Happy Fall Ya'll

I made this for a FALL MINGLE SWAP on Simply Sentiments for a dear friend, Cora. The flower started out to be a BIG FULL BROWNISH ROSE that I disassembled. I added some leaves that I rubbed with some Metallic Rub-ons by Craft-T Products, Inc. The big brad is by HOTP. PP is by KI Memories, Inc. I just luv big wide ric rack. YUM. The scallops for the CS was cut with my Create-a-Cut trimmer. Living in Louisiana we don't really see much of the turning of the leaves. But through my crafting I can still enjoy the love of the changing of the colors of fall! Happy Fall Ya'll!

Happy Wednesday Everyone.......

We are in Suffolk, Virginia visiting with Chris, Jennifer, and of course Ayden...... Oh the time is just flying by too fast for this Nana...... Our trip to get here went well last Thursday night. We chose a late night flight and Chris picked us up at the airport then dropped us by the house as he had duty at the ship. (navy) Boy was Ayden surprised to see Nana and Papa asleep the next morning at his house. So we were awaken by his jumping in bed with us! LOL. And it's been non stop with us ever since..... We took Ayden to a children's museum on Friday which he loved while Chris worked. Then Chris joined us downtown for a late lunch at a little pub. On Saturday morning we met Jenn for a 10K she ran in and she came in second in her age class! It was fun going in the little shops in the downtown area of Portsmouth. On the way home Chris took Bob and I by the naval base at Norfolk so we could shop at the Naval Exchange. I sure miss those! And wow was this a nice one. So I bought some early Christmas presents! I can now officially say I've started my Christmas shopping. I think I'll be visiting UPS to get all this home! sigh. He also drove us past all the naval piers so Bob could see how things had updated and changed since he was stationed here years ago when he was in the navy. Sunday was just a LAZY day for us..... Bob and Chris played golf. I think the BUG has BITTEN Bob.... We will see..... He thinks so... But....I'm not convinced for sure yet... We will see if it ends up in the garage along beside the bowflex and gets spider webs too..... LOL. Monday, Chris had to return back to work so we went to Williamsburg shopping. First we went to the Williamsburg Pottery Factory. I've not been there since the MID 80's. It's grown huge since then. I went straight to the FLOWER section... Of course always thinking about card making. LOL. I hit a bargain too. Walked away with a HUGE bag of silk flowers... I was happy happy happy! Then on to a clothes outlet too that day. Again buying more Christmas presents! Bob found things for our new grandbaby that is on the way this time..... It was fun buying for a newborn again! Makes you realize how much Ayden has grown! Tuesday morning Ayden returned to preschool! He's studying the letter "A" this week. So he painted with and APPLE yesterday to bring home! And he could hardly WAIT to dump out his backpack and show us a little acorn that was hiding in the bottom of it! LOL. Jenn and I had 3 hours to shop without a little boy! Bob and Chris played 18 holes of golf all afternoon. And I think Bob came home READY FOR BED! LOL. He was worn out! Well, today is another day...... Ayden will be going to school again today in a little while..... Happy Wednesday everyone.... I think I've caught you up on our stay while here in Virginia so far...

HAPPY BIRTHDAY FOR AYDEN! HE WILL BE 3

Ayden will be turning 3 on Sept. 16 during our visit to Virginia. He is into DINOSAURS! He wants his birthday party theme to be about dinosaurs! So of course this NANA had to make his card be of dinosaurs! And he also loves volcanoes. PP is by Around the Block. Added another little volcano stip to the bottom and actually used some Tulip Sparkles Dimensional Fabric Paint - RED HOT for LAVA...... Rhonna Farrer Rub-on's. Offray ribbon. Thanks for stopping by....

A fall card for a September Fellowship Swap I'm in for Simply Sentiments. The card went postal on Saturday to "someone"! Papers are by: Webster's Pages of their Parlor Collection. The "Savory" and the "Picnic" designs.
Chipboard heart that I painted with Acrylic paint, then added glitter, and then pressed magic mesh into it. Trimmed around the heart afterwards. MM rub-on. And computer font for the other sentiment. Offray ribbon and cute little pumpkin button from my stash. Rick-Rak sewn along the bottom. TFL.

Labor Day is almost over....... whine......

Oh I hate to see this long nice weekend come to an end. Back to work for us tomorrow. I was so busy all weekend that mine just flew by. I treated myself to a deep tissue massage on last Friday. Well, I SAY TREATED.... She about killed me in the shoulder area that was hurting so badly! By Saturday I could barely lift my coffee cup to drink from it. OH MY! Sunday it felt a little better, and today it is feeling much better. I know tomorrow answering the phones at work will probably put it right back into the shape it was in to begin with! ugh.

I finished up my design layout work for Simply Sentiments. Boxed it up and to the post office I went on Saturday bright and early! Always feels so good to get it mailed off and know you can then CLEAN your crafting room up finally! Mine seems to stay a mess until the issue's work is done! Back to a clean slate again! I managed to also finish up my card club card preps which I've posted already and my ATC card too.

This will be a short week for us. We will work Tuesday and Wednesday and then on Thursday afternoon we will both leave work early and fly to Virginia. We will get to stay with our Son, DIL, and Grandson. Ayden turns 3 while we are there so will get to celebrate his birthday too! Everyone enjoy your week!

ATC SWAP CARD FOR MY FRIEND CACTUS BARB

I'm in a calendar ATC swap with my best friend Cactus Barb. I'm leaving out of town this week so uploading this into the blog as I'm mailing to her. Maybe she will not take a peek and see it! Daisy D's pp, Autumn Leaves Clear Stamp. Rhinestones. Embossing. Watercolor Crayons. TFL....

Rum Cake

One of my very favorite recipes:


3/4 cup chopped pecans
1 box yellow cake mix
1 small box instant vanilla pudding mix
4 eggs
1/2 cup cold water
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1/2 cup dark rum--I like Capt. Morgan Spiced Rum (the good stuff)

Spray and flour a tube pan. Sprinkle pecans over the bottom. Mix all the cake ingredients together and then pour over the top of the pecans. I hit the pan a few times on the counter top to get the air bubbles out of the cake mixture. In other words lift the pan a few inches off the counter top and flop back down on the counter. Do this a few times and air bubbles rise from the cake mixture and pops out. Bake 1 hour at 325 degrees. Check for doneness. Cool..... Transfer into your cake covered container. Prick holes all over the top of the cake. I have a BIG METAL SKEWER STICK that I use for this.

Glaze:1 stick butter
1/4 cut water
1 cup confectioners sugar
1/2 cup rum
Put butter, water, and confectiners sugar into a sauce pot. Cook on medium heat and then when it starts to boil time this and cook for 5 minutes. STIRRING CONSTANTLY! Remove from heat and stir in rum. Pour this SLOWLY over the top of the cake and drizzling down the sides.

When I make my glaze I do mine just a LITTLE DIFFERENT than the recipe calls. I put about 1/2 the rum into the start of the cooking. And then add the last half at the very end. A little less STRONG that way. More of the alcohol is cooked off. Still has a GREAT rum flavor though. It is delicious! Enjoy.

1/2 MARATHON FOR DIL --- JENNIFER! WAY TO GO!

Jennifer decided to train for a 1/2 marathon race, which took place on Sunday, Sept. 2nd. This was her first time ever! She's ran in smaller races during the past year or so.... We are so proud of her for the hard work she put into training for this. She finished at 2:02. Chris had a little surprise for her waiting at the finish line! He and Ayden had made a poster for her and on the BACK SIDE he had written Jenn will you marry me again? He had a new diamond ring waiting for her finger when she finished..... They will have been married 10 years this coming January. Jenn's been wanting a new ring for her anniversary! So I know she was SURPRISED!

Transparencies...... Card club theme

Our little card club group meets once a month and we pick a theme to work on for our cards. For Sept. we chose transparencies. This is my card design I came up with using transparencies. PP is by DaisyD's. I added some wide rick-rak as well along the bottom. Autumn Leaves Clear Stamp's flourish was stamped on the front of the transparency and parts were colored in in a marker from the underneath side. Flowers also were stamped on the transparencies and colored too. Then trimmed out and hot glued on to the top side. Rhinestones were then added to the flower centers. Sentiment was stamped on the top side --- using Stazon on ink. I hot glued the transparency to my card base under EACH FLOWER SPOT so it would not show.....This held it fine to the card base. The transparency is folded over the entire card. A fun card to make!