Dog Days of Summer Thanks: Day Two

Day Two of my Dog Days of Summer Thanks would have to be for Summer Birthdays! There are 3 summer birthdays in our house (4 if you count the dog, which we certainly DO!).  Genevieve celebrates her birthday on the same day that her grandma was born!  Although she was not able to ever know her Grandma, Gen certainly loves to brag about how they share a birthday.  They have the same beautiful cheek bones, vibrant personalities and love of music!~

I am so very thankful that I didn't listen to the masses and stop at 5 children - because my life would be so much duller without this little princess. 

The clean and simple card which I created uses some Gina K. designer paper along with the sentiment from Lots of Lines.  Once again, the big sentiment looks so awesome in this purple color. The pop of green and white from the designer paper is so perfect and the button and sheer ribbon just add a hint of class to the card!

all items from Gina K. Designs unless otherwise noted

Dog Days of Summer Thanks: Day One

I used to hate summer - I hated the heat and the sticky weather -- but over the past 16 years, I have learned to love summer.  When my oldest three girls were young, I was told that the town pools were horrible and dirty.  Who told me and WHY I listened to them, I do not know.  Now my children live (and work) at the town pools.  We are there nearly every day (my children volunteer to help with swim lessons, we go to summer swim team practice there, and my oldest now works as a lifeguard there).  I now love summer - I love the crazy, going in 6 different directions - swimming morning, noon and night - the hot days when even I want to jump in the pool - The LAZY afternoons when it thunders and the kids spend their time in the basement playing video games or having a Harry Potter marathon.  I love summer.  If you have a town pool - join it!  You will meet wonderful people there and it will make you love those sticky days and splashes of summer memories!

Today is day one of my Dog Days of Summer Thanks -- and today is also my little man's birthday.  He is a swimmer!  He keeps me on my toes and I adore every little bit of him.  

Here is my little man at his birthday party last weekend!  Of course it is a swim party - there are all his buddies in the background!  Eleven is going to be great Xavier! Thank you for being you!

Here is one of the seven days of thanks cards that I made - it is a clean and simple card, just like the butterfly birthday card I made a few days back, simply using the star instead of the butterfly and the many thanks sentiment from the Lots of Lines set.  The Gina K. color companions in the blues was a fun gradient way of creating a thank you card.

Stop back tomorrow for Day 2 of my Dog Days of Summer Thanks!

all items from Gina K. Designs unless otherwise noted

Gina K. Designs: DT & Illustration team for 2013

Happy New Year! It's hard to believe that it is 2013!

I am super excited to be a part of this amazing group! Stop by Gina's Blog this week for more information on everyone, including bios on each member of the Gina K. Family

I am so excited to be working with this fabulous illustration team:
Becky Oehlers

Beth Silaika

Carolyn King

Debbie Corbari *yes, my BFF!*

Melanie Muenchinger

Tami Mayberry

Theresa Momber

with art by Heather Rolin and Rupa Shevde

This amazing group will bring the designs to LIFE!

Lee Murphy- DT coordinator

AJ Otto

Carolina Buchting

Cathy Tidwell

Latisha Yoast

Laurie Schmidlin

Michelle Woerner

Sean Fetterman

Sharon Harnist

Valerie Stangle

Farewell Summer 2012!

It is hard to believe that the summer is nearly over! We have had an incredibly busy summer here in the house. 

 

My six swimmers enjoyed a fun and exciting summer swim season with Knolls swim club! There were many cold mornings in the pool, but they had FUN!

The oldest 5 immediately proceeded to participate in the Summer Theater Camp production of The Music Man. My oldest, Karen, had the role of Marian the Librarian. Xavier was Winthrop. Victoria and Isabella were pick-a-little ladies (and Victoria also doubled as the Town Constable). Sophia was Gracie Shinn, the mayor's daughter. What a great show!

This past weekend, we celebrated one year since the accident that nearly took the lives of my husband, Todd and my oldest daughter, Karen. Luckily, they are both healing and healthier than they were last year. Here they are in Acadia National Park in Maine.

 I had a few thank you notes to make, so I thought I would create one with my stamp set: Stippled Nature.

 

I used a tomato soup card stock base with the new Sun-kissed autumn designer paper pack from Gina K. The sentiment is from Assorted Greetings. I added some buttons from the stash on the side and rounded one corner. Super simple & easy!

 What do you think? 

So what was your favorite memory of summer 2012?  Stay tuned tomorrow for a special hop with Gina K!

all items from Gina K. Designs unless otherwise noted

paper: tomato soup, sun-kissed autumn dp
ink: versamark, gray flannel
stamps: stippled nature, assorted greetings
misc: buttons, corner rounder

Happy 9th Birthday Xavier

So there's this boy,  he kinda stole my heart.... he calls me Mom

This boy keeps me on my toes, makes my hair grey, but fills my heart will love. Last night, he told me "When I go to college, I am going to skype you EVERY day, because I love you so much!" Then he got tears in his eyes and said, "Mommy, I'm so happy, but I feel like I am going to cry". I told him it was perfectly normal and that he was my most special boy in the world.  This boy is part of my heart & soul. 

He grounds me and he is so very spoiled by his sisters!

Happy August everyone!

Introducing the Fabulous Four

 The time has come for me to share some BIG news with you all! As you know, I recently became a member of the Gina K. Designs family. I will be introducing my stamps each month with Gina K. and I am really excited for this opportunity!

  One of the BEST things about this industry is the friendships which you form, both online and in real life. I have been incredibly blessed to be surrounded by the most incredible women in this industry. So much of my success is because of the support of my friends in this new adventure.  I asked four BEAUTIFUL, TALENTED ladies to help me use their incredible creativity to showcase my stamp sets. I would like to now introduce you to the Fabulous Four (in no particular order):

 

 

 

You can check out their blogs here:

Debbie Corbari: Doodle Designs

Cindy Coutts: Cindy Coutts Designs

Valerie Stangle: {Stampin' Gal Val}

Cindy Lawrence: The Creative Closet 

Stop by and give those ladies some LOVE!

Happy Birthday Genevieve- from negative to positive

It has been quite some time since I have 1. stamped or 2. uploaded anything to the blog. I have taken on my new role as stamp designer with Gina K. Designs and I am thrilled to be back in the craft room - designing and stamping with the new stamps. Although I am not ready to reveal my new set yet, it is very fun to play with and I hope you will love it. Right now, we are in the midst of summer swimming and I took some time to stamp a card for my daughter Genevieve's 5th birthday (TODAY!). It would have been my Mother-in-law's birthday as well, but she passed away 13 years ago next month. I love that Genevieve and Joan share this special day. I know my mother-in-law would have ADORED all my children (Sadly, she only met Karen)...but would have been tickled pink to share her special day with my little lady!

This is a very simple card - I ran the (retired SU!) cardstock through my big shot with a butterfly die. I placed some patterned paper behind the negative image and added some buttons. I stamped the sentiment in the lower corner and adhered the negative image to the same color card base.

       

Stayed tuned to this blog for more announcements about my happenings with Gina K. Designs. I am thrilled to be the proud owner of a Silhouette Cameo. Did you see the {VIDEO} that Gina uploaded to StampTV the other day? I am excited to get started with mine! Do you have the cameo?

I am off to make a birthday cake and get ready for a swim meet tonight with all six kids.

  

paper: retired Stampin Up! and DCWV designer paper
ink: chocolate chip
misc: dimensionals, butterfly die, buttons

A new adventure!!!!

There is a big announcement today on Gina K's blog:

http://www.ginakdesigns.blogspot.com/2012/06/two-introductions-and-first-sneak-peek.html?m=1

A new look, a clean slate!

I finally got finished setting up the new blog/website. Please make sure if you linked to my old blog, you update your roll to the silaika.com website. One of the most time consuming things was creating links to the stamp sets which I have created over the years for Papertrey ink. Each stamp set or coordinating die on the right sidebar links directly to the Papertrey Ink website.

I have taken a bit of a break from everything (but family) in recent months and I am glad to get back into the swing of things. My middle child, Isabella (Bella) Ray, had her first communion a few weeks ago. We had a small gathering at the house to celebrate and Bella has some of her closest friends over to celebrate this monumental occasion. Here is my freckle-face ginger-top! Oh how I love this girl and her beautiful locks!

One of the many things on my to-do list was to make thank you notes for her to send out for those gifts which she received. Her only request: make them blue!

I love the clean monochrome look of this card. It is clean but elegant! I had to make a dozen cards - so these are easily replicable! I used the monarch butterfly punch from Martha which is NOT easy to use with cardstock. The small sentiment is from Train Tracks, stamped with enchanted evening ink.

I raised up the mat stack die with some foam dimensional squares. The ribbon (may arts) is tied in a simple knot! Thanks for stopping by for an update!

all items from Papertrey Ink unless otherwised noted

paper: white base (GP), bashful blue (SU!)
ink: enchanted evening
stamp: train tracks (Thank You sentiment)
misc: birds & swirls embossing folder, dimensionals (SU!), monarch punch (Martha), blue striped ribbon (May Arts), mat stack 3