a week of surprises...

Happy Friday everyone!!  The lovely weather that we had for the last few days is gone and we are back to rain... bummer!  Oh well... my week of surprises definitely makes up it!!  On Tuesday the first surprise arrived in the mail.  I knew that I had some cards being published in the Spring 2016 issue of Stamper's Sampler Take Ten because several of them were featured in their monthly newsletter.  But I was totally surprised and delighted when I took my complimentary copy from the envelope and saw that my card was on the cover!!!  The card is part of a four card feature that you can find in the magazine on pages 110 and 111.  I made the card using products from the Simon Says Stamp May 2015 card kit.   This kit contains the beautiful stamp set Congratulations and tons of beautiful supplies courtesy of My Mind's Eye.  It seems this kit is still available so you just might want to pick it up... you won't be sorry!  I must admit that I really loved how this card turned out so it is especially nice that it was featured on the cover!


The second surprise arrived on Thursday.  I went out for my morning walk and when I returned I found a package from Annie's Publications sitting on my front porch.  I was a little puzzled because I had not submitted anything to Annie's in about a year.  I went inside with my package and opened it up to find two copies of their Spring Greetings special issue and a card that I had actually submitted for publication in the Fall 2014 issue of CardMaker magazine.  The card was accepted for publication, but did not appear in the issue.   Well... apparently they decided to include it in Spring Greetings!   They also showed four other cards that I had previously submitted to them and that had appeared in other CardMaker magazines.  To be honest I'm really happy they published the card and sent it back to me... I loved how the card turned out and was sad that it did not get published.   My card isn't featured on the cover of this magazine, so I took a photo of that card to share with you here.

Finally my last surprise arrived in the mail today.  A few weeks ago my sweet bloggy friend, Petra, contacted me and asked for my address.  If you don't know who Petra is you really need to check out her blog.  She is an amazing papercrafter who lives in George, South Africa.  She has an amazing eye for card design and she always includes the most amazing details in all her cards.  She often is the winner of the many challenges she enters.   To my delight she sent me a little package of treats (I already ate the little chocolate bunny!) and a beautiful handmade card!   Receiving this package from Petra brought a huge smile to my face and helped to cap a week full of lovely surprises!!  Here is a photo of the beautiful card Petra sent me.  It isn't it absolutely gorgeous??!!!  All the die cuts she used on the card have a lovely sparkle to them!  I can't wait to surprise Petra with her own little bit of "happy mail"!!