Homemade Doggie Toy

I had a lot of fun making this toy for Muffin for her first Christmas. She loves tags and strings, so I went around the house snipping labels off of pillows, mattresses and clothing, then added bits of ribbon and string and pieces of an old toy she had destroyed (by chewing of course). My circle templates were useful to trace some circles, which I stitched together with the tags and bits hanging off the edge. I even had a chance to use some  of my decorative stitching cams that I haven't used in years. One of her old squeakers from another destroyed toy was sewn in the center.

Muffin seems to enjoy it and has already decimated that blue string. Now my entrepreneurial son wants me to market them. Hah! He forgets that I'm retired!

OWH "Thanks to Our Heroes" Challenge

"Thanks to Our Heroes" is the theme of the current Operation Write Home challenge to make a thank you card using one of their sketches and a stamp. I used OWH sketch #57 and a thank you stamp from the new Hero Arts Year Round Sentiments set:

I had to laugh at myself, though. I first created some cards thinking I remembered the challenge criteria, and made several love cards using the same stamp set. No problem, they're off to my OWH shipper tomorrow too.

I'm loving my new Hero Arts sets. They stamp a sharp, clean image and they stick strongly to the acrylic block and then back onto the carrier sheet.

All This Gear?

I brought all this stuff to my last crop, including my Cricut, my Cuttlebug, a bunch of Nestabilities and embossing folders and all my embossing powders and tools:

And finished ONE CARD!

Ok, I finished the back too, so maybe that counts as two cards? This is a special one for my daughter's upcoming birthday (and she doesn't have time to read blogs so it's safe to post!). There's plenty of room left to leave her a special birthday message. The card base came together pretty quickly, but figuring out how to decorate it took longer. Of course, it was also our annual holiday party, so there was a lot of eating and talking and gifting going on too!

December in Florida

While much of the country is breaking out their warmest winter clothes and driving through snow to do their holiday shopping, I had a knock on the door last week from this man, asking if it would be OK to take the coconuts off my tree:

He was up the tree in no time, and pretty soon I heard coconuts plopping to the ground, bouncing off a piece of foam. We both win: he got coconuts to sell, and I no longer have to look up and protect my head every time I have to walk under the coconut tree!

OMDB challenge for Operation Write Home

Imagine my surprise to find out I was one of two random winners of a $25 gift certificate from Daily Bread Designs as a result of my entry into their November challenge for Operation Write Home! I picked out two great background stamps: a honeycomb and a doodle. ODBD goes one better than that: each month they will donate $25 towards shipping for each 25 cards posted in the OWH thread, up to $50. Last month we had 50 entries (one to a customer)! The December challenge is called "Get Sentimental", and we are to create a card where the sentiment is the main focus. Here's my entry:

The silver rectangles are my current favorite (free!) supply. I emboss coffee can liners and cut them up and mat them.

If you've never made a card for OWH, hope you will take a look at their website. It's a simple thing to do with all those bits and scraps we all have, and the cards are much appreciated by our men and women in uniform.