News and 2 Announcements

Okay, first off, I'll start with the announcements. As you can probably tell by the new blinkie on my blog, I am participating in the Holly Jolly Christmas Blog Train. Just click on the image on top or the blinkie in the side bar for more information about this wonderful event. I am sooo looking forward to this and hope that you check back in on Dec. 15th to see what I have available for you.

Next, I am also now a CT member for Tirza's Treasures. I will be working with her kit "Victorian Grandmother" the next few days, so check back in to see what I come up with.

In other news, Roxy is all better and doing just fine. We have come to the realization that she likes to chew on and eat things that she really shouldn't. I found out that she not only ate part of the dish cloth, but also part of a 'Mr Clean Magic Eraser' and part of one of the sparkle candles from my daughters 20th birthday cake. Any one of these things could have caused what happened to her. I was so worried, I am so thankful we did not lose her. I am doing a much better job of keeping an eye on her and making sure she doesn't get ahold of something she shouldn't. It is hard, though. She is like a little toddler, everything goes into her mouth. Maybe one of these days she will learn and stop doing it. One can hope, anyway.

Also, I was going to post some more layouts and pics on my blog. I have been so busy making scrubs for my daughter and our dear friend, Jessica, plus organizing files and creating layouts, I haven't had time to get everything organized. I promise I will try to make a better effort tomorrow and get them posted. Plus, I have a sneak peek for you, also.

Well, time to run. It is early in the morning now and time for me to jump in bed and try to get some sleep. TTFN.

News and Updates

Sorry guys. I haven't been on very much since yesterday. I have been busy nursing dear doggie. As I told Tracy a couple of days ago, she apparently decided that a wash rag was a good source of protein and ate the corner off of it. Her face and neck started swelling up really bad, so I gave her a 1/4 of a Benadryl tab. The swelling started to go down and she seemed to be getting better. I haven't given her anymore Benadryl since early yesterday morning and she started swelling up again last night. She is eating and drinking just fine and everything is passing through ok, she runs around and acts like her normal self, just worried about the swelling in her neck. I am putting off taking her to the vet, unless the situation gets really bad. Vets are sooo expensive, I want to try to do what I can before going that extreme.

In other news, apparently DigiFree has found me. I am not sure if this is a good thing or a bad thing. I am a little embarrassed because they are not quite the quality of other designers kits I have seen and not up to the standards I have set for myself. I posted them on my blog just to show the difference of my previous work from then to my current creations now. I have some other kits I am working on, but are not ready yet. They will have a Victorian/Heritage feel to them. I will post them as soon as they are finished. I am currently working on some projects as Tracy's CT for Ambowife Designs and will get those posted as soon as I can, also.

I will try to be back later this evening with more posts. I have a ton of pictures I want to get uploaded. TTFN.

I made it

Finally, she breathed with a sigh of relief. I did it. I got everything transferred and uploaded. My whole blog life lays before your eyes now.

Please help, though. Does someone out there in digiscrapland have a solution for completely removing Internet Explorer? It has been driving me totally bonkers all day today. Every time I change from one screen to another, I have another pop up coming through. The problem is, I thought I removed IE. It is not on my list of programs on my computer anymore, but it still shows up in my program files and WILL NOT let me remove it. I also have Spybot and AVG and they have not been able to do anything about it, either. I am not sure which is worse, gray or bald. Just kidding. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

And now, for the Grand Finale, an announcement. A little late I know, but better late than never I always say. Yesterday, Tracy of Ambowife Designs was very gracious to accept me as one of her CT Members. If you transferred to my blog from hers, then you obviously already know this, LOL. I am so honored and thrilled. I have her newest kits downloaded and am now ready to play. They are to die for is all I can say. I was impressed looking at the previews on her blog, but they are FABULOUS. I can't say enough about them, I am speechless. Stay tuned, layouts forthcoming very soon.

The Water Elements Are After Me - Originally posted Oct 15th

She yelled before running screaming out the door. Just Kidding. Though it does make a person wonder at times. If you are wondering, yes, we flooded again. This time it was the drain in the shower that backed up. Ever have times that you feel like you just can't win for lose? I am having one of those days. At least it wasn't nearly as bad as the last time. It didn't take me nearly as long to get everything up off of the floor and cleaned up. I guess that was lucky.

Anyway, on to bigger and better things. Chelcey's 20th is coming up in a few days now. She is very excited and trying to weedle what she is getting for her birthday out of me. But, of course, I won't tell her. Here is a layout SHE created for her birthday invitations. I turned her loose on my computer after giving her some pointers and this is what she came up with. I am very impressed with her style. (I really did not want to mar the look of the layout, but I also did not want to post personal information all over the net for everyone to access, either.) The kit she used was Rose Boudoir by Lisa of Sophisticated Scraps. You can find it on her blog at www.sophisticatedscraps.blogspot.com Be sure to check her blog out. It is totally AWESOME.

Another Chelcey Layout

Awesome opportunity for me to dust off this page kit and finally have an excuse to scrap this photo of DD when she was 2 months old. I created this layout for Meryl's T42 & 24T Colorful Challenge. The pink of the background goes so well with the pink of her blanket. I think the picture needs to be bigger, though, and maybe a few more elements. I don't know, it seems I can never have too many elements.

I used Meryl's Lavender and Roses Page Kit exclusively on this one
http://store.digitalscrapbookplace.c...oducts_id=2582

Sam's Flyer

Here is a look at the flyer I put together for Sam when the dogs got out a while back. He is our OFD dog, which stands for Obsessive Fetch Disorder. He seems to think that everyone who comes to our house is there to play fetch with him, and he doesn't know when to quit.

First Birthdays

This layout, in my opinion, did not turn out well at all. The pictures were too dark and fuzzy. I have not had the time to go back and touch it up to make it look better. I have had several positive comments on the layout, but something is just missing and I can't quite put my finger on it yet. I will work on it and see what I can come up with.

Another Yellowstone Layout

This layout was for the Weekly Scraplift Challenge with Crissa at Digital Freebies. This was my first time ever doing a scraplift. I scraplifted Victoria32's Sunshine Funshine to come up with Yellowstone 2008.


I was looking for some layout ideas for a brag book of our trip to Yellowstone and this layout really inspired me and gave me lots of ideas. Thank you Victoria32.

I also used the Aug. 16-31 Double Trouble Sketch Challenge Template by Jennifer Schmitt.
I used Retrodiva's 'A Sunday Smile' Page Kit

The latest News - Originally posted Oct 4th

Well, unfortunately, the hunting trip was cancelled after all. Partly due to the recent weather. Brandon went with his friend up scouting during our little flooding issue and I guess they got pretty wet themselves. Brandon said it was like a Chinese water torture. Every time he moved away from one drip, another one found him. They came home soaked to the bone. Lucky they didn't get frost bite.

I finally finished cleaning up the basement and got all of the laundry washed, dried, folded and put away and everything else put back where it belongs. It has been a long 3 days. Now I will be able to get back to work and finish up my projects. Got to run. TTFN.

Update from the Chaos Front - originally posted Oct 1st

Dear Hubby Shoveling Water LOL

Ankle Deep in Water

The Culprit

Okay, I think the worst of the damage is over with. It is now 2 am and things are finally starting to settle down after our little adventure. Poor DH has to get up in 3 hours and try to go to work and DD has to get up in 6 hours in order for her to go to work. So, guess who gets to stay up for the rest of the night working on laundry and mopping up the rest of the disaster? You got it, me. I was working on the computer, multi-tasking again, when our Britney, 'Lilah started making some funny noises behind me. I tried to sush her quietly without waking up DH in bed sleeping. It is funny how the mind works in slow motion sometimes when you think back on it. I had turned to pick up a sock and throw it at the dog to make her stop fussing, when, in the back of my mind, I noticed that the sock I was throwing was sopping wet. I started wondering why the sock was so wet, when I noticed a puddle of water on the floor and water creeping across the floor towards me.

Then the brain suddenly kicked in and I realized we were in the beginning stages of a flood. All at the same time, I am wondering where all of this water is coming from. Did I leave the sprinklers on again? No, haven't turned the sprinklers on in days because of all of the rain lately. Okay, think. The neighbors? They had their sprinklers running for a while.

All of this is running through my mind as I am frantically waking my husband up to tell him what is going on and pulling electrical cords out of sockets and powering everything down. So much for trying to be quiet and not wake him up, right.

Well, anyway, I ran around for about 20 minutes trying to find out where R2-D2 got stashed away this time, after we ran outside into the front yard to find out what was going on. Come to find out, the sprinkler main at the side of the house burst. We were ankle deep in water in the front yard and had about 2 feet of water pooled up in the window sills of the basement. Lovely.

I finally found R2-D2 and got him plugged in and hooked up and started sucking water out of the window sills. I never thought I would fall in love with a shop vac, but believe me, he was a life saver tonight. I think we averted a disaster in time. It could have been so much worse in the long run. We are almost dried completely out at this point. Just need to mop up all of the laundry that got soaked and all of the towels that we threw on the floor trying to sop up all of the water. Just another adventure in the land of Chaos.

Chaos Reigns - Originally posted Sept 30th

This is another post I am moving from my old blog.

Okay, I think the pressure is off for a little while now. I was finally able to upload my itty bitty little contribution to the SNL scrappers website, at least I think I did. That is finished for now, until next round. Now I have 4 more layouts to finish by Friday. I think I can, I think I can, ....
Then I need to decide if I want to go with friends hunting this weekend or not. I mean, I want to, really, really bad. Just not sure if I am going to or not. Always so much to do and so little time to do it in. Tomorrow is always a new day to accomplish everything that needs to get done, right? I am hoping so. Seems like I have so much on my plate lately.

DH and I are thinking about moving his DM in with us to help with expenses since I am not working anymore. Sounds alright on the surface, until I analyze all of the work involved in moving my entire sewing room to a different location to make room for her to stay. That in turn involves cleaning out a different room and moving stuff out of the way for more stuff to move in. Beginning to sound like lots of fun.!? I am running out of room to put everything and don't know where to go from here. The only other solution I can come up with is a new house. Yah, Right. Sorry for the sarcasm, just a little stressed.

I am also considering taking in baby sitting 2 or 3 infants to help bring in enough to cover the payment on my beautiful new truck DH bought me before I lost my job and some of the groceries a month. Only real big issue seems to be, if DMIL moves in, will she be able to cope with young babies being in the house? Anyway, time will tell. Even though our house is ruled by the Chaos Theory, things always work out in the end.

Well, got to run, just found out that the sprinkler system sprung a leak and is flooding our basement like you would not believe. TTFN.

Welcome to My Crazy Life - originally posted Sept 20th

This is a post I moved from my old blogspot that I am deleting as soon as everything is moved.

Today has been a crazy and busy day. It started out pretty good this morning with normal activities. My older son came over for a visit today, which was very exciting. I haven't seen him in almost a month. He spent some time with us and then took off back to his house.

I am almost done with the macrame table plant hanger. I am just that close to being finished. Maybe it will get done tomorrow.

I got on the computer around noon and started scrapping for my latest challenge for Lauren Bavin's Gimme More Crops Last Days of Summer layout. I just finished that up when all #$@ broke loose. I had let all 3 of our dogs out back to go potty a few minutes before I finished the latest layout, and when I went back to check on them, THEY WERE GONE. No where to be found. I immediately went from room to room through the house looking to see if someone else had let them in, but no such luck.

We proceeded to get into the vehicles and wander around town for the next hour looking for them to no avail. We came back home and I called our local animal shelter to see if the pets had been reported. Again, no such luck. About then, a storm started to blow in with high winds, thunder and lightning, and started to rain. I was so upset. I came back to the computer and sat down to scrap layouts for Lost posters. Suddenly, my husband yelled down to me that they had been seen and reported standing in the middle of a busy street, that I needed to hurry and get there before they got hit or ran over. I went running out to the truck and flew down the street to the location where they were reportedly last seen. No sign of them when we got there. Luckily the animal control officer had my husbands cell phone number and I had the cell phone. At long last, we were able to track the 2 girls down and bring them home safe and sound, if a little drenched, cold and shaken from there excursion out of the back yard. Sam however was still MIA and a big concern. I finished his 'wanted' poster and was trying to print it when DD came flying in to the house screaming her head off that Sam was back. That was about 15 minutes before my first SNL chat in over a year. Thank God everything worked out, however stressful it was, and we got all 3 of them back safe and sound.

Now that the hysteria has calmed down and I can finally think straight again, it is time for me to start working on another layout. The excitement never ends around here, LOL. Well, time for me to fly. Laters.

Yellowstone

I thought this picture was perfect for Laurens Gimme More Crops - Tranquility challenge. The name and colors both fit so well.

I took this picture when Mike and I went through Yellowstone this summer on one of his many business trips. It has been years since the last time I was there and first time for Mike, so we had a lot of fun and really enjoyed ourselves. I joked with him that it was our second honeymoon, not that we really had a first. LOL It was so beautiful and so many things to see. I wish I could show you all of the pictures. My digital camera worked great. The unfortunate part is that I took the 12 rolls of 35mm into our local Walmart to have developed and they ruined most of them. They tried to tell me that the film had been exposed to too much heat, yada, yada, whatever. I took the negatives and the unprocessed rolls of film into a professional, he took one look at them and said that the person processing the film had no idea what they were doing because the eyelets had been ripped out of the side of the roll. Good grief. Are you kidding me. Anyway, we got about a sum total of maybe 60 pics off of those 12 rolls of film. Can you say "Ouch"? Anyway, enough of my ranting about Walmarts film processing. Just for future reference, spend the extra money and take your film to a professional who knows what they are doing.

Page kit was all Lauren's Tranquility
http://store.digitalscrapbookplace.c...oducts_id=8950

Adore

Alright, back to the layouts. I created this layout about a month ago for Wednesdays with Marcee's Challenge using her Trinitee Page Kit. As if I don't have enough layouts with DD, LOL. I need to get some put together and posted of the boys.

Layout created using Marcee's Trinitee Page Kit
http://store.digitalscrapbookplace.c...oducts_id=8862

Freebie Time

Okay, I am almost caught up now, after being at this for almost 24 hours straight, minus my little break, LOL. Guess what that means. I have a sweet little treat for you. And I mean little, there are only 22 items. It isn't much, but I am proud of the advances I have made in the last month creatively. I have learned a lot, even more since posting this to the SNLscrappers site. BTW, I am also including some new creations I have made in the last few days that go along this same theme, I just did not include a preview of those items like the last kit. It's a surprise. Give it a spin and let me know what you think. There is always room for improvement, I know. I am getting better.

Download here.

You can check out the other SNL contributions for last month and this month by going to www.snlscrappers.com

Our First Family Photo Together Layout

I feel bad about this layout, because my husband is not in it. These were the first professional pictures I had taken of my children and I together shortly after Brandon was born. My ex and I were divorced just months before Brandon came along and Mike and I were not a couple at that time, just friends, so that is why he is not in the pictures. This turned out so sweet and way better than I anticipated.

I have decided to go through and start scrapping all of the pictures of my children when they were younger, since they are getting ready to fly and leave the nest. This way, they can take a little something with them when they go.

Journaling reads:
This was the first professional pictures we had taken together. Chelcey was 2 1/2 years old, Anthony was just over 1 year old, and Brandon was 4 months. Chelcey was so excited that day. She was such a ham for the photographer. She still is.
Anthony wasn’t too sure what it was he was supposed to be doing. Of course Brandon being only 4 months old, we couldn’t get him to smile at all. I don’t think he liked the camera very much.

Credits:
Lauren Bavins Serendipitous Page Kit
http://store.digitalscrapbookplace.c...oducts_id=8807

Homecoming Dance

I thought this kit went perfectly with the pictures of my son and his date for homecoming last year.

It was his first real dance, first real date and first corsage. He bought it but didn't know what he was supposed to do with it. Her mother and I helped him out, though.

Even with 4 inch platform heels, she still couldn't get as tall as he is. She is 5'6" and he is 6'8".

Layout was created for Meryl's T42 & 24T Round challenge. I was in a hurry to get this finished and posted before the deadline, so if you see anything I missed, please let me know. Thanks.

Credits:
Round About Quick Click by Meryl
http://store.digitalscrapbookplace.c...oducts_id=5837

Emily's Garden Page Kit by Lauren Bavin
http://store.digitalscrapbookplace.c...oducts_id=3834
and the deckle edged mat from the Antiquing Pack Freebie by Lauren Bavin

Teen Fashion Layout

Here is a layout using 3 different pictures taken of my mother on her 17th Birthday in 1940. I created this layout recently for Meryl's Heritage Chat-Fashion. Since posting this layout, I ran across some more pictures taken of her on that same day. I don't have very many good pictures of my mother, as she liked to be behind the camera as I do, so this was a treat for me to put together.

Credits:
Golden Delicious Page Kit (Charm Bouquet, Embossed Satin Ribbon, and Tag elements used) by Meryl Bartho
http://store.digitalscrapbookplace.c...oducts_id=2371

Golden Delicious Page Kit 2 (Glitter Butterfly and Journal Photo Tag used) by Meryl Bartho
http://store.digitalscrapbookplace.c...oducts_id=6895

Golden Delicious 3 Page Kit (Pin, Flourish, Gold RicRac and Scalloped Photo Edging used) by Meryl Bartho
http://store.digitalscrapbookplace.c...oducts_id=6894

Golden Delicious Back Pack (Gold Romance, Gold Ore and Gold Dust papers used) by Meryl Bartho
http://store.digitalscrapbookplace.c...oducts_id=6893

Another Challenge Layout

This is a layout I created for Lauren Bavin's Gimme More Crops Challenge. Picture was taken by my husband on one of our hunting trips in 2006 from the road overlooking the Boise River, just outside of Prairie, Idaho. The skies were a little smoky from a fire burning just above Warm Lake, Idaho. Looking at it now, I am thinking it may have just a bit too much yellow on it, detracting from the picture. I thought it would go really well with the yellow of the fall trees, though. Let me know what you think.

Rex

This is a layout I created recently for Meryl's Heritage Pets Challenge at DSP.

Journaling reads:

Rex was a hairless Manchester
and my dads constant companion.
Here he sits on the dining
room table waiting for my
dad to get home from work
and sharing dinner with my dad, circa 1961.
These two were almost inseparable.

Layout was created using Meryl's Golden Delicious Page Kit
http://store.digitalscrapbookplace.c...oducts_id=2371