C-H-R-Y-S-alis!

I'm a volunteer youth leader in my spare time. What does that mean?

A lot of the time, it means sleep deprivation, heart ache for them, overwhelming joy for them, advocating for them and way too much caffeine while sharing the message that God loves them and longs to be in relationship with them. Some days it leans heavily to the sleep deprivation side and others it leads heavily to the sharing God side. Any balance isn't of my own doing, but from the Big Guy.

Lately it means I won't have one free weekend for well over a month due to youth related activities, but I'm having an awesome time this weekend.

You see, last night we dropped off one of our teens for a special weekend retreat. Just last year, this girl was so shy, so introverted that most of the time it looked like she was trying to escape.

Slowly, slowly we got to know her and she got to know us and Look Out World, here she comes! All by herself, she asked to join the church and be baptized. A lot of us fully mature adults are too hesitant to make a decision like that.

She also stepped out of her peer group and joined us at Creation with about 100,000 other crazy teenagers. I'll never forget the night she came up to me, jumping up and down, covered in glow sticks, hugging me and screaming "I love Tobymac!" Gone was the shy flower.

And she just keeps surprising me. So, this weekend she is at the retreat getting treated like a Rock Star and showered in love. One of the ways we show our love is through all of the little details (and I can't go into those because I don't want to spoil the surprise for anyone else who might go).

I do think I can share these...Sometimes they may find a personalized placemat at their meals. Sometimes. I made her a couple and took them to be laminated, so they're safe from spaghetti sauce. They're pretty simple. Couldn't go wild with the embellishments since they were going to be laminated, but I have to say my favorite is the big layered butterfly I cut with my Silhouette.

That's her, a beautiful butterfly. :)

Sweetness for the Sweethearts

Sooooo, it's about time to pack up the Valentine goodies because I need to move on to some top secret projects for someone, but before I finish sealing these up in envelopes, here are a few more sweet, funny Valentines...You'll note the copious use of those little honeycomb heart cupcake decorations. And I found these bags of vintage buttons I had packaged up for a flea market that got rained out, so I decided their creamy patina was perfect to frame a heart. For a soft, simple Valentine decoration that wasn't blatantly red & pink, I cut out a heart old-school style; fold, cut and unfold. Pulled out cards of vintage (and not so vintage) laces & trims and hot glued them. A banner covered in antique German glass glitter with I Love You and a vintage earring finished it all off. I'm adding this heart decoration to the Opus Gluei challenge of creating a decoration for your home. Doesn't have to be a Valentine's decoration. You are free to get crazy. :) Be sure to check out their other entries!

The Season of Lurve

Have I asked you to hold me back from buying any more Valentine's Day papers because I already have more than I'll ever need? If I have, apologies. If I haven't, for the love of Pete, somebody stop me!

And half the time I make cards, layouts, canvases for different occasions using supplies that have nothing do to with the intended holiday. So why do this stuff continue to work its way into my supply? I'm pretty sure it's because we're all a bunch of happy enablers. Our 12 step program involves tips for finding the latest & greatest, new sources and coffee places in close proximity to our supply meccas.

Faced with all of these supplies, lovely and amazing though they are, I sat down to try and actually use some of them.

I made these cards with a mix of Teresa Collins, K & Co, Basic Grey and Heidi Swapp (super old stash, yikes). And you know what? I still have a LOT of Valentine's stuff from Teresa Collins, K & Co and Basic Grey. I love it all though. I mean, how could you not love a big pile of soft blush, pink and red with frilly stuff all around?

The next card has mostly stash; some Teresa Collins, Basic Grey, K & Co, Making Memories. But what isn't old stash is something I found in the cupcake supplies at the store. I saw these honeycomb heart cupcake toppers and said to myself "Self, those would make killer cute embellishments on a Valentine's card!"

You know what? They really do! Just snap the wooden toothpick off and you are all set. If you're mailing the card, don't open the honeycomb. Let the sender do that (send a little set of user instructions of course). The honeycome hearts are getting used elsewhere too. Hope to show that off eventually.

Until then, it's less than 2 weeks til Valentine's Day! If your honey doesn't do something special for you, do something special for yourself. You deserve it! :)