many MANY gorgeous things...not made by me

i've mentioned before that i have the most wonderful friends in the world...but it bears repeating, especially when i am lucky enough to be spoiled rotten by the sort of mail that's been showing up 'round these parts lately--holy moly! i'll show these chronologically because trust me there is NO WAY i could pick a favorite!!!

these "just because" goodies and this AMAZING, layery, blendy, stampy, inky masterpiece of a card came from my very sweet, uber-talented venn, linda for no reason at all, she was just saying, "hi"!

my darling stef is one of those people that if she sees something that reminds her of you...the next day it is in the mail to ya!!! latest example: how utttttttttterly awesome are those artist greeting cards?! not to mention the awesome london roadmap stamp, and the coolest halloween card EVER!

if there is a more "share-and-share-alike" person in the world than mi amiga mari, i certainly have not met them! in her latest care package she sent fabulous art paper, rub-ons to die for, MONSTA BOOKMARKS (!) and a whooooooooooole lotta different types of ribbon yarn! yummmmmmmmmm!

oh yeah, and did i mention the NOTEBOOK??!?! mari took a dimestore find and made it into one of the coolest pieces of art i've ever been given: she stamped, she painted, she embellished, and she re-did the original cover SO utterly PERFECTLY that i didn't actually believe it wasn't brown to start with! YIKES!

the phantastically phabulous ms. phinner and i did schedule a swap in which i *knew* i was getting a piece of her original art in exchange for an amigurumi grim reaper, but i had no idea WHAT i would get... or that it'd come in the most awesome "hello kitty goes punk" be-decked box... OR that there would be EDIBLE LEGOS inside too!!! :) :) :)

but of course the star of the show is this lovely lady who is called claudia...and i loooooove her! she is the most fabulous cerise pink, she is flower-strewn and bead-encrusted, her hair is this amazing pink mesh, her frame is inky and distressed and FABULOUS!

as you know, one of my favorite things about august was the series of SCD torso challenges, which culminated in an international swap! here are my gorgeous trophies, they are by (l to r) hazel, zoe, laura and joanne. WOW!!!

the delightful carol from SCD was in charge of parcelling up the torsos, and we decided to have a couple of our own little swaps, as well. she invented a great "3-2-1" format: you pick a theme and make 3 inchies, 2 twinchies and 1 ATC. our first category was FACES, and as you can see carol flippin' well ROCKED it with red!

then we did PLACES, and *again* i was totally and completely blown away by her creativity and awesome collage talent!

oh yeah and the package in which they came there was this outstandingly FAB mini-card, plus a bunch of totally cool and drool-worthy goodies for me to play with:

i do not think blogger has a font that is big enough or bold enough to convey how much i love absolutely everything on this page...and even if such lettering existed it would still not cover how much i adore the folk from which they came, but for now i will settle for sending a giant

♥ thank you ♥

♥ THANK YOU ♥

♥ thank yooou!!! ♥

to all the lovely people concerned! xoxoxo