Hello friends! 🙂  Are you still with me out there?  (This is a bit of a long post to catch you up with what’s happened.)

Wow!  It sure has been a while since I’ve been able to even TRY to get back into things.  This was a really abrupt and rude unplanned disappearance from me and I was getting worried for a while about how I would even begin to start up again!  I actually feel pretty “rusty” and unpracticed from my absence and I have a few things to share with you too!

Firstly, I want to thank you ALL from the very bottom of my heart for your wonderful comments, personal e-mail, cards and social media contact that I’ve heard from many of you.  There were days that I just went to tears hearing from my fellow crafty friends as it came on a few days that I REALLY needed it the most!  I thank you SO MUCH for that and it really helped to get me though some difficult pain days.

So what happened was a worsening of something that I believed to be a minor back issue that I thought would resolve on it’s own, but the issue grew worse and more painful to the point that I couldn’t sit, stand, walk or even getting out of bed was painful enough that I had a procedure to try and control the nerve pain.  With this done, along with physical therapy and adjustments to my life style, I am feeling better now.  It’s not COMPLETELY pain free, but it’s tolerable enough to do normal tasks for a period of time until I need to move around again.  It’s just a life style adjustment that I can live with and hopefully fit in with what I love to do which is crafting!  It really bothered me to just “walk away”, but sometimes when your health is in trouble, you just have to do what you have to do and heal.  I have just learned that SEVERAL small breaks a day are better than none at all and I will pay for it later if I don’t!  🙂  Thanks for sticking it out with me!

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And so with that, I would like to share a couple of things that actually took way longer to complete than what I would normally take the time to complete and it was actually the very last little bit that I had accomplished before I had to completely step out of my room for a while.  My husband wouldn’t let me go back in there until he was sure that I could tolerate my pain ok.  Still working through the exercises until my follow up Dr. appointment, but I think I’ll be fine from here…I sure hope so as I’m ready to ROCK N ROLL!!!  LOL

I had made a couple of masculine cards:

Although I don’t have a black light, if you hold up the card to a black light, the watercolor background that I made will glow!  It’s a pretty cool affect!

I took one of the foilable image panels from the kit and took several of the Neon Aqua Pigments and smooshed them over the background until I was happy.  I tried to foil over it, but it didn’t completely get all of it.  I added the strip of holographic paper at the bottom and the stamped elements along with the stars over it.  For the sentiment, I heat embossed it with the  EP that came in the kit and popped it up with foam tape.  My bro seemed to like it and I think those neon watercolors turned out pretty cool! 🙂

This is probably one of my all time faves from Newton’s Nook called Winston’s BBQ.  I think they have had this set for a while, but It’s a great one for masculine themed designs!

I’ve used a kraft cardstock background and stamped several of the images from the set all over the background with the same color of ink.  For the main panel, I stamped Winston, the grill and sentiment together and colored with my Copic markers.  I also sponged some blue ink around the edges of it for a “sky” looking appearance.

I’ve taken a strip of silver foil cardstock and ran an embossing folder through it to place across the center of the card.  I used some foam tape to pop up the image panel over top.  All of these layers were placed over an A2 sized white top folding card base.

Of course, last but not least, I wanted to share a card I had completed for a guest design card meant for June and that was completed at the end of May, but I was unable to share it before I had to leave for a while.  This is the card I gave to my husband for Father’s Day and he really does feel like my super hero! 🙂

Isn’t this just the cutest?!  I made this card using the adorable Paper Nest Dolls Superboy Owen and his sweet companion Superpuppy too!  I had so much fun blending the background in the different colors!  I added some blue stars stamped in the background.  the city scape behind him was made with a city scape die cut layered a couple of times.  I used some yellow cardstock behind the building for a lighted building affect.  The wall was made using some gray colored cardstock and then a brick stencil with some red ink colored embossing paste to over it with.  Then I just added the sentiment by white heat embossing it over a black strip that I die cut out.

Here’s a closer view of the coloring I’ve done on the images.  I’ve used a silver gel pen to color in the buckle on his outfit.  I fussy cut the images out after coloring.

Here you can also see the splattering that I’ve done with some white shimmer paint in the background with the blue stars.

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Other news

I actually got a bit of really cool news while I was down and thanks to a lovely craft friend, she tagged me and let me know about this, but my set of Whimsy Stamps “Bee cards” were shown in the Making Cards & Papercraft Magazine for August 2019!  Chosen as a “top spot” editor’s pick right inside the front cover!  I was very surprised and to see what was said about it along with my blog address was pretty cool!  So go get your copy of this magazine!  It’s my first time having a peek at it and they’ve got some pretty neat inspiration in there!

Although I have been in a great deal of pain and mainly dealing with what came with it, of course my husband was great at trying to “distract” me from it and trying to get me to smile as much as possible.  He knew first hand how I was feeling each day and like I mentioned above, he’s my super hero!  So there were a few fun or smiling moments here and there while I was being patient with myself as much as I could anyway.

I wasn’t able to do much to celebrate 4th of July, but going out in my backyard, my neighborhood seemed to have a pretty cool display!  You can see the half moon at the bottom underneath the left side of the firework.  Needed bug spray, but it was a nice night!

Back in April, hubby and I had gotten some Styx concert tickets and I was worried about going due to the problems I was having.  Of course hubby said not to worry about it as our seats were great with no one behind us so I could sit, stand or whatever I needed to do!  It was loud enough with the music and it took my mind off things plus I could always clap and sing the songs!  🙂  We took a good break in the middle of it so I could move around away from the seat too.  It was a great concert!

In my backyard, I have different flowers and I really enjoy going out in nature to see the flowers, birds, bees, etc.  The flowers this Summer really helped me relax, smile and just enjoy the beauty that is around.

Some days were absolutely horrible, but there are also these days too…

I’m soooo happy to finally be able to write up a post and now that I’m able to start getting back into my stamp room, I’m very excited to be able to come back to my design teams (who were ALL so absolutely wonderful with letting me have the time to heal and recover!  It meant so much!) and I will be along again soon to share new creations now!  Yay!  Hope everyone is doing well and I’ve missed you!

Crafty hugs