Cort's Prom Dress....

I had a bit of a photo shoot with Cortney's prom dress this morning. I want to soak in all of it....from the pretty dress, to the jewelry, to her cute "boyfriend" holding her hand, to my girl's beautiful self in this dress. I will never have the luxury of seeing her get married or hold a child of her own someday....so I want...need to take in all of the things she can do. My heart gets torn in a million directions.....

There is a bit of magic in this dress........*sigh*

Prom is a right of passage and I am so glad her school give these kids an opportunity to experience it.....

Have a wonderful day and be sure to check back tomorrow for some new releases from JustRite!

Hugs!

Hi Sunshine!

I can't believe it is Friday already! This week just flew by! Oh wait! Maybe it was because I only worked 4 days!; ) Every week should be so short! I have a very bright happy card to share with you today.....so get those sunglasses on before you scroll down. It uses Provo Craft's new Cuttlebug Flower Fringe die, . It creates such a fun flower! I used Pink Paislee's paper and a bit of fluorescent tulle.  I added a few glittery letters, twine, and rhinestones to finish the card off.  It was actually a pretty quick card for me.....like less than 2 hours! 

I also have a delicious recipe to share with you.  If you like blue cheese and bacon you are going to fall in love with this side dish! 

Nutty Greens with Bacon and Blue Cheese

Recipe Courtesy of Claire Robinson of the Food Network

Ingredients:

Kosher Salt

1 lb haricots, verts, trimmed

3 slices bacon

4 oz blue cheese, cut into small chunks 

1 1/2 cups toasted whole pecans, coarsely chopped

1/4 tsp ground black pepper

Directions:

Brian a large pot of salted water to a boil over high heat. Add the haricots verts and cook for about 2 minutes. Remove the beans from water and immediately place in a bowl of ice water. Remove the haricots verts from the ice water and set aside in a medium bowl. 

In a large saute pain, over medium heat, cook the bacon until crisp. Remove the bacon and place on paper towels. Add the beans to the bacon drippings and cook over medium heat for 2-3 minutes.  Add the blue cheese and toss just until is starts to melt.  Break the cooked bacon into bite-sized pieces and add to the pan.  Finish by stirring in the toasted chopped pecans.  Season with freshly ground black pepper and just a pinch of salt. serve immediately. 

Thank you for your suggestions on photo collage sites!  I was able to find exactly what I was looking for! 

Have a great weekend!

Easter and Instagrams!

My post today today is a little bit of this and a little bit of that! First I have an altered little Easter box perfect for little treats! I painted the wooden box white and sanded the edges a bit to distress it.  I added a pretty image from Crafty Secret's Bird's and Blossoms Creative Scraps for the window. The bunny was cut using my Cricut, the Kate's ABC's cartridge, and felt from Papertrey Ink.  I wanted to dress up my bunny a bit so I added a pearl for his little pink nose and a pom pom for his tail.  The flower was cut using the Flower Shoppe cartridge and kraft paper.  I added a bit of pink twine to finish him off.

The sides of the box were covered with a bit of paper I printed using Crafty Secret's Vintage CD collection. I also added vintage lace and some pom poms for fun! 

Am I the last person on this earth to have discovered Instagram?  I got the I-phone for Christmas and LOVE taking pics with it!  There is such a fun retro quality to the pictures!  I have seen many bloggers taking the Instagram a day challenge and thought it was kind of a fun way to document our every day lives.  So I am attempting to play along!  Here is my cutie pie pup, Skippers.......love him!

And this is a glimpse into my class room......my desk....my messy desk.......*sigh*

And last but not least.....my 15 year old cooking for himself.  He loves to play and experiment with food....which is great! (As long as he cleans the dishes afterwards! ; )

Okay, I have a question for you now.....do you know of any programs out there that are photo collage programs?  I would love to be able to put my Instagrams into some type of photo collage.  Photoshop offers a few, but not necessarily the ones I would like.  If you know of any, can you please let me know?  I would appreciate any info you can give me!

Thank you so much!

Have a great day!!!

Easter Carrots and a Tutorial!

Good morning to you! I have a fun little Easter treat to share with you! I createdlittle carrot boxes that contain  M &M's to give away to Cort's friends. I used the new Teresa Collin's Bunnies and Chicks CCR. It has the cutest images on them, and these carrot boxes were just calling my name!  I cut them at 4" and scored and folded them.  I decided to make chocolate bunnies to decorate the boxes with.  I used the at 2".  After they were cut I gave them a generous dose of glossy accents.  While those were drying I cut my tags using the Art Philosophy cartridge and a sentiment by Papertrey Ink.  I decided to make grassy tops for the tops of my carrots.  I have a step by step tutorial on how I made them below. : )

Here are the steps to making a carrot top!

Yes.....even my carrot tops had to have glitter!  I just can't help myself!

Here are a few close ups of my treat boxes.....

For those of you who asked about Cort's prom dress....yes, we were successful in finding a dress!  Unfortunately, the one in the store had a few small tears....so we had to order it on line.  It will be here in a couple of weeks.  It is very pretty though! 
Have a great day! Off to clean my very messy scrap room on my day off!

Egg Two!

Good morning and happy Friday to you! Remember THIS egg from last week? Well I told you I had a second egg to share with you and here it is! The steps for this egg were similar to last week with a few deviations.  First, the colors are much more neutral and soft. 

This is what I started with......

I found this beautiful shade of blue by Martha Stewart and decided THIS is the color I want for my egg. It needed a couple of coats to completely cover!

After the paint was dry, I gave it a generous coating of Mod Podge.....

And then applied this gorgeous Diamond Dust!  Be careful when using it though....it IS glass and I found out the hard way that it WILL cut you! ; )

The leaves and flowers were cut using my Cricut and the Flower Shoppe Cartridge. Who needs traditionally green leaves?  

As I did on my last egg, I worked in layers.  From the bottom up and adhered everything with my glue gun.

I have a 3 day weekend ahead of me......YAY!  I am prom dress shopping tomorrow with a good friend of mine and the rest of the weekend is going to be reserved for playing catch up and hopefully a bit of crafting!

Take care my friends! 

Bits and Pieces

I tend to be a crafter who uses what she sees.  And believe me, the state of my room right now allows me to see A LOT! My desk usually has piles and piles of stuff.......scraps, leftovers etc....that I don't have the heart to throw away.  So today's post is a compilation of left overs.  Random things that I thought looked rather pretty together. The house was one I purchased from Iralamija.  I covered it with designer paper and gave it a coat of Helmer's Crackle Medium.  I went a bit "Crackle" crazy.....because I added it to the oval that was cut using a Spellbinder's die, and to the key (by Provo Craft). It was also was also given a swipe of white paint and then the crackle medium. After it is dry, I rub it with brown ink to fill in the cracks.

The flowers were cut with my Cricut and the Mother's Day Bouquet Cartridge. The little rose was from my Sizzix die.  The sentiment was from JustRite.  See? I told you there were bits and pieces from everywhere on this card! ; )

My son has his first meeting for "Bass Fishing" today after school.  Yep.....they have a club for fishing!  My husband hopes he decides to join so he can buy him a new fishing pole!  I am just happy that my son who struggled socially, has really put himself out there this year.  He is already part of the United Nation's Club and has been going to many of the social events at school.   It is such a good feeling to see him happy.  He loves his school and it makes me realize we made the right decision!

Have a great day!!!

Eat, Drink, & Be Irish!

Happy "Hump" day to you!  It is so hard to believe that it is February 29th......and tomorrow is the first day of March.  Seriously, where does time go?  

St. Patrick's Day is right around the corner and I have a card to share with you that I made last year for the Cricut Circle Blog. It uses the Spring Holiday Cards Cartridge.   It is such a fun little cartridge that encompasses all of the spring holidays! I dressed up my "beer" with liquid applique and while I heated it, I sprinkled glitter over it.  I added googly eyes for fun and a bit of seam binding. I even pulled out the lil' sewing machine to give it a bit of texture.  

I cut the clover about 8 times, stacked, and glued them together.  It kind of makes your own "faux" chipboard!  Then I was able to punch holes in it to create a button. 

I wanted to tell all of you how touched I was by all of your kind comments about Cort.  Some days are tough.  Some days I want to sit and cry....and cry...and cry.  But there are more days where this girl makes me smile...makes my heart sing.....and literally makes my heart ache with love for her.  And it means the world to me to be able to share those bright spots with you.  So thank you again.....for being so supportive of this little blog of mine.