Crochet anyone?

So this used to be a common sight next to my chair. Crochet thread, pattern, crochet hook. I used to crochet constantly..... Then... .I discovered scrapbooking. Not so much crocheting happening after that. Well lately I am noticing more and more crochet flowers and embellishments on scrapbook pages. Believe it or not, I almost bought a package of flowers at the LSS earlier this month. That was until I saw the price! It was like $18 for not all that many flowers. I thought no way am I paying that when I know how to make them and I have all the stuff I'd need at home. So I dug out some patterns the other night and today went digging thru my stash of thread, and trust me... there is a STASH of thread. Now first of all would you believe I couldn't find pink?! Then my husband reminded me that my pink obsession only started about oh, 3 years ago or so. Maybe 4. So, the pink thing was post crochet thread stash. I did however finally find 2 spools with a tiny bit left on them. I bet I bought them to make something baby related. (I used to do blankets, bibs, booties, bonnets... you name it.) So look what I came up with this afternoon!


















Not bad huh? I remembered I had the butterfly pattern too. I had only made them once before and turned them into magnets for a friend. How cute will those be on a page? My favorite is the pink one. Shocking I know. Smile.... It's not so much the pink (well yes, it is...) but the flower. Of course this was a smidgen more complicated than the others. Figures I'd like it best. Cool huh?


















Here are some closer shots of the others:

So watch for Deanna's crocheted embellishments coming soon to a card or LO near you.

I forgot how much I liked crocheting. Making these today made me think of my sweet (and yes I mean that) Mother In Law. She is an awesome crocheter and was the one that got me started on thread. Also my Mom who taught me how to crochet in the first place! Thanks Mom! When we first got married I could crochet fine with yarn, but had never tried thread. I gave it a shot and man it is weird with the thread and the tiny hooks. My first piece was loose and yucky and I was ready to give up. She gave me a few tips on holding the thread, hook sizes and thread sizes and I gave it another try and the rest as they say is history.

I also became quickly aware today that this used to be easier.... 6 years later my eyes are 6 years older and have been thru cataract surgery... not so easy to see the tiny stitches anymore. How did that happen?

I'm discovering or re-discovering a lot of things I like or had forgotten I like lately. How does that happen? (what is that my new favorite saying today?) How do you forget that you used to enjoy things like dressing up, having your nails done, buying matcing jewelry for a new outfit, cute clothes, favorite hobbies etc. ? When did I fall out of the habit or get lazy about that stuff? Then you stick your toe back in the water after several years and you are like "oh yeah! I forgot how much I enjoy this." Makes me want to say well "duh!" to myself. I've been enjoying doing some different things and remembering things I like.

Been walking still too! I am up to about 1-1/2 miles in 30 minutes. Maybe not a lot to some, but awesome for me! When I first started I was not getting to a mile in that time. It was like .8. I got the furthest so far just this past week. It's cool to see yourself making progress. I think I've mentioned we have a nice lake/fishing/camping place behind our property and I've been going there to walk. I've liked it so much I almost went out on a rainy day with an umbrella (pink of course..) this week. I was saying to my Mom what is up with that? I have never, trust me, never been that devoted to activity! Ha. I ended up staying home and doing some indoor walking with one of those Leslie Sansome tapes. It wasn't too bad. I'm wondering about purchasing a treadmill for rainy/too hot/too cold/bad weather kind of days. We really can't afford it but I'll pray about it I think and see what God works out. Maybe He will toss in a pink ipod too for good measure? No? Plus... you may not be aware... but birthday week is coming in about 6 weeks or so..... Hope you are having a great weekend. We are about to have homemade sloppy joes for dinner. Yum...

Memorial Day Weekend

Happy Memorial Day weekend. Did you have a good one? Because of the weekend and today and what Memorial Day is about, I got to thinking about this layout I made last year. This is still one of my favs. Love what it stands for and so proud of my Dad and my Grandfathers for how they served our country. They are all heros in my book.




















So how did you spend your weekend? We mostly had some quiet time at home. I did some catching up on design team work for The Scrapping Spot. I finished up this layout featuring my niece Lauryn yesteday. Ok and judging from the last layout I posted of Lauryn just a few days ago, who can believe how grown up she has gotten? Wow!! So proud of her for being in band and since I was in band it brings back so many happy memories for me. The papers used here are Prima Morning Song and are from the Spots June kits. Gorgeous papers!! Do not miss out. Head on over to The Spot and grab yourself one while you can.















I made these 2 cards today. Both use scraps from that same kit. Either my husband or I took that photo of the butterfly last summer while out fishing. Thought it worked well on a card.














It is fresh strawberry time!! Yay! We stopped and picked up 2 quarts on the way home from church yesterday. They are sooooo good. Nothing like strawberries fresh from the field. No where near what is sold in the grocery store!

Well it's about back to work time I guess. Hope you have a great week. At least it's a short one right? Blessings.

Date Night

So Friday.. date night. Love date night. We had a great time. We started out with some Chinese Food at the buffet in town. It is good food, inexpensive and usually a quiet place. After that we wanted to get in our walk, so for a change we decided to go out to Iron Bridge in the country and walk the train tracks for a bit. Because I am funny like that.... I had Darrel take a picture of my feet on the tracks! Ha. There is something kind of cool to me about walking the tracks in my 2008 popular Crocs shoes when my grandma walked these tracks when she was probably 7-8 years old and was probably bare foot. She lived here with her family when she was a child. It was a railroad town years ago. Now it's just quiet and country. So we walked and talked for a bit and had a nice relaxing time. I love this picture showing the view down the tracks.
















When we were getting back near the bridge we thought we could hear the train rumbling in the distance. About the time I asked Darrel if he heard it, we heard the train whistle. It's kind of cool to see the train go by when you are out here. I've been there a lot and this is only about the 4th or 5th time I can remember getting to see the train. It is so different standing next to the speed and power of the train out here then it is in your car at a train crossing.
















Before the train passed, Darrel laid down a few pennies on the track. Have you ever seen what a train does to a penny? They are now very flat and wafer thin. It was cool we actually found them after the train was gone. Sometimes they get flung when the train hits them and you can't find them again.
















Sometimes I stand out here in the quiet and the country and am still soooo amazed how God brought us here and that I get to live here. LOVE it.

After we left here we decided to head to Zander's for some ice cream. It's a pretty good drive but so worth it. We listened to 80's music on the Sirius radio on the way. That always reminds us of the days when we were dating. We started dating in 1984 and were married in 1987. Who can believe how long ago that was.... wow.

A few days ago I posted my "Cinderella" layout and talked about how cool the song was. Well in the last few days, the man that wrote that song, Steven Curtis Chapman, lost his 5 year old daughter in an accident. I was so shocked and sad to hear this today. You can see a family photo and a few details here. Please pray for this family. I can't even imagine the pain they are going thru right now. I heard about this on the radio station I listen to during the day, WBGL. They had a few details here. I've heard an interview with Steven about why he wrote the song Cinderella and it was about his little girl Maria and her sisters. Wow... so so sad.

Hope you have an awesome, peaceful, restful, fun Memorial Day weekend! I hope to relax, read and scrapbook, not necessarily in that order. Ha. Ha. Blessings!!

More June Goodness....

So here is layout #2 with the June Scrapping Spot kits and I am loving these Prima Morning Song papers! On this layout I even combined a little of the second kit for June which is Prima Dude. The Morning Song kit has this pretty butterfly fabric. It has like eyelet holes in the wings of the butterflies so that made me think to stitch it. I cut out the butterflies, tacked them down with a bit of adhesive, poked holes with my Heidi Swapp paper piercer and then stitched with floss. LOVE the way that came out. How cute is my niece Lauryn in this photo? If I am remembering correctly this was her first official chocolate chip cookie. Cute!!

Been doing more walking this week but I am beginning to wonder if its messing with my head. Don't go there and tell me my head was already messed up! Ha. We've been having some nice walks at the camping/rec. area behind our house. We clocked it yesterday and for the moment we are doing about 1.2 miles. Maybe not a lot for some of you out there but GREAT for me. Smile. Anyway I am tuckered out when we get back home and usually in need of a shower. So last night I am getting my shower and first dumb thing I did was to put shampoo on my hair before getting my hair wet. I didn't realize I did this till I started trying to lather it up and was wondering what on earth was wrong?? Then.... I go to shave my legs and till this moment I cannot remember if I did both legs? I mean did I do the left leg or not and how do you forget? I have no memory of this. Maybe I actually had a nap in the shower or something? And I am sure you are thinking well is there hair on the other leg??? Well see since I am gettng older I have discovered the hair grows back much much slower .... so if I give my legs a quick once over each time I have my shower, I usually cannot tell a difference day to day....See and you thought I was losing it again and I am sure you are just so glad I shared that little story.

I finished the above layout today BEFORE tackling the house work so I better get busy! Hope you are having a fabulous thursday.

June Kits!

Just a quick post to share a layout I made this evening. This is made with Prima Morning Song papers which are in the June Kit from The Scrapping Spot. The colors and designs in these papers are soooo pretty! You will love this kit. You will probably remember I posted this photo here on my blog recently. It is a new favorite so I couldn't wait to scrap it. Darrel says he doesn't like it. I love it because he is grinning at me! That makes me smile. He is the most awesome husband ever and I am so proud to be his wife.

Hope to have more to share with you if time permits this week so check back soon!

Blessings.

To Dance with Cinderella

I have been hearing the song "Cinderella" by Steven Curtis Chapman on the radio almost every day at work. Love the lyrics of the song and it instantly brought to mind this photo I had of my brother and his little girl dancing. Just could not wait to get the lyrics to the song and the photo together on a layout. Really pleased with how it turned out. Got to play with all kinds of awesome new stuff here. The red border on the left is one of the Fancy Pants Glitter Cuts. Those things are sooo cool! Took my MM felt flowers and ran them thru the Big Kick to emboss them, layered them with some paper flowers and buttons and even added some stitching. Was having way to much fun with the detail on this one. Most of the awesome embellies here came from a recent Studio Calico kit. Love the mix of stuff they put together!! I mean how cute are the Heidi Swapp Cherries and the AC bird? Too cute!
















So how has your weekend been? Mine has been pretty good. Yesterday was fairly quiet and today we had great weather. Darrel and I drove over to the camping/rec area that is directly behind our property and took a walk. I took a couple pictures as we were walking. Isn't it pretty? When we used to visit here when I was a little girl we camped there a few times. Since I live right on a highway we have been trying to determine a good place to walk without having to deal with traffic and coal trucks. This may be the answer. Nice place to walk, beautiful scenery and not a lot of traffic. Plus it takes me all of 2 minutes to get there! Ha. When we were walking I noticed a tree ahead and we are like "what is on that tree?" Darrel was the first to realize it was a tulip tree in bloom. Tulip trees are the state tree of Indiana, but in my 6+ years of living here this is the first time I ever saw one in bloom. I now understand why they call it a tulip tree.
















Aren't the flowers cool? They are huge and so unique. Here is a closer look:















Isn't it amazing what you can learn in the spring when you actually get out of the house and do some walking. Smile...

Have you seen this? Its an ATB Paper Gator. It will round the corners of several sheets of cardstock at once or go thru chipboard, etc. I would LOVE to have this thing, but at $50 I am not seeing that happening any time soon. Very cool though don't you think? I wonder if Michael's or Hobby Lobby will carry it and then maybe could use a 40% off coupon. That would sure help. Um plus, did you notice.... its PINK.

So what are your plans for the week? I have work of course and it's what we call "newsletter week" which makes for a busy week. The evenings are mostly at home I think. I will probably have my DT kit for The Scrapping Spot arriving tomorrow so will need to get my layouts done for that. Wait till you see the cool Prima stuff coming up for these June Kits! Do not miss out. Great thing about this week though as it ends with Memorial Day Weekend. Really looking forward to hopefully a quiet 3 day weekend at home. Have a great week and don't forget to check back for those June kit layouts coming up! Blessings!

Card Challenge

Just a quick post before heading to bed. Made this card today for the bi-weekly card challenge I host at The Scrapping Spot. You should come join us on the message board!! This week's challenge is to make a summer themed card. I am soooo tired of all the gloomy dreary rainy weather we've been having that I needed something summery and vacation like! Ha. It started with finding these cute little flip flop buttons at walmart the other night. Aren't they cute? Then when I set out to make my card I remembered I had this summer paper pack from KI Memories (it was a gift with purchase at Archiver's last year.) From there it all came together with an added Melissa Frances sticker and a Heidi Swapp ghost flower. Cute huh?

Just about finished with my "spot tag" LO for this week too. Hope to have that posted tomorrow! TGIF!

Coolest Cell Case Ever....

LOOK at what I found at the hardware store of all places. Now first, you are probably asking yourself, WHY would Deanna be at the hardware store? Maybe they had scrapbook stuff there? Ha. Ha. Nope... Went to the hardware store while I was waiting for Darrel. We were going to get groceries (every other Tues. is grocery night after work). They are doing road work the way he commutes to/from work so he was running behind. He finished our bedroom furniture last night and we needed a knob for our nightstand drawer. So, being in a little town, I decided to see if the hardware store across the street from Walmart had any cabinet/drawer pulls. Luckily they did and I found what I needed. Anyway, while waiting to check out I spotted this little Crocs cell phone case and it was PINK! How cute! So first, it matches my current Vera Bradley purse. Second, it has a clip, or a nice strap to hang it around your neck. This will be perfect! I've been walking lately and when I go on my own, I like to have my phone with me. You never know when some big dog, or cow or something is going to like chase you down. Or better yet a snake (remember I live in the country and sometimes I cut back over to our property behind the cow pasture and um my Dad has told stories about snakes chasing him here and I've seen them before myself too!)!! I might need to scream for my husband you know? ha. (either that or strangle the snake with the strap from my case? ha. ha. ) So now I have this cool case. All its missing is a pretty pink flower jibitz don't you think? I need a smilie face here. The case also has a little pocket for like your debit card/drivers license. See they thought of everything. Here is the back view:















Here is the bedroom furniture Darrel just brought in the house. It was UGLY before but look how he transformed it. I don't have a before picture on these pieces but they were an Oak color with a laminate top and colonial hardware. My grandma bought them maybe in the 70's or 80's?? Now look at them!



















This nightstand used to belong to Darrel's Mom. I think she said she bought this bedroom set with her first paycheck from her first job. The drawer did have this stuff on the front that looked like old contact paper and this giant flat gold disc thing for a knob. HUGE improvement here! Love, love, love it!!

Heading to my scrap room to work on a LO a bit before bed. Hope you are having an awesome week.

Mother's Day

Did you have a happy Mother's Day? Look what my sweet husband gave me. When I was getting ready for church Sunday morning I found this on my vanity table. Isn't he the sweetest??? This is a Willow Tree Figurine called "Together." Now as most of you probably know, I am not a Mom. My husband and I have been unable to have children so I've never officially been able to celebrate Moms day. However a few years back my husband started giving me a gift anyway. Yesterday he said to me "Happy Wife's Day." Awwww isn't he the greatest? I've always said the day is hard because it's like all the women are inivited to this big party except me. My husband doing something special like that for me just makes the whole day go down a little bit smoother.

The whole day went pretty well actually. I did OK at church. I almost had an emotional moment but that was when Kay was showing my layout and reading my journaling. Really wasn't because of Moms day. I managed to sidestep the whole giving the ladies a flower thing in the Narthex so I didn't have to deal with the awkward feelings I experience in those situations. Song with the choir went well. It was a good morning and a good service. After we left church we hit a local buffet, before the huge crowd got there, and had lunch. Next we headed to my Mom's and got to spend the afternoon with her and with my family. It was a really nice day.

So now on to a new week. My next bi-weekly card challenge happens this Friday. I am "it" in "Spot Tag" and need to get a LO done for that plus new June kits will be arriving any time now. Wait till you see what The Scrapping Spot has in store for June!! You will LOVE it! We are also moving in the rest of the bedroom furniture that we have been refinishing and moving in an additional table into my scrap room. Can't wait to have a little extra work space. I think I am going to set up things like my bind it all and big kick on this table where I can just walk over and use them and not have to dig stuff out or make a space to work with them. If I ever figure out how to sew better I could set up my sewing machine too. Have you seen one of the latest trends with the crochet flowers? Well I love to crochet so have been thinking about making a few of my own for LO's. We have groceries to get tomorrow and I have a possibility of going to another crop on Saturday. Sound like a full week?

Watching the Semi Finals of Dancing with The Stars. Do you watch? We like Kristi. We used to love, love to watch her skate and saw her in Stars on Ice several times when we lived near Chicago. She just did a great tango. I love, love to watch the tango!! They have to do it to the right music though. I don't like when it's too fast or not traditional tango music. The perfect Tango music is like in the movie True Lies. I am not a big fan of the movie at all but will turn it on every time I see it on the schedule just to catch the opening tango at the beginning of the movie. I know, I'm weird.

I hope you have a fabulous week. Check back for this week's card and spot tag Layout and maybe some pics of our furniture and my reorganized scrap room. (yet again...)

Blessings.

Journal Project

So how cool is my Pink journal ?! I've been wanting to make a new journal for this personal project I am working on. I bought a blank chipboard spiral scrapbook album at HL a few weeks ago. I altered it today with a bunch of Heidi Swapp stuff (my fave). I am loving the little chipboard me on the front. My friend Lisa made this great LO recently which had these cute paper dolls (that she cut with her silhouette and yes I am jealous....) which she dressed with little tulle skirts! How adorable is that? So when I decided to use my maya road chipboard person today, she of course needed a pink skirt! Ha. I had this sheer pink ribbon (saved from a gift) and I just gathered it with a running stitch (which I have never before sewn until today - sewing is not my best thing!) and glued it down. You will also notice plenty of heidi bling and the new AC Roller Rink Taffy Thickers! LOVE those. Aren't they pretty? I wanted my journal to be all pink and pretty and sparkly and "me" so that I would want to work in it and write in it and keep up with my project. The project is still pretty personal, but I may share sometime in the future. Here are a few closeups:























So do you have big plans for Mom's Day Weekend? We have church in the morning and I am in the sound booth running video. I am also singing a solo with the choir. Kay will be speaking tomorrow instead of Pastor Mark and is talking about sincere faith from generation to generation. She was working on her sermon and we got to talking and I was telling her about my family and how I thought it was so cool and how it speaks to me that my Mamaw used to talk about how her Mom would walk them to church. Her Mom, my great grandma died when Mamaw was 9 yrs old so of course I never knew her. But that was a good memory she had of her Mom. Because her Mom took her to church, Mamaw took my Dad to church. Mamaw told me about Jesus when I was a little girl and because they took my Dad to church, he took me (his family) to church. Because of that I accepted Jesus as my Savior as did other members of my family. When I was young my Mom accepted Jesus and I remember how that affected her life. Dad used to teach me the 23rd Psalm by writing verses on my chalkboard when he tucked me in for bed at night. All those things shaped who I am and all those things were such a gift to the Faith I have in Christ now. It is so cool to me it started with people in my family I never even knew. Turns out that is exactly what Kay is preaching about and so she asked if she could show this layout up on the PowerPoint tomorrow and read the journaling. I did this LO in 2006 to document this same subject. Cool huh?

After church we will stop for some lunch and then head to my Mom's to spend the day with her for Mom's day. Should be a nice day and I am looking forward to the time with her. It helps to be busy and go visit so I am not sitting here feeling left out dwelling on why I'm not celebrating Mom's day.

Hope you have a blessed weekend and a great Mom's Day too.

A Beautiful Sunday

So we had a great church service yesterday. It was a focus on children's ministries and we had 8 people baptized. Really good service. Afterwards we headed out for lunch and when we were done instead of going the normal way home, we tried a new way. Darrel showed me around this fishing/camping/lake area that he his company had done some work for. My husband is in computer aided drafting and design and he drew some of the plans for the roadwork and a handicap ramp down to the lake. It was cool seeing work he had done kind of live and in person. I hadn't even known this area was there till yesterday. It was nice and must be a decent size lake judging by the amount of empty boat trailers in the parking lot. I bet here were at least 20. They were all out on the lake and I could only see about 3 boats on the water. After that we headed for the little town where my Mamaw was born. We've always called it Iron Bridge because the bridge above is there and there used to be houses and a town. I really like it here. It's so pretty and peaceful. We are going to go back more often this summer and spend some Sunday afternoons fishing. We got to goofing around with the camera after I took the bridge photo and I snapped this one of Darrel. Isn't he cute? I love this picture because he is grinning and laughing and looking at me!


















Then we snapped this one of both of us. OK, there were really about 3 before this where I was trying to take our picture. But I am short and evidently short people can't hold the camera out and take a picture of their 5ft 2" self next to their 6 ft 2" husband while they are both standing on a boat ramp! ha. So Darrel took this next one using my pretty pink camera. Real men can use a pink camera. Right?

















We headed back home after that and I snapped a few shots in our yard. This is an azaela bush my Mamaw planted. Isn't the color gorgeous?

















Took this one looking back up at the house from further out in the backyard. I liked the angle and the green of the grass with the color of the red bush. Right behind that red bush is a whole bunch of Irises that are just about to open.


















So that was our Sunday. Took a walk when we got home and took another today. I am becoming quite the walking girl and actually been enjoying it. Hope I will be able to keep it up when the heat and humidity hit.

Hope your week is off to great start! Blessings!

National Scrapbook Day

So it's National Scrapbook Day... or, it was. Guess it's almost over by this point. I had a great day! Headed out to be at an 8 hour crop that started at 10 AM this morning. Yes, you are right, I just went to an all day crop last Saturday. It was my first one. Well the day after, I got invited to one for NSD and I had so much fun at the first one, I couldn't resist. My friend Lori was going and Lisa was going too to set up her booth for Shabby Pink Designs so I didn't want to miss out on all the fun! The crop was hosted by a local scrap store called The Scrapbook Tree. It was at a cool local restaurant/coffee house type place called Zanders. They have great gourmet coffees, sandwiches and ice cream. So for the crop we got these great little tool tote goodie bags (thanks to my friend Lisa I got a pink one!), we got a great soup and sandwich lunch, free ice cream, giveaways and prizes every 45 minutes, plus they had a couple of classes and make and takes. I got the layout posted above completed. The adorable little boy is my nephew. I used some papers and supplies from one of the may kits from The Scrapping Spot. Papers are from Fancy Pants About A Boy and also Cosmo Cricket Cogsmo. I loved that paper with the gear/cog things and decided to try cutting one out. Well that was a pain so I was hoping I didn't like it. So of course I did like it and proceeded to spend quite a bit more time cutting out little gear sprockets! ha. Did you follow all that?

My most unfavorite thing about going to a crop is the packing. I believe I have mentioned that right? Well last week I had the idea to use this black duffle bag on wheels that we have so that I could pull most of my stuff rather than carry it - cause man it gets HEAVY. That ended up working pretty well sitting on the floor beside me. Well just before the previous crop I had spotted a large (and I do mean large) pink duffle bag at Walmart. It was $30. Not too bad but I thought, nah, I'll just use the black one and see how that works. Since I liked it, I checked on them next time we visited walmart only to find they were marked down to $15! Love that. So I got one. This one is even easier to pull because it has one of those pull out handles like the suitcases have. That also makes it so my tool tote can sit on top! Again...Love that. I'll have to take a picture so I can show you. Packing for these things can be so hard. I intend to like make up page kits and therefore minimize the packing but I find it so hard to figure out what I might want to use on a layout that far in advance. So hopefully this new system will be the best of both worlds.

They had several vendors there today from Shabby Pink (of course), Creative Memories, Close To My Heart, etc. Have you heard of or tried the decorative trimmer that CM has? I got to see it in action today. It is so cool. Cuts perfect waves along the edge and allows you to also make your own deco strips. So of course I needed one right? She was all out, but is shipping me one.

So tomorrow is church. We are having a children's ministry day as well as a baptism service. It should be a full but good morning! Been working on reading the one year Bible, NLT, chronological version lately. Really been liking it and enjoying the chronological LO. I highly recommend it.

Hope you are having a great weekend. Blessings.