Summer Smooch Preview

Before Club this morning, I realized I had not made many cards showcasing the Summer Smooch paper and Bright Blossoms stamp set that are available this month as a preview of the new catalog that will be coming out in June.  So I got busy......



 This was a quick one using some Delightful Delight, Pacific Point and Tangerine Tango card stock.  Added a little Rich Razzleberry ribbon.

 Since I had the templates for the dial ready for the club for the kite card (see previous posts)  I changed it up a little and used the flowers in a vase.   Here the flower is in Read Red.

 Now it has changed to a tulip I guess, in Tangerine Tango.  It really whipped up fast with the template.   (The kite card went pretty well at club except when I opened up the Lucky Limeade and the stamp pad came apart and landed ink side down on my sample card AND the demo card - ARGHH!)

 This is a simple one - you can not see htem very well but there are score lines along the bottom that break around the image.

And this one has diagonal score lines making a diamond background design on the white mat piece.  I used the Rock and Roll technique on the tulips.

Did you miss ordering these in April?  Don't worry they will be back June 1.

Soaring Kites

This is the other card for the club on Saturday. It is CASED from a card we made at the regional convention in Milwaukee.  I don't have the Send Me Soaring stamp set but my sister (and upline) loaned me hers for a month or so. 

 The kite is stamped on a 3 inch circle of Whisper White card stock that is anchored with a mini- brad in the center.  You can turn the wheel and change the kite as you desire.  The colors used are Lucky Limeade, Calypso Coral, Island Indigo and Basic Gray.

 A turn of the wheel and you have a different kite.  A piece of Baker's twine is tied in a bow and added to the kite's tail.  I am thinking this would make a great graduation card.

 And another turn and you have a third kite.  Wouldn't this be a fun card to receive?   I think I will make some birthday cards like this too before I have to return her stamp set.

This is the card we made at the regional convention.  It takes the longer, narrow envelopes which I did not have so I tweaked the design to make a card that fit the standard invitation envelopes.  I wound up actually tearing this card apart to make get my card to work - and then put it back together again.  The dimensionals used to attach the front to the base made it easy to dismantle without tearing the card stock.

Card Club Designs

These are two designs for the Card Club on Saturday.  For #3 I will be casing a card we made at the regional conference.

This card features the Summer Smooches DSP.  There are so many bright designs, how can you not love it ??   Stamp sets used are Flower Fest (retiring June 1) and On Your Birthday. I CASED this card from Connie Babbert at Inkspired Treasures.

This is a small gift card using the Kindness Matters stamp set and the diagonal scoring plate to make the envelope.  I also put a square of Very Vanilla on the back of the gift card to write a short note and sign the card.

As I said the third card is one we made at the regional conference.  I still have to get my 'version' finalized :-)   I'll post it after Card Club - don't want to ruin the surprise.

Gourmet Pizza and Military Thank Yous

Another batch of whole wheat pizza crust today. I sent all the other crusts home with Katie so had to make more for Bekah, Tom and I.  It is so easy with the bread machine - and if I say so myself I am getting pretty good at rolling out the dough.  Four ounces of dough makes a nice thin crust in the pie pans - just the way I like it.
So tonight I had a gourmet pizza -

 I started with a Roma tomato sliced very thinly .  Just enough to cover the crust.

 Then the last of a jar of greem olives I found in the frig. 

 Some carmelized onions.  Just saute some thinly sliced onion in a little olive oil until they start to brown - smells so good and tastes even better.

 Crumble on some feta cheese and add a little Italian seasoning. 

 Bake for 10 minutes and delicioso!   I must say it took me longer to make it than to eat it :-)


While it baked I took pictures of some of the cards made yesterday to thank the military.

 Abigail come up with this design.  The striped paper had a star punched from it for another card and I showed her how she could layer it over the blue.  She added the three stars in red.  I like the 'nautical' look.

 I showed Grace how to do the dougle star by punching the small star first and then centering that in the large star punch.  One of the things I love about the Stampin Up punches is the fact that you can see what you are punching.

Angie added some interest to her envelope with the star and Thank You greeting.  I may have to copy that on some of my envelopes.

We had a great time. I enjoyed teaching them how to make cards and customize their designs.  I hope they enjoyed it too.  I know the cards will encourage the soldiers that receive them.  These will be sent to Operation Write Home along with a box of cards for the soldiers to sent to their families.

Using up leftovers - a win-win - and cardmaking with friends

I am bad about not using up leftovers but fortunately DH takes his lunch to work and will take about any leftover as part of a lunch. Lately I have made it my goal to try to NOT have to throw any leftovers away after they have been in the frig for way too long :-)
Yesterday I used the leftover pasta sauce on pizza.  Later Bekah came home from work and wanted a personal pizza (no cheese please) and I had to open a jar of pizza sauce for that.  The canned pizza sauce was so watery and horrible compared to the thick pasta sauce - yuck!  I may be making my own pizza sauce along with the crust in the future.

This morning I wanted something different for breakfast - cereal and oatmeal get old after a while. I dug through the frig and found some leftover fried potatoes with onions and peppers -  perfect!  I put them in a small skillet with a little olive oil and heated them well.  Threw in a tablespoon or so of bacon bits - and a beaten egg.  A breakfast scramble as good as (or even better than) Bob Evans!   So patting myself on the back for salvaging those potatoes from the back of the frig and enjoying a nice breakfast on a beautiful Saturday morning.

Later today some ladies from church are coming over to make thank you cards for the military.  These will be sent to Operation Write Home to be used as Any Hero cards that they include in the boxes of greeting cards for the troops.   I played yesterday with some scrapbook paper I had stashed away and came up with two designs for us to make today.

 Most of the items used on these cards are either retired Stampin Up or not Stampin Up.   Card stock for these two are Night of Navy and Real Red - with Whisper White of course.   These two use the same layout and sizes of card stock - the patterned paper, stamp set and ribbon makes each one unique.

Again - retired or non-Stampin Up.  The card stock is Riding Hood Red, Night of Navy, and Whisper White. Same layout and sizes.  It will be fun to see what the others come up with using the same elements.

Homemade pizza - my favorite!

My favorite pizza is homemade.  I prefer it over all the pizza chains - of course, I will eat their pizza but if I have the time I like making my own crust and experimenting with different toppings.  Today I was in the mood to make some pizza crusts so we had pizza for supper. 

 

 

I made whole wheat crust using a recipe I found on Pinterest.  I have posted this recipe here.

Tonight I used the leftover Homemade Pasta Sauce (about 1 1/2 cups) that was in the frig and topped it with canned mushrooms, a few carmelized onions, strips of roast beef lunch meat and green olives.  I would have preferred fresh mushrooms but since the sauce had canned mushrooms I figured I would save my fresh mushrooms for something else.  We ordered pizza from Papa John's last week and I requested green olives - they don't have them!  I love green olives on pizza!  Oh, and all topped with lots of mozzarella cheese.  It was pretty good if I say so myself. 

The recipe for the whole wheat crust made the baking sheet and 6 personal pizza crusts. I use 10 inch pie plates to make the personal crusts. When they are cooled I put them in a gallon zip-lock bag with wax paper between and freeze. They are so convenient to pull out and just add some sauce and toppings for a quick dinner or lunch. 

While I had the bread machine out I mixed up a batch of plain pizza crusts.  The recipe made 8 personal ones which I will be sending home with Katie when she is here tomorrow.

I will probably make some more either tomorrow or Sunday so we have some too.  Bekah prefers the whole wheat so maybe I'll make a batch of those.  I can get 10 crusts from the batch if I make it all into the personal size. 

Retiring Hostess Sets

The hostess sets in the current catalog will also be retiring on June 1. I have really enjoyed some of those (of course I have almost all of them!)

Simply Soft is a nice two step stamp set. Here I used one of the flower outline stamps and Soft Suede ink to make a background in various shades of brown.  I stamped numerous times on the Whisper White without reinking.   After letting it dry thoroughly, I ran it through the Big Shot using the Snowflake embossing folder.    I stamped the complete image (outline in Soft Suede and flowers in Wisteria Wonder) for my focal image.   Embellished with Soft Suede ribbon and an IN Color brad - it makes a very nice blank note card.

Another of the floral designs in the Simply Soft set. I used Regal Rose and Soft Suede for this card.  The floral outlines were stamped in Soft Suede and then on the 'focal' ones I added the Regal Rose flowers.  I then added a drop of Crystal Effects on the individual flowers.  (Hard to see in the photo but it really made the flowers POP).  Some sponging with Soft Suede and a Soft Suede ribbon with a rhinestone finish the card

Here I just did random flowers using Basic Grey for the outline and Wisteria Wonder for the flowers.  The card stock is Wisteria Wonder and Certainly Celery.  A Certainly Celery ribbon with the IN Color brad embellish this simple card.

This is a set I imagine I will hold onto - and use for my own personal cardmaking.

Retiring stamp sets

Just sharing a few cards I made in the past with a couple stamp sets that are retiring June 1.


Vintage Vogue - the larger flower was stamped and cut out of a scrap of paper. I curled the petals using my paper piercer.


Flower Fest - for this one I stamped the images randomly using Basic Gray. Then using a cotton ball and the chalk pastels I added color to match the images.


Flower Fest - this is much bolder. Stamped with Stazon Black and then used sponges and ink pads to 'burnish' color on the images.

I will hate to see both of these go but looking forward to seeing the new sets!

Reitring stamps - Greenhouse Garden

A large number of Stampin Up stamp sets will be retiring on June 1. Between now and then I will highlight a few of these sets on my blog. Don't miss out - if you like them, you need to order them soon.

The first one is Greenhouse Garden. This is a two-step stamp set. You stamp the background image and them stamp the detail over that. Some two step sets take a lot of patience and the Stamp-a-ma-jig to get them lined up but this set is very forgiving. I rarely worry about lining up the second image and it almost always comes out looking fine.


This card was from the Faux Silk technique class. I used Tangerine Tango for the background and Cajun Craze for the detail stamp.
The sentiment is from Thoughts and Prayers.


This was a fun card I made to use up some Blue Bayou ribbon that I had. The larger flowers are More Mustard overstamped with Cajun Craze. The smaller flowers are Blue Bayou overstamped with Not Quite Navy. The sentiment is from Bring on the Cake.


This was a fun card we did for one of our clubs. Inks used were Daffodil Delight, Pumpkin Pie, More Mustard, Cajun Crase, Tangerine Tango, Early espresso. I have a tutorial posted at Tri-Fold Card which shows this same card in pinks and blues.
The sentiment on this card is from Herb Expressions which is another retiring set. More of that on my next post maybe.

I will miss using this set for clubs and workshops as it is one of my favorites. Which of your favorites are on the retiring list? Retiring List at Stampin Up

Retiring List and some recipes

Check out the retiring list at Stampin Up - Retiring List

These items will only be available through May 2012 - so if there is something you are wanting, better order it soon.

I'll be featuring cards and other projects using some of these items over the next 6 weeks.

And I have posted a couple new recipes - Homemade Pasta Sauce which I made to use up some fresh tomatoes which we received in the last Co-Op produce basket. It was sure yummy!
While you are there check out the super easy Foccacia Bread - using crescent sheets - duh! So smart of them to make a full sheet of crescent dough so you don't have to seal the seams of the cut crescent rolls.

And to use up the last couple oranges, lemons and a lime - I made some Citrus-Ade :-)
1 cup of fresh citrus juice
1 cup sugar
Water to make total volume of 1 1/2 quart to 2 quarts depending on your taste.

Cooking without a recipe :-)

So tonight I cooked without recipes Of course the frozen stuffed chicken breast was a no brainer - you just put it in the oven and 30 minutes later it is done.

I needed to use up some of the produce from the Co-op before the next delivery on Tuesday. I had a head of cauliflower - we really like it roasted - and some red potatoes plus green pepper and red onion. I have often had fried potatoes at work with pepper and onion but had never made fried potatoes from fresh. I always use leftover boiled or baked potatoes and slice them to fry.

I cut up some onion (1/2 medium) and green pepper (1/2 of a huge pepper) in slices and then took the red potatoes - about 10 that were golf ball size - after washing them well I slice them between 1/8 and 1/4 inch rounds. Mixed that all together in a bowl and drizzled with some olive oil (a good healthy drizzle). I added some salt, pepper and Italian seasoning.

Threw that all in a large skillet and put over medium heat. Just let it cook and stirred it every so often - a few of the potatoes stuck a little so I had to scrap them off the pan when I stirred but that was fine. It probably cooked for about a half hour - and perfect!




I love cooking when I don't need a recipe :-)
Oh - and the roasted cauliflower. Cut up a head of cauliflower, drizzle with some olive oil and sprinkle on a little salt, pepper, garlic powder and cayenne pepper. Spread on a cookie sheet and bake at 350 for about 30 minutes - or until there is some browning on the edges. I sprinkle some parmesan cheese over it while it was still hot - yummy!

And this was my dessert -


Homemade honey wheat bread (made yesterday in the bread machine) with butter and homemade raspberry jelly ( a gift from DH's co-worker last summer).

Mango Salsa - love it!

The produce basket last week included mangos. I have never eaten fresh mangos - boy what I was missing! One was pretty soft when I got home that night so I cut it up - thanks to Misty and others who shared instructions on how to cut one. It was so delicious, sweet, smooth - loved it!
Since then I have been looking at mango recipes and mango salsa sounded interesting. There are so many mango salsa recipes online - I did not have any idea where to begin. Today I searched again and narrowed it down to the recipes that used only items I already had in the house as I did not feel like running to the grocery store. Most called for sweet red pepper which I did not have. I found one on Weight Watchers online that was just perfect what I had on hand - fresh cilantro, fresh jalapeno, red onion, fresh orange juice, fresh lime juice and of course, mangos.



I made a huge salad using some of the other produce I had from the Co-op - avocado, grape tomatoes, green pepper, and romaine lettuce. Added some ham and cheese and a hard-boiled egg. The mango salsa and some tortilla chips on the side. The salsa was so good!!!! I even drank the juice left in the bottom of the bowl. Interesting orange juice with a little kick from the jalapeno.