Day Camp and Male Birthday Card

I'll start out with my male birthday card. I did this for a sketch challenge at Stamp TV. I used stamps from Eclectic Summer and Eclectic Summer Sayings from Gina K. I just love those hot air balloons. I used this for a male birthday card swap I was in on the Making Greeting Cards Yahoo Group. I was really pleased with the way it turned out.

Last week was Girl Scout Day Camp. It was the hottest week so far this summer; into the 90's everyday. We started the week out with a batch of thunder storms that moved through on Monday morning forcing us to put the 270 girls and and extra adults into a cramped shelter house at the state park. Fortunately with the storm some of our buses were late. Although Monday was overcast all day we could still be outside after the storms moved through. The highlight of the day was watching a huge tree behind our shelter house first loose a branch and then topple over completely by the roots. Fortunately, the tree fell away from the shelter and not toward it or I wouldn't be writing this and about 50 girls would have gotten hit too. It all happened very fast. It was pretty amazing!
The rest of our week was sunny and hot, hot, hot. I was in charge of helping the girls make gel candles and make a piece of recycled paper (very messy, btw), and I also planned the service projects the girls did. I showed you my samples in an earlier post but here's the finished products. The girls made 33 centerpieces, 168 butterflies for the Holocaust Butterfly Project and 145 cards for America's Children for America's Veterans. I'm very proud of the great job they did. Here's the centerpieces:







Didn't they do a marvelous job? Thanks for stopping by today! I'm hoping to get back to some card making this week although we'll be gone for the weekend. Only two more days of work left this week! Take care.

Happy inking,

Donna

Quick Card

I haven't had a lot of time this week because of day camp but I did sneak in a little card this evening to send to my son, Dan, in honor of his new apartment in Boston.



This is just a very simple card. I used a new folder for my Cuttlebug and the stamps are from A Wreath of Flowers by Gina K. I just love this set. I'll try to write more tomorrow night. I took some pictures of the centerpieces that we made for the senior center and I'll tell you all about camp. Thanks for stopping by. Hope everyone has a fantastic week. Only four days to work this week. Yippee!

Happy inking,

Donna

A Year of Flowers Blog Hop

Melanie Muenchinger from Hands, Head and Heart is having a blog hop with one of her sets, A Year of Flowers. You can check out her post about the hop. I love Melanie's stamp set and if you look at previous posts you'll see that I've often used that set in making my cards. Here's my latest creation using A Year of Flowers and my newest purchase, a Cuttlebug!



I was so excited to finally purchase a Cuttlebug. Of course now I will have to get some dies and embossing folders. I did purchase this thanks embossing folder at Michael's last night and I really wanted to use it on a card.

The rose is stamped in Memento Tuxedo Black. The rose is actually decoupaged in layers. The rose and leaves are colored with Kooh-i-nor Woodless pencils and odorless mineral spirits. After I embossed the paper in the Cuttlebug, I ran Certainly Celery down over the paper to pop up the embossing.

So thanks to Melanie for sponsoring the blog hop. Stop by her blog and check out all the other amazing things people are doing with A Year in Flowers and if you have the set join in the blog hop and the fun. Have a wonderful weekend and thanks for stopping by my blog!

Happy inking,

Donna

Day Camp Service Projects

Next week is our annual Girl Scout day camp. The day camp draws about 300 girls a year for a week of fun at a local state park. I love day camp and all the volunteers who either take off work to do this every year or just volunteer their time to give the girls a wonderful outdoor experience. This year almost my entire family is volunteering. Tom and Tricia are the leaders for the canoe unit. My son Steve will be working on different projects every day. He helps give swim tests, cooks on the day we have an all camp lunch, and he'll be in charge of our I Spy game this year ( a game to find objects that don't belong in nature.) Dan will be the only one missing, working his new job in Boston.
This year I am in charge of the Program Aids and also in charge of service projects. I was in charge of those last year too so I've been keeping a list of anything I run into throughout the year that we might be able to turn into a project for day camp. This year I chose three main projects. The first is America's Children for America's Heroes. It's a card campaign to let veterans know that we appreciate all they've done for us. I was sure that I could help with this effort! (grin!)
Our second project is the Butterfly Project for the Holocaust Museum in Houston, TX. I thought the girls would enjoy creating the butterflies but also learn something about the holocaust and what happened. I wanted them to be a part of creating this amazing exhibit.
Our third project is making patriotic centerpieces for a local senior facility. That's what I've been working the most on this past week. I've come up with two different centerpieces based off ideas I found in the Pac-o-Fun magazine.

This centerpiece consists of rockets made from toilet paper tubes covered in red, white, and blue construction paper and decorated with stars and "USA". The girls can use their imagination to decorate their rockets. The bases are heavy cardstock covered in fabric and I have a variety of borders to use around the rockets. This one happens to be gold pipe cleaners.


Our second centerpiece is made from styrofoam cups pained with red stripes with a blue border glued around the top rim and a red circle border cut with my Colluzzle. Without the flowers it looks like an upside down Uncle Sam hat. The girls will paint the cups and add the borders and then decorate. Some girls will be making the red, white and blue tissue paper flowers to put into the cups.

I have lots to do before day camp next week. But I'm always excited for the week to come. I'm praying for good weather and a fun time for all involved. Thanks for stopping by today. Hope the rest of your week goes smoothly!

Happy inking,

Donna

Graduation Pics

So I promised graduation pics of my handsome college grad. So here's a few of them taken on his special day. This pic was taken right after he received his degree.


Here's the graduate with his parents! Yeah, college is over and we don't have to pay his tuition anymore! Don't we look relieved?


Here's the whole family: Tricia, Tom, Dan, Steve, and me. We so rarely get a picture with all of us in it so this one's a keeper for me. Of course, Steve is rarely seen without that backwards hat on and he wouldn't make an exception for his brother's graduation. I did talk him out of his holey jeans though!


And here's one for the record books. At the end of graduation they sent streamers flying over the crowd. Dan's little cousin Henry took advantage of the fun and collected a bunch. Here's to the little graduate who graduated from kindergarten the same year his big cousin graduated from college. Lots of fun!

Last week Dan moved to Boston to begin his new job and look for an apartment. Today was his first day of work and he seemed to be really happy for the first day. This past weekend he found and put a deposit on an apartment. Tomorrow morning the movers will be here to pack all of his things for the move. It's amazing how much stuff kids accumulate in their short lives. I miss him already! Sniff, sniff! Love you, Dan!

I haven't been totally ignoring my crafts. I'm getting ready for Girl Scout day camp next week. And I'm again in charge of service projects. Tomorrow I hope to have a sample of the centerpieces that the girls will be making for a senior living facility in town. So stay tuned for that.
Hope you all had a good start to your week. Thanks for stopping in today.

Happy inking,

Donna

Stamp TV Sketch Challenge

This week I feel in love with the sketch challenge on Stamp TV. I'm not sure what it was but there was just something about this challenge. I actually did the challenge twice. And here's what I came up with.

This was my first attempt. I always have trouble with male cards, but I thought this one turned out pretty well. Sorry it's a little skewed from the scanner. Here's the recipe:
Stamps: Gina K Elegant Flowers (sentiment) and Guiding Light
Card Stock: grey, black, white, and red
Embellishments: recycled cord, 3 gold brads

And my second attempt:


A Happy Birthday card in purples! Here's the recipe:
Stamp Sets: Gina K Eclectic Summer and Eclectic Summer Sayings (from the new summer kit on Stamp TV)
Card stock: several colors of purple, white, and black (am I into black lately, or what?)
Embellishments: ribbon and 3 yellow and orange flower brads

Lately I've been noticing the trend to really finish off the card by making the inside match the outside. I don't do this all the time because sometimes I am in a rush but this time I matched the inside to the outside. Here's the pic:


I am very pleased with how these both turned out. I thought they really matched nicely.
Thanks for stopping by today. Today was the last day of the Dimensional Modeling class I was taking for work, so tomorrow it's back to the regular grind behind my desk. Hope your week is going well.Until next time...

Happy inking,

Donna

Sea "Horsing" Around for your Birthday

Tomorrow is my DH's birthday so I wanted to make him a card. I just got my Gina K order and cut out the first of my sets tonight. I just love the set called Best Fishes. The images are so cute.


I just love the cute seahorse. (There's a great fish in the set too that I'll have to use soon.) And the verse is also from the Best Fishes set. I popped up the seahorse to give it some depth. It's a pretty simple card. I colored the seahorse with Koh-i-noor Woodless Pencils and odorless mineral spirits. The seaweed, from the Best Fishes set, in the background is stamped with Versamark on the blue cardstock. Just a very simple quick card that I hope my DH likes.

Hope you all had a wonderful weekend! I'm back in class tomorrow for the last two days. Straight lecture is really hard to take for 8 hours a day but hopefully it will be interesting. Thanks for stopping by and have a wonderful week. Take care!

Happy inking,

Donna

Red and Blue, But Not Patriotic

That was the color challenge this week over at Stamp TV. Carolyn King issued the challenge. And what fun it was. Here's my card:



The stamps are from Gina K Designs called Wreath of Wishes. I added some red and white gingham ribbon and sponged the edges of the white paper. A pretty easy card. The ribbon technique is also from Stamp TV. Gina has a video that shows you several ways to easily use ribbon on your cards. Since I am ribbon challenged I need all the help I can get. LOL!

Hope you are having a wonderful week. Tomorrow is my last day of work. Yahoo! I took Friday off to clean for my son's "moving away" party on Sunday. Thanks for stopping by today.

Happy inking,

Donna

Another Graduation Party

Hello! And Happy Monday to you all, at least what's left of it. My son, Dan, graduated Saturday amid pomp and circumstance at Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology. I had hoped to upload some pictures but my DH ran off with the camera before I could get the pictures off the camera. My DH took my two sons hiking and white water rafting this week. I got to stay home and work.
It seems graduation season takes months to get over. So here's a girl graduate. The image is by Dustin Pike. He's such a talented artist. This Saturday we have a graduation party to attend and this is the card for the graduate. Then on Sunday, Dan wants to have an open house to say "good-bye" to his friends here in Bloomington before he heads for Boston and his new job. So it will be another busy weekend coming up.
So sorry about the picture. I have to scan everything this week until DH and the boys come back with the camera. Hope you don't mind too much! That's it for today. I have to get to bed. I am taking a class for work tomorrow. It's all day and I just know I'll have trouble staying awake. Better get my beauty sleep. LOL! Have a great week, everyone. Thanks for stopping by.

Happy inking,

Donna