HM&F Challenge #40 and Photo of the Day

Hi Friends!! Happy Sunday to you all! Hey, I decided to participate in another challenge. I'm making efforts to participate in challenges. When I make my cards, I tend to just randomly create a card and forget about all the fun challenges out there!

I remembered the House Mouse & Friends Challenge blog and decided to create this card. This week's challenge is to create an Anniversary or Wedding card. Okay. . .it sounded like an easy challenge so I decided to play along! Whoohoo!


When I colored the image, I had colored the image background in blue but I chose a darker blue color which was not my intention. I didn't realize the blue would be so dark. I wanted just a light blue sky.

I didn't like the color combo with the blue. Ugggh! Then to complicate things, I couldn't find a designer paper that had a similar color combo so I added the embossed card stock, ribbon, and embellishments to compliment the image colors.

Anyway. . .I colored the HM image with my Copic Markers and added a bit of stickles to the flowers.

I gave the card stock and DP an aged look using my Tim Holtz distressing ink.

I again used my Scribbles Iridescent paint to create the dots. I now have collected 20 different colors! LOL! Them puppies are cheap . . .only 99 cents at JoAnns or Michaels. I love the raised dots that they create to my card design. They sort of look like little brads. A much cheaper way to create the same look. LOL!

Card Details:

Stamps: House Mouse

Papers: K&Co Designer Paper, SU Pretty In Pink, Chocolate Chip

Ink: Copic Markers, Sakura Gel Pen, Scribbles Iridescent Paint

Accessories: Prima flowers, CB Embossing Folder, Basic Basic Ribbon, SU 1 1/4 and 1 3/8 circle punch, Coluzzle Oval Template, Nestabilities, JoAnn Brads

Photo of the Day

Old Town Temecula

Every year Temecula holds a community event called "Children Matsuri" and my daughter volunteered to be the photographer for the Key Club who offered their services for the event. The Children Matsuri focuses on children and the Japanese culture. There were lots of yummy Japanese food booths and activity booths for children focusing on Japanese art.

After Alexis finished taking the photos, we decided to spend the day in "Old Town Temecula" where the event was held. Old Town Temecula is a historic town and several years ago, the city decided to restore and preserve the old western buildings that were still intact to create an "old town" feel to this part of town with restaurants and many many gift and specialty shops.

If you've never been to Temecula. . .it's a fairly large city. . .combined with an adjacent town called Murrieta. . the population is approximately 200,000. Although it can be considered a medium size city, it has a very small town feel to the city. There was a huge boom in housing about 5 years ago and the population doubled in a short period of time. I love living here. The community is really pretty, with beautiful houses, and really good schools.

I love the wineries here. . .there's at least 20 of them and there's a lot of shopping centers. LOL! The only problem with living here, other than Abbot Industries and Pechanga Resort, there's no large industry that supports the community so many people are forced to work in San Diego or downtown Riverside. We have so many restaurants here. . .because of the large population. It's crazy because every day of the week, the restaurants are always full. I was told that there' are plans to build a "Cheesecake Factory" here. . .I hope it's true. LOL!

Anyway. . . we decided to head on to some of the specialty shops in Old Town Temecula. If you take a look at the picture above. . .I didn't intend to take the photo the way it turned out. I just wanted to take a photo of my husband and my daughter with the building in the background. It turned out to be an interesting picture because it says "For Lease" and there's also a sign with an arrow pointing to my daughter's head saying "Free Fudge". LOL! Unfortunately, the "e" in "fudge" was cut off or the picture would have been perfect!

The second photo is my daughter and husband standing outside one of the shops. We ended up buying a train set. . .spent $250 on it. Uggghh! But, I have to admit,it's a really pretty train set. We always put up a train set during Christmas time but our old set (a really nice one) stopped running so we decided to buy a new one. The set we bought is really nice. . .it's not the plastic looking type. . .instead, it's very authentic looking, similar to our old set, so I guess it was worth the cost.

Anyway, we had a lot of fun. . .unfortunately, I couldn't craft all day as I had planned to do. Hopefully, I can spend the day crafting today!

Hope you all have a wonderful day!!