Life, Joy and abundance!

Hello everyone! Happy Sunday! I hope you are enjoying a wonderful weekend! With Sunday comes another Stampin Sisters in Christ Challenge, and this week, Peggysue is our Challenge Hostess. She has chosen John 10:10 for today's Scripture:

"I have come that they may have life and that they may have it more abundantly."

You know, God is so good! Many of us think of the joy of our salvation mainly in terms of an eternity spent with God because of the work Christ did on the cross... but I think we sometimes forget about the change He makes in our lives here and now when we come to know Him! His very nature is pure love, and He wants only the best for us. Before we were even born He knew us and loved us! Now that doesn't mean that He never allows bad things to happen to us... sometimes we need the bad stuff... perhaps for our own growth, perhaps as a witness to others of how having Christ in our lives carries us through difficulties. He knows what we need the most, and that is to be in a right relationship with Him! When we are, then our lives are filled with joy and true fulfillment! That is what life more abundant is all about! The first part of this verse says that the thief comes to steal and kill and destroy, and that is what Satan wants to do! He will lie to us, accuse us, keep us feeling all sorts of negative feelings and thinking all sorts of destructive thoughts if we let him! But Christ came that we may have life and enjoy it to the fullest! Let's determine today to not let the devil rob us of our joy and to enjoy our Savior and our new life in Him to the fullest! That's His desire for us!

Peggysue's challenge this week is
Use a series of hand drawn in dashes or lines, like faux stitching, or real stitching on your project

I have used a cute Whiff of Joy stamp I won from the sweet Crystal in some blog candy she was giving away. I had so much fun coloring this! I paper pieced Willow's dress and shoes and colored her with Copics. I don't get to do cutsie images all that often and it was fun to get a little practice in on skin and hair with Copics! I also used this week's Midnight Madness Sketch 70. I pierced around my panels and drew faux stitching lines with a SU! Marker.

Card Details:
Papers: Papertrey, Neenah, BasicGrey Porcelain, scrap for dress
Ink: Memento, SU! Marker for my faux stitching
Accessories: Spellbinder's Classic Rectangles and Classic Scalloped Rectangles, Prima Flowers, MS bough punch, May Arts Silk Ribbon, ZVA Creative Pearls, SU! Piercing Mat Pack

Our sponsor this week is Simon Says Stamp, where you can get this sweet image I used as well as MANY others! Good luck in the drawing!

We'd love to have you play along! If you do, please leave a direct link to your card on the SSIC Blog and please link the challenge in your post!

Be sure to check out the rest of the Design Team for more inspiration for this week's challenge!

Chris
Cindy
Linda
Randi
Peggysue
Miesje
Rebekkah
Lisa
Patti

Challenges I'm entering this into:

MMSC70 Sketch
Bee Crafty - Anything Goes
Creative Inspirations - Lace and Sparkle (my dp top panel is lace, lots of sparkle)
Gingerloft- Anything Goes
Charisma - Something new or never tried before (this is the first time I used this stamp)
Pocket Full of Posies~ Floral Fantasy
Lexie's Creations- flower power
CES (Crafty Emmas) - Floral Frenzy
Digital Tuesday Challenge blog -use dots & stripes! (Lots of dots, stripes on bg panel)
365 Cards - tools and techniques (Copics for coloring, pearls for dimension)
Fab n Funky- What'Eva
Stamp Something - Something Cute
Your Next Stamp - Anything Goes

Stampin Sisters in Christ Birthday Blog Hop!

Eph. 2:8
"For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith - and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God."

Hello everyone! Welcome to the Stampin Sisters in Christ first birthday Blog Hop! For the Farewell hop for Kristine please scroll down one post.

Our Birthday hop starts at the Stampin Sisters in Christ blog. The list of past and present designers (and links) is there in case you get lost along the way. You'll find many blessings as you hop, and chances to win prizes on individual blogs as well as a HUGE $50.00 Gift Certificate to the Sponsor of your choice on the SSIC Blog, so we hope you'll join us in celebrating our first birthday! The Stampin Sisters in Christ Blog is the place to start and finish. After you have visited each blog return to the SSIC Blog and share which was your favorite Scripture on today's hop. The winner of the goodies on the SSIC Blog will be drawn from those who left their favorite Scripture in a comment at the end of the hop. You have until Wed. Aug. 18, 11:59pm Eastern to complete the hop and leave your comment. The winner will be announced on the SSIC Blog on Thur. Aug 19.

As Stampin Sisters in Christ, our focus is to share God's Word with our readers, and in some small way we hope God will use it to touch hearts. So for our Birthday Celebration, we were asked to share one of our favorite Scriptures. I have so many... I have many favorite verses of comfort from the Psalms, words of wisdom from the Proverbs, verses of encouragement from the New Testament, etc. But when it boils right down to it.... the message of salvation by grace is the greatest message I've ever heard! It has freed me from the bondage of sin and given me a sure future in heaven with the Lord! What really is "grace"? It's unmerited, unearned favor! It's such a gift... free for all who will accept it! I could never work my way to heaven... no one could! You see, God is a Holy God. We tend to gloss over what that really means! Not only is He Holy in His own actions, but He is Holy in His nature, and He cannot abide with sin! In Romans we're told that the wages of sin is death. From the first sin of Adam and Eve, mankind has had a sinful nature and is unable to change that. So God in His infinite wisdom provided the way for us to be washed clean by the shed blood of His precious Son, Jesus. Jesus was the only one who could pay that price for man's sin, because He was without sin. When He died, the way was made for us to have our sins forgiven... removed from us as far as the east is from the west. It is offered to all! To receive the gift you simply have to accept (believe) that He did pay the price, and receive it for yourself! You recognize that you are a sinner, in need of a Savior, and ask Him to come into your life... forgive you from your sin, and be your Lord and Savior. It will radically change your life! I urge you today, if you are not sure of your future... if you do not have assurance that if you died today you'd go to heaven, why not accept the free gift offered to you by a God who loves you? If you have questions or would like to talk, use the email me link in my side bar! I'd love to share with you!

My card details:
Stamps: Our Daily Bread designs "Don't Worry", Scripture Collection 2 and Flower Frames 2 (New this month and designed to fit the larger Scriptures of Scripture Collections 1&2)
Ink: Memento Rich Cocoa
Paper: Shimmery base - The Paper Co, designer paper - BasicGrey Cappella, Gina K CS
Accessories: Copics to color the images, JOY corner die cut, EK Success vine border punch, MS Ribbon, Distress Inks for sponging

Thanks so much for stopping by! I am blessed by your comments! Now the next stop on the Hop is Ceal!

The Flowers are telling me... spring is coming!

Hello everyone! I hope it's beautiful where you are! It is pouring here, but the rain is bringing the spring bulbs up already, so I know spring is here.

I made this card for several challenges. I used the MMSC44 for my layout, used Betty's ODBD Stamping in Time Challenge 5 to use something new, (as well as WT261), Stampin Sisters in Christ's challenge to represent Joy (see below for the Scripture inside), Cupcake Challenge 81 (Flower Power), Stamp w/ Fun (Spring), Sophisticat (Flourishes and Bling). Whew! LOL!

This beautiful image is from the newly released set "Happy Easter" from Our Daily Bread designs. I stamped on Neenah cs, colored with Copics, made a mask of a Spellbinder's label 10 and airbrushed the bg, masking the flowers off. I highlighted the daffodil with a clear glitter gel pen. The base is a new Coredinations cs that I LOVE! The dp is The First Blush by Prima. The ribbon is Martha Stewart and the pearl flourishes are ZVA Creative, while the little pearl flowers are making Memories. It was fun working on such a happy card when the weather is so gloomy!

The inside of the card is where I put the sentiment, which is from another newly released ODBD set "The Lord Has Risen". I stamped it with Memento, then cut with SB label 10, placed the smallest cross from my brand new Spellbinders cross set in the center and sponged all around it, using it as a mask. The picture doesn't do the inside justice. Used a MS punch on the scrap of dp that was left from the front .Thanks so much for looking! I love knowing you were here!

Have a blessed day! Thank God for His rich blessings!