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.

Last day of summer school

Last day of school for H and this is what I found when I picked him up. He fell an the way to school and skinned up his forehead & nose. Then he tripped in the hallway and skinned up his knees, what a mess. He did say he had a great day at school despite the boo-boos.

little swimmers

I did not do one scrappy thing this weekend, just hung out with the boys. The pool has recovered from the frogs, they kept claiming it as a nesting ground - ICK! All the rain we have been having threw the pool chemicals out and the froggies were enjoying those 2 days of low chlorine. I double-dosed the pool and ran the filter for 24 hrs, that did the trick.

This little pool has been a lot of fun this summer, the boys are finally swimming around like frogs.
Nico does not like it when H gets near him, gee I wonder why.

baby chopsticks

Nico eating his leftover Pei Wei noodles & chicken. He loves using the chopsticks & the "squeaker" - nico's name for the chopstick holder. If you have a Pei Wei locally and haven't tried it yet, YOU HAVE TO GO! I had the orange peel tofu & veggies, oh my yummy-licious.



And a picture of Henry in his latest Doctor ensemble, goofball.

2002

Found this picture while digging through a box, its me & SU! sisters in St. Louis 20o2 convention.
Stamped the background, cut out a frame, used a strip of hambly & some leftover stickers.

Got this page back from the store did it over a year ago, look how cute nico is with those curls.

Toot toot toot

I got an email from Scrap Street asking for one of my layouts for their September issue!!

Crazy rain

It has been raining off & on all day, the back porch is under 1" of water. The water has to be at least 4" deep off the porch. Nico set up a chair by the door and was singing a song about the water & rain.


I did 3 layouts today for the Eat Your Veggies August kit, all that needs to be done is 4 more pages & 2 cards.

Recipe swap #2

Here is this month's page - appetizers . I went with the poppers dip. I pulled out the leapfrog green paper for the jalapeno & the olive green for the topper. Somewhere along the way I pulled out the red . After getting the page all together I realized I wanted the pepper green NOT RED!

ohh sweet little baby

Two pages of baby Henry
Making Memories paper, sewed the buttons to the felt flowers & black star paper. I also used October Afternoon stamp "Once upon a time" to start the journaling block. H was 16 days old, tiny little guy at 5 lbs & so so yellow.

Lift of a J. Hornsby page - need a lift to get started this weekend. This page got me started on sewing all my buttons to the page. The empty space is for journaling that I need to write up first - its about H & his hat troubles - we could not keep hats/caps on his head from day one. They constantly would pop off, gave the nurses fits in the NICU. They would have to get a new cap if the hat hit the floor, after a day they just stuck a stack in his cabinet.

Let's test everyone

Henry did fantastic today at the allergist, he didn't even flinch when they started the scratch test. He sure puts on a great face for the camera.


His arm during the test, he has really tough skin so says the doctor. We had to move on the needles since he barely showed any reaction - not even the histamine control.

He did great with the shots too, he watched the nurse stick him everytime. He immediately showed a reaction to grass, dust & molds. Just what a kid needs. After the dr. checked out his arm, Henry asked if he could have 2 lollies since he didn't cry. The dr brought him 7 lollies!

This book was a hit, its a board book all about sinus & booger issues - ick.

Another project

I think the allergy meds are working, I'm been busy doing stuff around the house & making stuff. I feel a little better but my sinuses are still stuffy.

A quick little gift made from a Maya Road tin pkg and scraps of paper. I stamped the title & recipe separators using KI Memories Love Elsie stamps.

Love playing with paint

I'm still playing with paint, these pictures especially called for paint. The boys painting themselves & playing statues.



The boys outside flooding the backyard with a sprinkler. They had to wear their snorkle gear while playing with the flower-sprinkler. They even hosed down the neighbors backyard with that crazy flopping flower.

I used a mask of the flower shape & painted inside to create the flowers. Just a misc. item I found floating in the chipboard bin.

7 Gypsies stickers, frog from cheap sticker pkg., Fontworks label, Doodlebug sticker letters, AL journal stamp & a white Sharpie pen.

Crazy boys

I walk into the kitchen & find H sitting at the table playing with the powertouch book. He is wearing his birthday hat that he made at school, he is so proud of his artwork.
Then here is this goof eating his lunch of blueberries, he's not ADHD but is learning to be an ADHD child just like his brother.

Allergist

Meet with the allergist this morning to get new meds for "reactions" - itchies, puffiness, congestion, headaches and so on. Ran the scratch test on my arm, mild reaction to everything - dogs/cats, trees, pollen, hay, dust, mold/mildew and other stuff that I can't remember. Then they injected my upper arm with dog/cat, trees, grass, dust, mold/mildew & a few other irritants . Within 1 minute I had marble size welts with grass & dust as the worse. I took this picture an hour after the shots & the spots were still swollen.
They iced down the area & sprayed it with benedryl about 5 mins later but dang it hurt. The nurse gave me a xyzal to take right away for the reaction. The arm is looking much better 2 hours later, the swelling is barely noticable now. It was very scary looking & super itchy.

Basically the Dr. said I'm having an allergic reaction to everything that they tested me for today - indoor/outdoor allergens. So a new list of meds to try, keep a daily journal of my reactions/nonreactions and get rid of the carpet (duhh).

Nico enjoying his lolly, the nurse bribed him into talking. The boy would not say word to anyone, just his name. He was very good during the hour interview & testing. He sat there watching the nurse administer the tests and then asked me questions about what they were doing after the nurse & dr. left the room.

Henry goes in on Thursday for testing, the kid doesn't have a chance. He's just like me in every way other than look (thankgoodness). Hopefully he'll sit thru the scratch test like he did with the blood withdrawal. I'm going to have to bribe him with some new legos or something, it is not easy to sit there and let them pick you with a straight pin repeatedly.

Tired

It's been a long weekend - Friday went to the store to finish up the Christmas Card camp & prep for Saturday crop, home by midnight. Back at the store 8am for the crop, home around 2am. Up at 8.30am to head back to the store for the card camp.

I'm finally home at 6.57pm on Sunday and kicking back with a Yuengling. The boys will be arriving home in a few hours, in the meantime I'm just veggin' and enjoying the quiet with my feet up. At the moment all i hear is cicadas in the backyard and the computer fan going. AHHH sweet silence.

Bucket head

Finished this last night, bucket head doing what he does best - riding around the kitchen wearing a garbage can.
I love the black border, I took the picture of the layout on a metal chair outside. It's been so overcast that indoor light is way to dim for a good colour shot. I'm keeping the chair as a backdrop.

Super Painter Guy

This picture of H is hilarious! He covered himself with paint & said his name was "SUPER PAINTER GUY!" He 's showing off his laserbeam arms & "shooting" holes in the living room walls.

I cut out the frame from Scenic Route paper & hand-cut the scallops around the edge.