secret santa :)

have you ever played secret santa?

i have in years past. we used to draw names at work and fill each other's stockings with little items we thought the person we drew would like. I remember it was a bit cheesy at times and often getting things i didn't really like. but in the end i liked the idea of it :)

so today i wanted to share with you what i will be giving away this year as secret santa.

I was playing around with the idea of creating something useful and lovely to give and came up with my version of a 2011 calendar. I feel this year Mona and I have really bonded photographing a few items that looking back on make me really happy :) I'm not a professional but definitely an enthusiast and i cannot wait to see what 2011 will look like through the lens.

I even included some of my favorite photos I took for my inspire lovely class. I love the little bits of goodness all collaged together to create a pretty picture :) I have a feeling it will bring cheer throughout the year. xoxo ( i put a calendar up on my etsy just in case you would love to give one too :)

So thinking on that cheer, I'd love to cheer one of you with a 2011 calendar of your own. Maybe even give to a dear friend or loved one. Whatever you wish. If you would like to be entered to win a calendar please leave a comment answering this question:

What is the best gift you've given or have received and why?

mine was my sewing machine a few years back. my parents gave me money before christmas to buy my own gift. ( that way you get something you really wanted and they didn't have to hassle guessing at what to give ) I knew exactly what i wanted and bought it :) I loved that never in there wildest dreams would they have thought to buy me a sewing machine! lol! you should've seen their reaction. it was hilarious ;P

My favorite gift because i cannot imagine creating without it. I also love the gift of choice. I never want to give something to someone without really putting heart and thought into what they would love to receive. I put a lot of heart and thought into this wee calendar and would love to give you one too :)

I will pick a winner this monday. AND i want to thank you in advance for sharing a little bit of your story with me :)

-internationals welcome!

2011 looks lovely already :)

xoxo

-d

r loves yellow

hello hello :)

i'm seeing yellow in pretty much all that i create and i love it.

so happy that this month's cocoa daisy kit came with pretty yellow papers to play with :)

what to do what to do...

ah yes! add some yellow flavor to the R wall :)

(On the left hand side of the wall)

I have a few mini crochet doilies around the studio and LOVE how dainty and sweet they look so I simply added one on top of some pretty yellow pattern paper and placed them both inside a small shadow box frame. easy peasy :) price= free . love free.

gold metal butterflies swarming around the wall frames.

price = $2 for a bag of 5 butterflies. also a thrifted find

mini yellow moth/butterfly framed inside a wooden vintage frame.

price= $.25 i am kicking myself because there were 2 of these and i only bought one. what was i thinking right? love the frame :)

cross stitch floral art.

a recent find in my happy thrifting adventures.

price= thrifted for only $1. i almost died. it's SO pretty. i love the pretty purple mixed with the yellow. lucky me :)

(lower left hand corner)

I cannot tell you how much i love gold shimmer right now. even though it looks like handsome and i are being invaded by a swarm of bees ( paper & doily from this month's cocoa daisy kit)... i love them in all there shimmery glory. :) I made the pom pom flower for a mini kit i am putting together with lots of vintage notions. it's incredibly soft and fluffy. i hug it sometimes :) and that sweet little fawn had to go inside the shadow box just because it really wanted some photo love. he was a recent purchase at a paper boutique for $2. money well spent i say. smiles*

Next to the fawn shadow box is a mini frame ( under the R ) and that has a Leonardo Da Vinci ink sketch I did way back in art school. Mine, doesn't do it justice. but hey, practice makes perfect :)

The next framed butterfly in a white shadow box is from this gorgeous shop on ETSY. LOVE!

Price= about $20 but includes shipping which i love. and they were pretty awesome too :)

I filled some thrifted mini gold frames with some new updated photos from seattle. I especially love the frame where I'm kissing mr.handsome ( above the R on the right). It's nice to see different pictures. it seems like we've changed so much since our last photo wall. funny how that happens so fast. price for two gold frames= $1.50 thrifted find.

I also ended up framing a yellow paint color swatch from home depot. I kind of think it reminds me of one of my favorite painters... Rothko. Mr. handsome thinks i'm crazy. but i love it. it's simple yet bright. just what this wall needs. and it's free. all paint swatches are free at home depot :) and mr.handsome loves free.

Right next to the big red R is a cute mini white shadow box from IKEA.

During the summer I had this special card making project going on with a fun card company in the UK ( more on that soon!). I was looking for a picture to suite the theme "engagement". All the while nothing really came to mind except after mr.handsome and i were at the beach ridding our cruisers around and i thought of drawing a heart on the sand. And placing our hands together :) I know this has been done before but not with mr.handsome's hand and mine :) So we used this for the engagement card. and i almost forgot i had the picture until i went looking for recent for photos of us.

This is what I came up with to place inside the box.

The paper & pink leaves are from the kit and the flower I made with some cotton fabric around the studio. I love this picture so much i even used it once more in another project inside the bell jar underneath the frame wall.

a close up:

And here it is inside the glass.

I simply added the doily ( from the kit) to a vintage gallon ( i LOVE the yellow stripes! ) top ( from our trip to seattle) and placed a mini version of the photo inside the circle top. Next i placed the LOVE sticker to the side of the picture and a cute little leaf to finish it off. I love the little pinked piece of paper on top with the red bakers twine... i kind of expect a lovely cupcake to be inside the glass :) how i wish xoxo. the doily was too far at the bottom to see so i placed a few vintage spools of embroidery thread inside and voila! finished! Price= vintage spools $ 1 and vintage gallon top for $.25.

grand total= $28.00

i think i need a huge yellow R now :)

but for now, this pretty wall is what you would see if you were coming over for hot cocoa.

and cupcakes xoxo

i wish you lots of color and frame love

xoxo

-d

merry & sweet

these past couple of days i've been humming along to some pretty merry christmas tunes.

I'm lovin' elvis. :)

it's been a little puddly here in my corner of the world and I'm kind of enjoying driving around splashing in the rain :) I feel like shamu in my car spraying everyone as i hit a puddle. i don't drive away from puddles. i go out of my way to drive through them.

i.love.it. :)

lately i've been trying to plan ahead some projects that I've had in mind to do. And i came up with this merry little kit. no more hoarding. i keep reminding myself. sheesh. anyone watch the show "hoarders"?! yikes. so yeah. i'm sharing the paper love :)

25 papers including envelope, embossed, flocked and vintage papers. yum.

so my goal starting december 1st is to share a page from this mini everyday until the end of december. I'm really hoping to record the everyday sweet moments here. last year i kicked myself for not doing it but this year it's going to be different. :) I have listed 7 in the shop if you want to create your book along with me. I also included 20 embellies to go along with this kit.

I love the mini crochet doily! Looks like a snowflake. xoxo

I made the crochet flower using some vintage thread I found while thrifting. it's so soft and feels so happy every time I play with it. love! So yeah, i've got a plan and I'm ready with my kit to make it happen. I told mr.handsome. and he almost died thinking he'd have to be in 25 pictures for this book. lol! i told him he just has to be in 5 photos. he's getting off easy, i know :)

so last week i had a crochet date with a lovely friend.

i taught her her first basic chain stitch and I got so excited for her that I had this desire to learn something new myself.

later in the week I couldn't sleep. it was about 1 in the morning and i was wide awake. and i so happened to have my little crochet bag on my nightstand. i youtubed "learn to knit" and voila! 2 hours later i was knitting away like a busy bee.

oh. hehee.

i used chopsticks.

umm... i didn't really have anything else. i ran to the thrift store the next day and found 5 pairs of needles for $2. as i was switching the chopsticks out i figured i would take a picture of it for added silly memories. yes. my children will tell their children, " grandma used chopsticks to knit. that crazy old lady".

rolling my eyes.

whatevs.

legacy. that's real legacy right there.

even if i'm crazy. i learned to knit. and i'm on a roll!

yay :)

flexing my little muscles popeye style.

:)

xo

-d

i heart birthdays xoxo

if you recently celebrated a birthday, happy birthday!

we had a fun time yesterday celebrating with family. My sister turned 21 again :)

She came back from hawaii a bit ago and lucky her, she celebrated her birthday in hawaii while visiting our sister. So we had a sweet belated birthday celebration in her honor.

Mister handsome and i gifted her some very lovely gifts:

First by making some delicious chocolate walnut cupcakes and some pretty cupcake tops out of this months paper kit from Cocoa Daisy. I really love the dainty flowers :) And what better way to eat a cupcake right? a cup of one sounds soooo good right now :)

We also gifted her this beautiful ring from a delightful store we visited in Canada: Barefoot Contessa. SO adorable. I love the gold details. Very charming. xoxo

I also made her a pretty floral brooch. Which worked as a pretty little gift topper :) I think the two (the ring and the brooch) will look sweet together. Gifts must look good. and so do sweet sisters :)

And every gift needs an equally beautiful tag. I loved the gold on the ring so much i made a pretty gold foil garland tag to go with the gift. It's so shimmery. I almost passed out from the excitement :) To add the finishing touch... I punched out circles from vintage fabric sheets and sewed a little garland for her. I then wrapped the garland around the box for a perfect finishing touch. I love that everything serves more than one purpose :)

I made a few extra tags to add to my little shop here

And a while back i made these cute boxes to share some home made oatmeal cookies with loved ones. I also stocked a few in the shop here

i love birthdays. There is a very handsome man's birthday I cannot wait to celebrate coming up soon. i'm more excited about it than the birthday man himself :)

i'm hoping you enjoy a beautiful day

celebrate your everyday xoxo

-d

photo love

it's on. i finally edited down the 500 images i downloaded from Mona. Mr handsome and i traveled to Seattle and Canada for a few days to celebrate us :)

I traveled first up to Seattle for the weekend to enjoy some crafty love with some of the most amazing women I've ever met. I packed up Mona, fabric and yarn to play with. The suitcase weighed in at 50 pounds even. I almost broke my back :) I got to sleep in a beautiful mansion and the room was so lovely and airy. It was perfect.

I finished my apron. I think it took me about 3 hours since I'm all novice and i know i can totally screw things up in .0001 seconds. So i watched the other dearies and learned so much :)

I added some french knots and a little bit of lace for texture. I am afraid to wear it as I might spill something over it and I am so afraid it will fall apart :) But anyhoo, we all wore our aprons around the house morning noon and night. some pretty spiffy lookin' gals for sure :)

we beavered away like there was no tomorrow in this pretty space by the kitchen. Angela and Mary ( pictured in the kitchen ) were the most lovely of hosts and prepared the most amazing food for us. mmmmm..... i didn't count calories all weekend. xo

And some candid shots of the pretty decor...

( I love Tif's sense of humor. She put a doily on this guy to make him fit in :)

Some pretty flowers by the doorway to welcome the dearies in.

happiness lives here xoxo

that's nena in the middle. She played nice with everyone. I think I got a little crazy with her :) I have never sewn fabric on fabric before. It was kind of odd not having paper to sew on :) I kept thinking i should've brought pictures and paper to make more art pages but had to stop myself as I was learning to "sew". And, you know, sewing machines are meant to sew fabric. not paper ;P

we went outside once! the entire 3 days we only made 1 trip out into the world. That's how mad we were lol! I loved the pretty leaves turning colors. I just had to stop and take it in. ( I of course layered like crazy and put on my mittens for the trip. I think everyone else was chillin' in just shirts and skirts. I'm SUCH a wimp!

:)

we went out to take pictures of our banners. I haven't really finished mine and will share a close up shot later. I decided I wanted to add a little embroidery love to it and make a few more adjustments. So here are the pretty banners everyone else made.

and here is our fearless leader, dottie angel herself { Tif }

she pretty much rocks :)

here she is putting up the banners... my banner was quick friends with michelle's banner. they held hands for the photo op :)

i also finished dottiefying my slip. oh the drama. stupid slip. i cursed this thing like no other. the fabric is like a jersey fabric... very stretchy and soft. as i sewed down the lace strips the lace seemed to go all crooked. i just kept going. you know. whatevs. then by the 4th lace strip i realized how amazingly bad it looked. i gave up. i almost shed a tear. but never fear! tif was there!!!! she quickly cheered me up! we can fix this! yes dearie don't fret! i just looked at it and thought.... gosh i hope mister handsome doesn't notice how bad this looks. so not sexy at all :) and you know what was the answer to our problem? A HUGE doily of course ! lol!!! so Tif helped save my slip. She used the doily to cover the areas where the lace was just all wonky. and thanks to her it is actually quite lovely to look at and now wear.

then after the 3 most wonderful crafty days were over... mr.handsome caught up with me in seattle. Of course we met up in a starbucks :) i love starbucks and mr.handsome. not in that particular order of course...

xo

we even made our way up to canada for a day... so pretty.

in seattle we went to the market and mr.handsome bought me the most beautiful bouquet of dahlias. he even took me thrifting and I had this little cutie by my nightstand at the hotel... adorable.

isn't he a stud muffin? i think so :)

this trip was really to celebrate us. We never really had a honeymoon and decided this trip would be it. it was wonderful. just us. we're so thankful even a year and a half later we are able to make this trip. Really enjoy each other and relax. get away. Catch up. and make some pretty awesome memories.

sitting. trying not to look awkward. you know. like i don't know he's taking a picture of me. and pretending no one is looking. good times :)

and here i am day dreaming. well, actually trying not to fall asleep on our way home from canada to seattle. enjoying the crazy good san diego like weather. the warmth of the sun. embracing all the happy memories running around in my mind.

so thankful indeed

i wish you a ray of sunshine,

-d

my little art pages

hello :)

i wanted to share a bit of paper love with you today. after losing track of time with all the celebrating last month i just seemed to take an unexpected blog break too :)

sigh. september was so much fun!

i made this page about turning 31 and jotted down some wishes and hopes for this new year... ( on the back of the page of course ;) I think i got flower happy with this one. Maybe even hippie?! lol. 31... you hold new dreams...hope, joy and good times. I love you already xo

and because i'm so bad at buying birthday cards and sending them... i thought i would get a head start and make this little special card with some of my scraps. This little guy will be for someone really special... and very handsome :) ( any guesses?)

which ironically leads me to this handsome fellow.

i don't know what i love more?

a) the glo worm

b) the playskool computer

c) the training pottie

d) cute bare baby feet

e) tiny bare legs

f) the fact that mr.handsome was the cutest little boy & all of the above

i just want to kiss him... so cute !

kept this page simple as i really wanted the main subject to be the mini polaroid picture of mr.handsome. i love that cute air balloon rubon.. and the stars. loads of fun to stitch. punch out 3 stars from your favorite paper. next mark the area with a small dot on your paper where you want the stars to end up. then start sewing/embroidery using the dot as a starting point and get crazy from there. lastly... glue stars on the 3 areas you marked with a dot. ( this covers the mark you made perfectly) ta-dah! you rocked it :)

and look... this is what he looks like 100 years later. potty trained and all :)

I'm trying to find a glo worm to add to my collection of toys i want for our imaginary children. you know. i'm crazy that way. but anyhoo... this is us at a padres game. i. my dear friends. will not lie. i was trying to pay attention. and failed miserably. the hot dog was good though :)

this is just a simple page about saying "i love you".

journaling:

you say it everyday

we mean it very much

i say it everyday

we still show it

you and me

- LOVE*

it feels very valentinesy but you know... we still keep track of how long we've been married. 1 year and 6 months on oct.24th. not that you need to know :) but happy almost anniversary mister! i think i also have fallen in love with my heart paper punch. it's a tie. xo

and lastly... my favorite food date ever. kogi

the best korean BBQ tacos ever! we tried the kogi dog, blackjack quesadilla, short rib taco, tofu taco and spicy pork taco. my favorite is the blackjack quesadilla. to DIE for! my tastebuds were overjoyed . we ended up stopping by on a visit up to LA. We tracked down the taco truck at a VW dealership. Ate in the car and completely loved it. now we're trying to make up excuses for a trip up again :) it's that good. I think mr.handsome said they were featured on the food network too. amazing.

and just as amazing? the best date ever.

mr.handsome.

he's right up there with the quesadilla and heart paper punch.

riiiight up a notch.

thanks for you patience with me :)

missed you and will come back to share my dottie angel goodness.

good times,

xo

-d