2012 – Year of The Dragon

January 24, 2012 By Chris Durnan

This layout is for Chris in my capacity as a member of her CT . Chris creates the most amazing files and I am so lucky to be on her Team. This particular file came from her last QMC which is a membership run every few months providing you with more than 20 files for the tiny sum of $10. This layout uses CD00910 – 2012 year of The Dragon, which is so new it isn’t in the Store yet!

The photos are of a Bearded Dragon that frequents our yard at times. This one was quite happy to pose on the branch for some photos and seemed perfect to compliment Chris’s file.

The cutter files have had styles and textures added to them to add dimension, the kit is mine, “Autumn Breezes” . Designed to show that personal cutter files can be used digitally very successfully!

Thanks for looking

created by Caz in PSCS5

Digi-Cutter Files offered in SCUT, GSD, KNK, WPC & AI (SVG) at www.visualdesignsbychris.com

Share|

30 in 30 download.

January 24, 2012 By Chris Durnan

So in my New Year’s Goal vibe. Here is a little sheet I call 30 in 30. I am a big list person. I feel so much better if I can see I accomplished something that day. There are so many little things I would like to do around the house and the studio. So I have this list up on the fridge with little things on it that I want to do. Like I hang new curtains from Christmas. I just keep running out of time to do it. So I am gonna put it on this list. Every time I look at my “Mail Center” I think I need to fix that. I have the ideas. Just not the done part. Every time I look at the junk drawer I think yeah I could just sit down one night and run through it. But by the end of the day. I must admit I don’t think straight and can’t remember those little things. Like how long have I been thinking about rehanging my grandma’s quilt because it looks off centered. It sounds insane and maybe I am the only Mom that gets lost in the to-do’s and the interrupted before the Ta-Done part. But just in case here is a file. Both are printable and come in a different color schemes and one is fillable. So you can type it up on the computer.

This is for your personal use. Please download with that in mind.

Here is the Download link for the printed form.

You will need to be a registered member of the forum to download.
But no password is needed.

If you share on Pinterest please add my name with @Chris Durnan so I know it has been added to the Pinterest world and can follow your boards as well if you are a follower or HashTag me #chrisdurnan so I can see what is liked the most and what isn’t and work in that direction.

Enjoy!
Chris

To get quick fun updates of things going on, you can join my facebook page.

My files in the store can be located here. Thank you for stopping by!

Menu Monday

January 23, 2012 By Chris Durnan

Welcome to Monday!!!

I am busy busy. Trying to get a bunch of items under control before I get the call. We have a sick little boy who has been home for the last few days and missed some big events and begged to go to school today. I am hoping it makes it through the day, but am on standby to pick him up. I am working on my menu for food today. We picked up a bountiful basket this past weekend. So gotta make a menu plan.

So here goes.

Monday
Grilled Chicken and Brussel Sprouts. Going to try this recipe. Crunchy Sweet Brussel Sprout Salad.
-Cook extra chicken for Tuesday.

Tuesday
Extra Grilled Chicken and Make Chicken Nachos
-Tortilla Chips, Chicken chunks, Cheese, Salsa, Sour Cream melted together

Wednesday
Grilled Salmon or Steak? (Gotta ask Hubby) And Grilled Cauliflower (We grill cauliflower in tinfoil. First we toss them in a little olive oil. My goal this year is to cut salt completely out of my cooking because we all put salt on our meals. So if I can cut it in one place. It’s a start. So I won’t be salting it before it grills. ) This menu sounds really good. From Food Network. However, I just don’t have all of these ingredients on hand. Although I see grapeseed oil showing up more and more. I wonder what that is like. It seems to be a tossup for olive oil. I will have to look more into it.

Thursday
Busy Night… Leftovers

Friday Night
Freebie Friday. Kiddo gets to make the meal or decide to not cook and have make your own.

So that is my calendar for food. This is a New Year’s Goal. Get more on top of our food and using up these awesome bountiful baskets.

We also got pomegranate in our basket. I think just two of them. Does anyone have any interesting ideas for this?

We also got lots of pears. I think I am gonna cook it down into pear sauce. I have one of those cool kitchenaid attachments that will pull the peals out and give you the pear sauce. Or grill pears might be the next option. Think skewer them and maybe drizzle them with a lite sauce for better grilling. I will have to do some seeking on this.

And thank you!! I have received some really positive and happy emails over the weekend. Thank you! I really appreciate when folks take that few seconds to say Hey! Thinking about you. And for some reason when worrying about my little one these positive notes showed up in my emailbox. Just wonderful. Thank you! You made my day.

And now I am off to find some meds. Yep yep. Sharing is caring is the words they say. Personally when it comes to colds. I don’t think of caring as sharing.

Have a fantastic Monday!

Enjoy!
Chris

Sense of ???? what???

January 21, 2012 By Chris Durnan

The quote of the week from my little child…

My little eye rolling & trying to get my “goat” child…

So we are working on homework. New concept. I am getting a little out of sorts trying to explain .. .and well.. we are finally done. Wew. I think he got it… but …

I started being silly and annoying and…. Buggy .. just a Mom…

My son says in a very dramatic sigh and voice…. “ My Mother has no sense of HUMILIATION!” ( I notice him smiling and looking to see the reaction.)

Seriously? I humiliated him in front of the dogs,the horses? What? There is nothing around us to humiliate him in front of… . So I got up.. put on the tunes as loud as I could. And danced around and air guitared and head banged my long hair. And by the end of it he was on the floor banging away with drum sticks from Rock Band and laughing and thoroughly enjoying….

Oh did I tell you he wants to start a Rock Band. Yeah him and three other friends and he has plans….

OH BUDDY! Wait ‘til you see your Mom’s “sense of humiliation” just you wait !

Love my life. I truly do. Love my life.

And on that note. Have an awesome and rocking weekend!!! We plan to!

Enjoy!
Chris

Happy “Heart” Day

January 19, 2012 By Chris Durnan

One of my new year’s resolutions was to go back to offering regular freebies on my blog. So here is my attempt at meeting that goal. I love to create files and I love to share them. I just get the wierd look from my hubby when I spend hours and hours on the computer working on a “node” that just isn’t right. And I love to be able to support my family with something I love. So thank you for stopping by to get this file and thank you to those who stop by and visit my store. In supporting me, you help me support my family.

So here is today’s freebie. I thought you could use it for a wedding, a great day, or even Valentine’s Day.

And for those who like the border I am offering it in the forum free for a few days.Stop by here and enter the password newyeariagreetou and download. You must login to the forum to download. While there stop by the Sketch Challenge and get your first project of the year done!.

Things I need to say.

When you enter the password it says I agree TOU. it means that you agree to my terms of use that this is a personal use. In order for me to keep creating freebies. Please send folks here to my blog. Another good place to find me is on my facebook page for quick updates.

Answers to Questions..

Folks ask my why am I loading to the forum and why the password. Well my other option is a site perhaps like 4shared etc. So you would follow the same steps only instead you go to the forum on the VDBC site and download. I am trying to centralize my work and time on the net so I can create create create. So once you have registered at the forum you can continue to download the freebies by using the passwords. They change once a month rather then every time. So sometimes the forum may not even ask you for a password if you already entered it that month. 🙂 And that is the blah blah blah of today’s post.

So now run on over and grab that file. And just remember….

For the QMC members this file as always is in the
Perks section for current members of the QMC.

February 1st is the signup date for the next QMC. 🙂

Mark Your Calendar. I have a surprise… 🙂 Yeah!

A sneak preview of files loading for the QMC…

To get quick fun updates of things going on, you can join my facebook page.

My files in the store can be located here. Thank you for stopping by!

Wandering and Wondering Wednesday

January 18, 2012 By Chris Durnan

Okay folks. My mind is wandering and wondering. My hubby got this little wine sampler set for the holidays. He finished one and threw away the bottle. I saw one sitting there and thought hmm what could I do with it? They are so little and dainty. So I rescued the three remaining. Yes storage ideas for little things comes to mind. But I wonder could I use it for a message in the bottle valentine? Or a treasure hunt something.. or?? Any little ideas? I took a photo with a dry eraser marker so you could better see the size. Oh I just thought of another. Have my son write a note for teacher appreciation week and put it in the bottle with a tag that says… We didn't need a map to know you were the treasure… Hmm something hokey like that which will make my son roll his eyes at me and giggle all at once. Your ideas are welcome please leave me a comment here or in the forum. Stop by tomorrow for this weeks freebie.
Enjoy! Chris

Resolutions….I have the answer to 1…. woohoo!

January 17, 2012 By Chris Durnan

Well I have the answer for one Resolution… to get more of my photos scrapped. .. participate in the monthly sketch challenges. I would have at least 12 done this year. and if I can work it for double layouts then 24. I could dream, but I better just do it.

So of course like many of the crafters out there …. we are all trying to keep up on our own projects putting together memories. I really want to get those albums together I am missing. This year I decided my goal was to just not get lost in this year and not get this year done to. We have albums I have done and my son just pours over them page by page. He shows them to visitors. He just loves to see the old pics. So this year my answer is the Sketch Challenges in the forum. Ileana and Lori are running the January Sketch Challenge and Ileana is offering up files for digital scrapbooking and for digital cutter. What couldn’t be better for scrapping folks who want to be versatile. So this is my first of my goal. I took photos I posted the other day and put them into a layout using Ileana’s file. So here we go! I look forward to having an album to show for this year. and ahhhh.. well I better remember to print it out. If you want to join in… Visit the forum here. and if you wanna catch up there are older layouts and files as well. Just dive right in and post them in our gallery.
Enjoy!
Chris

Have a wonderful day!

To get quick fun updates of things going on, you can join my facebook page.

My files in the store can be located here. Thank you for stopping by!

Oh the weekend…Love it

January 16, 2012 By Chris Durnan

I hope you had a wonderful weekend. We were busy busy, but we spent lots of time together so in my world that works. We bowled at a birthday party for a friend’s son. D did awesome. He loves to bowl. Worked on the screen porch off the patio of the hobby barn. I am way excited about this. An area to sit during the summer without the horse flys bugging us and Dalen can move and stretch around. Even where he can build his legos maybe and leave them setup for a bit. So thinking about different table ideas etc. Just looking forward to it.

D Adventures.

So today is a day off school. My son has a really sore throat and bad cough. hoping it goes away as he has awesome next weekend plans and I would hate for him to miss it. So he is hanging out and decided since he can’t sing to his karaoke cd to play the “drums”. He is banging and beating dish lids in his room and comes out and says “MOM? Why didn’t I get a drum set for Christmas? I am so good.” I smiled, hiding my panic because I have already considering calling the hubby to find out where the ear plugs for the shooting range are, my response was… “because your room doesn’t stay clean enough to make the room for it. So when I see that happen we’ll talk.” Big groan. “Mom I am sick. geesh. you could help me dream about having a set”.. .and a way he walked. yes I am a big bad crusher of dreams. or hey .. novel idea… pick up your room. haha. what a silly boy.

Cody Adventures
Cody loves love to fetch things from my son’s room. If he can, nerf gun bullets, are the perfect grab. So if the gate is down he will rush in their and snag one and bring it out. So I had left him in the house and run out to the barn real quick. I came back in and here he sits. he looks just perfect. No worries. So pretty I even took a picture. And then I tried to call him over. He wouldn’t move. Like he was frozen. I sat and thought then

I said “Cody…. what do you have?”

and this look below is the one I got in response…

HA! Caught him. he was trying to hard to hide it. I had to laugh.

There is the tell a tale orange nerf bullet. So funny he tried to hide it and not move.

And then looked away when I started to talk to him. It still makes me giggle

Did you see the cowbell around his neck. Yeah the stinker took off to the big dog yard and we couldn’t find him. So we found him! and then tada. Time for the cowbell. He ran around like a crazy bat whose lost his sonar for about 30 minutes after I added it to his collar. Perfect. Now I can hear where he is while we are outside. He has gotten over it but gets mad and barked at his chest this morning when he was trying to eat and it kept hitting his bowl.

Hubby Adventures ..

It is cold and yuck and football game is on and he is working on the screen porch for me. He is just the bestest. He came in to watch the sad sad Packer’s game. his logic after the game was… Hey I rooted for the Packers and they lost. I root for the Vikings and they lost. maybe we should both try rooting for the Vikings next year and they would win.. I smiled… rolled my eyes… and politely said. Lets Grill the BRATS! hahah. 😉 love him but his football logic is not workin’ for me. I have to many cheeseheads, shirts, hats etc to switch teams and purple is notttt my color. So that means.. most likely on Super Bowl.. we will be riding horse. woohoo! Even better. Love my life!

So just had to share some stories.

This weekend I posted a freebie. if you missed it and are a current QMC member you can download it the perks section. next QMC is coming! Enjoy!

Chris

To get quick fun updates of things going on, you can join my facebook page.

My files in the store can be located here. Thank you for stopping by!

Valentine’s Day Card

January 14, 2012 By Chris Durnan

Update: Zenita sent in another use of the file. CUTE! Here it is.. Thanks Zenita

******************

Welcome to the Card A Day Blog Followers. Today is my day on Card A Day.

So here is the Valentine’s Day Project Provided to me by Zenita.

Thank you Zenita!!!

Here is what she had to offer as the recipe for the card

Recipe for card:
Bazzill cardstock
background paper–DCWV The Mariposa Stack
Versa Color–Pink
Shimmer Spray that I made

And for those who like the border I am offering it in the forum free for a few days. Stop by here and enter the password newyeariagreetou and download. You must login to the forum to download. While there stop by the Sketch Challenge and get your first project of the year done!.

And for the QMC members this file as always is in the Perks section for current members of the QMC.

New QMC coming in February. You’re gonna LOVE it!!

Are you looking for some Valentine’s Projects… here are some files I have to offer in the store. Enjoy! Chris