Bella Willow's Going To A Craft Show

As if my life isn't busy enough . . . I sign up for a craft show? Originally I signed up just so I could hang out for a nice leisurely day with my dear stamping friend Paris. She is always so busy with her SU business, her children, and all her other activities that I thought it would be a great way for us to have a nice fun day hanging out together. I have been to a couple of craft shows with her over the past year and it was so much fun. Paris let me bring a few of my stamped items and we put them at her table. So this time I decided to get my own table and really do it up. We also invited our dear friend Kristina so she could hang out with us and bring some of her stamped items too.

So . . . for the past month . . . I have been working on small and large journals, cards . . . lots of cards, and lots of altered items. Here are two cards I made this morning for the craft show.

The card base is from Archivers, but I'm sorry I don't know the color off hand. The designer paper and embellishments are from Paper Adventures. The ribbon is from May Arts. The stamped images are Ollie and Olivia from Stampendous and that cute little bear is from SU's Bundle of Joy. I fun flocked Ollie, Olivia, and that sweet little bear. I never seem to have any baby cards or wedding cards in my stash and I thought these might work. What do you think? Can Ollie and Olivia pass for a wedding card?

I hope everyone had a great weekend . . . and you didn't forget to set your clocks back. I will be back again this week with a lot of stuff I made for the craft show.

Big stamping hugs!

~ Pegi

I've Been Tagged . . .

. . . by my dear friend Kristina Lewis. In this game of tag, I am supposed to list what I was doing ten, twenty, and thirty years ago.

Ten Years Ago 1997: It has been exactly ten years ago that I bought my very own car for the first time and got my very first Minnesota driver's license. I always had access to cars, but preferred to walk, ride my bike, or take the bus. I had just moved out of the City though, and was working a lot of crazy retail hours at the Men's Wearhouse, and really needed to start driving. How many people remember when they were younger and they walked, and biked, and took the bus everywhere? Now when I go somewhere I am so short on time, or so dang tired from my hect life that I drive around the parking lot until I find the closest parking spot. How sad is that?

Twenty Years Ago 1987: I remember this year perfectly. I moved from my hometown of Lincoln, Nebraska to Minneapolis, Minnesota on November 2, 1987. The Minnesota Twins had just won the World Series a couple of weeks before and the Twin Cities were still celebrating when I got here. My best friend from college and her family lived here and there were so many more job opportunities than back home, so I came. I remember when I first got here they took me out to Figlio's in Uptown and I had Calamari for the first time in my life. If they had told me it was squid when we ordered it . . . I know I would have never tried it. Thank goodness they didn't tell me and that was just the beginning of so many new and wonderful things in my life.

Thirty Years Ago 1977: OMG . . . what an awesome year!!! I graduated from Lincoln East High School in Lincoln, Nebraska that year. I went to Adventureland in Iowa with three of my high school girlfriends right after graduation and then I moved away from my parents' home and was off to go live and go to school at the University of Nebraska where my major was interior design and fashion merchandising. I met my very best friend in the whole world, Terry, and we are still friends to this day. We listened to a lot of the Bee Gee's that year and I was so in love with their little brother Andy Gibb. I even got to see him in concert that year.

It seems like everyone has already been tagged, so if you haven't been tagged already, you're it!!

Big stamping hugs!

~ Pegi

It's Figgy Pudding Time!!!

It's finally here . . . the long awaited newest Christmas paper from Basic Grey . . . Figgy Pudding!!! My dear friends at the Apple Valley Archivers know how much I just adore Basic Grey . . . and they always manage to call me right away when the latest line comes in so I can get my 6 x 6 pads. I just love those little pads for making cards.

So in honor of Figgy Pudding's release . . . I broke out some Christmas stamps and made this little card. The card base is SU's Chocolate Chip, the designer paper is from a 6 x 6 pad of Figgy pudding, the main stamped image is from SU's Flaky Friends, and the sentement is from Hero Arts. I used SU small brads on the corners, Bo Bunny decorative brads on the cards, SU's 5/8" chocolate chip ribbon layered with Creative Impressions organdy dotted ribbon. I paper pieced my snowmen and colored in the buttons and carrot noses with SU markers. I used glitter on the edges of my snowmen for a little "bling" as my dear friend Taylor would call it.

On another note . . . a lot of my stamping and blogging friends have asked about my new stamping room that I converted from my unused guest room into a fabulous space where I can make all the messes I want . . . and then just close the door on it. I recently added a second table so I can have stamping friends over. I try to keep the room clean in case I have friends over to stamp, but sometimes . . . like tonight . . . it gets a little out of control and takes on a life of it's own.

So without further ado . . . here is my new space . . . before my Figgy Pudding card . . . and after.

I sure did make a mess tonight . . . but had a lot of fun stamping and just hanging out. Anyone wanna come over and help me clean up?

Thanks for stopping by and have a great day tomorrow!

~ Pegi

P.S. I got tagged . . . twice . . . by my dear friend Kristina Lewis . . . so I will be back tomorrow and post more about that for you.

Also . . . it appears that this little 'ol blog is fast approaching the 10,000 mark . . . and we all know what that means . . . Blog Candy!!!

Big stamping hugs!!

Life Is Good . . . And Hectic Too!!!

I am feeling like the worst blogger ever right now! Life continues to be good . . . but very hectic!! My new mortgage job is going great and all my marketing attempts are finally starting to pay off. I absolutely love my job . . . don't get me wrong . . . but I sure do miss stamping and blogging and visiting my friends' blogs and just basically working and living and enjoying life at my own pace.

Being self employed for the past three years has definitely had it's advantages. It has allowed me to have a work life and a fun life for the first time in 10 years. You can work from home in your pajamas . . . which is awesome!! You hardly spend any money on gas. Waiting for an important call from a client or an underwriter . . . no problem . . . just go clean out the cat box or do a few dishes or empty the garbages while you're waiting. Sitting there waiting for that 50 page fax to go through . . . hey . . . go into your stamp room and play a little bit. I was the "Queen of Multi-Tasking" . . . and now I'm just the "Day Late And A Dollar Short Girl"!

So . . . as time goes by . . . and I settle into my new life going outside the home to work . . . I continue to learn how to live life the way most people do ~ crazy, busy, hectic, schedules with never enough time to do the things you want. My house isn't so clean anymore, Willow misses me terribly . . . or maybe it's me that misses her . . . or maybe a little of both, and I can never find the time to stamp and blog and just relax like I used to . . . but I have to say . . . Life is good!!!

Now about my card . . . I spent last weekend at my dear friend and SU upline Paris Otremba's house for a stamping slumber party and I got to bring Willow with me. Our dear friend Kristina Lewis was there and we had so much fun. Paris challenged me to an SCS Sketch Challenge and this was the one she chose. It is Sketch Challenge 38. I made this card using Regal Rose as my card base and Fancy Pants designer paper for the card. Life Is Good is a rub on and the brads are SU's Regal Rose. It was a very simple and fun card to make. Sometimes you just have to make a simple card.

Thanks for stopping by!

~ Pegi

Basic Grey Christmas Card Class

It's never too early to start making Christmas cards. I think I need to start making Christmas cards year round though so I will have enough of them when Christmas actually gets here. Here's what usually happens . . . I start making my cards in July or August with leftover paper and embellishments from the year before . . . I put them in my stash for safekeeping and wait anxiously for the new paper and embellishments to start coming out in October . . . when the paper finally gets here, I make more cards with the new paper and put those in my stash . . . I've got most of my Christmas cards already made by November 1st and I can focus on my gift shopping . . . then my non-making card friends come over to my house and start going through my cards to see what last-minute birthday, anniversary, new baby, and thank you cards they might buy from me . . . they know I love to sell my cards to them because they gush all over them and tell all their friends that "Pegi made it" . . . and then . . . they spot the stash of Christmas cards and decide that they hate the store-bought Christmas cards they had to get and want to buy a few of mine for a couple of special friends . . . oh and a cousin or two . . . and they forgot about that client . . . and the boss . . . and the neighbor down the street . . . and before you know it . . . my Christmas card stash is gone and I have to scramble at the last minute to make my Christmas cards because I didn't have the heart to say no to my dear friends . . . and . . . well . . . everybody already knows me as the day late and a dollar short girl . . . so why break tradition. And this year is going to be no different. I am still a day late and a dollar short and will probably be scrambling at the last minute to make my Christmas cards . . . it's a tradition.

One very different thing about this year is all the beautiful friends I have met from all over the world through stamping and blogging. I feel so blessed to have you all in my life. So as I continue to scramble to get all of my Christmas cards made, and beat myself up for always being a day late and a dollar short, I will manage to say a little prayer and count my blessings for all the wonderful friends that are always right on time with their friendship, love, and support. Thank you ladies!!!

Oh yeh . . . about the cards . . . I made these three cards for my October card-making classes at Memory Creek. I love teaching classes, but have found it a bit difficult to come up with something that people will be able to make. My biggest challenge is that number one . . . I can't use anything Stampin' Up! . . . and number two . . . Ann doesn't carry any stamps in her store. Okay . . . so how do you teach advanced cardmaking/stamping without any stamps? Easy . . . you either go through your stash of what you may have at home . . . you go to Archivers and purchase what you may want to use . . . or in this particular case . . . you score a really cute Stampendous Christmas Tree stamp at a garage sale for $3.00. The other two stamps I already had at home in my stash.

Have a great night everybody . . . I'm off to get started on my Christmas cards . . . and I will be back again tomorrow with a frame I made for my craft show.

Big stamping hugs!

~ Pegi

All Spruced Up . . . In Basic Grey!

Hello everyone! I can't believe it has been a week since I had the time to sit down and blog . . . ugh!! It has been a crazy busy week. Work has been very hectic as always. I am preparing for a big speech next Friday in front of 200 CRS (Certified Residental Specialist) Real Estate Agents. I have never done any public speaking in my life . . . so if anyone has any pointers . . . it would be much appreciated. We had a very successful Clean Sweep sale at Memory Creek last weekend. It was a lot of fun and my dear sweet friend Kristina Lewis was there to help me and join in on some of the fun. You will have to ask Kristina about her great bargains she found at the sale! I guess I have been having too much fun lately and not taking very good care of myself, because I have been a little under the weather most of the week. Hopefully, I will start feeling better soon because I have a very busy week ahead of me. I am counting down the days until Friday when Paris, Kristina, Chris, and myself leave for our big stamping retreat. I can't wait!!!

I just joined my very first stamp club and I am so excited. That Kristina Lewis is so amazing and I have been having so much fun hanging out with her and her beautiful family and meeting all of her stamping friends. We had our very first meeting on Friday evening at Artsy Tartsy and had a shoebox swap. I had never done that before and it was a blast. Our dear friends Tami Wood and Kathleen Hopperstad were there and I met some new ladies too. Ruth Ann, Wendy, and Darlene. We had so much fun and I can't wait until our next club meeting.

So here is the card that I designed for my next stamp club meeting. I am getting a head start on all my Christmas cards this year . . . especially with the upcoming craft show at Christina Huddelston Elementary School in Lakeville, MN coming up on November 17th. If you live anywhere near the Lakeville area, Paris, Kristina, Niki, and myself will all be there. We got three tables right next to each other and plan on making all kinds of fun stuff to sell.

This card was used with Basic Grey's Fruitcake paper and SU's Fun and Fast Notes stamp set. I used the new 5/8" ribbon from SU and layered it with organdy dotted ribbon from Creative Impressions. I paper pieced my tree and finished it off with Cloud 9 red rain dots. I am in the process of designing some more Christmas cards and will feature them all week.

I hope everyone is having a great weekend, and thank you so much for all your beautiful comments and for the emails I got asking if everything was okay since I had not been here all week. I can't believe it was a whole week with no stamping and no blogging. I have a lot of catching up to do around here.

Big stamping hugs to everyone and I will talk to you all again soon.

~ Pegi

Introducing Lily!!!

I would like you all to meet sweet little Lily. Lily is actually Willow's baby niece (Willow's father is Lily's grandfather). Lily is 16 weeks old and . . . well I don't have to tell you . . . absolutely adorable!!! Lily is staying with us until she can go to her new permanent home. A few people have wanted to take Lily home with them . . . I mean who wouldn't . . . but Lily's breeder has to find the perfect home for this little cutie. For now we are giving her lots of hugs, kisses, and love as I try not to become too attached to her and not want to give her up. My sweet little Willow has taken Lily under her wing and is being the perfect auntie to this sweet little baby. They play together, eat together, and I even just caught them napping together on Willow's bed. It doesn't get any cuter than this!!

Also, I wanted to thank everyone for leaving a comment about your big weekend plans. Sounds like you are all keeping busy and having some fun this weekend too. The cleaning didn't sound like much though. The winners of the card giveaway are Tami Wood, Rita, and Michelle. Ladies, please send me your snail mail addresses and I will get those to you right away.

Thanks again for stopping by and for all your fun comments. I am just finishing up a fun project and I will try to get it posted in the morning.

Big stamping hugs from Pegi, Willow, and baby Lily!

Friday Card Giveaways!!!

Hello everyone!!! Did you think I forgot about our little tradition here at BellaWillow? I know . . . a day late and a dollar short as always . . . so today I have three cards for our Friday Card Giveaway.

I designed these cards for my first month of card making classes at Memory Creek where I am a card instructor. The classes were fun and I met some wonderful women. We had a lot of fun trying out some new stamps, punches, and techniques. I hope they will join me again next month.

My cards were made using Bazill paper for the bases and the designer paper is from Bo Bunny's Shabby Princess line. The stamp set is Just Picked from Technique Tuesday. I am loving these Technique Tuesday stamps. Oops . . . the first card is made using the Hippie Flower stamp from Limited Edition and the sentement is from Amuse. The other two cards are Technique Tuesday and the sentement is from my computer. Hey . . . if you can't find the right stamp . . . wing it!!

If you would like a chance to win one of these cards, please leave a comment on my blog and tell me about your exciting plans for the weekend. I will put all the names in a hat and draw three lucky winners out tomorrow night and announce the winners Sunday morning.

I hope you all have great plans for the weekend and thanks again so much for all your kind words.

Big stamping hugs,

~ Pegi

Bridal Party Bellas Dressed In Stella Ruby

When my very dear sweet title closer Cassie first approached me about making six cards for her bridal attendants, I was flattered . . . but a little apprehensive. All I could think of was wedding . . . white . . . lace . . . fru fru . . . yuck. How could I come up with something for that? She then explained that they were going to be part of the girls' thank you gifts, that her colors were red and pink, that she really liked my style, and to do whatever I wanted. We did agree that it would be nice to somehow incorporate each girls' name or first initial on the card to really make it their own. Okay . . . I could do that.

Bridalpartybella . . . that was my very first thought and so I took her to the Stampingbella website and she loved the stamp and immediately ordered it for me to use. My next big challenge was finding a designer paper that worked well with The Bellas, had red and pink in it, and was true to my funky vintage style. OMG . . . Basic Grey Stella Ruby was perfect and she loved it too!

So now that you know how the planning went, here is the card I came up with. Thirty paper pieced Bellas, each with their own unique dress on, 84 corner punches, 60 Swarovski Crystals, and 12 ribbons just to name a few.

Big hugs go out to my very dear sweet friend Kristina Lewis of Balance for helping me with the initials. She picked out the Quickutz letters from her magic bag of tricks and punched each one out for me. Thank you Kristina!!! I think these letters put the finishing touch on these cards. The funky style lettering goes very nice with the Stella Ruby paper and the Bellas.

And of course my dear sweet little puppy had to get in on the action too. "Look Momma . . . you dropped something!!" Do you remember the story of how Willow sits under my stamping desk and waits for any piece of paper . . . no matter how small . . . to drop from the sky? Well it looks as though she has caught herself a little paper treat. In case you can't see it . . . Willow has a small piece of paper stuck on her mouth. Can any Stampin' Up! fans tell what that is stuck to her sweet little face?

I hope everyone is having a great week . . . I know I am!!! Lot's of fun stuff going on here and I will have to sit down later and tell you all about it. Have a great day everyone . . . and thank you all so much for continuing to read my blog and for all your wonderful comments as I continue to grow in this craft. A very special thank you goes out to Kristina Lewis for all your beautiful compliments. You make me want to try new things as I continue to spread my wings and come out of my shell in this whole crazy stamping/papercrafting world. Big hugs to you and your beautiful family!!

Big stamping hugs to everyone from me and Willow!!

~ Pegi

I've Been Tagged . . . And Then Tagged Again!!!

There is a lot of blog tag going on right now and I'm happy to join right in on this fun game!!!

First of all I was tagged by Taylor and here is how her little game of tag works.

1. YOUR ROCKSTAR NAME (first pet, current car): Mia Jetta . . . okay this game might be kinda fun . . . that sounds like a famous rock star or a rock star's daughter.

2. YOUR GANGSTA NAME (favorite ice cream, favorite cookie): Chocolate Chocolate Chip . . . okay that's really gonna impress all my gangsta friends. "Word up . . . Chocolate Chocolate Chip here . . . holla back if you wanna go to Archivers and stamp with me tonight".

3. YOUR FLY "GUY/GIRL" NAME (first initial first name, first 3 letters last name): P-Tay . . . P-Diddy . . . okay that might work.

4. YOUR DETECTIVE NAME (favorite color, favorite animal): Pink Cat . . . okay I guess that works . . . wasn't the Pink Panther a detective?

5. YOUR SOAP OPERA NAME (middle name, city where you were born): Sue Lincoln

6. YOUR STAR WARS NAME (first 3 letters last name, first 2 letters first name): Taype . . . not a big Star Wars Fan . . . would that be pronounced TAY-PEE or just TAPE? Either way . . . it sounds stupid!

7. YOUR SUPERHERO NAME (2nd favorite color, favorite drink, & add "the"): The Blue Fresca . . . what kind of a crazy superhero is that?

8. YOUR NASCAR NAME (first names of your Grandfathers): Harold Heye . . . okay . . . I think Harry drives a mean race car.

9. YOUR STRIPPER NAME (favorite perfume, favorite candy): Chanel M&M's . . . I better do like Cher, Prince, and Madonna . . . use my first name only!

10. YOUR WITNESS PROTECTION NAME (Mother's & Father's middle names): Louise Lee


I was then tagged by my dear friend Kristina and here is how her game of tag works.

Four Tidbits

Four Places I have worked:
1) IMS Mortgage Services, Inc.
2) Midwest Lending
3) Men's Wearhouse
4) Sears

Four Places I have lived:
1) Minneaolis, MN
2) Des Moines, IA
3) Columbia, SC
4) Lincoln, NE

Four Places I have been on Vacation:
1) St. Thomas US Virgin Islands
2) St. Maarten
3) Sanibel Island, FL
4) Seattle, WA

Four Favorite Foods
1) CHOCOLATE!!!
2) Pizza
3) Mexican
4) Chineese Buffet

Four Friends I'm tagging that are most likely to respond:
1) Paris Otremba
2) Sheila Oliver
3) Michelle White
4) Tammy McBeain

I hope everyone is having a great weekend and now I am off to go stamp and will hopefully have some fun cards to post.

Thanks for stopping by.

~ Pegi