July Picks

My card choice for July is an easy one, because I made it with a recipient in mind, and he loved it.

Original post here, with supplies

I love this Daisy Bucket stamp, and I use it all the time. A whimsical little monster guy :)

Funny thing about my book choices for July, is that I already blogged about them both!  I had to add my voice to the millions of others recommending 

 The Help by Kathryn Stockett

 The Widows of Paradise Bay by Jill Sooley.

There were 18 books that I finished in July, and not many standouts. I was catching up on James Patterson's backlist, and still am. Fun books to read, and fast, but not necessarily something to remember either!

xoxo,
Jessi

Time for June!

And Happy New Year! I hope you had a safe & happy celebration - I'm pre-posting, but unless something radical happens our plans are to watch movies. I can't remember the last time I actually rang in the new year, although I've got to say I miss it a little bit. Parties can be fun :)

As you can see by my sidebar, I've linked up to another party of year-end favourites - this time over at Karin with an "i" for Paper!  (Thanks Meg for the heads up!) I've also linked up with Stephanie at Ingenious Inkling - go & check out what everyone's sharingh! I love seeing what other people pick as their favourites from their own work.

I fell in love with this card when I made it, and as I wrote when I blogged about it, sometimes the idea just translates so perfectly into paper that it delights me. This is one of those times!

Original post here, with supplies
Look at the stitching! {love it}

Heads You Lose by Lisa Lutz and David Hayward
Now, if you like mysteries or detective novels, and laughing, and you haven't read the Spellman Files series by Lisa Lutz, go do that first. Footnotes? In a mystery novel? Hell yes. This coauthored book is nearly as funny for the notes between the writers as it is for the story itself. Have you ever been a part of one of those get-to-know you sessions where each person builds off a sentence from the person before? Yep. But funnier.

 The Ruth Galloway series by Elly Griffiths
I love mysteries, and forensics, and strong female investigators, and this series combines all three with a thriller aspect that had me devouring all three books within days of one another. I could not put them down!

June saw 23 books read - many of them what I call 'throw-away' books, ones that take only a day or so to read and not even that long to forget. I read for entertainment, and I read very quickly! I also read everywhere I go, and I'm comfortable picking up a book even when I only have a minute or two.

xoxo,
Jessi

May favourites...

I think I was right - it's getting harder to pick favourites as the year goes on. I guess that's OK - I'd much rather have a hard time choosing because I like them all, than because I don't. So my pick for May is a graduation card:

original post here, with supplies

The books to choose from in May...I loved so many. I read 19, and I'm having a very hard time narrowing them down.

The Peach Keeper by Sarah Addison Allen (or have you read The Sugar Queen? LOVE. THEM.)

and
Once Upon a Time There was You by Elizabeth Berg
and
Still Alice by Lisa Genova
and
Bitsy's Bait & BBQ by Pamela Morsi

and I'll stop there. It was a very enjoyable reading month in May :)

xoxo,
Jessi

Favourites from April...

I went through April's blogging twice, and I really had a hard time narrowing down my favourites. I bet that will happen more as the year goes on - I generally find my more recent projects "better." Finally I went with the one I stopped at - a card set I made as part of Moxie Fab World's 350 Cards & Gifts Week:

Original post with supplies here

April's favourite reads were definitely easy to pick - 16 books read, and two standouts were:

 Salting Roses by Lorelle Marinello

and

The Four Mrs. Bradwells by Meg Waite Clayton

xoxo,

Jessi

March Madness

March was a great month - I was a guest designer for Pink Cat Studio's St. Patrick's Day release! Click here to check out my favourites from that adventure :)
To pick one absolute favourite, though, I went with this shamrock card:

click here for the original post

In March I read only 16 books, and picked these two as standouts:

The Bone Yard by Jefferson Bass

and 

The Weird Sisters by Eleanor Brown

That one I had to read as soon as I saw the title. HAD TO.
And I came back to edit this, since now I see that it's "Facebook official" - my weird little sister got engaged over Christmas :) I'm so excited - her fiance is a wonderful man who adores her. 

Are you sharing your favourites this year? Tell me!

xoxo,

Jessi

February Favourites

My card choice for February is a no-brainer - I love this card so much I want to marry it. Still!

original post (with more views) here

I have two books for February as well - it occurred to me to also note how many books I'm choosing from each month. In January I read 21 books total. In February I read 24, and my two favourites were

 Left Neglected by Lisa Genova

and 

Minding Frankie by Maeve Binchy

xoxo,

Jessi

Five Favourite Christmas Cards

If you don't already, you should follow Stephanie Severin's blog, Ingenious Inkling. I love checking out her creations - and her travels - and her Thursday Link Love posts have led me to discover some amazing things on the web. Right now she's hosting a link-up for us to share our own favourite Christmas creations of 2011, so I had to jump in & share mine (in the middle of my other favourites list, lol).

original post here, complete with supplies list
This is possibly my favourite new stamp this year.

original post here
I love the bright colours in the paper, and the fun flock bellies & glossy lights, beaks, and feet
give this card lots of fun dimension

original post here
Besides the time involved in sewing all the buttons, I just love the final
effect of all the different sheens!

original post here
Glitter? Fuzz? Mistake turned into happy effect? Check.

original post here
I love quilling, and this was my favourite snowflake this year.

So delve into your archives, think about your favourites from this year, and go to Ingenious Inkling and link up so the rest of us can see too!

xoxo,
Jessi

Time for the year-end wrap ups!

One of the things I love about this time of year blog-wise is seeing what different people pick as their favourite creations. I plan to do that, and I also plan to blog about my favourite reads of the year, and I don`t plan to list them in any particular order. But first, I thought I`d share something about this year that I`m absurdly proud of...

My sister & I, April 2011

Me, December 2011

OK, I *am* absurdly proud of my sister, but what I was trying to show you was the 45 pounds I`ve lost since summer. Yes, there`s more to go, but I`m definitely happy with this as a start.
A few pictures from the holidays:

Quick, everybody DERP!

Gingerbread train building - Connor & Riley

more train building - Riley & Connor

The train building was quite the adventure. Usually we build a gingerbread house, but when I saw the train kit we HAD to have that! It was harder to keep upright, though, and of course it was missing details that the Thomas-obsessed auties couldn`t ignore (Why doesn`t it have a funnel...why isn`t there an engineer...can we tell the company that they forgot the smokestack...etc.) Connor tried to build a funnel from candy canes, and when the whole train collapsed for the 2nd or 3rd time, he declared that what they were actually building was a train wreck.
The wreck was much more fun to build.

And now for a couple of favourites: I`ll pick one post from each month of the year, I think. So January`s favourite:

Link to original post

Maybe I`ll do the books the same way...I keep track of my reading in a spreadsheet, so I can actually look up books by month that way. I`m just going to pick them by how much I remember enjoying them. January`s favourite read would be 

The Matter of Sylvie, by Lee Kvern 

closely followed by 

 

The Darling Dahlias and the Cucumber Tree by Susan Wittig Albert

See you tomorrow with February`s favourites!