Nico funny

Joe took this funny shot of nico playing vids with his big kicking boots. He wore them all day - from the moment he found them in the closet in the morning until he passed out on the couch at night.


Yesterday, we're sitting at a light and nico spots at a convenience store ans asks "do they sell slurpies?" I respond "no... they sell hot dogs & stuff", he asks "what's a hot dog?". It dawns on me that he has not had a hot dog and hasn't seen me eat a hot dog since the last time I had a traditional style albeit vegetarian hot dog was when he was a little baby.

Continuing the convo w/ nico --- I try to describe a hot dog "wienie, eat it on a bun, sausage shape" I can see him in the mirror looking at me with a freaked look, he responds "I don't eat dog!".

So tonight we had hot dogs for dinner, he ate his w/o the bun and said its was very nummy. Henry even ate a whole dog on the bun w/ ketchup & extra mustard.

mini book

Finally sat down at my desk today and made this mini book for a class I'm teaching in Sept. Friends or something, can't recall the title but its about friends.

Flip out page held close by a heart clip.

Opens to a full picture split down the middle-ish.


Book includes a couple of pockets & large photo corner pockets.


Another flip-out page.

Out all day

The boy & I headed over to the Doodle to pick up supplies, decide on classes for the rest of the year (seriously, i'm that far ahead), design the Veggies Oct Kit and put together the kits for my class on Sat. -A little birdie told me. It's a technique class using canvas frames, masking, paint, stickles, matts and textures.

Tonight I need to work on my Soup recipe swap that is due Sunday, me? procrastinate much.

Another challenge from M2R - use b/w & colour photos together. Nico loves using the chopsticks (i was short an S) and wants to eat with them at every meal. Cosmo Cricket papers, autumn leaves stamps, AC sticker letters.


Finally its been nice enough outside to get decently lighted pictures.

Another one

Did this for a challenge on M2R - use stitching (ink or machine), handcut frame, ink most of the elements & weave paper on the page. I did a short weave - wove the corner of the handcut frame together.


I dropped a stamp on the journal box and had to find something to hide the spot. I found a yellow arrow sitting on top of the felt bin, perfect solution to hide the splot.

Catch up

Got around to doing a page late last night. Crazy nekid nico and his boots.


Close up of the tone on tone versamark image - Inque Boutique bug stamp.


Also we have the first official cold of the school year! H is complaining of a sore throat & his nose is running non-stop.

Use as directed

I have been dealing with this yucky cold/congestions for almost 2 weeks and I'm ready to for it to find another victim. I've felt like crud and stopped taking my allergy meds, big mistake. I started them up again yesterday and I'm finally feeling better - at least the headache & drainage has taken a leave of absence. Now if i could get rid of the congestion and aches.

I've been busy at night, was able to complete 2 pages while Joe took over parental duties. This page is about how I would find H & joe in the morning for over a year, all tangled up in each other. I cut out some sassafras lass paper for some cuteness and made a photo block with scraps of daisy d & ki memories. The edge of the paper needed something so I edged it with brushed corduroy ink.



A page using up scraps & misc. embellishements floating on my desk & the floor.
The boys outside painting the sidewalk or so I thought.

Fine weather

The whole city is shut down except for 7-11 and Walmart, we went out for slurpees at the 7-11 across the street from wally's. Not a drop of rain, been mostly sunny and a slight breeze.

I did 2 pages yesterday while H was in school. Preschool picture of H mugging it up for the camera.


Page about nico's obsession with coffee. He asked for coffee, I said no more -under his breath his says "coffee pot says give nick coffee". Good thing I was sitting at the table playing with the camera to catch these shots.

First day of school

We got a late start this morning, I did't wake up until 7.15am. I slept right through the 6.30 alarm. We did make it out the door at 7.3oam, don't know how we did it.
H. has major bedhead going on, he wants to grow out his hair and that boy has a mophead.

I thought there was a class size limit - there are 24 kids in his class! His cubby is on the bottom row, he has to store all of his stuff in there.

He signed in and went to his assigned seat, this was the look on his face - priceless. He was excited to go to school & ran most of the way but once he sat down he had second thoughts.

He puts his head down and says "i'm still tired, can I go back to sleep".


Joe & his new toy - NOT. Henry had to help put it together, he says his dad is super strong. The mower weighs at the most 15lbs, silly boy.

10 year timer

Ten years is the mark -the mark when half of your appliances decide to die the same week. We've been in this house 10.5 years - in the last 10 days the water heater imploded, the dryer fried, the dishwasher is circling the drain and joe walks in and says the lawn mower seized up! He looked up mowers & headed back out the door with Henry, they've been gone almost 3 hours, I hope henry didn't convince joe to get that riding mower he's (henry) been eying. 8.)

On Monday we have to have $30 for pictures, $10 for dues & $5 for supplies on top of the roughly $80 buying consumable supplies & his backpack. The boy is due for a haircut & will need new boots by the end of September, it just doesn't ease up. I know he'll have a pile of fundraiser flyers in his bag the first week.

Alligator

Nico just drew this picture - it's an alligator! An artist at 3 years old.

a little project

This a challenge from M2R, create a hanger using Cosmo Cricket Strip Teasers. I did a little sewing for texture, threaded some buttons on the Twistel & some bling.





Then I covered a cigarbox with Fancy Pants papers & diecuts, H picked out the photo of himself and then promptly filled up the box with little toys. I created this keepsake box as a prototype for a Whimsodoodle Fall Festival that is a few months. I need to get busy creating.

Meet & Greet at school

Open house at H's school this morning, he was so excited he was up at 7am and chopping at the bit to leave. The meeting didn't start until 9.30 am, so it was a long morning - every 2 minutes he would ask " is it time?".


Here is a super shot of one of his teacher Ms. F, she is so cute. We lucked out that h. was placed in her classroom, she was his integration teacher last year. They start to integrate the pre-k kids into kindy classes halfway through the year.


To keep the kids busy while the parents filled out the paperwork, they had a scavenger hunt set up - find your seat, find the helping hand chart (h's job for the week is special helper, what could that mean???) , meet your classmates and finally...



sit on the carpet, play with manipulatives and be quiet. That was super hard for H, he was so excited to see everyone - especially Jacob & Ms. Debbie (j's oma).

Watching the olympics

We've been having our own olympic trials in the house, last night the boys were swimming across the kitchen floor - doing the backstroke no less - they would jump from the carpet edge onto the linoleum, make a splash noise and then push themselves across the floor. I didn't get any photos, but I think I'm going to prompt them into doing it again so I can get some pics. Too cute of a moment to not document it.

Then this morning I hear Nico call out - "Look MOMMMY! I'm doing jumpastics!" as he's bouncing across the couch. No pictures of that one!

More beach pictures

At the beach for 4 days and took over 700 pictures!

We went down to Ft. Matanzas Nat. park, you take a float over to this tiny fort in the middle of the river. Read more about the site by following the link, it will do a much better job than my cr@ppy grammar.

The place is crawling with HUGE Golden Orb spiders (typical web spans 5feet!) these suckers were some of the biggest orb spiders I've seen in long time. This particular one was not that big but you can see her web. Female Golden Orbs are roughly 25mm (leg span of a avg. human hand) and like to create their webs at face height from the ground - [shivers] but they do not bite or sting.



The boys tucking under the webs, poor nick was catching all the webs.

Saturday night Joe & I went out to Caps on the Water, a very tasty seafood restaurant down the street from the house. We had a shrimp pastry appetizer, oh my gosh it was good. I do not even know what exactly it was, joe ordered it - good job. It was a puff pastry filled with saute shrimps with boursin cheese or something.

Here joe and his dinner of pan-seared Tuna filet on a black bean cake. I had the St. augustine shrimp (fried shrimp) that was sooo yummmy. My sides were plantains & miso cucumber slaw (cuks, red pepper strips, carrots strips), the slaw dressing was perfect for dipping the shrimp. I'm not a cocktail/tartar sauce person, give me some other dip or just plain lemon & horseradish.

This is the cool thing about the beach up here in north FL, its all shell. The boys couldn't make a sandcastles like they do in St. Pete.


Surfer boy Henry, he took to boogie boarding like he's been doing it for years. The surf is perfect, low long sets that just roll in along the shallow beach.

Heading out to the fort, about a 5 minute ride on a pontoon boat.


Nico decided that he was not going up to the top of the fort - half way up. The opening is about 30inches by 24inches wide & straight up.

Henry heading back down, the wall around the top was about 4feet high. We had to wait about 10mins while person after person headed up to the top.

Guard station on first landing.

Joe pointing out big spiders as we head down the natural trail on the mainland.

At the beach

The boys & I are hanging out at MIL's beach house for my 40th birthday! (did i just say that out loud) We're enjoying ourselves -especially H, he loved doing cannonballs into the pool.

The view down the beach with Joe & H in distance.

Henry enjoying the surf, the waves were crashing over his head and he just giggled.

Me & h watching the tubes coming in. It was almost high tide, the surf was picking up & the riptide was really working on the legs.

Joe caught me skipping through the surf.

More funnies

Where's Henry?
There he is!

Nico showing off his new shinner, the boys were jumping from the coffee table to the couch (thanks dad) and nico hit the edge of a toy hiding in the couch.


Another disaster in the makings - joe pulled the boys pants up to their shoulders with their arms tucked inside - h took a header into the wall and busted his lip.


Nico watching the rain, he pulled over his little chair to watch the water rise around his toys on the porch.

2 funny pages

More pictures of my days as a SU! demo and hanging at conventions. Shh! page is about 4 of us crammed in a little hotel room at the 2002 Leadership meeting in Utah. Julie liked to go to bed early while the 3 noisy-makers stayed up talking. Julie would sit up and yell - GO TO BED KIDS! She has 4 kiddos and has a great mommy voice.

I had all these misc. pieces floating around my desk from the last few layouts that I did - sticker & paper scraps. The sticker border up in the right is the negative border from a sticker sheet. It's cool looking so I used it as a decorative element.

This was my favourite & only winter time cap, I lost it a few years ago. The girls thought it was the funny thing that they have ever seen on an adult.


Used up leftover sticker strips & pieces of paper. That October Afternoon bookplate is mighty handy.