random reflections

Card Patterns Challenge

In my effort to finish the April birthday cards, I decided to play along with the Card Patterns challenge. Here's the sketch:

I don't often follow along with sketch challenges, and I think I know why. I enjoy creating a card for them, but often the final product is not really me. This one falls into that category. Although I'm pleased with it, it's not a card I would create on my own. 

I chose the papers first, both from a 6X6 paper pad, Random by Crate Paper. Papertrey's Raspberry Fizz and Vintage Cream cardstock were good matches, and I thought the Pretty Peony stamps worked well. The sentiment is from Delightful Dahlias, and the tiny butterfly from Butterfly Dreams. I used both Spellbinder's Lacy Circles and the Double Ended Banner dies from PTI, and finished it off with a Simply Chartreuse ribbon. The pearls are from Michaels.

Lots going on this weekend. On Friday I'm going to a lecture by the All Rochester Reads author, Debra Dean, who wrote The Madonnas of Leningrad which our book group read several years ago.  Everyone in the book group liked it, which is a good recommendation since we're a couples book group, and pretty diverse. Then we're having company for dinner later that night.

Saturday, I'm off with friends to a baby shower in Buffalo. Since we're all crafters, we're leaving early so we can spend some time at Buffalo Stamps & Stuff beforehand. It will be an all day event. When we get home, Tracy and I are going to friend's for dinner. I'm providing dessert, and will get it made so I can serve it on Friday as well. If it turns out well, I'll take photos and post it here. My friend made it for us last month, and it was fabulous! Hope you have some fun planned for the weekend as well.

CAS-ual Friday Challenge

This week's challenge at CAS-ual Fridays was to create a card using pastels and blacks. This finishes my stash of birthday cards for April. You'll see the rest of them in the next day or so.

This gave me a chance to play with a couple more new purchases from Papertrey Ink:  the 2012 Birthday Tags (which I'm sure will get lots of use) and the new Tag Sale #6 die which I love. I stamped the image on Aqua Mist cardstock and cut the tag from Bitty Box, using the Aqua Mist pattern. I love the way so many of the Papertrey products are color coordinated. The card itself was created from paper I purchased at the very first stamp store in Rochester so it must be at least 15 years old. The store closed years ago. Since then we've had two other lovely stores, but they are no longer in business either. The other die is the Vine Border, and the ribbon and pearls are from Michaels. 

March Papertrey Blog Hop

Today's the day for the monthly blog hop at Papertrey Ink, and I always enjoy playing along. I've been drawn to bright and cheerful colors recently so this inspiration piece was right up my alley.

I'm still working on the stash of birthday cards I need for April, so that was the direction I took. I also wanted to use the new star border dies which arrived a couple of days ago. I think you'll be seeing a lot of them.

Aside from the colors, I was drawn to the polka dots on one of the gift bags in the inspiration piece so I backed my larger star with a piece of Distressed Dots patterned paper. The smaller star was die cut with a piece of paper from the Hodge Podge collection which I've had for years. I used the Seeing Stars dies for both. The cardstock is Hawaiian Shores, Summer Sunrise, and Harvest Gold, and the sentiment is from Simple Sentiments. All the products are PTI. Here's a closer look at the layers on the card.

Yesterday was such a busy day. I was gone most of the day, and we celebrated Tracy's birthday and my brother-in-law's birthdays at Tavern 58 last night. In between I visited all the wonderful stops on Deb's fabulous Potluck Blog Hop. If you haven't had a chance to check these out, there are a lot of wonderful recipes to be had. 

Welcome to the International Virtual Pot Luck Blog Hop

Welcome to the Virtual Pot Luck dinner and specifically to my home in western New York! Should you be unaware of this fabulous event organized by Deb, go immediately to Paper Turtle so you can get started with some drinks and appetizers.

If you've been journeying along you've come from Karen's kitchen in the UK. By now you must be rather full if you've journey through all the previous stops. Hopefully you've saved room for some Chicken and Wild Rice. Many years ago, a friend served this for dinner and graciously shared her recipe. It's now my stand-by recipe for pot-lucks (which have become infrequent in real life) and when I need a dish that travels well to someone in need of a meal (quite frequently.) Hope you enjoy!

Here are the ingredients:

4 boneless chicken breasts or chicken tenders (I used about two packages of chicken tenders this time)

1 package Uncle Ben's Wild Rice (any wild rice mixture would do)

2 cans cream of chicken or cream of mushroom soup

1/2 c. milk

1/2 c. sherry or white wine

1/2 c. Parmesan cheese

1/2 c. slivered, toasted almonds (optional)

I chose not to use the toasted almonds this time since I was taking this to my friend who just had a new baby, and I wasn't sure the older kids would like almonds.

Sprinkle half the rice mixture into the bottom of a 9X13 pan.

Whisk together the soup, wine, and milk and pour half of it over the rice.

Arrange the chicken over the rice and soup mixture. 

Then repeat with the remaining rice and soup.

Cover tightly and bake at 350° for one hour.

Remove cover and sprinkle with cheese (and almonds if using). Put it back in the oven for 30-45 minutes.

Enjoy!!! This dish freezes very well, and I've made it for the freezer at our church where they keep a ready supply of meals for congregation members who suddenly need some meals. Left-overs are great, too.

Now you're off across the ocean to Ruth's kitchen for one last main dish before dessert. I know it will be delicious!

CR84FN Challenge

I've been really attracted to the bright colors of spring recently. I have my orange, yellow, and pink sweaters out of winter storage, so I was anxious to play along with CR84FN challenge this week.

This CAS card was inspired by one created by Cristina Kowalczyk published in a Paper Crafts magazine.

I started with some Bazzil textured cardstock in bright pink and added the Echo Park striped paper from their Dots and Stripes line. I stamped the sentiment from Papertrey's Birthday Basics right onto the patterned paper and added a couple of flowers and a brad from my stash. I just purged a lot of my flowers since I rarely use them anymore, but I was smart enough to keep a few around.  While I was at it, I made a second card with a slightly different color combination. 

Same ingredients except I used Hibiscus Burst cardstock (Papertrey) and a Basic Grey brad that arrived in one of my Studio Calico kits.

The weather here is just amazing. They are predicting a high of 80° today. Tracy is out golfing and later we'll go for our fourth bike ride in four days. I don't believe we've ever had our bikes out in March. I know it can't last, but I'm enjoying every day we have of these summer-like temperatures.

CAS-ual Friday Challenge

This week's challenge at CAS-ual Fridays was to create a CAS card with the following element:

1. A Pattern
2.  An Image
3.  A Sentiment

I needed a couple more cards for guys and made two of the same card. I chose the chevron pattern from a new Echo Park paper from the Style Essentials line. The image is a cute camera from Studio Calico and I created the sentiment on the computer with the American Typewriter font. I added the heart to add a touch of color to the card. Since they are both going to relatives, the heart was perfectly appropriate.

I love this chevron pattern and wish I'd purchased several sheets of it!

Babies!

This week a good friend and his wife had a tiny baby---just 3 pounds, 7 ounces. She's doing great, though, and I couldn't wait to go buy some little baby clothes. While I was there, of course, I had some other babies in mind as well. I still want to buy little Chloe a few more things, but I was only allowed to use one coupon at a time, so I'll go back in a day or two to use my $10 off coupon. Look at the difference between the premies on the right, and the three month size in the middle! The dress for Skylar is 9 months because I know she has plenty of clothes for the next few months.

Here's the card for Chloe.

I think the tag came from Paper Source many years ago. The papers are old Jillibean from my scrap drawer as is the ribbon. The flower is a new one from Pebbles, the stamp from Fillable Frames Additions 2 (PTI), and the die cut alpha is also Papertrey Ink. The wide pink ribbon is May Arts (I think) that I ordered from Emma's Paperie. The border punch is American Crafts.

At the end of the month, I'm going to Buffalo to a baby shower for one of my best friend's daughter-in-law. They're expecting a boy and doing a baseball theme in the nursery. I based this on a card Debbie Olsen did a long time ago, and was really pleased with how it came out. 

I used Papertrey's Banner Builders to create the pennants with scraps in my "baby drawer" and Pure Poppy cardstock. "BABY" was stamped with the PTI "Fresh" alphabet, and the baseballs were cut from a piece of patterned paper from Michael's. Also from Papertrey is the twine, the patterned paper (Bitty Stars), cardstock (Pure Poppy, Blueberry Sky and Select White), and the sentiment (Bitty Baby Blessings).

 

Two Layouts

I'm keeping up with my goal of a layout every week. Here's what I ended up doing with my Take Twelve photos.

Everything on the layout is from a Studio Calico kit, all but the flower from the March Story Teller kit.

The next one is an almost finished layout. I left some room for more journaling since it's an old photo and I know I have more to say---just have to figure out exactly when it was taken. For years, we've taken photos on the front steps. Often they are "good-bye" photos--off to school, off to camp, off somewhere. I'm not so sure about this one though.

When I was cleaning last week I found a whole set of layouts I did in a Technique Tuesday class at the Creating Keepsakes Convention last May. Then I was going through the photo file looking for something else and came upon this photo which seemed just perfect for this layout. I have three more layouts, but haven't seen the right photos for them yet.

Cards for Guys

Three of my family members (all guys) have March birthdays. The first is one that I'm linking with the CAS-ual Friday where the challenge is to make the sentiment front and center.

And here's my card for Tracy's St.Patrick's Day birthday. He's been warned to stay off the blog. I love the sentiments in the new Papertrey Ink "Movers and Shakers" set. The inside sentiment is just as great. All papers are Papertrey Ink as well as the Woodgrain Impression Plate.

The next card is for my niece's finance. One of our big events this summer is their wedding in Hyde Park. I'm already looking forward to it. The papers here are old Cosmo Cricket "Boyfriend." The frame, sentiment, and circle border die are all Papertrey Ink.

Last is the card for my BIL. We'll be celebrating his and Tracy's birthday at Tavern 58 the night before Tom's birthday, so I can hand deliver this one. The Houndstooth stamp, circle border and sentiment are, again, from Papertrey Ink. I used three different circle punches to create the tag.

 

Take Twelve

Take Twelve done on the 12th----very unusual. I've even printed the layout on legal sized paper and think I may make a one page layout with it. But perhaps, I'll print each separately and do a two-page layout. I can't decide so I'll post the photos here for now. The template is one from Ella Publishing's Take Twelve set.

I love the two pages laid out together. But for better viewing here they are separately.

The journaling reads:  Maureen came to lunch today. It was her first chance to see our new kitchen. I made a favorite, baked chicken salad, and a new dessert: caramel crunch brownies which are fabulous. I'm still working on the Sunday crossword puzzle, and refilled my little cup with my favorite mechanical pencils. The clementines are sitting on our counter, reminding me to snack on fruit when I get hungry. It works most of the time.

The beautiful flowers were a gift from Maureen. After lunch I took some clothes to the tailors to be altered as well as a lovely article about the tailor's daughter who is now a co-owner. New phone books arrived today. It's always a dilemma to figure out what to do with them, since we use the tiny ones in the kitchen which are not updated. I had to ice my knee (bursitis) while we watched the evening news. This month I'm reading "The Marriage Plot," as well as a book on Lightroom and some travel books on Washington, D.C. ----all on the iPad.

Like Capture Your 365+1, I'm happy to be keeping up with this project. It's fun to record one day a month, something I know I wouldn't do without this motivation.