My granddaughter Alyssa hard at work making a Christmas present for her mom. We used the make it now project from Cricut Design Space and the Cricut Explore.

Looking forward from here.

I have come to realize it is time to take control of my life and do what is important to me. I started out with excellent expectations of starting this blog 3 years ago and before I knew it the time got away from me. I even forgot I had it until I found a link for it in some of my paper work. So I decided now would be a good time to start posting on this blog again. I have been relatively busy since I retired in June 2013. For the first 5 months I didn't do anything except being off. It felt good to be able to sit out on my back porch and drink my morning coffee and work on any projects I had that were portable. The holidays found me at our local craft shows with my booths and making money that way is so addicting and so much more fun than having to work long hours standing or sitting at a desk. Now I have a job that I work to give me spending money for craft supplies (well I will have after the heating season is gone for this year). I hope you join me and grow along beside me. Looking forward to meeting new friends.

So tickled pink with myself.

Halloween Mini Album

With the smell of roasting chili, crisp cool mornings and the trees turning colors I realized Halloween isn't to far away. My grandkids will soon be planning their Halloween costumes so I decided sit down and make a quick Halloween Mini Album.

I also decided to challenge my self and use a minimal amount of patterned paper, tags and a border punch. I also decided NOT to use my expression. I used Jolee die cuts and rub ons only. So here is the mini album I came up with.

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I used my Martha Stuart score board for the album base
1 sheet of cardstock. Score at 3 inches, 6 inches and 9 inches
Turn sheet and score at 2 inches, 6 inches and 10 inches.
Fold all score lines
Fold the 2 inch score lines into the center and cut the 6 inch score line to the list score line
Fold album using the valley and mountain fold.

One Word for 2011

My one word for 2011 is Freedom.

I want some freedom from some of the debt I am in. So that will involve passing off some of the bills I am paying for other family members to them and making them responsible.

Freedom from not feeling guilty for choices I have made whether the decision is right or wrong.

Freedom to pursue other career goals and then having the courage to act on them. (Trying to start my own business)

Freedom to let the inner me finally shine through and not worry about what others think. Freedom to believe I really am an awesome person.

Freedom to say NO and mean it.

Mostly freedom to let myself feel/be happy. Our family has been through several tramatic issues in the past few years and then I lost my father in July.

Freedom to realize it's okay to fail sometimes. Will I accomplish all these freedoms? Probably not, but but I had the freedom to try.

So Tweet

I love the way this card turned out. It's from the cricut lite cartridge Four Legged Friends. This was one of the only cartridges left on Black Friday at Walmart and I'm so glad I got it. There are so many cute cuts on this cart. The bird was just to "Tweet" to pass up.