it was a rough week

Between the PMS, cramps, potty training ups and downs (mostly downs and no, she is still not there yet....), and Sarah's diarrhea and vomiting it was not a pretty week at my house last week. We really are thinking that something is up with Sarah- nothing like a toddler suddenly throwing up on you every couple of days when she isn't sick to get you thinking. Now that the one end seems to have settle down a bit, she's got the runs again which also means a sore bottom. That is probaby in part to me not giving her the fiber supplements- which don't help when she can't keep them down. Here's hoping this next week is better because I have lots to do!

We did have a bright spot on Wednesday when Mark's buddy Danny from back home and his family were in town. Mark took the afternoon off from work and took them, Sarah and Brenna to the zoo. I actually had the house to myself- all alone!- for about an hour and 45 minutes. The big kids and I met the rest of the crew at Fargos for dinner. So the day was topped off with no cooking or cleaning up. It was heaven, I tell 'ya! LOL We had a really good time visiting with them and hope that it isn't nearly so long between visits next time.

I did manage a few layouts over the last week in between cleaning up after my two youngest children. This first one started off as a CT LO, but the colors just weren't working for me and I ended up changing most everything before I was happy with it.

journaling: Beth and Carissa both had parts in the 3rd grade play this year- A Christmas Carol.
Beth was Mrs. Cratchit and had several lines to say, and Carissa was a member of the carolers and sang a song with several friends. They both did well during the dress rehearsl and performance that night. I’m sure we will be watching their performing skills improve over the years ahead.
credits: Sweet Evangeline Holiday Flair by Michelle Coleman at Scrapartist; gold paper and painted stars from Rock Star by Krista Mettler at Scrapdish; gold alpha clips by Ahsley Olson at thedigishoppe; boardblock and office date labels by Holly McCaig at mydigitalmuse; Lo template by Tracy Blankenship; glitter action by atomic cupcake; fonts: VintageTypewriter

So, since the previous LO didn't work out as I was originally planning, I had to do another one ;) I started with a template from Rachael Giallongo at DigiChick for this one, and again by the time I was done it looked almost nothing like it. sometimes that is just the way it goes LOL! At least the kit stayed the same this time.

credits: Rock Star by Krista Mettler at Scrapdish; Flip and Tear Cardboard overlays by Linda Gil Bildal at Scrapartist; LO is based on a LO template by Rachael Giallongo for DigiChick sketch challenge; fonts: VintageTypewriter

and I did this one last night at Trinitycrops, the monthly crop I have attended for over 6 years now with my good friends. Well, I started it at home, worked on it at the crop, and finally finished it up this afternoon. like I said, it has been that sort of a week. These are older pictures- the baby in the photos is Brenna ;)

journaling: Melinda and the kids drove from Boulder to the Butterfly Pavilion in Westminster to meet the Tamblyns for an afternoon of exploring butterlies, bugs and a few fish. Bryce had been there not too long before on a school field trip after their insect unit, but he still had fun holding Rosie the tarantula again and helping us look for butterflies and some of the other animals in the exhibit. We enjoyed the special talk by a pavilion employee on the life cycle of a butterfly, being able to see a few large butterflies up close and then seeing the release of the newest butterflies into the exhibit. It was a fun-filled day and then we went back to the hotel in Boulder to meet Mark after his conference meetings were over for the day. June 17, 2003
credits: Maddy's Smile by Dani Mogstad at DesignbyDani.com; Creative Crops shapes by Dani Mogstad at DesignbyDani.com; LO template by Robin Cabana for RAKscraps sketch challenge; blue butterflies by me; fonts: Times New Roman

Oh, and the Funk It Up! contest has started up this week and I got my LO done for that too, but since it is posted anonymously until after the voting for the week is done, I can't show it off yet. I think it turned out great though, and VERY funky. I guess we will see if I can keep the funky juices flowing during the whole 6 weeks of the competition. I'm in it mainly for the challenge of trying some new things and exploring a style I don't usually use, but I wouldn't be adverse to a few of the wonderful prizes coming my way either. I guess we will see how it all comes out in the end. I can show you the bonus challenge card I did though. We had to make a card and it had to have a flower on it. Not difficult at all. Here's what I came up with:

credits: Vivid Intensity by Kim Jensen at Scrapdish.com; glitter ricrac by Gina Miller at ginamillerdesigns.com; Punchlabel alpha by Leah Riordan at Oscraps

I just love KimJ's Vivid Intensity papers and elements- the colors are gorgeous and her attention to detail is fabulous. Thanks for making such great scrapping goodies, Kim!

Happy Birthday Tracy!

I hope you had a fantabulous, wonderful day!

It was just a lazy day at home today with everyone here, and then we went out for dinner at our favorite buffet place. I spent most of my time doing gallery 'cleaning' at RAKs and Scrapdish- moving older layouts around at RAKs into albums so that they are easier to find, and getting some of my layouts with Robin's stuff uploaded to the gallery at SD and then going through the all of my LOs there and updating the store links for the kits because they all changed when they switched to the new shopping cart. I'm glad that is all done now!

Tomorrow after dance lessons, Becky and I are going up to Denver to look for birthday party supplies. It is a bit early for my kids' birthdays, but Becky's first birthday parties are in just a couple of weeks. It's always nice to have a lot of the planning done for year, so I don't mind tagging along. It is amazing how much the store inventories between here and Denver vary, even for the same chains. We always find a few things up there that we hadn't seen in the Springs before. After that it is the usual 'clean up the house' mantra. One of Mark's old friends is coming through town next week and on the off-hand chance he and his family actually come to our house instead of just meeting somewhere in town, we need to get a bunch of cleaning done. Whoo hoo- so exciting! (NOT)

bitten by the designing bug

Here's what I have spent all of my time doing the last 1.5 days:
I dont have any particular plans for it- just had to make it LOL!

The kids and Mark are all off tomorrow and Monday, so we have a 4 day weekend going on around here. Hopefully the weather won't be too awful so we can get out some and not be cooped up at home the whole time driving each other nuts!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Nothing much exciting going on at our house. We don't usually do much for Valentines. I got out the boxes of candy hearts and some other goodies for the kids while they were at school so it was all waiting when they got home/got up from naptime. Yes, we got the packages MommyPat and Momma- and the stuff was put out today.

I've done three layouts in the last few days- a couple are kind of funky LOL The first was for Robin's Day 1 RAKweek challenge on Heroes

Credits HERE

This one was for day 2 and the Jessica Bolton Eclectic team blog challenge:

credits HERE

It's not too often I can figure out how to put pink on a layout about my hubby ;)

and a LO with Rachel's lovely kit, Devotion, available at Scrapdish:

credits HERE

and there was this little folded card project I posted on the Girltalk blog late last night. You can go see the instructions for them here. Becky posted the cutest craft project with the set of QPs we are giving out right after my post- you have to go see that too!

and lastly, I've been doing a little designing. I needed something to give the nightowls this weekend, so I came up with these:

The natives are getting restless, so I guess I had better go find something for dinner. I was sort of hoping we could go out for pizza or something, but DH still isn't home from work and it is getting late. They are going to start revolting if it doesn't look like I am trying to make something soon.

Happy Valentine's Day everyone!

Valentine Brag Book

The other Dani's Girls and I have been cooking up this little goodie to share with everyone on the Girl Talk blog. Isn't it cute? you can do one of your own- our treat! Go check it out :)

Cameras and Cookies

I definately get my love of photos and artistic things from my Dad. I found one pic of him with a camera in his hand. He was usually the one taking the pictures, so it is not surprising that this was a rare event!

journaling: Daddy loved to take pictures and just about always had a cmaera in his hand when we were on vacation. This is the one picture I found of him actually holding his camera, one that he used for many years.
credits: Rock Star by Krista Mettler at Scrapdish and DigiScrapz; Don't Be Negative filmstrip by Gina Miller; stamped alpha by Michelle Coleman; LO template from EZScrapz Volume 2 by Angela Sharrow at Scrapdish; fonts: TXT Abrasive

and for fun, you can take the What Kind of Cookie Are You? quiz! and go pick up a point or two by posting your results on the SweetShoppe blog too while you are it ;)

You Are a Chocolate Chip Cookie

Traditional and conservative, most people find you comforting. You're friendly and easy to get to know. This makes you very popular - without even trying!

What Kind of Cookie Are You?

Hey Chicky!

journaling: Sarah evidently watched me intently on Sunday nights after everyone else was in bed and I talked on the phone with my parents. One day she brought me the phone from the play kitchen in the bedroom, and after offering it to me, held it up to her ear. Nevermind that the phone was upside down and backwards, she knew where it was supposed to go!

credits: Spring Chick by Dani Mogstad and Dawn Bryan (Miss Huni Buni) at SweetShoppeDesigns (coming Feb 10); So Square stitches by Dani Mogstad; fonts: Avante Garde, Yippy Skippy

Today has just been one of those days where I need to look at cute pics like these to remind myself of the good things about having kids. Sarah has been doing nothing but get herself into trouble, Brenna has had several 'accidents' and then doesn't tell me about it, the big kids all came home from school doing nothing but bickering, tattling, and picking on each other and continued it all evening. Why do they save it all up for when DH is gone on a trip? And then to top it off, Sarah did her throw-up everywhere bit right after eating lunch today. I'm beginning to wonder if there isn't some bigger stomach/GI issue hiding in the shadows that is going to jump out and bite us. I'm learning just how much laundry I can stuff into the new front-loading washing machine these last couple of days.
I think I need a vacation. I guess going out for dinner and a movie with my friends Saturday evening will have to suffice.

today

So, a boring title, but I couldn't think of anything catchier LOL!

Here's the LO I did this morning:

journaling on page 1: Daddy’s memorial service was on January 3, 2007 at Heritage Congregational Church. It was wonderful to have so many family members there with us- many of which we had not seen in several years. We made all of the arrangements for the service ourselves from ordering the flowers to writing and printing the service program. Joe Clark gave a wonderful eulogy,,my mom had some wonderful things to say, and of course there was lots of music Daddy enjoyed. The highlight of the service was the fifteen minute slide show with pictures of his life and some of the music that he loved to listen to. It was a labor of love that took me most of the week before the service to put together. Learning to put together a slide show in such a short amount of time and when I wanted it to be perfect in his honor, was not the most ideal of circumstances, but with the help of Mark I had a working copy in time for the service.
credits: Novermber 2006 Scrapdish Designers Collaborative kit at Scrapdish; Flirty Flourishes 2 and 3 by Zoe Pearn at SweetShoppeDesigns; Square Quickies 3 Templates by Mish Gasser at PlainDigitalWrapper
fonts: Zapf Chancery LT

I actually did another one this evening, but I can't show it off quite yet ;) You can click on the picture above to see a bigger version, and if anyone wants an actual printable copy of the LO just let me know and I will zip the files up and send it to you!

So, today's big adventure was aquiring tickets to this year's Disney on Ice show. I was chatting with Becky last night on the computer and she let me know that the library had started the reading incentive program for the kids like they did last year. They read 7 books and they earn a voucher for a ticket to see the Disney on Ice program. Mark had seen the ad in the newspaper about a week ago saying that tickets were going to be on sale soon, and we had talked about going. Opening night tickets are only $10 each, so we figured we would just do that since we didn't know if the library was going to give out tickets again. It's technically a school night since opening night is Thursday, but it's only one day and then the kids are off on spring break so we didn't think it would be a big deal to let them stay up late that one night. I didn't remember to go check on tickets though until last night and the computer kept telling me that there weren't enough tickets available to be able to seat our whole family together. I called this morning to the box office and sure enough, there were a few seats on Thursday night still but the lady said they were scattered all over and not even in the same sections. So, I started earnestly looking into the library program deal. I had to sign the kids up on-line, I had to input books on-line, I had to call the library branch we go to and find out if they even had vouchers left still (keep in mind that this program only officially began two days ago), I had to go to the library to pick up the vouchers and then I had to drive to the box office to exchange the vouchers for actual tickets as well as buy a couple for the parents. What a pain! So, technically the kids haven't really read 7 books- I just said they did. I know they will in the next 4 weeks, but if I waited more than a couple of days there wouldn't be any vouchers and/or seats left to get. We went through the whole 'we are out of vouchers, we might get more later' thing last year and it was torture for everyone. The vouchers were only good for two shows- Thursday night and Saturday night, and as of 11 this morning the Thursday night show was completely sold out (only a couple of hours after I checked this morning). Anyway, to sum that all up- we are the proud owners of 6 tickets to see the Monsters, Inc. Disney on Ice show in March at the start of spring break. I'm sure we won't be allowed to forget during the next month that it is coming. ;)

Well, I think that is it for me. DH is out of town on a business trip until tomorrow night, so I think I might take myself upstairs to bed to finish the Tony Hillerman book I borrowed from my mom. I love to read in bed, but DH whines and complains about the light if he is trying to sleep, so I don't get to do it very often anymore. Night!

just a few minutes until bedtime

and I am looking forward to the peace and quiet, assuming I can get Sarah down too fairly quickly. I've got new CT goodies to play with and other than unzipping to make sure the DL was good I haven't had a chance to do anything with them. Since I will have to get up again shortly, I decided I would post my last two layouts and a little graphical fun I had over the weekend.
I used a few of the new digi-goodies I've been buying and collecting for these. One set of new pics and another oldie :)

journaling: This was the first time in 4 years that we were able to help Megan celebrate her birthday. We didn’t do anything fancy- Mama made a chocolate cake for everyone to enjoy, we sang Happy Birthday, and we just spent the evening together playing games, watching TV and going through slides and photo albums to find pictures for Daddy’s memorial service. It was nice just to be together!
credits: Celebrate You by Gina Miller, Natalie Braxton, Debbie Knorr, and Traci Murphy; Glitter RicRac by Gina Miller; calendar tabs by Misty Mareda; LO sketch by Teresa Ferguson for SweetShoppeDesigns challenge (right page); fonts: MA Sexy

credits: Hola papers and elements by Robin Cabana; Stitched and Sweet Lil Flowers by Gina Miller; LO template by Teresa Ferguson, Smarties Volume 1; fonts: MA Sexy

And lastly I had fun making this little ad for the weekly late-night chats that I co-host with Robin at RAKscraps on Sunday evenings. One of those ideas I just had to do because I had a brainstorm. I found a gorgeous shot of the moon my Dad took in his stuff when I was looking for photos for the slideshow, and one of the clipart books I got from him had lots of great owl pictures. Shrinking it down for the web makes it lose a lot of the detail, but I still think it is pretty neat. I also made a matching blinkie for people to put in their signatures of the forum at RAKs.

the LO redo

So here is the LO that I redid the other night after Sarah 'helped' me with it by trashing what I had done previously.

Sarah was loving on her Glo*e Bear and I had to snap a pic.
credits: Photo Transfer Action by Danielle Catalano at CatScraps; Everything else by Dani Mogstad at DesignbyDani and SweetShoppeDesigns: Crazy Love, Creative Crops 2, Paint Stamped Alpha from This Love Collection, and staple is from Hard @ Play
fonts: 2Peas Hot Chocolate

I was pretty certain before she got her sticky little hands on the computer that I was going to trash it and start over again, so it was more just an inconvenience than anything. I like how this turned out in the end. I did this for a Dani's Girls scraplift challenge that will show up later this month on the GirlTalk blog. Ideas for the LO were taken from: Erica's (pne123) My Little Monkey and What I Love About You , and Linday's (Lindsay) Adventure Calls

Sarah does seem to especially love her Glo*e bear out of all of her stuffed things. She doesn't have to take him everywhere with her so far, and I think that is a good thing. I do wonder though if I shouldn't get another one and stash it away, just in case ;)

since I just lost everything I was working on....

I might as well blog before I go start dinner.
Sarah is fascinated with the computers. That's not a surprise, given the fact that there is at least one person on a computer at any given time in our house. She likes to climb up in my chair when I get up to do something and play with my trackball and punch the keys. I was helping an old paper scrapbook customer with some things (yeah! some more stuff out of my closet and money in my scrapping wallet!! teehee- that rhymes LOL) and Sarah had to come help me with the LO I was working on that had a picture of her on it. She knows just what combination of keys to punch to mess everything up- I had to close Elements down because it was locked up- couldn't even save it. I'm not terribly heartbroken this time- I've been fiddling with it for a while and was on my second attempt at a LO and was still unhappy with it. But, that isn't always the case.

So, instead of showing you what I did today, I'll show you what I did yesterday and the evening before! :)
I found this tag accordian display kit on clearance at HobbyLobby after Christmas- actually I found 2. I used 3 of the kits (L to R-Puppy Love, Stolen Kisses, and Quiet Moments) from the This Love Collection by Dani Mogstad- which is now at SweetShoppe as well as DesignbyDani. The kids have been wanting to have some pics of Granddaddy posted around the house and I thought this would be a cute way to do it. I will use the other 3 kits to do the second tag display with some more current photos. I think the whole project turned out very nicely and it was easy to do too! It came with papers and some embellishments I didn't use, so I will probably just give those to the kids for some project.

Oh, and Bryce did just fine with the dental work the other night. I was definately the one more worked up about it. I have him some ibuprofen before bed that night and when I asked him if he needed more before he left for school the next morning he said no, he didn't. He hasn't complained at all about it. Who knows why that one tooth wouldn't come out on it's own, the root was practically gone. I guess it would have fallen out eventually. Now we are just waiting to see what happens with the permanent tooth. If it doesn't start moving into place on its own, then we will have to get him to an orthodontist.

I guess I will go see what I can find for dinner and get the dishwasher loaded and running. Maybe I'll be inspired and can actually scrap that picture this evening, or maybe I'll just try to scrap a different one since that wasn't working for me today.