More Webster's Pages

I made today's card using another sheet of my new Webster's Pages paper. Remember, this was my pick for "New Favorite Paper" at Summer CHA? Sometimes, you just have to let the designer paper you use stand on it's own, and that's just what I did for this card. I just couldn't cover up all the prettiness of it with other "stuff

This pattern is from their Sweet Charity Collection and is called Serendipity! Isn't it precious? It would be perfect for a mini album showcasing your garden, or, it would be stunning in a baby girl album! Since I don't have any living creatures in my house that are of the female persuasion, I just had to go with a simple thank you card instead!

For the stamping part of the card, I knew I wanted to stick with the "bontanical" theme of the paper. So I chose my Hero Arts window leaves stamp. The image is stamped with Brown Staz-on and then painted with my aqua painter and Old Olive and More Mustard inkds. For some dimension, I covered the leaves with Liquid Embossing finish (it's from All Night Media). I let that dry and then cut the stamped image out and layered it on a piece of shimmery pink paper. I cut it out using decorative scissors. I doodled around the edges of the scallop to tie into the brown of the stamped image.

The horizontal strip underneath the leaves is just a piece of More Mustard cardstock distressed with Ranger Ink in Walnut. I used some of this ink to distress the edges of the Serendipity paper as well. The sentiment is from Hero Arts. The other little tool I used on today's card was my new Heidi Swapp edge distressing tool! I've been seeing alot of edge distressing going on again, and of course, being me, I needed to jump on the bandwagon. Actually, I'm probably one of the only people left who DIDN'T have this tool, but I've gotten by just fine using my Pampered Chef scraper to distress edges.

Speaking of new things.....I'm afraid I've been on a buying spree! It's time to put the old debit card away and protect it from people like me. This baby's smokin' I've used it so much lately!!!!! So ya wanna know what I've bought? Well, thanks to all you enablers that took my Bind-It-All poll last week, I've caved and bought one!!! Of course, I haven't used it since I bought it (which was only Friday afternoon), but I'm hoping today is my lucky day for that. Next, I finally caved and bought a Janome Sew Mini Sewing Machine! I've been eyeing this sucker ever since Cambria bought one months ago. I've got a big machine, but it's been acting up lately and making my stitches look ugly. I'm sure all it needs is a cleaning, but I'd rather spend $40 bucks (I bought it this week when it was only $39.99!!!!!) on this little wizard than $40 bucks (or more) to clean and fix my big machine!!!!! I'm so smart and logical, aren't I? Always trying to justify......

Thirdly, I snatched up the BRAND NEW "Rockstar" matstacks from DCWV (Die Cuts with A View)!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Woo-hoo!!! Can you believe I bought this at Archivers? The Conservative Products Capital of the World? When I saw this line at CHA, I wanted it so badly, but was sad because the line is a real stretch for DCWV, and retailers alike. They told me at CHA that the retailers that were carrying it were reporting that it was flying off the shelves, but I really didn't think ARCHIVERS would decide to carry it! I can best describe the paper line as "sophisticated grunge", its filled with GORGEOUS paper filled with skulls and electric guitars on it (and trust me, I am NOT a skulls fan, but this stuf ROCKS!). If you've got teenagers at home, you need this paper!!!! The line has paper in colors geared toward both boys and girls (brown and greens for boys, pinks and blacks for girls). There is lots of foil and flocking on the paper too! I'm so PUMPED I got some in my hot little hands people!!!! These papers will make fabulous teen birthday cards! It is SO COOL!

Well, I think that' about all I've gotten lately. If I forgot anything, I'll be sure and report back here later today. I hope you are all doing well. Life here is still busy. One last baseball game today. My son has been playing in an All Star tournament since Wednesday. His team (which is made up of the top 2-3 players from each of the teams in our region) is undefeated so far! Today is the championship game. He played two games yesterday which we sat watching IN THE RAIN for 4 hours. It not only rained, it was COLD! Brrrrr. I'm hoping the sun comes out today. We definitely needed the rain cuz our grass is d-e-a-d dead. But we did not need the COLD along with it.

I'm bummed to report none of my cards got picked up for the Dec issue of CARDS. Grrrr. Is this submission stuff even worth the aggravation of not having your work acknowleged by these companies? I'm leaning toward answering that with a big resounding NO! I have NO idea if my submissions were even RECEIVED via email because they don't send anything to you if your cards are not chosen (and they don't let you know they received them either). The submission world is definintely tough on the ego, that's for sure. I really just want to say "screw you" to the whole deal, but I'm afraid that's just sour grapes. My ego is bruised once again, and it's showing. I know, I know. Keep trying. That's what you're saying to me in your mind right now. "Don't give up". But jeepers, I want to. What I really want to do is send "someone" an email at CARDS and ask them what's wrong with my cards. I want to get some advice from them about what I can do to catch their eye. I've submitted some awesome work to this pub but it's not good enough and that's frustrating!

Ok, I know, it's time to put an end to this immature rant. You know what I think my problem is? I think my cards have too much stamping for CARDS and not enough stamping for other publications. I'm right in the middle. I use both, and I think the pubs, depending on their style, want all paper crafting cards or all stamping cards. And I'm not going to change for them. I do what I do and if it's not good enough well then I'm going to have to decide whether or not I'm going to continue on this submissions rollercoaster and deal with the rejection maturely, or jump off and nurse my wounds privately. I definitely have some thinking to do over the next few weeks.