During my whole butterfly metamorphosis experience, I started playing around with these butterfly cards. Both cards are made with CTMH colonial white cards stock, an assortment of CTMH ink pads and swirl stamps, along with 2 different Martha Stewart butterfly punches and a lot of embossing with some embossing 
plates I have. Oh, and don't forget the glitter, you can never have enough glam. A perfect card for my grandma's birthday. She will be 86 this year. Enjoy.
On Friday morning I decided to take a crafter's weekend, destination my CRAFT ROOM. Immediately after work on Friday (at Noon) I entered my home, put on my stamping clothes and off I went for some serious crafting and me time. I first started with cleaning my room from last weeks card and club class, which took about 4 hours. The whole time my dogs just laid at my feet, my little speed bumps, supervising I guess. Not sure were Reese, our other dachshund was when I took this picture. While I was doing my cleaning and laundry too, I had hired someone to come and clean my ceiling, fans, light fixtures, baseboards, etc., all the stuff I hate doing. Just to let you know, Reese hates the vacuum cleaner which was running constantly for about 4 hours, so it was no real surprise that I couldn't find her, ever since she was a puppy she would hide, usually in our closet. While folding the laundry the mystery was solved, there was Reese buried under all my clothes on the couch. Sure wish I had my camera when I found her.
month's class. 2 movies later, I was done cutting, sorting, inventorying, and packaging the kits for this cute Coffee canister and some other cards. Breaking to make dinner for my husband. Before I knew it, it was 7:30 and I was done for the day.
Sunday, back to it. Made these 
really cute cards using CTMH Makin' Waves stamp set and other assorted CTMH papers.
Keeping up with my blog is very exciting to me. I've made so many cards and projects over the past year and I've decided to stay true to myself and to my followers by posting the most current projects and showing off all great products I've been using. 
What a great day for stamping and making cards. While watching the news the weather man predicted a hot and muggy Florida Summer day and was he right, it was 101 with the heat index. So I dropped my A/C down to a cool 72 degrees to accommodate my girls. The second Sunday of each month is when I have my Card Class and Cards Plus Club together. This Sunday I had 4 Club Gals and 3 Card Class Gals. What a way to spend a day like today, on top of the heat, it began to rain. This month I decided to challenge the girls and make more detailed cards, with lots of pieces. I just know they liked the finished projects no matter what it took to get there. The class ran a little over this month, which gave me the opportunity to show sneak peeks of next month's project, cards
and special projects for a new Open Project Day, which will be held on the last Sunday of each month. This is a special day indeed. Currently, all my gals are into card making, so instead of a crop day, I'm offering a project day. All the girls are invited to either participate in a special project or they can bring along a project they are working on and can use all my fun, fun stuff. The really great thing about this project day is the cost......$5.00 to make a project or for the use of all my supplies, paper, embellishment, dies, punches, you name it, if I have you can use it.
After everyone left, it was time to clean up, I literally tossed everything into my craft room until Monday. The funniest part of the day was, my husband and the dogs retreating to the MAN Room during class. When class was over my husband came out and the first thing out of his mouth was, "what is the temperature in here?", he went straight for the thermostat, 72 he said, I'm freezing and he turned the air up. My husband is just wonderful, he helps me set up my tables and chairs and when we're done he helps me clean up, What a guy, he even found Beth's glasses and took them to her.
Bright and early 6:30 on Saturday morning, still in my pajamas I'm outside taking pictures of my butterflies. This one is ready and should be coming out in a few hours. See how transparent the cocoons get, you can see the wing patterns through the outer shell. Went to Target and Walmart for my weekly shopping and when I got home in about and hour and a half, he was gone. I searched everywhere for this guy and found him laying on the rocks in my garden. This little guy must of been really shocked, he actually stayed in the rocks for 5 hours before he took his first flight. This guys cousin was born shortly after, still can't catch this in action, but I have about 10 more cocoons to to keep an eye on.
Down to the last minute and I'm done with my dad's birthday card. Besides getting this card ready, I've been busy setting up for my Card Club and Card Class for this Sunday and designing a project and cards for next month's class. Where did the week go? Having off on Monday made this whole week fly by. My goal is to do one card or project a night, so I can be ahead of the game. Then I choose the best cards and project of my classes. Definitely a task, but I love it. This is the best way to work out your stresses from the daily grind. I'm sure my husband likes it too, since he has the superior rule of the remote control when I'm in never never land, stamping and coloring. Have a great weekend.
This afternoon when I went home for lunch, I checked on my little butterfly cocoons, no change today. Then something told me to turn around and when I did, there it was, a beautiful baby butterfly that had just come out of its cocoon and was still drying it's wings. Poor thing, I spooked him while trying to get a better picture and off he flew, well, if a butterfly could stumble that was what he was really doing. I then found his empty cocoon and to my surprise, at least 15 more in different 
stages in my cypress trees. This one is just about ready for freedom, hopefully when I get home tonight I can catch one coming out. I just can't believe how bright these cocoons are in the early stages.
My goal is to take pictures everyday for the next 2 weeks and make a butterfly mini scrapbook of their metamorphoses. I'll keep you posted as the changes come around. Hope I catch one coming out of the cocoon. That would be too cool.
Just love mini mental health breaks. Honestly, I take about three of them a day. A few weeks ago during one of my breaks, I stumbled on to a blog and discovered this wonderful idea on how to alter a battery operated tea light candle as a birthday cake. Oh, was my mind racing. For days I thought about this card and altered cake. When I left work on my early day, Friday, I ran to the dollar store and found these tea light candles 2 for $1!!!! I had so much fun with this project, but you definitely need to have some patients, good lighting, glasses and tweezers, too.
