Paint.Net Tutorials.

I've had a few requests for Paint.Net tutorials. I've basically learned some of what I do by trial and error and having my husband look over my shoulder saying "why'd you do it that way?". I've looked around on the internet and here is a place that might be of some help to you.

They have lots of tutorials describing different things. They are called Lunartics.

Here is a tutorial that shows how to whiten teeth in Paint.net

Here is a video tutorial that shows how to make fire in Paint.net

Hope this helps some of you get started. It really is an amazing program, has a fairly short learning curve but because of how powerful it is it's not super-easy.

USPS Thanks

I made this card for our mail carrier to thank her for faithfully delivering the mail this past year.

I used Loads of Love from Stampin' Up!.

I hand inked the stamp with a marker so I could leave off the top of the bed of the truck and the back of the cab, then I drew the back on so it would look like a USPS van.

I hand drew the road, colored it with a black marker and drew white lines with a gel pen.

I printed the eagle from the internet and then just glued that onto the truck. It should be facing the other way but.....oh well.

Happy New Year!!

Christmas Thanks

Here's one of my "Christmas Thank-You" cards. Lots of paper piecing and glue but a good result.

I used my cricut and the Christmas Cheer cartridge. The santa outfit, hanger, and candy cane are all on that cartridge.

The "thanks" was stamped using the "Make It Count" set from Stampin Up!.

I used white, black and real red paper (all from Stampin Up!) and real red ink. The belt buckle I colored in with a silver pen.

They say rain is coming....

Well, the weatherman says rain by Christmas. We had another 4-5 inches of snow last night. Our big pine tree in the front lost one of it's major branches, we fear it's a lost cause and now we can see our neighbor's house.

Looks like we're going to have a huge clean up job on our hands.

Too much snow!!

A couple of weeks ago I posted a little note saying how ready I was for snow. Can I take that back? We've had so much that church has been cancelled two weeks in a row. The kids missed the entire last week of school, my van won't run in the snow/ice so we're stuck at home unless we want to walk somewhere, we've got 9 inches of snow and counting plus at least 1 inch of ice in between snowfalls, and to top it off we lost power for almost 12 hours today (brrr!!!)

Here's some pictures I took though. It may be snowy, cold, blowing, and icy but God sure knows how to paint the landscape!!

Not a Creature was Stirring....

I found a picture of these cute little mice in an old cookbook of mine. After showing it to my daughter, we decided to make a small batch of them.

They were so easy and turned out really cute.

All you need are Oreo's, Kisses, chocolate chips, maraschino cherries, sliced almonds, shortening and red and green gel.

Carefully take apart the Oreo's and save the tops for something else. Unwrap all of those kisses!.

Melt 1 cup of chocolate chips in 2 teaspoons of shortening (I melted our in the microwave). Dip the cherries into the melted chocolate. Place it on an Oreo and attached a kiss to the cherry. Stick two sliced almonds between them for ears.

Use the red gel for eyes and use the red and green to make a little holly leaf on the cookie.

This recipe will use an entire jar of cherries (about 24).

Gift Card Holder

This is a gift card hold I made for my mom. I used the "merry" set from Stampin Up! and my Cricut to cut the scalloped oval.

The snow flakes are stickers that I found at Michaels.

I used a basic matchbook template, cutting it 8 1/2 X 4 inches. For the pouches inside I made them 8 X 4 and then folded them in half. I punched a half circle in the front of each to make it easier to get the gift card out.

After I decided which "pouch" I wanted in front, middle, and back, I trimmed the first pouch by 1/2", the second pouch by 1/4" and left the third pouch the original height.

Then I used Terrifically Tacky Tape to glue the edges of each pouch down and decorated the front of each pouch.

I put the pouches in the book so they fit all the way to the bottom and used my crop-a-dile to punch holes for the gold cord.

I did not glue the bottom portion of the scallop down as I wanted it to lay over the front of the matchbook.

Gift Box

I made this box to put a small gift in. The trees in the background were cut on my Cricut using the Christmas Cheer cartridge. The three trees in the front were stamped green on green using the Season of Joy set from Stampin Up!. I bought the gable box at Paper Zone.

I just glued the ribbon around the bottom and then adhered the trees, tied on the tags and it was done.

Free Stuff

Here are some links to get free stuff for scrapbooking. Fonts, papers, embellishments and patterns. Sometimes the free stuff changes but I've found that these always have something free!.
Merry Christmas!

Free Digital Scrapbooking

ScrapbookScrapbook

ScrapbookFlair (This is a fantastic site!)

1001 Free Fonts

WebpagePublicity

The Scrapbook Lounge (This is a great place to get ideas!)

Craft bits (lots of ideas here)

Santa

Some of you know that I collect santas. I have been collecting them for about 15 years or so. The nice thing is once everyone knows that you collect something, that is usually what you get as gifts.

Here are some of my favorites that I've either received or purchased.

This santa in a spaceship is one I received from my husband a couple of years ago. We were out to dinner with friends at an old hotel that had a gift shop and this was in there. My dh actually had our friends go back the next day and pick this up for me.

The "chime" santa and the santa with the blue hat are both that I bought at one of the after christmas sales.

The santa in the fur is one that my sister bought me while she was teaching in Turkey. The fur is actually reindeer fur!!

Family Tree

Here's a page from my heritage album. It shows my family tree (or most of it anyway) on my dad's side.

We use a program called Family Tree Maker to store all of our data as we come across it. It's not the best program out there but it's all we have!!

I printed this out on a regular sheet of paper. I digitally blacked out the names of the living.

I then mounted that sheet onto two other color-coordinated sheets and then mounted that on to the page.

I used my Sizzix to cut branches and leaves, to go with the whole "family tree" theme.

The more I look at this page though the more I think it needs something else. Maybe some felt flowers to brighten it up or something in that big blank white space!!

Retooning the Navitity

This was shown to me and I wanted to share it with all of you. It's a wonderful, fresh "new" look at the nativity story. Take a look. It's less than 5 minutes but is really great!!

You can view the video by clicking here.

Ready for Snow!!

Here in Portland we don't get much snow in the winter. At least where we live there's not much. The higher elevations get more but down here it's usually just cold rain.

When we want snow (and lots of it) we plan a day to head to the Mountains. No one in my family ski's. We just like to play in the snow with friends, go sledding, and drink hot chocolate!

This picture was taken at Trillium, on Mt. Hood. It's a great little sledding area with some trails for cross country skiing.

I'm posting this because now that December is here I am ready for some snow. We're still hovering around 55-60 during the day, sometimes rain or drizzle but mostly just gray!