THE BIG DOUBLE BOO!!!!

Well my camera finally took the big one, which was very upsetting for me this holiday weekend. I had every intention of walking everyone through my 2 day cooking adventure, including posting some recipes. First, I made 2 turkeys and a country ham.




Just look at this beautiful Pumpkin Swirl Cheesecake, recipe will be posted by the end of the week.


AND the step by step transformation of my new craft room and Todd's new MAN CAVE.
Not sure if you can even see what this picture is suppose to be, but its my living room with a king size bedroom set in the middle of the floor, and stuff everywhere. The weekend before, I had packed everything in the front bedroom of my home with exception to Todd's man stuff in the closet. So before we could start the room we had to take out the furniture and stuff. Then Todd needed to move the shelves and cabinets I had in my craft room first. Well I didn't think about packing any of that stuff up, since I use the room everyday, what a disaster. Just look at all the stuff that was in the cabinets all over the counter tops.

Since my good camera bit the big one, I was forced to use a spare camera that just doesn't work very well. No flash or auto focus that works properly, so some pictures turn out and some not at all. Now, if you are wondering where the furniture is going, well I'm storing it at my mom's house, probably for the next 20 years. Hope you enjoy. I have so much more to show you, so check back and see the projects underway and I promise to have a new camera soon.

More Sneak Peaks of the Christmas Workshop

Hey there, as promised here are some more sneak peaks of the projects for my first Christmas Workshop. Thanks, Annette for showing me how to work with the liquid appliqué. Just love this card.



Here are a few of the tags we will be doing.



Inspiration is found every where, but I'm even luckier, my upline and good friend, Annette Green is very talented and an inspiration for styles and techniques. I attend her monthly club and this month we made this wonderful Tim Holtz styled tag. I loved it so much I made my own version below. What do you think...Enjoy and again thank you Annette.

Mt. Dora Antique Show

Last weekend we went over to Mt. Dora with some friends for the Antique Show. We really enjoy going to Mt. Dora and usually make this trip twice a year, but we have never been for this show. I was amazed as to how much stuff there was and how many people were there.

It was actually a little over whelming. I made one purchase for the day, besides carni food and BEER!!! It was hot and that cold beer tasted so good. My big purchase was 2 antique print press blocks made from cherry wood and copper. I came home and Todd cleaned them up for me and they still stamp.....I tried to take a picture of them this morning, but the batteries in my camera died before I could get the last shot. Will post later next week. Isn't Todd cute, and so tolerant of me always taking pictures of him every where he goes.

Fellow Bloggers......I'm so excited about the new 2011 Idea Book and classes I am offering next year, that I can't wait to share everything with you. The January 2011 Inspirations Product Sneak Peek is amazing. Love the way CTMH is going for next year. In January 2011 I will be starting a Magic Scrapbooking Club and will continue my Card's Plus Club. Below are the details. Enjoy......

Cards PLUS
Second Sunday of Each Month

This monthly club of ladies enjoys three projects each month at no cost. The specifics of the club are:

· Budget your purchases over a six month period, only $25.00 minimum per month.

· Receive hostess benefits once during the sixth month period.

· FREE Idea Books for all.

· Exclusive hostess products & $25 plus in Close to My Heart merchandise of your choice when you are the assigned hostess.

· This club will meet on the second Sunday of each month at 2:00 p.m., where you will have the opportunity to learn more advanced stamping techniques, use more exclusive CTMH products, and other products to coordinate with CTMH. Each month you will make two wonderful and fun cards and one altered project. GREAT GIFT IDEAS!!!!

· All supplies and instructions are included.

Join me for a fun, relaxing and FREE afternoon out with your stamping buddies.

If you have a friend that would like to join our club, invite them to attend a class, they pay only $15.00 as a guest (for the supplies), and they will get to make our club projects. If they decide to join, you will receive a Free Stamp Set (A-D size) of your choice from the current Idea Book.

Magic Workshop
Third Wednesday of Each Month

STARTS JANUARY 2011

This monthly club commits to a 6 month cycle, meeting once per month where each member learns scrapbooking techniques while creating four beautiful 12 x 12 scrapbook pages, and has enough supplies to make several cards, tags, and more scrapbook pages and cards kits each month for $37.50, plus tax and shipping. The specifics of the club are:

· Create exclusive scrapbook layouts and handmade cards.

· Kits include a full paper pack, coordinating embellishments, photos and directions, and an exclusive stamp set.

· Receive hostess benefits once during the sixth month period.

· FREE Idea Books for all.

· Exclusive hostess products & a minimum of $25 in Close to My Heart merchandise of your choice when you are the assigned hostess.

· This club will meet on the Third Wednesday of each month at 6:00 p.m., where you will have the opportunity to learn more advanced stamping techniques, use more exclusive CTMH products, and other products to coordinate with CTMH.

· All supplies and instructions are included. Kits are pre-purchased for the upcoming month.

· Magic Book is a requirement for this Club and is available for $29.95, plus tax and shipping.

· Club members also enjoy special perks like promotion sneak peaks, exclusive discounts, first-priority to events, and more!

Join me for a fun, relaxing and FREE night out with your stamping buddies.

Sign up today and get 25% off the Magic Book for this Club. Orders will need to be placed by January 2, 2011 for the January class.

Save your spot by going to my CTMH website and email me today!!!!!

Don't forget to follow my blog.... By joining as a follower and posting comments from November 24 and December 15 YOU can WIN SOME BLOG CANDY. I will randomly pick 2 days during this time period and 1 person from each day picked who has posted a comment and those 2 lucky people will receive an extra special Christmas present from me....Hint: possibly a D size CTMH stamp set .

My first Annual Christmas Workshop will be here before I know it, so I'm pushing through with my goal of completing at least two projects each night, including the design, cutting and assembly of the kits. Last night I completed this ornament card and teddy bear card. Too cute.



Once I was done preparing the kits I decided to quit for the night. While I was watching TV, I was reading a new scrapbooking magazine I picked up at Hobby Lobby last weekend and I saw these really neat 3 dimensional tags made with all kinds of glitter and embellishments and the light bulb went on in my head. Mind you it was now 11:00 p.m., as I running to my room to make this really cute scene with my spellbinders, CTMH Level 2 Mistletoe paper and CTMH stamp set Snow Days.........Lots of fun going on here and it only took about 5 minutes to make.....Super easy. Check back in a few days for more sneak peaks and to find out what I do with this cute tag.

Falling in love with Studio J

I can honestly say I'm falling in live with Studio J by CTMH. Studio J had been out for about 8 months before I gave it a try. Since then I have renewed my membership for another year and I have done two albums. This software is so easy to use and is perfect if you don't have a lot of time or space for all the necessary supplies needed to create a scrapbook. Its great being able to pick and change paper packets, color combinations and embellishments through out your project. I personally like all my pages to flow together.



I hope you enjoy these samples I did from our trip to Tennessee, North Carolina and Virginia.



Give Studio J a try.....I promise you'll fall in love too!

Last weekend was one of the craziest for me in a long time. Up bright and early on Saturday morning for my neighborhood Fall Garage Sale. 5:30 in the morning early. Trying to get the word out about my CTMH adventure, I set up this display and signup table. No sign ups, but a lot of talking and giving away of cards and Idea Books. Who knows, something might come out of it after all. The most fun part about the sale was my assistant Ricky. Isn't he cute. When his mom pulled up with her car completely packed full, I couldn't find Ricky and there he was in the middle of all her stuff strapped into his car seat. Ricky helped with the sale all morning and he even helped clean off my driveway of all the acorns that kept falling.
After the sale, my madness went into over drive. I had my husband pull my Christmas Tree out of the attic. I rearranged all the furniture in the house and cleaned all my nick-nacks before I put up the tree and continued with the decorating until 11:00.
The next morning I was up bright and early again for breakfast with my mom and dad, 5:30 again, and I got right back at it with the tree until we were ready to go. When we got home, I set up for my Cards Plus Club. i even made these cute gift tags to go on the girls Christmas presents. Since I'm not having a club in December, I had to be ready now. Class was a breeze. I'm so proud of this group of ladies, they plug along and keep getting better and better each month. Way to go Girls!!! Now, when class was over, back to the tree I go until the last ornament was hung at 9:00. Know, most of my friends think I'm out of control, but with so much going on in my life, I have to utilize every minute I can. So, if decorating the tree wasn't enough, I thought it looked bare underneath without any presents under it, so I wrapped presents until about 11:00. When I was done I took some pictures. I just love ornaments and like to take pictures up close. Now, if you can only imagine what my mental state of mind must of been at midnight........well, I think this next pictures says it all. My mind and eyes were gone at this point. Crazy lights for a crazy girl.....LOL.

Christmas is right around the corner and we haven't even had Thanksgiving dinner yet. While in Micheal's the other day they had this free project instructions. When I got home I started and found out quickly that either I'm not as intelligent as I thought I was or the instructions were simply written in a non-human language. So, to solve the problem, I did my own math and created my own template.
Now, I know what you're thinking, why not just get online and print out a new template, well that would of worked but my printed is out of yellow ink, so the whole thing doesn't work. Live and learn.



I think this Hot Chocolate Gift Cone came out pretty good. You can do anything with this idea, even decorate a tree!!! Thanks for that idea Christine. I used CTMH Mistletoe paper for the project and a sticker I picked up at Michaels, a few clear snow flakes I picked up at a show in Orlando last year, some glitter, liquid glass and a snow writer pen. My Cards Plus Club gals are making this project on Sunday and this quick Christmas Card made with CTMH products only....

Its a sad day at the Pope house. Last night while watching tv, we heard our sugar gliders barking up a storm out in the garage. We thought they were talking to each other. With the cool weather they have been more active at night. Around 10:00 when we went to feed them, we noticed Chunky Monkey wasn't coming out of her hut. Shortly after that we realized she had passed. Chunky Monkey was adopted by us about 3 years ago from my brother, who just couldn't give her the attention that she needed. When we got her she was standoffish and wild. Sugar gliders need at least an hour a day of human interaction, otherwise they get that way. We already had two gliders, Pitter and Patter when we got her, which helped to calm her down. Now, after 3 years you still couldn't hold her but she would let you pet her and she would talk to you at feeding time. She will be truly missed. I can only hope she enjoyed the last 3 years of her life with us, we certainly enjoyed her. Chunky Monkey was 14 years old this October.

Fall Escape

I just luv this picture. While in Blowing Rock (Boone) North Carolina, Todd and I took our cousins Toby and Diane for a drive on the Blue Ridge Parkway. This drive is so tempting, you so want to stop at every look out point, but if you do that your half hour 6 mile drive will take several hours. We drove until we came to Linnville, then to Valle Crucis to the Mast General Store. This store still has its own working post office and pot belly wood stove for heat. There are great big rockers in front of the stove for patrons to sit at while they talk all that mountain gossip and more rockers and swings out back on the porch. This is one of my favorite places to visit and shop while in North Carolina. Now, before we took this trip to the Mast General Store, I had to get in my shopping in downtown Blowing Rock. I love to shop, especially for home interior stuff. I'm not a girly girl who likes to shop for clothes and make-up, nope, pretty plane jane in that department, but I like stuff and the Last Straw has stuff from the front door to the back door and from the floor to the ceiling, oh how exhausting. Todd and Toby sat outside while I did my damage. Ok, so on this trip we have Todd and me, Toby and Diane and our 2 dachshunds Kimber and Reese, so with all the luggage, people, and dogs in my Mazda there wasn't much room for more stuff. So I carefully walked through the Last Straw with minimal purchases in my arms.....I made sure not to pick up a basket that I could fill, then out of the corner of my eye I saw a sign that said WE SHIP!!!! I became this mad woman, grabbing everything that I wanted, even got my own personal assistant to pick out items and carry them for me and to store them at the back counter until I was done shopping. I could go on and on about this but, there is so much more to my trip I would like to share beside shopping. While in Damascus, Virginia, that's where we bought our property a few years ago, there is this wonderful bike trail that was made from the old abandoned rail road that use to go from the top of Whitetop Mountain to Abingdon, Virginia. For a whopping $25 bucks you can rent a mountain bike and get hauled up to the top of the mountain and your off for a 18 mile bike ride down hill to Damascus. Now, this ride takes about 3 hours, but with all the stopping it took 4. Ouch, my bum hurt for few days after that. I have several videos, but I can't seem to attach them to my blog. I will need to get help with this. By now, you can see I'm having a great time on vacation, no cell service, no Internet, no cable tv at our cabin, no land line telephone, just good old mother nature all around me. But, how is Todd doing on vacation, well he loves it too, but I always take a day out of our trip to do something he really likes to do!!!! GUNS.....Yep, I said guns. before we go on our trip, Todd lines up all the gun shops and surplus stores in the cities we go through on our trip. Now, I usually sit in the car with the dogs or go antiquing, but something made me go in this one shop in Johnston City, TN and look who I found the Gunny!!! Too much FUN..... I bet you're wondering were Diane is this trip, she's here, I promise. Diane is such a fun fun person to be around. Bless her heart she gets sea sick while riding in a vehicle. With all the mountain roads she did very well. I like shopping for stuff and Diane likes shopping for food. Check it out, we went to the largest craft show in the southeast, in Bell Buckle, TN. So,much stuff everywhere and food too. Here is Diane getting a caramel chocolate covered apple, and then Diane enjoying some sweet potato chips, and some kettle corn. Funny how certain things make people so happy. This was an amazing trip and so much more was seen and done,you'll have to check out the rest in my scrapbook I'm putting together with CTMH Studio J. I've been working on it for the past few days. This program is so easy to use and neat, no paper, ribbon, glue and all that other stuff laying around in my craft room for days and weeks until I'm done. Once complete I will make the book 3 dimensional by adding embellishments and found objects from our trip. Check out my blog in a few weeks for previews. Hope you enjoyed this post. Have a great day.

October gone in a flash....Just after my last post, Todd and I went on our annual trip to Tennessee and Virginia with our cousins Toby and Diane. Just look at these wonderful colors in the leaves. This picture was taken on the 18 mile bike ride we took from White Top Mountain to Damascus, VA. OH Boy, you know what hurt after that 4 hour bike ride. But well worth it. Once back home the rush was on for the Halloween party we had been planning. So much to do with so little time and before I knew it October was over. Its taken a few days but we're getting back into the swing of things. So check back in a few days for lots of cool pictures from our vacation and Halloween Party.