ChristineCreations: February 2012

Bloom

Something bright and cheerful for you. We're supposed to get a good amount of snow starting tonight so I thought some cheery flowers would be in order. I don't actually mind the snow. We've had such a mild winter, and we're so close to it all melting and real spring happening that it doesn't feel so bad as it might in November. We're on Teacher's Convention the next couple of days, so if it doesn't get crazy cold, my boys can adventure in the snow.

This is another little card made with Flourishes February Release of Tiny Flowers and Tags. There are SO many sweet elements in this set. It is jam-packed with adorable flowers that are mini versions of other Flourishes sets. I'm also on a Scor Buddy kick this week so you can see I've scored the cardstock and then added the flowers within each little diamond.

See that cute little hanging tag? Made with our own custom die, Tailor Made Classic Tags

I love their little pint size :) Papers are Basic Grey's Picadilly, love this page of the pretty flowers!

I'll be back with something new on Friday for you! Till then, have a good day!

Color Me Hoppy

Could you use a little color pick me up for this Monday? How about something full of spring?

I jumped in on this week's - The Cat's Pajamas Challenge which was a color challenge.

Cute hey? I love the big bunny ears and the cracked egg. I'll be honest, I'm feeling a bit like a cracked egg today too! It's TCP's Bunny Side Up set. Which I think is adorable. Colored up with Copics.

Awesome fun colors to work with....

And I used Jen's Deconstructed Sketch, from this week.

Here's a closeup of the details....I colored up the Candi embellishments with my BG11 Copic.

Hopefully it colors you a little hoppy or happy today :)

Stamps: TCP - Bunny Side Up; Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black; Paper: Flourishes Classic White, Pool Party, Certainly Celery, SU - Everyday Enchantment DP; Accessories: Grand Calibur, Lacy Ovals Dies, Grommet Tags, Card Candi, Chenille Ribbon, Scor Buddy Board, Scor Bug Tool, Dimensionals, Copic Markers (C01, C02, C03, C05, BG11, BG13, G40, G43, G46, RV32, RV34).

Project 365 - Week Eight

Hello friends,

Sorry I've been a little absent this past week. A lot going on behind the scenes at the homefront, and I've just been kept very busy. Hopefully this next week I'll have some more things to show you.

February 19 - The Wee One turns One. Our little nephew celebrated his first birthday last Sunday and OH he was the sweetest little party goer. My sister-in-law decorated so beautifully with some of my crafting supplies too. I love him peering up at these balloons in wonder getting ready for his birthday cake.

February 20 - What's for Supper? African Nut Stew. I know I've shown this recipe on the blog a couple of years ago, but it's such a unique and tasty recipe and we were having it for supper again. It includes a stew base, and then fruit, vegetables and nuts that you top it off with. Thanks to those of you who've asked about my braces :) It's improving, and we're getting used to each other, but I'm still limited in some of what I can eat. In a couple of weeks I'm getting two teeth pulled to make room in my tiny little mouth for things to be straight.

February 21 - Upside Down. A week or two ago the theme on the Project 365 Blog was Upside Down. I'm always a couple of weeks late with this sort of thing so I had the boys lay upside down on the couch. They're both giggling with their eyes almost shut and can't you just tell they're brothers? :)

February 22 - Snow! A little snow falling softly in the neighbourhood.

February 23 - School Days - This is the oldest school building in our city, and I think it might be one of the oldest operating school buildings in our province. I love it! I think it's so pretty with the red brick, high peaks and shaped windows. We know a number of kids that go there and they all complain over how many stairs they have to climb each day, but they love their school too.

February 24 - Fondue! One of the ministries I run each month is a girls night for the JH and HS students in our youth ministry. This month one of the things we did was Fondue....so we had yummy cheese and chocolate fondue to eat. The guys had a fitness night in another location. How funny and ironic is that hey? :)

February 25 - Catching Snow. We've been in some heavy snowfall since Friday night, probably about a foot has fallen. We went outside and snapped this quick one of our little one trying to catch some snow on his tongue. It really was snowing much more than you can see, but he caught more on his eyelashes than on his tongue! When we went in he said "Mom, my tongue is cold!"

Thanks for journeying with me in my photography this week again.

Birthday Hop for Jan Marie

Let’s light the candles and strike up the music!! The owner of Flourishes – Jan Marie Caruso – is celebrating a birthday and we’re helping her by getting the party started with just about the entire Flourishes Crew! Why not leave some love on her blog HERE and while you are hopping around, pay a visit to the Flourishes team members who are honoring her special day!

Happy Birthday Jan Marie, you are a beautiful lady inside and out. And it's such a privilege and blessing to work for you at Flourishes! Thank you for the many years of opportunity, creativity, beauty, such generous support and fun. Blessings on a wonderful year ahead full of hope and joy!

In honor of Jan’s special day, the worker bees behind the scenes decided to have a COLORFUL sale to help celebrate! TODAY and TOMORROW only – all Copic Markers will be on sale 15% off. Just use the code COPIC15 in the coupon code box at the time of check out to get this fun discount! So, join us in singing her a special little birthday song! Be sure to check out all the fun and festive wishes and grab some great ideas for birthday cards along the way!

I wanted to pull out this beautiful Fuschia set from Flourishes called Fuschias in Bloom it is such a lovely set illustrated by Lauren Pope. I just love the fuschia border included in the set.

Coloring is done with Copics and I've used some Spellbinders to accent Labels Twenty, Edgeabilities, Ornate Artisan Dies, and the Butterfly dies.

Love this textured Two-Tone Fuschia ribbon too, and I've paired it here with some pretty white lace Laural Venise.

Join the rest of the girls to continue on in the Birthday Celebration Hop!

· Barbara Anders

· Christine Okken

· Cindy Lawrence

· Danielle Kennedy

· Dawn Burnworth

· Julie Koerber

· Sharon Doolittle

Stacy Morgan

Tammy Hershberger

Beate Johns

Cindy Haffner

Heather Jensen

Maki Jones

Mona Pendleton

Silke Ledlow
Betty Wright

Kathy Jones

Yvonne Hagane

Pat Adam

Happy Birthday Jan! We hope your day is the absolute BEST and cheers to an even better year ahead!

Pink Callas

It's Family Day here, a vacation day set aside in Alberta for families :) So like many of you in the US we have a day off, which we're grateful for.

Something pretty for someone needing some encouragement. Another lovely card with this beautiful Calla Lilies set from Flourishes. I did a little out of the box with the leaves and inked the embossing folder a little with some pink ink.

Short and sweet once again today... hope you're having a wonderful day!

Project 365 - Week Seven

Back for another week of photos from our life!

February 12 - Valentine's for our youngest. He was such a happy heart getting all his Valentine's ready for his class. :)

February 13 - Sunrise here at the house overtop of the trampoline :) I have to say it was my beloved that took this picture because I wasn't up yet!

February 14 - What's for supper? Smashed Potato Soup. One of our family favourites. It's like baked potato in a soup form. Because of my braces we had supper at home as a family instead of going out for Valentine's.

February 15 - The side view of a card I had made last week. I loved all the dimension on this cute little scooter girl.

February 16 - Flip Flips at Old Navy. I had to return something and saw this display of flip flops there. Doesn't all that color make you wish for spring?

February 17 - Playdough with the cousins :) This is the first weekend since 2011 that we have off. No youth events this long weekend and we had some time with my family. The girls were playing with playdough and our daughter made my niece some "glasses".

February 18 - House of Boys with Nerf Guns - We definitely have a house of boys. Boys obsessed with nerf dart guns. They saved up some money and bought two more today, so they did a little display of the 10 they have. We have a rule...no shooting the mama!

Resurrection

I really had the best time playing with this month's Releases at Flourishes. And this set in particular....He is Risen. I think it is an outstanding Easter set. And yet, so much of it can be used outside of Easter as well. These lilies are beautifully done by Marcella.

Today I wanted to show you this windowed-style card I created with the lilies in the set and focussing on one of the Verses. I layered my dies so that the sentiment would be in the inner window and stacked open dies (negative space of dies cut) over top. Then I added some Nestabling to really frame out the design.

Coloring on the lilies is with Copics in soft blues, greens and grays, with some touches of yellow accent. The papers are gorgeous MME Vanity Fair. And I've added a little crochet ribbon along the bottom to accent.

Join the rest of the team in seeing some more beautiful creations with this month's sets.

Remember today is the last day for the New Release Bundle at 10% off!

Go Girl!

Hello gang,

Just a quick post today with a cute card. When TSG had last month's releases I swooned over this cute little set, Scootin' By...I just have a thing for scooters :)

Isn't she just adorable? Man, if I were not a mom of 3 kids I can see myself scootin' about town all spring summer and fall with a little scooter like this...though NOT with a dress on! As you can probably tell, it has a lot of layers and dimension in the main image, 3 to be exact. The body, her paper pieced dress and then the scooter popped up.

This is this months' SFYTT Sketch.

I really enjoyed coloring up this little cutie with Copics, and the pretty color palette thanks to the Alla Prima paper.

If you need more deets let me know....I'm off for now! Back to see you again on Friday with another peek at the Flourishes releases this month.

Stamps: TSG - Scootin' By; Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black, Bermuda Bay; Paper: Sahara Sand, Bermuda Bay, Flourishes Classic White, Prima - Alla -Prima DP; Accessories: Big Shot, Picot Edge Circles Nestabilities, Martha Stewart - Quilt Edge Punch, Circle Nestabilities, Dimensionals, Copic Markers, Corner Rounder, Embossing Folder, Teal Twill Ribbon.

Toile Flowers and Tags

Happy Valentine's Day Everyone! I hope you're able to express your love to - or for someone today. For the first time in many many weeks we don't have one of our kids at home today because of being sick or exams or days off from school, so our day off is just me and my beloved, which is really nice!

There is so much that you can do with the new set from Flourishes Tiny Flowers and Tags, so today I thought I'd show you another totally different look you can achieve with the set.

I took the cherry blossoms stamps from the tiny set as well as some leaves and then my Memento Inks in Summer Sky and New Sprout and random stamped them on the Vanilla paper in the bakcground. Then I focussed on the individual blossoms on three little medallions, highlighting them with Spellbinders Dies. Finally I added the pretty little tag from our new Tailor Made Classic Tags, with the sentiment inside.

Thanks for dropping by! Remember this New Releases are available in a Bundle at 10% off this week only!

Stamps: Flourishes - Tiny Flowers and Tags; Ink: Momento Summer Sky and New Sprout Paper: Bashful Blue, Very Vanilla; Accessories: Big Shot, Flourishes - Tailor Made Classic Tags Die, Beaded Circles Die, Parisian Accents Die, Parisian Motifs Die; Crochet Ribbon, Twine, Dimensionals, Pearls, Sewing Machine.

Chocolate Bliss

Oh those little Easter Eggs....you know those mini ones with the pastel hard shell and the chocolate inside? They do me in every year! I love chocolate :) But these braces will put a limit on candy-coated anything this year! I suppose that's a good thing.

So this cute card has Mr. Bunny maybe a little over-indulgent in Easter eggs today! My guess is they're chocolate too.

It's a new set from The Cat's Pajamas and I think it's adorable :) Just look at his tummy!

It is also the TCP Sketch from a week or so ago too...

And below is a close-up of the details... Prismacoloring, fun papers from Prima, some eyelets that I haven't used forever and then the mini clothespins which I though worked perfectly with the pennant line.

I wanted my background to be swirly yellows, but I'm not sure it looks blended enough despite going over it with a blender pencil. Still cute, and full of sunshine!

Isn't that a cute font on the sentiment too? Reminds me of something 1970's like The Jetsons!

Thanks for stopping by today! Enjoy some chocolate for me!

Stamps: TCP - Sugar, Sugar, Ink: Memento Tuxedo Black; Paper: Barely Banana, Chocolate Chip, Whisper White, Flourishes Classic White, Prima Jack and Jill; Accessories: Big Shot, Circle Nestabilities, Lattice Embossing Folder, Scalloped Oval Punch, Prismacolors, OMS, Twine, Mini Clothes pins, Dimensionals

Project 365 - Week 6

We spent part of this week at a Pastors and Families Retreat at our Camp. Its a once a year gathering of Pastors and their spouses and kids for 3 days. Really, really fun and meaningful time, so I have a number of pictures from our time there, and more than 7 photos this week :)

This is our camp, more specifically, the view from the main lodge to the little chapel one morning. The chapel just seats 60 or so people, so its used for small special occasions, all the main events happen in the very well equipped lodge.

A little ice sculpture at the camp....cool shadow too.

This is where campfire would be in the summer each night, right now the snow covers the benches, but it's pretty.

Homework teenage style. Our daughter working on homework since we pull them out of school for the retreat. IPhone headphones in one ear :)

Me! I took this picture (or my son did) because of what was happening the next day....

Yep, braces. When I was a teenager, I needed them, but my family couldn't afford them. Since our kids are at the age of braces, I said to my husband, "I wish I would have gotten braces". He responded with, "well, why don't you?" The more I thought about it, the more I decided I'd be crazy not to do something I wanted to do. So I'm locked in so to speak for the next 2 years. It's been a bit bumpy with the pain and the learning curve of what I can eat right now (soft stuff only). But in about 700 + days or so I know I'll be glad I did it. So, I'm being really brave in showing you the gory details :)

These are two of my three best guys, reading together cuddled up on the chair. My husband has a substantial Theology textbook, and the little guy a new science fiction he was engrossed in :)

And finally.....one last one for the week.....

The little nephew's adorable grin. You'd never know he had four shots that day.

He Is Risen

I'm so excited to show you this beautiful set from Flourishes for Easter. It is everything that is Easter to me; faith, the Cross, beautiful sentiments that speak the message of Easter, and stunning illustrations from Marcella.

This stunning cross with the lilies and flowers surrounding it are amazing. I watercolored the scene with watercolor pencils as well as watercolor markers. The card is 5 1/2 x 5 1/2 in size.

A really big close up of the coloring above. It was beautiful to color up. I'm so blessed to have this set in my stamping collection!

Be sure to see what beautiful Easter creations the Design Team has for you with this set!

Barbara Anders

Christine Okken (you are here)

Jan Marie Caruso

Today you will find one more Mystery Blogger....a last chance for you to comment on the DT's blogs, if you find the Mystery Blogger you could be chosen to win this set!

You have a few hours left to play in our Challenges this week to win, deadline is 5 pm Eastern tonight. Black and White +1, as well as both of our Noon-Time Challenges!

All of our gorgeous February Sets are now available in the store HERE! For one week only the New Release Bundle is 10% off!

Tiny Tags

We're back for another round of Sneak Peek Previews from Flourishes on Day Two! Today's fantastic set gives you maximum style in a mini size. It's Tiny Tags and our own Flourishes Custom Spellbinder Dies to go with the set!

There are SO many options with this wonderful set. It's jam packed with tiny images that are classic Flourishes style. You'll recognize a number of the images all together in one set, just scaled down. The sentiments are just adorable too. Here I've pulled together the precious cherry from the set as well as one of the leaves in the set to frame the image. Coloring with Copics, and framed out with Blossom Dies and Accents and bordered with Creative Book Pages Two.

Now check out that cute little custom tag from Flourishes! It's darling isn't it? One of two special little tags to go with this set. They're perfect to add your sentiment without detracting from the main image. And here's a closer look at them:

Papers are Indie Bloom from Basic Gray, Velvet ribbon from Flourishes and the ruffled ribbon is some I had in my stash from a long time ago.

The girls will have maximum style going on with this set be sure to check out their blogs.

REMEMBER THIS WEEK's DEETs

All this week there is a Mystery Blogger hidden amoung the Design Team's posts. If you comment on that DT'ers post you could be chosen to win the Set of the Day!

All the sets are available for Pre-Order HERE in the store! For one week after the Release the Bundle is 10% off!

Play along with us this week in the Pre-Release Challenge B & W +1, and the Noon-Time Challenges for more chances to win!

Bloom

Color Me Hoppy

Project 365 - Week Eight

Birthday Hop for Jan Marie

Pink Callas

Project 365 - Week Seven

Resurrection

Go Girl!

Toile Flowers and Tags

Chocolate Bliss

Project 365 - Week 6

He Is Risen

Tiny Tags

ChristineCreations

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