Baby Emmitt meets The Weez!

It is 1996, and baby Emmitt meets his cousin Topo who we lovingly called "The Weez".

You can see the pug is a bit more curious during this first visit.

The weezy wasn't too sure at first, but had a nice afternoon entertaining the pug.

After he pooped him out, he handed him over to the Zack to babysit in the afternoon.

My sister's German Shepherd, Zack and Weezy loved Emmitt very much. They are no longer here with us in form, but they are with us in spirit. I think they still look after my Emmitt.

Yay! Now, I am off to set up my booth at the Colorado Pet Expo 2008. It is all weekend at the Denver Merchandise Mart. I will have lots of pictures to show you on Monday! If you are in the area, come and say Hi! We are in booth #316.

Be sure to tune in tomorrow to meet two very special sitters I have hired to watch the pug during the day while we are away.

Have a great weekend.

New Pop Up Journal Pages

I added two new pop ups to my altered journal. Baby wild Emmitt and my Parrotlet, Gilbert. I also added my birthday card I made last week to wish Gilbert a happy Hatch Day. He turned 7 on Wednesday.

Happy Birthday Gilbert!

We love you!

Pop Up Pugs! Photoshop Class Week 6

WoW! The last 6 weeks have just flown by. I loved my Cards with Flair Class. I learned to make so many neat cards in photoshop elements.

Here is another baby picture of Emmitt and Zack. I put a deckled edge and a drop shadow on these two trouble makers.

This is one of my favorite baby pictures of Emmitt. He is about 10 weeks old and is running around in circles like a crazy creature. I made the orginal much sharper and changed it to black and white.

Here is a cd envelope we learned how to make this week. I glued on some Emmitts I made a couple of weeks ago and added some glitter glue for fun.

And now for the pop up pugs! The first 3-d thing we made is this box! The templates allow you to change the colors and size. The top and the bottom are made separately, cut folded and glued and voila! A paper box!

I combined the petal fold card envelope with Emmitt and the box and here we go...

Crazy Pop up Pug on top of the box...

and in the box with a pink paper pop up ball.

Bottom and top of the box.

(I left the inside of the petal envelope white for the bottom and colored it blue for the top so that the pug really pops.

I loved this class!

Meet Nichol, Flannery and Benjamin

I am so excited! I just received my 2 very own Pillow Monsters!

Meet Flannery, Benjamin and their creator, Nichol Brinkman. Nichol creates a pillow monster a day which absolutely inspires and amazes me. Each doll is beautifully designed and hand-crafted by Nichol. Her creativity goes beyond her design and sewing as she even writes a story about each one really bringing her characters to life. I cannot wait to add to my Pillow Monster family.

You can see what Pillow Monsters Nichol is creating every day on her blog and in her Etsy Shop!

Flannery sits next to me in my office inspiring me with her smile.

Benjamin lives in the Boulder Foothills with my sister telling stories to her teddy bear collection and her Corgi, Moe all day while she is away at work. He is a charming fellow and has alot to say!

Nichol even decorated the outside of the box which of course I had to cut out and keep!

Emmitt loves our two pillow monsters and wants to give them a big kiss!

Someone who Inspires me...

Wendy Gardner Featured in Canada's National Post, April, 2007

I want to introduce you to the work of a friend and a huge inspiration to me, Wendy Gardner of Scary Stories, Inc.

I originally found Wendy's work in 2003 at the Denver Art Museum's Gift Shop. I was looking around when all of a sudden I saw Dig Ivan Dig.

He was like a magnet drawing me to him. I picked him up and took him right to the checkout counter, saying to Fred with excitement, "Look at him, I must have him, he is so Puggy!" Fred just smiled and nodded as I left the museum like a kid with a huge smile on my face.

The first thing I did when I got home was to take Ivan up to my desk and look up Wendy's website. I found the page where she introduced her muses and found out Ivan is a pug! I knew it!

I contacted Wendy just to tell her that her art totally made my day. She has been a good friend ever since. Here is a video of her on YouTube where you can meet her, her kitties and her kids.

Wendy has developed so many wonderful characters, products and even a cartoon series on The Cartoon Network! Here is one of my favorites Flee the Flea featuring Dig Ivan Dig.

This is me with Wendy's Characters that I have collected over the years.

To meet Wendy and to see her work, please visit her website, store and blog.

She is a true inspiration.

Baby Emmitt - 1996

We have been scanning in all of Emmitt's baby pictures to get them onto the computer. It seems impossible that the first 4 years of Emmitt's life were pre digital camera! I cannot believe how tiny he was. The picture above is Emmitt at about 10 weeks with his cousin Zack. More to come!

Happy Friday! Have a wonderful weekend!

Photoshop Cards - Week 5

I had a great time in photoshop class again this week. We learned to make Gate Fold cards and Money Enclosure Cards and Envelopes.

Here is my pug gate fold card. The opening is in the middle and the two halves of the image meet.

I also took a photo of my altered journal closed and used that image as a gate fold too. I love all of the colors and textures that the photo shows on the card front.

Here are the front and back of a rounded edge gate fold card that I also used my knowledge from last week to add a pink inside color that peeks out of the front opening.

Here is the money envelope I created and folded and the card insert I made. I usually do not send money or checks as gifts so I made a card instead the exact size of a dollar bill.

Yes, that is a photo of Emmitt that I made into a paint brush in photoshop and also stamped a little pink hat on his head. Ha!

I had a great time learning to make all of these cards this week. It is really fun putting all of the knowledge I have learned over the last year and a half into projects. I highly recommend taking all of Sara Froelich's photoshop classes at Eclectic Academy.

I even made Emmitt an award! He is definitely the world's best pug to me!

Pugs in New Spaces...

I added my new senior pug as a pop-up in my altered book. I tried to show how the two pugs pop off the page when you open the book.

I love how his face looks so wise and gentle. He really reminds me of Emmitt.

Now I have a story is too funny and made me laugh. Sometimes I think I overlook things that are right in front of me. It is a good example of how sometimes I look outside for things that I already have and maybe do not fully appreciate.

I have been searching on Etsy for awhile for the perfect switchplate for my front hall. I wanted it to have a furniture element in it, and to match the style of art I have hanging on that wall.

Here is my Black Pug Double Switchplate. I have been selling this product in single and double plates for years, and just realized... It is just what I have been searching for!

I just treated myself to one and I love it. I crack myself up sometimes.

New Senior Pug - A65

Meet the newest addition to the Pug Notes' Family, Senior Citizen Pug A65. He is the wisest of the bunch, and is available on all of my products where you can choose a design.

He was so much fun to paint!

Emmitt says Senior pugs are cool!

Emmitt also wanted me to explain that neither he nor I were up at 3 am posting our new painting. There is a new feature on Blogger in Beta that I had to try out. We can now write our posts anytime and schedule them to post in the future. The feature is not on the main dashboard yet, but you can access it from Blogger in Draft. I love this new feature!

Monday Morning Muses

Happy Monday Morning!

I had a great weekend, crocheting pug finger puppets for my Etsy store, planting flowers in our front beds (good thing too because it is snowing pretty hard right now. :), and Fred and I even found a huge thrift store we never knew existed.

I am so excited! I found 4 red Heller bowls for .60 each!

My Heller collection is a fun story. It all started with my grandma when Melanie and I were little girls. She had a set of white and a set of yellow stacking Heller bowls, plates and cups that were popular in the late 60's and 70's. My grandma was an amazing, wonderful person and very important to us. I always love to surround myself with things that remind me of her. Well, several years ago, I just got it in my head that I had to find that dinnerware. I did a bunch of research and found out what they were and found them on Ebay from different sellers. They are not too expensive, usually about $8 - $10 a piece. My yellow and white set bring me lots of joy everyday when I use them.

So, it was very exciting to find a red set of bowls in great condition at the thrift store for only .60 each!

And I found this cool fabric on Etsy from Lucky Kaeru Fabric that I just bought to add to my fabric stash.

I also love these two glove bear and dog dolls that my sister, Melanie just finished and listed in her Etsy shop, Shop MoeMoe. They are so cute!

Other fun things to share are these wonderful gifts I just got from my friends Linda and Diana.

Linda was so sweet to run a contest where I won her beautiful egg painting that I have displayed on my mantle.

Here is a beautiful bunny that Linda surprised me with.

And a wonderful postcard that she has had for about 12 years of a pug named Chester.

She is so generous to let Chester come and live with me and Emmitt. He is on my desk so I can see him all of the time.

My Friend, Diana, surprised me with this beautiful card she made of her Women of Spring Series. Thank you Diana! She is beautiful!

Have a wonderful Monday everyone!

Emmitt says Hi and that he loves Monday Mornings too!