Clothes Dusting - Who Knew?

I start a new job tomorrow. Mostly I'm excited but I must admit to being a little bit nervous too. I haven't started a new job for nearly 9 years! It won't be all new as I am returning to my very first employer!  I guess it's full circle time.

At least I won't have to worry about where to park, the location of the restrooms, or the cafeteria!

To prepare for this new adventure I did some culling and cleaning of blazers and blouses. My previous job was at a university so much of my attire was collegiate gear with nearly every article of my clothing bearing the school logo. Those items were packed away and sent to a local charity. Bye-bye casual wear in school colors. Hello business professional.

A check of the blazers/jackets situation revealed a decent quantity - all of which had a layer of dust on the shoulders and collars. Seriously!!!??? What good are closet doors!? Why do I have dust in my closets! How embarrassing!

I don't mind dusting furniture as I like any immediate gratification house cleaning project! But dusting clothing! Not so much! In fact - not at all! Sooo....off to the laundry room to 'air-fluff' these long neglected garments. I also had to hand dust the exposed part of each hanger...NOT FUN! Dusting hangers? What?!?

But now it is done and like a school kid anxious for their first day I have my 'outfit' laid out including shoes, socks, and accessories!

Now...on to the card!

 

Just Thank You

~Base card PTI Enchanted Evening
~Layer of PTI Sweet Blush stock die cut with Spellbinders scallop square; sentiment die cut
~Navy card stock circle punched
~Pink polka dot button with navy blue embroidery floss
~Two 'page flags' from the dollar aisle at Target - aren't they fun!?

Challenges | Inspirations
Just Us Girls - color week

Retro Sketches - sketch

Crafts 4 Eternity - circles (navy punch and button)

 

Thanks for clicking by!

 

Here's to dusting my clothes, new job jitters, and dressing like a grown up!

 

Nancy in Iowa

Indicision & Jars Filled with Memories

I love playing and working with paper. But I must admit... I HATE scrapbooking! I can admire scrapbooking that others do! I love all the journaling and embellishments! I just flat-out can't do it!

I find with scrapbooking that I am unable to make a decision! Put this here? How about there? Add this charm? Add that trim? I add. I subtract. I move this. I reposition that. I am more indecisive than a chameleon walking past a rainbow striped wall!

What is it with me and scrapbooking!? I did manage to make scrap books (okay scrap booklets) for my sisters. The books are filled with memories of our one of 'sisters club holiday' in Shellman Bluff. The good thing about our holidaying in Shellman Bluff is that life moves so slow - that the same memory book remains in effect year after year after year! I have to admit...they are very cute!

I also made them an 'old fashioned' photo album. This one commemorating a sisters trip to Okoboji. No embellishments....just photos and a few running comments. AGAIN...making three identical books....NOT FUN! But knowing they enjoy them...THAT is fun!

Instead of a scrapbook I got the idea to assemble scrapbook items and throw them into a jar! The lazy-man's scrapbook method! Maybe lazy - but SMART! We can add to the jars and update the key in a flash! 

But not a plain jar! I did 'fancy it up!

This is the tag...on the back is a pocket that houses the 'key' to the jar items. (Just in case the sissies didn't understand my thought process...that is an entire blog to itself!)

Gail's Memory Jar

Memory jar contents including wee bedroom slippers (stolen from my years of Barbie doll playing - made by my mother); punched leaves (the awesome beauty of fall at The Lakes (Okoboji); a seam ripper (we quilt - therefore we rip!); a bit of netting (shrimp fishing); coffee beans (we drink ALOT of coffee and it is a reminder of a FABULOUS shop in Esterville, IA 'Cool Beans').... 

MORE! A Florida license plate with punches half punched along the side (we were in Jacksonville, FL the year of the infamous 'hanging chads'); a skull & cross bones (our nightly boat bar stop in Okoboji "Pirate Jacks"); a little cooking pan (for all the amazing homemade cooking we enjoy - cooked by sista Judy); a snippet of a dryer sheet (Jimmy told us the way to keep the dock gnats away was to rub dryer sheets on our skin....I think this southern born and bred told us this KNOWING FULL WELL THAT THE GNATS WOULD LOVE dryer sheet slathered skin!); YES that is a bra hook.... That was a random moment that will NEVER be forgotten...

Here is a photo of the moment...one that can never be explained or understood! What the heck!?! It was too far from the beach (or bar) to make any sense! I just know it was a photo op made in heaven for my little 'traveling gnome' Bobbins!

Of course this 'random act of support' had to make it into the memory jar!

Are you tired of looking yet?

I started with a small jar. Upped it to a medium size jar when the small jar was overflowing. Then moved to a LARGE jar when I realized the number of memories was abundant! Here we have some bling (there is a bling-worthy memory that was WORTHY of the memory jar); a wine charm (yes - we drank lots of wine); a sugar packet (for all the times we NORTHERNERS would forget to order tea "unsweetened"); a Hostess cupcake top that represents a laugh meltdown; a Barbie wig (to memorialize the CREEPY mannequins we encountered in an Iowa fabric shop). Also...a wee roll of toilet paper, a peanut, a crown, a very important little red truck, some sesame seeds, an ice cream cone, a palm tree, a telephone, a tree spirit, a tiny passport and more!

Making these books and jars, made me so crazy that I ended up not making either of the memory books or jars for myself. THREE of each was enough! Lucky for me the memories remain so vivid and fresh that I don't even regret not having one for myself. I had my walk down memory lane putting them together...in TRIPLICATE!

Now...on to the card! AGAIN with the indecision! I made a card using vellum then decided to make another one using drywall mesh. I'm claiming it's not really indecision if I end up with TWO cards!

 Thinking Vellum

~Base card PaperTrey Ink Kraft card stock

~Sentiment by JustRite

~Strip orange card stock

~Vellum dotted with aqua Sharpie and edge smudged with Palette Beaux Arts Blue

~Image stamped using Stampin' Up Early Espresso ink, edges smudged with orange ink - Hero Arts Dandelion Frame

~Three burlap flowers by The Paper Studio

Thinking Dry Wall Tape

~Base card PaperTrey Ink Hawaiian Shores

~Image stamped using Stampin' Up Chocolate Chip, edges smudged with SU Sahara Sand

~Dry wall mesh

~Strip orange card stock with JustRite sentiment

~Colored craft wire

~TThree burlap flowers by The Paper Studio

Challenges|Inspirations

Just Us Girls - trend week - burlap

Retro Sketches - sketch

Stamping Sensations - anything

Fusion - color inspirations

Polkadoodles - kraft

Tuesday Throw Down - use metal

Thanks for clicking by and putting up with my rambling!

How blessed am I that I needed progressively larger jars to try to contain our sisters holiday memories! 

Here's to incredible and lasting sissy memories, dissolving into giggles at the mere mention of things like Hostess cupcakes and taking cheese from strangers, and indecision...I think...maybe...I'll get back to you on that!

Nancy in Iowa

Whimsical Neck Strains

I had some frustrations with this card. Yet another concept that was FABULOUS in my head...with the execution...well let's just say these were originally printed as one unit on another die cut piece. I already had these colored so I decided to try to salvage them...Much tiny snipping and a neck ache later...here is the reincarnation.

What is it with my lack of translation from concept to reality! Is there a Rosetta Stone for this?!?

I really like Lavinia Stamps! I have a couple digital ones - might have to add some of the actual stamps to my  'internal wish list'! They are so whimsical and quirky!

From My House to Yours
~Base card Papertrey Ink Simply Chartreuse
~Layer of Prima Doodle Deux
~Sentiment die cut
~Two layers oval die cuts
~Digital images by Lavinia, colored with Copics, highlighted with dots of Smooch
Challenges | Inspirations
Lavinia Stamps - bright and beautiful
Tuesday Morning Sketches - sketch
Crafty Calendar - anything

Thanks for clicking by!

Here's to ruminating on the synapse hiccup from conception to reality, wishing I lived in one of the houses on this card, and hoping for a neck message!

Nancy in Iowa

Christmas Coins

You have been warned! Plan on seeing many of these "coin envelope | remnant" cards! I need a snappy name for this "use it up" process! Coins? Remnant? Yesterday's post was the first in what I envision as a bountiful series of Coin Envelope Cards.

I REALLY need a better name for these! Coin Cards. Coin Remnants. Suggestions anyone?

I have been waiting to find the perfect perch for this flocked bird brad! He looks quite at home with his bird branch friends!

Christmas Readiness

~PaperTrey Ink Pure Poppy card stock "remnant"

~Salvaged gift-card front

~Doodlebug Design North Pole in the 'window' of the tree

~Red flocked brad

~Satin striped ribbon

Challenges | Inspirations

Little Red Wagon - window

Card Mania - add red

Crafty Hazelnut - anything + Christmas

Crafty Hazelnut - anything + design paper

Thanks for clicking by.

Here's to remnants, ribbon, and recycling! 

Nancy in Iowa

Remnants of 3 A.M.

I rarely have what you might call an epiphany - that ding-ding-ding I have a great idea moment! For some unknown reason, in the middle of the night, I was thinking about all the 3.25" x 11" card stock strips I end up with when making square cards. Then I remembered the nearly 500 "coin envelopes" I have sitting around (a transfer of crap item from a friend).

So with a wee bit of additional trimming I now have a source for cards that will facilitate the whittling down of my monumental stack of small envelopes! Sweet! I love it when an insomniac plan comes together! So watch for a series of  'remnant' cards!

Friendship Love
~Cream colored card stock, edges smudge, background stamped with Hero Arts Soft Leaf
~Three silver sequins
~Red punched hearts
~Pink card stock flourish die cuts
~Wink of Stella accents
~Dollar bin sentiment stamped using VersaFine (BEST stamp pad EVER for sentiments)
~Strip of ribbon
Challenges | Inspirations
Just Us Girls - word week: love
Amusing - Valentine
Come and Get It - love is in the air
Digi Designs - include heart
Sweet Stampin' - add a heart
{PIN|spirational - photo

Thanks for clicking by!

Here's to using remnants, culling an inventory of 490 coin envelopes, and 3 AM epiphanies!

Nancy in Iowa

Snowy Lottery Numbers

Snowy greetings from NW Iowa! At the time of this afternoon's photo the amount of snow was nearing 13 inches. And it's still snowing. Also...notice that my husband's method of moving snow is very....methodical....fastidious!

And this just in.....Another shout out from Just Us Girls! I am so excited! Is it a coincidence that I received the honors from "JUGs" on a post where I was ranting about tatas and bras!? TeeeHeehehehe!

This is my second Chic of the Week in resent history! Number 272 was for a PowerPoppy post, A Winter Solstice Merry Mulligan, on Dec. 21.

My first Just Us Girls honor was in 2012 for this card on my Ice Cream and Pirate Jack post for a Christmas wreath card.

So...let's recap: JUGs Chic of the Week #164 #272 #277. I think I have new lottery numbers! SWEET!!!

Now on to today's cards I wanted to play along with the challenge at Just Us Girls again and couldn't make up my mind which direction to take so I made two!

Shiny Thank You!
~Base card Gina K Pure Luxury Pure White
~All the layers are from an American Craft Specialty Paper Foil Collection (a long-ago gift from my sissy Gail)
~Ribbon
~Hero Arts Thank You die
~Two punched circles
~Cuttlebug
~Spellbinders Labels 2 Nestabilities 
Challenges | Inspirations
Moving Along with the Times - sketch
Cupcake Inspirations - color
Just Us Girls - wild card week - sentiment as the focal point
Sister Act - anything
Southern Girls - sparkle and shine

On to version two! I'm sure you are all wondering how I could possibly have time to make two cards - what with the snow....and The Super Bowl! That is today...right? Something about deflated balls, east coast, west coast? This one is headed to my sister Gail - she already called 'dibs'.

You Mean the World to Me
~Base card Gina K Pure Luxury Pure White
~Layer of black card stock
~Sizzix Word Labels stamps and die - outer ring stamped with Tim Holtz Fired Brick, sentiment stamped with Versafine Onyx Black; stamped on grey card stock
~Layer of DCWV Glitter Stack card stock - with center hole punched using Spellbinders Circle Scallops
~Two layers of grey and red washi tapes
~Strip of Far and Away garland by Teresa Collins
~Sequin and  pearl
Challenges | Inspirations
Just Us Girls - wild card week - sentiment as the focal point
Glittern N' Sparkle - anything
Lil Patch of Crafty Friends - anything
Gem of a Challenge - layers
Fusion - sketch

Here's to snowy Iowa days (and nights), over-under, and perfectly inflated balls, and a string of new prospective lottery numbers!

Nancy in Iowa