President's Day Photo Shoot

I borrowed the kids from their week of play to take these shots. I hadn't taken pictures of the kids for no reason (non-holiday, birthday, etc.) in awhile, and I wanted to take advantage of the light in the living room. I'm pretty happy with how they turned out.

I did, however, learn an important photography lesson. You can't mix kids and pets. 'Cause IF you get the kids to smile at the same time, and IF you get your unruly Lab to stay in one place, and IF the dog isn't rolling over or licking anyone's hands, and IF your camera takes the picture at the right time... The dog will STILL like her nose or stick out her tongue so it looks like the kids are choking her. *sigh*

More Layouts of the Day

Here's a quick catch-up on February 16-18:

Layout of the Day 2/15

Nicky took pity on me last night. I was playing pinochle instead of scrapping this layout of the day. So he thought he'd "help" and make it for me. Course, with all the help he needed to make it, I ended up losing pinochle, but I had lousy hands anyway. The layout needed 14 stars, "bling"(sparklies) and stamping.

Then of course, I had to sneaky make one myself, cause his wouldn't count for the contest. SHHH.... he thinks he got me the big points! I think his is cuter than mine, anyway.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Ugh... what a few weeks it has been!! We've all been busy, we've all taken turns being sick, the weather finally realized it was winter, and we snuck in fun where we could find it. Altogether, it's been crazy. But when is it ever NOT crazy??

Today finds us "snowed in" though we didn't really get much snow. It's the ice and sleet that are making the roads a mess. It still looks very pretty, especially since school was cancelled and Scott could work from home, so since we've no place to go... you know the rest!

We aren't doing anything special for Valentine's Day today. The kids made their usual homemade valentines for friends and family, and Scotty and I will probably go out this weekend. Scotty never gets me roses for Valentine's, which is just fine with me, since the markup is ridiculous. But he gets me roses for no reason, like these pretty ones from last week. So why would I complain?

Kairi had a sleepover last weekend. Four giggling girls doing craft and cooking projects on a Friday night makes for a very tired mama. But they seemed to have fun. Kai and I enjoyed decorating the house a little for the party, too - she especially liked the balloons. Gee, I wonder why?

Nicky was feeling a little left out at this point, so I took him all by himself to Jungle Fun last Saturday. He had a blast - especially attacking the hanging punching bags.

Last, here are a few shots from my Educator's Night Out at the Franklin Institute. We got to see the King Tut exhibit before it opened to the public, which was cool. Unfortunately, no photos allowed inside the exhibit. The artifacts were really amazing. The night out with friends from work, free dinner, and goody bag of classroom helps were pretty darn cool, too. The only drawback was the around the city block line, and the fact we got back home after 10 on a school night. Ah well - I can't wait to take my seventh graders on their field trip now!

Catch-up - Layouts of the Day

The layout above needed red, black, white, doodling, and three kinds of ribbon. I like it a lot because of the precious picture of Nicky with Hobbes.

This layout is from Nicky's trip to Jungle Fun for his birthday last year. It needed red, blue, brown, a ghost shape, 4 photos, and an arrow.

This layout had to use a poem that is typed on the brown strip on the left.

This layout needed paper from three manufacturers and _3_ bookplates! (Definitely a challenge!)

Layout of the Day 2/10

We had to use _23_ flowers and a black background on today's page. As you can see, I "cheated" and used pictures I took in my garden last spring.

Layout of the Day - Feb 9

Yes, I know I missed a day. That one calls for one large and two wallet photos, and I don't have them- I was planning on using some professional shots, and then I realized I had already scrapped the one that I have in a large size. Ooops. But I digress - I'll catch that up later. Until then, here's today's layout, using all the colors of the rainbow.

Oh, and one last thing. The next time I agree to a slumber party at our house, will someone PLEASE stop me???

*yawn*

Layout of the Day 2/7

The requirements were a winter theme, snowflake embellishments, and paper tearing. The picture of the layout doesn't do it justice. *sigh* I miss my scanner.

Layout(s) of the Day(s) - 2/5 and 2/6

Oops. Got a bit behind.

2/5 was free choice, but points for "secret" items. Hope I found a few:

2/6 had to include pink, green, epoxy stickers, paint and shapes cut out of patterned paper:

Layout of the Day - February 4th

I had to use the Dr. Seuss quote and stars on this one - the picture didn't come out well, though.

Layout of the Day - February 3

Today's layout needed blue, orange, and eyelets. Plenty there of all three, I'd say!

Layout of the Day - 2

Here's my second layout for my layout a day challenge. This one was supposed to have 3 photos and inking.

Happy Groundhog's Day, everyone!

A Layout A Day - February 1st

I'm in a challenge that will have me creating a layout a day for every day in February. I thought I'd post them here as I went along.

This layout had to have silk flowers, brads, buttons, ribbon, and letter stickers. I like that with all those required products, it's still pretty simple and non cluttered.




I'd rather be blogging about my fabulous preview trip to the Tut exhibit, but since I got home SO late last night, that will have to wait until I can download the pictures I took.

Happy February!

Surprise Vacation

So, this weekend, I decided to surprise my sister. She's 7 months pregnant, and on bed rest, so I thought it would be nice to drive up, keep her one year old occupied for a few hours, fill up her pantry (cause she's not supposed to be leaving the house), and generally give her some company. Surprise! Turns out we're the ones who got a great weekend out of the deal. (Though Cyndy enjoyed our visit, too, I hope!)

We drove up Saturday morning and stopped off at the grocery store to get pickles and ice cream (*grin*) and some yummy easy foods. I called her on some lame pretext as we got near her house, and ended the call by asking if she was going to open the door, cause it was cold. And boy was it! We happened to find the one place with SNOW in the northeast this winter, I think!

So, we chatted, I saw her gorgeous work on the new nursery, we played pinochle, ate a big breakfast and dinner (I was supposed to be NOT causing work, but Barry just jumped right in and handled all the cooking!) , and enjoyed our incredibly talkative little niece! She apparently has learned TONS of words since we saw her last. She recruited both of my kids as willing slaves. Then, this morning Barry and I took the kids out sledding while Scott and Cyndy hung out at the house. Plus, we got to sleep in their gorgeous Adirondack themed room with a fireplace and snow falling outside - seriously, who benefitted more by this deal, I ask you???

Here's some photo highlights. None of my sister, because she didn't look overly thrilled about having her picture taken. She's still tiny, whatever she may say - except for her stomach, which I do admit looks like she's having quadruplets! (Sorry, sis!)

Here's Baby Faith helping me with pinochle. Didn't need much help, though, with my sister bidding 70 on one hand!! (Long, giggly story - probably had to be there...)


She then captured my kids in the dog cage by crawling in, ordering them in after her, sneaking out, and shutting the door! She proceeded to play the piano for them - as Scott said, she had a "captive audience"!

And here's a ton of pictures from our snow adventures. The one big spill was so funny I had to include it - Nicky forgot to lean forward on the tube and fell off on his butt, which then caused Kai to flip head over heels. Naturally, she didn't find it amusing. Hm.








We rounded off the visit with a trip to Brook's BBQ on the way home. They have the WORLD'S BEST chicken, no lie. All in all, a much better weekend than we would have had staying home!

Finding Joy

This was an uneventful week in the average american household. Not much was happening that could be construed as exciting, or blog-worthy. But looking back over the whole week, (and downloading photos from same), there were plenty of little joys, if you know where to look...

We (or one of us):

-Read new Relevant magazine
-Beat the Browns on Madden O7
-Beat Bowser on The New Super Mario Bros.
-Read "Seabiscuit", again
-Watched "Top Chef"
-Made several scrapbook pages
-Played with Mommy's fuzzy scarf
-Watched "What's Up, Doc?"
-Got a blue tongue from raspberry drink at Perkins
-Finally spent birthday money on four fashion-conscious (and adorable) outfits
-Ate delicious tiramisu from the new Fresh Market
-Read "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix"
-Got beautiful pink roses
-Went rollerskating with a friend
-Got recruited to do the children's sermon five minutes before service, and actually pulled it off
-Helped several kids to NOT FAIL English by keeping them during lunch to finish work
-Played dress up as Voldemort and Darth Vader
-Caught up on sleep
-Watched 24, got the DVD, watched it again, watched the sneak preview of the first 10 minutes of next week, waited impatiently
-Woke up to the first dusting of snow of the season
-Updated the 24 Wiki
-Decided on a vacation destination for the summer, after much democratic debate - we're planning a combo trip to Philly and the Outer Banks

I think sometimes it's easy to look forward to big events coming in the future, or memories of the past. What's more difficult is to find joy in the everyday moments. Sure, there were some down moments this week, too. Lots of things didn't go the way we planned, tempers flared, people were cranky. But hopefully this little list will remind us to enjoy the little things in life.