Card Lot

Here are the cards finished I was working on for WOYWW sans four that have already gone into the mail.  This was a fun project, if I had worked at it in one shot the 14 cards would have taken me about three hours.  Using an electronic cutter was a huge help! 
The verse was Ephesians 3:20+21  "Now unto him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think, according to the power that worketh in us,
Unto him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus throughout all ages, world without end. Amen."  My favorite cards have bible verses, I have worked for years at  setting up verses as digital stamps.

I also made this card for my Sweet Sisters' Birthday:  I won't say how old, but just much older than ME!!  Actually I'm the youngest,  they are all a LOT older than ME.  jajajaja, crack my self up !  This stamp is heat embossed in black and watercolored.

Thanks for Stopping By!
Ginny, the youngest!

WOYWW#169

Wednesday again!!  It's time for the world wide blog hop!

I have a fun desk today, actually the project is occupying my stamp room and has even gone out doors for a little while!

Before I show you my desk, I will show you two cards that I made before I decided to mass produce:

My desk in the planning stage
I received a wonderful birthday gift from my sister, don't ya just love sisters!!



I made 6 of these as gifts for the Deacons in our church, 130# papers with multi -layers made this a very nice weight.
I like the concept so much I thought I'd like to make a bunch more of the bases.  So I have 14 to start with.

First I picked papers for layers and began cutting, I used my ecraft for this,  each card had seven layers, so using an electronic cutter was wonderful.

After I cut the layers, I made the card bases, A6 size on 100# Neenah solar white.  It was so hot in the house, I brought the parts out side and Steve and I glued everything .

You can't tell from this picture, but 20 minutes later, we finished the cards by using one of the solar lamps on the deck!

Tomorrow I'll post the finished cards!  Thanks for stopping by!
Enjoy the Hop, go Here for more fun!!  http://stamping-ground.blogspot.com/

Going to a party!

On Saturday I am going to a party, just three of us, we are going to sit in a basement studio, eat fruit salad and pizza and play with stamps.   I am looking forward to it, and I have been getting ready off and on all day.  We don't have a plan other than to just get some things done.  I was going to work on my Christmas cards, but I think I will wait till next week and see if I can get Steve to help me.  He will be off all week, still melting down from weds.  So that will give us something we can do here at the house.
So I have a list of things I  want to get done, in order, with all the supplies I need.  This is where I have been getting into trouble for decades; 
When I was 10 I wanted to organize the sleep over in the tent at my friends, and I did not want anyone stepping on my sleeping bag that matched my nightgown.  When I was a teenager, I was organizing where my friends could barf and not be heard by their parents up stairs, and how to hide the smell of the alcohol.  Of course since I was the only one not getting plastered, I was the one talking to the parents.   When I was older Still, I was the one doing all the cooking and and the cleaning for the get togethers, so we could get together.  Yep, and believe it or not I had and have lots of friends, Maybe for those of you who understand, I have lots of friends that need a "Martha" in their lives, and I even more so need them!!

 So tomorrow I am bringing gifts

A package of 100# Neenah Solar white,  Package of "By the Sea" papers two 4x4 nesting circle card blanks, a 6x6 Hexagon swivel card blank, a nice crystal lotus dish for their desks with a bottle of glimmer glaze, silk fibers, and Burt's bees stuff.  These gals Like these soft muted colors.  I'll take your black, red and cream Colors!

I'm bringing a fruit salad

I packed lightly:

and it will still take three trips to the car.  I love these kind of things, being grown up is wonderful!
I hope you all have a fun Saturday, what ever your fun is, you need it!!  We all do!!
Ginny

Unloading

Yesterday I unmounted my wooden Sentiment, and Scripture stamps.  I like having things that are like, and it bothers me to have things unlike. Needless to say I excelled in my third grade 'what things are like and what things are not like' exams.  There must have been secret nuclear testings in New England wafting out radioactivity that day in 1968, because my brain forever froze in that mode.  I don't like mixing my markers, I like having whole families of types of ink pads. Everything plays together better when they are 'like'.

So it really made sense to end the dilemma of trying to remember which stamp was where, in a drawer or in a binder.  They are now ALL in a binder!! Not only are they all together and not in 5 different places, they are all indexed.  So I have some good organization happening and these stamps are by far easier to accurately stamp using a clear block.   I also have my unmounted stored and indexed in similar binders, they all live on the same shelf.

These are right over my head, my computer desk is in an alcove and Steve built a sturdy shelf over it.

Now  I am going to Quote Vickie "  I have unmounted most of my stamps now and I play with them a lot more this way!  "  Others have said they couldn't do it, no way!!

Well I took another step today in the unmounting process  I did most of my Stampin' Up two step stamps!!  I have a few left to do.  I love the images that I have but they are little pains trying to get them aligned , seeing through wood is pretty tricky, I never mastered it!!  Now using them on a clear block, what a difference!  Hopefully I can make some cards tomorrow using a set or two  of these!!

I will be able to store about 40 sets here in these 5x7 drawer sets!

 

I don't plan on ummounting everything.  I just want to better utilize what I all ready have and improve the quality of what I do.

 

So what is your preference?  Mounted or Unmounted?

 

Thanks for stopping by!

Ginny

MOJO Food and cat swap

I've been working on this swap for about a week on and off.  When ever I do a swap I try to make a batch of the same card, usually I shoot for ten and there are always a couple of big errors that lead  cards to the trash can.  This one however was an exceptional batch to the trash can.  the finished card style card was the I think the 6th and final attempt, and I am happy with it. 

 

I wanted to make a brown square swivel card using several Asian stamps and of course it had to feature a cat

 

 

But after several tries, I decided to try a Hexagon swivel.

 

.    I like that, but not in brown, not in blue and not in red, green was not too good either.  (I feel like the cat in the hat should step in here).  I did finally hit it with my Wasua Birch card stock.  I will spare you all the bad stamps and crooked cuts and tell you what put it all together for me: 

 A nice big bowl of carbs.  Doesn't matter, there was nothing nutritious in that bowl, just pure mojo food. 

This is an A6 size card (aprox 6x5)

 

 

This is the card face

You open the card and it swings!  So this would be the front!  The writing is Kanji and it says "May God Bless You Abundantly"  Thank you translation software!!

This is the back: 

Don't ya just love the concept?

I used all kinds of tricks with this card, Dry embossed the left opening panel, heat embossed the cat, painted the cat with twinkling H2O's, Distress inks, distress stickles, the butter fly is heavy glitter.

 

With the swaps, I don't like to write a personal message on the card, I do like to make a smaller "surprise card" and I do put the personal note on that. 

This is the personal card I made.  3.5 x 5".

 

 

This card was a great learning experience, next time after things don't work on the second try, I'm going straight for the mojo food!

 

Thanks for stopping by!  Have a great day!

Ginny

 

WOYWW #168 or 9

My finger is better so I can type a little now!!  But the really good News Is we received the latest test results for Steve and they are Excellent!!!  He is receiving his radioactive treatment today and then another body scan next week and that should be it!!  My mom is also doing great!!  Thank you everyone for prayer!!  I know it worked!! 

In anticipation for having a whole day alone, I started  a big project, I am taking all my "word" stamps of their wood mounts and making them clings and reorganizing all my cling stamps.   So that is what my pictures of my work desk show today!  That and a few pieces of my cat mingle swap project. 


For the fun world wide blog hop go Here: http://stamping-ground.blogspot.com/

Thanks for stopping by!!

Uh Oh

  I won't be  typing  tonight, I cut myself yesterday on my right index finger, while I didn't need stitches, I have gotten a nasty infection, I went to the dr. this afternoon and started on an antibiotic, he felt pretty sure I would need iv therapy tomorrow (sunday) I think he is right, 2/3 of my hand is now red and very swollen and I can't bend my index finger at all. Oh Joy, just about the first day in three weeks I don't have to go to the hospital a dr.'s office for my mother or Steve, or to  I end up having to go for myself! What a summer.!!

But I was able to work on a cool card  (8) a little bit today!!  Hopefully I will finish and post for tomorow!

Thanks for stopping by!

Ginny

Meals on Wheals

This arrived yesterday, today there will be a shipment of sealing bags to go with it.   I had this Brainstorm on Tuesday, What could I do to really help my Mother and her Companion when she got home from the Hospital?  Many of us are now in the situation of trying to help maintain our parents Independence.  My mother, in her mid 80's is still very independent and totally on top of things mentally, but she can't lift and shouldn't after surgery and her mobility is a little bit challenged.  Same thing with the BF.  If I had room here I would just move them both in, and that might be happening down the road, but we would have to sell the house and look for something bigger and on one floor.  So to help immediately I am going to become meals on wheels.  My sisters bought the machine and bags and I am going to do the cooking and delivering!  They would do this too but unfortunately east and west coast sisters live to far away.  I am looking forward to this endeavor.  I run a whole foods, organic kitchen and I love to cook and I love to eat good food.  My plan is to have a food plan and when I cook for my family make enough to freeze for my parents.  When I go over once a week to visit and help out there, I'll bring the meals!  If any of you have experience using a food sealing machine and would like to pass on tips, PLEASE leave comment, I'm a rookie at this!!

On the Crafty side of my Yesterday night:  I've started a new mingle or swap for OSA, this is an oriental cat mingle.  I'm going to make swing cards for this!  First time!  Lindsey W. so nicely provided a FREE svg file for the card base I couldn't resist!  If you have an electronic cutter and would like to have this go here: http://thefrugalcrafter.wordpress.com/  This BTW is my favorite blog and favorite videos person!   Lindsey continually offers up the best crafty tips and tools, home inks, homemade stamp cleaners all kinds of great stuff!  Last night I cut the 90# card stock and will work on the rest of the cards sometime today I hope!!

Thanks for stopping by and have a wonderful day!!
Ginny M

Lantern Geisha

I thought I'd post a picture of the Lantern Geisha card I had on my Work Desk yesterday.  This was for a mingle on the Oriental Stamp Art Group.  I love this group, always something interesting going on. 

Back when I quite stamping for a while,  in 2000, Internet was just becoming affordable and there were very few rubber stamp sources and I don't think "groups" had even started yet, there were "still message boards" and if you were lucky you had a fast dial up connection and you "got mail"  Ah, the old purchase the Internet by hours... and then the cool tool was a crimper.... So I am still amazed at how this whole rubber stamp thing has grown and still retains a very personal identity.  I guess I said all that because I like being challenged and I like meeting new friends on the blogs and in the  groups.  Or I said all that because my brain is functioning more like a fried Cheetos right now - went to bed at 4:30 am and was up at 7. 
Any way here is the card!! hopefully the peek was worth all the above blah, blah blah.

The lantern is actually mounted on dimensional dots, the kimono has a tie which holds the card shut.  What you can't see are all the bronze firefly stamped all over the card!

The card is a A6 size and mailed out in a A7 envelope to make room for the swap goodies!

Thanks for stopping by
Ginny M

WOYWW #167

It is is WOYWW again!!  This is week #167!  I totally missed last week,  Last weeks desk was covered with BC/BS EOB's and if anyone knows what they are, I know I have your sympathy and support!!   This is a better Week, Hubs doing well, and Mom coming home from open heart surgery!!

I have been stamping on the run a little bit, and this is what that looks like at my stand up desk:

UGH What a mess!!  I am supposed to be making a card for a OSA mingle, and when I took these yesterday this one card had already taken 4 attempts to come to pass:

I had a great idea, but I couldn't get it to work!!  So I changed the base of the fabric on sticky paper idea to a leathery black base of 120# paper:

Okay now this is working and I should have the finished cards to post tomorrow!

Thanks for stopping by!  Good here to continue the world wide 'What's On YourWork desk Wednesday' Hop!! http://stamping-ground.blogspot.com/

The Forrest and Depression

Today turned into a very retrospective day for me.  It started out as a regular Sunday, Then Church happened.  Then a question not related to church happened,  Then a question from a friend happened.  Gasp, Did I say that on an Internet blog?  Yep, Oh No Mr. Bill you might offend someone.  I think not, not this post, not today.   The questions were about the same thing and they made me stop and think and type. 

For the last three weeks my day has revolved around the health and welfare of my sweet husband and my dear mother.  I have spent more time in the hospital watching them breath than all the times I have been in the hospital put together.  It does something to you, watching the people you love fighting for life and all the while all you can do is be there, holding a hand full of tubes and probes, try to encourage, swab a tongue that looks like it has walked a hundred miles in the desert, feeding ice chips.  Knowing how fragile their lives are there while I sit there, just watching and praying and trying to be strong.   Life can make us feel like we are the Lone tree, but we are not. I am not

At the very least I am two trees, a married woman, and everything I do is a part of my husband and the strength of his life, and his to mine.

The first question came from church, What are your treasures.  The answer is your treasure is what you invest your life time and money into.  Pretty simple.  But I had to think is my treasure something that will help me get to heaven and help the people I love get there?   Or will it hinder?  Treasures yield dividends, do those dividends bless only myself, or do they bless others?   And that led to the Question; 

What I Am really all about?  You know, "you know a tree by it's fruit," so what am I producing?  I take my life  seriously, I only have one.  Since I was too dumb in math I was never able to join the Peace Corps. That was a big disappointment in my 13 year old life : I would never be able to go to Africa because I couldn't do Algebra.   I never felt I would be able to really offer something to make peoples' lives better.  Even Now many years later  I love being a wife and a mother, but there is still more. Because I'm not just one tree, I'm not just two trees, I am this:

   I am part of a Forest, mingling roots and branches climbing upward,              reaching for the Perfect.  You are that too. 

The third question came from a fellow card maker about the quantity of stamps she owned and about her battle with depression.  I am going to share that here.  My friend told me she was suffering from depression and could no longer take meds for it, but how card making helped her,

"I am so sorry you had seizures from the medications, but they may have been a blessing in disguise. I think creating and gifting are a sweet healthy way to help heal depression. Depression comes from our focus being locked on a problem or injury, with a little bit of time those things can heal, except when we take meds for them, then they aren't allowed to go through the normal process of healing:  hurt, anger, healing and restoration. The purpose of the meds is to break the focus of the problem. But what it ends up doing is never releasing you from it. The meds never change anything, it just alters the focus. Without the meds, you focus, you heal, you restore.  Medications leaves you in stage one . Crafting and giving help you heal and the restoration comes. Giving naturally breaks the focus, allowing you to move away from the cause of the depression. I know, been there and as they say done that. Abusive father, Abusive husband, divorce, money problems, feeling alone and abandoned (because I was). I was told I was depressed (who wouldn't be) and that I should go on meds to help me cope. I realized I did not want to cope with this trash I wanted to walk away from it and free my life up. And I did, that was almost 20 years ago. This October I will have been married to a wonderful man for 10 years , my kids are grown and doing well! Every life will go through seasons some are great some are not, but they all pass, it is our choice who we become because of them! I choose Joy! I pursue it! The drugs they are so quick to hand out are so toxic and dangerous, as you know !!  Dear Friend you have a very special gift to share and bless people with! What you are doing is so important, you are helping yourself and helping others. You may never really even know how much good you are doing, Every card we make with love and beauty is a great blessing we give to someone."

I wrote all this because of this week of facing life and death, I also faced who was I really and what am I really all about.  I have the power to use the gifts God gave me for the purpose He would carve in my life. He held my hand in the valley of dispair and got me through.  Leaning on Him and Learning about Him the whole way. Card making and writing are part of my purpose in this season of my life, I can't do algebra but I can pray for you and write to you and tell you to hang on, better days are coming and most importantly I can 'be a tree planted by the water' my roots and branches mingling, giving strength, even if it is in ice chips or cards. 
So now I ask you;  What are your treasures, What are you all about?  Do you suffer from depression? Then if you do the anwser is in Him and in giving and blessing others as you are blessed, He brings the healing and through acts of love you tip the scales and cause restoration.
God Bless you abundantly,
Ginny

I'm Back

I'm Back in a small way tonight.  This week has been so crazy busy for me.  My husband is doing very well from his cancer surgery and will be getting ready for the next treatment and then we hope that will be the end of this story!!  My Mom had open heart Surgery on Monday, 5 bi-passes and a Maze procedure.  She is feeling well enough to feel lousy, at her 80+ years she is making an amazing recovery.  I would say her actual age, but since I have two sisters that might be reading this and this disclosure might get back to her, I will play it safe......  So I am very thankful, all is well with my mother and my husband.   I want to thank everyone for all the prayer and encouragement!!  It has made all the difference!
Now on the techno side, I must have the electronic death plague on my finger tips.   First my smart phone, (I don't know why they call it a smart phone, it spells worse than I do!!) locked up, froze, to the point where Google told me the next thing to try was a four iron on the back nine!  So I went to Verizon and they were able to drop it into a hat, when they pulled it out it worked, well the rabbit in that hat wiped my hard drive 'En Toto'.  Of course it wasn't backed up, so you know the rest of that story...
and on Monday, while spending 16 hours in the hospital, my PC crashed. Blue screen of death in 5 shades.  Steve is an expert, but there was no bringing that baby back.  Now I know it is only a computer, but I am inappropriately attached to my computer.  It started  45 years ago when I flunked penmanship - it is the only thing I am worse at than spelling!!  In 1996 I got my first PC, and it came with a word processor called Ami-Pro.  Anyone remember that?  Well I purchased fonts and did what I always dreamed of doing - calligraphy  and since then my PC has been my right hand so to speak.    Since my PC was toast, Steve rigged up my lap top to give me a command central set up.  I can now work and watch a video, or work and blog.  This is so cool!!

Of course I've had to spend hours trying to relocate everything but I'm back in business so to speak. 

Speaking of business, I'm doing a huge workshop tomorrow

 night, these are for brand new stampers. here are my sample cards:  I know I have a new photo program and I need to learn how to use it!

Thanks for stopping by, I'm off to readjust things in my computer land! Ginny

What A Week!!!!

Computer Crashed!!  My phone crashed!!! Oy, Oy Oy, But I will be back tonight!!

Time and BMI of 24

I wanted a really big picture of clocks here,  It has been one of those days, or weeks where it just seemed like I was running against time.  Not Mad Hatterish,  just needing more time, to do the things I want to do and feel I need to do.  But I don't have it and that is probably a good thing, because time works like a diet in reverse.  You gain an hour and the next thing you know you loose 5 more.  It just happens, there is no explanation on the planet for explaining this.  Experts try, but they fail.  If somebody came up with the right explanation just once, we'd have enough time and we would all have a BMI of 24.
This will happen the same week a gallon of Organic milk costs less than 2 liters of Soda.   

I did manage to get a few cards made tonight.  My sweet husband is feeling better; he still sounds like Marlon Brando in that famous movie and we found out today that may take months to heal up and be normal.
 A very significant event did happen today, He took his car keys back, but before he did, my knowledge of him being a world class terrible passenger ( is it a male thing?) was totally reaffirmed. I did try and tell him he had absolutely nothing to worry about with me wanting to be the driver  when we went places!!

I wanted to make thank you cards for the meals that were brought in, cards, calls and just so much love shown to us. 

 

These are on 130# paper so they are nice and heavy.  I may put a magnet on the back of them.  I made a dozen altogether.

Well it is time to sleep, past time actually, but I needed the quiet and the peaceful purpose of thank you cards: I am thankful!
Have a great weekend! ~ginny

Roza картинка

This beautiful watercolor Rose was painted by my friend Lena.  Lena is a Wife, Mother and Sister.  She is temporarily living in the City of Ashdod on the Mediterranean coast of Israel. 

I believe we all have inner vision, it is this inner vision we try to express in our arts, to bring forward , giving birth to beauty.  Lenas' vision is rich and beautiful with life and promise of tomorrow.  A new bud waiting to open, a new day of life.  In my mind I can feel the velvety softness of each petal and smell that sweet spicy smell that pierces the air and demands your attention in the way only the Rose can do.

We all have different gifts needing to be brought forward from the heart.

 They are types flowers painted in dimensional beauty,

We have them in our  heart, they are there, locked in memories, and  they come out through our gifts,  needing to be  birthed , bringing to others.

These gifts, no matter what they are become a passion, which is why we have guilds and groups, specialty stores to sell the mediums in which we create.  Crafting, cooking, writing, so many gifts so much beauty!  So much blessing, all of it, fountains from the creator springing up like a well of life.

I would encourage you all to Spring up! Make your world a more beautiful place and share your gifts. Pick up the brush, needle, pen, paint, inks, pads, papers, clay, fry pan, dough, whatever it is you are blessed with and Pass it on!

Thank you Lena, in all the days' events you took the time to paint this beautiful rose for me.  It made me pause and remember the beautiful roses my mother grew when I was a child, they were glorious! It made the reality of  'the velvety softness of each petal and smell that sweet spicy smell that pierces the air and demands your attention in the way only the Rose can do'.  And now it will always make me think of you and the beauty your life and talents grace us with! 

But mostly it reminds me of Him in whom all beauty is founded.

"I am the rose of Sharon, and the lily of the valleys."  Song of sol. 2:1