Silhouette Giveaway!

If you go to:
 http://southernhospitalityblog.com/its-a-fabulous-crafty-cutting-silhouette-giveaway/comment-page-5/#comment-74977

you can enter and have 4 chances to win a Silhouette electronic cutting tool for all your crafting needs!

Sugar Cookie Recipe

Sugar Cookies

Prep Time: 1 hour 0 min
Total Time: 3 hours 10 min
Makes: 5 dozen 2-inch cookies

1 ½ cups powdered sugar
1 cup butter or margarine, softened
1 teaspoon vanilla
½ teaspoon almond extract
1 egg
2 ½ cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon cream of tartar
Granulated sugar or colored sugar

1. Mix powdered sugar, butter, vanilla, almond extract and egg in large bowl. Stir in remaining ingredients except granulated sugar. Cover and refrigerate at least 2 hours.

2. Heat oven to 375ºF. Lightly grease cookie sheet

3. Divide dough in half. Roll each half 1/4 inch thick on lightly floured surface. Cut into desired shapes with   2- to 2 1/2-inch cookie cutters. Sprinkle with granulated sugar. Place on cookie sheet.

4. Bake 7 to 8 minutes or until edges are light brown. Remove from cookie sheet. Cool on wire rack.
 (I like this recipe because it has both vanilla & almond extracts)

Sugar Cookie Icing

Ingredients:
1 cup powdered sugar
2 tsps milk
2 tsps light corn syrup
¼ tsp vanilla extract or almond extract (I use almond)
food coloring
1. Stir the powdered sugar and the milk until smooth.

2. Beat in corn syrup and vanilla until icing is smooth and glossy.

3. It it’s too thick, add more corn syrup.

4. Divide icing into separate bowls and stir in food coloring as desired.

5. You can dip the cookies, paint them with a paint brush or spread them using a knife or the back of a spoon. ( I use a knife)

I thought that I would share the recipes that I used to make the Valentine cookies that are pictured below.  Enjoy!

Halloween layout

I got the urge to do a digital layout today so I decided to do this layout of Kelsey at Halloween last fall.  I used staples for the first time on a digital layout.  All the digital elements are Designs by Krista from Trick or Treat Krista.

Tim Holtz Goodies

I still had some credit left over on a gift card that I got for Christmas so I went to Michaels today.  They had a lot of the Tim Holtz products on clearance so I snatched some ot them up.  I got some grungeboard, crackle paint, paint daubers, masks and a stamp set.  Now I can't wait to play with them!

Spooky Crew

I saw a layout in a magazine that I liked so I tried to re-create it. I wish that I could find it online to post on here but I couldn't. This layout is digital.  Here is my verson. 

Snow

So I've lost track of all the snow storms we have had and how many inches...it's seems like winter will never end. All I know is that the driveway needs cleared almost everyday and the snow is up past our knees.

I have this snowman on my front porch that holds a sign that says, "Let it snow!" so I decided it was time to bring him in! No more snow please!

Here he is thawing out in my kitchen sink then off to storage in the basement he goes.

Valentine Cookies

I made some heart shaped sugar cookies for Valentines Day. I had pretty much given up on making sugar cookies because I couldn't make them look pretty like you see in magazines. Then a couple of years ago I found this great recipe for sugar cookie icing that I love.  Corn syrup seems to be the secret ingredient. I can now finally make a pretty sugar cookie.  I am so excited!

Valentine Cards

I decided to make my own Valentine cards this year.  Since Zach is away at the Academy I'm trying to do some "special" things for him and the rest of my family.  I cut the cards out with my Wishblade and stamped and stickled them.  It was fun!

Played with PSE6 again today.

We took our annual trip to Lynd's Fruit Farm to pick apples. We have been going every year now for the last 15 years. I wanted to try using one of my photos for the backround paper. I had seen it done but had never tried it myself. I really like it.

So it's been a long time...

As you can tell from this layout my family has been through some changes this summer. We took Zach out to Colorado Springs at the end of June to the Air Force Adademy. He went through Cadet Basic training over the summer and started classes in August. He seems to like it so far. We miss him very much. I finally decided to do some digital scrapbooking again. I had to make the Air Force Academy embellishment. It's a simple layout but it was good to get my feet wet again.

A New Year Has Come

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So Christmas and the start of another year has come and gone. The Christmas decorations are all put away and most of the goodies are gone. Now it's time to start eating better and making time for exercise. There is snow on the ground and the kids had a snow day today. We are expecting more snow over the weekend. I did another digital layout to enter for a chance to win a gift certificate to a local LSS on one of my message boards. The challenge was to use inked edges and the provided a link to instructions. This way worked much better than what I had done before.

paper-Shabby Princess Holiday Sampler 2006 & Jessica Sprague Home Away From Home
alpha-Shabby Princess Mommy Kit
elements-Shabby Princess Holiday Sampler 2006

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas!

Christmas is only about 3 weeks away so I started my decorating and baking this week. I have some of my shopping finished too. I still have a long way to go. I also have some projects to make for gifts that I can't talk about yet. We plan on getting our tree this Saturday. We have been getting a live cut tree for several years now. We tried one with the root ball but they are too heavy and after we planted it it died anyway. Tomorrow is another baking day so I'm signing off.

Thanksgiving

Well, we have another Thanksgiving under our belt (a notch bigger I might add) as a result of not one but TWO delicious Thanksgiving dinners. We went to PA to spend the holiday with our parents and siblings families and had a nice time. Plenty of turkey and pumpkin pie and lots of card playing with my mom and dad. We have a lot to be thankful for that's for sure. We ended our visit with a movie...Madagascar 2. We came home Saturday night and today I have been doing mountains of laundry and a little decorating for Christmas. I have no pictures to share because I forgot to take my camera...can you believe it?

I Did It Again!

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I worked on learning another technique today. I learned how to use brushes as a mask. This is really cool! I can't wait to learn more. This is a photo of my family that I took myself (with the timer). This time next year Zach will be off to college or the academy so I figured that I had better get some shots of the family together.
patterned paper is Jessica Sprague Naturally Free & Home Away From Home
hearts &"love" are Corina Nielson Wordart ??

Another Digi Layout

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So I was playing with Photoshop again today and came up with this layout of most of my family...my older sister is MIA. I tried to learn how to "tear" paper and as you can see I didn't accomplish that. I was also unsuccessful in learning how to put text in a circle...oh well I'll keep trying. I did "load" some brushes and used one to make the poloroid. That was fun. I had to stamp it on a white backround first then put the pic on it, then move the whole thing to the red backround paper. I find this really interesting and will keep plugging away.

All of the paper & elements are from Shabby Princess-Dinner Party

Playing with Digital

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I have been learning about digital scrapbooking from some magazine articles. I made this layout today and I had a lot of fun. Although I really enjoy digital I don't have any plans yet to hang up my paper cutter yet.

pattern paper & embellishments are from computerscrapobook.com-J Baechtold-Fall Frolic

flower is from scraprebellion.blogspot.com-Fall is here

word art-all I have on this is wordart for SS

Today's Thoughts

The holidays are coming fast and the weather is about to get colder and snow this weekend. Zach is a senior this year so the school year seems to be flying by too. He is trying to get accepted to the US Naval Academy and is also applying to some "backup" schools so that along with all his school activities keep him really busy. I will miss him a lot when he goes off to the academy or college next year and have been thinking about that a lot lately. Kelsey just finished up her 6th year of playing soccer and will start Upward basketball in a few weeks. This time of year is usually a fun time of year for me but with the economy the way that it is I'm not sure it will be as fun this year. I am kind of nervous about starting my Christmas shopping just yet but I will soon. I had fun today playing with this blog and Photoshop. The more I play with it the more I learn.

May 21, 2007

This is my first entry in my blog. Zach's Eagle Scout project is getting into full swing finally and after a few more in car driving lessons he should be ready to take his driving test...watch out! School is almost out and I think that Zach and Kelsey are both ready for a break. I am looking forward to warm weather, fresh veggies from my garden and cookouts this summer.