Thank You Heather!!!

Welcome to the Skipping Stones Design blog hop in honor of the owner Heather.  If you are just popping in, you can start the blog hop here.  I used to design for Skipping Stones, and I love her stamps.  Heather has made the tough decision to take a break from designing her stamps and is scaling back her business to allow her time to focus on family, school and work.  I totally respect that and wish her the best.  Thank you Heather for letting me play with your fun stamps over the years, you are totally awesome and I know you will enjoy this next stage of life just as much.  And we just may see Heather and her wonderful stamps later on in life.  ;)

So today we were asked to make a card using one of our favorite stamp sets from Skipping Stones.  I have many that I just adore, but this is definitely one of my favs.  I used the Breathtaking Butterflies stamp set.  You can never have too many butterflies.  :)

Here's my card:

I used my sketch for my current challenge for this card, sketch 229c.

And I paired the stamp set with one of my favorite paper collections, Hopscotch from Fancy Pants Designs.

Don't forget to leave comments on all the blogs in the hop today for a chance to win some awesome stamp sets!

Your next blog stop is the fabulous Jingle.  Hop on.  ;)

And have a fantastic day!!!!

Sketch 229 Challenge :)

Sorry I've been MIA...just busy.  But I knew I needed to get on here because I owe you another fun sketch.  :)  So here it is...

If you are new to my sketches, here's how it works:

I essentially create three versions of one sketch each time. There will be one 12x12 scrapbook sketch, one double page sketch (12x24), and one card sketch (A4). This makes it easier for all types of crafters to participate. :)

Of course, there will be prizes.

So for today's sketches:

Sketch 229a -- 12x12 layout

Sketch 229b -- Two Page Layout

Sketch 229c -- Card (A4)

And now for the prize up for grabs...

This contains:

* Party Games kit from Vintage Street Market (includes 2-24x36" decorative papers, 1-24x36" red foil sheet, 1-24x36" yellow crepe sheet, 1 diecut sheet of 36 cardboard tags and things)

* Vintage Vogue kit from Pink Paislee (includes 24 pieces of double-sided cardstock papers--2 each of 12 designs)

* 5 transparencies and 1 patterned paper from Hambly Screenprints

* 1 sheet of paper from Piggy Tales.

* 1 package of 8 flowers (Velvet Pleats) from Maya Road

* 1 package of Trinket Pins from Maya Road

* Chipboard Alphabet from Pink Paislee 

* Ribbons (4 designs) from Pink Paislee 

* Buttons (45 pieces) from Fancy Pants Designs

* Tinted Tape from Vintage Street Market

Nice, huh?

THE RULES:

*  Your project must be newly made for this challenge, and then linked below.

*  You can use the sketches for any type of project, not just scrapbook pages or cards.

*  Please post which sketch you used with your project.

*  Feel free to combine with other challenges.  :)

*  You can enter as many times as you like.  

AND FOR BONUS ENTRIES:

*  Check out my sketchbook here.  Pick a favorite sketch and use it for an additional project.  You can do this as many times as you'd like.  These must be newly made for this challenge too.  

DEADLINE IS THURSDAY, JAN 31ST.  

I hope you play along!!  :)  

And who wants to know who won the last challenge?  

The winner is...

Congratulations Gloria!!!  Send me your address to pamelacy@msn.com and I will get your goodies mailed out to you!  :)

And thanks again to everyone who played along!  

I do have one more thing I wanted to share with you today, I've got a new stamp set that I designed for Unity...

You can see it and buy it here.  You can also get it for free through this promotion.  :)  I think it is perfect for scrapbooking!  But it also works for cards and other projects.  Check out this awesome card Natalie made using the set:

Natalie does great work!  You should check out her blog here.

Anyways...just wanted to show you an example of the set in action.  :)

Ok...well I hope to see your projects using the new sketch soon!  And if you do something with my new stamp set I would LOVE to see that as well!  :)

Have a fabulous day!!!  

LINK UP HERE!!!

Happy New Year!

Wow.  2013.  Enough said.

I'll get a new sketch up soon, but in the meantime, I have a layout to share with you.  It uses a variety of collections from Fancy Pants Designs.  The pictures are of Christmas...the boys are reading the Christmas story out of their Bibles.  But even though the pictures are of Christmastime, I didn't want to make the page a Christmas layout.

These are the kind of layouts that I hope may make a point in the future.  I imagine the kids, older, picking it up and considering the words dear mom had to say.  :)  No seriously, if I was gone, it would be a way to leave a subtle message.  Know what I mean?  Anyways...

Here are some close up's of my layout:

Well I hope you enjoyed your holidays.  I had a blast, with lots of family in town, but I am also ready for things to settle down and return to normal.

Have a wonderful day!!!

It Ain't No Ordinary Love.

It's EXTRAORDINARY love.

Our identity is in Christ and not in men or approval from others.  What we know on Earth as "love" does not even compare to what true love, the love our God has for us.  We try to describe it in ways we can understand, like Agape love, which by it's very definition is unconditional.  His love covers our flaws and sees past our mistakes.  We truly cannot understand His love for us, because we have nothing to compare it to here on Earth.  That kind of love does not exist apart from Him.  

Your identity is in Christ, in God's Agape Love.  There is nothing on Earth you would rather your identity be associated with.  Trust me.  

Merry Christmas!!!

Hi all!!  I just wanted to drop in and wish you a very Merry Christmas!!!

And here's a few Christmas cards too.  :)  You know, you still have time to make a few last minute cards if you need to.  ;)

To find out more about these cards, all using Fancy Pants and Scor-Pal, go here to the special blog hop post on the Fancy Pants blog.

Well, once again, Merry Christmas!!!!!!

On My Playlist

Back with another installment of On My Playlist. :)

We sing this first one at church a lot and I LOVE it!!!!

Inside Out sung by Hillsong United

A thousand times I've failed

Still your mercy remains

And should I stumble again

Still I'm caught in your grace

Everlasting, Your light will shine when all else fades

Never ending, Your glory goes beyond all fame

My heart and my soul, I give You control

Consume me from the inside out Lord

Let justice and praise, become my embrace

To love You from the inside out

Your will above all else, my purpose remains

The art of losing myself in bringing you praise

Everlasting, Your light will shine when all else fades

Never ending, Your glory goes beyond all fame

My heart, my soul, Lord I give you control

Consume me from the inside out Lord

Let justice and praise become my embrace

To love You from the inside out

Everlasting, Your light will shine when all else fades

Never ending, Your glory goes beyond all fame

And the cry of my heart is to bring You praise

From the inside out, O my soul cries out

My Soul cries out to You

My Soul cries out to You

to You, to You

My heart, my soul, Lord I give you control

Consume me from the inside out Lord

Let justice and praise become my embrace

To love You from the inside out

Everlasting, Your light will shine when all else fades

Never ending, Your glory goes beyond all fame

And the cry of my heart is to bring You praise

From the inside out, O my soul cries out

Everlasting, Your light will shine when all else fades

Never ending, Your glory goes beyond all fame

And the cry of my heart is to bring You praise

From the inside out, O my soul cries out

From the inside out, O my soul cries out

From the inside out, O my soul cries out.

Thoughts and a Layout

Hi everyone!  It's been an emotionally draining week so far, with the recent events and the constant news stories.   It's scary, and so incredibly sad.  I am having a hard time dealing with it all, as we all should be, and I wasn't even affected personally (meaning I wasn't there and didn't know anybody there).   I just don't know how much more of these "events" this world can take.   It's hard not to get consumed by fear.  But I remind myself that a life of fear is not the kind of life I want.  I know that there is more good in this world than bad.  And I am not going to cower to the evil of this world, because that's what we do when we live in fear.

But I am praying for each and every person affected by the shooting in Connecticut.  My heart goes out to you all!  Just think about how many prayers are going up right now, and how many people are stepping up in support...it's a pretty powerful picture.  

So I was able to make a layout for my sketch 228a.  There is still time for you to play along with the challenge for a cool prize.  And there's only two entries so far, so more chance of winning.  ;)

Here's my layout:

I used the fun Blissful Blizzard collection from Fancy Pants.

I really like how this layout turned out.  It's different.  And I love playing with shapes so I had fun with the triangles.  I just cut 4" squares then cut diagonally to create 4 triangles from each square.  I had some left over that I will probably use on a card.  :)

Here are some close up's:

Well I hope you have a fantastic day!  

Please join me in lifting up those affected by the shootings in Connecticut.