Back (and with a question...)

Second post for today. Maybe my nojo is on break and the mojo is covering for it...I surely don't know. What ever is happening, it feels pretty good.

Not sure if I've mentioned this before, but a couple of you bloggy folks already know that I have a mild form of dyslexia. Certain things refuse to either take hold, or only become a part of my memories/brain processes after finding a round about way to get in. For example, the only way as an adult that I can discern my left hand from my right hand is that I know that my wedding ring is on my left. That in turn, is a signal for all lefts and rights. Works most of the time. I don't know how else to live, and these little problems usually don't bother me too much. So here's my question, and it will probably be longish. (Is it my dyslexia that has caused me to not figure this out or am I just not blog savvy enough?) I'd love to add a couple more clickable badges to my right side bar. CASology is one, and Fusion is another. However, there is no code beneath the badges for me to copy and then go into my layout, add a gadget... Is there anyone who can give me some pointers on this? And the other part of my question, and it is truly just a wondering question, - why don't all challenge blogs put code beneath their badges? Sorry for sounding like a ditz.

Onward and upward (no lefts/rights here!).

Haven't played over at Muse for a couple of weeks. The incredible Jen Mitchell is the guest designer, and she's created something awfully cool. Take a peek:

For me it was love at first sight. *sigh* My take is slightly different, but definitely think that you can see Jen's work in my card.

Bazzill white card stock base, scraps of brown, aqua, and white. Avery Elle sunburst stamp, MFT sentiment, memento brown ink, Studio G aqua ink, the coffee cup sticker from K&Company, Twinery twine, Cuttlebug embossing folder, and some brown blings from Pebbles. Happy dances everyone.

There and back again

First, if you know what the title of today's post is from, let me know... Sorry. I was swamped after my Thursday post, and then Sunday, when all was supposed to be full of laughter and light, things went from walking on champagne bubbles to caca pretty fast. Won't bore you with the details here. Just wanted you to know that I'm getting things back on track. Hate wasting energy, time, and brain cells on unhappiness. Then, yesterday was migraine day, and all of you out there who suffer from these know exactly what I mean when I say it knocked me flat on my hinder. Today has started out promisingly.

So. Decided to play along with CAS on Sunday's #7 challenge. I've had a vague idea for a card (well, more than one vague card idea) floating around in my head, and the sketch over there was the perfect one for this particular idea.

I really made two cards for this challenge. Will admit that I'm only showing the one, but the second is nice too--just not as good as this one. Great sketch don't you think? I have to say that I will probably be using this on other cards...Lots of birthdays in May. 

For my clean/more graphic cards I find that I keep going back to the PTI Birthday Basics set. It fit perfectly below the artsy part. Once again, these are scraps from the cardstock box. SU black ink, three random black blings, and a Crate Paper brad whose little leggies I took off. That's it for this card. That's if from me for now, but as I plan to work in here for a few hours, I just might be back today. Happy dances everyone.

I'll have a little giggle, please.

After seeing the new cue card over at CASology, I had a ping moment. I tend to obey my pings. They can be irritating if I don't...Also, as many of you know, I'm really working hard to use up as much of my stash as cardmakingly possible. There, in my tackle box of brads, tucked away for at least 5 years (probably more...), I knew I had a brad that actually said "giggle"! The little hands in my head rubbed themselves together, and thought, "whoopie, we've got this challenge won!!" But the more the real me thought about it, the more I knew it just wasn't quite what I wanted. But at that point in my day, I had to stop thinking about it so hard, because Lizzy came over. She's 15 and funny. And fun! So while she was supposed to be doing her homework, I stood there and read her one-liners in hopes that a little better idea would ping. We both laughed at the one-liners until tears ran down our faces, and probably made grandpa wonder what the heck we were up to. When she and I get together, it's always fun!

Then, after Lizzy left for home, another ping hit. A humdinger of a pinger (sorry...) (well maybe only a little...). I remembered what my older sister did to our younger sister's kids when they were little and full of mischief. Sara and Brett were probably 7 & 9 years old, it was close to Christmas, and the threat of no visit from Santa wasn't working. Now, I don't know where Sue came up with this, but she made tags, and attached them to bags full of marshmallows. After reading their tag, the two little jewels took notice. Brett burst into tears. His mother said to start behaving. He did, Sara did, and all was right with the world...at least until after presents on Christmas day....For today, and for the challenge, I made my own tag. I still chuckle at it, but I'm naughty like that. Just ask my friend Mary.

I tried to make it big enough to read without you having to click on the photo, but alas, you'll have to click if you can't quite read it. I found the snowman in a clipart gallery, and I regret to say, I didn't take notice from which company it came. But he fit just right. I colored bits of him with copics and SU markers, and added a snowball to his upturned hand, and then used some white flocking to fluff it up a bit. Computer generated font for the sassy saying, a bit of MME dp paper (scrap), and a scrap of ribbon. I used the Cricut to cut the tag. Giggle away my friends, and enjoy a little happy dance.

Whew! (so far at least...)

After two days of headaches that start with the letter "M", today has been free of the rotten, life stealing things. I'm not saying the "M" word; it might be a jinx! There are at least a couple of you out there who know exactly what I'm talking about. My granddaughter Lizzy is coming over for supper tonight, so I just don't have time to deal with all that head pounding. Plus, I really wanted to play in my craft room. Which I did. Over at Retro Sketches, Deanna created a fun sketch. Wasn't sure at first if I could make anything work, but after a few trips to the recycle bin, I got something to work. And in my world, it works pretty well.

I can see this sketch working for about a bazillion cards. That Deanna is a genius. Someone give me an 'amen' on that! Be sure to pop over there and see all the DT's cards, as well as those in the gallery. Well worth the trip. And this is mine:

Now, I made this for my daughter-in-law's birthday, but I could us some honest opinions. Is this too masculine for a female? The family birthday frenzy season has started, so it wouldn't go to waste...

The dp is from Bella Blvd., the white card base is Bazzill, scraps of white, orange and brown, a smidge of The Twinery's brown twine, stickers from Pebbles, SU ink, and HA stamps. Happy dances everyone!

Fuzzy brain

Woke up with a migraine this morning, took my rescue meds, and now my brain is fuzzy. Headache is better,  not gone, but better. However, you really don't want to hear about that...you'd rather see what pinged around in my little brain...(minus the pain, of course...)

So I decided to play at CAS(E) this Sketch, and after several recycled attempts, I came up with something. It's flipped, but the basic sketch is there. And I'm in this turquoise and orange mood...go figure. Must still be dominating my thoughts after seeing the TAWS inspirational challenge (here's the post). I just went with it. First check out the CAS(E) sketch:

Nice. Sweet, simple, clean. Fun!  N@Ali always makes killer cards. Love her work! And here's my take.

A little whimsy for your Monday. I cut out a fish bowl with my cricut, and used a computer generated font. All the stamps are from DeNami, and they are just the cutest little things! I colored the fish with Copics, and the other inks are from SU. CAS. Raise your hand if you love white space...then go have a little happy dance.

TAWS

Really fast here. It's no secret that The Alley Way Stamps are awesome. And they have a color challenge going on. So while I was in the mood, and the mojo was working, I am going to post what I played with. Check out these fun colors:

Sweet, eh? Here's my take:

White Bazzill card base, two kinds of washi, scraps of white, orange and turquoise, and then both the glasses and the sentiment are from TAWS Adorabowl set. I dusted the glasses with some MS glitter. Couldn't tell you the punch I used on the top - I used it on the blue yesterday and it belongs to my friend Kati. The flags were cut using MFT Fishtail dies. That's all folks. Happy dances.

Quick!

Quick, look outside! The sun is actually shining!!! Not that it will last long.... More rain coming later in the afternoon. We had a contractor in after church today to look at the chimney on our fireplace. Old bricks, and a big, ol' crack. Mucho bucks, but the darn thing has to be rebuilt. It's either that, or the house goes down the tube. Guess we'll be forkin' over the dough to have the blasted thing done. Such as life, and I'm really not complaining. Much.

Yesterday was Scrap and Stamp at church. It's an open invitation to the community at large to come and craft for a day with us. We provide snacks and dinner, some die cut machines and lots of space to spread out and play. Usually, and my friends can attest to this, I'm too busy visiting to get much done. Yesterday was no exception...though I did manage to get two cards done, one of which is below. So who surprised me by dropping in for a few quick minutes??! My biggie sister Sue! Just made my day. She and family friend Kathy made a quick stop before heading to BWW for lunch with Sue's son Steve. Everyone should have a sister like mine. I am blessed beyond all blessings to have her as a sister, and she's also my best friend in the whole wide world. So, just in case she reads this post, "hi Sue".

This card is going into the challenge over at Addicted to CAS, where the code word for the week is:

I took that literally. I have one flower on my card. It's kind of fun and whimsical.

Believe it or not, the flower didn't come like that. If you enlarge the photograph, you can see the silvery edges. That's a sticker. The purpleish/blueish flower color is actually a piece of vellum onto which the sticker is stuck. (that sounds funny, doesn't it...) Then the center is an enamel dot my friend Jen gave me at S&S yesterday. I fussy cut the flower out, and it's on a pop dot with some Karen Foster Design twine for the stem. I put some random greenish pearls around it for balance, and used the "hi" stamp from TAWS Adorabowl set. So that's it, and I'm off to see what you all have posted. Happy dances everyone.

Go.

But in a nice way. This is a card for my granddaughter, Melissa, who will be graduating in June. She'll be off to UW in the fall and we will miss her. She joins her sister Jessica, who is in her first year even as we speak. We celebrated the youngest (in that family) granddaughter's birthday about a week and a half ago. As we were sitting around the dining room table having cupcakes and visiting, Lizzy said she loved the birthday card I had made for her. I said thanks, and not to look for it on my blog, cuz I hadn't posted it. Melissa said "You have a blog????" Well, yeah...She's so funny. Young people in general are so funny. I can remember being that age and thinking that 'old' people just weren't hep to the times. Boy, I couldn't have been more wrong! Now, granted, I don't tweet, and I rather dislike FB, but I can text with the best of them (lol). See....It's not that I can't, it's just that the other forms of social media would eat up the rest of my day.

And with that, we move on...

CASology has a new word this week, and it quite stumped me until I was trying to get to sleep last night. A giant ping shook my brain, and I knew that I would have to answer. Fortunately, I went right to sleep after that, and was able to make this card this morning in just a few, quick minutes. First, the new word.

Now for my  word:

I have to apologize for the not-very-good photograph. Still raining here, and with the overcast skies, even my best-ish lighting wasn't enough. But I think you get the idea. I think it's a good card for graduation. Inside it has that nice sentiment "Go confidently in the direction of your dreams". Ready for the deets? Okay.

Bazzill white cardstock base, scrap of navy blue (insert a squeency happy dance here), a computer generated world map, and while you really can't tell, I added glossy accents to the land masses. I used my Cricut for the letters and the arrows. That's it. Easy peasy. Happy dances everyone.