Reversible Handmade Signs

I've been making these signs inspired by "Ghost Whisperer" for a few years now and just love them. I posted a few on my Etsy shop tonight. Take a look-see.


Here / Not Here
Open / Shut
Open / Closed

An investment for the future

An investment for the future, originally uploaded by SudsMuffinCanada.

Maybe I'm crazy but I came upon a great deal for 2 retail display cabinets that I just had to buy them. The crazy part? They are much too big for my current shop and I have no plans to move any time soon. Ah, but when the time comes, I won't need to shell out big money on display cabinets because I will have these babies in storage. What do you think? Good move?

Another Ice Storm and Power Outage

It was a miserable weather day today, with freezing rain off and on all day long. This meant an armour layer of ice on the car, that required chipping off a few times throughout the day.

On the way home, we noticed truck from the local power utility working on power lines by the breakwater. So for the rest of the drive home I looked in all the houses for some sign of light within. Nothing. Once we pulled into the driveway, it was obvious that the entire neighbourhood was without power. Hubby got out and quickly shoveled the wet crusty snow from the walkway, getting drenched by the pouring rain in the process. It was then that I suggested that we just go out for a quick supper. So we went back out and hit the drive through at the local Arby's and headed back home to eat by candlelight.

Hubby left for work and my little apprentice and I retired to my bedroom with the laptop and watched The Incredibles from my bed. It was so much fun with the oil lamp lighting the room, the cat snuggled at our feet and the two of us snuggling under the blankets. We watched the movie until the battery died. Then we switched to the iPod and watched Discovery Channel podcasts that I had downloaded, until that battery died.

We continued to snuggle and I quizzed her in verb conjugation until we decided to roll over and snooze for a bit. We just started to drift off when all the lights came back on. What crazy timing, just in time for me to record hubby's favourite shows tonight. With all that, I hope he makes it home ok on the slushy roads.

My back yard and my old car

My back yard and my old car, originally uploaded by SudsMuffinCanada.

This is what my back yard looked like just a few days ago. Today it's raining steadily and while a fair bit of snow has melted from it, there's still no getting the car out of there at the moment.

Front window of my shop

Front window in my shop, originally uploaded by SudsMuffinCanada.

I took this picture of my shop window a few days ago. This is our Candy Cane soap cake, looking all delicious on the café table.

Union Street on Sunday morning

Union Street on Sunday morning, originally uploaded by SudsMuffinCanada.

We went out for breakfast yesterday morning and stopped by our shop for a few things. I took the opportunity to try out my new camera on a few street shots. I really like how this one came out, so bare and desolate, even for a Sunday morning. I am standing in front of my store, just out of view on the right, and we had breakfast at Cora's just around the corner, down the street between the white house and the brick building on the left.

Breakfast was delicious and we made a great contact. Our waitress is opening an organic spa and was meaning to come and talk to us about creating an organic skin care line for her business. How much kismet is that?

Butterfly Maze Book

I thought I would change things up a bit by showing some of the other items I also make (or in this case, have made in the past).

This is a little 3x3 maze book. The inside pages are made by cutting a single 12x12 sheet of scrapbook paper which then gets folded into a booklet. It's very simple to make. The cover is simply scrapbook paper over a piece of cardboard cut from a cereal box (I save all my cereal and cracker boxes for various projects).

The paper is from K&Co and I just love the sparkly butterflies as well as the little pockets that this technique creates inside the booklet. It's a perfect little mini album and the pocket can hold small pictures, journalling tags or memorabilia.

6 O'Clock Card - Thank You

Stamped on the untextured side of Bazzill card stock because I got an incomplete stamp on the other side. So flipped it over and voilà! I thought the dragonfly bling would be a cute touch. I did a different technique for the sentiment. First I heavily inked the stamp with brown ink then applied a bit of black over the brown, then I stamped the card. I like how it made a brown outline around the black and almost looks like it was stamped twice.

6 O'Clock Card - Together

6 O'Clock Card - Follow your own path

New card made yesterday. Cuckoo clock image from Amy Butler. Sentiment cut from back of Amy Butler packaging.

6 O'Clock Card - Our souls are the same

My beautiful MiniMuffin

My beautiful MiniMuffin, originally uploaded by SudsMuffinCanada.

I was playing around a bit with my new Rebel 400D and the telephoto lens. I'm still learning; have lots to learn actually. MiniMuffin was playing Wii and she looked over at me and I snapped this. You can see her earring still swinging. Anyhow, I thought it was a lovely shot, even if it was in very low light. This picture of her just makes my heart swell.

6 O'Clock Card - True Happiness

I just bought a DSLR Camera

It's a Canon EOS Rebel 400D xti and I am LOVING it, but oh I have so much to learn. It's clear already that this camera takes straight up noticeably better pictures than my point and shoot (also a Canon). It's simply an amazing Camera. I want to go everywhere and take pics with it. It's fantastic.

These are my very first pics out of the camera. Not the best but I thought they were sorta cute.

My little apprentice playing on the Wii

She looks like she's saying a bad word. haha

Miss Chai enjoying the heater on my computer desk. Love the paw...

Stay tuned for more as I learn my camera.

6 O'Clock Card - As boundless as the sea

6 O'Clock Card - How do I love thee?

6 O'Clock Card - We have been friends

I made all the cards in these most recent posts quite some time ago. I had a pack of rub-on sentiments that I just loved and couldn't stop using them. I haven't made any cards this week as my schedule has been a bit wild and I've been working on my SudsMuffin website. We're going to be revamping the look over there a bit and will soon be offering soap crafting supplies and kits. Stay tuned!

More Winter Pictures

This past weekend, my little apprentice spent the weekend at her grandfather's house. He is so good to her (and to us) and they both enjoy each other's company so much. These pictures are great because they bring back so many memories of the tunnels he used to help us dig when we were her age. She had a blast!

Here she is in the snow at the back of Papie's house. It sure looks different in the Winter with all the gardens covered in white.

I wonder what's in here...

Did anybody see a rabbit go this way?

Hello there!

6 O'Clock Card - A friend in need

6 O'Clock Card - The road to a friend's house

6 O'Clock Card - Forever

6 O'Clock Card - If we are friends much longer

6 O'Clock Card - Heartfelt Love

Just a very simple card this morning. K&Co paper adhered to white card stock and the sentiment is a rub-on.

6 O'Clock Card - For My Love

This card was made based on Kazan's Sketch 19. The paper and flower are all Basic Grey.

Update 3 & a half hours later, a coworker selected this card to give to his wife for Valentine's Day. Thanks for everything you do for me C! I hope your wife loves it!

Also, for a chance to win some great Blog Candy, check out Crafty Coo's blog. Her giveaway is perfect for Spring and Easter.

Buddy the abusive hamster

Buddy is a little dwarf hamster we added to our family last summer. He lives on a television stand in my craft room, which is right beside the family room. I can hear him running in his wheel right now. He's a cute little guy but definitely has an attitude. We joke that Buddy is an abusive hamster because he hits us. It's funny but also kind of intimidating. If you get too close, he will strike you with both of his front paws. He may even give you a quick nip.


But as grumpy as he is, we love having him around. He can be quite entertaining, and as you can see, he's pretty photogenic too. He loves peanuts and pumpkin seeds best, will often turn his nose up at almonds but doesn't mind dried fruit like raisins and cranberries. He's a persistent little guy, always looking to escape from his mod pod. Last night he jumped out from a tube as I was digging through a container looking for more pumpkin seeds for him. He landed on the television stand with the cat (you'll meet her another day) mere inches away. The cat was interested in Buddy but sat calmly, just looking at him as he scurried about. I quickly grabbed the lid of the container with all the seeds and nuts in it, and scooped him right in. I think he thought he was in heaven. He hopped right back into his pod without a fuss.


Anyhow, that's Buddy. I hope you enjoy his furry little cheekies.

Wild and crazy winter

We got hit with yet another storm last night. We were still chopping up the ice from the storm last Wednesday. We are all just a little bit tired of digging out.

Here is hubby starting to scoop at 6:30 this morning. The red arrow shows the top of my concrete pedestal bird bath.

At 8am, the path to the sidewalk is finally passable and the car in the driveway to the right can be backed out.

Here is the view out our back door. That's our old car in the back. It's not going anywhere. The snow drift to the left of the door is up to my chest. I remember a few years back though opening this door and the doorknob had left a hole in the wall of snow. So all things considered...

Have a great and safe Wednesday!

6 O'Clock Card - Hugs & Kisses

This morning's card was inspired by Ashley Newell's beautiful baby card and Becky Carafa's gorgeous hearts card.

Paying the bloggie love forward

Today I received a brief but lovely mention from Keri over at Pink Lemonade and wanted to do the same for a few fellow bloggers who have visited and left me comments. Thank so much ladies. It's so greatly appreciated.

Mary at Everyday Elliott
Enfys at Going Buggy
Lisa Renéa at The Tattered Tiara
Chelemom at Thoughts of a Cardmaking Scrapbooker
Becky Carafa at The Lakeshore Stamper

Thanks for reading ladies!

My other life as Mrs SudsMuffin

I like to keep busy. So you know that I enjoy paper crafts, especially making cards. Another one of my loves is soapmaking. Indeed, my husband loves it too. He loves it so much that he learned how to make soap from watching me. Pretty soon he was taking over the soapmaking in the house, not that I minded. He makes a pretty awesome soap. We've actually been selling our soap and bath/body goodies since 2000. Two years ago this month, we opened a store in our city, selling all our products, including my cards, though the main focus is our soap biz, called SudsMuffin. You probably got it already that SudsMuffin is a play on "stud muffin", and we don't sell muffins either.
Our signature colour is bright pink, which we call "SudsMuffin Pink". This picture is one of my favourites as it best represents our business, with the colour and the luscious soap.

I just thought it would be nice to let my bloggy friends know a little bit more about me on here. And if you're at all tempted by handmade soaps (mine included), welcome to the club.

6 O'Clock Card - Adorable

Don't you just love this paper and the cute owl? I think she's gorgeous! Simple baby card with a holographic "Adorable" sticker.

6 O'Clock Card - Hello

6 O'Clock Card - 29 Again

This is the last of my ProvoCraft paper birthday cards (for the moment). I love the sentiment on this one.

6 O'Clock Card - Birthday Wishes

6 O'Clock Card - Happy Birthday

The circle of life

I took this picture out in my back yard last summer. It was just one of those playing around shots, learning about my new camera. It wasn't until I downloaded it later that I realized that the picture told such a story about life and death. It has since become one of my favourites.

6 O'Clock Card - Thinking of you

Sorry for the poor lighting. There's not a lot of natural daylight when I get home. The next few days I'll show some cards I made with this ProvoCraft series of papers. I've always liked this collection. The sentiment stickers are from a package I picked up at the Dollar Store. They are pretty cute.

Want a simple science project for the kids?

Last year my daughter (ahem, little apprentice) did her grade 4 science project of observing what happens to a bar of Irish Spring soap over 5 days in water. One bar was kept in cold water, the other had the water reheated for 2 minutes in the microwave at the same time every day for the 5 days. She charted the weight of the soaps every day, and measured their width, length and thickness. She should have weighed the water at the end of the experiment too but we didn't think of that.

Here was her final outcome, with the pink tag showing the soap that was left in hot water and the blue tag shows the soap left in cold water, the control soap is in the middle. The leftover water from the cold side remained fluid with some chunks of soap inside. The water from the hot side became a semi-solid gelatinous mass. She thought this was VERY cool and we both ended up being surprised at the final outcome as it was different from what we projected.


If you have any questions about the process, let me know.

6 O'Clock Card - I Heart You

Playing with my new Basic Grey adhesive chipboard letters.

6 O'Clock Card - One Happiness in Life

This romantic card is made from Amy Butler die-cuts from K&Co. The card stock is Bazzill and the ribbon is from Martha Stewart.

6 O'Clock Card - Friends

The kraft frame is recycled from Amy Butler packaging, as discussed here.

This Year's School Valentine Cards

Like last year, my little apprentice and I made a bevy of little Valentines for her class. They are a bit different this time around as we mostly used the little pictures from the back of a couple of expired calendars. We used a Tinkerbell calendar as well as one with dog pictures (for the less sensitive boys...). We hope you enjoy our efforts.

First a view of all the cards:

Then a few of our favourites: