Positive and Negative die cut card side by side
Negative die cut card
Positive Die Cut Card!
If you want to take your stamping to the next level I recommend taking the class from Cathirine pooler!
Stamped Positive and negative Die cut card
If you want to take your stamping to the next level I recommend taking the class from Cathirine pooler!
Doughnuts with two ingredients
Did you see my post about the chocolate cake mix with pumpkin? If you have a cake pop maker or a doughnut maker you can make these! I made some peach butter (1 pint), and added that to a yellow cake mix (1 box,) baked them in the Baby Cake doughnut maker and they turned out amazing! once they were done, I dipped them into butter and then dipped them into cinnamon sugar to the top!
Add the spice or yellow cake mix with peach butter or apple sauce, what ever you have on hand...
Get your helper ready to go... Here is my set up for the doughnuts with the butter and cinnamon sugar
Here is the finish product... lol don't mind the mess!
Final price for this was about $1.50 to feed all of us!
Better Paintings with Water Color Angela Fehr Class on Craftsy
I have been following Angela Fehr on youtube for about 4 months and have fell in love with her art. When I saw that she had a class on Craftsy I had to watch it. I am glad I did. I learned a lot about:
~ Composition, value, planning a painting, selecting a reference photo, to just playing with your water color and seeing what happens.
~ She is a lefty, so all you lefties out there, this painting class is for you! you can mirror her!
~ She want's you to enjoy painting free and loosely.
~ She is really good at getting back to you with your questions. She wants you to feel good about painting and it shows in her class.
~ She goes in depth with the focal point of a painting, and why your eye goes to where it goes.
Angela's style of painting is effortless, she seems to know exactly what to do when needed, for example she made some "happy mistakes" and showed us how to use that to our advantage. I liked her down to earth mood to this class, and it was really enjoyable to watch.
As a water color novice I could watch her lessons week after week and still learn and grow from this class.
Here is my example from the class. What do you think? it's very expressive and bright. My objective for this painting is that the viewer could feel movement from looking at the piece, as if a gentle breeze was blowing the flowers on a spring day.
This is my first attempt at this painting, I planned out where I wanted the tulips, and did a loose sketch in water color with this painting.
I wanted a different look with this piece, so I changed my colors to a more brighter and limited my pallet to a three color pallet for the harmony part that I wanted to get.
My final piece, I like that it stayed loose and free, and that it has it's own story. When I look at this painting it makes me thing that the tulips are happy to be blooming, singing almost, if tulips could. It was a really fun process! I can't wait to do another painting!
So cheek it Angela Ferh Class Better Paintings with water color sketching on Craftsy
If you have a painting or a picture of a landscape that you would love as a painting leave a reference photo in the comments bellow with some info as to why you would like it as a painting and when I feel inspired to paint I'll paint it!
~ Composition, value, planning a painting, selecting a reference photo, to just playing with your water color and seeing what happens.
~ She is a lefty, so all you lefties out there, this painting class is for you! you can mirror her!
~ She want's you to enjoy painting free and loosely.
~ She is really good at getting back to you with your questions. She wants you to feel good about painting and it shows in her class.
~ She goes in depth with the focal point of a painting, and why your eye goes to where it goes.
Angela's style of painting is effortless, she seems to know exactly what to do when needed, for example she made some "happy mistakes" and showed us how to use that to our advantage. I liked her down to earth mood to this class, and it was really enjoyable to watch.
As a water color novice I could watch her lessons week after week and still learn and grow from this class.
Here is my example from the class. What do you think? it's very expressive and bright. My objective for this painting is that the viewer could feel movement from looking at the piece, as if a gentle breeze was blowing the flowers on a spring day.
So cheek it Angela Ferh Class Better Paintings with water color sketching on Craftsy
If you have a painting or a picture of a landscape that you would love as a painting leave a reference photo in the comments bellow with some info as to why you would like it as a painting and when I feel inspired to paint I'll paint it!
Get your Flu shot and Hy-Vee deal
What it means to be a Sahm (stay at home mother) #129
There are a ton of reasons to be a sahm. One small reason it means to be a stay at home mom is how we spend the money we have. I think it's really hard to stay with in a budget,! It's not my favorite thing in the world.
As a Sahm, I am always thinking about what can we get away with and what are our needs are as a family. Or, I am saving money on a vacation so we can go to Disney. This is what I do: September is a perfect month to not buy groceries, I am using up all that stock pile I've created in the past year, because in a month or two grocery stores are bursting with good deals, I just have to get through this month and not spend our money on things that we don't need. only but the essentials like milk, and produce. Seriously that's it that I am buying this month. and produce is negotiable. (I use my freezer a lot when produce is on sale at a rock bottom price.)
No stock pile? You can still save some money by making meals with good nutrition sense. Here are some of my favorite meals that I go to when we are "out of money" (when I say were out of money, it really means oops I spent too much money at the craft store this week, remember my art supply obsesion?)
Here are 2 Brenner Ideas (breakfast for dinner) Because you spent your grocery money on other things.... like art stuff:
Eggs, it's hard to beat the price of eggs and what nutritional value it packs. I always add cheese and some ham to it, but it's my go to were "out" of grocery money" and my family likes eggs a lot, Here is my fav. egg bake recipe: Farmers Casserole (side note, it calls for evaporated milk and I seem to never have it. I use regular milk.)
I keep going back and forth on is it worth my time to bake bread or to buy it, and I still don't have a good answer but it does taste like 100x's better when you make it. and it's really cheap if you have all the ingredients anyways.
Cottage Cakes makes about 24 cottage cakes, or a meal and half for a family of 5
24 oz of cottage cheese
9 eggs
6 oz oil
1 cup flour (any will work)
1/4 cup sugar
and a splash or two of vanilla
mix it up like pancake batter and then use it as pancake batter to make. It's easy and my kids never seem to notice a "big" difference in their pancakes. My difference is that it's full of protein, and breakfast for dinner, who doesn' complain?
As a Sahm, I am always thinking about what can we get away with and what are our needs are as a family. Or, I am saving money on a vacation so we can go to Disney. This is what I do: September is a perfect month to not buy groceries, I am using up all that stock pile I've created in the past year, because in a month or two grocery stores are bursting with good deals, I just have to get through this month and not spend our money on things that we don't need. only but the essentials like milk, and produce. Seriously that's it that I am buying this month. and produce is negotiable. (I use my freezer a lot when produce is on sale at a rock bottom price.)
No stock pile? You can still save some money by making meals with good nutrition sense. Here are some of my favorite meals that I go to when we are "out of money" (when I say were out of money, it really means oops I spent too much money at the craft store this week, remember my art supply obsesion?)
Here are 2 Brenner Ideas (breakfast for dinner) Because you spent your grocery money on other things.... like art stuff:
Eggs, it's hard to beat the price of eggs and what nutritional value it packs. I always add cheese and some ham to it, but it's my go to were "out" of grocery money" and my family likes eggs a lot, Here is my fav. egg bake recipe: Farmers Casserole (side note, it calls for evaporated milk and I seem to never have it. I use regular milk.)
I keep going back and forth on is it worth my time to bake bread or to buy it, and I still don't have a good answer but it does taste like 100x's better when you make it. and it's really cheap if you have all the ingredients anyways.
Cottage Cakes makes about 24 cottage cakes, or a meal and half for a family of 5
24 oz of cottage cheese
9 eggs
6 oz oil
1 cup flour (any will work)
1/4 cup sugar
and a splash or two of vanilla
mix it up like pancake batter and then use it as pancake batter to make. It's easy and my kids never seem to notice a "big" difference in their pancakes. My difference is that it's full of protein, and breakfast for dinner, who doesn' complain?
Wild Cards 21 Techniques Craftsy Class review
I am always impressed with Craftsy, and of course this class didn't disappoint. As a seasoned and self taught stamper I thought I knew enough to make some nice cards, This class took my knowledge to the next level This class was a breath of fresh air for me, In a nut shell I saw new light from my older stamps and from supplies I have had for years! So here is a small rundown of how the class worked and some of my projects.
Stencils, are very trendy right now, and Catherine Pooler from Stamp Nation focused enough for me to feel like I could make any card with a stencil, She also showed ways to use texture in our cards, including embossing paste, heat embossing, and heat embossing with die cuts. Her class taught me a lot about ink and the different ways you can utilize your ink, Ink is not just for stamping! During her class I couldn't stop taking notes from all the great insights she had given along the way. I do feel like my cards have gotten a more professional feel to them because I have taken this class Thank you Catherine Pooler for the great content!
Here are some of the cards from this class. There are so many cards that I still want to do but for now this is a preview of what inspired me.
At the end of this post I would love to hear your ideas about the cards I made, do you like the color, and the stamp and the die cut choice? Still learning and would love some comments!
Cheek out this class, it's still on sale for a little longer for $14.99
Feel free to find me and follow me on Craftsy to see more details about these cards I have made!
Stencils, are very trendy right now, and Catherine Pooler from Stamp Nation focused enough for me to feel like I could make any card with a stencil, She also showed ways to use texture in our cards, including embossing paste, heat embossing, and heat embossing with die cuts. Her class taught me a lot about ink and the different ways you can utilize your ink, Ink is not just for stamping! During her class I couldn't stop taking notes from all the great insights she had given along the way. I do feel like my cards have gotten a more professional feel to them because I have taken this class Thank you Catherine Pooler for the great content!
Here are some of the cards from this class. There are so many cards that I still want to do but for now this is a preview of what inspired me.
At the end of this post I would love to hear your ideas about the cards I made, do you like the color, and the stamp and the die cut choice? Still learning and would love some comments!
Cheek out this class, it's still on sale for a little longer for $14.99
Feel free to find me and follow me on Craftsy to see more details about these cards I have made!
Free Live Photography and scrapbook classes this weekend! Something for everyone!
Watch live photography classes for free this weekend! Creative Live also has a bunch of marketingclasses to watch for free.
Check Out CreativeLive's Free On-Air Courses
I found a really cool new website. As a stay at home mom I always find myself with thoughts of instead of watching netflix, I should see if I couldn't feed my "art" addiction that I totally have! So enter CreativeLive.
They are an online class website that has wonderful classes to help you become a better "artist."
This weekend is the weekend to pick up a new or dust of a passion you once had, as they are broadcasting or showing some classes live! Cheek it out, you will be sorry you didn't, there are some really good photography classes you can watch!
Also they have a free paper craft class that seems full of great ideas... perfect for the upcoming christmas season! Close to My Heart paper crafts, scrapbooking and stamping
Save hundreds of dollars, Learn to save money and coupon class!
Saving money and couponing workshop
Intro, what money means to us… how do we spend it
- Grocery store layout. How it helps to save money, guidelines for buying produce, meat, dairy, deli, grocery, health, and beauty, pharmacy,
- Strategic Marketing tactics. Placement of products, size’s of the product, make it cheaper, circulars (grocery adds) and planning a shopping trip.
- Sale cycles
- Finding coupons
- Organizing coupons and use of coupons
- Price points and using coupons
- Utilizing your kitchen and talents to help save money
- Hy-Vee, Target, Walmart, store policies. Store coupons and other store deals to be aware of.
- Menu planning and implementing it
Starting Friday, September 16th we will meet in the morning 9:30-11:00 (Ankeny area) with a $5 cover charge to talk and worksheets about how to save money.
Leave a comment bellow if you are interested in attending and I will message you with more info.
This weekend Craftsy Classes 50% off
Craftsy is having it's 50% off all classes sale this weekend!
Calling all makers! Get 50% off every class. All of Craftsy's online classes are $19.99 or less — now through Sunday. *Select classes are not eligible, including those from Craftsy partner The Great Courses®.
The ones on my wish list are that I want to do this season while the kids are in school are:
The Art of Caramel Techniques Treats (Christmas is coming sooner that we think, and home made chocolate is always a good choice.)
Make the most of your food processor I am always looking for a good way to use my appliances, and the food processor has so many great ways to utilize a lot of gadgets.... which I need to weed through my gadgets Anyways this looks like a way fun class! I have heard really good things about this class!
Sketching landscapes in pen and ink with Sheri Blaukopf Because my artist's child needs to learn how to sketch and gesture paint, and I would have lots of fun painting with this class!
Food Photography, from plate to photo Hello, food and photography, yes please! This class sounds like a really good class to get your feet wet if you are curious about photography. It looks like the teacher gives good feed back to the work you submit to craftsy, so you get professional feed back to help you get better. That to me is worth the cost of the class!
The Perfect Cupcake, I like to bake, This seems like a good class to watch and get ideas on how to improve your baking skills.
Lovely Layered Cards a card making class that the teacher actually gives you comments about the project: The ones I have done none of the instructors have commented on my card projects,the paper crafting classes I have taken are really good, but it's nice to see a teacher's comment here and there.
What classes are you interested in? I always like to know what other's are taking!
I also want to put a big shout out to Craftsy, I love it! there is an artist community that is positive and lively. Most of the teachers are really good replying back to your questions, and your projects, so you get professional critics from well known professionals in the area you are learning about. I really enjoy spending nap time learning about making cards, watercolor, utilizing my kitchen to it's fullest (aka cooking for my family.)
Best way to save money.... The real secret
Although I don't have everything figured out, and usually it takes a lot of mojo to "save money" This is what I have learned
First start small, I have a stock pile that right now my family is eating out off, because I know food sales are going to be going on in the month of November and December, and I want to save my grocery money for when the Sales are really good. So I only buy what we need for food, like milk and fresh produce. I then replace the food when prices are at a good price and stock up. (small things that really make a big difference.)
2. The Dave Ramsey envelope system does work, we use to do that in college and I hated it, but it got me in the habit of deciding just how much I wanted something, and stretching my dollar as far as it could go. basically it's a system that let's say we have $500 a month for groceries, $200 for Gas, $50 for clothes and so on, and you put that money in an envelope and use that money for when you need cash from that category. (this means you don't use your credit/debit card.) I have done the same thing with a gift card from the grocery store, I would load up x amount we have to spend that month on groceries and then when the money was out... you guessed it I was done grocery shopping for the month.
3. Don't window shop. I use to love to "window" shop but $200 later I was like opps I did it again right? so I don't window shop. That temptation is gone when you don't window shop.
4 What motivates you to save money. Remember that I don't like to save money with out some serious mojo... yup... so find out what you really want. For me I started couponning/saving money because I really love being an Artist, but I can't be a starving artist with a family to raise. So I wanted money for my art addiction, that was enough for me to figure out how couponning really worked. Now that I have most of the Art stuff that I "need" not want, I want to save for a family vacation to Disney. I think it's a lot more do able then just saying I need to save money, get some mojo behind it and you can do it!
Those are my tidbit of knowledge on saving money. I would love to hear your comments about how you "save money by not spending money"
Mary Murphy's watercolor class on Craftsy
This summer it was my goal to learn and develop my watercolor skills, I believe I have achieved that goal in the fact that I *did* it, I am not a professional water-colorist, but when I paint I love it, I am in that zone where all my doubts, and time just goes away, I am in the moment and that I love!
With the help from Craftsy and Mary Murphy, I now have a ton of little skills to help me paint better, or at lest not have the fear of a blank canvas to get me started. I love that watercolor is a very unpredictable medium, and that it's fun to just play around with.
Mary did an excellent job of working through her Simple watercolor technique class. Her content was really remarkable, her responses to my work that I posted in our class projects were a huge help, including ADDING MORE COLOR, and watching my values in my painting, she met me where I was as a artist and built onto that, which I respected a lot. Mary Your awesome, I do feel like I got to know Mary as an instructor while working on her class at my pace.
Here is the link to the Stunning Tecn
Here are some of my projects
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| Heartland Landscape (expressionist style) |
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| Sky study on canvas paper |
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| Value study from a black and white photograph, with a lose style |
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| miniature inspired painting of a tulip |
Here is a video of what the class entails, it's a good one! If you are thinking about starting watercolor, or even if you are more advanced, and want to boast your skills this class is worth it!
Let me know in the comments if you take this class so I can follow you on Craftsy!
And to keep it real here is a picture of my work space, Mary I took your advice and had my water colors out all summer so I could paint when I needed too, even at 5 am!
Hy-Vee Sale item of the week to make Chocolate Muffins
Hy-Vee has Cake mix on sale this week, and I thought this was a great recipe to post.
I do this all the time and cake mix is on sale this week at Hy-vee, it's a favorite at my house my Price point is usually $1.00 for cake mix .So this got me thinking about Chocolate muffins, I love when pumpkin goes on sale in about 6 weeks from now, makes for a cheap and yummy breakfast!
Please note: My favorite recipes are ones where I don't have to measure anything. Btw to get kids really excited for this, add chocolate chips to the top of the muffin. The batter is thick, make sure you blend / mix the batter up really well I sue a kitchenaid mixer for the job. You can also do this recipe with spice cake mix and apple sauce or pumpkin, it works the same way!
Happy Saving and Baking!
I do this all the time and cake mix is on sale this week at Hy-vee, it's a favorite at my house my Price point is usually $1.00 for cake mix .So this got me thinking about Chocolate muffins, I love when pumpkin goes on sale in about 6 weeks from now, makes for a cheap and yummy breakfast!
Please note: My favorite recipes are ones where I don't have to measure anything. Btw to get kids really excited for this, add chocolate chips to the top of the muffin. The batter is thick, make sure you blend / mix the batter up really well I sue a kitchenaid mixer for the job. You can also do this recipe with spice cake mix and apple sauce or pumpkin, it works the same way!
Happy Saving and Baking!
Water Cards Made Simple class review
Not only that My 7 year old Daughter was also mesmerized by the class, we watched it together, and my daughter also hopes to make some cards with what she learned as well! So thank you Craftsy for providing content that my daughter and I can watch together and bond too!
Thanks Deepti for your Class it was well worth it, and I have had compliments from the cards that I have made from your class from the person(s) I sent the card too.
I have posted my cards here, And she is on Pintrest here is her board
Happy Creating!
Watercolor cards made simple from Deepti at Craftsy
I really love the watercolor card class, I bought it as a splurge, and I am glad that I did, it really took my cards to the next level. all these cards are inspired from this class, I really like the techniques used, and the good advice Deepti gave as we were developing the class.
First easy card, with brush stokes and then I stamped
I made this with masking fluid, and my Japanese paint that I love
I sketched this flower from my silhouette, and then added watercolor to it.
impressionist style roses in watercolor with a mop brush
a gradient of green for the background, then I water colored die cut roses, with gem in the middle
Mixed media background with stencils, and hand painted die cut flowers
Mixed Media background with stencils, then hand painted die cut flowers.
wet into wet watercolor stamped image, with embossed background
impressionist roses used a size 4 mop brush with crimson red, medium yellow, and veridian green.
impressionist roses used a size 4 mop brush with crimson red, medium yellow, and veridian green.
I sketched this dog on my silhouette, then added some brown watercolor to the dog, My hand writing for the sentiment.
impressionist roses used a size 4 mop brush with crimson red, medium yellow, and veridian green.
a Textured background, with a silhouette file as the top.
watercolored stamped the tulip, with a gradient wash, and stamped sentiment.
a gradient wash, with black embossed stamping
an impressionist flower painted with a flat brush
stamped sentiment
water colored pencils an stamped image
my impressionist painting of wild flowers, used Quin yellow, and Quin red with turquoise paint. I used a exacto knife to cut into the paper for the texture of the stems
Silhouette sketch pen did most of the work, then I added watercolor to it.
Craftsy
I was talking to a friend, Sarah Day, and she recommended that I should just take a class on Craftsy and see if you like watercolor, because they have watercolor classes. So I did, and then I took more, and realized that I LOVE WATERCOLOR! Mary Murphy is a fantastic teacher, and so is the Frugal Crafter.
Craftsy has many free classes too, that I am in love with, want to learn how to make really yummy pizza, or cake pops, you can and it's a free class.
I will be posting more about individual classes soon, so look for those reviews.
Craftsy has many free classes too, that I am in love with, want to learn how to make really yummy pizza, or cake pops, you can and it's a free class.
I will be posting more about individual classes soon, so look for those reviews.
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