July 28 is National Milk Chocolate Day!

Which of course means that there are no calories associated with chocolate, milk or otherwise on National Milk Chocolate Day. Hey if someone is good enough to make up a chocolate holiday, I can make up my own rules! I’m also sure that any chocolate is an acceptable way to celebrate National Milk Chocolate Day.

Beth over at It Is What It Is has a downloadable candy wrapper you can use to wrap your favorite chocolate bar to share with a friend. OK the extra one you bought for the friend. OK the extra extra one you bought because you might have eaten the extra one you bought for a friend.

Here are some other ideas to celebrate this most delicious holiday!

Chocolate-Inspired Fun & Games:

• Dove EPromises – Send a chocolatey egreeting to a friend or loved one from Dove.
• ChocoRapids – Play this Chocolate Factory game online.
• Fudge Frenzy – Connect the pipes to make a Willie Wonka bar.
• Major Mayhem – This fun online game is similar to a game from back in the day. But fair warning – it’s addictive!
• Shmuffleboard – Play this online game from M&Ms.
  Flip the Mix - Another online game from M&M’s.
  Hangman – Play this no-frills hangman game about chocolate.
• Cadbury Chocolate Machine

(Courtesy of San Francisco Examiner)

Recipes:

Milk Chocolate Brownies from Epicurious

Fudgy Milk Chocolate Fondue from All Recipes

10 Milk Chocolate Desserts from Food and Wine

Milk Chocolate Frosted Layer Cake from Recipe.com

And in honor of the occasion, I’m re-posting some chocolate themed printables:

Plus one new one:

Happy National Milk Chocolate Day !

Sad Card, Happy Card

To everything there is a season and that includes the need to make sympathy cards. Sadly, I’ve had to make several lately, including this one for a colleague whose mom just passed away.

Gathered up my materials:

which included cream cardstock for the card, DCWV flocked damask paper, antique gold cardstock scrap and Recollections Elegance paper scrap. I was going to use my one and only “Sympathy” stamp but then saw this gladioli image at The Graphics Fairy so printed that out along with a sentiment.

Added some cream organza ribbon and plain HW store twine and dotted the centers of the main blooms with an iridescent Stickles.
On a happier note, my BFF’s baby started High School yesterday! We both have college freshmen this year so she’s got a double whammy of “My babies are growing up”. Made the new HS student a more mature but still fun card to commemorate this milestone:

I picked the blue paper up at Michaels ( 4 for $1 this week!) and then got home and realized that without even trying  it’s who else…KandCo! (Addison Blue Garden Swirls) Natch, I had to use KandCo scrapbook borders ( Abrianna) and a dimensonal sticker for the center from KandCo (Cottage Garden Pink). Ran a scrap through the Cuttlebug and finished with a clear sentiment sticker mounted to a scrap.

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Paris Plaque

I went a little nuts over some Graphic 45 papers I found recently at a local stamp store called Impress. I love my finds at Michaels and JoAnn’s, but I also like to support my local independent retailers . Share the love. How gorgeous is this paper!

It’s a page of postage stamps of the Eiffel Tower with one larger image. I’d been in Lowe’s recently, making the Lowe’s people crazy like I do when I go there for stuff to not use for its intended purpose and bought some wood “plinths” I think they’re called.
I painted one with taupe and dry brushed with some white then Mod Podged a black and cream paper from Recollections Elegance paper pack on the back and part of the front. I cut out the largest image from the sheet and MP’d it on top.

Didn’t even sand the wood because it was in pretty good shape and I wanted a rough look anyway. Finished the whole thing with black and cream paper flowers, buttons and a self adhesive pearl . OK one time where less is more. One. Time!

It’s on a hall table with a collection of milk glass and a few other altered pieces.

Also wanted to play with one of the Art settings on my camera!

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BFF Link Party #12 Wrap Up and Features

Thanks everyone for linking up to last week’s BFF Open House LInk Party. I love seeing familiar names and some new ones each week and as always, the creativity is inspiring ( and adding to my ever growing to do list!). Here are just a few of the wonderful ideas that were linked up. Have a wonderful week all!
Bethany, from A Fish Who Likes Flowers, has been BUSY. These pillows, which are such a fantastic wedding gift idea, are only a portion of what she’s done for her niece’s wedding:

The Amazing Suzy ( I’ve renamed her) from Suzy’s Artsy Craftsy Sitcom, outdid Van Gogh himself by quilling a version of one of my favorite Van Gogh pieces, Starry Night:

If you haven’t seen these stitched furniture pieces from Bev at Flamingo Toes, you really need to check them out. They are so sweet and her collection of frames makes them pop!

And maybe it’s all the talk of the heat, or the fact that I’m starting to see stuff in the stores or my love of black and white or all of the above, but Kelly Dawn from ‘Til Death Do Us Part shared these adorable owl silhouettes that just make me want to get busy on Fall!

Thanks everyone for making each week’s Open House a fun and growing party!

BFF Link Party#12 and BFF Southern Scraps!

Happy Friday and for once, people around the country are envying our Pacific Northwest weather since I think we’re the only part of the country that’s not sweltering. Hope everyone is finding creative ways to stay cool and maybe you’ll show some of them off here this week!

This week’s Blog Feature Friday is Fonda from Southern Scraps! This is one busy lady. You name it….cards, scrapbooking, jewelry, décor, sewing, re-fashioning clothes…she tries it and does a great job of it! I purposely didn’t feature this from last week’s party because I knew she’d be this week’s BFF and wanted to show it off here:

Isn’t that a gorgeous bracelet? It’s made out of ROPE! I just love it. And she didn’t stop there, making a necklace you can see here. She could look fabulous while staying cool wearing her bracelet and necklace with this re-fashioned tee:

 

I also love these punched flower décor balls :

And she’s also been rockin’ some great Anthro knockoffs:

I’m telling you, you will NOT be disappointed when (not if!) you go visit Fonda!

So….let’s see what everyone’s been up to this week! Anything goes as long as it was made by you! Please link to your project page and not your main blog page and please no advertising or Etsy stores. Otherwise…party on!

Doodle Monogram

When I first started blogging, I shared something called Zentangle. It’s basically art doodling that repeats a series of patterns and is done primarily in black and white. I haven’t taken any of the formal classes but just kinda started doing my own interpretation of it and it’s very addicting!

One of my son’s friends was over visiting last week and my sketchbook was out and she was enthralled by my doodles. So I thought I’d do her initial in a doodle!

I didn’t just want to tear it out of my sketchbook to give to her so I painted an unfinished frame from Ikea, then dry brushed it and applied some rub ons that have a similar doodle pattern and some words from the same pack.

I also thought I’d try out Big Huge Labs photo editing which I learned about from Viv at the V Spot Blog. I used it to create the mosaic of pics seen above.

Of course I had to finish the frame off with some strategically placed bling. Just a rhinestone in the middle of each flower. Got the stamp of approval from my son.

Creativity Tags

I posted last week about the opportunity I had to get some free craft supplies through Wholeport’s Creativity Expo promotion. I selected a paper sampler. It arrived quickly and I couldn’t wait to play.

I got some additional supplies out from my stash:

I’d decided to make some tags so I ran blank tags through my 2.5” Xyron

to apply adhesive. I’m not naturally drawn to pinks but there was something about the pink papers in the pack that made me want to play with them.

Used different things from my stash…buttons, KandCo self adhesive scrapbook borders, round and shaped self adhesive rhinestones, ribbon, paper flowers to embellish my tags. I incorporated some other paper scraps from my stash as well.

Wholeport’s asked everyone who received sample packs from them to post what they’ve made on their Facebook page so I’m sharing there.

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