i'm a tia...again!

ciao, amigas! i just had to share my exciting news:
i'm an auntie again!
my sister and her lovely husband, randy, welcomed a bouncing baby boy into the world yesterday!  i don't have all of the deets but i know his name is "mason". awww :-)
i created the card below in mds just for them!





thanks for stopping by and supporting my blogs!
abrazos y amor,
bella

simply the best!

omg! i've totally been dying to show you my first project with my simply scored scoring board!

it's simply fabulous! i'm so happy i waited to purchase a scoring board until now. stampin' up! has really hit the mark with this one (the one thing i wish it did was start at 1/16" increments but its 1/8" increments rock, too)! it has a comfortable stylus to make your score lines with and awesome little place markers for if you have several projects to score in the same place! stampin' up! was brilliant to include a little compartment on the scoring board to store extra place markers and even a small treat or bone folder! i absolutely adore it!
so the first thing i created with it was a never-ending birthday card for my dear friend, anett's daughter, anne. i have been waiting to show it to you because i wanted anne to get her card all the way in germany first. so...i received a message from netti, that they received my little packages., so now i'm finally ready to share the little card i created with you. you can see more views of it on netti's blog.


i used the dsp and card stock from my starter kit! yea!
i hope you like it! this card signifies three firsts for me~ 1. it's my first never-ending card. 2. my first project i made using my simply scored. and 3. it's the first thing i created with my starter kit components!
thanks for stopping by and supporting my blog!
abrazos y amor,
bella

happy 4th of july birthday! two celebrations, one card hee hee

all mds images (c)stampin' up! 1988-2011
i just wanted to wish a very sweet sixteenth birthday to my lovely little baby, mills and a happy 235th to my dear country tis of me, sweet land of liberty! i'd also like to wish all of my family and amigas a very happy fourth of july! enjoy your holiday!
abrazos y amor,
bella

atc's up the wazoo and got my mojo workin'

hee hee(love johnny winter...got my mojo workin')
atc's up the wazoo! yep that's what i'm going to have for the next few weeks as i work on creating atc's to fill my new(well it's still new... eventhough i bought it last year hee hee) 7 gypsies atc printer's tray. i was thinking of spreading it out for twelve weeks. you know, like one atc per week, but then i decided to create two per week and make it around six weeks. hmm...well it all depends on my energy and if my mojo keeps workin' hee hee! i'm sure as long as i don't overdo it, i'll be fine and stay on schedule. in my excitement to get back into crafting i have to be mindful not to get ahead of myself and overwhelm myself and cause me to be stuck in bed tic'ing and spas'ing hee hee. i know because i've set myself back already a few times because of my being overzealous and crafting all day and night. but baby i'm back!
ok, so take a look at the first two:


i'm thinking the theme of this tray will be love, amor, amour, amoré! i believe these two are not too shabby (but pretty shabby chic hee hee)! please let me know what you think.
thanks for stopping by. i appreciate your support!
abrazos y amor,
bella

finally!

i've been in the worst creative slump since i started feeling better! you may recall the two cards i couldn't finish. well, i've finally finished one! woo!hoo! i don't think it's my best work ever, but it's still rather lovely. i have more information about it at bella's petits gateaux. please let me know what you think!
abrazos y amor,
bella

you're on my mind

ciao all! happy valentine's day! here's a pic of the latest card i posted at bella's petit gateaux. let me know what you think! thanks for looking!
abrazos y amor,
bella

maybe you have an opinion?

well, i've been working on a couple of cards for the past few days. i'm stumped on how to finish them. will you take a look at bella's petit gateaux and tell me what you think? thanks!
abrazos y amor,
bella

you're not going to believe it...

'cause i didn't, either! go to bella's petit gateaux and look at what i made!
don't forget to leave a post on there letting me know what you think.
abrazos,
bella

love somebunny,yes,i do!

here's an idea i'm working on for valentine's day for my bunny. i think he'll love this card!
abrazos,
~bella

para mi hermanita

ciao all! good morning/buenos dias! i was down in my patisserie last night! this is a little cupcake of a card that i created for my sister~i feel it's more of an "i'm here for you" card more so than a "sympathy" card. i had bunny mail it for me this morning. i hope she likes it. i'm hoping she will get a smile from it and not laugh hysterically at my attempt escribir en espanol solomente.
please let me know what you think, as well.
here's the recipe:
paper: cs~pink pirouette(new in color), very vanilla, basic gray
inks: pretty in pink, regal rose
stamps: tender toile, serena primavera
accessories: styled silver hodgepodge hardware ribbon slide, pink piroutte striped grosgrain ribbon, pretty in pink stampin' pastels
tools: scallop border punch, snail, glue dots
technique: paper tearing/folding, chalk distressing, rock 'n' roll inking

thanks for looking!
abrazos,
bella

rrrippp!

well, not exactly, but this is my first attempt at the faux tearing technique.
here's the recipe:
stamps: serenity, upsy daisy(sentiment)
paper: cs~ barely banana, very vanilla
inks: so saffron, versamarker
accessories: very vanilla 5/8 grosgrain
tools: scallop border punch, stampin' pastels(so saffron)
technique: faux tearing, chalk distressing

let me know what you think! thanks for looking!
abrazos,
bella

my first card front swap!

whew! was i stressed trying to get these done and mailed by saturday afternoon before the post office closed!
well, first off, "my boyfriend's brown truck" didn't arrive until late thursday afternoon(maybe that's why he delivered my backordered stamp set early the next morning :0)
and then i just couldn't find a time, with training abbey and supervising the cats and millE's virtual school, to get down to my patisserie and get them all done on thursday evening.
so friday i started them and finished bustin' them out on saturday morning. i had a bit of a creative block for a moment then i remembered it just had to be simple and easy to demonstrate and use the "say it with scallops" set and in colors. so i think i did a pretty good job. i also made them in black, but i didn't get a pic before rushing to the post office. let me know what you think!
here's the recipe:
paper: cs~baja breeze, very vanilla, and whisper white
ribbon: baja breeze double-stitched grosgrain
inks: baja breeze
technique: paper tearing/folding
stamps: say it with scallops, upsy daisy(sentiment)
tools: scallop border punch, scallop square punch, stampin' dimensionals
grazie mille!
abrazos,
bella

last two cropping chicks-ut swaps

ciao all! sorry it has been a while! i wasn't able to get on and post like i wanted to last week. i'm finally able to post for you the last set of swaps that i received in the cropping chicks-ut card swap i hosted last month. i'm glad that's over! whew! how exhausting! it can be stressful hosting swaps when ladies don't come through when they're supposed to.
i'll tell you it was really heartbreaking to me to find out that when i did the ctmh atc swap, last month, that the hostess (tiffany) had to fill like four spots! i think that's totally ridiculous! true, "life happens" to a person, but when you procrastinate that's when you leave yourself open for murphy's law! it's great when you can find an angel to fill the spot(s) you're missing! it's just not fair, in my book, to the hostess when you can't~but what do i know? i've only been a hostess once! lol! well, let me get off of that soap box! lol!
thanks for taking a look!
abrazos,
bella

oh my heck! i just realized the top card is a flower~i have it standing the wrong way! aye aye aye! my blond roots! lol! i'm sure carlos mencia is somewhere going "ddd bella!"

eatin' good in the neighborhood

no, i don't mean that yucky applebee's i mean the delicious cookies my new neighbor sent over to me! well, you know i cannot go without sending a card to people for any occasion so i made them a "welcome to the neighborhood" card. bizhan was trying to be a model in those shots, as well! so i finally decided~'fine, i'll take a picture of you too, hammy choo choo!'






huh?! are you gasping? yes, i did create the card with a lot of ctmh items! lol!
here are the ingredients:

paper: silhouette bulk dot and floral, desert sand cs
inks: basic black(su), chocolate(ctmh)
stamps: welcome to the neighborhood
tools: paper snips
accessories: stampin' pastels
techniques: ink distressing

thanks for looking! please let me know what you think!
abrazos,
bella

sweet new neigbors!

how sweet are they?! oh my goodness, they sent over like half a dozen cookies the other night to introduce themselves to us. so i decided to make them a thank you card. as you can see, bizhan decided he had to be a model in one of the pictures. he's such a ham!












here are the ingredients: paper: cs~whisper white, perfect plum and pale plum/dsp~bella rose
ink: versamark, regal rose
stamps: sprinkles and heartfelt thanks
tools: scallop border punch, paper piercer, stamp-a-majig, heat tool
accessories: stampin' pastels
techniques: two step stampin', watermark

let me know what you think!
abrazos, bella

sanela don't look!

sanela, i mean it, don't look! is she looking?! she's not? good!
ok, so i recently found out that sanela's baby ayane(such a beautiful name and she's a beautiful little girl~check out sanela's blog if you don't believe me) is turning four (4) on 14 august. well, she loves pink as much as i do and so i had to make her a card. i mean she's a girl after my own heart with her love of pink! now i'm not as fond of monkeys as she is~ but the pink thing i'm totally into that! so here are three pics of the card i created for her yesterday and finished today.
here's the recipe:

stamps: sock monkey paper: bella rose dsp, whisper white, pretty in pink cs and pink pirouette cs ribbon: regal rose 5/8 grosgrain accessories: styled silver hodgepodge hardware rose ribbon slide, light pink chunky sprinkles inks: pretty in pink, creamy caramel, regal rose~and stampin' pastels in those colors tools: scallop border punch techniques: paper piecing

what do you all think? do you think it's too plain? i hope she'll love it~it's a pink card with a pink monkey~do you get more pink than that? :0)

thanks for looking!
abrazos, bella

it's coming together nicely

ciao all! remember when i told you all i was the hostess for a card swap with my cropping chicks-ut group? well, it's all coming together nicely. i have most of the cards from the 14/14 swap now.
boy oh boy let me tell you~ i've learned some things about the group i wasn't made aware when i offered to hostess:1. procrastination is fine 2. almost everyone expects procrastination so they are fine whenever they receive their cards after the swap deadline.
well, this is going to be my last time hostessing because i got some finger shaking private messages over the deadline and procrastinators and i just don't want to deal with that again. i personally could care less about the deadline but i started this swap way back in june and i made the deadline the 8th of august so i would be sure to be done with the two ctmh swaps i was in and convention would be over and i'd have the energy to sort and get the cards mailed back. i tried to consider everyone with summer schedules and everything.
i love the group, but it was like some people were like 'i want mine now send me back my extras' and others were like 'well, i can wait until your hubby's next day off so you can wait for the late ones and mail mine back then'. the bittersweet thing about e-communication is you can't really tell a person's tone unless it's an obvious happy tone. so i don't know if the ones that said 'i want mine now, you gave two months for the deadline' are huffy or they're just needing their stuff now. ah well, 'tis life you cannot please all of the people all of the time and just barely some of the people some of the time! lol!
ok, so take a look at the pics. these are the nine cards i have so far. i made the criss cross card in the last pic. let me know what you think!
abrazos,
bella

monday 11 august 2008~check it out i've added a few more pics of the cards.

i did it! i particpated in one challenge

ok, so i've been an scs fan club member for a while now and i finally got a chance to make something to post in the dirty dozen gallery. here's my little card i created. i titled it nice and simple. i truly believe that, though it's simple, it's totally nice. i gave it to mom last night as a thank you card. she's such an awesome matriarchal role-model and i felt i should just remind her of that with the card.



the particulars(all stampin' up!):
cs: whisper white
stamps: happy harmony
ribbon: 5/8 regal rose grosgrain
ink: pretty in pink, regal rose, certainly celery
technique: empressor, 2nd generation stamping
hardware: hodgepodge antique brass buckle(ribbon slide)

thanks for looking. don't forget to let me know what you think.
abrazos,bella
p.s. i just barely posted it yesterday on splitcoast and it's already been favorited by 3 people! wow! that was a good feeling! i received three comments too!
here~ you can mira mi~ it's my splitcoast stampers gallery.

july is national ice cream month

ahhh...i remember the days i'd make coffee can ice cream, with my classes (when i was an ece teacher), for national ice cream month. ahhh...such memories!
well,...now i'm making paper ice cream!
it's like totally 98 degrees along the wasatch front today!(naw, really, it's supposed to be like 96 degrees~ but i just had to be punny because i loooove that "boy band"!)
i hope this card cools you off! take it from me, it's not worth it to push yourself with the heat as bad as it is! so take it easy! have a lovely friday!
happy national ice cream month!
abrazos,bella

i'm stampin' up!

well, since i'm all done with my atc's that were "ctmh only" i can get more stampin' up! projects done~and i have! here are some pics of two cards i made for bunny's colleagues. both families are having boys! let me know what you think! thanks for looking!
abrazos,bella