Simple paper flowers

Hi lovelies! I thought I would show you how I've been doing my simple paper flowers. I cut out a bunch of circles from my scrap pieces of coffee dyed, designer,  and music papers.  I used 3 sizes 3/4", 1", and 1 1/4".   

 

 

Next I wadded them all up into loose balls, then unfolded them.

 

 

Using vintage photo distress ink, I inked the circles

 

Then I chose 2 to 3 circles to glue together, making sure the larger circle was on bottom.

 

 





Then I put an adhesive backed gem in the center of each one.

See, super easy!!  I hope you enjoyed this little tutorial. Take care and happy crafting!

Lots of stuff going on. At the beginning of the month we took a family mini vacation camping. It was me, my husband, our 3 kids ages 12, 6, 1. My mother and father-in-law and their middle son, his wife, and their 5 kids, ages 12, 10, 8, 7, and 1. So two toddlers tied us mom's to hanging out in the cabins or around the river swimming.  The kids all had a blast so it was fun.  We started our homeschool year 2 days after we came back. That's been occupying a good amount of my time. After all I have to relearn 6th grade math, to be able to help my oldest, and I have to beg my 1st grader to read. She loves to be read to, but doesn't enjoy it yet herself.

I've been working on journals for etsy, and I was hoping to do a Gypsy Moon Glow Caravan show in the middle of October. It just looks so fun, but if I don't get hopping I won't have enough inventory!!

My hubby did get me some stuff to make some fall and Halloween journals with though. He's a great guy like that. Always wanting to do things to surprise me and stuff.

 I've also been cleaning up an old bookcase that was in my hubby's shop at work. He's a mechanic so it held some really grimy things, but it's in great shape, is solid wood and is about 4ft square and 10 inches deep. Lots of storage for my crafty stuff!

 

So this has been my month so far. Please share what you've been up to!!

Hey lovelies! I'm so sorry I haven't posted in a while. I've been working on a lot of things. I'm down 55 pounds as of today! I've got a lot to go, but I'm getting there!!

I'm working on getting journals done for the October craft fair season. I've been invited to 2 on the same day. Not sure which, if either, that I'll choose.  I've bought a new set of stamps. I've sold one of the decoupage necklaces that I shared a mini tutorial for. I bought a lot of stickers from the Dollar Tree. They're beautiful, and look pretty vintage.

 

I have also started reading Harry Potter and the Cursed Child. I have started working on a journal for my bestie. I've been trying to catch up on housework before we start homeschool after we get back from vacation. I need to get all of my stuff together for vacation too.  There aren't enough hours in the day. LOL I am never bored though that's for sure.

 

Oh a friend of mine over at Junk Journal Junkies on Facebook has opened an Etsy Shop. https://www.etsy.com/shop/SoulSearchinJournals Go check it out. She just opened and already sold the first journal she posted. How awesome is that!  Anyway have a great week everyone! I'll post again soon. I want to show how I print on tissue paper and then decoupage it onto what ever I want. I may do a "printed" candle tutorial soon also.

Happy Crafting and take care everyone!

Keto Diet update.

Well it's been about 16 weeks, or 4 months, since I started the Keto way of eating. As of Monday, August, 8th, 2016, I've lost 51.5 lbs! I get frustrated some times because I'll see fluctuations of about a pound here and there, but I know it's water retention because I'm not keeping myself as hydrated as I should.  The point is, it's working. I feel great, and I'm getting healthier.
In September my family is going to go stay in some cabins with my In-Laws. There will be 14 of us in 3 cabins and tons of fun. Fishing, and swimming, grilling, games, etc. I can't wait. I have less than a month, and I would really like to hit 55 lbs lost by then. So keep me in your thoughts and prayers as I try to reach this goal.
I've been looking up some recipes for easily made foods while we're there, because let's be honest, no one wants to spend their entire vacation cooking! My Sister-In-Law and I will be doing the majority of the cooking. I plan on doing Keto waffles for me, her and my Mom-In-Law since we're all doing low carb. I will make and freeze some homemade waffles for the rest of the group. We'll also be doing spaghetti one night for dinner, so I'm thinking we'll have zoodles! I'm so excited. I haven't been "camping" since I was a teenager!!  I really hope my kids enjoy this. I've been wanting to take them camping for a long time but my hubby isn't a fan of camping in tents, so maybe this will change his mind some.
Well that's all I have for now. I have to get back to mommy duties, and getting my journals and jewelry done for the craft fairs this fall. Wish me luck!

Quick Mini Tutorial

I know I've been busy and haven't been posting much lately. I've had some back trouble, and had VBS last Saturday. That was an awesome time!

So I figure I should share something with you guys. I am trying to prep for Christmas afghans I'm working on for clients, and also get some inventory built up in my etsy shop and for my Fall Craft booth.  One of the things I'm working on is pendants.

I rolled out polymer clay about 1/8 of an inch thick and cut it into 1 1/2 inch squares, and baked per the package directions.

While those were baking I chose a collage page to use as my background. I chose to do some in black and white so I copied my vintage brown paper in the copy machine.

Then I chose my background and cut it out slightly bigger than my clay tile. I applied a liberal amount of white glue to the tile, pressed the image onto the tile and when dry I cut the excess paper from the tile. I also tried to decopage a rose onto it, but the black tiles were too dark. *duh, I know lol*

 

Next I took my finger and patted a bit of white paint over the background, and when it dried I glued on this lovely lady, also in black and white. Then when it was all dried I inked around the edges in black to match the tile.

 

I ended up putting a jewel on this one in the corner then sealing with Glossy mod podge, and then I went over that with an acrylic sealer to avoid the sticky feel. You could use Glossy Accents, or resin epoxy, or any number of gloss sealers.

You can do pretty much anything you want with these. Here's a shot of the few I've finished and sealed. I still have to put the bails on. I really like the way they have turned out. Oh, and yes, they are different sizes. Mostly because I used two different cutters, but these are hand made not assembly line and are supposed to original. That just adds to their charm. ;)

 

There you go. Easy polymer clay pendants. Happy Crafting Lovlies!

 

Envelope journal tutorial (kind of)

Hey lovelies! I've just gotten into making journals out of manila envelopes. This one is made from a 6 X 9 inch manila envelope.

 

There is a pocket in both the front and back covers.

 

To begin I lay out the envelope flat, and remove the clasp if it has one.

 

Next I make sure all of the overlapping places are securely closed. We will be matting over these places and do not want the extra lumps of a loose flap.  After that is done, trim a super thin sliver off of the bottom closed end of the envelope. This will be the pocket in the front cover of the journal. I'm sorry but I didn't take a picture of the gluing or trimming.

 

Next I measured 1/2 an inch from the flap fold and marked it lightly in pencil on the top and bottom.

 

In the picture I drew a line so you could see better where I was talking about. Then I make angular cuts to make folding the marked part of paper inside the envelope easier. I put the piece of paper in the cut, so you can see how I angled mine.

 

I then applied glue, white craft glue, to the inside of paper to be folded, and tucked it under.

Next snip off those little corner pieces sticking out.

 

Measure in again from the flap fold on both sides. This time only go in 1/4 inch, and fold. This will be your flap spine.

 

Next make your center spine. I folded the bottom edge (that we cut the sliver off of ) to the original fold line of the flap, and then measured going from that line, toward the flap,  1/4 inch. This will be your spine.

 









 

From here I just matted the front and back covers and sewed in my two, six page signatures and added a button closure and ribbon to wrap around it.

 

These can be as fancy or as plain as you want! Experiment and have fun! Happy Crafting!

What if I can't afford punches?

Being a single income family is hard. Crafting on a limited budget doesn't mean you can't have all of the embellishments that you desire.  All it takes is some creativity and patience. What I've done is to go around the house and find objects similar in size to what I wanted. I found circles in many sizes, a raffle ticket, a baby food container lid (the plastic rectangle containers) a foam star that fell off of one of the projects the girls made at church, a journaling card that I was gifted, and a banner I made.

 

All I did was cut these out of Kraft cardstock. These will be great templates until I can afford all of the punches I want.

 

Crafting is supposed to be fun, so no need to stress over the things we don't have.  So go out there, and find a way to do what you love! Happy crafting lovelies!

I made the most amazing popsicles today! Sugar free, Keto friendly, and they tasted like Orange Dreamsicles. You'll need a blender.
1 4serving pkg of sugar free orange jello (but you can use any flavor)
1 1/2 cups of ice
1/3 cup boiling water
1/3 cup of ice cold water...
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
2 Tablespoons Heavy Whipping Cream
sweetener, I used a squirt of stevia liquid,

Mix the jello and boiling water, and disolve powder, then add ice cold water and set to the side.
In blender put ice cubes, vanilla and sweetener, and whipping cream, then pour in jello water. Blend until smooth. This can be a single serving, that's how the recipe came to me, minus 1Tbsp of the heavy cream. I add the second one for a little more volume as I'm putting mine into 8 popsicle molds. If you're using as a single serving, you can eat as soon as you've blended it smooth. For pops, just spoon into your molds, then put the sticks in and freeze for about 2 or 3 hours and that's it. My kids LOVE them just as much as I do.

I count the whole recipe as one carb, as there are only .43 carbs per tablespoon of liquid Heavy whipping cream.

 

This is the Strawberry Banana flavor I made. I didn't add the Vanilla and used a cup of frozen strawberries in place of 1 cup of the ice.  Now this will up the carb count significantly. 1 Cup of frozen berries is 10 net carbs, and this recipe made 10 popsicles, so that would make them around 1 carb per pop. Still not a bad treat for the summer time!

 

In the background is my first attempt at making cloud bread. Not too bad, good for a sandwich, but I think I'll try soul bread soon.  Any fellow low carbers out there have any recipe suggestions?

2 month Ketoversary!! Diet Comparison, and update on projects and life in general.

Happy Saturday Lovlies! I almost didn't get to post this week, but here I am! Today is my 2 month Ketogenic diet anniversary. Guess what! 35 pounds down! I have been looking at my results from Ketogenic dieting, vs. my Weight Watchers days. When I did Weight Watchers, I started on March 16th, 2011. I was a little over 1 year post partum from my middle child. This year I started eating Keto on my son's one year birthday. So the difference between Weight Watchers has been this; I don't feel hungry all the time, and I have lost significantly more. I don't graze all day long like I did on WW. I lost a good amount of weight the 6 months I was doing the program, BUT there were no restrictions! I could eat anything I wanted if it was in my points. Thus the addiction to sugar and junk foods was not broken. I still ate snack cakes, and candy bars and ice cream. Don't get me wrong, I don't deprive myself now, I have frozen whipped cream mixed beat with sugar free jello and that sates my cravings. I eat whole foods, no more boxed foods for me. I make my own crackers and breads, and I know what goes into everything I eat.
 Now, I will say this, last Saturday I had a slip up. I deliberately ate popcorn at the movies with my hubby last Saturday. Then I ate pizza for dinner. Not my pizza... Little Caeser's.  I could not believe I did it, but I was starving. The card readers in the area where we were, were down. So we had to rely on our cash.. We had a whole whopping $5.50 between the two of us. So Pizza it was. It wasn't even that great. I mean I remember loving the flavor, and yeah it was good, but it wasn't really something I'd come to miss.  I paid for it Sunday though. I was in so much gastric distress. My hands and feet swelled up within an hour of eating it. I hurt, I was nauseated to the point I couldn't move without wanting to throw up. I was so bad, that we missed church because of the hangover feeling I had.
  I eat pizza now, and I get the thin and crispy crust that I prefer, all from making a skillet pizza. I just put about half a cup of shredded cheese in a frying pan sprayed with Pam, and shape it into a round shape as it starts to melt. Then while it's still gooey, I put on my toppings. Pepperonis, olives, mushrooms... Whatever you like! Then wait till the bottom starts to turn brown, you'll see it around the edges. When all of the cheese is good and melted and the toppings are fully "attached" use a spatula to help unstick any portions of the pizza from the pan, and slide out onto a plate. As the pizza cools it will solidify, and the bottom will turn into a cracker crisp crust, that in my opinion rivals that of Domino's thin crust. Now you can add tomato or pizza sauce, but I've never really cared for that much sauce on pizza so I don't miss it. Depending on the type of cheese you use, your total carbs is only like 2 for a whole personal pizza.

Now on to the mermaid afghan I'm working on. The pattern I shared in my other post, I'm just still following the established shell pattern. It says to work for 50 rows. I'm about 15 into it. I know I'm working slow, but my 1 year old gets jealous of anything else in my lap besides him. ;) So I only get to work on it in the van, or when he's asleep. Usually when he's asleep is when I journal craft, after I do some laundry or other household chores. 
Speaking of crafting. I'm doing a journal swap with the wonderful Marge who sent me that giant envelope of ephemera! I can't wait till it's done, and we've swapped so that I can show you guys the beautiful journal I've made, and to show you the one that she has lovingly made for me!

I also had a sale in my Etsy store of one of my journals. My favorite journal, the Butterfly Journal. I screwed up and only charged 8 dollars shipping. The buyer is from Australia. It's going to cost me 22.75 to ship it. The journal was only 30 total with shipping. Gah! Oh well lesson learned! lol

So that has been my week guys! I hope you all have a great week. Keep crafting, and leave me some feedback about what you want to read about. Do you have a new craft technique you want to learn about, but don't want to try it until someone else does? Let me know. I'll see if I can do a review. I'm up for anything!
Take care lovelies! Bye!

Gifted Ephemera!

Hi lovelies! Yes, yes, I missed last week. I'm horrible lately. It's like I just can't get it together and I'm side tracked by everything.  I'm still doing the low carb way of eating. I'm down 30 pounds now. I have a lot left to lose, but you know what? I'm okay with that. I'm working on a healthier me. Unhealthy me didn't wake up one morning fat, I surely won't wake up skinny. ;)

Now on to my lovely gift from my new friend from the Junk Journal Junkies group. She's a totally sweet woman, awesomely devoted grandma, and super generous to boot!  Thank you Marge for sharing your treasures with me! I am so blessed by you!

Now to show all you lovelies just what was in my darling package.

 

She took the time to gather everything up into groups and tied them all together with trims and such. So gorgeous. I was almost bursting from the excitement. I love "old" and "vintage" things, but Marge has me beat!

 

There were cards for journaling. I've NEVER seen these things, and both my Aunt and my Grandma have had antique shops and I have seen a lot of things, but never any of these.

Oh and a whole envelope of envelopes! I love them all. There were even some that were scented with perfume. It was all deliciously lovely.

She also sent me all of these receipts and time cards and registers! I LOVE them!

I homeschool my girls, and she set me all of these Dick and Jane and early reader pages, cards, flashcards and workbook pages. They're beautiful!

 



There were even some vintage cards included. One had a note expressing love and concern after the loss of the recipients loved one. I love to read these types of things.  The handwriting is beautiful, and the sentiment equally so.

 

And here are the lovely bits of ribbon and trims she wrapped my lovely gifts in, and some vintage buttons on cards!!  I almost just want to store all of these lovely things in a box just so when I'm having a bad day I could open it up and rifle through it.  Paper and books bring me peace.

So that's my share. My heartfelt thanks go out to Marge for this package. She has no idea how much this made my week!



 



Sorry for the long absence. Chocolate Hazelnut 90 Keto Cake recipe!

Hi lovelies!  Just an update. I'm still around, keeping on keeping on! I'm now down 26 lbs thanks to my Low Carb High Fat (Ketogenic) diet! I love it. For breakfast today I had two baked chicken thighs, for lunch I'm having 2 scrambled eggs mixed in with 1 cup of stir fried, shredded cabbage. I stir fried it in about half a teaspoon of sesame oil, and a teaspoon of soy sauce. Yes, I know coconut aminos are better for you but I'm allergic to coconut, so I stay away from anything derived from coconut. I could have used Tamari, but hey, I'm cheap and live in a rural area. Good luck finding that on a whim. Ha ha!  I did have a good week though. Last Monday was Memorial day. We spent that BBQing with family. The kids played with their cousins outside and in the pool all day. The guys played lawn games while us women folk relaxed with the babies.

Ooh and guess what CiCi's pizza has a low carb pizza! You go in and pay to eat the buffet, you put in your special request with one of the pizza chefs, and a few minutes later out comes a tinfoil pan with a HUGE amount of cheese and toppings. You can get ANY of their toppings made into a crustless pizza. I got mushrooms, olives, peppers, ham and pepperoni. They threw in some onions too, but that's cool I like onions. I went a bit over my daily allotment of calories (1500) and my carbs (20), BUT I didn't eat anything wheat or corn or rice. I didn't eat dessert either! I then went for a stroll around our local Wal-Mart Super Center for at least half an hour so I did get some extra walking in.

I also came up with a new 90 second bread "cake" Sorry no pictures, but it was so yummy! I will probably make this as my personal birthday cake for my birthday coming up at the end of the month.

Chocolate Hazelnut 90 second cake
1 Tbsp Almond flour
2 Tbsp Ground Golden Flaxseed
1 1/2  Tbsp melted butter
1 1/2 Tbsp Sugar Free Hazelnut coffee syrup
1/2 tsp of baking powder.
1 Tbsp unsweeted cocoa powder
1 egg

Mix all together very, very well, pour into a mug, or small square container. I use a sandwich keeper for lunch boxes that looks like a bread slice.  Pour into oiled or sprayed container and microwave for 90 seconds. Some microwaves vary. If your "cake" is still runny in the middle microwave for 20 seconds more. I sprinkle mine with splenda over the top. like less than half a pack.
Nutrition Facts
Calories    372
Fat            31.75
Net Carbs  2g
Protein      16g

Not a bad treat in my opinion!



I haven't touched my mermaid afghan again... I need to get on it, but I had to finish my Butterfly Garden journal. You can check it out here (click the word here).  I'm fond of it. Not as fond of it as I am the Little Birdie journal, but I love how my butterfly tuck spots came out. Too cute!

One month Low Carb High Fat

Today has been officially a month on this new way of eating. Low carb high fat has been interesting to say the least. I found myself completely breaking down like what I would assume an addict would do on night number 2.  I just wanted something, anything, that was carb laden. Cookies, French fries, anything!  I was hateful to everyone. I started on a Monday, and by Wednesday night at church, I was praying that no one would say anything that would make me break.  I couldn't be sure if I would cry, or if the devil himself would crawl out of my mouth.   Amazing isn't it? We allow inanimate things to dictate our lives and our behaviors. I remember crying and telling my husband I hated him because his metabolism allows him to eat anything he wants. I was in pain, not figuratively, real physical pain.  They call it Keto Flu, and I had a brief go round with it. Still I pushed through. I'm not sure if it was God alone, or all of the prayers from my Wednesday night group, or just that my body detoxed quickly enough that the joint pains and cravings didn't have a chance to topple me. What I do know, is that I'm missing carbs less and less, and that I'm seeing inches and pounds lost. My weight loss has slowed, but I'm attributing it a few days I felt "hollow".  No matter what I ate I was hungry feeling, and ate way over my normal calories. I've also been eating Atkins snack bars. One every day. A lot of people say that it stalls them. So I'm going to cut them out too and see if that makes a difference.
As of today I've lost 21.4 pounds. I've dropped my BMI by 4 points and I have lost around 4 inches just in my waist.

Here are some sample dinners I've had, just in the past two weeks.
1. Steak with mushrooms fried in garlic butter and zucchini noodles in Alfredo Sauce.
2. Hamburger steak with mozzarella cheese and bacon, celery sticks, a pickle, and ranch dressing.
3. Pan fried tilapia, served over garlic butter zucchini noodles garnished with pan roasted almond slices.
4. Keto friendly Cauliflower crust pizza.
I must say that the zucchini noodles are probably my all time favorite!

So this is my weight loss journey so far. Hopefully soon I will get some pictures so that as my weight loss progresses I can share the changes I'm seeing.  I have a long way to go, and I know it will take a long(ish) time to get there.  Please feel free to share your weight loss goals, plans, and victories. Have a great week everyone!