Treasures

Here are a couple of handmade cards/treasures I received for my birthday, which was last week. There are more, but they're from local friends. Dare I not exploit my local friends who are close enough to strangle me should they not desire to have their beautiful handiwork shared on the Internet. LOL.

This top card just arrived today. It's from Erin of Inky Smiles fame. Take a look at the very cool photo backdrop she made recently. It beats my Square Perfect Photo Tent all to heck. Erin's creation is much less limiting that my little 12-inch cube, which isn't good for anything much bigger than a 4-1/4 by 5-1/2 inch card.

Back to Erin, I first came to "know" her when we were fellow CTMH consultants and have gotten to know her better in the blogosphere. She's the one who roped me into her Scrap My Scraps challenge back last spring. Man, how I stressed over that challenge, waiting 'til the last minute to do my cards. As it turned out, however, it was one of the highlights of the year. It was so much fun to see what three different people did with the same scraps. Fun is a good word to describe Erin, her personality as bright and sparkly as the card that brightened my day. Thank you, Erin!

This next gorgeous card is from Jeanne of Creative Bliss renown. Her card arrived well in advance of my birthday (or so said my husband who wouldn't let me open it until "the day") along with this. Her photo does not do her masterpiece justice and neither would mine were I attempt to photograph it. Thinking about the time that she put into this gift has reduced me to tears more than once. And it's almost as beautiful as the heart of this wonderful friend - my first cyber buddy who found me, cheered me on and is most likely the biggest reason why I'm still blogging.

While she's much younger, we have a lot in common. If you read her "Cross Stitched Butterflies" post, she reveals her first memory of me, which for me is a tad embarrassing. You see, when I'm passionate about some things, I can come across as a little bitchy, particularly in writing. Marv calls it my "Poison Pen." The fact that Jeanne, while feeling as if she'd be put in her place, appreciated my passion is testament to the wonderful person she is. I don't think there is anything I would be afraid to tell her. Anyway, while I didn't remember the copyright discussion (which I may well have been wrong about), I remember her encouraging words on the CTMH Artwork board when she, too, was a consultant.

My second memory of Jeanne (and the moment a friendship started to take root) was a very supportive, out-of-the blue email message I received after she discovered my blog not too long after I started it two years ago. I told Jeanne the other day that while my Bucket List isn't very long, one of the items on my list is to meet her. Yup, when life settles down, I'm going to hop on a plane from Fargo to Denver and spend a couple of days with Jeanne. I haven't seen a mountain but from the air since I was 12 years old, so I figure if I'm in Colorado, I'll be able to check one more item off my short list.

Like I said, Jeanne and I have much in common, including our astrological signs. We're both Virgos, and Jeanne's birthday is today! As there is no post on her blog and I haven't seen a sign of her in the blogosphere today, I can only hope she's doing something fun and is having the best of days. Happy Birthday, Jeanne! You bring sunshine to not only mine but the lives of so many. Thank you for being my friend.

Speaking of friends, this crazy blog has brought so many people into my world - good people whose cyber friendships I treasure. I have to laugh, too, at how leery I was at first. While I loved them, comments on Kathi's Corner were, in the beginning, like having strangers in my living room. Then, watching my stats, I realized how many were looking and not commenting. That, at first, felt like there were Peeping Toms outside my living room window. Yes, I know. I was weird. I got over it. LOL. Anyway, what I discovered was our common bond - papercrafting that's as unique as each of us is and appreciated. It's all about the sharing - our art and snippets of our lives. A good thing.

And about my day: It was more than a typical Monday. Crazy. Busy. Behind from having missed Friday. If it were possible, I'd put a cover on my cubicle tomorrow to ward off all the little stuff, because I have a couple of BIG projects with looming deadlines that are going to take up all of my time for the next couple of days. My wild day was made OK by coming home to a couple of little boys who were here today and tonight and are spending tomorrow with Grandpa while their daycare is closed. I won at Cootie and lost at Memory, which means I have more luck than skill. I also lost at Go Fish, which is half luck and half skill. Mathias and I went through the alphabet flash cards, too, and he got all but four of them. Not bad for a four-year-old. Bjorn, who has little interest in letters but loves numbers, brought me the calculator and punched in random numbers and identified them - numbers like 763 - numbers I sure as heck didn't know prior to Kindergarten or most likely fourth grade. LOL. Man, they're fun. While I didn't know it at the time, I think I had kids so I could be a grandma.

Nope. Enough of my rambling. I hope your Monday was the start of what will be a wonderful week. Take care, friends. If I can clear the clutter, I'll make my way to my corner and show up here tomorrow night with a card or somethin'. Later...