Chalk Up Another Holiday! FMS115, Merry Monday #86

I figured I couldn't miss when I combined the challenges of two amazingly talented designers!  Jen Timko's wonderful graphic design at Freshly Made Sketches plus Lesley Croghan's charming chalkboard challenge at Merry Monday equals one sketchy, merry Christmas card!  

                                                    

                                                 

Winter Joy.....FMS114

Snowflakes are falling around here and the winter Olympics will be here soon.  My husband is a retired ski coach and can't wait for the events.  In the meantime Emma and I have our own Olympic events.  Every morning we start our day with the dishwasher derby. I open the dishwasher and try to unload it faster than she can reload it with various toys and household items. Then we head to the laundry room for the washer/dryer relay.  I hand her the wet clothes and she puts each one carefully into the dryer.  Of course the light switch on the dryer door must be flicked each time to announce the arrival of a new garment.  Then it's time for rock climbing. She crawls upstairs as many times as her grandfather has the patience to carry her back down and let her climb again. My role in this activity is to divert her attention when the event is over so Grandpa can lock the gate at the bottom. A handful of goldfish works every time!  Here is Emma watching some real goldfish this week at Pet Smart........perhaps that is giving her some inspiration for summer Olympic events!

   Linda Suarez loves snowflakes - and so do I -  and put them in her sweet sketch this week at Freshly Made Sketches. (and so did I!)
                                   

The Home Stretch......Merry Monday #85

It's my last week as Featured Designer with the Merry Monday team. They are an amazingly talented group of gals and I have enjoyed working with them this month!  I have also been glad for the opportunity to add some more cards to my Christmas card stash.....I am creeping closer to that magic total of 80!  I write my cards Thanksgiving weekend so I think I will finish "production" just in time. Of course a lot depends on how well Miss Emma naps this week!

Thanks but No Thanks! PPA180

This close to Thanksgiving I couldn't resist making one more thank you card using that gorgeous Sweater Weather DSP and some fibers from the burlap ribbon!  It has definitely been sweater weather around here - perfect for making desserts for Thanksgiving dinner.  First let me say I hate to cook and am a terrible cook - and my daughter is worse than me for which I take full responsibility. But I do make a decent pie and can rustle up some cookies as needed. Erin arrived Sunday as I was dipping molasses cookies in white chocolate. She offered to start the pie dough for me and wanted to use my Kitchen Aid mixer. I always make dough by hand but I told her to go ahead and try the mixer. We wrapped pie shells to freeze for next week and then baked the scraps of dough sprinkled with cinnamon and sugar. After we cleaned up the kitchen we sat down to enjoy our cinnamon crusts but something was definitely amiss. They weren't exactly flaky.............in fact they were downright chewy.........in fact they were downright glue-y!  It was like chewing rubber cement.  So I asked Erin if she had followed the recipe card I gave her.  

"Yes," she said. "First I put in the flour, added the water and mixed.  Then I put in some Crisco and salt."  

Guess I never taught her what cutting in the shortening meant so she just mixed at will.............and yep she made paste........

I will be starting over on those piecrusts tomorrow!

                  Margaret has a fun sketch for us this week at Pals Paper Arts!