It has been a while!

I can't believe how long it has been since I last posted anything.  When I started this blog, I intended to make regular entries showing my paper crafts.  However, I got side tracked with several things and have not made any projects for a while.  My biggest obstacle to making anything has to do with the fact that I have a very active 2 year old girl and I just had a baby boy in December.  My kids keep me very busy, to say the least.  I always want to work on my crafts after they are in bed, but I am usually too exhausted. 

Secondly, during the past summer, I decided to start on the massive undertaking of unmounting all my stamps.  For those that have gone through the process, I am sure you know my pain!  I intended to unmount all my stamps, remount on EZ Mount, stamp an index file, and finally store them in binders separated by category.  I planned to complete all this before the baby arrived!  I would say that I am approximately 95% done with the unmounting.  However, I have not remounted on the EZ Mount.  So right now, the majority of my stamp collection is stored in envelopes inside a very large storage tub.  Since I have not sorted into categories and have not stamped an index file, I really don't know what I have and where to find it.  I got burnt out during the unmounting process and stepped away for a while.  The problem was that I didn't get back to it before the baby arrived.  Now I don't seem to have the time.

I really wanted to reorganize my stamp system because I had way too many wood mounted stamps and no where to store them.  I had outgrown my previous stamp storage a while ago and just had bags and boxes of stamps everywhere.  I couldn't find a stamp without rummaging through tons of stuff.  My husband and I also did a massive overhaul of our bonus room/office.  Our craft area was previously in our bonus room.  We decided to turn the bonus room into a play room for our daughter.  We then turned the office into our craft room.  We totally splurged and purchased a ton of pieces from Scrap N Cube to organize our new craft room.  We couldn't be happier with the products!  Once I get rid of the clutter of my unmounted stamps, I will take and post some pictures of our craft room.

So now that you know why I haven't posted any projects for a while, let me get to the point.  I finally got a card done.  It only took me three days of trying to work at night after the kids went to sleep.  I needed a thank you card for a baby gift.  This is what I came up with.  I hope you enjoy it.  Thanks!
 

I stamped the leaf background with Papertrey Ink's (PTI) Turning a New Leaf set in brown ink.  I then stamped more leaves in green ink, cut them out, and adhered them with Pop Dots.  I made the accordian flower from patterned paper.  The center of the flower is a punch from an old book and sprayed with Smooch Spritz. The button is tied with twine. 

Ingredients:

• Stamps: PTI, Sentiment stamp unknown
• Paper: PTI,Kraft CS; Prism, Brown CS; DP, Bo Bunny
• Ink: Clearsnap Colorbox Chalk ink in Dark Brown, Colorbox Pigment ink in moss Green
• Accessories: McGill, Flower and tag punch; SU scallop border punch; Clearsnap Smooch Spritz; twine; PTI button.