Holiday Packages

Since John and I will be spending the day with his family tomorrow to celebrate Christmas I needed to get all of our gifts wrapped tonight. I thought they looked so pretty that I wanted to share them with you! We kept things fairly simple this year. We did not buy individual gifts for the children and individual gifts for their parents, instead we bought one gift for each family. I finished wrapping them earlier this afternoon but needed a break before I tackled the bows. Those are always the hardest part in my opinion.

Here is a close up of the bows I made:

And here are all the packages grouped together. Aren't they so pretty!?!


I finished all my wrapping today ... but I realized that I need to pick up one or two more gifts for someone special. I'm glad I figured that out now since I still have a week left to fix my error in judgement! LOL

Wishing you all a very Merry Christmas!

-Janice

Knitting Project

Happy Holiday Season Everyone! Last weekend we decorated the exterior of our home, set up the Christmas Tree for my mom at the Nursing Home and attended an annual Holiday Party put on by the company my husband works for. This weekend I have officially started my Christmas shopping, set up our Christmas Tree, signed the Christmas Cards, and my husband played Santa for the Children's Christmas Party, again at his office. This will be his last year playing Santa for the children as he will be losing his job in February. Yes, this is something he already knows ... long story ...

I am so far behind in my crafting that I may never get caught up! Our December calendar still has no photo on the decorative paper and I need to make up a couple of cards/tags for the upcoming week. I did complete a cowl that I starting knitting at the beginning of October. I only have a photo of the "in-process" project. I will need to get a photo of the finished product so you can compare! Next I will be starting a helmet liner for John to wear when he's snowblowing. I've already told him he may get it for next year since I am such a slow knitter! LOL I think he's okay with that. :)

Hopefully I'll have more crafty-goodness to share with you next weekend. But for now we have a very busy week ahead. We're taking our cat to a specialist tomorrow to hopefully determine why he keeps pulling his fur out, Tuesday I have a Yankee Swap at work, Thursday I am meeting my mom at the mall for our annual shopping trip, and Sunday is our family Christmas Party. I'm exhausted just thinking about what the upcoming week holds.

I hope your week is a bit less hectic than mine will be! LOL

-Janice

Autumn Themed Thank You

I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving Holiday! We spent the day with family, cooking, visiting, and of course eating waaayyy too much! LOL We still have so much turkey left over that I think we will be eating turkey until Christmas. Seriously. I am officially sick of eating the traditional left-overs from Thanksgiving. I'm not much of a left-over person anyway. I made a Turkey Pot Pie last night so next I'll make Turkey Soup and then probably freeze whatever's left over.

So before we officially kick-off the winter holiday's I thought I would squeeze in one last Autumn Themed card.



Here are the details:

Cardstock: White from source unknown, Orange Zest by Papertrey Ink
Stamps: Maple Leaf from Leaf Prints by Papertrey Ink
Ink: Maple Leaf's in Yellow, Orange and Red Colorbox Petal Point Ink, sentiment in Memento Tuxedo Black Ink
Sentiment: Mega Mixed Messages by Papertrey Ink

Well that's all I have to share with you today. I hope you all have a wonderful week! We will continue decorating the inside and outside of the house. Hopefully we will be done by next weekend!

-Janice

Calendar Pages

Well, as usual it's been a while since I've posted. I don't know how time consistently seems to get away from me. I realized the other day that I never posted my October calendar page and now it's already November and I haven't posted that page yet either.

So, without further ado, here are the last two months of calendar pages! October ...

And November ...
The photo used in the October page was taken last year from our yard. The photo in the November page was also taken last year but it was from a local farm. We moved the pumpkin from the pumpkin patch over to a spot that I thought would make a nice picture.

I've really enjoyed having this calendar displayed in our kitchen this year. I was thinking about purchasing another one but Papertrey Ink has recently come out with calendar pages and if you follow my blog you know I'm crazy about any from Papertrey Ink! Needless to say I've already ordered and received two different types of Papertrey calendars. Now I just need to find the time to make the calendars for next year! LOL

As always, thanks for stopping by. I hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving holiday this week.

Until next time,
Janice

Halloween Thank You

Happy Halloween!! We just finished giving out candy to the little goblins going door-to-door for Trick or Treating. I love watching the kids get dressed up and I really like that we live in a safe neighborhood where the kids can walk and be assured they are getting good candy.

Well my birthday falls around this scary time of year (no it's not actually today) and I needed a Thank You card for a good friend who helped to make my birthday something special this year.

My friend Cindy remembered my birthday and took time out of her busy schedule to make me a card and cupcakes! How sweet is she? I want to be sure she realizes just how much I appreciate her thoughtfulness. So I made her this card:

The base of the card is just white cardstock and all the other pieces come from PaperTrey Ink. The black is Smokey Shadow cardstock, the orange dotty paper is from Heather Nichols Halloween Paper pack, the white oval is more of the plain cardstock that I die cut and embossed with a Spellbinders Oval Nestability die, and the black ribbon started out as white grosgrain that I colored with a black Copic marker. The sentiment is from Dawn McVey's Signature Greeting stamp set. I used an orange Copic marker and their spray can to tone down the bright white of the oval. The inspiration for this layout came from Paper Crafts Go-To Sketches magazine, specifically Maren Benedict's sketch on page 33.

Well that's all I have to share for today. I do need to make another Thank You card for a different friend who also remembered my birthday. Hopefully I can get that made this week and I'll share it with you all next week.

Don't eat too much candy this week! LOL

Janice

50th Birthday Card

Tonight I would like to share a birthday card I made for my brother-in-law's 50th birthday earlier this month. Normally when someone celebrates a milestone birthday (30, 40, 50, etc.) black is a common color. So I went with that theory and here is what I came up with!



I started with a white standard cardstock base and added Smokey Shadow cardstock by PaperTrey Ink. I then stamped the letters "The Big" using Color Box Frost White Ink and Trajan: Monogram Edition by PaperTrey Ink. The numbers "50" are from PaperTrey's Top Ten stamp set. The interior sentiment is from PaperTrey's Birthday Basics stamp set and the lines on the front and interior were made with a white gel pen and a ruler.

Over the last couple of weeks I have given away a couple of cards and I haven't remembered to get pictures before they are gone. Oh well, I'm trying to do better.

Things are definitely different around the homestead without Skeemo. The cats seem to be more active and we are seeing Lady and Sultan much more now. I guess the dynamic has shifted. John and I are adapting but we still have our moments when it's really hard. I know it will continue to get better.

Thanks for stopping by. Enjoy your week.
-Janice

In Memory Of Skeemo

Well as I have indicated over the last couple of posts, our beloved dog, Skeemo, crossed over the Rainbow Bridge on Friday, October 15th around 1pm. We took her to the vets office for an appointment and everyone agreed that it would be in her best interest to euthanize her. It is, by far, one of the hardest decision any pet owner needs to make. However I firmly believe that it is a responsible decision.

Skeemo came to live with my first husband and I in May of 1995, she was 8 weeks old. She has been a true companion to me for the last 15 and a half years. She moved with me 6 times, helped me thru a bitter divorce, 5 jobs, a new marriage, and the loss of two pets. I cannot begin to describe the emptiness I feel right now. It has been a truly difficult weekend for all of us.

Back in May she developed a small lump on the bridge of her nose, right between her eyes. At first I thought it was a mosquito bite but it didn't go away. We took her to the vet and they byopsied it but said it was nothing to worry about. Due to its location it could not be removed so we were told to keep an eye on it and let them know if it changed size or shape.

In June we went back to the vet because it had changed in both size and shape. Again we were told to keep an eye on it as there was nothing that could be done. The growth continued to change in size and shape over the summer. In September she developed nosebleeds which is very uncommon and dangerous for dogs. We immediately took her back to the vet. This was when we were told it was not just a growth but a tumor. The vet gave us some pain meds and told us to take her home and make her final days comfortable. I truly hope she was comfortable during the last four weeks.

Here are some photos I have of her on this computer:


This is a professional photo I had taken when we still had two dogs; Tasha (Keeshond) and Skeemo (American Eskimo).

This was Skeemo's favorite toy for a very long time. It got so bad (stinky) that we had to replace it several times!

Here she is just hanging out with the family!

She loved the water. We took her camping with us every year and here she is at Danforth Bay Camping and RV Resort. I think she liked this campground the most! Just like her mom! LOL

This is one of my favorite pictures. Camping just exhausts her!

Thank you for sharing my walk down memory lane. I need to get some pictures of her earlier years off the external hard drive. I'll share some of her puppy pictures when I find them.

Have a good week.

-Janice