Valentine Series 2016 #4

TGIF!!!!

Happy Friday everybody, well it was Friday when I started this post! (I am easily distracted and apparently cannot watch American Idol and type)  ;)  Here we go into the weekend and here I am with one of the sweetest images I think I have ever found! This image makes me think of the conversation hearts candy which I loved as a kid which is ridiculous because now when I see that candy I think "eww I'm not wasting my carbs on those!". Thankfully I don't have to make carb choices when card making! Yay!!!

Ingredients:

• image is a digi stamp from Saturated Canary LLC, created by Krista Smith
• striped patterned paper is from BoBunny #foreveryoung collection 6x6 paper pad which I purchased from Scrapping For Less
• wooden embellishment with sentiment is from Crate Paper Kiss Kiss wood pieces also from SFL (Scrapping For Less)
• yellow cardstock was from my stash
• the sweet little enamel heart stickers were part of SFL's 2015 card kit (I think it was February but not completely sure)
• Wink of Stella on the hearts in her hair and on her leg warmers (that's what I'm calling them) and also on the hearts in the box and the one in her hands
• Glossy Accents on her eyes (one of my favorite things about the Saturated Canary characters) and her lips

One last thing: If you are making a card with an image like this and are fussy cutting it out I picked up a great tip from Kristina Werner about taking a black ink marker and running it along the edges of the image. It gives it a clear, crisp, more finished look and can also hide any little scissor slips you may have along the way. 

I am missing my buddy Teresa but for an excellent reason. She is off lending a helping hand and some much needed TLC to my friend and her sister Beth. If you are looking for some inspiration on card making, goal setting, or just a pick me up check out her blog at Fresh and Renewed. 

Thank you so much for stopping by, I hope you enjoy this little gal, she is so sweet I want to print out a bunch of her and color her in a ton of different color combos! Happy Weekend!!!

Wishing you sunshine and smiles,

Kim :) 

Valentine Series 2016 Card #3

Happy Hump Day!!! 

 When I was a kid but old enough that Valentine's Day at school did not include bringing the little cards with a sucker attached to them for everyone in your class I wanted a real Valentine. I had fantasies of being the girl in school who instead of getting one of the candy grams that were being pushed by the cheerleaders I would get a real gift. I would be in the middle of a really boring class (preferably science or math, I loved english) and the office secretary would loudly stumble in interrupting the class so that all eyes were on her and her arms full of a dozen red roses, a box of heart shaped chocolates (the ones that taste terrible but it's the thought right?) and the cutest stuffed teddy bear holding an "I Love You" heart. As all the girls were holding their breath hoping that it was for them she would call my name and I would timidly raise my hand because I didn't have a boyfriend but it would all be for me and the note would be sweet and charming and signed, "you're secret admirer."  

Yeah well, none of that ever happened. What did happen every year, every Valentine's Day no matter how much I kind of rolled my eyes and said things like "Mooom it's not a real Valentine's gift" my mom would come home with a card, chocolates, and usually a stuffed animal. The card would tell me what a great kid I was and how much I was loved and would be signed by my mom and dad. Not both names by my mom but each one would sign their own. I haven't thought about this in years! Looking back on it I always loved it and it made me feel special. Looking back now I am super grateful that they did this for me. 

Long road to say that I think it is important to let the people you love know they are important to you not just your girlfriend, boyfriend or spouse. So I like to make Valentine's cards that don't necessarily scream about love and being mine forever but are just cute and a great way to say "I am thinking about you, I love you and hope you have a Happy Valentine's Day!" 

Today's card is just that type of card. I am a coffee lover and it was so much fun coloring this image, using the coffee cup paper, and even the embellishment. I will probably give this to a fellow coffee lover so that they know I love coffee but I love them more (at least after my first cup of coffee when I can think straight).  

Ingredients:

• Latte Anya stamp from The Greeting Farm (sorry couldn't find it on their site to link to it)
• paper is from my stash
• Hello sentiment is a dienamic die from My Favorite Things
• the sprinkles are from Doodlebug Designs as is the little coffee cup
• I used glossy accents on the button on the hat and her boots

Well I appreciate you stopping by and I sure hope someone makes you feel special this Valentine's Day! 

Wishing you sunshine and smiles,

Kim  :) 

Home Again!

It is so good to be home!!! I got to hold my dog Cookie whom I have missed more than I thought it was possible to miss a fur baby (but let's face it she is my precious). I got to sleep in my own bed and have my favorite coffee from my Keurig machine. I got to to snuggle down into my couch that I find so comfortable. Then, reality set in as I looked around and realized there is so much freakin' work to do around this house!!!

Now mind you when I say work I don't mean cleaning. One of my good friends stayed in our home while we were away and left it cleaner than I did when we left for Ireland. What I mean is that as I look around my house I realize that I want to change everything!

This coming February we will have lived in our house for nine years and truth be told I did not bother to decorate. Even in my room where I keep all my card making stuff most of the decorations are more functional. Just this past year I started decorating my room. I also picked out a bedspread to attempt to decorate our bedroom but truth be told I don't have a clue as to what I am doing or how to do it.

This will be a guestroom but for now it was storing our stuff while our friend was living here. 

The reason I am going on about all of this is that I want to make this house our haven. I want to come into it and love everything I see, not just make do which is what I have been doing. Now I will not be making a run to Ikea, Target, Kohl's or any other store because I do not want to pick out a room that has been put together and slap it on a room in my house. I also struggle because I don't want a bunch of stuff clogging up the house and taking up space just to take it up. I like for things to be pretty and serve a purpose.

Most of this will be fixed once I can get in there and put things away (while packing things got far flung) but I am truly hoping to have a pulled together room in the end...someday :) 

I went onto Pinterest thinking that I could pin a bunch of pictures of rooms or things that I like and I would figure out what I want the house to look like, turns out I know that I like those pictures but I am pretty sure the rooms I like are completely different decorating styles. (I have even tried to take a "What is your decorating style?" quizzes and I STILL don't know what my style is!
I am doing all this "pre-work" because since we have spent the last six months in Ireland and traveling every chance we got we are not ready to do any type of remodeling to the house (most likely not for all of 2016). I figure that I can do some decorating with things we already have around the house and pick up a few things as the year goes on but nothing major. I am struggling with the feeling that I want to change so much NOW! I want blinds instead of curtains (which will be rather expensive because a lot of the windows are large not a typical size carried in most stores), drawers in my kitchen instead of cabinets that I have to crawl into the great beyond to pull things from the depths of darkness!

The materials I took to Ireland with us that now need to be unpacked and put back in their home...

Knowing that this is how things are for now and will not be changing in the near future I need to find a way to be satisfied with my home as it is. It is a great home and an excellent space and truly more than we need so I don't like that as I write this I feel as though I sound rather ungrateful and petty, but I acknowledge that and am looking to get over it. All I can think to do for now is to come up with a list of the things that I can change now or even improve upon and then concentrate on other things until it is time to do more.

Has anyone else out there ever felt this way and what did you do to deal with it? Thanks for listening and for any help you wish to give!

Wishing you sunshine and smiles,
Kim :) 

Valentine Series 2016 #2

So here is card number two. I received the kit that this stamp came in months ago and have being itching to color it. This little image is sooo cute and I figured with all the hearts on the image it would be perfect for a Valentine card.

The Ingredients:

• card base
• patterned paper from my stash
• image from La La Land Club Kit
• My Favorite Things Dienamics blueprints #15
• Technique Tuesdays Fishtail Banners 
• colored image with Copic markers
• Wink of Stella on bow and heart on purse
• Glossy Accents to apply to camera and eyes

This was such a fun card to make! I really love the hair on this image and all the hearts too she's cute and funky. 

Hope you enjoyed stopping by and look forward to seeing you all on Monday! 

Wishing you sunshine and smiles, 

Kim :) 

2016 Valentine's Series Begins!!!

Hi ya's!!!

The candy's been on the shelves for weeks now! I walked into the grocery store a couple of days ago and it was chocolates, stuffed animals, forever roses galore...so thus beggineth the Valentine Series!!! I am so excited! I love cutesy images, fun colors, hearts galore, and finding ways to use images that don't typically lend themselves to the holiday of focus and bending them to my will! (Bwahahahaha!!! Hmm I feel as though a holiday built around letting your loved ones know they are special should not bring out the villain laugh in me...oh well! )

The lovely little banner at the top of this post is brought to you by Teresa Russell (I am still working on acquiring such skills). She has been posting her Valentine Series since January 6th. You should definitely check it out over on her blog at Fresh and Renewed. Many thanks to Teresa for making this for us, I had to tweak my dates a little since I was still traveling through the first of the year.

So here we go!

I always use items that are in my stash, the majority of my supplies I order from Scrapping For Less which is a preorder site that Teresa runs on FaceBook. I am sure if you follow this blog for any length of time you will hear about it again and again. :)

The Ingredients:

• textured cardstock
• patterned paper from my stash (thought the hearts on grey were so cute)
• image is from La La Land Crafts (I participate in the La La Land Club Kit it is absolutely worth it! )
• used copic  markers to color the image
• the sentiment is also from La La Land Crafts (is part of the same kit the image came it...told you it was worth it!)
• the pearl spray is a Zva sticker
• the little purple heart is a wood heart that I colored in with a purple Wink of Stella pen

I don't think the photo really shows it but on the buttons on the hat and on her eyes I added Glossy Accents. I also used a Uniball Signo white pen to color the white of her eyes.

 I put in links where I could just in case you see something you would like to add to your arsenal. I don't get any kickbacks or endorsement for any of the products they are what I happened to use while making the card. Thanks so much for stopping by!

Wishing you sunshine and smiles,
Kim :)

Sunday!!! Better late than never?

I would love to call this a bonus blog entry but I would only be fooling myself. The last 72 hours have been a heck of a whirlwind! Friday morning the 15th we woke up in Spain then that afternoon we flew to Dublin and spent the evening there. We went out to dinner with our visiting family and enjoyed one last wonderful dish of bangers and mash from the Brazen Head, Dublin's oldest pub. We were curious about a book that was on the shelf in the room we were dining in and discovered that it was a guest book so we signed it, me, hubby, and my sis in law were so excited. After dinner Jamie and I had to go back to our hotel room to repack for our trip back to the States. Our company got to go hang out in the very swanky bar that was located downstairs in our hotel, lucky ducks! 

The next morning we got up and had breakfast and then headed back to the airport. That nine hour flight back to Orlando was a (insert choice curse word here)! I tried to sleep but that just was not happening but I did get to watch three movies! However this is not what I want to talk about this is just a very long explanation of why I flaked out on Friday's post. 

Our last ride to the airport getting ready to say good bye to Dublin. 

Sooo all that to start the actual post which is all about Granada. Such a beautiful city!!! We did one of the most fun things I have ever done on a vacation. We took a two hour tour on Segways!!! It was amazing. We got to ride around the city and our tour guide, Manuel, took us to amazing viewpoints to get pictures and see the city. We went to one that was an amazing viewpoint of the palaces. 

No matter which way I looked I was impressed by the landscape and the mountains it was all beautiful! After our Segway tour we went to the palaces and walked up a rather steep incline to get to the entrance. The landscape was so perfect! It was nothing compared to the palace. Everywhere I looked it seemed as though there was something breathtaking. I could not believe how chilly it was getting inside of the palace as the sun went down but it was made from stone, marble and tile and was just gorgeous! 

I am standing in one of the very large doors in one of the many courtyards.

This is the ceiling, I can't imagine how long this must have taken! 

We left the palace and headed back to the resort since we had to get dinner, pack up and wanted to relax and enjoy our last night in Spain. We hope to return to Spain for sure it was beautiful and there was still so much more that we would love to explore! Thanks so much for indulging me and letting me share this experience with you all!!! 

 

Did you know that Gilbraltar is a territory?

Yesterday we did something I have wanted to do since hearing my dad talk about being in the navy. My dad used to talk about seeing the Rock of Gilbraltar and he would always speak of it with a sound of awe. 

Fast forward many years later my dad has since passed away and hubby and I are going to visit Spain and as he is researching what to see and do while we are there, we find out that we are only a 45 minute drive from the rock! So we go out there and discover that Gilbraltar is a UK territory and we have to have our passports to cross into it. Oh and by the way you have to cross a tarmac to get to Gilbraltar! 

It was amazing! We didn't go on the rock we just went over to get a good look at it and take some pictures. It was really cool to see this place that I had heard about all of my life. So grateful that we had the opportunity to see this!

Thanks for joining me once more for tidbits of this little journey.

Wishing you sunshine and smiles,

Kim.  :)

Beautiful Barcelona!!!

Oh Barcelona! It is one of the most beautiful cities I've visited! We loved the Gothic Quarter where we were staying. It was such a great place to stay and right downstairs there was everything you could possibly want. 

Barcelona dines late! We ended up going to dinner around 9:30 pm and the restaurants were jumping! We had such great food and great Sangria! Turns out we love Tapas and it was a wonderful way to try many different types of food.

The main thing we wanted to see in Barcelona was Basilica de la Sagrada Familia. I don't have words to describe how amazing it was! 

We did the hop on and off tour bus and that turned out to be a great idea! We got to see so much of the city and decide where we would like to go back to and explore more. 

We walked to the beach and watched the sun go down and sat on the coolest concrete lounge chairs that we built right on the pier! It was so cool!

It was a beautiful city to visit and we are already looking forward to coming back!

We have ventured on to our next destination so more pictures will be coming your way! Thanks so much for stopping by and I hope you have enjoyed a glimpse of our trip.

Wishing you sunshine and smiles,

Kim :)

Barcelona Baby!!!

WHi Everybody!

After finally getting a good night's sleep we got up this morning and had a hearty Irish breakfast before getting on a flight through Ryan Air and flying to Barcelona, Spain. It was a pleasant flight but really tight there was hardly any room to move around but we arrived safe and sound. We quickly shed our coats (as Barcelona is 15 degrees warmer than Dublin) and hopped on a bus that brought us to the Gothic District which is the area we are staying in while in Barcelona. 

This city is beautiful!!! It is vibrant and busy but still open enough to not feel claustrophobic. There are a few remnants still left standing from Christmas but the city seems to be in the process of taking it all down. 

We ate at a wonderful tapas restaurant right around the corner from our flat and the staff was very friendly and attentive and were so helpful and patient while I stumbled through my limited ability to speak Spanish. We had the most delicious sangria I have ever had and then as we were paying our bill and getting ready to leave they popped the cork on a bottle of champagne and poured us each a glass. It was a beautiful and delicious way to start our holiday! 

After dinner we walked around the city and scoped out some of the shops around where we are staying. I for one cannot wait to hit up one of the bakeries for breakfast tomorrow morning and at some point stop at the cheese shop. 

So, happy weekend! I hope you are going to be doing something fun and that will truly make you happy even if it is only for a small amount of time. I look forward to filling you all in on Monday, January 11th as to what we have been up to and may possibly inundate you all with pictures. 

Wishing you sunshine and smiles,

Kim : )

Whew!

I have been packing for two days (a little longer than that because I began packing things we don't use regularly but wanted to take home about a month ago)! I am super excited because we leave tomorrow to travel to Spain for a week for a one last holiday before returning to life back home.

As I just posted on Monday one of my goals this year is to blog consistently and I intend to achieve that goal. I had intended to begin my Valentine's Day card series but my dates are going to be a bit different than I had intended because of the move and the upcoming holiday. So instead I plan to change the content of what will be on the blog until I get back home.

So many bags for just two people! (We brought WAY too much!)


So there will be pictures of Spain coming your way! We have a lot of fun adventures planned for the next week and a couple of chill days to truly relax. I am hoping to get a massage at some point. For some reason whenever we move (even when it's a move I want to make) it tends to be stressful and my shoulders get super tight!!! So I am looking forward to a massage to work all that out.

I wanted to bring so many of the clothes that I have needed while in Dublin home to Florida. I got honest with myself as I packed and packed and packed and then realized I had not yet packed any clothes! So then I took a closer look at the things I wanted to bring back and if I didn't love it then it didn't get packed. Some of the things that I really do like didn't get packed because let's face it I live in Florida and there is just no reason for me to bring back a bunch of things I would only get to wear maybe once a year.

This little crew is getting left behind as well :(  So sad but I probably would not have been able to use them as door stops at home anyway because our dog Cookie would think they were her new buddies and I would probably find them in her crate! Ha ha! 

I would still love to be able to pack the duvet in our guest room and Jamie is still going to help me see if we can purge a little more so we can get it in but I'm not holding my breath. Good thing I wasn't holding my breath I would have come to on the floor! There's just no room for it boo! 

I love this duvet the flowers make me so happy! 

Even though I will not be featuring my Valentine's Day series until Wednesday January 20th I don't want to leave you without some inspiration so I am going to send you over to one of my favorite gal pals Teresa so you can see what she's been up to! Head over to freshandrenewed.blogspot.com for some inspiration!  

Hello 2016!!!

Happy New Year! I hope you all had a great and safe New Year's Eve we stayed in and relaxed with family that came in to visit us for a little while. It was a lovely evening and around midnight people started setting off fireworks. We had a great view from our 7th floor window!

So now a new year has begun and for me that means it's time to set goals and decide what I want to strive for this year. I have decided that since life isn't segmented and separated into categories I would put all of my goals in one place (and bonus I will have a place to come back to and see how I am progressing)!

GOALS FOR 2016:

Meet step goal 5 days a week

Keep track of food & calories

Do something active each weekend

Blog consistently M,W,F

Be consistent with skin care routine 

Learn how to make intros for videos with iMovie & Windows moviemaker 

Learn how to edit videos & add music

Read more

Make card videos

Stop playing phone games to fall asleep 

See & visit more places in FL

Stick to card making schedule

Put up extra cards on Face Book 

Wow that seems like a lot but I think it's all doable there are quite a few small tasks on my list.

So what are your goals for this year? Have you ever set goals before and if so did you meet them by the end of the year? 

Thanks for stopping by and I look forward to spending the next year with you all!

Sunshine and smiles,

Kim. 😀