Hi crafty people! I did not realize it had been almost 3 weeks since I blogged! I have been a little busy. I woke up one morning about 2 weeks ago and my right knee decided it wanted its own zip code. Got that worked up and it's not a simple Baker's cyst that I thought. I somehow managed to tear whatever I could in there, but the meniscal tear seems to be the main culprit. The good news after the dye was injected, I'm not bone-on-bone! That is a relief. Due to the RA and SLE, I can't take the easy way out and get it scoped and fixed. I have to get sliced open on both sides of my knee which is going to look so ugly and I am going to insist on sutures, not staples. I am also going to inquire about skin glue but that means off the leg completely which will be very hard for me but I need to look to the future to see how this will affect me if I don't follow doctor's orders. I'm starting to do that and respect my body and not feel guilty about it. But the knee issue is small to no potatoes since I'm letting the baby out of the crib and tell you that I'M GOING TO BE A GRANDMOTHER IN MAY TO THE MOST PERFECT AND PRECIOUS BABY BOY IN THE HISTORY OF FOREVER!
I actually found out the day I buried my daddy on September 7, 2013. I wasn't told but you just listen very carefully. My son's conversation with my cousin who just had his 2nd son was a bit of a dead giveaway. Either my son and DIL knew or suspected she was pregnant but it was so early in the game. In November, I found out my grandbaby was going to be a boy. I do wish my daddy would have had the chance to see his first grandbaby/grandson. This news was really hard to sit on and keep my mouth shut and everybody who knows me would know that. I just wanted to get through the holidays, the first without my daddy as he would have been 72 on December 29, so that was a hard day for me. One of my best friend's husband died suddenly at 55 of a heart attack the day before Thanksgiving, and I had just had enough of so many awful things happening to everybody that you just take a break from life for a litle while and spend some time with the Lord to get everything back into perspective. There is some family division that is just heartbreaking to me personally in my immediate family and I covet your prayers like I've never asked before. God knows our needs so your prayers do count whether or not they are specific, and I do need daily prayer so please help me out and add me to every single prayer list you run across with your church, your friends, Bible study groups, all of it, as there's some issues where God is going to literally have to move mountains and since He is in the business of making beauty from ashes, I'm going for it. I will tell you that the largest hindrance is the condition of hearts. Your heart has to be willing to hear what the Lord wants you to hear or the get knocked upside the head way, but God will get your attention one way or the other. That's all I ask and I thank you, thank you, thank you!
I'm at my dad's house right now organizing (what else is new) some stamps and I came across a lovely Gina K. Designs stamp set called, "Don't Lose Hope." The image is a simple yet lovely butterfly perfect for coloring with Copic markers. For some reason, I am determined to color this in various shades and hues of purple. I think this is because purple is mentioned in the Bible a lot and God really put it on my heart. The sentiment is so encouraging. It reads, "Don't lose hope. You never know what tomorrow will bring." That is so true. Life can change in a second." I will make a card first and then I plan on going to the flea market (oh the finds I could get there! Good thing I don't have too much cargo room in my car!) and finding a vintage frame of sorts, and then I will start from scratch again and made a beautiful home decor item to always look at. Of course, when I do the frame, I'm going mixed media and out of my box. I think you will be pleasantly surprised and I'm sure I will too.
So, now onto my grandson's first baby card. I did a video on it putting it together. I thought that I would give iMovie a try and after the first frame, no. There is honestly nothing I like about this Mac and need to learn and take advantage of the classes they offer. Everything seems so darn hard! I much prefer Windows as it's so much easier. I mean, I still can't insert a watermark onto my work and it literally takes 5 minutes from all of the videos I've watched and in Windows, it's a simple insert picking the file and save. I do not like working on two computers as it hogs up space, which is something I never have enough of. I got Parallels that allows me to use this Mac like a PC but I'm even having trouble with that since it forgot my key code as this is actually my 2nd Mac due to spilling an entire cup of coffee on my first Mac 3 or so months ago and the information just didn't move over. I was lucky to get it retrieved to begin with. The on New Year's Eve, I was having some tea and spilled a bit of that right on top of the keyboard too, so now the keys are very sticky and hard to type on and I'm missing words and letters all of the time! I remembered what the Apple tech said about the first time me spilling and that is to turn off the computer since my screen was getting all wonky crazy like it did the first time and I just wanted to cry and didn't want to drive 2 hours to Sacramento since I was at my dad's house to spend my entire New Year's Day at the Apple store. After I turned it off, I sat it open on its side and let the tea run out. Fortunately the tea wasn't super hot. So I'm just wiping the tea as it leaks out with a tea towel. Ha ha. I took a blow dryer to it the next day standing about 2 feet away and just went back and forth over it. Nothing else leaked out. I turned the Mac back on and it still worked! Yay! Relief, excitement, everything. Starting out my new year in the Apple store just would have been horrible considering that 2013 was the worst year of my entire life. The only thing I'm dealing with now is a keyboard that is all crooked and it's hard to type on. I did get a great warranty this time as last time, I was 3 days out of warranty. Can you believe that? It always happens that way, KWIM? So my next task is to see if Apple can just replace the keyboard and I pray they can and take some classes. iMovie was hideous since there's like a million frames and you have to work on each one whereas with Windows, it's the entire movie and you do whatever you want wherever you want in the movie. So, I need to get that Parallels working and maybe iMovie has this weld feature or something. I don't know. Talking about this is making me tired since it's such a hassle with so much to do and take care of, but I'm going to be a grandma!
Since I deep sixed the video, I made another one just talking you through how to make this card. I don't know how it became 20 minutes long. I did discover two new techniques while I made the card and explained those to you so that was the time. I plan on doing two videos this weekend between getting this place finally put together, which I say every single time I am here and with this knee just having work done on it on Monday, ugh. I am so relieved of the tremendous amount of fluid they took out. It was so bad I couldn't get it into pants.
So, when I learn how to take pictures, which hopefully will be soon, this baby card will look so much better. I don't have my light box (still) set up. Bottom line, I'm a hopeless tech tard. And for some reason, my spell check feature isn't working on my blog either. Now it's time for that nap making myself tired this early in the morning of about 1% of what's really on my plate.
Now, I stumbled upon two brand new techniques. Tim Holtz is going to be so mad at me! First I showed you how to make your own kraft resist paper. Next up I am going to show you how to make your own Crackle Paint so you don't need all 36 colors! Awesome. The second one is a couple of cool heat embossing techniques using two similiar types of materials.
Let's get onto the video and card. As usual, the pictures do not do this card justice. I used a tremendous amount of materials on this card believe it or not, just a lot of product. I hope that you enjoy! Have a great day and God bless you. Thank you so much for stopping by to visit me today.
Luke 15:11-32.
Stamps: Bitty Background Blocks II, Kid Kudos (Papertrey Ink), Stitched Stockings (My Favorite Things, Lisa Johnson Designs)
Card Stock: Leaf Shimmer, Night Sky Shimmer, Sea Shimmer, White Shimmer (Papertrey Ink)
Ink: Pool Party, Wild Wasabi (Stampin' Up!)
Sequins: Caribbean Blend, Lucky Blend, Winter Blend (Avery Elle), Silver Sequins (Craft supply)
Embossing Folders: Spotted (Lifestyle Crafts), Northern Flurry (Stampin' Up!)
Die-Cuts: Pierced Rectangle STAX Die-Namics (My Favorite Things), Boy Basics: Out of This World (Papertrey Ink), Hearts (Paper Smooches), Mini Hearts Die (Simon Says Stamp)
Tools: Heat Tool (Milwaukee), Vagabond (Tim Holtz)
Technique: Die-cutting, dry embossing, heat embossing
Misc: Clear Fine Art Powder (Filigree), Glossy Accents (Inkssentials)
Size: 4-1/4 x 5-1/2
At the end of my videos, I'm trying to ge the frame where you can insert 3 other videos about the same topic, etc. I can't explain it but it's very cool. I am also working on getting my InLinkz together so I don't have to type out all of my supply list anymore. This industry changes a lot!
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This is such a delightful card! Love the danglies! Each new moment with new life is a treasure!