Momma Bragging Moment!

Okay, so my youngest turned 9 yesterday!  Yikes! 

Where does time go?!  Lately mine has been going to the ball fields.  Trey made it on the Smithfield All Stars this year in coach pitch little league, and they are rocking it out!  They played in a tournament this weekend, came in second yesterday.  Two weekends ago they played against 23 teams in a tournament, and came in first place!  You can read an article about it here!  Trey is the first boy on the left in the second row!  This was the trophy for the whole team for getting first place two weeks ago. I have never jumped up and down so much!  We were so excited about their win, and were excited to know they got second, but for them to win two games against the number one team take first place was unbelievable!  I swear, those little boys amaze me with the plays they make!

Because they came in first they get to go to NC for a Super Regional tournament!  How exciting is that?!   I hope they play well, but either way, something to be super proud of years from now!

Snow Day!

Finally, we got snow here in VA! We've had two snow days, with no snow, this school year! Now, go figure no school on Monday and Tuesday due to Teacher work days, and we get a good snow storm! Funny! The kids and I headed out to play, and were out there for about an hour. Trey got chilled, and came in a few times. He didn't have snow boots, so he used my rain boots. We don't get a lot of snow, so that's why he didn't have any. Will have to get some on clearance for next year, just in case. I tried to stick on a pair of Gabi's older smaller boots on him, but he refused cuz they were pink! Like, who's gonna look at your shoes?!

We tried to build a snowman, but the snow was very dry and powdery. No sticking together. So, than Trey built a mound, or mountain, of snow as he called it! Gabi had little snowflakes stuck to her eyes! And you can see the balls of snow on her hair, and Trey hat.

This was Maxwell's first time in snow. He had fun, because several of the neighbor dogs came out, and he got to run around with them, too. Good thing he's so furry, cuz he stayed pretty warm.

Stamping and Family Fun Times.

Finally had some time to create today. It's been a busy few days, and it's been a while since I've played some challenges. I hope everyone had a blast for Halloween. Halloween was fun here. Will have to post a fun photo of that in a moment. I embarrassed poor Gabi and it shows all over her face in the photo. Cracked me up when I saw it later! Our cul-da-sac did a theme of Rednecks for Halloween, and I embellished myself with tattoos, big hair and heavy makeup. Not to say those are redneck things, but that combined with our neighbors and yard, it made me blend in well. Gabi seems to be a bit conservative like her momma, so it was over the top for her! My neighbor's helped decorate our front yard, which had Halloween, Nascar, lawnmowers, kid's toys, and other items thrown about. We added some lights just for fun! There's a photo below of that at night.

This is my Monday Mojo Card.

My take on Rachel's Cupcake Inspirational Challenge.

Pile It On's, Thank you.

Flutterby Wed's free challenge week.

I was moved by the pale blue in Rachel's Cupcakes, and the mushrooms. I added a little ladybug, but I think its hard to see in the photo. I used a Cosmo Cricket line from Rachel's store. I added Angel Wings shimmerz, and stickles to her wings. I popped my wagon, and masked her to add the mushrooms. The mushrooms are from a Doodle Fairy set.

Other supplies: CC designs, TAC sentiment, So Saffron cardstock, Red Riding red ink, stickles, copics, nesties.

Thanks for stopping by!

Total Sweetness!

Man, shame on my friend, Debbie! She sent me this uber cute image. I'm in love! Normally, I tend to go for the long haired Tilda's. Oh, I'm in trouble now! This cutie was so much fun to color! Made me smile, and reminded me of Shirley Temple! Anyhow, this is my card for the Just Magnolia Sketch. Thank you so much for the image! Very cute!

I'm way behind on blogging this week. It's been a rough week. I'm never sure on how I should view things on life sometimes. Like should you be embarrassed about something, or should you just own up to who you are and say this is me....I'm really a this is the deal type of gal, and possibly too honest for my own good. The last couple years my cycles have been getting the better of my moods, and lately, it's more often. So much to the point where I'm fighting stuff every other month, and it's creating a lot of personal havoc for me. I went to the DR the other day, and started meds for PMDD. How nice of the DR to confirm that I can be a total bag sometimes! LOL! Anyhow, I'm hoping that in a month, I'll be feeling more like my happy easy going self, and less like a pitbull all wound up ready to attack. It takes awhile for the meds to start working, and the mood swings are due to my cycle, so I gotta wait for it to come again to see if it helps. Being a girl is hard sometimes! Sorry for the way personal detail, but it seems like just about every four weeks I'm going on here saying it was rough again...and this is why!

I have to share one other thing, this darling card from my MIL that she sent to my kids. I got my MIL into stamping this past year, turns out to be fair, because she got me scrapping. She lives far away, so I don't get to create with her too often, but she's been moving along on her own. I was so proud of how far she's coming on her own that I wanted to show it off for her. I love seeing someone else get into stamping, and knowing that she's enjoying herself with this hobby.
Supplies: copics, Magnolia stamp, SU sentiment, cardstock-cool carri, pink pirq, and ink, DCWV Sweet stack, primas, SU punches, nesties, stickles.

How funny is life?

No card today. But funny evening for me. So, my washer's been acting up for about 6 months at least. There's been some issues with the piece that gets pushed down from the lid, that more or less controls the timer changes. I've been able to work around it by pushing on the lid in a certain spot, and stuff like that. Sept it got a little more ornery, but I figured Congress is gonna get that Rebates for old appliances up, so I'll get a new one than. Never wait on Congress....right? Well, it got really bad this past week, where I was able to rig it with a screwdriver down the hold, and put the lid down to keep the screwdriver in place. This worked well on Sunday, got all my loads done. Today, it won't work. I've got a few loads to do, and no luck. I had to start standing over the washer, holding the screwdriver down to get the cycles to work. Than my last load of the day, I go to put the screwdriver in, and bam, the flipping piece breaks off. Now, the washer is stuck totally full of water, with 4 throw blankets, just sitting waiting to go to the next cycle.
Here we stop for a moment, because small story in between this one. Maxwell, the 6 month old puppy, and Precious, the 14 year old cranky cat, are coming together in my bedroom. My butt is by the washer in front of my room. I keep telling him to leave it, and she's hissing like a wild cat at him. He's doppy, innocent doggie, not wanting to hurt her. Keeps going up to her. She's aggressive towards him. She freaking made him pee! Scared the pee out of the boy! Sigh! She's got no claws, and is missing teeth. Really, what can she do to you?!
Get that cleaned up, go back to the washer situation. Meanwhile dinner is started. I stick my finger up the little hole, under the metal frame. Dang it, I got shocked! Really?! How funny is that?!
Moral of my story, don't let the cat and the dog make friends cuz you've got your finger up a hole that'll shock you! And please, be careful not to burn the dinner!
Life is good!

Flutterby Birthday

Man, a work in progress today. Hard to get back into the swing of things with the kids starting school. I like to help out as often as I can, so I'm trying to balance two schools. Fun part, both kids start/end at the same exact time and are about 15 minutes apart this year. So, I started this card this afternoon, and just now finished it!

Here is my Mojo Monday challenge. I flipped it. It's also a Pile it on Challenge, which was birthday. And Flutterby Wed, which was pink card. Exciting news, I won some fun blog candy from Danni! Woo hoo, and a big thanks, Danni! I didn't have time to stalk a lot of other challenges today. Only three, that's a short list for me! LOL!

Anyhow, it's TAC's pattern paper, More Mimi, Mimi-retired, and a Mabelle Rose stamp set called Fairy Wishes. So cute. She's got a new one out too, that's even cuter! I almost used it, cuz I got it, but remembered, fairies! No fairies in that set. My cardstocks are SU's rose red, and creamy caramel. Colored her with copics, paper pieced her, and used some fun paper from Target, the major glitter layer. Than she's topped with stickles.

As always thanks for stopping by!

Here's a fun shot of the kids for the first day of school this past week. Gabi was all about the bling! I found her whole outfite, outside of the leggins at Justice. I made her wear black to try to not look like bubble gum so much! This card is so her in fact! Trey was a cool dude, cuz Daddy was saying Momma goes over board with photos. I don't think so!

Abundant Mojo

This one took me awhile today! Always good when a challenge is a challenge, right? I used TAC's More Abundance, and Willoughby paper pack. The cardstock is PTI Old Olive, and their dark brown color. My ink colors are SU's Baja and Choco chip. I brushed my flower with blue shimmerz, and topped it with a gem. The punch is the new SU word punch.

Last night Maxwell was too cute. I have a mirror from a bathroom remodel in my dinning room, which is never used for that purpose. I use the mirror to help Gabi with dance routine practices. He kept thinking he was seeing his siblings last night, and playing with the doggie in the mirror. So cute! Kids have worn him out today!

Sparkling Elzy and Max

Today Sparkle had a layout for us to use for her Christmas Card Challenge! Love having the layout done for me! I had picked up a bunch of Elzybell stamps in June because of her running some specials. So, I figured I'd use one of those new stamps. Had a hard time picking which one to use. I ran into a problem with her hair line, colored too deep, so I gave the girl some bangs! I paper pieced her jacket. Reminds of something Gabi would totally wear. The more bling the better! I had the snowflake buttons on hand, and they matched the paper from DCWV perfectly!

I swear, you gotta love nesties. They just cut things so nice and perfectly for cards! Makes it so much easier, I kept wondering what I did before I had them, because I sure do use them a lot!

Other supplies:Martha punch, DCWV cardstock, ink from Michael's, copics.

And we picked up a new family member today. We've been waiting to take one home for a few weeks now. I would have taken two, but Paul thought that was a bit much. So, we brought home one today. Trey has named him Maxwell! So, Meet Maxwell! Gonna make for a cute scrapbook page! He's sleeping right now, exciting day for him, I'm sure. We adopted him, so I'm not sure what his breed is, and all that jazz. He's currently a calm little chap, but I'm sure once he's feeling more at home, I'm gonna see a different doggie! The cats are just now figuring out he's here, and thankfully, he's mellow right now! Give them all time to adjust before he's active.

Flutterby Genevieve

Play Flutterby Wed today from Danni's blog. Seems like awhile since I've played that one. Grabbed my TAC set called Beauty and my Genevieve paper pack. The cardstock is Retired Purely Pom from SU. I used a new EK punch, that also punched out itty bitty flowers, so I added them to the card too. Other supplies: stickles, ribbon, and copics. Copics:BG01, B02, BG05, G85, G94, V15, V17. Vooo.

I just realized this weekend is Father's Day, so I need to pop out a few FD cards! Quickly too!

Last nights All Stars game went well. They won 23 to 3. Tonight's team will be harder to beat. Trey was so excited about it today that he got dressed again in his uniform. Yea, it was dirty from last night, and wearing it all day yesterday! But impossible to get it off him today! I wasn't able to snap a lot of photos last night, so I clicked one today. Doesn't he look so happy and cute?! So proud of himself!

Thanks for stopping by.

Trey's Last bat

Today was Trey's last official T-Ball Game. He made All-Stars, so he has a few more games to play with that team. This was his last with Daddy coaching. Paul was so sweet, he went into the dug out before their last hit, and told them: This is your last hit for the year. You're gonna have to think about this hit for the next nine months until next season. Make sure you make it a good one. I think the sentiment was lost on a bunch of 5 and 6 year olds, but I thought it was so sweet he said that to them. I captured them all at bat their last time, and you know I gotta show off my boy's last hit. I snapped two, one of him in stance, and one after he's swung the bat. I don't know if it shows his face well enough to see how serious the chap is when he's at bat! So cute to watch.

Wonderfully Sad Weekend

The dance recital went very well. Gabi did a fantastic job. I was so proud of her, and excited to watch her perform stuff she's been working on all year. She did 3 shows, and 8 routines. I wasn't able to get photos of all her costumes because in the third show they were all back to back quick changes. No time for photos. These photos are of her in the Swan Lake Ballet. Her class was the Russians. Her lime green outfit was her baton outfit. And the purple and black outfit was one of her group production pieces.
Paul's Mom and Step-Dad were able to come watch this year. This was the first time they were able to see her perform.

Than it was sad ending for us, because her favorite dance instructor is leaving the studio. Gabi's taking classes with her for 5 years, and they have such a sweet bond. She always makes her feel so special, and she does that with so many of the girls. She brought the studio to tears when the students had to say good bye. Gabi advoided all of that after the end of the show, but I took her by the hand before we left and told she knew what we had to do. Than she just burst into tears. Mrs. Chrissy just picked her up and gave her the longest hug and they both just cried. Brings tears to my eyes thinking about the gentle exchange between the two knowing the two just bring smiles to each other when they have class together. Than poor Gabi cried the whole way home, which was a good 45 minutes away. As a parent, I'm touched with how wonderful she made my child feel every time she came to class. I'm so grateful she had the time with Mrs. Chrissy that she had, and I'm so sad for Gabi that she won't get that any more with her. She has some sons Gabi's age, so I'm wishfully thinking maybe they'll meet and fall head of heals and get married later in life. Than she would have the perfect mother in law!

Card Making Skills!

I put some card making skills to good use today! Gabi has a jazz/hip hop routine and we had to decorate a black hat that was part of her costume. She's a total bling gal, but aren't we all? So, I found these cool flat gems at Michaels in the colors of her costume. I than pulled out my crystal effects, and glued them down-in a pattern too! I actually laid them out before I glued them down! I had thought process! This was my first time decorating clothing with gems, and it turned out pretty good, if I do say so myself! Than I layered up the white part with fine glitter! Thinking dazzling dust technique! Resulting in a lovely blinged up hat for my hip hopping girl! Coarse, I don't think bling and hip hop go arm in arm, but hey, it matches Gabi's personality! She posed for a quick, awful quality photo to show off what I accomplished today, instead of a card! Hoping tomorrow is a card, but just found out my in laws are coming in town a day sooner than I expected for the recital, and hubby's birthday is tomorrow!

Quick few photos and Trey story.

I got some photos in the other day from Trey's baseball photos, and spring school photos. I'm not posting Trey's school photo, because I have his Tball photo. The guy who does the photography for the tball league takes them of the coaches too for free. So, they took a photo of Trey and Paul. Such a sweet photo. I'm looking forward to scrapping it. Paul had a few call outs at the restaurant, so he had to skip the game that week, but stayed long enough for the photos. So, he's wearing dress shoes, and slackes in the photo. I was so worked up over Trey's smile, or lack of in his photo, that I didn't notice the pants in this photo! How cute is it that one leg is higher than the other. In his individual photo, he's bitting his bottom lip, instead of smiling! I so wanted an open mouth smile to show his growing in teeth!

Gabi just looks so much older to me in this photo. It's a lovely photo of her. Just amazed me at how much older she seemed in the picture. Hopefully, time permitting, I'll get a Flutterby card done today. It's a busy night, Gabi's got dance, followed by a meeting at her new school for next year, and than Lost! Our current school only goes to third grade, so it's her last year there. So sad, because I love her school!

Now to my story. Last night was the first grade PTA performance. Trey was some how selected to have a speaking part. He's a very quiet kid in school, and teachers often complain they can't get him to talk to them. Naturally, I was shocked to hear he had a speaking part. Than I figured it was a lot of kids in his grade. Discovered it was only 10 kids who had speaking parts. Now, I have no idea what to expect from him, but my guess was we wouldn't hear a peep from him! I was commenting to friends how we had no idea what was gonna happen when he went up to talk. Let me tell you, I was floored when he spoke, because he was so loud in the mike, it caught me off guard! My jaw dropped! My neighbor was sitting by me, and went, well, he wasn't quiet tonight! Even his teacher commented when we went to get him how surprised she was, because she was expecting it to be worse with him in front of everyone. I was so proud of him, because I know that had to be very hard for him, but he came thru LOUD and clear! LOL!

Paper Mojo

I made this card last night, and really struggled with it. Not sure why, the layout at Mojo Monday was perfect, and I had that part come together so nicely. Than I went to add my images and was lost! I pulled out a Paper Trey Ink set, and got ready to go. But than I struggled getting it to work the way I was hoping. I think it's because I saw so many awesome cards on the blog with the swirly flower and I should have used that part of the PTI set, instead of the part I did use. So, I can see me trying this layout challenge again. I worked on it so long, and it got too late to switch gears. I even left at one point, but found hubby in the shower, which stopped me from taking a bath. (That's not where this post is going!) There would be no hot water for me to take a bath! Instead of relaxing in the tub, I returned to the card, and finished it. I wasn't sure I was happy with it last night. But this morning, looking over it, it's a pretty card. It's just what I was hoping for. If that makes sense!

Supplies: Basic Grey pattern papers, SU Carr. blue, wild wasabi, pretty in pink, SU ink wild wasabi, regal rose, cert. celery, shimmerz blue and pink, gems, primas, TAC Swirly, PTI With Sympathy, nesties.

Sparkle Santa

I keep meaning to tell you all this story. Remember the story about Paul saying something about the jelly beans being in the eggs, not in bags in the kids Easter Basket in front of Gabi? Well, the whole next day she kept asking about it, and telling me she didn't think the EB was real. Her little contraption at the end of her bed with the tied up basket didn't help me either. I kept looking that night to make sure she was asleep, so I'm not sure if she was faking it or what, but she did tell me she saw the basket was missing at one point. Would have been when I was filling it!

Anyhow, so this goes on all day, and I finally told her I didn't think she really wanted me to answer the questions she was asking. I also am a parent who believes in telling the truth, so they will believe me when I tell them things are bad for them in the future, or they'll be dead meat if they do things they see on tv. I don't lie if they're getting a shot at the DR check up. I feel it's important for them to believe what I say. She said she really wanted to know, so I told her the truth about the EB.

She felt very proud of herself that she'd figured me out, but than I had to add into the mix about Santa as well. Oh, the face was priceless! She'd come home several times in Dec because the kids were discussing it, and half of them know who Santa is. Just the look of anger, disbelief and a nine year old crossing her arms and stomping her feet was so worth it to ruin that one magical moment left for her. Yes, I have a sick sense of humor! Don't fret, she took it in good stride! And was told she had to keep this secret from her friends, and her younger brother. So far she has done just that. Her brother even offered to pay her for her little secret. I felt relief after telling her. I mean, keeping that up for a nine year old is pretty hard! I have to have neighbors write their Christmas tags from Santa, and I even use different wrapping paper! It's tough keeping up that illusion. Than a few days later, she was saying she wanted the new DSi, and I gave her my normal response which is always, better ask Santa. I got a raised eyebrow from her! LOL!

So, today's Sparkle Challenge had to have a Santa on the card. I love how this card turned out. The paper line is one of my favorites because of the bright colors. Just a fun paper. I discovered I only have a hand full of Santa stamps! The sentiment is from a TAC set they had out a few years ago.

Other supplies: copics, nesties, fun flock with glitter in it, applique, ribbon, EK punch, SU word punch, PTI Pure poppy cardstock, SU Wild Wasabi cardstock.

An April's Fool...

Sounds like a good title for the day! Two foolish things happened today. I got so excited seeing that fairies could be part of Danni's Flutterby Weds, I missed the detail that said it starts NEXT week! So, I sat down, started to create. Worked around some scraps, cuz that works for Barb's use those scraps challenge, only to go back to review the sketch Danni had last week, and saw this week, no pattern paper! ACK! I had already colored her. So, my card is girly! Very girly! But I stuck to the challenge, and completed the card. Reminded me how things used to be done back when I first started stamping! I popped out her arm and wings, but glued the center part down, to make the rest come out from her shoulder. I added shimmerz, and stickles, to the wings. You can see the shimmer in the photo below.
Than my second event today involved a little man named Trey. Got a call from the school about 15 minutes before they were due to be released. Trey was burning up with a fever. Could be totally possible, due to my state the last few days. Moms touch everything, and as much I used a ton of hand sanitizer, I touched a ton of things that they use. So, I rush up there. They had already pulled Gabi out of class. That was kinda odd. I sign them out, he says his throat hurts. I get him home, check the temp, it's 99.4 Okay, that's not burning up. Turns out a dude check him, not a nurse, and by touching him. I don't think I can ever thing of a time when Paul's known from a touch that they were ill. Turns out he had been outside at recess prior to going to the nurse, so I think that accounted for some over heating. But I found all this out after he gobbled up a ton of food...with his sore throat? I can't take him back tomorrow, as the school was freaked out, cuz they yanked the daughter out of class too! So, I'm going to the DR tomorrow, just in case, but I'll be shocked if it's strep. I think he just pulled off the best April Fool's Day joke for a 6 year old! Put the whole school on panic mode! Too funny!

Supplies: lyra water crayons, nesties, Pixie pink cardstock, and ink, PTI black cardstock, and blue. CB folder,

Funky night with a snow day!

Last night the news was all about the snow heading up from the south. We were watching to see if it was actually, seriously gonna get near us. They called for a major snow storm back in Jan, and it never happened! Funny thing was the news was all hyped up about it that they called off schools to have nothing land on the ground in the form of snow! Well, at ten-ish last night we lost power. House went dark!

I'm not the most organized person, and the kids tend to grab flash lights. Paul and I spent 20/30 minutes looking for flashlights or matches with our cell phones! Such a funny sight! He had left the lighter stick outside, so it was wet from all the rain yesterday. I haven't had matches in the house in the longest time, so there was a small shot of us having them, and them being in the junk drawer.

Yea, that was fun going thru with a cell phone! I didn't find any. Paul found a flashlight in the garage. At some point he passed it off to me, and I found a pack of matches in the junk drawer, and we had light again via candles. But I was right in the middle of Brothers and Sisters, and I have no idea what happened to Hottie Rob! I hope they didn't kill him off! So, we passed the time playing Phase 10 until I was ready for bed. Hard to sleep without my white noise making fan! Power stayed off until 9 this morning. Coarse I was all worried about waking up, and making sure we made it to school on time, and Paul was concerned about the openers at the restaurant, so he was set to get up to be at CFA by 5. Neither of us slept well. Image trying to find out if you have school with snow on the ground and no power! Can't watch the local news, and the phones are connected by powercords too! Paul ended up calling me from Chick-fil-A, so I had him look it up on line there! LOL!

Kids where exited when they woke up to the snow! It's was that fun, wet, fluffy kind of snow too! The trees looked so pretty! First snow all season, will surely be the last one this season, and for the year. Note Trey's 'snowball' he made! That boy is full of tall stories! I need to write these down and make a book out of it when he's older! Hope you enjoyed the lovely photos of our adventure today! Gabi had to make a snow angel. That's her favorite thing to do when it snows outside. And one kitty was brave enough to venture into the snow. Miss Blondie! I swear, that cat is part dog! She was out about the entire time the kids were. Thankfully, the county made the call today to open later tomorrow, so they don't have to be at school until after ten! That'll be nice for Momma! Coarse, I'm already trying to figure out how I'm gonna get these two to blend on a scrapbook! Trey's got red and orange and Gabi's decked in pink, with a splash of purple! Sheesh! That's gonna be an interesting scrapbook page!

OMG! OMG! OMG!!

Okay, today was like totally rocking mail day! I must have said OMG! Like 50 times in 10 seconds! My Whiff of Joy spring set came today! OMG!!! If you ordered it, HOLY HECK! It stinking ROCKS!!!!!! It is beyond darling! I'm thinking the kids year book is so not getting done any time soon! LOL! Wow!

Than I ordered some stuff from Queen and Co, one of my fav places for brads and stuff. They had buy one get one, so lots of stuff there!

Than I started chatting with a sweet lady in England, and we traded some images. Or should I say I traded some images, and she flat out spoiled me rotten! She sent me more than "some images", some darling ribbon, two cute stamps, and paper to match! What a sweet heart! And the images she sent are all so sweet and darling! Thanks a ton, you shouldn't have, Linda!

Happy Gal!

That made me happy! I just got a blog header photo up there! All on my own too! I'm fairly excited about that. Trust me, it's the little things that make me giggle! I even took the photo of some scraps of paper I had from The Angel Company, TAC, paper pack called Mimi. I love that paper line. Such pretty colors! Next I'll have to learn how to put in those links that take folks to websites. Cuz I have no idea if http://www.theangelcompany.net/ will turn into a link to send you to the website to learn about their products.

(Mmm, looks like I need to figure out how to make that title box a touch smaller. I bet someone will have some advise on that topic for me! )

I've been a busy lady lately. I started, figured I'd have a few moments here or there to pop up something, and instead, no luck. It's been a crazy few weeks for this family. Opening the new CFA has been a ton hard work. But totally fun!