Got the box

I got the box of goodies from M2R and I'm ready to get working but I feel like p%p! My ear is starting to ache now and its friday! The dr. office is closed until monday, they have a walk in clinic but I could be there for hours. No way! CVS has a clinic in the store I wonder what the cost is for an ear check. I wish joe would get home so I can have some down time, he's being getting home after 8pm most nights.

Brrrrr

It's 55deg at 6pm at my house and nico is running around naked. That boy will not keep his clothes on, now he's complaining that his legs are cold. @@ Then put on your pants.

I dug around my closet looking for some mini-books to use and I've come up empty. How could that be, guess where I'll be heading on Saturday.

I've been tagged!

by Sarah.

The Rules:
You must list one fact about yourself for each letter of your middle name. Each fact must begin with that letter. If you don't have a middle name, just use your maiden name. After you've been tagged, you need to up-date your blog with your middle name and answers. At the end of your post, you need to tag one person for each letter of your middle name.

My middle name: Lyn

L - Leo - I was born in August
Y- YMCA - I joined the Y just for the indoor racquetball courts.
N-native floridian

3 pages

I cut out the rockets & a few stars to pop them off the page. Heidi Swapp chipboard letters, Basic Grey paper & letters. I cut a couple of photo corners out of the paper
H and the ball pit - Bisous chipboard letters, Scenic Route paper and CI fuzzy brads (love them) and a ScrapWorks fabric tag.

One about me, very simple and used up scraps.

Even better news!

I've been picked as the guest designer for the March Moments to Remember kit! Check it out.

I've been picked!

I'm featured on Moments To Remember website as the "pick of the week". They choose my "boots" page as the page of the week. Check it out on the front page. This is so cool, I've never had a page picked out to showcase and it feels AWESOME.


Other than finding out about M2R pick of the week & surfing the net, I didn't do anything crafty today other than sketch out some pages and clean up my space.

H. had Chick-fil-a nite for a school fundraiser so we headed over there around 6pm for dinner and meet/greet with everyone. The boys always have fun running around the play area and going up the slide instead of down. Nico spent the evening running in and out of the playarea, I guess he was checking to see if we abandoned them.

well its been 3 hours

I got sidetracked by the boys and had to get nico settled down for a nap.

Here's challenge #4 - stitching -real or fake

Challenge #1 f00d - 3 photos, 2 diff. ribbons & 2 diff. pattern papers.

Challenge # 6 - matching embellishements, same colour

so far....

I've completed 2 of the challenges. I need to pics as soon as I finish the 3rd one which will be in about an hour. Check back later.

tired

I worked the all day crop yesterday at the doodle, Jen & I left the house at 7.15am and didn't get home until 11.45pm. I didn't fall asleep until after 1am and the boys got me up at 7am, ugghh.

There's a cyper-crop going on at ScrappyGirlsDesigns with 10 challenges that I want try to complete today. I better get busy.

Nothing today

H. was down today due to a double ear infection and bad allergies. He was miserable most of the night and morning. he took a long nap and woke up at 1pm demanding to go back to school 'because i'm all better'. Poor boy wants to go to school and mommy tells him no.

Jen picked up Nico this afternoon and went over to the doodle to drop off food and then dinner. What a lucky boy. Henry was little bit concern about aunt cissy taking nico, he asked Jen to bring back his brudder by 5 days. I just talked to Jen and the little bud is doing fine and acting all lovey-dovey.

one more for today

I'm liking these challenges that I have come across on some sb boards. This one is about the daily "things" you do. I only did my a.m. to-do's.

goofs

I did a b/w photo! We did all match in this photo - boys blue oxford, joe in a green polo & i in a perwinkle blue shirt - yes it matched. Again those Bisous letters, 7 gyspies gaffer tape and misc pieces of stuff from a bin. I'm liking those fuzzy brads from CI they're pretty much dust free.

Lunar eclipse

I set up the tripod & camera and messed around with the settings. I really couldn't tell what I was getting, my vision is horrible. They were all done in manual mode. Once the moon started to dim, you can make out the surface ever so slight.

First pic I set iso1600 1/40s f/29 - start of the LC.
Then i started messing around trying to get away from the burn out effect. iso1600 1/2s, f/13.
It started to cloud up during the "fill up" - i dropped the iso100, helped with burn/solar spots. f/22 s/2.0
Cropped in 100% iso100, 4.0s, f/16
Getting darker out, bumped shutter speed down 6.0s f/16 iso100

Last pic of the night before the clouds rolled in for good - 8.0s, f/16, iso100

Challenge layout

Now its working....
I did a challenge from Scrappy Girl Designs forum - 5 buttons, 1 flower, 1 odd shape, 1 pat. paper & 1 sheet of cardstock. This page came right together.
Fancy Pant felt pieces, Bisous chipboard letters, Basic Grey paper, Bazzill cardstock and one scrapworks fabric tag.

Tuesday

Well I guess I have to do laundry today, H is out of uniforms and I need some gym clothes. I can't even walk down the hallway without jumping over the pile in front of the machine, need i say more.

H is in school today and woke up with an earache late last night, hopefully he'll survive today. The pedi rarely gives us antibotics for ear infections so what's the point of going and paying $20 for that. If he's still complaining after school then I 'll call and see if they'll send in a script to the pharmacy.

I want to do some pages today, I could be doing a page now while nico is in the backyard digging a hole to Australia. He wants a kangaroo, silly boy.

12x12 version & a keychain

I did a 12x12 version of 'real life' for the dt. The only difference is a bigger picture and some paint under the journaling.

Here's a keychain made with the CI creative cafe tags. I added some contact size pictures, rub-ons and that cool felt ribbon.

2 boys today

h. is out of school today so i had to entertain to whippersnappers today. we finally got out of the house around 11am and picked up joe for lunch. We took joe back to work and headed over to target to check out the $1 spot. The spot was picked over so we moved on to the v-day aisle - 75% off. H picked out a plushy dog for .75 and i found some mini m-m's in packets. H. loves having mm in his yogurt so the mini pre-packaged is perfect for his lunch. Nico found a watercan in the pool aisle, the boy loves watering cans and H wanted another bug jar. An hour later we finally check out and head back home. Nico is down for a nap and henry is whining that he didn't get to help make ice tea, he didn't want to help me when I asked him to and then pitched a fit when I finished making it. What ever kid.

2 pages

Did this page using nothing but scraps of paper except for the main sheet of cardstock. This is nico having or should I say wearing some peas. Finally used the inque boutique circle stamps I bought last year.

This photo documents h. love for tape. He taped himself up so well that I had to cut his shirt off of him. He also had nico's sitting toy all wrapped up and he was dragging poor nico around with him. I printed the journaling but I'm too tired to walk to joe's room to get it.

Wasted day

Jen, Cynthia & I headed over to Stampfest in Clearwater today. I was good, spent only $12 on some unmounted stamps. I'm working on some pages right now and need to mount the stamps so I can use them.

We spent 4 hours at the show! The only reason we left the show was to get food. Cynthia said let's go to the Pirogies place for some food. We had mushroom & sauerkraut pirogies and potato & cheddar cheese pirogies. Yummy!

After we dropped off Cynthia, we headed over to the Y for a few games of racquetball and some puking. just kidding. We played 2 sets in an 90 mins, we hovered at 11/13 for the longest time and then I kicked her butt! Next time she gets to serve first.

Jen's back!

She's back from CHA and gave me the skinny on what she bought. Then we picked up henry from school, went to target to waste some time before heading over to the Y for a game of racquetball. Its been a while since we played a few games and boy am I tired. It's 10.30 at night and I should be sleeping or atleast lying down but no I'm sitting here blogging and skipping thru IMDB.com.

I have big hopes on getting a bunch of pages done tomorrow. Joe took the boys up to his parents this weekend so I could have some down time. I hope he doesn't expect to come back to a clean house & folded laundry like I did last weekend. Maybe...I'll try to mop the kitchen floor and declutter the toyroom.


Last, look what meatball did to himself when I wasn't looking. He stamped red ink all over his face! A long shower and a scrubbing just lightened the ink but it looks like he has a rash. His teacher was upset with him and told him he made a bad choice.

I love this simple & quick page of Nico's first teeth. Did it in less than 1 hour with interruptions from the boys.
This layout busted my teeth from the get-go. I should have just ripped the picture up and started anew. I just gave up and threw some buttons on the page. The felt ribbon that has adhesive on the back is a b!tch to work with too.

Happy Valentines Day

This is my treat, nico hanging on me while i work. He loves to hang over my shoulder and watch or help me craft. I get bugged when he starts jerking around on my back so I throw him on the bed.

The kitchen chair is much easier to work with then the dang office chair that was killing my back. The boys were consistently swinging off it or spinning it around, so out to the garage it went. I love this wicker chair that I bought at Pier One 14 yrs ago, wow its been that long. They were $15 each, got home and decided I like them
went back and they were all gone! I lived 15mins away and there must have been 30 chairs when I left the store. The employee said someone came in right after me and bought them all for their restaurant. I love these 2 chairs.

2 today

I forced myself to work on some pages today. I've been distracted by the computer the last few days, so I shut it off and got busy. Sometimes I really hate the computer and the way I can get sucked in to it.

These layouts were done with scraps and pieces of stuff.
This page was a bear to work with, the pictures were two different sizes and I didn't want to print them again. I did some journaling by hand but its too messy so I'm going to print it up on the computer tomorrow. Again I dug through my bin of stuff and found some items to use - QK tab, arrow, leftover sticker and some paint. I pulled out all my sticker letters and threw them all in one big crate, I have so many letters and I got to use them.
Henry's first time fingerpainting, he covered himself and tried to get me too. He was just one year's old. He such a cutie.

I did the 2p photo class this week - window light. Of course today is overcast and rainy, so I only did one part of the challenge - catchlights in eyes. The only room that is bright enough and has a window on the eastside is the masterbath. I sat in the tub with the window directly above & behind me. I propped nico on the ledge and had him look at me/window. Not bad, wish it was brighter out but I didn't have to use a flash.


You can see my arm in his left eye if you look closely. The dark area in the window is the wooden fence about 6 feet from the window.

Finally a card, I have lost my card making mojo. I need to come up with 2 Easter cards for a class this weekend. I have been "working" on cards for 2 weeks and I can not create a single card I am happy with. This card is stamped with an Autumn Leaves set and paint. I need to find something for the flower center, probably a button with some glitter.
This is the March class -(still in progress) My Sentiments Exactly card organizer. I'm fairly happy with it, its been sitting on my desk for atleast a week. I wasn't happy with any of the embellishments that I picked for the title. So I dug out the Quickutz -the trusty scallop circles and some alphabets. The birdies were stuck there just for entertainment, I might use them some where in the box. You can't see the glittery dots on the flourish.

back in town

So glad to be home and amongst my stuff. The house is very clean, joe steamed the carpet, folded the laundry and caulked the shower. Next weekend it will be my turn to clean the house from top to bottom.
Henry loves watching the butterflies burst out of their cocoons, we were lucky and and a bunch were coming out at the same time. I took these shots with a 50mm f/1.8 lens and without the flash. I could have used the flash but I didn't bring in the camera bag. I need to play some more with dragging the shutter, this would have been a perfect opportunity to sit and play a long time.

This dark room is the underwater room with oversized shrimps, crabs, jellyfishes and fishes. Henry was a little spooked by the giant jellyfish. I took this shot with the on-board crappy flash but it worked, the room is blue and the light cast is a dark blue. Not bad for a shot over my shoulder.

Outside the museum, there are small elevated water gardens with lilies and fishes. This flower was just asking to have its picture taken. It really was that vibrant pink.
On the way home, I caught this billowing smoke cloud that looked like it was taking over the road. The Withlacoochie forest was having a "controlled" burn today. Didn't look in control to me.

I took the boys up to visit their grandparents this weekend and I didn't bring any stuff with me other than mags. We head back today sometime today, it takes about 3 hours with a break or 4 hours at 55-65 backroads to conserve gas.

H and I went over to the Natural History Museum on the UF campus, he wanted to see the Lepidoptera collection & garden. We spent a few hours wandering around looking at the fossils & exhibits, then played with some blocks & gears in the kids area. Henry really liked the gear building toy, you put them together like lego but they're gears that connect.

Valentine's mailbox

The mailbox is a CI box 7in. long by 5in. high. A nice size for cards. There is a closure for the lid but I misplaced it. I threw it into my bag and now I can't find it. I have a few extra kits $35 for the whole thing, it has 12 cards total only 6 are shown. Its Scenic Route Paper & chipboard, CI felt flowers and buttons. Misc. ribbons for the flag, ignore the ones that are on it. I had had to dig for something pink at home at that's what I had.

YeeHaw

After having the crazy Tuesday, I did some layouts. i'm enjoying just using some scrap paper and a few embellishments. I did spend a little too much time on sticker elements. I just couldn't find the right thing that would set the sticker.
KI Memories Pet papers (works great), it was an 8x8 $1 pkg from Joann's. CI Creative Cafe stickers, AC felt (flower), ATB clip & sticker and DCWV cardstock (harvest yellow). The yellow notepad is from an It Kit Studio kit.


H and his "making man" cookies. He made a huge mess but it kept him busy and the cookies were yummy.

QK man diecut, Making Memories paper (blue stamp), Basic Grey scrap, recipe card from my kitchen, Sticker Studio letters (5 yrs old!) AC letters, WRMK eyelet (large) and Technique Tuesday month/year stamp.

The boy gave me a fright.

Yesterday I recieved a call from h's school - he had a headache and was crying. School was letting out in 15mins so I knew he was not doing well if school called that close to ending.

The boys did a dental appointment (reg. check-up) at 2.30 or so I thought. I asked H if he was up to going to the dentist - he said yes. 20 minutes later we're at the dentist office and he goes down hill fast. I reschedule and carry the boy out to the car, the whole time Nico is going on about 'dentist mommy, dentist!" Nico didn't not understand what was really going on or really cared, he just wanted to get something out of the treasure box.

We get home, I unload everyone and put H in my bed with all the shades drawn tight. I did give him so Motrin when i picked him up at school, I figured it would have kick in by now. He falls asleep but was very restless and whined/whimpered for an 90 minutes. He wakes up and asks for some water, about 30mins later he wakes up screaming -my back mommy it hurts. I immediately think meningitis and call Joe to come home. I then call the pedi, explain what's going on and they have me immediately come in to see the NP. Luckily, the office is less than a mile from the house.

Within 5 mins of being in the office they call us back. H is just freaking out now and calling out for the doctor. I didn't know what to do other than hug him and talk to him. He was getting himself upset which made the headache worse. Joe showed up about 5mins later and dealt with crazybaby nico.

The nurse came in and had H do some knee-crunches (only way to describe it) to check his coordination and had him hang his head off the edge of the table. She did some other physical stuff but I can't remember exactly. She ruled out meningitis since he was not screaming out in pain when his neck was bent backwards. He was not running a fever either. Since the headache come on suddenly she thinks it was a migraine = we were relieved that it was not meningitis but dang it no child should have to deal with a migraine.

We went home and h. was down for the night or so I thought. It was DQ nite for the school and he 'Had to go see his teacher'. I took him up there for some ice cream since ice cream usually helps with my migraines (the cold). He was fine but on the way home he threw up, I turned around and he said he didn't know he was going to frow up sorry mom. We arrived at the house a few minutes later, I took the boys in for a shower and joe cleaned out the car and carseat.

Within 5 minutes of being home, h said 'my headache gone, mom my headache gone'. Definitely sounded/acted like a migraine.

This morning he comes into the bedroom asking to go to school, sure little bud you can go.

I did 2 simple pages today. One of baby henry and troublemaker nico. I'm still using what is sitting in the bins next to my desk - misc. pieces of felt & chipboard. The big tag was an extra from the 7Gypsie book I did last month & the fabric tag on Nico's page is from the same set of Scrapworks tags that I used on "do daddy" page.

Found some pictures

While I was cleaning out my closet, I came across a box of Henry's baby pictures. I am so happy to find these pictures of him in a sling. I know I have a digital copy somewhere in the house but it was a nice suprise.
This is the next pile of pictures ready to be worked on. I love the picture of H covered in paint, I think that was his first fingerpainting session.

Found these A2Z papers and the Scrapworks fabric tags in some bins, so i made myself use them on the pictures laying on top of the pile. I had to dig for some sticker letters that would go with the papers, finally spotted some Rusty Pickle easter stickers that would work. I also dug out some white paint to make the letters pop from the bkgd paper. I just need to add the date to the page and put it into the book.

Finally

This layout has been sitting on my desk for the last few days waiting for me to "finalize the details." I was stumped on what I wanted to do so I just did it with what was on my desk.

journaling- i peeked around the corner with camera in hand and caught this scene between the boys. H was suprised when the flash went off & he was caught "in the act." 7january 08

I used the new (to me) Maya Road calender stamp but found that the set is missing a zero! HUH! You can't add the year to the date stamp, so I improvised with the mini clock that comes with the set. Didn't work to well but atleast its there.