So many things to Rejoice about!

Remember I told you about my friend Erin getting married? Well, here is Mrs. Erin and I after the wedding! It was a perfect prince and princess wedding and so nice to be included in her celebration! I think it has made me appreciate my own 24 years of marriage and how much my husband and I have come through to be so happy together! He really is my other half and I can't imagine doing this life without his wonderful-ness. He is truly my Esposo Favorito (one of my many nicknames for him! Our Mexican friends thought it was hilarious...Manuel said, "Esposo Favorito? How many husbands have you had???" Only one, thank you! I had a Stampin' Up party on Saturday, and he cooked the brunch for 13 of us! Then my friend, Gail, came over Sunday after church and we designed her Christmas cards together....and he cooked Duck with Mango sauce and Pumpkin soup! Oh my! It was incredible! Then today he took the day off to go with me to visit with my mom in the hospital! Love him!


I trust that all of your Thanksgiving holidays were great! Our church coordinates a "Thanksgiving to Go" event and we delivered about 270 meals on Thanksgiving day!!! Can you believe it! People volunteer every year and it was again a success! What a blessing to work together and make someone's day brighter! God is so good to give us these opportunities!


I want to say a special hi to my first and always best friend, Elizabeth. HI BETT! I think I showed you the card I sent her for her birthday on an earlier post (no not the Happpy 50 years one!!). Isn't it wonderful to have best friends? They are there with you through it all and still they love you! Love you, Liz! There. My first personal hello on the giant web! tee hee!

I know what you are thinking....well, where's all the STAMPING???

Hey, I HAVE been stamping, but also so busy it's been hard to post!!If you can stand one more purse, read on. If not, well....read on anyhow!!

I used the emboss resist technique on this card! The backgrounder stamp is one of my favorites from Cornish Heritage Farms, Paisley. I used SU's River Rock paper and embossed the image with clear embossing powder. Then I used a sponge dauber and colored it with SU's Real red ink. The color of the base stays River rock. Cool huh? I was inspired by my MIL Joyce's shirt she wore to my house....and it matched perfectly! I gave her the purse but snapped a shot before I gave it away!

What do you think? She thought I was crazy! But she loved the purse :)

I am working on a bunch of things for Christmas right now, so I'll be sure to post them soon...well, the ones I can without ruining any surprises!

I sure pray that you are being blessed by God's goodnesses this week! I am just so joyful, and I know it is God's grace. Snow is coming and still I rejoice....now THAT'S grace! :)

I want to share a link that my friend Barbara sent to me....be blessed by it as it is so true! And God's word is always a lamp onto our feet....don't you agree? :)

Beautiful Video.

Love ya!
Kim

PS Can you believe it's only 29 days until Christmas!?!

Supporting Autism Awareness with Joy!

Good day! Those of you that know me well know that I am an educator who has a special corner of my heart set aside for those children I serve that have autism. They are usually my favorite kids in the world! Yes, we all have "Children of our hearts" and God has put these children in mine! Every kid I know with autism loves to laugh...they have the most ADORABLE giggle! With this in mind, I want to send you over to a Mockumentary that makes fun of my other favorite thing....STAMPING! Well, scrapbooking and stamping! The reason I am mentioning it is that these two guys have made a DVD poking fun in a fun way of what all of us do when it comes to stamping and scrapbooking (and that's why it's so funny...it's all true!!!) They are making this DVD available for $9.99...with FREE Shipping and Handling!! But the coolest part is, they are giving $1. of every sale towards Autism awareness. What better way to support a cause than to have fun doing it! Click here to watch a trailer of the DVD and then jump right in and support a great cause, Autism Support Daily. You'll feel glad you did! What a great gift for your favorite scrapbooking friends!! Be blessed today!!

Kim

Joyfully, it's the weekend! And a holiday!

First, I want to say THANK YOU to all the VETERANS and MILITARY MEN and WOMEN and FAMILIES who have sacrificed their love, time and lives to make my family safe and free! My uncle Weldon served in the Army for over 20 years. I remember praying for him during the Vietnam war. I am so blessed to still have my uncle here, but so many did not return. Won't you pray for our military families today?

We remember those we have lost and those we support today! Bless you all!!!!

Hurrah! It's finally the weekend! Life has been so crazy busy and high drama, that I am ready for a day to do little chores (and there are always LOTS of little chores, aren't there??). But I am thankful that I can get to them....do you find it as hard as I do to let them slide as you tackle the big things ? They just nibble at my thoughts and I keep thinking....'just wait. I'm gonna get to you soon!' So today's the day!

Before I begin my little adventures, though, I thought I'd keep my promise and post those little purses I've been creating....remember the shower I was coordinating? Well, it was a hit! and so were the purses! Fun!! First here is a pic of Erin (the bride to be!) and I at the shower. They are getting married next Saturday! She's the adorable one, and I'm the tired one on the left.

And here are the purses....well some purses and one tool box gift card for the groom to be. SU Designer paper works wonderfully on this project....I love it! On most of them I included a gift card "pocket" and you'll see one with a ribbon. They are so EASY to whip up in a pinch.

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I've also included one I made for my friend's birthday....a 'purse'-onal wish wouldn't you say so ;)

I think I will make Thank you cards for the other coworkers who helped me whip up that shower including Jane, who makes beautiful cakes!! Here is her creation below!! Yum!

Thanks for visiting my blog!! And thanks, too, to Keri for such a WONDERFUL purse tutorial! I love when I look at one of her tutorials and say, I CAN DO THAT! Check out her blog Pink Lemonade! And have a really JOYFUL weekend with your families and doing all those little things that need done.....now....where IS my toilet bowl brush??? Tee hee!!

Kim

PS forgive any spacing issues...some days they will not resolve!!!!

A Soggy, yet Eternal Joy

Well, it's a soggy night to be leaping, but praise God Joy is eternal and not dependent on our circumstances!

Tough evening. Our soccer girls played in POURING COLD rain tonight for the class title and lost after tieing the game, overtime, sudden death overtime, a shootout and finally a sudden death shootout with an ending 4 goals to 3. They played their hearts out for a third run to the state championships and just didn't make it! They remain the defending state champs from last year, but the opponent goes on to state play this time! Well, hope is eternal and I am confident that they will have a GREAT chance to go back next year! So we end the season with the this year's Division and Sectional titles for the class. Not a bad set of plaques :) The girls are sorely disappointed but nothing keeps them down for long!

On the down side, we had snow at work today. You know, I just can never feel ready for snow!!! And we hardly get any here compared to some of my stamping friends out west! Sigh. As if 100" a year isn't enough....pah!! More lake effect is predicted at work (higher elevation, that!) tomorrow. Thank goodness I live in the valley!




While I can, I'm taking time to post three things. One is a pic my hubby took on the river here in Letchworth Park. He's an avid canoeist and this trip was one of his trek and paddles a few weeks ago. Isn't it fabulous?! They call our park the "grand canyon" of the East. If you're ever in the neighborhood, let me know! We live less than a mile from the park and I'd love to show you 'round!



The other two things?? Shhhhh...don't tell her....but my friend Erin is getting married next weekend. We are having a shower for her at work on Thursday. Here are the card and a purse card I made for the gift cards we're giving her from the group! The purse card project is on my stamping buddy Keri Sereika's blog, Pink Lemonade. Try it out! Her tutorials are smashingly good!!

I used patterned paper from Current and my Autism Awareness set from Gina K Love you to Pieces. The embellishments are SU stitched ribbon in chocolate chip and the buttons are from my button box! Inside the sentiment "A perfect fit!" is stamped from the same set. I calligraphered their names. It opens in the center, obviously, so you can see I had to use an acrylic block to hold the card closed for the picture. It is flatter now :) I needed the card to be big so everyone who donated to the gift can fit their well wishes! I'm so excited for her!



They are a young, adorable couple and they are ready to take on the world together. Nothing's as good as a friend you can count on to be there forever...it's especially sweet when that person is your spouse!



Isn't this purse adorable? The paper is some I received from a Wish RAK and I'm not sure but it may be SU. The top flap is actually stamped with SU creamy caramel and chocolate chip ink and an SU basic backgrounder stamp. Matches well, doesn't it? Oh, and the ribbon is choco chip too! You can see on Keri's tutorial that you can glue a little pocket inside to hold a gift card if that's what you want. I'm going to make two more for the party...I'll show them to you when I can!

Hey! Enjoy the week the Lord has set before us! He will be with us in sunny or soggy weather. He promises! Be well and totally blessed!!!
Kim

Joy joy joy in a sparkly day!

Hi! What a sparkly day! First, today is my 24th Wedding anniversary! Praise God John has put up with me for this long!! LOL! Just kidding....us married people know it's a two way street! Yes, that's right....praise God for the grace to put up with him this long!! LOL!!

And! Kels' team WON the SECTIONAL TITLE girl's soccer game with God's grace!!!! So we continue on our run for a repeat showing at the state championships! It's still a long way away but we will concentrate on each game and see what's around the next corner!! If the worse happens, we will be done with varsity soccer games and practices til next year, so it's a win-win no matter what happens :)

So, I promised pictures! Here we GOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO......


Last month was pastor appreciation month, so everyone at church signed up for a day of the month to honor the pastor (we have two). We signed up for the end of the month, baked cinnamon and banana bread and added a card of appreciation. I couldn't POSSIBLY use the same card TWICE, could I??? Ah, well, more stamping!! I do so love monochromatic cards, but I also had to try out my prismacolors I recently....ahem..."acquired". This one went to our senior pastor and the next one to our associate pastors. We so appreciate these men of God in our lives!

In case I never told you where to get these amazing stamps---run right now on over to Cornish Heritage Farms! They just recently released a new set of Thomas Kinkades! The lighthouse is on my Christmas list!


The scripture is CHF as well, and it is the Psalm that tells us to delight ourselves in the Lord and He will give us the desires of our heart. Pastor Eric, our senior pastor, once challenged us with this scripture...he thought that perhaps it isn't a promise that God will always give us what we want, but that God himself will put the desires for the things He wants for us into our hearts. I love this way of thinking of things. If we delight ourselves in God, He will reveal for us what He has placed in our very being. Cool, don't you think?

Oh! You want to see a few more cards? Okay! Here is another bella card. I made it for my son's girlfriend's birthday. Kalene is dear to our hearts and I can't wait to see her to give her presents! She is at college, so I'll have to wait until thanksgiving! Grrrr....waiting is not my favorite thing to do!!! (Yes I KNOW patience is a virtue....I just don't know WHY! LOL!!)



She is a blingy girl,so I HAD to add the sparkly butterflies! And she also wants one of those little dogs someday, so this card was perfect for her. I received this image as part of a swap at SCS; I don't have the stamp itself. I used sparkly gel pens for the dress and prismacolors for the doggie! Then I used SU's patterned paper and also the three flower punch and stamps for the just for you. Gina K's Make a wish! sentiment is stamped on twill and BLING! A card!

If you click on the pic, you can see finer details :)

You know, with all this fun, I'm beginning to think working is really putting a downer into my stamping time! (Just a random thought).

Alright, friends, I have time for one more shared card....but I DIDN'T MAKE THIS ONE!! Deb Ring is an amazing stamper I have "met" through the CHF stamper's forum. She and I have exchanged cards several times and her designs always bless me! This one is particularly cool...She used a stencil and then BLEACHED the card!! The lighter color you see is the color that the cardstock changed to after the bleach was applied. Isn't that BEAUTIFUL??? Then she edged the picture with glitter (sparkly!) and put some of that poofy ribbon on the side. I don't have her full 'recipe' for the card so forgive my adjectives! If you want me to get the details from her, leave a comment and I'll see what I can do :)

You all, it's been fun updating you tonight. I have to go to bed and get some sleep so I can help those speech needy kids tomorrow. Be blessed tonight! I'll let you know how our game turns out!!!

PS If you have left a message on my blog...thank you!!! What an encouragement. For those of you who have emailed me....thanks for that, too!!! You are God's gift to me! Arrivederci!

Kim

Joyfully GREEN!! (And Turf green at that!)

G'day! Sorry to say I don't have a lot of time for blogging what with Kelsey's team in the soccer sectionals again this year and games coming at a fast pace!!! We go to all the games so it is a whirlwind of tiresome but exciting times! Her team has clinched the division, but must win tomorrow night to win the sectional title! She was pictured in the paper this week heading a ball! whoo hoo!

So suffice it to say I will keep with a quick post to let you know I'm still alive and leaping :) And we are again in the green on the blog as well as the soccer turf! Yeah! Please continue to keep those struggling with breast cancer in your prayers, however! And be blessed by this gorgeous indian summer if you're from around here! Hey, I think I have a few cards to post that I made for pastor appreciation day but that'll have to wait for the weekend....almost there!

be well blessed!!!
Kim