Wowser is all I can say!

The new stamp pads arrived in Monday's mail.  Considering I didn't order them until Friday afternoon and they were sent from the east coast that was pretty impressive!

Any way, they are so much nicer to use and they make nice clear impressions.

I have learned some lessons though about the stamping process:

• It can be messy and you can smudge the the card or paper using them.
• You only get one go at each stamping and if you blow it you could ruin the project.  I have decided that I will not stamp directly onto my cards, I will stamp onto a different piece of card and stick the piece of card with the stamp on into the card.
• I still need to practice.....a lot!
• You can roll ink on embossed card and it will just colour the bumps as in the pink card with the blue dots above.  The pink card next to it is just embossed so you can see the difference.  This will be great with my Christmas cards as I emboss the front on a lot of them.  I like to layer my other cards with one of my layers being embossed so it will be nice to add a bit of colour to the embossed layer.

I will not just be using stamping on my cards, I will only use it for verses and backgrounds.  I like to decoupage my cards with the cut outs.  I have spent a couple of days assembling flowers.

I need to use my dies to cut out some more 'greetings' then I will have plenty of things ready to make more cards.

I do so like the winter months as it gives me more time to do crafty things.

I need to make some curtains next for our bedrooms upstairs.

An update on the stamping progress!

**Warning! Photo heavy and a bit boring**

Well, I am a little disappointed in my progress on the stamping front.  I have concluded that the problem is the cheapie ink pads that came with the stamps I got at Christmas, (as well as user error!)  They have dried out very quickly and are not very big so I have difficulty getting the stamps inked evenly.

I did a lot of online research and have realised that you need to buy good quality refillable ink pads and bottles of refill ink to ensure even stamping.

But! and as I have said many times before, there is always a BUT!

Good ink pads and refills are very expensive to get an assortment of colours. The ones I like are $8 for the pad and $4 for a bottle of refill.  To get six different colours that comes to $72 plus mailing costs as we do not live anywhere near to a good craft store.

So I have been churning over and over whether to spend the money on the inkpads and refills.

I couldn't commit that much money, it defied logic to me.  I decided to check out ebay and found some inkpads that came with refills in  the brand I wanted.  They are the previous model of pad but a pad and a refill bottle were only $5.50 for the two. So I gritted my teeth and ordered 6 and I eagerly await their arrival next week. I negotiated on the mailing cost so that helped with the decision making. As you can see from the cards below, the stamping is patchy and feint.  I am really hoping the new ink pads and ink will solve that problem in the future.

I make cards because I really enjoy doing it and also because good quality ready made cards are very expensive.  I try to personalise the cards too, like my daughter likes dragon flies and one of my my granddaughters likes unicorns so I try to incorporate their likes into their cards and I really like matching envelopes.  I can  pretty up the envelopes to match the cards using the stamps or even make them with nice paper.  

This is what I have done lately:-

This one I will use, not 100% happy with it but it was made with love and it is my first home made matching envelope

This one will probably languish in the bottom of the 'made cards' box to be used only in emergencies. The stamping is not good, partly user error and partly bad ink pads.

This one is not finished yet, will certainly not be doing any stamping on it until the new pads are here.

It is dull and cold so I am trying to get organised by cutting out flowers, butterfies and greetings etc so they are ready for when I want to make more cards.  My husband is also tied up with a project of his own so I am getting more time to spend on my card making right now, which I am thoroughly enjoying.  There is something very therapeutic about running these dies through the Sizzix machine and popping out the shapes.

 I also cleared out an old set of plastic drawers to use for my supplies.  I had things in there belonging to my son from when he was a teenager.  They are tucked away now in a plastic tote and I have organised the supplies into the drawers.  Much easier! They sit right by my work table.

Will post again after the ink pads get here.  Fingers crossed they help a lot.

Wolferman's 1910 Original Recipe English muffins

 My goodness, have you ever tried these?  They are the most delicious muffins I have ever had.  We received a gift of a hamper which included a packet of these.

My husband said 'Oh they are good, my mother used to drive to KC to go to Wolferman's bakery just to buy them.'

We toasted one each with breakfast on Christmas Eve and I was instantly smitten.  We saved the other two for Boxing day.  

I googled if they were available online and yes, you can buy them online direct from the bakery.  I ordered a box of 6 packets and they arrived today.

They are so nice and thick, there are 4 in each packet.

I will be having one for dinner tonight, my husband says they are a breakfast thing but my mouth is watering so I will have one with some raspberry preserves. Yum!!!

All is revealed!

 Now all the festivities are over I can disclose what we bought everyone for Christmas this year.........

Yep, everyone got a wooden letter money bank with their own specific initial.  I thought they would be something folks could use and keep for a long time regardless of their age.

Now let me show you what I got for Christmas, I love it!  We saw it in the Black Friday deals at Walmart and it was only $50.  I couldn't believe it when I saw the price and said to my husband "That's what I want for Christmas please."

It sat wrapped up in Christmas wrapping until Christmas morning.  I don't know how I resisted opening it before.

Our trusty toaster had began to go on the blink and it would have cost more than $50 to replace it with a good one so this was the perfect solution.

I found some time this week to experiment with my new card stamping supplies.  I usually start out with an idea which doesn't come out quite like I envisage so it morphs into something else.

Here is my first attempt at including stamping.

I have watched several YouTube videos on stamping since then so now have some better ideas.

I am enjoying this hobby a lot and strive to get better in my endeavours.

Happy New year everyone.

Merry Christmas everyone!

 I juggled things around and finally found a place for the tiny tree, so from our house to yours every one, Merry Christmas!

Santa and the Nativity didn't cheer loud enough!

We sat down yesterday to watch England -v- France in the quarter finals of the World Cup.  I thought maybe England needed some extra support so Santa and the Nativity watched it too to cheer them on but obviously we didn't all cheer loud enough!  I think it might have been Maggie, our dog's indifference that did it, she slept through the whole thing!

The decorations and lights are up, inside and outside, cards have been mailed, gifts have been ordered and mostly delivered so just some baking and caramel corn to be made much closer to the time.

I have been thinking about introducing stamping into my card making so have been researching that and watching You tube videos.  

I am liking what I have seen so far.  I can buy a starter kit with stamps, stamping blocks and ink pads so will probably do that after Christmas ready for birthday cards.

Christmas cards are made

I have managed this year to get all my Christmas cards made in a timely fashion.  Stamps have been bought, labels have been printed so I am ready to start writing them, but I am procrastinating!!! Why? I have no idea.  I keep finding other jobs to do.  Weird!

Here is a selection of some I made:-

I have been quite ill with a really nasty cough and cold for 12 days now but I have managed to do other things.  Maybe I don't want to spread germs in the mail, yes! that must be it.  I am not infectious anymore I don't think so I must start on them soon.

Most of the Christmas presents have been ordered and delivered except one which was missing from one of the packages.  I have messaged the supplier through Amazon and they assure me they will get the missing item sent out.  Everybody, regardless of age or sex are getting the same thing this year and no, it is not gift cards or chocolates.  Can you guess what I have brought almost everybody? (All will be revealed after Christmas). I still have to find something for our son and daughter in law though.  The orders have been received for the three grand children from that family but 5 of the same thing in one house would be a bit much so I have to think of something different for the parents.

My husband and I are just getting one gift each this year and we have them already.  We got mine in Black Friday sale and I can't wait to get it.  I am very strict about not opening and using Christmas presents early so I have to abide by my own rules too.

It has been a tough year financially for most folks and we are no exception, our income is fixed so with the roaring inflation our buying ability gets less and less. But I will always try to buy presents for everyone at Christmas and hope that will always be the case.  With health issues and other things that had to get done this past year we haven't made any Christmas gifts, hopefully next year we will get back on track.

I did mail off the hoodie and felt Christmas tree ornaments for my great grandson in England this week so hopefully they will be there before Christmas.  They are not his Christmas gift, just something for the adorable young toddler whose 2nd Christmas this will be.

I also mailed off a birthday card for one of my granddaughters in England and I think this my best birthday card so far.

This will probably be my last post of 2022 as I only seem to post monthly these days so to all my blog friends I wish you the merriest of Christmases and a happy, healthy and prosperous New Year.

A delightful Christmas addition and on sale too!

Today we had to go for a doctor's appt. at the VA clinic which is 75 miles away.  To make the journey worthwhile we nipped into Menard's (big DIY store) to have a look around and to see their Christmas display. It wasn't as good as prior years but maybe they haven't finished it yet.

We found this Barn snow globe reduced from $24.99 to $9.99.

It is very well made and has the bonus feature of an LED light and a motor to move the liquid around so the glittery snow flakes are always moving.  I made a little video but it didn't upload so here is a photo instead but it doesn't do it justice. 

Even without the light and the moving liquid the snowflakes stay suspended for a long time.

It is absolutely delightful, a treasure to be brought out at Christmas for years to come.

The fallen tree

 In May when we were having such a lot of rain we had a huge oak tree uproot and fall.  It is at the back of our property so there was no rush to do anything with it.  As usual, I never thought to take a photo at the time.  From June onwards we have had very little rain so the top of the tree dried out nicely and it was time to cut it up.  It must have been at least 75 feet high before it fell.  Such a shame to lose it.  

We started to cut it up this past week.

At this point there is about 15 more feet to cut up.  The branches have all been cut into usable size logs and stacked already.

The larger logs at the back of the woodshed are from a previous year and still have to be split.  We plan to rent a wood splitter when we have it all cut up and probably fell another tree to make the cost of renting it viable. (We only take down dead trees or old leaning trees that could uproot, we would never have cut down the tree that fell). For a splitter that can be towed home and can handle those big logs it costs $80 plus for a day to rent. But the guy at the rental place told us if we pick it up early Saturday morning we don't have to return it until Monday morning for the cost of just 1 day so that's what we will do. Below is what we need to split so far from this tree.

The tops of the branches are always a nuisance to deal with, it is horrible to pick up and load into the small trailer to take to the brush pile.  It takes up a lot of room and pokes you all over when picking it up. Unfortunately, right now I am not much help at all as my back is still very sore and standing and walking is a problem.  But, when my husband is cutting wood I have to be there incase of any problems.  So I was sitting and and watching him work which I find very frustrating.  I was looking at the branch tops and thought that some enterprising teenager could break that all up and sell it as fire starter.  Well, no teenagers anywhere around so I thought I can do that whilst sitting down.  Not to sell but to make fire starter kindling for ourselves.  So now that is what I do and I feel so much better for being productive.  

I reduced 2 piles like this:-

To this:-

Much easier to load up and haul and can be cut up too for small fires.

I broke up the small brittle top branches and bagged them in old Walmart plastic bags ready to just throw into the fire and they will easily light with just a few pieces of scrunched up old flyers.

Today I added to this pile of kindling bags and still have more to do.

So, that and finally finishing replacing the studs and siding on the back of the sunroom is what we have been up to these past weeks.  We still have to finish out the inside but no rush on that, we can do that over the winter months.

         

Move put on hold due to a fall and a bad back and a beautiful wedding

Well, the move is on hold again.  We were looking for an alternative house to buy after the other one fell through due to too many structural problems but 2 weeks ago I took a tumble outside whilst walking on uneven ground and have a compression fracture in one of my vertebrae.  Now, I didn't think I had done any real damage as I could still get up and walk etc. but after 10 days and it was still extremely painful, I thought I had better get it checked out.  A couple of xrays bought forth the diagnosis.  My doctor said that I had to rest and take painkillers and it would take several weeks to get better.

So right now I spend a lot of time sitting.  Boring!!!

I have read several books, watched a lot of TV and finished making the set of Christmas tree ornaments to send off for my great grandson who is nearly 1 1/2 now.  How quickly the time is passing!

My eldest granddaughter got married in July after having to cancel 3 times prior due to the Covid regulations.  She finally got her big day. And stunning she was as was my great grandson too and of course her husband and the rest of my family.

My granddaughter, great grandson and daughter

with her sweet flower girl

My grandson, her brother, walked her down the aisle

The happy family

My other granddaughter (centre) was a bridesmaid.  The other girls are her half sisters.

Sadly, I couldn't be there but I have looked at all the photographs over and over again that it feels like I was.

In limbo

The house buying saga continues.  We thought we had found the ideal house for us.  It was an older home in a town within reasonable driving distance of  the VA hospital where my husband gets his healthcare.  As it was an older home we got a structural engineer to do the inspection and it came back with some major problems.  We got quotes to fix the bigger problems and they came to over $21,000 with the possibility of  even more costs once they started to do the work.  With the other problems the cost would have been almost $30,000.  This was without the problems with the existing garage which had no doors, no concrete floor and  was not in good condition and would need tearing down and rebuilding.  We knew that when we made our offer of the asking price and were prepared to pay the cost of that ourselves. We asked for a reduction in the price of $25,000 though to cover some of the costs of the major repairs to the house.  They would not agree to that.  They did say they would get the repairs done themselves but when they told us they had payed someone to fix one of the bigger problems and it cost only $256,  (our contractor had quoted $4,000) we knew that we would still have a huge expense if we carried on the the purchase, so we got out of the contract.

He had another couple of days in the hospital the week before last so we really need to get moved soon but we do not need a house with a lot of problems to deal with.  

On our house front, we are still trying to find someone to do some work for us on the attached sunroom.  We can't get any one so we are trying to do it ourselves.  Now bearing in mind, I am 74 years old, my husband is 77 and quite disabled and has been in the hospital 3 times since April and the temperature has been in the high 90's for two months now, we are not getting very much done.

So, in limbo we are!

Life in limbo is not great.  We are carrying on doing things towards moving.  I have cleaned out most of our cupboards and scrubbed them.  We are throwing out things we think we won't need but the comforting feel of our home has gone for me.  

After a lot of thinking and searching for homes we have decided to try and get our house ready to sell before we seriously look for another house.  We have both spent way too much time looking at houses for sale, we need a break but we know we have to move.

Like I said above, life in limbo is not great.

Watch this space, it could all change at any given time lol!

The moving saga

We made the decision very reluctantly after my husband's last stay in the hospital that we really need to move closer to his VA facilities.  Tomorrow is one of the reason's why.  He has a VA appt with his heart specialist which is 150 miles away plus another to have his port flushed.  We have to leave very early to get there.  I can't find anywhere to board our dog and leaving her for 10 or so hours isn't fair to her.  It is going to be 98F tomorrow so we can't take her and leave her in the car when we go inside to see the doctor.  Waiting on a reply from a neighbour to see if she can come and let her out mid day but she goes out every other Tuesday and I am not sure if this is the week she goes or not.  We will probably end up taking her and I will have to stay with her while my husband goes in alone. It will still be uncomfortable for both the dog and I because it is impractical to leave the car running for the air conditioning on such a hot day so we will be sitting outside somewhere hopefully in the shade for a couple of hours. 

Added to that we are too far away from any hospital should another emergency come up, hence the need to move.

BUT!!!!! and as I have said before 😔 there is always a 'BUT'

We need to do some work on our house, we were in the middle of taking off some siding and re-studding the back wall of our sun room when he get sick and we can't find anyone to come out and do the work to finish it.  It is in the 90's all day and every day and my husband is too weak still to work. 

So we can't list our house yet.  We could get a mortgage to buy another house but we couldn't manage to maintain two homes especially with a distance of 150 miles in between.

We have looked at maybe moving half way between there and here but have not found anything suitable to buy at a decent price.  We did put a bid in on one we both liked but they chose different buyers.  There are always multiple offers on anything worthwhile.

So we are stuck!

The past few weeks

 It will be 3 weeks tomorrow since my husband came home from the hospital.  He is still very weak and tired but we have physical therapy coming in twice a week to help build up the strength in his legs so in a bid to encourage him I do the exercises along side him, it helps us both.

He is still sleeping a lot so it has given me chance to get up into my sewing room and work on my card making.  For Mother's Day I got a couple of cutting dies from my husband and I got an Amazon gift voucher from our son and his family and I used it to buy a couple more and some card stock.  I think I have enough now to make a variety of cards.

After our anniversary came our youngest grand daughter's birthday and this was before Mother's day so I was limited with supplies.  Here is the card I made for her:-

Next will be one of the grandson's birthday and for his card I used one of the new dies which I really, really like:-

And for the inside I used new dies too

Now I liked these dies a lot so I made another similar card in readiness for another grand daughter's birthday later in the year.

Because I am naturally frugal I try to do my hobbies on a shoestring.  I use Christmas and birthday's, Mother's day's etc. to obtain the things I want rather than just purchase willy nilly.  Many Christmases ago I got a Big Shot machine.  I had never heard of them until I read about them on a friend's blog.  I used it originally to cut out felt and fabric to make Christmas tree ornaments and in the past few years of Christmas card making I used it too.  I am amazed at just how much I use this machine.  For the Christmas cards I recycle prior years cards but this new venture of birthday and anniversary cards etc. calls for new card stock although I do still try and recycle card.  For practicing I use those really annoying advertisements that come in the mail so I don't have to use good card stock and when I do use the new card I try to get as many things cut out of it as possible.  Any shape I don't use at the time I pop into a ziplock baggie for later use.  

I am also in the process of making some more Christmas ornaments to send off for my great grandson.  I cut out 5 and have made three so far. He turned one at the end of March.  My goodness, how the time flies these days! 

The weather has been a bit erratic.  We had lots of storms and rain which made the grass (and weeds) grow like crazy.  When it stopped it was too wet to mow, then it warmed up and was too hot!  We had a few nice days and we managed to make a start and this morning, early, I whipped out again to mow a little more before the thunderstorms started.  As we mow about 5 acres it is hard to get it all mowed in between storms, rain and extreme heat.  My husband is hoping he will regain more strength and will be able to get out and mow a little more.  He is desperate to get his strength back but they have told him not to overdo things as his health is not great at the best of times. We have 2 riding mowers and he usually does all the more difficult places, for now I am just doing what I can.  His well being is the most important thing.

The iris have been particularly beautiful this year.  I think all the rain has helped.  These are just a couple of many different colours of them we have.

Oh, and we are thinking of selling up and moving again!!!!!

More to come on that.....