Organize your Stuff: Week 11(round 5): Operation Write Home

For starter, some housekeeping. For our most recent WOYWW post, click here!
For our Jan 1st One Little Word post, click here!

The POW apologizes for the infomercial. The writers have been sacked. (They forgot the moose though).
Today, we are sharing the card that you may have peeked on our desk.

Patterned Paper: Graphics 45, CTMH; Solid Paper: CTMH; Ink: Momento; Markers: Copic; Accents: Stickles, Liquid glass, DMC floss, Misc brads.

It is our entry today for Operation Write Home’s three patterned paper challenge. For every 50 cards with three patterned papers linked back to OWH, they get a box of cards shipped for free to our troops from their challenge sponsor, Our Daily Bread Designs. Creative Me and the POW highly encourage you to join in this challenge (especially, since once Fabulous Spouse gets to Afghanistan, we might just get a card from OWH!).

What is Operation Write Home (OWH)? It is a non-profit organization that accepts homemade cards and ships them to our forward deployed service members so that those service members can write home. (Darn it, no Hallmark in Kabul or the Horn of Africa!) For some, this is the only correspondence and communication that they have with their families, especially when the internet is down!

Note: No glitter goes on the cards that are sent to OWH, as it is able to flake off and stick to their uniforms. Glitter on uniforms makes service members visible to night vision goggles. Any glitter must be sealed with gesso or liquid glass (Creative Me started with stickles and coated with liquid glass).

As for the family, we sent Oldest Child off to the Klondike Derby (a Boy Scout snow Olympics of sorts) this morning…EARLY (6AM). He forgot his coat ?!? so we had to run home and get it. His penalty was a shot for the blog. Did we mention that it was 35 and raining? How do you forget your coat?

Also, here is a picture of the gang "poison testing" cookies for Fabulous Spouse's latest Care Package.  Today Illusive Middle Child and Girl Friday have basketball, so we will have pictures for Monday.

Have a great weekend!!!

Organize your Stuff: Week 27 (round 4): Operation Write Home Blog Hop

This is a quick post today at the request of OWH due to the 125+ blogs we need to visit! (This blog hop goes live at 3 AM Eastern time).

The POW loves Operation Write Home. This organization has touched our family, as it has allowed Fabulous Spouse’s brother to write home… and made our Awesome Auntie smile when she needed it.

Also, our dear Fabulous Spouse is due to deploy to Afghanistan after Christmas this year, and we hope to recieve some mail of our own.

It also justifies some of the Inner Hoarder’s scrappy purchases!

Today is National Card Making Day! In a work up to the holidays, we have been asked to share a holiday card for the troops…

…hope you like it!

Supplies: Cardstock, patterned paper, stamps: Close to My Heart; Markers: Copic; star brad: BoBunny ink: Momento

Thank you to all our soldiers, sailors, and marines for making our sandboxes safe!

Click below to return to the hop!

Organize your Stuff: Week 18 (round 4): WOYWW & Tools

Happy Wednesday! Sorry that last week was a one post-er, but kept waiting for that shot of Girl Friday and the missing tooth! Finally, here it is:

Her tooth fairy brought 5 “gold quarters” (5 one dollar gold coins, which according to the Illusive Middle Child, tooth fairies make…like Santa’s elves make toys) and a little Hello Kitty tin. After this though, she is on the reduced $1 per tooth rate. Not only did Girl Friday finally lose hers, but Illusive Middle Child lost yet another just tonight! (must remember to finish blog and go to bed before the tooth fairy comes!)

Here is our desk:

It is full of crafty things that Creative Me has been making. To skip ahead to other crafty desks, head on over to Julia’s Stamping Ground.

First on Creative Me’s list of craftiness for this week, was our design team card for Tuesday Trio’s Sketch #77- Acrylic paint. We just LOVE these vintage Alice in Wonderland stamps from Clear Art Stamps and are always looking for an excuse to use them! Here, we painted our roses…er..brads red!

Next is a layout from Girl Friday’s 6th birthday. OCD Me really wants to get 2010 moved out of the D-ring temporary binder and into a permanent post bound. This was one of the missing layouts keeping us from calling it done (this and all of July and August). This is TRUE scrap booking, as all these paper blocks car scraps from previous layouts! Girl Friday even helped... it was her birthday after all, and helping is what Girl Fridays do best!

Finally, as you can see on our desk, we have been busy creating for our favorite charity, Operation Write Home using CTMH stamps. Girl Friday helped me put together these cards destined for our overseas troops so that they can write home... did I mention that our TV died this weekend, and the repair man does not come until tomorrow? No? Total family time in the cool rain that is our summer.  Oldest Child, who has been away from home for two weeks at camp almost had a coronary.

As for tools…OCD Me keeps our favorites in a scrapping tote for both ease of transport to crops and such, and ease of finding as Creative Me has a nasty habit of losing tools in plain sight on our desk mid project!

What are your favorite tools? My list will be up by Saturday…Pinky Swear! (We do not need to wait on pesky teeth this time!)

Organize your Stuff: Week 16 (round 4): Chalks, Paint, Glitter, and Stickles

Well the quiet week has come and gone way too fast! Creative Me finished this layout from our desk picture on Wednesday.

Originally, the plan was to use stickles on all of the red dots, but at the last minute the POW decided to reign in Creative Me and leave it as is. OCD Me was a little conflicted, since we always try to tie in to the week that we are organizing. However, OCD Me is also the one who constantly criticizes Creative Me for swinging too far to the Dark Side and venturing perilously close to the infamous Product Vomit.

The POW, self-proclaimed arbiter of my mind, decided that when OCD Me is worried about our craftiness, then something must be done quick… lest we tear a hole in the space time continuum or something. So, a few clicks later, and we were off to create a card.

This card uses the color scheme from The Play Date Café Challenge #90. Creative Me just loves the pictures that these folks put together each week to represent their colors!

Also, this card uses the “I Miss You” sentiment from Operation Write Home’s Wednesday challenge. The POW thinks that these people rock, as Awesome Auntie gets a card from her deployed spouse every other day or so, and those cards are free from OWH to him so that he can write home.

As for storage, not much has changed since last round.

This little bag has my stickles (name brand for dimentional glitter glue) mists and chalk inks. A reusable grocery bag has two stacked mini-milk cartons of acrylic paints and one set of watercolors in it. 

Hope that you all have a great and crafty weekend!

Organize your Stuff: Week 12 (round 4): WOYWW …Ribbons & Fibers Intermission

Hello fellow WOYWW –ers! PA Me loves this point in the week, because she knows it is not that bad, and she likes to watch OCD Me pace around wondering if someone is judging her for the mess we have made of our workspace! (FYI- it is a good thing that this is not what’s on your kitchen counter…then we would have reality cameras and people in hazmat suits here!).

For more fabulous desks (not kitchens… well unless one crafts in their kitchen…), please click over to the Stamping Ground!

Creative Me is in summer mode, which swings between extra crafty and taking a siesta with PA Me and looking for the Cabana boy to refill her Margarita glass. This week is a crafty one! We have a layout in progress, and we have wacked out some cool starburst cards inspired by Operation Write Home (OWH) who are looking for cards for the troops to send home to their loved ones. Summer is slow for them this time of year, but the troops still want to write their families! Send OWH a card or two if you have the chance!

Papers for this card were ancient Cosmo Cricket.
The eyelet is from Michaels or Jo Anns from around 2004, so manufacturer unkown.
White Ric Rac from the wall at the scrapbook store, manufacturer unknown.

If you like the flower/ rosette, the POW wanted you to know that there is a tutorial in the last post.

OCD Me is girding her loins for the summer invasion, as there are only 5 days left of school, then Girl Friday and her brothers will be about the house all day every day! The POW vows to keep them in check, but PA Me will believe it when she sees it. Inner Hoarder is crying. Guarantee: minimum one inch of paper, and countless other things will go missing this summer. Girl Friday is very creative.

Final thought in this ribbon and fiber intermission. Question of the week: do you sew your layouts/ cards?

It is well documented that our sewing machine is in solitary confinement right now for tension issues and a purely sociopathic hate of Creative Me. The POW would like to give it another try, but Creative Me is not on board yet. We will see.

Organize your Stuff: Week9 (round 4): OWH Blog hop & Embellishments part 1

This is just a quick post this morning to celebrate the Men and Women serving this great country during Memorial Weekend! To help Celebrate, Creative Me made some more cards for the fabulous folks at Operation Write Home (OWH).

If there is any doubt in your mind that this is a for real and awesome charity (sending blank cards to the troops to write home), fear not! Awesome Auntie has received two OWH cards from her husband (my brother-in-law) since he left for Iraq in April.

Here are my cards…

Since it was embellishment week, we had to use buttons (LOVE them!) even though Fabulous Spouse put us on button probation for overuse… (that’s okay, Creative Me snuck a clear button on to his Iraq layout on the previous post on the Bingo Travel Card…maybe we do have a problem!)  We especially love the heart button with the yellow ribbon.  The POW does, however, want to show that we can be more than just buttons, so...

We also made a much simpler card using the same liquid glass that was the adhesive for the buttons to add dimension to the patterned paper and stamped phrase.

The POW did snag us some blog candy for this weekend. One name will be drawn from this post (don’t really need to be a follower, but it is easier to get a hold of you!), one from yesterday’s Iraq layout post, and the final one from our June 1st post! Winners announced June 4th! So, that is 3 chances…Woo Hoo!

Happy Hopping!!! And a great Memorial Day Weekend!!!

You should have ust come From Trish at Mouseprint Creations
and next is Sharon at Sharon's Shenanagans!

Organize your Stuff: Week 8 (round 4): Projects, Pages, and Kits part 2

It has been a busy week here at the shoe. (For those of you who are not regular readers, it is our family of 5, our cat, Fabulous Spouse’s SIL (whose husband is IA to Iraq), her two little ones, her 2 cats and her dog…therefore our home has become that of nursery rhymes “there was an old lady who lived in a shoe…”) However, we did manage to get two layouts done from when Fabulous Spouse went to Iraq during the surge in 2007 in honor of the Operation Write Home blog hop tomorrow morning. (PS- thanks for scrolling down if you are reading this after the hop has begun!).

Speaking of Kits, here Creative Me used the Destinations kit from Simple Stories that was purchased by the Inner Hoarder at CKC Portland in March… this is currently my current new favorite paper manufacturer!

The POW has been instructed by Creative Me that layout #2 is not perfect yet, but OCD Me wanted it published anyways, so that we could show that we are making progress (the rest of this album… so far… can be viewed here in my Facebook album).

Here is some blog candy with which the POW has convinced the Inner Hoarder to part.

We have three prizes. One for those who are followers and comment to this post, one for comments to followers who post to the blog hop post, and one for the comments of followers posted on June 1st. There will be more than the 4x6 journaling elements page, one of the three playing card strips, and ribbon in each…but we are not sure what. We work at a scrapbook store all this weekend, and SOMETHING will speak to Creative Me, we are sure of it! Since Oldest Child was my random generator for the last blog hop (and truly, is there anything more random than a boy in middle school?). Girl Friday, Illusive Middle Child, and Shark Bait a.k.a. The Toddler will pick the winners this time around.

Organize your Stuff: Week 2 (round 4): Intermission- WOYWW & OWH

Enough acronyms for you?
The POW is going to try something new this round and try to participate in the WOYWW group. What is WOYWW? It is What’s On Your Workspace Wednesday. OCD Me is hoping that this will keep us honest with our mess, and curtail PA Me when it comes to cleaning up our scrap space.

What Mess? Well, here is what our space looked like after Creative Me started working on some Father’s Day cards for Operation Write Home (OWH).

The big thing is that we have to make sure that Awesome Auntie’s Declutter Fairy does not notice our scrap room, or we are in trouble. PA Me feels that she can happily not clean up after herself in many other areas of the house… in order to take one for the team. This makes both OCD Me and the POW nervous. They point out that we have three kids, and that creates enough clutter without adding to it!

Anyway, here are our cards. We will make a few more before sending them off to the OWH folks. Off to pick up Girl Friday from a Spring Break play date!

Organize your Stuff: Week 26 (round 3): New Items and Keeping it Neat part 2 &OWH Spring Blog Hop!

Apologizing in advance to our regular readers for two blog hops in a row! if you are looking for One Little Word (OLW) blog hop, click here for that entry.

Today’s blog hop is in support of Operation Write Home. This non-profit group sends homemade cards to our deployed forces so that they can write home. Since Fabulous Spouse’s brother will be headed to the sandbox in a few weeks to do his one year tour, and Fabulous Spouse, himself, will be gearing up for an Iraq deployment at the end of the year, this seemed like a perfect fit for us and our extra cards!

For any of you interested in using some of your stash to help support this cause, the Easter deadline is March 18th and the Mother's Day deadline is March 31st.

This is the spring card that Creative Me put together. It was our first attempt at the rolled paper roses, and OCD Me nearly threw in the towel (it is slightly harder than the internet makes it seem). It did not help that PA Me never bookmarked the site (or sites…we have seen it a couple times now) where we saw the tutorial, so we decided to make one for you…just in case you want to try. (The POW says that it was not that hard. We got it right on the third try, ODC Me is just impatient!)

To make this rose, just grab some scrap paper (this was leftover paper from an 8x8 album where Creative Me sacrificed a lot of 12 x 12 cardstock to get it done).

Cut at the one inch mark, then fold in thirds and tape close with double sided adhesive. We have a Martha Stewart Score Pad, so we scored at 3/8 inch and 6/8 inch and put the glue on the1/4 inch.

Then the tricky part, rolling the flower. We found that if you cut your base and put adhesive on it first (we used 1 1/8 circle and ATG tape) then set it aside, the assembly process was easier.

Lightly mist your paper with water (This will make it more pliable). Roll in a corkscrew the whole strip. Then form rose by rolling in a circle. When done, place it on your sticky circle so that it does not unravel.

Another trick that Creative me discovered is to lightly mist once adhered to the circle and press down. This makes sure that the paper fibers set this way and do not try to spring back and pop off the page like our first attempt. Ta Da!

As for the something new and keeping it neat, we have done neither. The POW and OCD Me are proud of the Inner Hoarder for not using this week as an excuse to shop, but to be honest, we have been so busy that she just has not has the chance. We have, however, survived three Girl Scout cookie sales (one rain, one hail SERIOUSLY!, and thankfully one indoors), two wrestling matches, cub scouts and boy scouts! Using what we’ve got, Creative me also got more of the Iraq 2007 book done. We will have to post them later as the scanner and my computer are not speaking. (*update: layouts posted here*)

Three weeks left until the Organization Challenge restarts! Can you believe that we will actually make it to Week 29 this time!

For those on the blog hop this is where you are (I did not post the whole list as there are 135 participants!) If you get too lost you can always go back to OWH and pick it back up:

Leave a comment and we will give some blog candy (and paper roses) to one person!  Since there are so many blogs, we will close this on March 12th!

60. Tammy, My Craft Central, you'll link to Amanda at http://scrappnbee.blogspot.com/ *you are here*
61. Amanda, Scrappnbee the Scrapbooker, you'll link to Shelley at http://shelleyscreations.blogspot.com/
62. Shelley, Shelley's Paper & Ink, you'll link to Mari at http://marikocreations.blogspot.com/
63. Mari, Heartfelt and Handmade by Mari K., you'll link to holley at http://helloholley.blogspot.com/
64. holley, holley's hobbies, you'll link to Velda at http://oldstamper.blogspot.com/
65. Velda, Oldstamper Musings, you'll link to Cheryl at http://shestamps.blogspot.com/