Happy New Year

Our New Year's Eve was relatively low keyed this year. We didn't have a big party or go anywhere but we did promise the boys they could stay up to see the ball drop. (luckily we are in the central time zone and the ball drops at 11PM) We made cookies and brownies and salsa and chips and watched movies and cartoons until 10:30PM. Then we switched on the Dick Clark New Year's Eve show and watched the Jonas Brothers (who the boys say is their FAVORITE band) and then it was almost time for the ball to drop. Ian jumped up and did the count down but I think Evan was almost out for the count and he stayed laying down all covered up on the couch. After the ball dropped I got kisses and hugs from my guys and then it was time for bed. They didn't really fight it (like I thought they would because they were so tired) but they did beg to sleep downstairs on the couch. I didn't agree to that but I did give in and let them pull out their sleeping bags and sleep together on the floor of their room. I didn't hear a peep out of them after saying goodnight.

And luckily I didn't hear anyone shooting off guns or illegal fireworks in the neighborhood either at real midnight so it was a great night!!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!

More scrapping was done...

I don't know if it is because Ian is home so he is playing with his little brother so I am having more time to get stuff done but here are a couple of more that I have completed.

This first one is a becky fleck page map that I altered a bit. It is from her book. I used a bunch of Cosmo Cricket Mr Campy paper (which I had to have it all because it was so cute) and a sheet from Love Elsie's Forrest collection too. The title letters are QK Chemistry and were a great buy at Archivers. I love how they are all on one die, almost like making your own sheet of stickers. oooooo next time I should run them through my big Xyron and then they would be sheets of stickers!!

This red white and blue one was done for Scenic Route's monthly product challenge. You had to use one of the mini lines. I chose the line Liberty because it is one of my favorites and I also used my Scenic Route stars stamps. Those stamps give a great image (and you all know how stamping challenged I am). I also used my Hero Arts basic stamps for the journaling and my new QK Diesel Grand alphabet that hubby got me for Christmas!!

Got the scrapping bug this weekend...

Got a bunch of scrapping done this weekend, I don't know when but it was like I was bit by the scrapping bug over Christmas and all I wanted to do is scrap scrap scrap. Here is what I got done.
This first one is done using one of Janelle Richmond's sketches from Sketch This! I believe it is sketch #73. Mine is a little different but I definitely got the inspiration from her sketch but my picture was going the other way. Supplies: bazzill, cosmo cricket, love elsie, hero arts, crafter's workshop, hambly, doodlebug, creative imagination -- inks StazOn and American Crafts. Lots of pictures from the VEISHEA parade at Iowa State University. Probably one of the best parades I have been to in a small town ever!! Supplies: bazzill, American Crafts pen, sports solutions pp, American Crafts chipboard heart, Making Memories tiny letter stickers, Studio Calico letter stamps and StazOn ink -- oh and i outlined them with my gold pen.

Before and After pictures of Ian when he got his first High & Tight haircut. He met the "army marines" at the VEISHEA parade and wanted to get a haircut just like them and daddy. I think I would like this layout better if I hadn't done it on white cardstock. Supplies: the paper is scraps from an SA Anniversary kit (done with it), Basic Grey buttons, letter stamps from my local educational supply store (love those stamps), made the scallops with my circle punch, stampin up punch, and that "like father like son" flair that I don't know where it came from.

Pictures from the state park, the boys got butterfly nets for Easter so we took them hiking and to play. Supplies: Stampin Up punches, same stamps from the education supply store, buttons from a Studio Calico kit, SEI pp, bazzill, Hambly sticker, Quickutz nesting circle die, twist tie from ages ago. I made the scallops on this one with my circle punch because I thought it was a little plain so I punched them out and then cut them in half and stuck them down side by side. I love how it looks!!

Last layout, pictures from the cabin that we stay at with my parents over memorial day. We always take pictures of the family in front of the cabin. Supplies: Studio Calico kit for the papers, rubber embellishment, and border strip. I also used the coupon out of the kit as the background for my title. Those letter stickers from the title are Polar Bear Press and they are from my friend Debbie C who so kindly sent me them when I first met her by asking her who made the letter stickers on one of her layouts. This is also based on Sketch #75 by Janelle Richmond of Sketch This.

Merry Christmas!!

Merry Christmas from my family to yours.

And a happy new year too!!

Of course it is real.. it is on the internet!!

So it is Christmas Eve and Evan has opened all his birthday presents so far and so I was playing online and came across NORAD TRACKS SANTA. So I was showing the boys and we were watching a video of Santa flying across the Great Wall of China and Ian asks "Is this real?" And so I answered "Of course it is real, it is on the Internet." Which in his mind means YES IAN THAT IS SANTA AND RUDOLPH FLYING ACROSS THE GREAT WALL OF CHINA.

Check it out, it is pretty cool and has a handy little countdown to when he will be moving.
http://www.noradsanta.org/en/home.html

He's 4!!

Guess who made it to 4? EVAN!!!We started the day by opening birthday presents from Mommy, Daddy, Ian and Beaker. He got the Lego set that his brother really wanted, a set of Bumblebee Transformers, a Star Wars action figure guy and a little set of Legos from Beaker (to make up for always getting in the way when he is trying to build something). I think we have offically graduated from the big Legos to the little Legos. If anyone is the the market for some of the bigger Legos let me know, I'll make you a good deal!!

Anyways Happy Birthday to my best little guy in the whole wide world!!

(hope you make it to 5 LOL)

Grandma and Grandpa's package along with Aunt Sally's just came in the mail with perfect timing too. He got Elefun from Grandma and Grandpa and Oil Slick the Transformer from Aunt Sally, Uncle Ryan and Evelyn. Hoorah for perfect timing by the post office!!

A day without a car.

Well my truck went into the shop yesterday and Darren has to work today so I am at home with no vehicle. If you didn't know when we went home at Thanksgiving someone hit my truck and banged her up pretty good. We were all safe and fine and the kids didn't even know it had happened because they were watching Transformers in the backseat. All the banging and spinning around in the truck must have just seemed like good special effects to them. Hopefully no one else was hurt badly but my truck was scarred. Luckily she had insurance.

But she went into the shop yesterday, they are going to replace the entire bumper and Darren swears that you won't be able to tell that anything ever happened. You know I didn't even take pictures of it that's how much it bothered me that my truck was all banged up. Looking back, I guess I should have but maybe the nice little CSI gal from Cedar Falls will let me have some of hers.

Zoo Layouts

I did get some more scrapping done on Saturday night and these are pictures from the Des Moines zoo from April 2006. The first one is Ian standing next to the glass where a baby alligator is swimming. His shifty eyes thing helped the picture for once!! I used some old Reminisce Christmas paper that I won at a marathon crop at their store one year. Also used some kraft paper, old vellum and brads. Sticker letters are Basic Grey and the lines behind the journaling are from a clear American Crafts journaling sticker.
This second one was taken while Ian was crossing the little bridge, he loved crossing the bridge he would do it over and over until I finally told him it was time to go. I used up some SEI paper, love that tree one because it is has some flocking on it. This layout is also based on the Becky Fleck PageMap that was featured in December's Basic Grey Newsletter. Heidi Swapp butterfly, Making Memories tiny alphabet stickers, Bo Bunny alphabet stickers and Scenic Route chipboard.

End of the Year PageMap

I love Becky Fleck's PageMaps, they are a great source of inspiration for me when I am needing a little push in the behind. She is having a little contest on her blog for the end of the year.

This is my version of the end of the year pagemap contest. Wish me luck!!Paper is by Heidi Grace and Bazzill, Chipboard by Scenic Route and letter stickers by Making Memories and American Crafts. Also used my Creative Memories corner rounder and Stampin Up border punch.

Journaling says "ian playing with the net that the easter bunny brought him" and the date and place on the Scenic Route chipboard circle, above the picture the full title is "how to catch a Goofball" and along the side in the little Making Memories letter stickers it says "give him a net and he will catch himself".

More layouts

I scrapped this weekend and finally the stickles is dry and I could scan things. This first one is based on a sketch by Katie Stowell and a digital template by Anne (aka Stormrose). I used this sketch as the sketch challenge for the week over at the ScrapShanty.
This second one is my attempt to get as many pictures of coloring easter eggs on one page as I could. And using up some buttons. The large letters in this one are the Noah letter stamps from Studio Calico and then I coated them with black stickles.

Both of these layouts were made using the Confections kit by Studio Calico. All except the Basic Grey Obscure buttons.

Seeing Santa

The gym we belong to had a kids night tonight and Santa came to visit. He was a good looking Santa for a Santa that drives a Honda and almost hit us driving through the parking lot. The boys really enjoyed getting to ride on the little red train that Ms. Teresa had arranged for the kids.

The "follow me" thing.

So from what I can tell when you sign up on blogger to follow someone then when you log into blogger is posts at the bottom of your homepage what their newest post is. So I guess it kind of notifys you when I post something new. But it is still new to me so I am not quite sure what it does.

If anyone has any other information about this please share!!

Little contest I entered...

I entered a little contest over at ScrapSupply.com that was due last night at midnight. For the challenge you had to come up with a list of 10 words that describe your home in December. I took this picture friday after school to use for the challenge. Journaling says "I have a feeling this is just a preview of what will be going on at our house over HOLIDAY BREAK picture december 12, 2008". And my 10 words are...

bored

lazy

hungry

messy

constructive

destructive

playful

noisy

silly

happy

Products Used:
Bazzill cardstock, Basic Grey patterned paper, Basic Grey buttons, Studio Calico stamps, Quickutz scallop border die.

And the Winner Is....

THE STEPS!!! Ian tripped today while playing at the gym's kids club and landed on his face. He was a brave little guy though the guy in charge said he fell and then just got up and came over to say what happened and he put some ice on it. He is probably going to have a pretty good black eye in the morning. Hopefully it will heal up quickly as we are supposed to get pictures taken next week on friday! But that is about par for the course for us when we are supposed to get pictures taken. LOL!! At least he wasn't crying and it isn't hurting him. Plus I don't think he is minding at all that I MADE his lay down on the couch to watch cartoons all night with ice on it. We'll see how it looks in the morning, it definitely didn't effect his appetite, he ate two helpings of beanie weinie tonight!!

Mountains

I seriously think I was born in the wrong spot. There isn't anything like this in Iowa. There is something about looking at this that just calms my soul. It is so beautiful!! I could have stood and stared at it for a very long time.

I just got back from a little visit out to see my friends Kim and Mel out in WA State. As you can tell from the picture I am way up high, we had dinner at the Space Needle in Seattle and it was really good. The whole visit started because Kim got me hooked on reading those Twilight books and we decided it would be fun to go and see the movie together too and see some of the sights of where the books were supposed to take place. More pictures from that later!!

Around the World at Christmas Time

That's the name of the 1st Grade Christmas Program this year. They sang songs from all around the world. I have the program with the song names but I will have to put them in later because it is in the back of Darren's truck right now.

Ian was so cute in his Santa hat. He didn't want to wear it after he got there because none of his friends were wearing a hat, man I sure hope we aren't getting into that whole peer pressure thing already, I am totally not ready for that.
He has this funny look on his face in a lot of my pictures and when I asked him what was wrong after the show because I thought maybe his throat was bothering him from singing his lungs out like he likes too, he said no, he had to sneeze. LOL!! That's my kid!!

The highlight for Ian was getting to be a bell ringer during "I Saw Three Ships". It has been all he talked about for the last month. He did a great job!!

And what would be Christmas around the world if you didn't have a song that represents Christmas in Mexico, you know since we live in Texas and many of the same traditions are done here. So they danced and pretended to swing at a pinata!!! ((Ian said he really wanted to be the person holding the pinata but he didn't get that part.))

That's Ian's friend Patrick playing Santa Claus!!

The whole first grade!!!

Home for the Holidays

Ok so I was gone for about a week visiting family and stuff and I wanted to share a couple of pictures of the boys with their grandparents and my whole big family.
And a quickie of the boys as we were leaving MO playing in the snow!! They had so much fun and kept begging please can we go outside and play in the snow!!

COMING SOON!

The ScrapShanty has another fun daily challenge coming up starting next week. It should be a lot of fun and I just wanted to share with you the little teaser blinkie that Didi made for it.

So make sure you check out the ScrapShanty Blog and Message Boards for more information!!

How long have you been blogging?

Well I just noticed that I passed my 3 year blogging anniversary the other day. November 30. 2005 was the day I started this blog. I didn't really know if anyone would look at it let alone read it or comment but here it stands today still going strong. Still not sure why people look at it or read it or comment but thank you to those of you who do.

I promise tomorrow to download the pictures off my camera from our trip and post them. Right now I am just too tired.

I'm home!!

Did you notice I was gone?

Family Pictures 2008

Here we are. One big happy family.

SALE SALE SALE

There's a huge sale at Queenscraps right now!
It's their year end clearance sale!!

Here are the codes for you to use while checking out your cart.
EOY30OFF - 11/15/08 to 11/23/08
EOY35OFF - 11/24/08 to 12/08/08
EOY40OFF - 12/09/08 to 12/15/08
EOY45OFF - 12/16/08 to 12/22/08
EOY50OFF - 12/23/08 to 12/31/08

The kit for January, February and March 2009 is also up at the site too. These will be some of their final kits as the owners had decided to discontinue offering kits after this year .

Here's the link to Queenscraps.
http://stores.homestead.com/QueenScraps/StoreFront.bok

Have fun shopping!

Blogging blogging blogging

I am in charge of the ScrapShanty Blog this week so if you aren't seeing me here check

HERE!!

((PS if you do check it out there you might find some fun challenges and little RAKs throughout the week.))

OMG He Wrote His Name

So we are all sitting around this morning doing our own thing and then the follow conversation happens.

Evan: I wrote my name Mom, want to see.
Me: Sure honey bring it in. (thinking I am only going to see a scribble)

Evan brings it in and shows me his name and I can't believe how perfect he wrote it. We haven't actually been working on his writing or anything he just did it all by himself. Check it out!!

I WON SOMETHING!!

My favorite LSS Scrapbook 911 had it's birthday last weekend. I wished I could have been especially when I saw on their blog how cute their cake was, it was an ambulance and they had cupcakes with fake pills on top!! SO CUTE!! Scroll down on their blog and you will see them.

Have to let you know later what I won but no matter what it is I am sure it is cool!!

Tree House Layout

Pictures from our trip to Indianapolis IN one year. We stopped at this observation tower and climbed up to check out the view. Used all Love Elsie PP and embellishments.

Cards Week 1

Got the first week of cards done for Kim's month of card challenges at the ScrapShanty. Normally I am not a big card maker but this aren't too bad I guess.

Supplies are all old papers that I have been hanging onto for a long time. Mostly Basic Grey and Love Elsie PP and embellishments. Sketches used for some of the cards are all posted in the gallery at the ScrapShanty.

New Layouts

Since I haven't scrapped in almost a month I finally got my sewing done and my mojo back!!

This layout is of me and my niece right after she was born. She is so pretty (and a couple of years old now). I used my August Studio Calico kit for the paper and the layout is based on the November AD Challenge at the ScrapShanty.

This second layout is of Ian playing with a worm when we were home visiting my parents for Easter. I never thought he would pick it up but he did. Finally got to use my fun Boys Gone Wild patterned paper by Reminisce.And this last layout is a picture of the boys with Grandma. Why is it so hard to get them to sit still for one NICE picture. Paper and brad from the August Studio Calico kit, some old KI Memories Lace Cardstock and some old letter stickers that happen to match pretty well. Also got to play with my new Martha Stewart border punch.