Trinity is one! Gotta love those little pigtails...

I am sitting down to work at 10:40 PM, my usual. Tonight I had a meeting here at the house... nothing fancy, a group from church that meets every other Wednesday night. But it was amazing how much cleaning you can do when someone might see how you live! The good thing about it now it will remain in this (clean) condition until one of the children comes home and puts their junk all around. Oh, that would be this weekend... oh well.

Confession time- I thought that this week would be the cleaning/purging of my studio. However, too many events to celebrate conspired against it happening... but there's always next week. I recently have had some very cool card ideas and can't wait to sit down and play with them. When I finish them, they'll be posted...

I am all alone! Maryanne has been successfully brought to college and left. I hear from my sources (2 other daughters) that she is alive and well. So my husband is off at a Boy Scout meeting (son that got him into this is now 26!) and I am in my studio and thinking about working. Have a pile of wedding invitations to work on upstairs, orders to fill and all kinds of ideas and projects to think up, but for the moment I am reveling in

s i l e n c e

It really is golden. In this time, anything is possible. All of the world can wait. It's just you and your thoughts. OK, well that was enough for today....

Here's the latest on the design front. Book #1 has been completed (except for one project which is being sent Monday). Now Connie will work her magic and make it look nice. Final edit should be 9/1. It will be out and ready for CHA Winter in February. Next news, Book #2 is in the works- looks like that will be out April 1! More info will follow, believe me! Everyone will need copies of these books-they are life changing :-)

Mary was going through her stuff before she left and showed me this quote and said it reminded her of Chris, "A hero is one who hangs on one minute longer." You da man, Chris.

I'm not proud...

My friend Brenda is hosting a "Messiest Studio" contest and I can't believe I am posting my horrible mess on the internet, but if you want to go look: http://brendapinnick.typepad.com/ Hey, I think I have a good chance to win!
I had a fun night playing with punches, glitter and spray adhesive. I wanted to make a birthday present for my friend Patty and was having performance anxiety. Only a week and a half ago, this same group of friends met for another person's birthday (she will remain nameless).This person (let's call her Sandy) has an interesting collection of animal skulls which she picked up on her family's farm and in various other places. Anyway, I made her a cool box of cards with all different skull designs and a matching box! So now it's Patty's birthday tomorrow night...and the pressure is on. But I had had this idea floating around for a while and it worked out well- simple and really fun. Here's a photo.

Punch out a shape (i.e. butterfly) from colored paper. Center this design within a larger punch (oval) and punch again. Punch yet another oval of white background paper. Lay on scrap paper and spray white oval with a heavy coat of spray adhesive. Place colored oval on top, matching corners. Sprinkle glitter in the punched out section. Mount on cardstock. These are so easy and fun...

I made a mat board box to match and used a dollar store stretchy headband to keep box closed.

Today is Chris's birthday. I think of him in Iraq and wonder what he can possibly have done there to have a fun birthday. I passed out mailing labels to my friends in hopes they would send him cards.