Change is good, right?

You may have noticed that I have been making little changes to the design of my blog every so often. But today, I have hit the mother load of change - I've changed the entire hosting domain of my blog. From Blogger to Wordpress.

Apparently, Daniel, my technology GURU, thinks Blogger is not "powerful and versatile" enough so I have to go to a "better" one - solely his opinion, but after the blogger outage last week, infrequent they may be, I am inclined to agree.

Anyhow, my new blog address can be found at www.artycarty.wordpress.com. I will no longer be posting here but at my new blog. You will also be getting a new invite to follow me on my new blog address ... sorry about the inconvenience. But please continue to subscribe to my blog. I very much appreciate your support of my creative journey.

I've made a card to welcome you to my new blog space.... head on over.

End of the school year ...

I'm sad that 1 of my children is graduating preschool ... the end of his 1st formal school experience, the end of some of his 1st friendships, the end of some closer adult relationships he has built with his teachers.

There is also some degree of excitment about starting kindergarten in the fall - new teachers, new school, new friends, "new toys", new learnings, a new beginning of being a "big boy" ... I suppose there will be many more ends and beginnings to come.

But don't forget to thank the teachers who make your children's school experience a memorable one. Here is one of the cards I made for his teachers.

Background patterned paper is from Karen Foster School Collection. Journaling lines on the white cardstock is part of the Impression Obsession Cover-a-card notebook stamp. The pencil is part of the October Afternoon report card clear stamp collection and is embossed with  Ranger super fine black embossing powder and colored with Copic markers (Y04, E00, E31, C03). Sentiment is diecut using my Silhouette machine.

Have a happy scrappy summer.

Another challenge this week ...

I get so inspired to make more cards when I have a reason to make these ... Flourishes Timeless Tuesday Challenge. I try to use each challenge to try out various inking/coloring techniques so please leave feedback when you can. Thanks.

This week, Tammy is challenging us to create a card/project using the paper flower topiary (below), made by Julia Sandvoss as an inspiration.

When I saw the topiary, all I could think about was some old English antique drawing room with white linen and fine china sitting around and an antique card would sit on the nearby desk. Here is that card ...

The background was stamped using Hero Arts antique writing cling mount stamp. The butterflies & dragonfly were also part of the stamp but I colored them with Copic Markers (Y4, Y15, B21, B24, YR04, YR02, E15) and mounted them with pop dots. 2 corners were rounded and chalked with ColorBox Chestnut Roan chalk. Simple card that took less than 10 minutes to get done - that's another reason to love background stamps.

Impression Obssession Black and White Challenge

I love challenges - they give me a reason to get cracking and as the name implies - they also challenge me to be versatile with my creations and use different colors and medium. Did I say I love challenges?

Here is the card I am submitting for this week's challenge.

Background is stamped with Impression Obsession Cover-a-card Wavy Lines and embellished with Hero Arts crystal gemstones. Foreground is embossed with Sizzix textured impressions embossing folder - wedding set #2 set on coredinations black cardstock.

Enjoy!

Time to organize ...

Sorry everyone for the gap in post - Blogger, the hosting domain, went down last week for over 2 days and no one could get in to post anything. In addition, they took all the post and comments after 5/12 down with it. What a nightmare! So here I am re-typing the 5/12 post again and it infuriates me as I am typing and also not knowing if the blog invites I sent that day got to anyone. I hate to inundate friends with multiple invites. Sorry for gripping - I found a quote from a source I don't remember that says "If you threaten me, I'll blog about it".

Anyhow, I spent most of my time today, reworking on the blog what was lost, hunting for tools, fondling my tools, moving it from place to place to try a new spot instead of stamping and actually creating something. That means it's time to organize again...organizing always refreshes my creative mind. Finding a new home for something is like looking at the world from a different perspective - sometimes, the perspective is so different, I can't find what I am looking for. (but that is for another post).

In one of my mentally idle moments, I found Ted's amazing, out-of-this-world stamp organization. OMG!!! you have to see it to appreciate that OMG comment!! It's a level of organization that only a librarian (or some related profession) can come up with!!

My own stamp collection is in 3 piles - to be used (on my craft desk), used and to be put back (on my computer desk) and unused (in 3 ring binders). Binders didn't quite work for me because the weight of the stamps were ripping the D-rings out of the binders and it just seem like a 3" binder could hold about 10-15 stamp sets before they would start ripping out. So I wondered for a long time (6 months to be exact) if Ted's system can redefine the current state of organized chaos in my own stamp collection.

I decided to embark on this organizational journey that I have dared not venture. So I bought 200 empty CD jewel cases from Polyline Corp - they are the cheapest (including shipping) I have found online @ $0.14/case. My husband rolled his eyes when he saw me spending money on junk again. Here is a picture of it.

It's been sitting for a week now - I better get a moving on it otherwise, I would have fallen off this organization bandwagon before it got anywhere. And since I have already post it, that is added incentive to keep moving and get my stamps in the cases.

Have a great day today and I hope blogger doesn't remove this post again.