OWH - WHAAAAT??????

Good Afternoon my friends!

Today is a beautiful Monday here in New Jersey - hot and humid but that's summer in New Jersey!

I'm sharing two cards today that are part of my latest box going to Operation Write Home!  

What IS Operation Write Home you ask? So glad you asked! Operation Write Home (or OWH as we lovingly refer to it) is a wonderful 501(c)(3) Organization that ships cards to our heroes in the Armed Forces all around the world. Crafters from all over lovingly make beautiful cards that are blank on the inside.  The heroes can then write to their loved ones back home. 

We send a variety if cards in every box - Birthday, missing you, love you, thank you, Christmas, Mother's/Father's Day, seasonal - you name it we send it.

If you'd like to make a donation to OWH to help defray the cost of shipping these packages out to our heroes please go here: http://operationwritehome.org/donate/

Now onto the cards!

Our cards can carry words of comfort and inspiration to people who just might need to hear them as much as they 

want to send them!

I hope that my cards help both our service members and their families and loved ones up know 

that we love and support them for all they do for us!

Not Just Another Pretty....

Card!!!!!!!

As well as paper crafting, I also love to sew! I've been sewing for over twenty years now! I learned to sew when my oldest daughter was just one!

I am blessed to have a terrific sewing machine that not only sews but does machine embroidery! I just create a design or lettering in software on my laptop - save it to a disk - and put it in my machine! Just call up the design and press go! I don't even have to be near the machine!  It's amazing to watch it sew all by itself! Magic!!!

Today I had to do an order of towels for a client! Seven towels with their initials! I did them all in fun vibrant colors as they are taking the towels with them on vacation!

                                                

If you are in need of any custom embroidery work,. please feel free to leave me a comment and I'll get in touch with you!

I can do bath towels, beach towels, pillowcases, bibs, burp cloths, hooded towels for children, totebags - you name it and I can probably do it!

Thanks for stopping by!

As always please leave a comment - I really do love to hear what you think!

Ann Marie

Friends......

Good Monday to you!!!! It's beautiful here in sunny NJ this August afternoon - NO HUMIDITY!!!! I am loving it.....

Something else I also love is the fact that I am surrounded by FRIENDS! Friends have been extremely important to me and I have been blessed to have widened my circle of friends as my life has gone on.

I wasn't terribly popular in grade school - and in high school I had a "core" group of eight girls but they were a year ahead of me so they graduated before me...I had a few friends though that I've kept in touch with from high school.  I've also had one of my very best friends since grade school and A-HEM that's over 36 years ago! LOL

College friends....I've got two that I've kept in touch with via Facebook and visits. Work friends - yup got one lifetime friend there too!

But I was blessed by God to make so many friends after I had children.  At first there were Mom's Group friends.  Found two of my "keeper" friends there.  Then there were "mom" friends - mothers of the friends of my children. PTA Moms too. Some of them are among my nearest and dearest now.  I've made friends via online forums that have become in real life friends.

Church friends and friends from the sport teams my daughter has participated in and crafting friends and now scrapbooking buddies too....wow I couldn't even begin to COUNT the number of friends I am lucky to have!

I just keep ADDING to my list of friends - which is a wonderful thing.

So to honor my blessings, I've decided to send each of my friends a handmade card (don't worry if you haven't received yours YET - it's going to take awhile to get through the list!) and here is the very first one:

I am a seamstress as well as a card-maker and crafter so this card is going to one of my "sewing" friends.  I love the vintage feel of the kraft paper and the vintage look of the pattern guide sheet too!  Of course I had to add a little "bling" as well!

Leave a comment or send an address if you would like a card too!

Thanks!

Let it Snow...Let it Snow...Let it Snow!!!!!!!!

For those of you who know me well - you know how much I ADORE snow and snowmen! I'm that person you can't stand in the winter when you say you've had enough with the snow already - I AM PRAYING FOR JUST ONE MORE BLIZZARD! LOL LOL

I have been collecting snow-people (it's not just snowMEN anymore ya know! Women's lib and all - Snow WOMEN UNITE!)

I put my snow collection out AFTER I pack up my Christmas decorations.  The snowy goodness stays through March or till Easter whichever come first!

Some of my "snowies" even stay out year round so I can enjoy them on these terribly hot summer days!

So I decided to pull out a few COOL-er cards to share with you today!

This guy seems to be reveling in the sight of some fellow flakes coming down!!!!

While this guy seems to be begging for a cold snowy hug!!!!

Who wouldn't love a cuddly polar bear bringing a special sentiment???

 

And I love the snowflake on this card - it was a Christmas gift tag. I just hid the hole for the string with a rhinestone!

Thanks for stopping by today!  Who knows maybe this will inspire you to start making YOUR Christmas cards early this year? Or spur some Christmas shopping to beat the rush?

Bye!!!!

New for 2013....

Welcome back! I am relaunching my blog with more of a purpose to share my cards and other crafty creations with my friends and family! 

So to start us off (again) here is a card I've made and given to one of my "besties" for her 25th Wedding Anniversay!

Still need to hone my photography and editing skills! 

Hope you like this card!

Feel free to invite friends to follow me too!

See ya soon! 

Ann Marie

Don't Faint

But it is time to start blogging again for real this time.

With the dawn of 2012 everyone in blogland has published their list of resolutions.

I only made ONE resolution for the coming year.

Wanna know what it is????

I want to sell some of my craftiness. I am not expecting to become an overnight success or millionaire with this. I have been sewing and crafting for almost twenty years now and if I had a dollar for every person who has told me "oh you should sell what you sew/make" well I'd be a lot closer to that million right now!

So I am going to take a leap of faith in 2012. I believe that if God gave me the talent to sew/craft then I should believe in His gift and actually DO something with it. No hiding my light under a bushel for me!

You are probably asking: "So exactly HOW are you going to do this Ann Marie?"

Well, I have already created this blog to "talk" about my sewing and crafting projects. I have also created a store on Etsy.com. I will be working in the coming weeks to create items to actually STOCK in my store. I will be back here to post pictures and a link to my shop.

I am asking my dear friends and followers to HOLD ME ACCOUNTABLE FOR THIS RESOLUTION!!!

I am also asking for your prayers as I head into this venture!

Till next time,

Ann Marie

No need to adjust the fine tuning on your screen folks!

I REALLY AM posting twice in one week! LOL

So far no sewing has been done for the Stash Challenge over at SewingMamas - but I do have a bunch of shirts to embroider for school today (last minute orders - gotta love 'em! :*)  )  Hopefully with the kiddies back to school I will be able to sew uninterrupted (I don't even KNOW what that feels like)!

Have been going through JUNK and more JUNK for our town wide yard sale on Sept 11th - if you're in Joisey get off on my exit (6 off the Turnpike) and stop on by!!!! Lots of great stuff - seriously!

Older daughter will be at school (college) and my younger two kids go back to school tomorrow so by 7:00am I will be all alone with the dog and the bird. I do my best to ignore the bird - her name is Oochie which is short for Oochalino which means "little bird" in Italian.  The bird is a cockatiel and is my hubbsy's bird - it SHRIEKS whenever I go past it. We're not sure if it likes me or hates my guts.

The dog Buttons (a beagle - 3 years old) is not so easy to ignore - I love her. I am hoping to start walking her every morning (more for exercise for me although she can use it too!). Normally the kids do 99.9999% of the walking of the dog but I will do it when they're out.

So what should I sew first? I'm leaning towards a purse for me - or some new pants. Either option will give me lots of fabric points (more for the pants LOL!!)

Post and let me know what you think I should make for ME!!

See y'all next time!!!