Happy, Happy, Hopeful!

Hello Stamplings!

Happy New Year! I hope this finds you doing well and avoiding Omicron and I hope you enjoyed your holiday! I was so optimistic that 2021 would find us completely back to normal with good times and good health and no more stress and depression. Wrong. My heart goes out to you if you've had illness or death of a loved one this past year.

So now I am heaping even more optimism onto the back of 2022 ~ The Year of High Expectations! I hope it is strong enough to bring us to a place of sanity and a return of human kindness and common sense, which, in turn, will lead to an end to the pandemic and political infighting. Well, I don't know about that last bit, but a girl can dream.

And make you a card:

For the base, you'll see a layer of handmade paper, shot through with gold tinsel. Over the top is a platinum circle of stars which was a gift from a friend; I think it's made by Papertrey. The inner circle is adorned with a NBUS bottle of champagne (vad elsk?) from Cottage Cutz (which I paper-pieced in different appropopo colors of glossy paper) and a NBUS sediment from Hero Arts which was heat-embossed in gold.

Here's a better angle of the schparkliness and color!

Challenges

• Cardz 4 Galz: In with the new year/new stash.
  
• Double D: Lots of white.
  
• Krafty Chicks: AG.
  
• Simon Says Monday: Party
  
• Simon Says Wednesday: It's time to party.
  
• Watercooler Wednesday: Marsha's AG.

Thank you to ALL the wonderful card challenges in Blogland and their dedicated Design Teams who work to inspire us and schpark our creativity month-after-month!

______________________________________________________

In other happy news, this is my 10th blogging anniversary! I actually published my first post in October of 2011, but it was just a coupla practice posts. I didn't really get my feet wet until January of 2012. It's a pretty big deal to have maintained a blog for ten years, especially in the era of Instagram and with all the changes Blogger has made over the years, not all of them good ones. 

The readers play a huge part in the longevity of a blog and I am so thankful for all of you! After all, without you leaving me wonderful comments, I'm not sure I would still be blogging. More importantly, many of your comments have developed into real friendships, both inside the computer and outside in the real world. We blog because we want to share our creations and have a diary of them ~ it's an incredible magical bonus when strong bonds and friendships also develop!

In celebration of my ten years of blogging, I'm hoping to do a sort of restart this year. This pandemic has taken some of the stuffing out of the ol' blog sofa, as it were, and I want to see if I can rekindle my joy of blogging, visiting, and commenting. Know what I mean? I also want to spread more joy around the world cuz the world could use more joy.

So in louie of a blogaversary give-away, here is my plan, complete with preamble:

If you've been a friend for a while now, you've heard me talk about my dear friend Verna. I became friends with Verna in 1978 when we both worked in the same small law firm. That's a long-time friendship. Verna is 97 now and confined to a bed after breaking her neck seven years ago in an accident with her walker and an automatic door. She is an inspiration to me in terms of her stoicism and her spunk. Mentally, she is sharp as a tack in spite of the pain her body is in.

I asked a few years ago if friends would send her cards and many of you do. The joy that Verna feels from getting these cards is hard to put into words. I stand on the porch and visit with her and she shows the cards to me through the window. And her face just lights up! Thank you for that gift for her!

Rubberstamps.com

In turn, I would like to offer that gift to a senior you may know. There are wonderful people who do annual card drives and I have enjoyed taking part in them and also donating cards for seniors in my own community, but I'd like to do more. Two years of off-again/on-again isolation has been hard for everyone, but it is especially hard for seniors.

So if you, or someone you know, would love to receive some old-fashioned love in card form, please use the Contact Me form on the right to let me know and I will get the details from you. (Using the form is more reliable because comments are often un-reply-able.) 

Thank you, everyone! Mwah! And RIP dear Betty White.😇

 

 Enjoy your day and Happy New Year! 
No, seriously, enjoy! Life is too short!

p.s. I was just searching for something on my blog and ran across an old post at the beginning of 2016 that I found both humorous and depressing in that I've not yet reached any of the goals I had high hopes for SIX years ago. Slap! Time doesn't speed up for old people. Old people slow down and resolutions stay the same!😄