A crooked day, I think.

First of all, I have to say this:
May Day! May Day!...Oh, I mean April Day, April Day! (I was so sad to realize that I had forgotten to say that on Wednesday...I love saying it. LaunchPad-McQuack used to say it when he was crashing on Duck Tails - My most fav. cartoon as a kid...well as a high-schooler too!)

Okay, back to the good stuff!!

It is 2:30 a.m. and I’m finally getting ready for bed. I thought I’d post real quick so you could have something to look at with your morning coffee cuz I’m pretty sure I’m going to still be snoring!

I want to thank Lindsey again at Jacksonbelle Embellishments for the great opportunity to ‘serve’ her! All I can say is that I am THRILLED and I look forward to many months of fun with the design team!

Not a quick card.

Thursday was such a distracting day for me! I had plenty of real work to be done…..but I just couldn’t sit long enough to do it! I left the sewing machine out the other day and I could hear it calling me name all day today. Finally, I succumbed to the voices! I thought I was going to just sneak and make a really quick card, so I pulled out my scraps from my 6x6 Sugared Basic Grey paper pack. I was thinking about doing some sort of “paper quilting” but this is what I came up with. I don’t think it is really quilting….but it is paper! I took my scraps and inked the edges a bit with my most fav. brown ink in the whole world, Versamagic Jumbo Java. If you have never tried this stuff, especially the brown…well you are missing out! It is DELISH! I'm pretty sure I might have even tried licking it before cuz it looks so yummy! It has a creamy sort of chalky finish that is delightful to the eyes (and I don't recommend licking it or eating it cuz it really isn't as good as it looks). I especially love it for distressing. What I love the most is that it does not “soak” into the paper like other inks do, GWIM? Then I stitched inside the first layer of Basic Grey paper and I added the pink circle (which was already cut…so that part was quick), but then crazy me decided I needed to sew a zig-zag stitch around the circle….oh how great it will look! Okay, yes, it will look great….but it was NOT FUN TO DO! Once I put the pressure foot down and began to turn the wheel to get the needle in the paper….I realized I was making a big mistake! First, I can’t sew a straight line worth C$#!… Do you think I can sew a straight-curved- line? Heck no! So I think I spent 15 minutes hand-cranking that wheel and turning the paper the whole way around that circle! Yes, I am happy with the final outcome, and there was only one stitch that wasn’t perfect, but I had major carpal tunnel by the time I was done! (note to self….do not attempt to sew a circle…especially not while trying to hurry and sneak a quick card - not gonna happen!)

My next mistake was that I had not planned on what I was going to stamp or where I was going to stamp, that came to me after I had it all sewed down. I decided to go with the bird from Inkadinkado's Bird Assortment (I was going to give you a direct link...but I see Jacksonbelle is out - gasp!..keep checking...maybe she will order more!)
I wanted it stamped on the pink circle, and I had one chance to get it right! Luckily that part worked out for me…the mistake was that I decided I needed to color it and it picked up the edge of the layer below so it looks like the bird has a funky neck! I also only had one chance to stamp the sentiment. I thought for sure I’d mess that one up, but it all worked out! So my card was almost done. I did my final sewing around the outside edge of both BG Sugared papers..don’t look too close cuz I really did a bad job here! I had to use some brads in the corners to help “distract” the eye from my really bad corners! And then the ribbon…You’d think that a nice big bow would take maybe 3 minutes…nope….more like 30. It was too big, it was too bulky, I cut the ends to short, etc. Everything went wrong! Finally, I ended up actually punching two holes in the card front (the holes are behind the bow), ran the ribbon through it, then glued the “faux bow” onto the piece of cardstock right between the two holes, like this
----*==*--- (- is the ribbon, * is the hole, == is the where I glued the bow). After all that work…the quick card was finished…and after all that work…the quick card took me 2 hours.

A Crooked Cat.

This was another card I had to try to sneak in tonight. It was a disaster from the beginning. No matter what I cut or rubbed on…it was crooked - EVERY SINGLE THING ON THE CARD. I stamped him crooked, I cut him crooked, the Basic Grey Sugared piece was crooked, the DaisyDs rub-on tape was crooked, the Crate Sentiment “hello…” was crooked, I trimmed the photo corners crooked, EVEN my scoring on the scor-pal was crooked (probably because the card I cut was crooked) and then I mounted the whole dang thing crooked. And if all that crookedness wasn’t bad enough…when I went to cut my scalloped rectangle, I cut it the wrong size! Arg! I don’t know was going on…but after I glued it all together (crooked)…I decided I’d probably better just get to work.

It is now 3 a.m., the internet is down, looks like I will be drinking coffee with you in the morning!

Later babes!

Addendum: The internet is back up...it is now 3:30 a.m...and I won't be enjoying a-cup'a with you as I will be snoring!