The Happiest of Anniversaries -- with many more to come! =D

Hello everyone!  So, today is a VERY special day for me... it's our 3rd Anniversary!  3 years ago today, I married my absolute best friend and we had the most amazing wedding!  It was a very special day with lots and LOTS of fun for everyone!  Our wedding was REALLY big (about 400 people, we invited 500!) because Zach has a gigantic family and my family knows EVERYONE.  =)  It was a really perfect day, and we took LOTS of pictures!  =)

For our 3rd Anniversary, my husband and I had a fabulous dinner last Sunday out at a restaurant that is right on the Allegheny River... we had a fabulous view and the food was excellent!  Today we did things a little more low key, having a dinner at a local restaurant (one we'd never tried before because we always love trying new things!), then we went out for dessert, and shared a little champagne this evening!

One special thing that we always do for our anniversary is to share some blueberries.  I know this might sound strange, but during our wedding sermon (which was quite possibly the STRANGEST wedding sermon ever given!) the priest started talking about the price of blueberries in Washington state (we live in Pennsylvania).  He then tried to tie it back to the Beatitudes -- I wish I was joking but this really happened. I couldn't hide my complete shock over the chosen topic and many of our friends and family were too.  It's ended up being this funny blessing though, because we always remember the sermon about blueberries from our wedding and laugh!  We decided on our first anniversary that we'd always have something with blueberries for our anniversary!  Here's us tonight with some blueberry yogurt (with fresh blueberries of course!) at a Simply Yogurt:

OK so onto the project!  I'm not much for scrapbooking, but I did make a really nice scrapbook of our wedding!  It has lots of fab photos, journaling tags, stamping and all sorts of other techniques!  The full album can be viewed HERE, but I didn't want to put up the entire thing on my blog.  Here are a few of my favorite pages:

The Front Cover -- the embellishments are handmade clay flowers!

This is my favorite picture that we took at the wedding!  It really shows just how happy we were that day!

 Just married!  I made several pull out tags for this scrapbook -- the blue one in this picture reads: "After the ceremony, we took pictures and went for a limo ride!  The pics started in the church and ended in a beautiful courtyard!  This was the slowest part of the day, and we had SO much fun!  =)"

I also love this picture and quote!  This picture really highlights my dress which I LOVED!  =)

We took a lot of pictures with our parents, but this one from the rehearsal ended up being my favorite.  I like it because in order, it goes: Zach's Dad, my Mom, Zach, Me, my Dad, and Zach's Mom.  It reminds me of how easily our lives blended together!  =)

Our relationship started because Zach taught me how to swing dance!  Of course at our wedding we had to show off!

I wanted to include as many pictures as possible, so on a few pages I made photo collages like this to showcase more pictures!  This one is my favorite!

Another favorite picture of mine, and we are planning on living a long happy ever after!  =D

WOW ok I know long post!  Again if you want to view the whole scrapbook in picture format, go HERE!  Thanks for visiting and reading about our anniversary and wedding story!  I hope you enjoyed it!  =) 

Casual Fridays #2

Well hi there blogland!  WOW it's been a really long time since my last post!  This month of May has so SO much going on that I really haven't had much time for crafting!  Luckily, I've finally found a little time and I'm SO excited to play along with my first challenge over at CAS-ual Fridays!  This week's challenge was Buttons and Twine:

Both buttons and twine are two things that I really enjoy putting on my cards, so here's what I came up with:

How cute is that background stamp?  It's a Studio G cling stamp and I couldn't wait to ink it up!  Then I colored the flowers with copics, and created the center focal point!  I thought it would be fun to make little "balloon buttons" using some Divine Twine and buttons from my stash!  I then made the button and twine border to finish off the card!

=)  In other news, my Father-in-Law got remarried over the weekend!  Basically, they've been together since I've known my hubby, and we've all always considered ourselves one big happy family!  It was nice to just finally make it official!  They got married at a lighthouse in Annapolis (it was an amazing ceremony filled with both families' cultures - Irish and Persian) and we all got to have a part.  It was super special and the entire weekend was filled with a lot of love and blessings. 

As part of their wedding gift, I made their wedding announcements!  Here's what they looked like:

 

I really had a great time doing this for them, and they absolutely loved them!  They displayed them at the reception and used a picture of it for their u-stream of the wedding!  Needless to say, making 70 of these has consumed my every crafty minute for a good while, but it was ABSOLUTELY worth it!  =)

Ok, that's it from here!  Have a splendiforous day! 

Crafting Madness!!!

Hi everyone!  I hope you have all had a great week!  I've been having a busy week with lots of school, crafting, and home projects!  my hubby and I tore out the carpeting in our dining room to expose the beautiful (and TOTALLY FINISHED) hardwood floors!  I'll post some pics of that this week!  =)

Also, I've been crafting up a storm lately, but haven't been posting much!  Today, I wanted to share a card that was inspired by SO many things!  First, I've been following Britta Swiderski's "No Stress Distress Inks" series on her blog, and I have to say that I was so inspired to start distressing backgrounds and layering ink a LOT more!  Then this week's PTI "Make It Monday" Challenge came along, and I knew that I had to do some ink blending!!  Thus, I got out my PTI Sweet Blush ink and my Ranger "Worn Lipstick" distress ink, and a DOILY, and here's what happened:

I first applied the sweet blush ink to the entire card base, and lightly to the diecut circle.  Then, I used a doily as a mask and applied worn lipstick distress ink over the doily and blended the worn lipstick right into the sweet blush.  Then I stamped the couple silhouette on the diecut circle, attached the vellum sentiment, and added some pretty pearls!  I love the faded look of the masked doily!  =)  I like this card so much I'm also going to enter it into the Wee Memories Challenge #49: Anything Goes! 

I hope everyone has been doing well lately!  I've been super busy getting some card sets made for a small crafting show that I'm going to this weekend!  I'm so excited to have people looking at my cards and tags!  Woo Hoo!  I'm also working on some bridal invites too that I'll be sharing at some point and time so stay tuned!  =D 



Paper: 
PTI - Stamper's Select White and Vintage Cream Cardstock
Stamps and Ink: 
PTI - Sweet Blush Ink
Ranger Distress Ink - Worn Lipstick
Wedding Silhouette - Inkadinkado
Other: 
Doily
Pearls
Vellum/Ribbon Sentiment

Lawn Fawn Mania!!!

Good evening readers!  So I LOVE having some time off of work -- it always means more crafty goodness!  I have three cards for you today, all with lovely Lawn Fawn stamps!  Here's the first one:

I got Bannerific for my birthday this year, and so I was SO excited to finally ink it up!  I also used the dog from Critters in the 'Burbs, and Harold's ABC's.  I colored everything with copics, added some twine from The Twinery, and some fun birthday ribbon!  =)  This card was inspired by the Wee Memories Challenge 35 - The Colors of the Season:

We also have a wedding on the first of the year this Saturday, and so I needed to make a wedding card!  This is what I came up with:

This card also allowed me to use Bannerific some more, as well as my new Worn Lipstick Ranger Distress Ink!  Once again, Teeny Tiny Backdrops just works so well with so many cards!  I also used Antique Linen Distress Ink to give the card a more vintage-y feel!  I colored the pearls and birds with Copics and used some Fruit Punch Stickles.  This card was inspired by the City Crafter Challenge 37 - Stamp it Out; AND the Play Date Cafe Color Challenge 62:

Finally, I made one more kind of funky card that I ended up really liking:

Here, I used my Cuttlebug embossing folder and tag die cuts to create several of the layers of this card.  I used Staz On Timber Brown and Versamagic Sea Breeze inks and several Lawn Fawn stamp sets.  I used ivory grosgrain ribbon and brown twine for some extra texture.  I added some last minute touches with Waterfall Stickles and Pearls colored with Copics.  This card was inspired by the Curtain Call Color Challenge 62: 

Well, that's all I have for  you today!  I hope that everyone is ready to bid 2010 a happy farewell, and welcome in 2011 for a wonderful new year!  =) 


Paper: 
* Neenah, Bazzill, and Recollections Cardstock
Stamps and Ink: 
* Lawn Fawn Stamp Sets
* Ranger Distress Inks
* Staz On
* Versamagic and Memento
Embellishments: 
* Pearls
* Ribbons
* Twine
* Stickles
* Cuttlebug
* Copic Markers

Congrats and Critters!

Hi readers!  I just have two quick cards to share with you before I hit the hay tonight!  =)  I hope everyone had a craftastic week!  Here's my first card:

This is just a card that could be used for either a wedding or an engagement!  I love this little chapel stamp that I think is from Studio G!  And once again the Lawn Fawn teeny tiny backdrops and sophie's sentiments stamps are just perfect for every occasion!  All of the cardstock is from Neenah, and the inks are Versamagic (pixie dust) and Studio G.  Flower embellishments are Flora Doodles.

This card was inspired by the following challenges:
1.  OTWC 37 -
2. Caardvarks Final Challenge - Monochromatic Card

My next card is for the Lawn Fawn CHA/Magazine challenge!  If you haven't entered this one yet, you DEF want to!  You still have a few days!  I decided to keep this one fairly simple and to let the stamps speak for themselves:

I used my Critters in the Burbs stamps here, paper-pieced the tree, and colored in the cat and butterfly.  Originally, the uneven ink for the grass wasn't intentional, but then I decided that I liked it and it added a neat texture like real grass, so I purposefully went for that "uneven" look!  =)

Card stock is from Neenah, Recollections and Bazzill.  Ink is from Memento (Tuxedo Black) and Color Box (Green).

Well, I hope you enjoyed these cards for today!  I was also tagged in a fun blog tag of fours entry by Lisa, and I'll be posting that tomorrow!  Happy stamping!!!  =)