Just Playing

I sent this card out to a friend the other day. There's no stamping on it as the greeting is some rub ons. I thought it was kind of fun. It reminded me of being a kid again where you made cards with this and that and not rubber stamps, because who knew what rubber stamps were when you were a kid.

At the same time I made the first one I made this second one, again without stamping. I don't really care for this one. The proportions are off and that fat fabric brad in the center makes the card way too bulky to mail. This one will probably just lurk in my craft room until I get tired of it and toss it away.

The Fine Print: They can't all be winners. 

Mousse Munching Mouses

This month my big stamp club's card exchange theme is "oldie goodie." That doesn't come with an explanation so you can interpret that however you like. I picked out one of my older stamps to use for the swap. This is from the days when Stampa Rosa did House Mouse. I picked it up at one of the Co*motion warehouse days.

That probably doesn't mean much to you, but those from Tucson know about how the stamp company Co*motion used to be housed here and they'd have certain days they'd open their warehouse to the public. I think standing around Co*motion talking about the desire to get together is how the big stamp club was born. Just so you know, the big stamp club is old enough to legally drink. It too, is an oldie goodie.

The Fine Print: Well, I kind of gave it away already by telling you it was House Mouse by Stampa Rosa, designer paper by DCWV, ribbon from my stash, colored with Copics, not valid with any other offers. 

You're Awesome

I pulled out an oldie (but goodie) stamp set the other day and decided to play with it. I didn't even give myself palpitations by not using designer paper. I must be getting old or something. I mean, like, mature, not aged.

The Fine Print: Okay, maybe I'm aged too. Stamps and embossing folder by Stampin' Up. 

Being Healthy

I figure that I'd better post something before you all start thinking that I've succumbed to the flu. I've lived through the ordeal with some residual asthma lingering on (the onus of being asthmatic).

We are a really an unhealthy bunch at work, which is a school, and it has more to do with lousy lifestyles and poor choices than it does to our extreme exposure to so much public. In the past my school would partner with the city when it came to purchasing our health insurance. We would get better rates when trying to cover a larger employee mass.

But then the city divorced us and said they didn't want to partner with us anymore because they did a study and the study showed that we were far too unhealthy and it was our employees who was driving the cost up. They wandered off into the sunset with their lower health insurance rates and our school floundered under the increasing costs of covering such an unhealthy bunch.

To try to get us to make healthier choices my employer started offering perks for completing wellness goals. They have offered healthy eating and cooking workshops, offered discounts on equipment, created employee-only fitness classes (being a school with a thriving athletics department we had lots to offer anyway), health screenings and finally discounts on health insurance.

See, without the city our rates continued to climb and our employer covered it until last year when they said no more! You had to complete X amount of wellness activities and then they would continue to cover the increase. If you didn't do them then you yourself paid for the increase. I did them last year and they have a new set of things for this year. Currently I'm doing a sleep study and 150 minutes of exercise a week (both completely skewed by having the flu). I've signed up for a couple of foodie workshops and still need to schedule my health screening, but maybe I should wait until I'm healthier first.

So that's my story and I'm sticking to it! And BTW, the really unhealthy people? They continue to do nothing and complain about the rate increase.

The Fine Print: This is a birthday card I sent today made from Club Scrap stuff.

Life Looks Beautiful

Well, then I am pleased to announce that I am going to survive this current iteration of the plague that I managed to go and catch. I'm not up for dancing, singing and celebrating but am down with having a shower and being upright for a few hours.

Life looks beautiful on you! It looks rather ragged on me, but at least I have it!

 I'm going to enter my card into the Rubber Dance Blog's February challenge. My pink is a bit more rose than their hot pink offering but hopefully it counts. What the heck, you only life once!

The Fine Print: Stamps and designer paper (retired) by Stampin' Up, dies by Spellbinders.

T.G.I.F.!.

Thank God It's February!

I thought January would never, ever end.

The Fine Print: All products by Taylored Expressions except solid heart and background paper.

Zumba

The other day I went to my Zumba class. I pulled and I pushed and I sweated and turned this way and that and jumped around and twisted myself almost inside out. And that was just to get the stupid sports bra on.  Who the hell invented those things?!

The Fine Print: Stamp by Hampton Arts, designer papers by My Mind's Eye.