Goodbye 2009

The New Year is almost upon us, what will your resolutions be ? My number 1 resolution is write this blog more often !!! With regards to any others I have 24 more hrs to make my mind up. In the past I have never managed to stick to any I have made so I am going to think very carefully this year and pick things that are realistic.

Christmas was interesting this year, it was on one hand a really lovely time as it was the 1st time in 4 years that we have been with our daughter, however it is a time when you really notice how much you miss family and when you call them on Christmas day and hear them all sitting down together to lunch you feel your heart strings pull. Prior to Christmas, just like everyone else it was a busy time for crafting and I was very glad tonight to put away all the Christmas card trimmings and start looking forward to some spring colours, I even bought a new valentines stamp yesterday.

I am just going to post a couple of pictures this week as apart from Christmas cards, which I am sure you are all fed up with, I have not made too much.

It was my niece's 4th birthday this week and like most 4 yr olds she is really into fairy's and ballerina's, however she really does not yet know who Tinkerbell is which is why I changed the colours on this one. Unfortunately as yet it has not arrived in the UK but I am hoping she really likes it. Tinkerbell is suspended with invisible thread and spins around showing her 2 different outfits.

I made some fun Christmas cards for the kids, not particularly artistic in their design but made with the children in mind. The snowman is made into a shaker card which my nephew loves shaking, I don't think there will be any seed beads left at this rate. The smaller snowman is a spinning card, so easy to make and so effective.

One week before Christmas I sold one of the post it frames through a shop I have my cards in, the lady really liked it and went on to order 19 more, all to be ready for the big day. Once I had managed to finally get hold of the frames I did get them all made and delivered on time. They were all on a theme similar to this one. It made me a nice little bit of extra pocket money at an expensive time of year.

The last picture I am going to post is of my daughter, I am so proud of how hard she works in school. We took an afternoon out of our schedule to go play in the Magic Kingdom and see all the great decorations. My DH had great fun taking lots of photos and I think you will agree that this is a fantastic shot of my beautiful baby ! ( she will always be my baby)

All that's left to say is, I hope you have all had a wonderful Christmas and that the New Year brings us all good health and happiness.

Farewell to 2009 and hello 2010

Sue

Well the plan was to write this every week, and as we can all tell, that has not happened ! I don't know where the weeks go, I was always told when I was younger that times goes faster when you get older, and I never believed them, well now, I am that older person and it's true ! Since I last wrote I have had a fantastic trip back to the UK to see family and friends. Unfortunately there was not enough time to see everyone I wanted too, again it comes back to time going by so quickly. For those I did see, thank you for helping me have a great week and to recuperate and for those I didn't, you will top of my list next time.

Whilst home in England the main purpose was to rest which I did lots of, but I also had the opportunity to see all the family and have our own mini Christmases. Lots of presents were exchanged and we were all spoilt. The best part was though, that all the hand made gifts I made were also opened by the recipients, so I can share them with you all now, as they have seen them.

The biggest things I made were 4 individual calenders for Mum, Rose, Chris and Karin. These took many many hours and sorting of the photos was one of the most difficult things. Here are a couple of sample pages to show you. I would not dare to bore you with all 48 pages and 578 letters I cut just for the months ! I did not want to count how many letters in total, think I would have scared myself !

I find making (or buying) presents for my Dad really hard, don't we all?. My Mum came up with the idea of altering his diary, he actually writes in his every day. This one is well travelled, to ensure that the holidays etc were marked correctly my mum posted an English diary to me , I then altered it and took it back with me. A well travelled diary ! I put pictures of all his children and husbands in the front and ALL his grandchildren in the back. This means he can take a look at his family on a daily basis. I think he really liked it.

A candle was next on the list for Kerry, she is really enjoying her time meditating so I thought she could use this, however she has already said she will never burn it ! The saying ' Just for today' is her favourite and it is written in both English and Japanese.

It was also Chris's birthday just before we arrived, so she got double presents! We all love the 2 pictures used here and I went with the idea of making a clock to show how precious Grandparent time is. This is the 1st clock I have ever made. I am pleased with how it turned out although I have learned things from it on how to make a better job next time.

Well now back home and hopefully back to work finally this week I needed to finish a couple of orders I had for people at work. 1st to be done were these Princess paper dolls. I love them, and I really hope the little girl gets as much pleasure playing with them as I did making them.

Anything you see on my site can be orderedand personalised, if you are interested in anything to buy or would like more details on how I made them just e-mail me at just1stamp@hotmail.com

Well as today is my last official day on medical leave (here's hoping) I better put my time to good use and go clean the house...... on 2nd thoughts I am going to be crafty ALL day hehehe

Thanks for taking the time to look

Sue

Its been a long 2 weeks, but I have finaly turned a corner and I am beginning to feel more like myself. I have been very busy where possible making lots of crafts, but mostly for Christmas. Now this gives me a little problem, because if I post all my bits and pieces on here, no-one is going to get any suprises ! I have a couple of new cards I have made but aagin they are for peoples birthdays and I really don't want them seeing them here before they drop through the mail box.

So for this week, I am going to share some of my favourite cards I have made throughout this year.

This beautiful Aurora card was made for my Neice's 2nd birthday, although only 2 she is already very aware of who her favourite princess is. I cut the princess using my cricut. The castle in the corner is actually made into a shaker. I made it by stamping onto white card, then using double sided foam tape and acetate made a window and filled it with confetti. I hope you can see what I mean by the photos.

Ariel was next on my list for yet another neice, ( be warned, I have 7 neices and 10 nephews) although this one just turned 24! This is what I call a slider card and is much easier to make than it looks and is soo effective. If anyone would like details please either leave a comment or e-mail me and i will forward them to you.

Another example of the slider card is this Tinkerbell one. This was an order for someone at work. I love to get orders and get paid for what I love doing, however parting with them is sometimes very hard.

Ah, my 1st Christmas card for the year. This one was so easy to make, I managed to make 4 in less than 1 hr, oh how I love the Circut!

I am keeping this short this week so that I actually manage to get it posted. I hope to post again before I leave for my trip back to the UK next week.

Have a good weekend

Thanks for stopping by

Sue

I'm Back in the land of the living ! It has been an eventful 3 weeks but the surgery went well and I am now at home recovering and beginning to spend a little more time each day at my craft desk. I would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone for their care, thoughts and prayers over these last 3 weeks. Knowing there are so many people that care for me certainly helps the healing process.

I have been trying to get on top of a couple of Christmas presents whilst I have the time and also as I am hoping to go to the UK for 10 days to finish my recuperation it makes sense to try and take as many with me rather than risk posting them.

So far I have just made this Jewellery tin for my niece, good job she is too young to look on here ! (sorry Karin if I spoil your surprise) I bought the tin from Hobby Lobby for about $6 and got a very good friend to make me the cushion for the inside. I then set about decorating the edges and top. It was actually a really easy project and I think it is very effective. Hopefully Princess Emma will enjoy putting all her crown jewels in it.

I have made a couple of these Tic Tac snowmen boxes as little stocking fillers for friends and family. I got the idea from the Cricut web site and then just worked out my measurements to work around a large pack of Tic Tacs. A very cost saving gift that I hope will bring a smile to peoples faces.

Typical for me though, I decided if you can make a Christmas gift from Tic Tacs, then why not a birthday gift ? I am not as happy with this one as I was unable to get the flower to have as large a centre as I wanted, and therefore show the sweets . However it is now on its way to the UK and I hope the birthday girl will like it.

Last week was our 24th wedding anniversary (how did that happen? and when did I get old enough to be married that long ?) well I forgot to organise a card before going into hospital which was really stupid as I ended up only coming out 36 hrs before the big day, well bless my DH he went and bought a card for me to give him, knowing how upset I would be. But in true Sue style, (determined and stubborn) I decided I could make card! Well this is the result, I went for very simple and could not believe how much effort and energy it took. By pure coincidence it has 24 crystals on it! I of course told him it was deliberate.

My Sisters birthday is next week so a card for her was next on the plan, again I had to go for a simple design as for some reason my crafting brain had left me for the 1st week I was home. I am always thinking I should clear out some of my older crafting items, but then I go ahead and make a card with probably my oldest clear stamp. Oh well maybe instead of getting rid of stuff I should just get more drawer space. At this point my DH and DD will scream...... NO MORE DRAWERS!

This last card for today is for someone who has recently lost their husband, I wanted to make a very simple sympathy card and hope I succeeded. Both this card and the 'LOVE' card were made using my latest Cricut cartridge 'Storybook' which I am loving.

Well I think I will sign off now as have been sitting at the computer for long enough today. I hope to get back to updating this weekly now.

Thank you for looking and any comments are much appreciated.

Have a good week

Sue

Happy Halloween !

Oops sorry lost a month, however if you take a look around the stores you could be mistaken for thinking it was Halloween next week ! This week I was treated to a night out to the 'Mickeys Not So Scary Halloween Party' at Magic Kingdom. I have been once before, but I was still in awe of the fantastic decorations, fireworks and parade. I especially liked the hug from Aladdin (A good friend of mine is 'friends' with him) In the UK Halloween is such a small celebration in comparison to here in the USA. It is still quite amazing to me how Halloween parties can run from early September through to Nov 1st and have sooooo many people attend them. This year we decided to join in and try to dress for the occassion, but with only 24hrs notice and no real time to make a costume for 3 , we pulled out all the stops and went as pirates. Not very imaginative but at least we took part. The picture below shows our elaborate costumes.

I decided to continue with the theme of the week and make a couple of Halloween cards and a note pad holder to put in the shop where I have a baskets of things for sale. Lets hope they sell. The cards were made using the Paper Dolls Dress Up Cart (cricut) and the pumpkin came from Stretch your Imagination. All the dolls shown this week were cut at 4".

I again made this next note pad holder as I wanted to show that they don't all have to be Disney based so I tried for something pretty that might appeal to anyone. Time will tell if I am right and it is saleable. It was probably the easiet one of these I have ever made and I think it took me about 20 minutes.

It is my Nephews Birthday tomorrow. Happy Birthday Matthew. I have all but given up on making cards for teenage boys as I find them impossible, but Matt is a fantastic tennis player and as I now have the Everyday Paper Dolls Dress Up Cart (cricut) I decided to go for it and make him a card this year. I was really pleased with how it turned out, just hope he likes it. He will now be entitled to learn to drive so stay out of his way !!!

My last card for this blog is just a simple girls birthday card, again using PPDU. I needed to spend my time this week restocking the cards from the shop, so have not had much time to create and play.

Well I think that's all for tonight, I am heading into the hospital tomorrow for a few days of rest and relaxation!!!! I wish! Unfortunately I have to have some surgery, so I hope it wont be too long before I am back and able to show you some new creations.

Thanks for looking

Sue

Just a quick mid week update this time to share some of the bits I have been making. I am really starting to get to grips with Christmas presents now as I am hoping to maybe get a quick trip back to the UK this side of Christmas, so it makes sense to get them made and take them with me rather than having to post them all. I really enjoy being able to make gifts for people rather than having to keep looking around the shops trying to decide on what to get. I just hope my family enjoy receiving them as much. Managed to get to a Hobby Lobby yesterday for more than just 5 Minutes, its a good job there is not one close by me. It was fantastic and I got some really good bits and pieces.

This 1st picture is of a scrapbook frame I made my hubby for his birthday. The Vinyl record is actually the original I have had for more than 25 yrs and I used to play it over and over and over again, listening to the words when I was hoping and dreaming he would notice me. He eventually did and the anniversary of our engagment is today (25 yrs ago). He really liked the frame and I think it was made more special by the fact that it was the original that I have kept all these years. Heres to the next 25 years.

This recipe tin was my next project. I really enjoyed doing this although it was quite a challenge. Covering the lid was the hardest part but I think the finished project was well worth the effort.

I made a couple more of these post it notes stands this week as an order for work. It seems that no sooner do I think I have finished the orders, then someone else orders one. Its great; I'm not earning enough to retire just yet but every penny counts. Going to make a Halloween frame today so looking forward to making a different style.

Finally for this blog are these really cute hanging decorations. I bought the baubles at Michaels and had not realised they had a flat front. It worked out ok in the end and they were so easy to do. I am really hoping to be able to set up a craft table somewhere soon to sell some of these.

I would really like to thank my DH for these latest photos, He has now set up a small studio lighting area to take the photos in and I think the quality is now so much better.

Well better get back to my craft desk, will post again at the weekend.

Thanks for taking the time to look.