My 2011 Summer CHA Picks!

Here's a few of my favorite releases from CHA this summer. :)

LOVE this Halloween line from Echo Park. (Brace yourself, there's a lot more Halloween ahead!)

I completely and absolutely adore the Christmas line from Authenique! (Quite a bit of Christmas too!)

They've got a super fun Halloween line, too! (See, I told you! More Halloween already!)

I can't wait to get my hands on the Farmhouse collection from October Afternoon. It's just gorgeous!!!! (Finally, something not Halloween or Christmas!)

Their Sasparilla line looks super cute, too!

The Memoir line from Studio Calico is another line that I just have to have. Love the bright warm colors. Gorgeous!!!

I love this cute pinecone die from Sizzix. Isn't just adorable??? So stinkin' clever!

I really loved the last Pink Paislee/Collage Press release, Hometown Summer. I didn't think I would at first but they have some seriously amazing b-sides. This one has that same feel. Can't wait to see it in real life!

My Mind's Eye came out with four more color ways to go with their Lost & Found line. I'm probably going to pick up one or two from each color with the majority being from this Blush line. Did you see that label paper???

They also have a really cute Halloween line. I love the touches of aqua! (More Halloween!)

My Little Shoebox had a couple of releases that really grabbed me. First up, the pretty florals in Enchanted Garden. Love the blue flowers on the yellow background! They are another company that rocks the b-sides!

My other favorite line from them is the Audrey line. I was fortunate enough to win it on their Facebook page! I've already received it and it's adorable!!! I'm super partial to the name, too!

I loved everything from Lily Bee Designs. The Christmas line is fab with those amazing trees. (Not the last Christmas you'll see!)

My very favorite release from them is their Valentine's line, Head Over Heels. The colors and patterns are seriously luscious!!! Their Memorandum line is half office inspired themes and half fun patterns in pretty, pretty colors!

They also have a fall theme that's just wonderful. I seriously love Lilybee!!!

Jillibean had some great releases, too. My favorite is Homemade 6 Bean Soup. It's got a cute, vintage sewing theme. (I tried to just show you the 6x6 pad but this is all one image. Yikes!!!)

Love Crate's Peppermint line, so pretty and so versatile! (There it is our final Christmas!!!)

Love their fall line, Farmhouse, too. So warm, so yummy, so on my list! :) (And, the second line named Farmhouse that I adore!)

Lovin' the Tiny Text from Cosmo Cricket! I hope they come out with more of these. :)

Well, there you have it. Some of my favs this release! There were a few more that I liked but didn't add because there has to be an end somewhere. Especially since what I liked was more Christmas and Halloween. For example, Simple Stories and Teresa Collins. I'd have to celebrate Christmas 10 times a year if I got all the lines I loved! Hee!

Do you have a CHA list? Are any of ours the same? Did I miss something fab? Please share! :)

Punky Sprouts!!!

Hey guys! Here's a layout that I made for Punky Sprouts this month. I chose to do a wedding layout because it's one of the categories for the Clackamas County Fair. I swear, if it wasn't for that fair, I'd never scrap my wedding! Hee!

Here's a close up of the paper waving technique. I first saw this over at Lolly Chops blog. Mmmm, I love that Portrait paper line from Crate!!! And, a close up of my flower. I made it with a Lil' Stem and a few Lil' Petals as leaves. I also built the entire layout on a piece of Punky Punkyground. It's going to go in our dining room so the Punky Playground will make it much easier to display.

You can see a little more info on this layout up on the Punky Sprouts blog here.

Thanks for stoppin' by! Stay tuned for a post about some of my CHA favs!!!

More Old School Scrappin'!

So, not only did I use a paper crimper yesterday, today I used some old Creative Imaginations papers! I'm pretty sure I picked this stuff up in 2007! :)

In other news, today Audrey went down for her nap like a little angel. None of the screeches and screaming fits that we've been having for the last few weeks. I'm pretty sure she was just trying to make up for pouring pink glitter paint on my scrap desk and breaking a bottle of black nail polish in the bathroom.

Life's never boring! :)

Just For Fun!

I was playing with my August My Scrapbook Nook kit last night and I busted out the paper crimper! Hee! I'd forgotten how much fun that thing is!


I also altered this Happy Cow cheese container that my Granny had given me a while back. It's now a treasure box for Mickey!

I think we are going to put his Viewfinder discs in it so that Audrey will be less likely to destroy them. :)

Thanks for stoppin' by! :)

Dixie Pieces August Kit!!!

I had such a good time with Dixie Pieces' Simple Life kit! It was an amazing mix of products, I don't know how Sherri does it! Here's the kit itself. Love the warm, bright colors!!!
I saw this little phrase on Simple Stories Photo Mat paper and knew exactly what I was going to do with it. I used the included Jillibean stamp to create my journaling block which is simply a list of our favorite events at Doernbecher's.

Journaling reads...5-Getting positive EEG results, 4-Hearing you say ma-ma, 3-Watching you write the letter "A", 2-Seeing all the wires & tubes come out, 1-Bringing you home safe and sound!

Next up, a layout about Miss Thing. I loved that pink piece from the Photo Mat the instant I saw it and knew it would be great for a layout about her with lots of journaling. I also had a lot of fun with the washi tape included in this kit. If you subscribe to the Dixie Pieces newsletter, you'll find a tutorial on how I made the little rose by the title using the tape.

Journaling reads~Audrey, You love it when I do your hair and you are always asking me for "piggies" or a "pony". I sit you on the bathroom counter and dig out a brush, comb, rubber bands and hair clips and then we spend five to ten minutes playing with your hair until it's "pretty". When we first started doing your hair, you were really good about leaving it alone and your cute little hairstyles would last until nap time. lately, you've started playing with your hair and I'm lucky if it stays "pretty" for the same amount of time that it took to do your hair. I took these pictures just to prove that we did try to do your hair. It took you less than three minutes to take this style apart. It's okay though, we have fun together and that's all that really matter. Love, Mom

My last layout uses that papers from Simple Stories, My Mind's Eye and Fancy Pants. I love how they look together. :)

Journaling reads~It was so nice to be able to take you two to DQ. The last trip we planned was the evening of Mickey's accident. So these Dilly Bars were extra sweet!

I also made this fun card for my uncle's birthday. (He loved it!)

And, I altered this frame that I'd picked up a few weeks ago at a garage sale for a buck. I just added spray paint and the kit and now it's sitting proudly in our living room! :)

There are a few extras available this month, too! There's a Fancy Pants brag book and a Simple Life paper add-on as well as the Simple Life kit itself.

Week in the Life -Day 7

Last day of Week in the Life! I made it! Wheeeeeeee! :D


This morning started out pretty silly. I came out of the bedroom to find my kids taking turns smelling daddy's feet, shrieking "Stinky!!!" and laughing like little maniacs. :)
I had my normal breakfast because even though we were going out to breakfast I knew I'd eat way too much if I skipped it.

Little Man wanted to bring SoftDog to the country club and we let him. SoftDog is his most favorite toy and one he sleeps with every night.

We were a little frantic getting out of the house and we figured we'd be either right on time or just a minute or two late. We pulled up to the main street in town and Andrew started laughing. The lights were flashing and the gates came down and we were officially going to be late. It wound up taking a few minutes for this to scoot in front of us and then the gates came back up.

Audrey was looking super adorable and getting all sorts of attention from the grandparent age group at the country club. However, she was feeling a little shy and this was the pouty little hesitant look she shot the kind old gent who was talking too her.

Here's our breakfast group. We went to breakfast for my uncle's birthday. He's the handsome gentleman on the left. :) You're probably wondering why I didn't ask everyone to smile but it's because that if I'm not sneaky about my group shots, my granny will hide! She hates the camera. She only barely tolerates it at times because she loves me. :D

Mickey got Mickey Mouse pancakes! Aud had bacon and eggs with hash browns and Grandpa Larry's fruit, Andrew had a huge, loaded with meat omelet and I had bacon and eggs and fruit and one of my mom's blueberry pancakes. Mickey also had one of Granny's pancakes and Uncle Doug's fruit. The kid was just packin' it in!

Some after meal silliness with SoftDog and Daddy.

When we got home we all changed clothes and got ready for the party. It went really well and everyone had a good time.

Audrey had a blast in the pool with her Daddy and kept asking to go swimming. Her cousin's obliged her one time but didn't realize that we'd put her back in a normal diaper because those swim diapers don't hold anything. She looked soooooo funny when I got her out. Hee!

Other party activities were horse shoes...

volleyball...

and more swimming! The weather was perfect. Warm enough to swim but not so hot that everyone else was miserable.

My sister-in-law and I were walking around the property talking plants (she's amazing with plants!) and we found this little fort thingy Mickey built. I love it! It's so the kind of thing my brother and I did when we were kids. :)

More chatting with family. :)

My nephew had my camera and couldn't get it to take a picture. I finally put it on full auto (or as he called it, idiot mode) and he started snapping away. I was pretty happy when I saw this because I didn't really get a shot of myself today. Too busy! (You'll see my last ditch effort below.)

Here it is! The yikes-I-didn't-get-a-shot-of-me-self-portrait-in-a-window shot. It's famous world wide, don't ya know! I was taking a sleepy Miss Thing into the house to get her all set up watching a movie on the couch while everyone was leaving.

Not everyone left though. Two people (complete strangers to us!) stayed until almost midnight! Andrew had kindly invited them in after everyone else left and it was just us and them. Andrew and kids promptly fell asleep on the BigChair and I was left with them. I finally told them I needed to tuck the kids into bed and pinched Andrew when I got them so he'd wake up. They finally left and we were able to go to bed ourselves.

It's kind of appropriate that this super busy day was the wind up to a very busy week. I think our only days of down time were Friday and Saturday. Our summer's are always like this. A week or two of super busy followed by weeks of nothing. It's pretty cool because we have fun and we are also able to relax and just be a family.

So that's it. My Week in the Life. I still have to get my photos off my iPhone and then I can start putting my album together. Since this is my first one, I think I'll wait until I see how Ali's doing hers and check out the albums of the ladies that are linking to her blog.

Week in the Life-Day 6

Saturday started bright and early for us. Andrew had an early morning business call and so instead of having him drive all the way into work and back on a Saturday, I decided to take the kids garage sale-ing! First step, hitting the ATM for some mad money!

Then, since the garage sales don't start until 8:00 and we took off at 7:30, we hit McDonald's and the kids got to split their first ever Egg McMuffin. They were a little sceptical at first but then they loved it! Aud had juice with her half and all Mickey wanted was a water. I had my favorite, a bacon, egg & cheese biscuit. Those things are heavenly!!!

One of the coolest things we picked up was this guitar. Andrew had jokingly said to buy him something and he never says that. So, we got him some gag glasses at one of the first sales and then we found this guitar. He's secretly always wanted to play the guitar so I was so excited to find this one for only $10!!!

It was another good mail day. I'd won a Facebook contest and my prize was the new Audrey line from My Little Shoebox. I love it! (And not just because of it's awesome name!) Mickey loves opening up scrappy mail with me but gets a bit disappointed. I'm going to have to order him some stuff with my next order so he gets a goodie too! He's started scrapping with me and I even got him his very own real scrap stuff, including my old trimmer!

When we got home Andrew was feverishly mowing the lawn in preparation for Sunday's party. The man is determined to have the best lawn on the street and he's been hand watering it all week and then cross mowed it today. Hee!

Here's what we picked up for a whopping $26.50! It was a much better day for the kids than for me. All I found was a $.25 bag of sequins. They had a blast because I gave them each $5 to buy stuff with. Aud was completely non-plussed but Mickey was super excited and kept it in his pocket the whole time and wasn't scared to pay the people. It was so cute!

Lunch was up next and the kids had PB&J and I had my current obsession, Wheat Thins, a dill pickle and some Tillamook Medium Cheddar. Oh, that is the best cheese! Yummers!!!!

Aud was outside with Andrew and got into the watercolors from yesterday. We think she was putting on makeup. Hee!

Mickey was behaving and playing with his new cars (and Aud's new cars, too!).

My boys resting after setting up for the party.

Audrey was snuggling with Rillah, our cat. When I first got her, she was a skittish nut and I never thought she'd be as good with our kids as she is. Aud can pick her up and drag her around and she's totally fine with it.

My favorite picture from this whole week!

After dinner it was Popsicle time. Mickey chose green.

I finally got some pics of Devo, he's our almost 15 year old Whippet.

After dinner it was time for a much needed bath. Aud's hair doesn't like regular baby shampoo so it's No More Tangles all the way for her.

During bath time, Andrew started reading the book that came with his guitar and it made me sooooo happy. :D

When I was brushing out Aud's hair I was impressed with how long it was getting. She was having fun pretending to put her hair in "piggies"!

After such a long day, I decided to have some relaxing mom time. Good old Harry Potter and my very own bowl of popcorn!

Tomorrow I'll be back with Sunday's photos and a new Dixie Pieces post! I'm excited to start working on my actual Week in the Life album. :)