!  I love her in her lime green coat!  I added the jingle bell embellishment that's fun, but doesn't really go with the theme of the card.  The green stripe on the card is actually a vertical stripe just like the red is, but I turned the paper and cut it so the stripes would appear diagonal.  The problem with what I did is that I made my panel too small, so instead of redoing it, I added the bigger white panel behind.  Not sure I like it.  What do you think?
Recipe:
Paper - Both Striped paper, red and green are from Canvas Corp, Cardstock Green, White, Silver Glitter Paper
Stamps - A la Mode Candy Cane Kisses from My Favorite Things
Ink - Memento Black
Tools - MFT Scalloped border die, Spellbinders Labels 18 & Petite Oval, Jingle Bell die from Memory Box
Other - Rhinestones from Queen & Co., Ribbon from $1 bargain bin at Hobby Lobby

Here are a couple of pics from Christmas at my house:

This is my Santa collection.  If I don't get out anything else, I must get out my Santa collection. 

And the next pic is our tree, all lit up. 

Pretty, huh?  

I will be back tomorrow for the Saturday share.  Both Debbie and I have a Christmas card for you.  I am kinda happy to say, it's the last Christmas card for this year!  Next on my agenda, sometime next week, I have to clean up my room.  It looks like a tornado hit it!  And, I can put all my Christmas stamps and papers away for another year.  That makes me happy!  Because that means, I can stamp other things, like a bunch of sets I have acquired in  in the last few months, that have been sitting and waiting for me!  All the new got put on the back burner, when there were so many holiday cards to make for the last 3 months!  Plus, the first two weekends in January, there are two stamp conventions, so you know I will pick up new things to show you from those!  And, if I have the time next week, I need to get my next class samples done.  I have been asked to teach the desk calendars and planners like the ones I made and gave to my friends. 

See you tomorrow!  Happy Stamping!
Tina 

Gift Money Holders with Tutorial!

Hello!  I am still running behind but at least now I can say the Christmas decorations are out of the boxes and the tree is in the house and decorated and the cards are in the mail.  Woo Hoo!  I had some time to spend in my room last night finishing up the four money holders I need for the grandkids.  Two were sent in the mail yesterday to Arkansas, which I did the day before.  When I was working on the last one, I took some pics with my camera so I can give you a quick tutorial.   Let me show you.  Enjoy!

I love these as they look just like a little gift package.  Before I get to the tutorial, first I need to give credit to the blog I found this great idea on.  You can see the post here.  And I believe in her post, she gives credit to who she got the idea from and you can see that one here.  It was in this last one that I got the actual instructions, so if my instructions are confusing, you might check hers out!  That is what I love about "blogland"!  So many ideas! 

Tutorial:
1. Cut cardstock to 4" x 11".  In horizontal position, score at 4', 5.5" and 7".  Valley fold on the 4 and 7 inch score lines, and mountain fold on the 5.5 inch score line. 

2.  Flip over and add adhesive so that the V will be adhered together.  I have used score tape in the pic below to show where your adhesive will be.

3.  Flip back over and add adhesive to form a pocket.  In below pic, when the adhesive tape liner is removed, and it is folded over, a pocket will be formed.

4.  For the present top, cut card stock to 3" x 4 1/4" and score in half in the vertical position at 1 1/2" and fold. Add scrapbook paper to the front  of the topper and to the underside that will show when card is open. 

5.  Add adhesive to the inside back of this piece and attach to the back of the card base.  It is a very good idea to make sure it not only will fit at the top of the base fold but that it is straight before adhering.  (don't ask me how I know this, and also how I know that score-tape is hard to pull up without taking cardstock with it when you don't like how you adhered it!)  First pic shows tape before adhering and next pic shows the top on. 

6.  You will want to open the card back up, and finish the inside.  I added some paper on the inside top panel where the pocket is and also the sentiment panel on the inside bottom.

7.  To create the package "faux" ribbon, I used two sizes of Spellbinders Petite Oval dies and ran them thru my big shot at the same time to create these open ovals.  I saw in the blog instructions, the lady used two different size oval punches, but I don't have them so I used what I have!  I debated on whether the ovals were too big looking for my box, but I decided it was o.k. and went with it! 

8.  At this point, all I did was overlap them and glue dotted each oval to the one before to create my faux ribbon loops.  And then I added more glue dots on the backside and stuck the formed ovals to the front at the top. And added a 1/2" x 1 1/2" red strip on top to cover it and then a big bauble on top of that.

9.  One last thing, I added a Basic Grey magnet under the "top" and the front of the base "present" for a closure.  I normally would have added them under the paper where they wouldn't show, but I decided since I was making these for "kids", that are not going to care one way or the other, I would simplify it and just do it the easy way!

Even though it took me 9 steps to show you, these were super simple to make.  They could be used for anytime of the year and would also hold a gift card perfectly!  Would love to hear what you think of them and let me know if my tutorial was helpful and made sense! 

I am working on cards for my mom and hubby, so I will try to post those to show you tomorrow.  And then on Saturday, I will have another sketch share ... and the last Christmas card! 

Happy Stamping!
Tina