LUCKY I’m In Love With My Best Friend

Happy St. Patrick’s Day whether you’re Irish by ancestry or Irish just for today. There’s the religious history, the folklore history, the modern history, but regardless, there’s the recurring theme of “luck” associated with it so I also view it as a day to celebrate good fortune and things for which I am grateful. Of course that includes the hubs and bubs ( husband and son for those who don’t speak me) whom I tease and joke around with and would be lost without.

I made this to use on a tag for  Mr. Chocolate’s St. Patrick’s Day pot o gold, and am sharing it here as a last minute printable.

So with that I wish you:

For each petal on the shamrock
This brings a wish your way -
Good health, good luck, and happiness
For today and every day.
~Author Unknown


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I’m Surrounded By Guys

so I don’t often get to “get my girl on”. I was perusing my reading list and saw that Liz over at Liz’s Paper Loft is collecting cards for a sweet little girl named Juliana who is fighting cancer and may have to lose her leg. OK how could I NOT make a card for her?!? Exactly.
I’d gone through my paper stash this weekend and found some papers I’d forgotten about  chose a butterfly print paper from Me&My Big Ideas. I knew I had some butterfly stickers in coordinating colors and needless to say ( hello…EK Success people are you listening?) I had some K&CO self adhesive scrapbook borders.

I made the card from white card stock 5x7 and then cut a panel of the butterfly paper slightly smaller 6.75x4.75.Used a scrap of green polka dot paper trimmed to 4.75 by whatever it was and edged it on either side with one of the scrapbook borders and then went over that with a heart shaped border from the same pack, “Wild Raspberry”.

Put the butterfly stickers on scrap card stock and trimmed around the edges and mounted to pink and white panels. Embellished the antennae with some rhinestones:

and the scraps leftover from the scrapbook borders. It’s just a card, but I hope it brings a little light into Juliana’s young life. If you would like to send a card, the details can be found here at LIz’s place.

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St. Patrick’s Desserts…Chocolate of Course!

Trying to decide what to have for dessert for St. Patrick’s Day. The fam doesn’t love corned beef and cabbage so it’s usually a long simmering pot roast cooked with some Guinness . My non-red-meat eating son has been eating some again lately, so that may be back on the menu this year. Or, I’ll roast a chicken basted in Guinness.  Thankfully he has no problem with chocolate and dessert's the most important part of the meal right? 

Hershey’s has this mint chocolate dessert:

I could see some Thin Mints added to this or maybe one on top of each piece? 

Epicurious.com has this Guinness infused pudding made to look like its special ingredient:

Family Fun has this yummy looking toffee shortbread recipe:

As much as I love chocolate, there's something about shortbread so with chocolate? Mmmmmmm.

bhg.com has this amazing looking Irish cream chocolate cheesecake:

Or, you can’t go wrong with a cupcake!

These are from cakecentral.com. Guinness chocolate cupcakes with buttercream icing and chocolate coins.
So, what are you making? I need to go for a walk after writing this!

This Week At The Answer Is Chocolate

Hi Chocoholics! Welcome to those new followers who have recently joined the chocolate infused frenzy.

Here are a couple of things that are coming up this week at the chocolate factory.

First up, a review which will end in a fun surprise! Being a blingy kinda gal, I was THRILLED when the folks at Chunky Bling gave me the opportunity to review one of their gorgeous Swarovski crystal and pearl rings! Ooooh sparkly! Since I wear so much black, I chose this one:

It’s called Mystic Black and is made of Swarovski pearls and crystal rondelles.

If you’re not familiar with Chunky Bling, they offer fun fashionable jewelry at a super affordable price. I love my “fine” jewelry but I also love to combine it with current fashion trends and this is a great way to do it.

Although they provided me with a ring to review, I went through the order process just as you would if you were ordering something and it was easy and fast, just like delivery of my ring! You can also build your own watch (or necklace) . Needless to say, my fave is:

OK so now for the fun fun fun part! Chunky Bling is giving a follower of The Answer Is Chocolate a chance to win your own ring! You’ll get to choose from:

or

Which brings me to the next happening at  The Answer Is Chocolate this week…the March Open House Link Party on Friday 3/18!

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Come by on Friday and link up your current projects. Cards, scrap layouts, mixed media, home dec, DIY, makeovers, recipes, etc. and you will be eligible to win! (US and Canada only).  Can’t wait to see you there!

Three To-Dos In One!

I wanted to make something for a themed link party on Sunday over at the blog For The Love of Life. I needed to make birthday cards for an aunt and cousin whose birthdays are coming up. I was in the mood to play with my PrintshopDeluxe and make a printable (OK that’s seriously becoming an addiction…another one).
SO….I made a printable in the theme of the blog party that I could also resize and print small enough to use as a focal on my cards! Three-fer! Even though I made the printable first, we’ll start w/ the cards.

The stash o stuff to use in the cards which includes K&CO adhesive scrapbook borders ( I have a problem…I admit it and they should just call me and tell me I’m their permanent product tester…just sayin) .

The images I resized from my printables and added some effects / colors to the borders.

Card number one using a scrapbook paper with a sponged pattern, a dark olive scrap and K&Co’s “Poppy Seed” border collection. Close-up of the focal part of the card:

Card number two using the dark olive scrapbook paper, K&Co’s “Flora and Fauna Swirl” pack. Focal part of card:

Had to use some of my hoard stash of blingy rhinestones!

And…if you’d like the printables….they’re yours! I’d love a follow if you download and if you use, would love love love to see how! Click to bring to full size, right click to download / save image as.

Can you guess the theme of Sunday’s Link Party?
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BFF#12: Christine and Co!

If it’s Friday ( or Thus night) it’s time for Blog Feature Friday here at The Answer Is Chocolate! This is my way of sharing some bloggy love and highlighting one of the MANY blogs I follow . This week I’m introducing my followers to one of the first blogs I started following when I started blogging:

Christine says on her blog that she doesn’t have a lot of time to craft but I don’t believe her because she’s always turning out something incredible. I could do a whole post on just her amazing use of images from The Graphics Fairy. For example:

This very cool journal she did using Melody Ross scrapbook paper ( even though she’ll tell you she’s not a scrapbooker she has a paper stash as bad as mine) and great images from TGF. Or this clipboard she did :

And she incorporates these great images into one of her favorite crafting loves, jewelry making. I adore this pendant!

It’s not uncommon for one of us to tweet the other about a great image Karen has posted and find we’ve both downloaded it. 

Other brilliant jewelry projects include things like this awesome bracelet…love the combination of leather and chain ( not like that!) :

And she does great things with fabric too like these gorgeous flowers she made after water color dyeing the muslin!

I could post her whole blog here ( and did I mention she also has an Etsy shop) but if you’re not already familiar with her , you’ll just have to go visit to see more loveliness. Or you might see her out and about, like her recent guest post over at the CSI Project:

You will never guess what this is made from. Never. So you’ll have to go see!