♥ Simon Says...Thanksgiving/Thank you! ♥

Happy, happy Wednesday everyone! It feels good to be back to a somewhat normal life again! Kids back in school (after 2 weeks), we have power, crafting again! And today is a new challenge at the Simon Says Stamp Challenge Blog! It is to create either a Thanksgiving card or a Thank you card.

I decided to make a Thank you card for a special friend. I used some beautiful new papers from Heidi Swapp's Vintage Chic 8x8 Paper Pack as well as a Paper Banner, Note Card and Mini Tag all from the same line.

The stamped sentiment is from the Friends Sentiments Stamp Set by C.C. Designs. I finished the card off with a vintage button, seam binding and some Bisque Liquid Pearls.

And don't forget, Heidi will generously give the random winner of this challenge a $50 Credit Voucher to the Simon Says Stamp Superstore! Good luck everyone!

Have an amazing day!

hugs....

InLinkz.com

♥ I'm Back! ♥

Wow! Where do I begin? It's been a very long 2 1/2 weeks! Hurricane Sandy really got us good! But we are 1 of the lucky ones! A lot of  people very near us have absolutely nothing! Just the clothes on their backs! It's so sad! On Monday October 29th we woke up to very high winds and the eye of the storm was still 16 hours away! I have never in my 40 years of life seen anything like it! Complete darkness everywhere, the skies lit up green and blue from transformers blowing, police and fire sirens heard non-stop for days! It was like a war zone! We lost power at around 2 pm that day and it didn't return until the following Monday around the same time. We lost parts of our fence, lots of soffits on the house, a dented gutter from a falling tree, our gazebo was a little damaged but we are lucky! We still have our home and our lives! I thank the Good Lord above every minute of the day!

We are only 10 minutes away from Seaside Heights where there was just devastation. The Governor says it will take at least 7 years to rebuild it back to normal. This photo of the roller coaster now sitting in the Atlantic Ocean just gives me chills. It was sitting on top of a large pier that housed a lot of rides on it and it just disappeared into the ocean. The beach was pushed in 20 blocks and just covered streets and houses. It was insane!

There used to be a boardwalk there!

Point Pleasant Beach is just 15-20 minutes away and this is what the Boardwalk there now looks like! Not to mention the scores of homes severely damaged or destroyed!

So like I said, we are 1 of the lucky ones!

Then to make matters worse! We were then hit with a Snow Storm! So there went the power again! Just 2 days after we got our power re-stored! We then had it re-restored this Saturday 4 days later!

Hubby was lucky enough to have found a large generator towards the end of all of this, so a few of the days we had lights, hot water and heat. But it was still not fun! Especially having the 2 kids and trying to entertain them. But I think this made our family even closer! We played lots of games and just acted silly trying to make the best of it.

Antonio making a Snowman on our deck.

We are 1 of the lucky ones!!

A BIG Thank You to Alabama Power for helping us out here in Jersey!

Thank you so much for all of your thoughts and prayers!

♥ Simon Says...Get in Shape! ♥

Happy Halloween! Well, not sure if it's so happy for us yet! You see, I am writing this post on Saturday due to us getting Hurricane/Tropical Storm Sandy starting on Sunday. It is supposed to make landfall right on top of us and we are only 10 minutes from the ocean. If we have power on Tuesday, you won't see this post! I will re-write it, but if you see this right now, that means we have no power. So please pray for us! We have a generator but it will be used for refrigerators, lights, etc. The poor kiddies won't have a Halloween! But hopefully they will reschedule Trick-or-Treating for them and also reschedule the Halloween Parade our town has every year. It's the 2nd Largest Halloween Parade in the World! So hopefully, the storm won't be too bad. Please pray for all of us here in the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic States.

This week's challenge at the Simon Says Stamp Challenge Blog is all about Shaped Cards! No squares or rectangles. You can make cards in so many shapes! You can do circles, triangles, hexagons, snowflakes, a house, a stocking, etc, etc! Be creative and think outside the box!

For my card, I wanted to make something a little different. So I racked my brains for days and then one day, on my die cutting table, I had a scalloped circle laying next to a heart. And then, my Turkey was born! I first ran the largest die from the Spellbinders Large Scallop Circle Dies through my Cuttlebug with some Timeless paper by Bazzill and 2 more circles using some Kraft cardstock. Then add glue to the very top of the Kraft circle and adhere it to the back of the patterned paper circle to form a card base.

I then punched out several hearts using the Martha Stewart Heart Punch and some papers by Authentique from the Thankful 6x6 Paper Pad. Now adhere each heart individually to the back of the card to form the "feathers". When finished, adhere the other Kraft circle over the back of the card.

Now, add 2 hearts to the bottom inside of card, folding at the top to make 2 feet and another to the front of the card to act as a beak. The eyes are Prima Crystal Hearts. I added a Happy Thanksgiving stamped sentiment to the inside of the card using Lawn Fawn's Happy Everything Set.

And don't forget, Heidi will generously give the random winner of this challenge a $50 Credit Voucher to the Simon Says Stamp Superstore! Good luck everyone!

Have a wonderful day!