Having Dinner With a Blogging Sister/Swap Partner

I hope that this post is finding everyone doing well.  I am a bit tired today from doing lots of paperwork over the weekend for work and making "thank you"  favors for my friends that attended my stamping  workshop to include with their orders. Making the favors were fun to make initially, but after the first 10 or so I was getting tired.  I made 30 of them.  LOL!  Well, today I had a chance to meet a blogging sister and my swap partner from  February's Secret Sister swap, Kathy.  It was a pleasure having dinner together at a local Hawaiian restaurant.  We enjoyed chatting with each other about our passion of crafting and of course enjoyed our ono meals.  Before leaving to go our separate ways we took a picture together.

Here is picture of the RAK that I made for Kathy.

Here is a close up view of it.

The flower is a die from Stampin Up and I embossed the pink portions of the box using the swiss dots embossing folder.  Inside the box I gave her a variety of chocolates.  We are both thankful to have met each other and look forward to KIT.  We are also glad that we don't live too far from each other unlike all the other blogging sisters and swap partners that we have had.  

Happy St. Patty's Day!

Even though I am not Irish I made several cards for my swaps this month in honor of the holiday.  I've never made this many cards for St. Patrick's Day all at once, but it was lots of fun.  As soon as I sat down to make one, my MOJO took off.  I could not keep up with it.  LOL!  Here are 3 of the 5 cards that I came up with.

I will share the other two some time next week or as soon as I get my swaps in the mail.  Tonight we are having corn beef and cabbage for dinner.  I love having this once a year on St. Patrick's Day.  It's super yummy! Have a ...

Thanks for stopping by!

A Surprise For Me

My super creative, generous, and dear friend Shirl gave me another award.  I was so surprised that she chose me as one of the people to receive the                
   

award.  Big hugs Shirl for thinking of me and for this special honor.  Receiving this award is the perfect way to help me end my week and to hopefully inspire me to do lots of crafting.  :)  Be sure to check out Shirl's blog at creationbyShirl.blogspot.com

Here are the rules and guidelines for this award:

~Thank the person who gave you this award. That’s common courtesy.

~Include a link to their blog. That’s also common courtesy if you can figure out how to do it.

~Next, select up to 16 blogs/bloggers that you’ve recently discovered or follow regularly. ( I would add, pick blogs or bloggers that are excellent!)

~Nominate those bloggers for the Versatile Blogger Award — you should include a link to their site for others to see how versatile they really are.

~Finally, tell the person who nominated you 7 things about yourself."

The following are the 16 versatile bloggers that I follow or have recently discovered: ( I  think they are all awesome, creative, and a blessing to look at. Please don't be disappointed if you are not on my list below.  It definitely does not mean that you and your blog are not awesome, creative, and a blessing to look it.)

1. Kris:  klusivekreations.blogspot.com
2. Karen:  haveascraphappyday.blogspot.com
3. Jill: jill031070.blogspot.com
4. Jen: expressivelyme.blogspot.com
5. Fran: littlepaperstudio.blogspot.com
6. Kathy: ekboutique.blogspot.com
7. ManLe: pineapplecove.blogspot.com
8. Chiaki: stampingpro.com
9. Elena: bearsaurus-craftroom.haven.blogspot.com
10. Laura: bytkg.blogspot.com
11.Cheryl: pinkydots.blogspot.com
12.Angie: mychicnscratch.com
13.Linda: inkstampandscrap.com
14.Mary: stampinpretty.com
15.Debi: craftybuzz.blogspot.com
16.Linda: yamstamps.com                

7 things about myself

*My first love is God and His people.

* I like working with children.

* My favorite place away from home is Hawaii.

* I love making cards and 3D items to brighten the day of others.

* I really like Hello Kitty and have met her 5 times. (Does this count as 2 things?)

* I enjoy watching police drama shows on TV.

* I love collecting lots of items:  crafting items, purses, shoes, bracelets, Hello Kitty items, Precious Moment dolls and figurines, VIP Bears, and cute Asian and Hawaiian items.

Thanks for stopping by today.  Be sure to check out the above 16 blogs if do not already follow them.  

Anything Goes Swap for February

I hope that everyone had a wonderful weekend.  Are you all set to start another week? My family and I had a nice weekend together especially with the SoCal weather being so beautiful.  We especially had a good time with meeting with some friends for lunch and for dinner on Sunday.  Yes, we ate plenty of good food to last for awhile.  For the next week or so it's only eating salads for me.  LOL!  Today I would like to share with you what I received for my "Anything Goes" swap from last month.  This is what Jayne made for me and sent to me for the Valentine's Day theme.

This is the heart shaped card that I made for her using one of my Spellbinder dies and the sizzlit heart die from Stampin Up. 

I did not realized how many Spellbinders I had until I used this die. I need to start using them more often.  Actually there a lots of stamps, accessories, and dies that I need to use more often.  LOL!  

What's better than crafting... some yummy food.

I hope that everyone is having a good weekend.  I'm sorry, but I don't have anything crafty to post today, but I do have some pictures of some yummy food.  My son's school got out of school early on Friday so we thought it would be fun for the 4 of us to go out for lunch together.  We all love Japanese food so we went to a local restaurant Japanese restaurant.  My hubby and daughter shared some chicken teriyaki and a double order of tempura.

I ordered mix sushi, tempura, and yellowtail rolls.

My son ordered chicken teriyaki, tempura, and Calif. rolls. (Sorry I did not take a picture of the Calif. rolls.)

For dessert we ordered our favorite- fried tempura ice cream.

For those of you who have never tried fried tempura ice cream, it's pancake fried in tempura and filled with ice cream.  It't super ono!  Here is how is looks inside.

Have I gotten your mouth to water yet and crave some for Japanese food?  :) My family and I had a good time having lunch together since we rarely go out to lunch together on a weekday.  I hope that all of you will have a fun, crafty and yummy weekend.  :)

A Date and Some RAKs

Happy Wednesday!  Today my hubby and I spent the day at Disneyland just the two of us.

Even though we have gone there so many times over the past year with our passes this is only our second time going there together with just the two of us.  Hopefully we will get to go one more time on a "date" before they expire at the end of this month.  Today I would like to share with you what I have received as some very thoughtful RAK.  This is from Shirl.  Thanks again for surprising me with such fun items. I especially like the little cards.  I can't wait ink up the super cute stamp set.  :)

This is from Sherri.  Thanks again Sherri for taking time to me such a cute board especially since it's in one of my favorite theme.

This is RAK is from Jill.  The box that she made for me is just too cute and the cookies she made using the Stampin Up cookie cutters fit perfectly in the box. I could not believe that the cookies made it to me in once piece even though they were not mailed in a heavy duty box or a bubble envelope.

I thank the Lord each day for the all of you and for the friendship that He has blest us with.  I hope that everyone is having a good week so far.  Happy crafting/stamping and God bless!

Secret Sister Swap for February

I hope that everyone had a good weekend.  Mine was very relaxing for a change so I was very happy.  Even though my family and I did not have any plans besides just two small events, unfortunately I did not do much crafting.  :(  I did get to check out different blogs that I left comments on.  All of you continue to amaze me with all your creative ideas.  Thanks for being an inspiration to me.  Today, I would like to share with you what I made and sent to my secret sister, Kathy, last month.

This is what my secret sister sent and made for me. I love all the detail that she put into making my the card.

Here's the inside of the card with the flowers that she sent to me.  The flowers are perfect for me since they are purple, my favorite color.  :)

If anyone is interested in join the secret sister swap leave me a comment and I can give you the information to sign up.  It's a great way to meet new friends that are very creative.  Thanks for stopping by!