This week's Bitten by the Bug Challenge!

This week at BBTB, Carole is our lovely host! She challenged us to use the bird cut from the Storybook cartridge. I decided to break out this new paper I had purchased a bit ago from Making Memories. I love the rich fall colors of it! I dressed the bird's body up with glitter (On his underbody and the flowers), and feathers. I used the copper "leaves" as a branch for him to perch.

I sprayed the felt flowers with adhesive, sprinkled with glitter, then sprayed with a bit of walnut ink to "dirty" it up a bit. (This glitter obsession is gettin' a bit out of hand! LOL!)

Well, I am home today with my boy. On my way into the city, with Cort,to get her H1N1 vaccine, I got a call from Kyle's school saying he didn't feel good,and that he had a headache. It was already 2:30 (He gets out of school at 3), and I was pretty far away. So being the good mother I am, told the nurse he will have to stick out the 1/2 an hour and walk home. She didn't sound to thrilled with me. In the meantime, my hubby, who also wasn't feeling well came home a bit early and picked up our messages at home. He went to the school and got Kyle. Now you have to know Kyle.....he is a bit of a drama king. He is constantly complaining of headaches, toothaches, foot aches, spleen aches, stomach aches, ANY ache! So sometimes we aren't really sure if this was a ploy to get out of school or what. (You know the story of the Little Boy Who Cried Wolf right? My husband openly expressed this to our son. Brian continued his lecture into the car about how he had to go to CCD since he had missed last week due to a headache, when suddenly.......Kyle threw up. Yep.....inside the car. Then again outside of the car on our front steps. Ick. So needless to say.......we now believed he really was sick! On top of that, he headed to bed around 7 PM and is still currently sleeping while I am typing this. 12 hours of sleep.....this is unheard of for my lil' night owl!

So maybe today will be a curl up on the couch, stay in our jammies, watch a movie, kind of day.

Hope your day is wonderful (and vomit free! : )

Our Favorite Recipes Blog Hop!

Welcome to the first day of the Creative Cuts & More Mega Recipe Blog Hop, which is featuring the 8”x8” Treasured Family Recipes Kit. We have 24 designers who will be creating wonderful pages to inspire you. Plus we all will be sharing some of our own delicious treasured family recipes.Make sure you check back at http://www.diecutdiva.com/ tomorrow for the Holiday Treats Apron Recipe Kit Blog Hop. We will also have 24 designers who will be showcasing their great creations and sharing holiday treat recipes.

Hopefully, you are hopping over from Lori Renn's blog. If not, you can start at the beginning of the hop, at DiecutDiva. I was thrilled to get a chance to work with this adorable kit ( Treasured Family Recipes. ) It is jam packed with yummy Cosmo Cricket papers, chipboard embellies, and die cuts!
I wasn't able to complete the entire album, but I figure it will be a work in progress! I will just continually add to it and as I do that I will share my pages here with you. I am officially addicted to glitter, so I had to add black glitter to the diecut letters. I used my Spellbinders circle and scalloped circle to create the "frame" around the opening. I used some of the Cosmo Cricket chipboard utensils tied with ribbon, as an accent piece. I tied additional ribbon around the metal enclosures along with a few kitchen inspired charms. (Those were from my own personal stash)

For the first page, which if you noticed was peeking through the front cover, is my recipe for Apple Tart. I tucked it behind the photo so the picture took center stage. I don't know about you, but I love pictures of food!

See? Just pull that baby right outta there! : )

Apple Tart

Ingredients:

2 Tablespoons butter at room temp, plus 1 tspn for the cake pan.

1 med. apple

2 Tablespoons sugar

1/4 tspn ground cinnamon

2 large eggs

1/2 cup milk

1/2 cup all-purpose flour

Directions: Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Grease cake pan. (9 inch round) Slice and peel apple. Place in mixing bowl. Add sugar and cinnamon. Mix with apple. Spread apple in cake pan. Break eggs into mixer bowl. Use electric mixer on med. speed. Pour in milk until blended. Turn mixer on low and mix in the flour 1 tablespoon at a time. Pour batter over apples. Cut remaining butter for topping. Bake for 25 minutes.

Here is another sweet recipe my family enjoys: Pumpkin Spiced Bundt Cake

Ingredients:

1 (18.25 oz) yellow cake mix

1 package instant vanilla pudding.

1 can pumpkin

1/2 cup vegetable oil

1/2 cup water

3 eggs

2 tspns pumpkin pie spice

1/2 cup pecans

Directions:

Heat oven to 325 degrees. Grease and flour a 10 or 12 cup Bundt Pan. If using a 10 cup pan, fill 3/4 full and make 3 to 4 cupcakes with remaining batter. In a large mixing bowl, combine all ingredients except nuts. Mix on med. speed for 2 minutes. Increase speed to medium-high, mix 3 min. Stir in the nuts. Spoon batter into prepared pan.

Bake at 325 degrees for 45-55 min. or until toothpick inserted in center of cake comes out clean. Cool 10 min. Remove from pan.

And just an FYI:

"As part of the celebration CC&M will be having a great sale. For the next six days, they will offer 20% off the entire store. But act quickly, it is only for six days – this sale will end on Nov 14th. Make sure you enter this code recipebloghop2009 during checkout.
As a continuing part of the celebration CC&M will of course give away great gifts. Each day they will give away one kit. Here is the twist – go through the blog hop, leave wonderful comments for the great designers. After you have finished the blog hop, return to http://www.diecutdiva.com/ and instead of leaving a comment, you need to share a recipe to have a chance at winning the kit. Share the recipe on your blog and link it back and get another chance to win the kit. Help us also make this a great recipe swap."

I am so glad you hopped on over here today! Thanks!

So where to next?

Ellen Sosnoski 's blog!!! : )

Have a FABULOUS Monday!!!

Great Sketch.....not so great LO!

Vicki Chrisman is hosting a sketch challenge this week. THIS is the sketch! Last night I decided to scrap Cort's Hannah Montana pics. I struggled for some reason with this LO. I think my creativeness left the building! OR maybe it is because I have a tendency to do shabby, vintage inspired LO's.......which this was definitely not! Anyway after struggling......and not really happy with the results....this is my LO. I guess not all of them can be winners.

On a positive note.....I did get an appt. for Cort to get the H1N1 vaccine on Monday. Hopefully, she stays healthy until then. And my girl is getting a haircut tomorrow. I am thinking of going short on her........what do ya think?

TGIF! Have a great one!

Dream Big!

How about another card using the newest release by JustRite called, Just a Note. I love the images in this set! To see all of the images you get in this versatile set click HERE.

I decided to use my Scalloped Spellbinders to make this lil' card. I pieced the DP together and machine stitched it. I added that to the scalloped card. The sentiment was stamped with Papertrey Ink and cut out. The border is part of the new, 2 inch Wide Round Borders set. It has a choice of 9 different borders to choose from. Mine was stamped and cut out. I layered the two circles and adhered to the DP. For some reason butterflies and dreams seem to go hand in hand. (Or maybe that's just me? LOL!) So......I cut the butterfly using Spellbinders and old vintage book paper. I inked its edges and glittered up his body, added a button and twine antennae. I also cut a swirl and glittered that up. And why stop there? I also glittered the perimeters of both circles! Because we all know there is no such thing as too much glitter! (Or is that just me??) : )

So it's Thursday already. That means Spanish class tonight. Still can't put a sentence together to save my life, but I do know the days of the week and lots of nouns! Maybe I need to take Spanish II? Last week we had to fill out a survey about the teacher and there was a place to fill out suggestions to improve the class. My darling husband wrote down that next time there should be a field trip.....................to Pepe's! Oh yea. Did I ever tell you how funny he is? Bet the teacher will guess who wrote that comment down! Still a class clown at 41 years old.

Have a great one everybody!

New Releases by JustRite!

Hello! In case you've missed it.....JustRite has been releasing some fabulous new sets this week! Head on over to the JR blog to see some of the sets and projects that the talented DT have been working on. My card today uses the Just A Note set. I stamped the sentiment and border separately and then cut them out using my Spellbinders. I did a bit of distressing ont he edges too. The background paper was Cuttlebugged, sewn on, and distressed. (Paper by Basic Grey and SU!) I added a couple of ribbons and a scalloped bottom to pretty it up a bit!

Thanks as always for stopping by! I do appreciate your visits and comments!!! : )

Family Time

Good morning to you! I wanted to share a LO of my family apple picking a few weeks ago. It is one of those traditions that I so enjoy. I will be so sad when they tell me they no longer want to go! I used Noel Mignon's Mill Street kit. (sold out!) I love the bits of blue mixed with the traditional fall colors. It really makes the other colors pop! I created my own embellishments with my circle and scallop punches.
For the title I wanted to layer the letters, so I added pop dots underneath every other letter. I love the dimension it gives!

And on a more serious note......a letter came home from Cort's school informing us that another student has died. (H1N1). How awful for this family.....I can't even imagine the pain of losing a child. I am nervous about my girl getting this......and trying to locate a vaccine has not been an easy task. They are offered in the city.....I live in the suburbs. So I will be making more phone calls today....hoping somewhere...someone...is offering the vaccines!

Warm Winter Wishes

Good morning to you! Hope you all had a great Halloween weekend! Now that we are in the month of November.....my thoughts are turning to Christmas. I just can't help myself......I love all the excitement and preparation for the holiday. So I decided to play a bit with the Crafty Secret's Snow Bunnies' set. I stamped their itty bitty clothes on the DP and cut them out. The rest of them were colored in with Copics. The circle/pinking shear circle were cut using my Spellbinders. I distressed the edges and layered all of it on a paper doily. I added some mica flakes for snow. The paper is by Basic Grey, and as a final touch, I tied a ribbon.

Just a quick post.....need to go and get ready for work! Have a great day!