StampingBella 'Love Me Do' Blog Hop

"Love, love me do. You know I love you. I'll always be true. So please, please, please...love me do. Ooh oh. Love me do." Am I the only one who hears her father singing instead of the Beatles? My dear dad was infected with Beatle-mania years ago, and it was like watching a kid in a candy store when he opened up the entire Beatles anthology at Christmas, courtesy of my mom (and her *friends* at QVC!) LOL! I know, I know. My anecdotes are not why you're here..........

Welcome to the LOVE ME DO Blog Hop sponsored by Stamping Bella! If you've just happened upon my blog, you can start from the beginning at Bloggabella. If you are hopping along and arrived here from Mary's blog, you are on the right track!

When I saw that Stamping Bella was hosting this blog hop, I immediately thought of this image - Jugglabella! I think my favorite thing about Valentine's Day is that in addition to reminding us to make sure that we tell those close to us just how much we care, it gives us an opportunity to pause and reflect on just how much love we are blessed with. We have to keep a lot of balls in the air, but love is the ball we have to be most certain of not dropping.

In addition to the fabulous eye candy, Stamping Bella is hiding a prize somewhere along the hop! One blogger will draw a random winner from the comments on her post, and the winner will receive a $25 Gift Voucher to Stamping Bella!!! The fun part is...we're not telling you who it is! So as you hop, make sure you leave comments on every post so you have a chance to win!! The winner will be announced on Friday in the Stamping Bella Splitcoast forum. Thanks so much for stopping by! Now it's time to hop on over to the lovely & talented Carisa.

MWAH & Happy V-day,

Image(s): StampingBella - Jugglabella
Pattern Papers: Cosmo Cricket - Hey Sugar
Cardstock: local source
Embellishments: MFT buttons, PTI twine, Stickles, pearl dew drops, fibers
Colored with Copics
Layout: SC 251

Belated #4

If patience is a virtue, I will surely be nominating dear, sweet, witty Susan for sainthood. Her b-day was waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay back in February. I don't know why, but I had the hardest time with her card. It wasn't a lack of ideas but in actually creating the card - I believe this is attempt #3! But finally, here we have it. I had all kinds of plans for this card - another few layers, another pattern paper, more embellies, ribbon, etc. But in the end, the card demanded simplicity (first it asked nicely, but I wasn't listening - LOL!). And as it turns out, it ended up coordinating fairly well with the wrapping paper and ribbon on the accompanying gifts. (What do I know? I just make the cards. I'm not necessarily in charge...) At any rate, I hope the card conveys my wishes for Susan: a year full of happy days and time to stop and smell the flowers.

TFL,

Life's Simple Pleasures

I happened into SCS's Buy/Sell forum a week or so ago, and found a rather sad story that is becoming more and more familiar - a fellow crafter selling her goodies following her DH's layoff. She had some Unity stamps I'd been eyeing...how could I resist Unity at a good price AND the opportunity to do a good deed????? ;) As it turns out, my new friend lives about 2 hours away from me, and is just a sweetie and a half! So, rather than just send my payment in a plain old envie, I thought I'd try to spread some cheer with a card.

The dimensions, if memory serves, are 5-1/2 X 5-1/2. I used brown cardstock and yummy Basic Grey paper, a Poppy stamp from Bella Stamps, and SU Wondercolor Crayons with a Dove blender. The sentiment (hard to see) in the lower left corner says "Life's Simple Pleasures" and is from A*Muse.

It will never cease to amaze me how this cardmaking/stamping hobby can bring such wonderful people into my life. We are now looking forward to spring and a chance to meet for lunch. They say God works in mysterious ways....stamping must be one of them. Thank you all for your friendship, and God bless you.

Hugs,

Coffee Swap

Everytime I think that phrase, "Coffee Swap," I can't help but say it in the voice of Mike Myers's character from the SNL (Linda Richmond?) skit "Coffee Talk" and it makes me smile. ("I'm feeling vehrklempt. Give me a minute. Talk amongst yourselves.")



Anywho, this was my submission for my first card swap on SCS! (On the inside I stamped, "I take life one cappuccino at a time." (Sorry for the crooked scan, my battery had died on my digi cam.) If you click to enlarge the pic, you'll see the coloring better - still working on mastering those Copics!
There were two groups for the swap: one for tea, one for coffee. I chose coffee. The fun part of the swap was that everyone included a coffee single, or something coffee related. It was mostly International Coffees, or their chilled coffee mix (which I'm still looking forward to trying), but one gal sent Splenda Coffee Singles, which was fun. And, I loved this swap because all of the cards I received back were really good. I hope they like mine just as well. What do you think???