Psalm 145:2 WORDart Home Decor

Happy Thursday!  I love Thursdays.

This scripture is my “motto” to live by.  I feel that if I will bless the Lord and praise Him every day, then I will live my life in the right perspective.  It keeps my life in focus, if you will.  My priorities are lined up the way they should be and my attitude is brighter.  One of my husband’s favorite sayings is, “is your cup half empty or half full?”.   When I am focusing on the goodness and the love and grace of Jesus Christ, I tend to see my cup as “half full”.  When I lose that perspective, then it is so easy to be overwhelmed by life…to see the negative and to focus on those things in life that we feel are not being fulfilled.  Jesus is the way maker, the provider, the deliverer, the healer, the encourager, the strength of my life and I will bless and praise Him and trust Him to be all of those things to me.

Because I love this scripture so much, I wanted to hang it in my home.  I had a block left from the scrapbook blocks I made for my son,  so I decided to use it for this.  The wood is about 11 inches square.  I stained it and dry brushed it with off-white and aqua paints.

I printed the WORDart onto canvas fabric and then “aged” it by using distress ink and a foam pad and fraying up the edges.  I then glued it onto the block using gel medium and used upholstery tacks to embellish the edges.  I had some paper flowers and leaves left over from my last paper flower making binge and used them to add a little something to the bottom.  It looks great hanging on my wall.

Here is the WORDart if you would like to use it.

(click image to download)

Thanks for stopping by.

~Karen

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Little Birdie Blessings

Word Art Wednesday

The Shabby Creek Cottage

My Memories Giveaway Winner

The winner of the My Memories digital scrapbooking software is:

Kathy

hennies.pennies said...

There are really too many to choose from on My Memories, but I really love the Vintage Sepia pack. I love things that look old and worn! Be especially blessed, Kathy

Congratulations!  Thank you for entering, I know you will have so much fun with it.

~Karen

Decorating With Scrapbook Pages

I just wanted to share what I made with the scrapbook pages I created with My Memories digital scrapbooking software.   I used the Heart & Home Album Template.  I love that you can do several sizes and I chose to make the pages 8x8. What I really love about the album templates is that you have access to all of the papers and embellishments separately so you can use them as you wish.  I removed some of the page elements and added my own WORDart. 

I wanted to make something for my son and his wife to show off their little family.  I started making an album then thought they would look really great hanging on their wall.  I didn’t want to just frame them, so I decided to get a little more creative. 

I purchased a 1x12x4 in. board at Lowe’s--which actually is only about 11 inches wide—and cut it into 4 pieces the same size as the width to make them square. I only used three of them (I’ll share what I did with the other one later.)  I dry brushed some off-white paint onto the boards, distressed them and wiped on a coat of wipe-on poly. 

I printed the pages with my inkjet printer, so I sprayed them with fixative to keep the ink from running and coated them with three coats of matte Mod Podge with a foam brush for protection. This also adds a really nice finish.  I painted first vertical, then horizontal and then vertical again, because I like the cross-hatch look it gives.

I didn’t want the pages to be permanent so we could update them if we chose, so I just adhered them to the boards with upholstery tacks I found at Hobby Lobby in the home décor fabric section.  I nailed sawtooth hangers to the back and they were finished.

I absolutely love the way these came out and so did they.  I plan to make some for my daughter's room with the Teen Dreams album template.  It has a Paris theme that will be perfect for her room.

I am giving away one My Memories software to one of my readers, click here to enter.  The winner will be drawn and announced on May 29th, so you still have time.

Thanks for stopping by, hope you have a fantastic weekend.

~Karen

Psalm 86:12 WORDart

Happy Thursday!

Here is the WORDart for this week.

(click on image above to download)

This whole month my theme has been praise.  There is only so much you can say, so I am sharing the lyrics of one of my favorite praise songs with you today.  I love singing songs that talk about His greatness!

Water you turned into wine, opened the eyes of the blind

there's no one like you, none like You!

Into the darkness you shine, out of the ashes we rise

there's no one like you, none like You!
Our God is greater, our God is stronger,

God you are higher than any other.
Our God is Healer, Awesome in Power,

Our God! Our God!

And if our God is for us, then who could ever stop us.
And if our God is with us, then what could stand against.
And if our God is for us, then who could ever stop us.
And if our God is with us, then what could stand against.
What could stand against.

I believe this song was written by Chris Tomlin.

(click on image above to download)

I also have a free printable for you.  Enjoy.

Don’t forget to check out my giveaway in the previous post.  My Memories has given me a copy of their digital scrapbooking software to share with my readers.  You can enter for that here.

Thank you so much for stopping by.

Have a fantastic day!

~Karen

My Memories Suite Digital Software GIVEAWAY

I was so excited when I was contacted by My Memories to try their scrapbooking software and offer one to my readers.  I was even more excited once I started playing with it.  My Memories Suite is a digital scrapbooking software.  It sells for the very reasonable price of $39.97 and includes over 1,500 papers, over 1,000 page elements, and over 30 album templates.   I love how easy it is to use and all the things I am able to create with it.  I know I have only begun to scratch the surface.  I am not really a scrapbooker.  I was several years ago when I only had 4 kids, but then it was just too time consuming to keep up with.  My Memories Suite has made it so easy to complete a page in no time at all.  There are so many quick pages and page templates to choose from--all you have to do is insert the pictures.  I also love that I am able to use my vast supply of digital papers and embellishments that I collected over the years and have stored on my computer.  My Memories store offers a great selection from many great designers and many, many freebies.  They also offer a great Designer Club. 

Go ahead and check out all it’s features here.

I really like the other capabilities My Memories Suite has as well.  I always make a calendar every month to post on my refrigerator to keep track of everything we have going on.  I was able to make some really cute ones very easily with this digital scrapbooking software. 

 

This one was created completely with free downloads or what came included with the software.  I know April is over, but it’s so cute, I had to share it.

 

Here is the one I made for May, again all created with free stuff. Gotta love it!

I had so much fun making scrapbook pages as home décor.  I will share them in a few days, I just need to get pictures.

So, do you want a chance to win?  Here’s how:

You will have several chances to enter.  One entry for each category.  I will choose a winner on May 29th and post the announcement that same day.

1. Go to the My Memories shop and choose your favorite digital paper pack or layout and post it in the comments.

2. Visit My Memories Facebook page, like it and tell them I sent you.  Leave a comment here.

3. Visit the My Memories blog, take a look around then come back here and leave a comment.

4. Become a follower of my blog and/or my Papercraft Memories Facebook page and leave a comment letting me know.

Also, if you do not win or don’t want to wait to see if you won to start using this amazing digital scrapbooking software, you can purchase now with a  $10 discount using this code.  The software will also come with a $10 coupon for downloads—that’s a $20 savings. 

STMMMS20880

This code and link to the site is also on my right side bar and will stay there a while so you can come back and use it anytime.

Have a fantastic day!

~Karen

My Weekend

I had the most fantastic time this past weekend.  Friday was my birthday and my husband and kiddos surprised me with this cake before we left to drop the kids off at my daughter’s house for the weekend.  I have to give a shout out to my amazing daughter who offered to keep the kids so we could have the weekend together.  Thank you so much, Karissa!!! 

Then it was just my hubby and I for the next two days!  That happens so rarely that we get time alone together for that long.  We had fun using Instagram to document our weekend.

We went to the Greek Festival Friday night.  We haven’t been in a couple of years.   We used to live just down the street and went every year, but we don’t get there as often since we moved to Gettysburg.  They have the best Greek food!  I had never tried Greek food until I met my husband and he took me to a Greek restaurant on a date.  It was love at first taste. I forgot to take a picture of the HUGE chocolate covered strawberries.  They were delicious!

Saturday we went to Lucketts to the Spring Antique Market.  I love going there, but it is definitely something I enjoy much more without the kids.  Here are some of my favorite things, I couldn’t possibly share all of them.  Let me just say here, that I have the best husband.  I thought he might be a little bored, but he enjoyed it every bit as much as I did and insisted we see everything.  Oh, how I love that man! 

Crabcake sandwich…oh my goodness.  Yum!

Miss Mustard Seed.  BIG fan…and we share the same town.  She is coming out with her own milk paint colors.  I can’t wait to try them.

I fell in love with these photo frames and may try to make one.

…and this framed vintage receipt….LOVE!

I purchased these shutters because I have wanted some forever.  They look great on my table and hide all the little nicks in my wall that need to be filled and painted.  Am I the only one who has that problem?

My birthday present.  I am so in love with chalk paint and I was so excited when my wonderful hubby told me to pick out some new colors to add to my chalk paint collection as my birthday gift.  I can’t wait to use them!

We went to the mall after and I found a Kirklands and bought a few things I will share in a future post.  Then we went to the Cheesecake Factory and ordered appetizers for dinner and cheesecake for dessert.  We don’t do THAT with the kids. I forgot to take a picture of our cheesecake.  They have the BEST mint green tea.  I always drink way too much when we go there.  It is SO good.  I wish I could figure out how to make it at home.  Anyone know how?

Sunday we just spent recovering from the very busy previous days.  It was a beautiful, relaxing day and I enjoyed every minute with my man.

I hope I haven’t bored you too much with all the pictures and all.  Thanks for sticking around to the end.  I have a very exciting giveway coming up this week…I can’t wait to share.

~Karen

Psalm 35:28 WORDart and printable

Happy Thursday!

I am so excited it is Thursday because that means tomorrow is Friday and my weekend is beginning.  I am SO excited about this weekend.  My hubby and I get some much needed alone time and I am really looking forward to it.

Anyways, back to the purpose of this post, to share this week’s WORDart with you.

(click image to download)

It is difficult sometimes to make a practiced effort to praise when things are not going as we want them to.  This scripture really spoke to me about my need to speak His righteousness.  I can either focus on the negative or I can focus on Him.  He is worthy of all my praise! When I focus on His goodness, the negative doesn’t seem so bad because His goodness overshadows it.  I know there is nothing that my God cannot handle.  His ways are not my ways, they are so far above me that I can not begin to imagine His thoughts.  I may not understand why, but I do know that it is in His hands…hands that are so much more capable than mine.

(click image to download)

I have a printable for you as well.  I used textures from Shadowhouse Creations -Grunge Texture 4 and Post Card 7 from the Post Card Set 3 collection-  and a Photoshop brush “February Swirls” from Pixels & Ice Cream along with my own paper I created.  I hope you find it useful for something.

Thanks so much for stopping by!

~Karen

Psalm 150:6 WORDart and Printable

 

Happy Thursday!

My word for the month is “praise”.  We are told often in the scriptures to praise the Lord.  If you have children or have ever worked with children you know that just giving them a command is not always enough to motivate them to do what they are supposed to do.  There is still a conscious decision that must be made on their part to do what they have been commanded.  It is the same way with us.  We have to make a conscious decision to praise the Lord.  It is not always easy and sometimes we just don’t feel like it—or at least, I don’t, I’ll be honest.  When I feel like that and I surrender my praise to the Lord, there is such a feeling of release.  It is so uplifting and I can feel my attitude change. It is impossible to feel down and praise the Lord at the same time.  God is so, so very good!  He has done so much for me, but if He never did another thing for me, He would still deserve my praise.  He has saved my soul and I never deserved that.  I have never done anything good enough to deserve His love, but yet He has never stopped loving me.  I WILL praise the Lord.

(click the image above to download)

I also have a printable for you today.  It is 4x6 and created with paper from the NeareStore.

(click the image above to download)

I pray your day is a great one.  Thanks for stopping by my blog today.

~Karen

Word Art Wednesday WORDart

Hello, I am sharing the WORDart I made for the Word Art Wednesday blog here, but please be sure to head over to their blog to see what’s going on over there.

(click image above to download)

Remember, if you link up your project on the Word Art Wednesday blog you have a chance to win a great prize.  The sponsor this week is Heart & Soul Rubber Stamps.

Thank you for stopping by my blog today.  I will have new WORDart and a printable for you tomorrow.

Have a great day!

~Karen

2 Samuel 22:31 WORDart

Happy Thursday!

I am sorry for the lapse in blogging.  We were away on vacation visiting my family.  I brought my laptop and had every intention of blogging while I was away, but it just didn’t happen.   We have had this vacation planned for months and I thought the time would never come for us to leave.  My brother came from Florida and we were all together for the first time in several years.  I had such a great time with my family and, quite honestly, I was not ready for it to end.  Why is it that when you are looking forward to something it takes forever to come, but then comes to an end so quickly?

I have to share this with you, but I need to lay the groundwork first.  When this year started, I felt that I should have a theme for each month for my WORDart instead of having random scriptures.  As I feel impressed with a word, I write it on the next month of the calendar and then do a little research to find scriptures with that theme.  I then write those scriptures down on the week that I will post them, so my scriptures are written down weeks ahead.               Most of you are aware of my husband’s job situation.  The day before we left for vacation they pulled him in the office and told him that they were letting him go.  We were expecting this as this is quite common when a new management company takes over--to let the current general manager go and bring in their own people.  I have to say that the expectation and the experience are quite different.  My first reaction was, “Yes! I am so ready for the stress of all this to be over.”  However, it did not take long for reality to set in and with it all of the doubts…the fears…the what-ifs…the what happens now thoughts that totally took over my brain.  I hung up the phone with my husband and decided to work on my wordart and this was the scripture for this week.  It was exactly what I needed at that moment.  God is just so awesome! I love how the Word of God always speaks to me and encourages me.  I could not help but be thankful and praise His name because His way IS perfect!   We had been praying for God’s will to be done in this situation and how can you argue with God’s perfect way?  He is tried and true and I can put my trust in Him for our future.  He surely knows what is best for us!

(click image to download)

I also have the WORDart that I created for Word Art Wednesday this week.  Sorry it is a day late.  I am getting caught up on all the post vacation duties.  If only there was a way to not have to unpack and do laundry after vacations—ugh.

(click image to download)

Be sure to stop by the Word Art Wednesday blog and see what the design team has created and link your project up.  There is always a prize.  While your at it, why not link up to Abby’s Scripture Thursday as well.

Thanks for stopping by.

Have a wonderful week!

~Karen