Tuesday Teaser: Castaway Cove

From this week's Castaway Cove (August 6th) teaser, it appears Annie's life isn't the only one affected by former American Forces Radio deejay Mac Culhane's call-in late night radio show on Shelter Bay's K-Bay radio.  Maureen Sacchetti, in real life, is one of two readers who won my Find Dillon contest from Sea Glass Winter to have her name in a book.   Enjoy:

 Before Annie could respond, the glass door opened and a sixtysomething woman entered. “Good morning, Mrs. Sacchetti,” Sedona greeted her after shooting Annie a sharp We’ll talk about this later look. “Don’t you look dashing.”
 
The woman patted her Lucille Ball fluorescent-hued hair. “Thank you! I did it myself from a box. It only took twenty minutes, and just like magic, I was a new woman.”
 
“Well, it’s certainly a new look. And quite appealing with your coloring. So, are you having your regular today?”
 
“No. I decided to think outside the box and go with the marionberry cheesecake.”
 
“That is a change from your usual vanilla with buttercream frosting.” Sedona took a cheesecake cupcake topped with bright berries from the glass-fronted display counter.
 
“I was listening to Midnight Mac talk about taking risks and falling in love,” the woman said. “When I woke up, I realized I’d gotten into a rut, and decided to make some changes. So I drove over to the market as soon as it opened, bought the hair color and went home and, although it recommended a twenty-four-hour test, I just mixed it up, applied it, and voilà! I was a redhead.
 
“After I leave here, I’m going to walk down the street to Passages travel agency and book one of those seniors’ Alaskan cruises and have myself a shipboard romance. Just like Deborah Kerr and Cary Grant in An Affair to Remember. But without the part about getting run over at the Empire State Building. Because that scene always makes me cry like a baby.”
 
“Wow!” Annie entered the conversation. Maureen Sacchetti was also one of her customers. The elderly woman always reordered her favorite supplies, and had never indicated any desire to attend a class or try some new technique or paper-crafting tool.  “When you decide to shake up your life, you don't fool around."
 
“I’m sixty-eight years old, dear,” the older woman said. “And I come from sturdy peasant stock, which means that I’ve still got a lot of years of living to do. No way do I want to end up being one of those boring, dried-up centenarians content to be rocking on my front porch when the mailman shows up with a birthday card from the White House. And as nice as it would be to have the president wish me a happy birthday, by then all the glaciers might be gone.
 
“And with women outnumbering men, at my age there aren’t nearly enough of them to go around, either. Which is why I’m also stopping by the Dancing Deer Two and having the twins set me up with cruise outfits that’ll knock some hot geezer’s socks off.”
 
“I think that’s a grand idea,” Sedona said.
 
“So do I. You know what they say about regretting the things you don’t do more than the things you do,” Mrs. Sacchetti said.
 
“Funny,” Annie murmured, “someone said the same thing to me just the other night.”
 
“Well, whoever it was, you ought to listen,” Maureen stated firmly. “Or you’ll end up like me, living in your dead mother’s house, surrounded by all her antiques, spending your free time knitting and making sympathy cards for all the widows and widowers of your friends who are passing away left and right.”
 
And wasn’t that a pleasant thought?

That's it for this week! Have a super rest of your week, I hope you'll come back for Friday's photo, and for crafters out there, this coming weekend I'll be taking part in Operation Write Home's grand Memorial Day bloghop, which begins Saturday morning, sharing cards I've made and giving away stamps sets and a designer paper pad to one lucky commenter.

xo,

JoAnn 

Friday Photos: Oregon Coast lighthouse

It's a two-fer today!  Both Friday photos are from the Oregon Coast, where my Shelter Bay books are set.  And where Sweetie and I are -- yay! -- looking forward to summer escapes! Some of you may recognize the top photo from my website header.  

 It did, btw, take me lots of tries and a couple trips to get the rotating light just where I wanted it!  :)

Have a great weekend everyone!

xo,

JoAnn

OWH Midweek Throwdown Cards

Sundays are always my cardmaking day.  This past weekend, I decided to change things up a bit and make some kits to take to put together during an upcoming trip to the Oregon Coast, where Sweetie proposed when I was eighteen and where my Shelter Bay series is set.

Although I usually make cards for kids, a letter from one of our heroes that Sandy shared on the recent Operation Write Home cardmaking day blog hop has stuck with me.  Since the letter writer was newly married when he got deployed, he was asking for some romantic cards to help him share his feelings with his new wife.  Knowing how my own husband can search through a lot of cards before finding one that says what he wants to say, but doesn't know exactly how to express in writing, had me thinking about someone else I know. A young woman whose husband, currently in Afghanistan, has been on FIVE (!!!) deployments.  Surely that must be difficult on a marriage.

So, I decided to break from tradition and, since I was making a bunch of card top kits, switch to romantic cards.  (I've never been one to make multiples, but this OWH sketch #168 made it really easy, it's great for using up scraps, and going with simply a sentiment saved time I'd usually spend on coloring. It also works with my style, which is mostly Clean and Simple, but I fudge and layer pretty papers instead of sticking with white backgrounds.  (Which I love, but I can't seem to pull off nearly as well as people who are REALLY good at CAS.) I also decided to make masculine and feminine layouts from the same sketch, which works for May 8th's Wednesday Throwdown His and Hers challenge.

THEN, this morning I checked in for this week's  Midweek Throwdown challenge, only to discover that it's for -- wow -- cards featuring sentiments!   I am already so there!  So, while waiting for the new landscaper designer to show up with his plant plan, I decided to go ahead and put some of the kits together.  (I am quickly becoming a fan of multiples!) 

This cardstock top is Bazzill, the paper is Fancy Pants Designs Summer Soul, and the My Favorite Things sentiment was double inked with Hero Arts Soft Pool Shadow Ink and Memento Teal Zeal. 

The cardstock is Stampin' Up's Early Espresso, the paper is from BoBunny's Marketplace collection, the sentiment was stamped with Early Espresso.

The cardstock is Bazzill, the paper is Teresa Collins Tell Your Story, and again, the sentiment was double-inked with Hero Arts Soft Pool Shadow Ink & Memento's Teal Zeal.

This cardstock is Bazzill,  the paper is BoBunny's Little Miss collection, and the sentiment was, again, inked with Early Espresso.

The cardstock's Bazzill, paper is BoBunny's Camp-a-Lot collection, sentiment inked with Early Espresso. 

The cardstock is Bazzill, the paper is BoBunny's Gabrielle collection, and the sentiment was double inked with Hero Arts Soft Pool Shadow Ink and Memento Teal Zeal. 

 

Cardstock is Bazzill, paper is The Paper Loft Hooked on Fishing, the ink is Early Espresso. 

Cardstock is Bazzill, the paper is Echo Park So Happy Together, the sentiment was double-inked Hero Arts Soft Pool Shadow Ink and Memento Teal Zeal. 

The cardstock is Bazzill, the paper is Echo Park Everyday Eclectic, and the sentiment was double inked with Stampin' Up's Calypso Coral and Hero Arts Soft Pink Shadow Ink.

 

The cardstock's Bazzill, I dry embossed with my Cuttlebug, the paper is, once agan, Echo Park Everyday Eclectic, and the sentiment was stamped with Hero Arts Soft Pool and Memento's Teal Zeal. 

 Finally, I changed up the sentiment, which is again from My Favorite Things, on this one.  The cardstock is Bazzill, the paper is BoBunny Timepiece collection, and the ink is Stampin' Up's Early Espresso. 

That's it for this week! Thanks for visiting and I hope you'll check back for Friday's photo. Also, don't forget the next Tuesday Teaser for Castaway Cove, my upcoming Shelter Bay novel featuring a heroine who owns a scrapbook store and holds card making parties for OWH.

xo,

JoAnn

Tuesday Teaser: Castaway Cove

Here's this week's Tuesday Teaser from Castaway Cove, Shelter Bay #6, which will be out August  5. 

 Not only is Mac dealing with his grandfather's Alzheimer's, still learning how to be a single dad, he's discovering that his six-year-old daughter isn't all sugar and spice.  This scene is at the park, where a recently divorced mom is trying to coax him into bidding on her picnic basket at the 4th of July auction designed to raise money for the school's arts, writing, and music programs.  Enjoy:

Emma, who’d just raced over from the swings, had now begun scampering up the brightly colored monkey bars.

“And the pièce de résistance is my red velvet cake, which is even better than Sedona Sullivan’s recipe. Not that I’m one to toot my own horn, but it makes sense, since she grew up in Arizona. In that commune.”

The derision in her voice suggested the blond baker could well be Shelter Bay’s sole communist.

“And, of course, there has to be sweet tea. I always make enough for a crowd,” she said significantly as her gaze drifted across the rose garden, past the statue of the woman waiting for her husband to return from sea, to her son, who was currently sitting atop the colorful jungle gym, talking to Emma. Who, Mac noticed, was no longer smiling as she’d been only moments earlier.

“That’s a good idea. Since a lot of people are probably bidding for their family supper,” he said distractedly as his daughter tossed her sunshine-blond head in a gesture he’d come to recognize as a warning of impending temper.

“I was thinking that perhaps you and I, and Kenny and your darling little girl, might like to share it together before the fireworks.”

Before he could respond to that suggestion, his daughter, clad in pink jeans, a pink T-shirt studded with rhinestones that spelled out daddy’s girl, and a new pair of pink sandals, suddenly drew her thin arm back and hit Kenny smack on the nose with a left hook that while totally socially unacceptable, was pretty damn effective. Especially for a six-year-old girl.

Mac’s father had always taught him that you never ever hit a girl. Although seemingly provoked, Kenny apparently had never had that little life-lesson talk with his lawyer father, sincehe hauled off and hit her back. Mac cringed as the small male fist connected with Emma’s right eye.

“Emma!”

“Kenny!”

Both parents shouted at once and took off running as the two combatants tumbled to the cork pad beneath the jungle gym and began rolling over the newly cut green grass.

Mac got there first, grabbed his daughter up, and held her tight against his hip even as she squirmed to get away and her fists continued to flail.

Kenny’s mother went the cajoling route, which didn’t seem to be working, since the boy leaped to his feet and charged at Emma.

“That’s enough,” Mac said, even as he lifted Emma higher. He’d pulled out his military voice, which apparently still possessed some authority—Kenny stopped in his tracks and Emma quit swinging. “Stop. Now.”

“She started it,” the boy insisted, shoving his hands into the pockets of his jeans. “By hitting me first.”

“Because he said bad things about me and Poppy,” Emma countered. “He said that no one should be allowed to play with me because I could give them the Alzheimer’s. Like chicken pox. I told him Alzheimer’s was not catching but he kept saying that Poppy was dangerous and it was a good thing he was locked away in that home.”

Mac felt his own temper rising and resolutely tamped it down. Kids, he remembered from his own school days, could be unbearably, often casually, cruel. And many, as it seemed Kenny did, knew just what buttons to push to get a response.

“Kenneth Fletcher,” his mother said, her moonlight-and-magnolia-sugar tone sharpening, “that’s a very cruel thing to say. And absolutely not true. What happened to Emma’s great-granddaddy is very sad and you owe her an apology, young man.”

“She hit me first,” he repeated sulkily, wiping his bleeding nose with the back of his hand. “And Peter Potter said that his grandfather has the Alzheimer’s and had to be locked away because he kept getting mad and getting in fistfights with strangers and that he even hit a man in the checkout line at the grocery store. So he was dangerous.”

"Poppy wouldn’t hurt a fly,” Emma insisted. “Just because Peter’s grandfather got in fights with people doesn’t mean my poppy would. He just has a sick head. But his doctor is giving him medicine for it. Right, Daddy?”

“That’s right. Alzheimer’s affects everyone differently and your poppy might get a little grumpy from time to time, but he’s never hit anyone.” Deciding that the combatants seemed to have reached some sort of detente, he put Emma back on the ground.

“See.” Unwilling to totally surrender, she jutted her chin out and stuck both small but surprisingly dangerous fists on her hips. “I told you so.”

“But you still owe Kenneth an apology for hitting him,” Mac said.

Emma stuck out her bottom lip in a pout that he was getting used to seeing. No longer was she the totally acquiescent little girl who’d greeted him with such joy when he’d returned from war. Mac’s father told him that was a good thing, that it meant she was trusting that he wouldn’t leave her again, so she no longer felt as if she needed to be on her best behavior. But there were times, like now, when he wished she didn’t possess such a strong streak of both her parents’ stubbornness.

Not quite ready to wave the white flag of surrender yet, she folded her arms across the front of the grass-stained T-shirt. One elbow, he noticed, was skinned, probably from falling onto the cork below the jungle gym.

“First he has to take back what he said about Poppy.”

That's it for this week!  I hope you'll come back for my Friday photo.  And hopefully, in between painting my office walls and having more landscaping done in the back yard, I'll find time to post some cards I made for Operation Write Home.  

Have a super week!  

xo,

JoAnn 

Friday Photo: Oregon Coast and OWH Summertime Challenge winner!

I'm back to feeling in an Oregon Coast frame of mind today after learning yesterday that Castaway Cove (August 6th) sold to the Doubleday and Rhapsody bookclubs, and will also be published as a Doubleday Large Print book!  This is probably the most personal of the books I've written for a while, so I'm delighted it's also going to be published in those hardcover editions.

This week's photo's not far from where Sweetie proposed to me when I was eighteen.  And where my Shelter Bay books are set.  

Smooches to everyone who commented on my summertime card challenge for Operation Write Home!  I loved each and every comment and the cards were so wonderful, they almost made me forget that not only am I not that wild about warm summers, Washington was the hottest state in the U.S.!!!!  Even hotter than Phoenix, where I spent too many years in the desert! 

The winner of the collection of MFT stamps and the Lawn Fawn paper pad, chosen totally at random, is -- ta dah -- Donna Nuce!  Donna, if you'll email your post office mailing address to joann At joannross DOT com, we'll get your package out to you next week.  Have a wonderful weekend everyone!  

xo,
JoAnn 

Tuesday Teaser from Castaway Cove

If you're here for the Operation Write Home Virtual Card Party Challenge, just scroll down to Sunday's post or click here.

If you're a reader, here's this week's Castaway Cove (Shelter Bay #6, out August 6th) teaser.  It's a scene between Mac and his grandfather, Charlie Buchanan, a WWII veteran and former fisherman who lives in a memory care residence, which is a "best-of" compilation of ones I've visited during years of volunteering with Alzheimer's patients, and researching online.  

Charlie is, hands down, one of the favorite characters I've ever written.  I dearly love him to pieces and hope readers will, too!  The scrapbook mentioned is one the heroine's been working on with him. Though, due to various name mix-ups, it takes a while for Mac to make the connection.  Enjoy:

Mac noticed the scrapbook on the table beside the chair. There were new photos that hadn't been in it when he'd visited last evening. 

"See," he said, "pointing one out.  "Here's you eating ice cream at the seawall."

The confusion dissipated, like morning fog over the harbor burned away by a summer sun.  "Rocky Road."  Charlie nodded with satisfaction, certain of this fact.  "It's always been my favorite."

"I know."  The disease might be robbing his grandfather of many things, but not his love of ice cream.

"Annie liked strawberry."  His smile was reminiscent. Wistful.  "I always said it was because it was the sweetest.  Just like her."  He tilted his head, thinking.  "We didn't have as many flavors in those days. Nothing like now. It's near impossible to decide what to choose when you just want a damn cone." 

"You're not alone there, Pops."

"Annie liked strawberry," he said again, as if for the first time.  He turned the pages until he'd come to one of Mac's grandmother, posed like a 1940s cover model on a driftwood log, smiling into the camera. "I always said it was because it was the sweetest.  Just like her."

That's a good memory."

"Yeah. It is." He paused again, whether lost in that memory, or just lost in the labyrinth of his mind, Mac wasn't certain.  "Your Emma likes strawberry best, too."

Mac had found it puzzling that the one thing his grandfather was never confused about was Emma.  He always talked about her, always remembered what she'd told him, even recalled the name of her friends that she'd chatter about during their visits.

"She does," Mac agreed. "But I think it's because it's pink as much as for the flavor."

"Probably so. The girl does have a fondness for pink.  Annie used to like it, too.  Did I ever tell you about the time she surprised me by painting our bedroom?"  

"I don't think so." He had, several times. But knowing it was one of his grandfather's favorite memories, Mac didn't mind hearing it again. 

"She painted it bubblegum pink because she thought it'd be more romantic than the beige I'd painted it when I built the addition. Well, when I came home from crab fishing up in Alaska and walked into that room, the first thing that hit my mind was that the guys would never stop ragging me if they knew I had a foo-foo girly pink bedroom. But she was so happy about her surprise, I decided that I liked it, too. 

"And it wasn't as if any of the guys on the boat were ever going to see our bedroom. Plus, she turned out to be right.  We did have some fine romantic times in that pink room. . . 

"Mac, you need a wife." 

That's it for this Tuesday!  I hope you'll come back for my Friday photo (when I also announce the winner of the OWH card party giveaway!) and I may share some more cards Wednesday or Thursday. 

xo,

JoAnn 

Operation Write Home's Virtual Cardmaking Party for National Scrapbooking Day

It's National Scrapbooking Day weekend, and while I started out making scrapbooks, the past few years I've been making cards for our heroes to send back home to their families. This weekend, I'm taking part in Operation Write Home's Virtual Cardmaking Party!

Operation Write Home's blog team is presenting challenges for your inspiration all weekend long! To start at the beginning and to learn about the twitter live party (it's #nsdowh) just click here.

And that's not all!

Blog candy! One lucky crafter who's dedicated enough to make an OWH-appropriate card for every challenge will win a whole box of crafty goodies!

Plus, since every party needs prizes, I'm giving away some fun sets of My Favorite Things stamps and a darling Lawn Fawn 6x6 paper pad to one person, chosen at random, who comments.

Although I don't care for hot summers (which is why I live in the Pacific Northwest), summer  is my favorite season to make cards for.

Nothing says summertime to me like ice cream.  And I love the idea of two friends sharing a summer day together.  The cardstock is Bazzill (the teal is Kachina, I don't know what the pink is), both the stamp, which I colored with my Copics, and the sentiment are from Stampabilities.  The paper is Echo Park Dots and Stripes, and although I have a LOT of pads that have papers with ice cream cones, I always seem to come back to the simplicity of the dots.  The little ice cream cone cutout is a Penny Black stamp and the ink is Hero Arts Shadow Ink in Soft Pool.  This layout is from an OWH sketch I use a lot, so if you haven't been using them for inspiration, you must check them out!  

Another sketch card.  The cardstock is from Bazzill; the paper's from BoBunny and Echo Park Dots and Stripes; the stamp, which I paper pieced, is from Penny Black; and the sentiment is from Hero Arts. The sand and ocean are from and old piece of Cloud 9 Designs scrapbook paper, which shows I was right not to toss all my 12x12 paper!  I tore, then rolled the top of the water a bit to give a look of whitecaps.  

And, since I've decided to make one Any Hero card, to send directly to one of our deployed men and women every day this month, here's today's:

Since one of the things our nephews (along with soldiers, sailors, Marines, and Airmen we adopted through Soldiers' Angels over the years) had fun with while in Iraq and Afghanistan were Super Soakers, I decided anyone deployed in hot temperatures would probably enjoy this Aloha beachy kitty. Although most of my cards are blank inside for heroes to send back home, this one reads "You're the GREATEST!!" The cardstock's Bazzill; the paper is that same BoBunny as the previous one, which is another of my summertime faves; and the stamp and the inside sentiment are both from Penny Black.

Thanks for visiting; now go forth and make and share your summertime card!

My contest will be open until 9 PM PDT Thursday, May 9th; I'll be announcing the winner here on the blog Friday morning.  Enjoy the rest of your weekend and Happy Cardmaking!

xo,

JoAnn

OWH National Scrapbooking Day Virtual Card Party, Day One

It's National Scrapbooking Day weekend, and while I started out making scrapbooks, the past few years I've been making cards for our heroes to send back home to their families. This weekend, I'm taking part in Operation Write Home's Virtual Cardmaking Party!

Operation Write Home's blog team is presenting challenges for your inspiration all weekend long! To start at the beginning and to learn about the twitter party (it's #nsdowh) just click here.

And that's not all!

Blog candy! One lucky cardmaker who's dedicated enough to make an OWH-appropriate card for every challenge will win a whole box of crafty goodies from OWH!

Plus, since every party needs some candy, tomorrow, on my challenge (2 p.m. EDT, 11 p.m. PDT where I am), I'm giving away some fun sets of My Favorite Things stamps and a darling Lawn Fawn 6x6 paper pad to one person, chosen at random, who comments. If you'd like to be entered, please include your email addy in your comment, writing it out so Spammers don't pick up on it, such as: JoAnn AT JoAnnRoss DOT Com. I'll also be posting the name here at the blog on Friday morning.  :)  Meanwhile, please check back on Sunday to see my theme  cards and I hope you'll play along. 

The first challenge was an ODBD to make a Miss You card.

Since I just planted sunflowers, I chose this paper, which is a bit darker than I usually use. The cardstock is a DCWV linen; the paper is BoBunny's Forever Fall; the stamp is from Stampendous; and the Unity sentiment was stamped with Versafine Vintage Sepia.  I think this might be a card for a female hero to send home to a male loved one. Or perhaps a father to an older son. 

Next, Paula's challenge was to make a card for kids using a sketch.  Since most of my cards tend to be for kids, I just happened to have a brand new stamp I was looking forward to using. 

The sketch is OWH #153, one of my favorites for mixing papers.  The cardstock is Bazzill, the paper is from Doodlebug Designs Sweet Cakes, and stamp, which I colored with my Copics, is from Penny Black.  

Since I had much gardening to do, I was considering taking a break when I came to Sandy's "romance" challenge, especially since, as I said, most of my cards tend to be for our heroes' kids or Cards for Hospitalized Kids. (I have a writer/soldier friend who was stationed in Iraq at the same time her husband was deployed, while her baby and toddler were at home with her mom, so kids' cards are super close to my heart.) But this letter she included from a hero on her blog was impossible to ignore:

Hello, We have a whole building that this will come to, but if you could add some personal ones for me that would be great. My wife and I are not doing so well with the military training and deployments. We got married as soon as I joined, once I leave here in October, we will have spent 2 out of 4.5 years apart in our marriage. As a result, we are not doing so well. If you could add in some “romance” cards, that would be great. It’ll take some thinking out of my brain and hopefully keep our marriage together. Thank you for your support.

So I stopped putting away supplies, and made this card:

The cardstock's Bazzill; the twist on Sandy's challenge was to take inspiration from one the tutorials, so I used the one on using up a 6x6 pad of paper.  (But I fudged by not using ALL the paper for this challenge.)  This paper is from a gorgeous teresa collins' Tell Your Story 6x6 pad; the sentiment is from Penny Black. I didn't exactly have to color ink I wanted. The Hero Arts Soft Shadow Pool was too pale, but the Memento Teal Zeal was too dark for the softness of the paper.  So, I first stamped the the stamp with the darker color, then, while it was still wet, put the lighter on top of it, and it blended into the exact color of the aqua on the papers.  

NOW, I'm off to plant herbs, then make dinner.  I hope to see many of you back here on Sunday for day two of the Virtual Cardmaking Party! 

xo,
 JoAnn

Friday Photo: County Kerry, Ireland

I'm feeling in an Irish frame of mind this week, so my photo's from Killarney, in County Kerry, where I'd really love to be right now since it's going to be -- yikes! -- 83 degrees here in the Pacific Northwest. Which is pretty much a heatwave for South Puget Sound, and although our neighbors are happy, generations of Irish ancestors ended up with me being a misty "soft day" girl myself.  :) 

 

OWH Midweek Throwdown Card Challenge

Happy May Day!!!  We're having a super lovely sunny one here on South Puget Sound! 

Wow, somehow I managed to sleep for nearly two days straight!  I suspect it was partly the post-oral surgery drugs, and partly catching up on all the hours of sleep I missed while finishing Castaway Cove and Christmas in Shelter Bay back to back. 

Today's Operation Write Home Midweek Throwdown challenge was to create a thank you card for a deployed service man or woman to send back home.  I'm always up for an excuse to use polka dots (they just make me happy!)  and believe the image and color makes this card pretty gender neutral.  

I'm still playing with my photo lightbox, so the brads may look a brighter blue than they actually are because the light seemed to focus on them, but they're actually pretty close to the color of the paper and stamp.  

The paper is Echo Park's Dots and Stripes, the stamp ( which I picked up at Stacy's Scrap Shack in Lincoln City, Oregon while visiting our beloved coast), was inked with Memento Nautical Blue, the sentiment was from my computer, and the brads from stock.  The banner actually does have a border on the bottom, but the angle I took the photo from isn't showing it.  (I think I'm still a bit blurry from the wonders of pharmaceuticals, lol!)  

Thanks for visiting! I read and love to receive all comments.  Friday I'll have a new photo, hopefully more cards on Sunday, then Tuesday there'll be a new book excerpt teaser!  

xo,

JoAnn

Tuesday Teaser replaced by OWH cards, just for this week.

Since I've been on three different pain meds every four hours after oral surgery (they must be working because I've been much pretty pain free) for the past day, my head's too groggy to manage a Tuesday Teaser of Castaway Cove this week.  

However, the minute I saw the strips tutorial on Operation Write Home's Stars and Stamps blog, since this is one of my favorite tutorial's EVER, I had to share two cards I've made in the past using it.  

Here's last Halloween; the darling stamp, colored with Copics, is from Impression Obsession, which I picked up at Stacy's Scrap Shack while on a vacation to the Oregon coast and the strips are from scraps:

And this is a Penny Black stamp. I had so much fun with this card the first time the tutorial appeared on OWH, I made multiples for much of my personal Christmas card list. 

Thanks for visiting! I hope you'll come back for my Friday photo; hopefully I'll have a Sunday OWH sketch challenge card; and next Tuesday, there'll be another book excerpt teaser!  

I also read and LOVE all comments!

xo,

JoAnn