create

rain, rain, go away!!

Thank goodness the rain here seems to have ended...i feel just damp and moldy these days.  I have never experienced that much rain EVER!!!  The boys have been going stir crazy inside, so it was awesome to get to play outside today (even though we had to have a VERY LONG bath to get all the mud off).  Also, the rain brought out the mosquitos something fierce!!  The whole house smells like OFF now after multiple sprayings.

Here are a couple more layouts I did with Dani's kits.  See SBB or SA gallery link in the right column for credits:  The pink one is such a nice change here....this is my new niece. 

Ok, well have to teach Vacation Bible School tomorrow, so I better go prepare my lesson and craft!!  It's been a fun week teaching, but it is EXHAUSTING.  I have twelve 4-year-olds (my oldest son Alex is in the other 4-yr-old class--rejoice!!).  I do have a teenage helper (who is VERY QUIET, but wonderful with the kids).  Thanks goodness, without her I would be going totally insane.  I think I want to get her a gift, but not sure what it should be.  Maybe a gift card to Borders or something?  Then how much?  Is $25 ok?  Hmm...have to think about that.

can't stop

Don't have much time to post because I am still frantically trying to finish building the ark!!  LOL...only makes sense if you live near Wash DC these days.  My goodness we've had a ton of rain.  I've never seen it like this.  Anyway, it's still storming and I don't want to take even the slightest chance of frying my computer, so I am quickly posting a couple of the layouts I did this weekend with Dani's two new kits (Hopscotch and Yankee Doodle Candy - collab kit with Kim Giarrusso).  They will be available in her store on July 1st.  They are just awesome - especially some of the embellishments - really unique and FUN!!!  More later, but here are 2 of them for now.

For credits see posting in my SBB Gallery (link on right).  Bye...and wish us the best in not getting flooded out here....wow is it raining hard.

scrapping away..

With these two great teams now I have the most unbelievable designs to work with.  I just have to keep pinching myself to make sure I am awake - it's that GOOD!!  In the past 4 days I have done 4 layouts.  For me that is HUGE!! 

So, here is my latest with Jessica Bolton's (Eclectic Scraps) new Epiphany kit.  I love that the papers ooze texture!!  I haven't even scratched the surface of the kit, so I'm excited to go back for another round!!  See SA and 2Peas gallery link to the right for the credits:

In much less exciting news, we might be getting a new car.  I say this with the utmost lack of excitement as it won't be an exciting purchase.  My hubby is very cheap when it comes to buying a car - he absolutely is not one of those people that has to have a certain brand name or whatever.  Frankly, he is more about the power of the engine than who made it.  Before we had kids he had a Ford Mustang GT and an old Porsche 911 (sounds great - but it was really about the whole speed factor for him).  We traded in the Porsche for a GMC Yukon XL and also have an old Ford Contour.  See...not exciting.  He is now thinking of getting a Ford Five Hundred.  It is not the most attractive car, but oh well.  It's considered the safest car in it's class.  That can't be bad.  Stay tuned...

Happy Dance!!

I feel like a very lucky girl these days!!  Last week I found out I made Jessica Bolton's creative team and today it is official, I am one of Dani's girls.  WOW....very fortunate to have two such wonderful homes and designs to play with.  Each of these communities is awesome and the teams are so inspirational and the designers...SO talented.  I can't wait to grow and play and learn - it is going to be  a great six months!!  SO.....i have some work ahead of me this week, but I am so looking forward to it.

My bad news of the week is that my camera broke.  I think it is just the battery, so I am trying to get a new one.  But I missed a Father's Day picture - had me pretty bummed.  My hubby is going out of town again tomorrow through Thursday...ugh....bad news is that I won't sleep, but the good news is I will have lots of time to scrap.

Here's a picture from the park last week (not the best quality picture, but I just love that it totally captures my boy).  We had a great time with our playgroup friends...it's so NICE to have these women in my life.  There are times it can be annoying with the petty gossip, although I do like to listen sometimes...lol, but it is nice to share time with other women. 

Boy do I feel crafty...

Today was sad in that we said good-bye to one of our playgroup members.  She is moving to Hartford, CT.  We had cake at our current fav playground and the 18 kids (all 4 and under) pretty much demolished the chocolate cake with chocolate icing so that there was none left for the mom's.  Oh well, it was a good thing for me to avoid.  I made her a CD photo album book of current pictures of all the playgroup kids and random shots taken throughout the past 2 1/2 years we have all been together.  I didn't take picture of the all the pages in the album, but will post a couple of the pages below.  I thought it turned out pretty good, but from hearing my friend rave you would've thought Donna Downey put the book together.  LOL.  Anyway, since my husband's comment is usually, "yeah, looks great", it was nice to get some comments, like "wow, how did you do this", "you could sell these".  I'm saying this tongue in cheek, because I know this wasn't something so totally unbelievable.  People love photo albums, especially with pictures of their kids and the icing on the cake is pictures of their kids with their friends. 

It was a good trial and error project to do before I start my father's day albums (i know I'm kind of late here).  I have to pick another type of cover for the album.  I used a thinnish piece of transparency and I don't think it looked great (or for that matter, will hold up well).  So maybe a thin piece of plexiglass?  Hmmm?  I'll have to experiment on my father's day albums.

Here are some of the pictures. 

 

Off to bed now and read my latest CK magazine issue.  So loving that magazine these days.  It's a close tie between CK and Scrapbooks Etc. in this house!!

Quickpages....

So a couple weeks ago there was this thread at 2Peas about quickpages.  I was reading with interest, because I for one could never imagine using quickpages.  Really, why would I when the whole fun was to actually scrap the page.  But some of the comments really changed the way I thought, because after all isn't it sometimes just about the pictures and for a gift to the grandparents how could you go wrong.  So in comes Dani Mogstad's Little One album (availabe at acot).  She really is one of my inspirations...i probably have every single one of her layouts in my BOS at 2Peas.  Anyway, so now after using her Little One quickpages, I have 6 gorgeous layouts done by Dani using MY photos.  SWEET!!!  I'm going to put them in an accordion album, add some chipboard letters to the cover pages, wrap with a big white satin ribbon and give it to my parents.  I know they will love it.

Finally....

I've had some news I've been dying to share for a couple days now.....and it is finally official.  I was lucky enough to be picked to be on Jessica Bolton's creative team.  I've made no secret of my love of all things Jessica and Eclectic Scraps.  She is an unbelievable designer and I am so looking forward to working with her designs and the other great members of her creative team.  Check her blog here for the official announcement of the new team.   

Check out these layouts I have done in the past 5 months using Jessica's designs......how awesome are these designs....some of the most unique and best quality designs out there.  See credits at SBB gallery link in right column.

So I had started scrapping this layout below a couple days ago and thought maybe I would just abandon it as it wasn't going anywhere for me and I just didn't know if I could work with the colors.....so different than what I normally do.  This was for the Outside the Box challenge at Scrapartist.  THANK goodness I stuck with it, because I LOVE how it turned out.  So different for me, but that's mostly what I love about it.  See credits at the SA link on the right.

 

Our anniversary was so nice last night.  I just love getting a babysitter and going out with my hubby alone.  We SO rarely do it and boy is it nice not constantly getting interrupted by our oldest who is such a chatterbox.  Gary and I actually had a LONG, interesting adult conversation - of course it was about the boys, but oh well.  We also starting talking about out next kid-less vacation that we hope to take for our 15 year anniversary.  I know it is two years away, but we want to do something exotic (maybe a cruise to the Galapagos Islands), so we are going to try and plan ahead so we can get a better deal.

Anyway, off to scrap more now since the kids are in bed.  I'm going to take a look at some more challenges at SA - maybe the scraplift challenge - since all my creative energy has been sapped for today.

13 years ago

Hard to believe that 13 years ago at this moment, I was just arriving at the church with my best girlfriends and putting on my wedding dress.  It wasn't the most gorgeous day - kind of cool and sort of looking like it would rain any second.  It ended up waiting until everyone was at the Country Club for the reception before it started pouring.  Then once things were winding up at the reception the rain stopped and it was gorgeous. 

We tried to get a babysitter for this weekend so we could go out on Saturday night, but (as usual) we waited until the last minute and all our regular sitters were busy.  So, we got a sitter for tonite and are heading out at 6:30 for dinner at our favorite Thai restaurant and then either the movies or the bookstore.  I know, I know....the bookstore is kind of lame, but we love going to Borders and getting some coffee and hanging out.  We did that for the first 9 years before we had kids and now it is pretty much impossible to spend more than 15 minutes there before the books are being pulled down from the shelf and tossed about OR we need to use the intercom system to page for a lost child with *really* blonde hair that answers to the name Alex.  We can't stay out late anyway as Gary has a TON of work to do as usual AND we need to watch last night's TIVO'd Big Love episode. 

No layouts done this weekend.  I did buy a Xyron machine and put together a couple "pages" in my cd-altered-photo journal/album thing.  I am having a ton of fun with the hands-on album stuff using digital kits/designs.  I was kind of burned out on the standard 12x12 layout, so this is getting my creative juices flowing.  I do also have to say that Donna Downey is a genius and her how-to journal/creative photo albums books are unbelievable.

Here is a picture from this weekend of the boys.  We got Alex's hair CHOPPED and Ben is next in line for this weekend coming up.  It is amazing how fast their hair grows.

Home

So hubby got home today from Zurich.  Picked him up at the airport.  The boys were ECSTATIC to see him.  I loved watching them run to him yelling "Daddy"....makes my heart skip a beat. 

Here is something I thought was interesting...did most of you all know that Memorial Day used to always be celebrated on May 31st - no matter what day of the week it fell on.  My mom was saying something about it on the phone to me and I was SO surprised.  The Holidays Act of 1971 (passed into law in 1968, but not effective until 1971) established all these Monday holidays.  Essentially, it was to make 3-day weekends.  They left Veteran's Day (Nov 11) and Fourth of July alone, but changed all the other federal holidays (except Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year's).  Also in reading this interesting article about the origins of the holidays, I found out that Thanksgiving was MOVED in 1941 from the last Thursday of November to the 3rd Thursday of November to stimulate the economy by lengthening (in some years) the holiday shopping time.  I'm not sure why this sort of freaks me out, but it just does.  Anyway, I had no idea about this and thought I would share.

Here is the other layout that I finished this morning.  It is for the scraplift challenge at SA (see credits via the Scrapartist link on the right).  This was fun....kind of a follow-up to my "frustrated" layout I posted yesterday with Alex. This is Alex when he was just a baby - 8 months old.

   

Well....I'm going to bed early with hubby...to read.  I'm reading this book I got a while back but haven't had a chance yet to read.  It is His Excellency: George Washington by Joseph Ellis. I really love history - especially the American Revolution.  I find the men and women involved so inspiring.  John Adams is my favorite, but good 'ole George would be next in line.  Good night all!!

Exhausted

Came home from our mini Memorial Day vacation...phone rang as soon as we walked in the door.  It was my boss who had her baby more than 4 weeks early.  After the finding out the important stuff - like is the baby ok and is it a boy or a girl - I went into shock.  I am supposed to be filling in for her while she is out on maternity leave and we were supposed to transition all this stuff over the next couple weeks.  Also, Gary was going to Switzerland that evening which would leave me here by myself to do everything.  I am happy to say that I survived so far....it's been 2 days.  It was touch-and-go for a while especially when I showed up Wednesday AM (I only work MWF) and I had 26 voicemails - mostly from people I don't even know.  ACK!!!  It's kind of bittersweet because I plan on quitting in September when Alex goes back to preschool and my boss comes back from maternity leave.  It will be hard to quit after 15 years with the firm, but our schedules are so crazy at home and our weekends are spent running errands.  I'm not delusional in that I think staying home will be easier - because I know that it won't be as work is sometimes a nice break - but I think Alex could use some good, solid attention before he starts kindergarten.  Also, childcare options aren't great.  I live in a major suburb of Wash DC and I haven't found a daycare (home or big one) that I *really* like and we've had 2 nannies that didn't work out for various reasons.  And I am not that picky about things......   So big changes happening here in 4 months.

Since I don't sleep when Gary isn't here, I decided to scrap instead of tossing and turning in bed.  I did 2 layouts in one night!!  Now for most people that doesn't seem like much, but for me it is amazing.  I posted the one at 2Peas and SA (see gallery link on right).  The other one is for the Scraplift challenge at SA and I have a little bit left to do.