Pink.

I don't like this card.  I like the letters, but it's just boring.  It needs something else, but I'm not sure what.

Other than just putting the stickers on the card stock, I inked the entire front of the card with embossing ink, Super Fine Detail embossing powder all over it, then heated it.

So, it's kind of interesting because it's slick and shiny which gives it a cool texture, but it's still too bland for me.

Suggestions on how to make it better?

Word Search.

Look at the AWESOME stamp I found at my thrift store!!

I think this is the coolest stamp I have ever seen. Talk about versatile! 

Polka Dots.

When I said that Priscella takes AMAZING photos, I was exaggerating. They're not stellar, but they are much better (IMO) than my digital camera.

This isn't a great photo of this card, but I don't think a great picture is needed.  It's a simple card, initially made for my mom.  She asked me to make her 12 thank you cards that she would buy from me.

I don't think it's quite the quality that I want to "sell" to anyone.  It's just washi tape at an angle with a strip of "thank you"s that I made on the computer and printed out.

What do you think?  Too simple?

Valentine.

It's a running joke that I get Adam flowers for every Valentine's day.  

The first year we were together, I called the flower shop that we always use (The Flower Gallery), and asked what kind of plant they could deliver to him.  I was hoping they had a cactus, but they sent a plant in a white basket that had white fuzzy balls on it.  Adam called it a popcorn plant because they kind of looked like popcorn.  He was confused about why I sent it to him... lol

The second year ... uhh... I can't remember. But I bet it was awesome.

The third year (last year), I got him an 8-bit bouquet (from Think Geek) that he still has in his office.

I told him the joke that I've been giving him flowers every year, because I'm sure he didn't see the trend.  And he definitely didn't!  

Women always get them, but men get nothing (usually).  This year I decided to make him flowers from Hershey kisses.  I'm so happy with how it turned out!

I was ecstatic with my idea to use Reese's Pieces (his favorite) as the vase filler!  I may or may not have patted myself on the back for my pure genius idea. ;)  I bought 6 boxes of the candy, which I thought was going to be WAY too much, but I used all of them! That's a lot of candy!

Close up!

They were very simple to make.  I used this tutorial.  I got everything from the dollar store and the total came to about $20.00.

He loved it.  Everyone at the office that saw them thought it was so cool.  He shares an office with the other two IT guys: his brother, Jerrod, and his friend, Alex.  They were jealous because they didn't get anything for Valentine's Day (see what I mean!? Men always get shafted).  Alex was staring at them for a long time, apparently trying to figure out how I made them.

Adam, of course, had flowers delivered to my office:

Tulips! Roses are overrated IMO

The note that came with the flowers that Adam wrote was hilarious.  I was cracking up at it all day long!

It reads:

"Roses are red,

WoW pandas are hacks,

You are OP in RL and

I love you for that!"

No one will get the humor unless you play World of Warcraft.  That's partially why I love it so much.

Love, happiness and sparkles,
Tessa

Wreath.

I'm going to start off with some Christmas cards that I made.  I made a ton of them (well, for me it was a ton).

I embossed the circle stamp in green , used a die to remove the enter, then spent about an hour trying to die that darn bow. 

This card I totally stole from Damask Love.  Amber is my #1 inspiration.  Also, she's a psychologist, married, and has time for her blog?  Really?  I'm convinced she is either getting help (like from her husband or from a friend) or she's bionic.  I'm leaning towards to latter.

This is her card from this post.

Huh?

** I was going somewhere with this post.  I started it weeks (months?) ago, but I didn't finish and now I have no idea how to finish it.  I'm just going to post it and maybe some day I'll remember what the purpose of this was **

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

I'm not the type of person that can look at something in a store and say "oh my, this is absolutely PERFECT for the the ledge in my parlor on the north wall in the east corner near the peacock painting!"

Nope.  I'm horrible at estimations. Case in point: one time I decided I was going to try my hand at upholstering, so Erin and I went to Hobby Lobby to find some fabric. I found some I loved, and thought 2 yards would be enough, but I bought 3 yards instead. After we got home, I looked up directions and it said that you need like 8 yards. Oops! I changed my mind after I looked at how awfully complicated and time consuming it was, and once I added up the ridiculous price of additional fabric would be. I picked out a fabric that was $35 a yard. I justified it since I thought I only needed 3 yards. After figuring I needed 8 yards, there was no way that Adam would let me live! Plus, what if I messed up? What if I had to scrap the project? That money would be GONE.

I'm also not one that will have a room that looks like it came from a magazine. Not only am I too poor, but my mother taught me how to be frugal and it's stuck with me.

Whenever I'm at a store and I find something I love, I just buy it and hope that it works somewhere in my house. Unless it's expensive. Then I tell myself "wow, I love this so much, but WHERE am I going to put a 6 foot metal chicken dubbed Beyoncé?", then walk away. (Warning: link has cursing and crude humor.) I'm usually pretty good about walking away.

I always try to buy on sale. Majority of all of my supplies and organization were on sale or free. If they weren't on sale, they were cheap or a cheap solution to what could be an expensive problem or project.

Take my table, for example. The supplies were from Lowes and, while not on sale, was only $38, I think?

Here is the link to my original post about my table.

Priscella.

I'm so obsessed with my iPod.

<<checks to see if I even posted about my TOTALLY FREE iPOD>>

Nope. 

STORY TIME

Well, I got a free iPod almost a month ago to the day.  It was free.  100% totally free.

No, it wasn't from those ads that are on every-website-that-was-ever: 

*WIN A FREE iPAD* 

*OR LAPTOP*

*OR A ZILLION DOLLARS!*

Adam apparently racked up so many reward points on his credit card that he's had since before I came along, and he didn't know he had reward points.  I guess the points last like 5 years, and his company was nice enough to send us an invoice of his point balance and a brochure of some of the items that you can redeem your points for.  Small things were on the list, like workout DVDs and barbecue utensil sets, but there were also HUGE ticket items like 60" TVs, fancy schmancy laptops, iPads, etc.  Adam looked through the brochure and said he didn't want "any of that crap", and said that I could get use the points if I found anything I wanted.

So I went online and found that they had iPods. Which I've been wanting for like... ever.

And we could afford the 32GB one.

OMG, I ALMOST DIED.

Priscella

That's my baby.  Her name is Priscella.  You want to know how awesome she is??

1. She takes videos, two of which I made yesterday and sent to my mom so she could help me with a sewing project I'm having troubles on;
2. She has 578,915 apps.  And by 578,915, I mean about 31 apps;
3. One of those apps lets me call and text anyone;
          Anyone. For free.
          As long as I have WiFi, which is where I'm 99% of the time: at home or work;
4. She also is an enabler to my music and Pinterest habit; and
5. She takes magnificent photos.

I've been complaining about my crappy photos since before I was born.

I'm going to try to upload a bunch of pictures and create an auto-publish for all of the posts I'm going to put them on. 

I've been crafting like crazy. And it's fun. I would hope it's fun... otherwise that kind of defeats the purpose of a hobby.

I leave you with this unbearably humiliating photo:

If you haven't read the jumble of text above, you'll want to read this story.

It's our new Capital One credit card.  (what's in your wallet?)  It's an elephant, which I love, and which I've loved for years and years and years, way before they were cool to like.  The embarrassing part is that I was so excited when I got it that I immediately posted the picture on Facebook.  Unedited.  Meaning, no blur.  Meaning, I totally posted my credit card information, even with expiration date, all over the internets.  Totally.  For DAYS, my Facebook "friends" kept messaging me and telling me what I did, even though I took down the photo literally 100 seconds after I posted it.  I mean, these "friends" are people I haven't heard from since High School: no lie.  Days.  I was humiliated for days.  

I win the internets.

Finish.

Does anyone else start a project or a card and then stop mid-way because you lose the inspiration?

I do. All the time. This week I got the inspiration to finish a bunch of cards. What a great feeling!

Doilies.

HELLO!

My mother asked me a few weeks ago if I would make her a dozen thank you cards.  At the time, Adam and I were in the middle of installing a shelving system in my Craftination Station (my craft room) closet and, since we're hopelessly newbie at these types of things, it was taking us a very long time.

For the record, ClosetMaid's instructions are SO much more complicated than they need to be.

We finished the shelves a week or so ago, but then I had to put my room back together so it was functional.  Eventually I will get around to posting pictures of my new organization!  I still have a lot more to do and still have solutions I need to find, and money for something like a bookcase... but the Craftination Station has come SO far in the last 3 years!

I digress.  Over the past few nights I've been putting some ideas together and have made a few cards.  I'm sorry this is taking so long, Mom!

Tonight I came up with an idea that involved a paper doily, but I couldn't figure out how to attach it to my card.  Luckily I didn't make the whole darn card only to ruin it at the end when I attached the doily!  I tried my usual Tombow tape, which showed through the doily; Mod Podge, which made the doily shrivel; glossy accents, which of course shriveled like Mod Podge too; and also Crafty Power Tape, just in case that happened to be made of fairy dust that worked with doilies, which apparently is fairy-dustless.

Enter: my best friend, the Internet.  Apparently there's a very specific way to adhere doilies!  I found this video:

Don't bother watching the video.  Do you know what the solution is?  Elmer's Glue.  That's it.  Boy did I feel dumb.  I kept watching the video, thinking that I missed something.  Nope.  It's that simple and any 2 year old knows how to do it.

MY POINT IS that I did this all in my craft room!  Adam has this 10 year old laptop, and of course it's fairly crappy and can hardly stand running Google Chrome, but I stole it anyway and put it in my Craftination Station so I could use it in times like this!  Which is great, because when I go into the computer room and sit down next to Adam, I get sidetracked and conned into playing a game.  I usually don't make it out of there until bedtime.

And just because, here's a peek at my favorite card I've made so far for my momma mia:

I'm a fan of the bright primary colors and the texture, texture, texture.  It took 10 minutes to get this picture on this post because this laptop is slow as molasses, so I'll post the pictures another day.  Knowing me, that'll either be in a year or never. ;)

Have a grand night and weekend, ya'll!

Rabid.

I just cancelled all of my appointments with every one of my doctors. The medical debt is up to $21,000. That's more than I make in an entire year. I don't understand how the world can work this way. I feel so defeated, so angry, so depressed, so panicked.

I can't even see my counselor. I left a message on her voice mail; I wanted to tell her myself that I couldn't see her anymore. As soon as I heard her voice on the recorded message, I crumbled in tears. She may not even understand my message through my cries. How embarrassing.

I wish Wisconsin wasn't a marital state so I could let all of my debts go to collections, trash my credit, and never pay them. I don't care that it's dishonest. I feel cheated and they don't deserve anything from me. $500 for 5 minutes of a doctor's time is so outrageously wrong and I get rabid with anger when I think about it.