Keep The Roses, Give Me The Chocolate

OK, I admit it, I like the roses too! But with Valentine's Day only a week away, I started looking online for some fun  dessert ideas and thought I'd share some of them with you all. I haven't yet decided what I want to make for our Valentine's dessert but here are some things I'm considering:

From Hershey's:

 Fudgey Valentine's Cake

Double Chocolate Cheesecake

From Martha: 

Rich Chocolate Heart Cakes

From Country Living: 

Chocolate Peanut Cheesecake

From Better Homes and Gardens:

Rum Laced Chocolate Fondue

I'd probably leave out the rum but I do have that new fondue pot....

Decisions decisions! 

BFF aka Blog Feature Friday: Naturally Me Creations!

Whew. These past couple of weeks, Friday can’t come fast enough. Now, if we could just do something about Mondays! On with the show. It’s time for :

This week, my BFF is all the way from South Africa! The great thing about blog travel is you don’t have to get to the airport 2 hours earlier and no TSA scanners! Meet Monique from :

Monique calls herself a craft addict. I call her a craft maniac! She is always up to something. From her own creations, to craft tips, to recipes, to hosting a link party, to entering challenges,to featuring other bloggers. I’m tired!  Monique makes lovely cards:

Including the one below that won a challenge at Creative Inspirations!

She’s an avid scrapbooker, sharing the progression of her wedding album on her blog, and  also loves to incorporate beads into her projects like she did on this adorable box:

or this jar:

There’s much more to see over at Naturally Me Creations, and did I mention that she loves chocolate?! If you go right now, you’re just in time for Monique’s weekend link party:

I’m sure you’ll be welcomed with a big smile!

I LOVE It When A Plan Comes Together!

My mom (aka The Mumster) gave me a gorgeous frame for my birthday last year. She did a whole “bling” theme, with a box FULL of blingy adhesive rhinestones and stickers and the frame was also blingy.

I just couldn’t decide what picture  to put in it so it’s sat empty. Until today! While linking up to Someday Crafts Whatever Wednesday, something caught my eye which brought me to a new blog called Sprik Space, home of a lovely and generous blogger named Aimee. Aimee had linked up some adorable printables which just happened to feature an image my mom loves and in a color that was perfect for my frame! WIN WIN!!!

It’s the LOVE image based on a sculpture by an artist named Robert Indiana. The Mumster  has pics of the original sculpture in New York and this just tied together an already meaningful gift from her.

However, since the frame is mirrored , it’s also a bear to photograph without reflecting everything, but I was so giddy about this coming together  I wanted to share.

Go follow Aimee for this printable that she’s done in a variety of colors, as well as many more cute ones!

And yes, I’m going to frame Mom’s favorite color for her. Thank You Aimee!!

Be Still My Heart

I thought that was a more poetic title than “Galvanized Metal Heart” which is what this post is about.

Somewhere in my travels, I picked up these galvanized metal hearts but I know they had to be a steal deal because I bought 3 of them.
This started out like this:

To which I added some of these rub ons:

I remembered a gorgeous frame I downloaded from The Graphics Fairy and pictured it as the focal for this. I imported it into my graphics program and added the text “j’taime” and the number 20. We’re celebrating our 20th anniversary this year so I figured this could be up now for Valentine’s but since  it’s neutral,  it can stay up all year for our anniversary.

I printed the image out on Avery transparent label paper which actually looks like vellum. It was perfect with the rub ons…the white in them is almost the same opacity as the vellum paper. And I had to bling it up with some clear adhesive rhinestones.

Right now it’s hanging on our bedroom door. Haven’t decided if that’s its permanent home or not.

Linking Up At: 

  

Banner Love

Or, Love Banner…po-tay-to po-tah-to. In keeping with my chocolate Valentine’s theme, I made a new banner to go on my fireplace :

I  started with a chipboard book that I picked up after Christmas at Michaels for $.60. Yep. That’s right $.60. OK it started out at $1 from the dollar bin, but still…$.60:

I covered four of the hearts with scrapbook paper :

and added a torn strip of a coordinating paper down the middle. Then I cut out medallions in coordinating papers using my Cricut Expression and ran the larger solid one through the Cuttlebug for texture:

Cut the letters LOVE using the Jasmine alphabet cart and put those in the center of each heart. Never content to leave things simple , I added silver foil stickers (I’ve used Magenta peel offs before but these are from Elizabeth Craft Designs…I found these at Ben Franklin) and of course I had to add some bling so I added some rhinestone and pearlized self adhesive strips.

Linking Up At: