Happy {Second Day of} Summer!

Good morning! I hope everyone has been having a good week so far and staying safe. A lot of ugly weather happening this week- between severe weather back east and super hot temperatures (definitely not looking forward to the weekend of 97 degrees...) I guess summer really is here, or will be soon enough!! With that, it seems only fitting to post a summer-themed card today:

Doesn't it just make you want to sit at the beach, drink a cocktail, and play in the water?! I know I would want to! Although, I guess drinking a glass of wine on the patio at night would have to do... A lot of the pieces are pop-dotted, to add a little pizzazz:

The last picture is of the other side of the card:

I went with a single-sided, notecard-esque design to make sure it would all fit in the matching envelope that you can sort of see (or at least it matched before my plan changed) My new envelope-making toy sure is getting a lot of use this summer!! I have a few more finishing touches to add to them, but that'll happen in time. These took a whole lot longer than I had planned. I was really hoping to get them out before summer began, but I guess the first week of the season wouldn't be too bad, either!
Thanks for stopping by! Please come back tomorrow to see a surprisingly "cute" custom project I finished for an awesome customer!

A New Year's Day Excursion

Happy Thursday! We hope everyone had a wonderful New Year's Day! It was a bit hard to wake up at a reasonable time today. Fortunately, we still have a few more days of winter vacation to go, so it's all good! On the plus side, most of our friends back East will have a somewhat-extended break. Granted, it comes with a big winter storm. Darn.
Anyway, today's post isn't a crafty one. Boy and I spent yesterday afternoon walking along the coast. I wanted to post a few pictures because I was scolded last time I didn't post our beach pictures.

This is a picture of the beach in Westport, Washington (quite different from its Connecticut counterpart). My phone camera didn't do a good job capturing  the view, but this was right before sunset. The weather was kind of confused. We got there and it was a bit cloudy with a few sprinkles.  The sun finally decided to come out for a bit. Or, as they say here, it was a sun break. (I tried to argue that one. I don't think I won).  Right before we left, we saw a rainbow, which is always exciting!

And just to prove that Boy is indeed real, I included a picture of the two of us. He's not imaginary! Look at that! A sunny Washington winter day. We really have had a pretty nice winter so far, although we are way below average in rainfall. Can't say the same for everyone back home. So sorry you all have to shovel and use the snowblower this week.
Thanks for letting me share! Hopefully we'll have a new project to share with you all tomorrow. Have a superb day!

Everything's Just Beachy!

I just want to start by channeling the camel on the Geico commercial- It's Hump Day!
Now that that's out of the way, here's today's project. It's a beach theme layout with the title "Just Beachy."

There are three mats for 4x6 pictures, perfect for showing off those beach pictures. I used some shiny papers for the sand and water.

This layout was entered in the BBTB2 Beach Time Challenge here.

And here's today's holiday project.We made some fun Halloween cards to share with you.

The frames were embossed with our new embossing toys. Do I need more excitement in my life if watching the powder heat up is fun? The silhouettes in the middle were also embossed, cut out, and mounted with puffy adhesive to give them more dimension. And all frames need a little bling, so we added some around the outside of them.

Thanks for stopping by!

Cupcake Saturday!

Welcome to another Cupcake Saturday! We hope you have had a great week and are enjoying the weekend. I can't believe it's the end of another week. Unfortunately, yesterday wasn't very nice and today isn't looking much better. But next week looks so much nicer, and I think summer is coming! To bad we won't be here to enjoy it....Anyway, today's cupcakes can brighten anyone's gloomy day and get you into a beach-y mood!

Today's cupcakes are just vanilla cupcakes with a bit of vanilla cream in the middle. Since we didn't want to make them too fancy, we decided to decorate them with fondant, medallions, I guess you can call them. They fit rather nicely right on top of the cupcakes. As you can tell, hopefully, we decorated one with a palm tree and the other with a beach ball. Not too shabby for using a knife and a cookie cutter. I'm really happy with the way the palm tree came out. It looks so much better up close, with all of the little marks on the palms and the trunk.
Thanks for stopping by. We'll have a new theme tomorrow, which will be perfect for the up-coming holiday!

Today's Party Trivia:
- In 1859, a Frenchman was the first to tightrope across Niagara Falls.
- Albert Einstein introduced his theory of relativity in an article published in 1905.
- The telephone number 999 became the world's first emergency number. It was in London.

Kid-Friendly Friday!

Here it is, another weekend! I'm really excited to share today's Kid-Friendly project. Since our theme was beach this week, we are going to make some sculpting sand. It's like moon sand, but much cheaper and really easy to make. You just need some kitchen items and sand.

Materials:

Bowls
Sand
Cornstarch
Water





We found this really cool sparkle sand at Michaels. Since we don't have any kids to use it, I didn't want to make too much, so these packets were perfect, and pretty! They also sell larger bottles and bags of single colors.

Step One:
Mix cornstarch and sand in a 2:1 ratio sand to cornstarch (ie, 2 cups of sand to 1 cup of cornstarch).

 Step Two:
Add water. You'll need about 1/2 cup for the above amounts, but add a little at a time until you reach the desired consistency.

 Here are two diffrent consistencies. The pink one didn't have quite as much water and looked more like sand. It was moldable like beach sand. The green one had more water and was actually pretty cool. It didn't look like sand, but more like oobleck. It looked wet, but didn't feel wet. And it was clean. Either way, I think kids would love it! I wish I had found this last year for my sand station at school.

 If it dries out, add a little water to bring it back to life.

Thanks for stopping by! Come back tomorrow for Cupcake Saturday!

Today's Party Trivia:
- The first European settler reached Prince Edward Island in 1534.
- In 1889, several little townships in Illinois were annexed by Chicago. At the time, this formed the largest US city in area, and the second-largest in population.
- The US Interstate Highway system was officially created in 1956.

Full-Time Floatin'

Hey there! Today we have an underwater layout to share with you. We wanted to use Ariel from the Disney Princess cartridge, and thought this was the perfect reason. We took the lyrics to one of the songs from the movie for the title of the page, and added Ariel's friends along with her. It holds two 4x6 photos on the photo mats.

We've entered this post into CWC's "It's Hot Outside" challenge here.
Thanks for stopping by!

Today's Party Trivia:
- Today's date, 6/28, is the only date each year that the month and day are two different perfect numbers. This means that if you took all of the numbers 6 and 28 are divisible by (except for the two original numbers) and added them up, you would get the original number (6= 1+2+3; 1x6, 2x3; 28= 1+2+4+7+14, 1x28, 2x14, 4x7). The only day in the year that has the same perfect number is June 6.
- The saxophone was patented in 1846 in Paris.

A Cute Gift Idea

Good morning! We hope everyone is having a nice week so far. Today's project is one any little girl (or not so little) would flip for...OK, just kidding, but anyway. This is a two-part project that would be a perfect gift or favor for a beach party, or a spa party, or a bachelorette party. I'm sure there are a few more ideas out there. The first part is a little box we made. It is in the shape of a flip flop:

How cute is that?! We've seen similar projects on-line, but they looked so big and clunky, and we didn't quite like that look (although there are some super cute decorating ideas for them out there.) It's hard to tell in the picture, but our box measures about seven inches long and 1.5 inches high. The top is also embossed with some waves. The flower is handmade, as well. The second part is a little beach cover-up:

Another cute idea! In the last few weeks we've made two different cover-ups. The first one is pink, with a white ruffle edge. Unlike this one, there are no straps. This one has two braided straps and a ruffle around the edge. They're just towels with some extra "pizzazz". The two we made use the same fabric as our shower curtains, since they'll be used mostly in the bathroom, and not at the beach, in our case! Put the two of these projects together and the gift ideas are endless!!
Thank you for stopping by! Have a great day!

Today's Party Trivia:
- The first main-line passenger train to use electricity completed a test run from Washington DC to New York in 1895. A few days later, the train was opened to the public.
- The world's first automated teller machine was installed in England in 1967.
- Today is National Sunglasses Day.

Sand Pail Gift Card Holder

Today's project is a sand pail. But not any sand pail. This one holds a gift card for the birthday person! I really like the microbeads we used to make the sand look like sand. It definitely adds to the card, as long as they don't all roll off the table when you're putting them on.

Thanks for stopping by!

Today's Party Trivia:
-The US government declared Christmas a federal holiday in 1870.
- Coney Island's roller coaster, the Cyclone, opened in 1927. It is now considered a National Historical Landmark.
- The first product to be scanned using a UPC was a pack of gum

Splish, Splash!

You're invited to a beach birthday bash!
We hope everyone had a wonderful weekend and are ready for another week! Here's something that might put a smile on your face!

 Today's project is a birthday party invitation. How cute are these invitations for a beach party?! The outside of the card has a cute paper doll who is ready for some swimming and we designed the invitation itself to look like a beach ball. The petal fold opens up to give you all of the information for the party.

 

The invitation will actually keep itself closed, without the need for the band. We thought that the dolls added a nice touch, though!
Thanks for stopping by! Have a great day

Today's Party Trivia:
- Virginia ratified the Constitution in 1788. It became the 10th state.
- Anne Frank's diary, The Diary of a Young Girl, was published in 1947.
- Bugs Bunny made his theatrical debut in 1949's The Long-Haired Hare.

Sea You Soon!

Another week means it's time for another theme! All of this week's projects will be beach-themed. There are two big differences in beaches here and at home. 1. The water is much too cold to go swimming, which is fine, since I'd rather just sit on the beach and enjoy that, anyway. 2. The beaches here aren't sandy. They are made up of teenie-tiny rocks that get bigger as you move away from the shore.

Today's post is a card we made for some of our friends back home. Since we'll be making another cross country trip back home next week, we thought we'd make something to show how excited we are to see them! It will definitely be nice to be around family and friends for a while. The inside of the card says, "Sea You Soon!"

Thanks for stopping by!

Today's Party Trivia:
- The first female actress to sign a million dollar contract was Mary Pickford in 1916.
- The longest professional tennis match in history took place two years ago. The 185 games played lasted just over 11 hours.
- Today is National Pralines Day. Maybe something to do with all of those pecans...