Happy New Year

Party Hearty, but be safe!!! Happy New Year my friends!!!

Surviving Christmas

This little guy woke up many times during the wee hours of Christmas morn. You would never know, that hours before, he was sick as a dog!

There seemed to be 2 themes in gifts for Bryant this year. First there would be Star Wars. Starting with the mini clone troopers:

And then he became one:

Then it was all about skateboarding and Tony Hawk (mini skateboards a/k/a Tech Dechs):

And the ramp:

Oh ya...and then the real deal:

Bryant was not the only one to get sick, but luckily he only had a touch of it. It started with Steve early in the week and he NEVER gets sick. It lasted a a few days and then I got it. I got hit HARD! It started on Tuesday and lasted all day on Christmas eve. Christmas eve night I had a bit of a reprive (good thing 'cause I had to make these cookies for Santa since Bryant was in no condition) and Christmas day it was back.

Today is actually the first day that I have been feeling a bit better and able to eat a little...I am starving!

Sorry, there are no pics of me, though I did look pretty good Christmas day. I did my best to keep appearances up in front of all the family. Bryant had a great visit from Santa (I guess he was good!) and his grandparents and got lots of cool presents. We survived and now heres to a healthy New Year!!!

Merry Christmas

Thinking of Aleida

On a day of sadness revisited, I came across this note from my sweet friend Aleida. Yes, I save everything and then I eventually purge. This I will keep forever. Today it made me smile... again. I really needed this today:

Today I found out through Aleida's in-laws blog, the verdict of the young woman that took my sweet friends life. This is the actual quote from the blog:

"It was shadowed though, by the news via e-mail from our son, that the Grand Jury had handed down their verdict regarding the punishment for the young lady who's carelessness caused the death of our daughter-in-law. On a Class 4 Felony of Manslaughter she received a "no bill" which means she received no punishment whatsoever. Not even community service. I am not a vindictive person by any means but I felt very disheartened, saddened, and confused about their decision. I realize that she was not speeding, or on any kind of drugs, but she wasn't paying attention. Are their no consequences for someone who is careless and who's inattention to the traffic light that caused the life of a mother, wife and daughter-in-law to be taken at the blink of an eye? And what do you tell the children when they are older and ask the question of "what happened to the girl". Do you tell them that she was not charged with anything and walked away free of punishment? Do you tell them that strangers, who made up the Grand Jury, who didn't even know their mother, made the decision to let her walk away free of any consequences for her actions?Which brings me to the questions of what rights do the victims family have in this situation? We weren't even allowed to be in the courtroom when the evidence was presented and yet it was our daughter-in-law, our grandchildren's mother and our son's wife who will bear the brunt of this decision. We are the ones who will have to move forward, forgiving this young lady for the carelessness that has caused our daughter-in-law's untimely death."

This is truly upsetting and very unfair! No punishment at all! I know that she will have to live with this for the rest of her life, but I feel that is not enough. What would be a fair punishment?? I do not know. But, to walk free? I do not understand. I guess that I never will.

I think about Aleida everyday and I miss her so much. I think of her children Josh & Bella. I think of her husband Brandon and his family. I also think about all the friends she had and how she filled their lives with happiness, as she did for me. This is a tragic loss.

Scarlet Lime Rocks!!

Remember this?? I made this for a co-worker friend of mine's Birthday last month:

I made it with papers from the FAB Scarlet Lime November kit. Loved these colors and was immediately drawn to them:

I had e-mailed Christy Tomlinson (owner) to let her know how much I really LOVED this kit and shared the project with her. She loved it and asked if she could feature it in a future newsletter. I was thrilled and honored. This is so COOL!! The newsletter came out today. You can check it out here.

I just wanted to put out there (again...and I can never say it enough!) -Thank You my friends for all the support, encouragement and inspiration that you have given me in my journey through this wonderful (and sometimes obsessive) scrapbooking hobby of mine. I really do appreciate it!

Let it Snow

Since it looks like this outside at the moment:

I thought that I would share some happy snow moments from past years. Bryant can't wait to pull the sled out. Though we do not have any big hills, he makes due with what we do have and still has a blast:

Loved this picture of Bryant with our snowman. So did he. He even drew it. He did a great job! Quite the future artiste!! I thought that it was so cool!!

This LO I made last Winter for a Scrapping the Music challenge. Just a little fun on an actual 'warm' and sunny Winter day:

There will be many more Winter LO's from many more entertaining pics of Bryant, but for now I think we will just cuddle up in a blanket, with some hot cocoa and watch it snow through the window. Let it snow :-)

Short Post

Did you see this? I am so excited! Made my whole day! Thanks Donna!!

Starting to feel the Christmas Spirit

I really do love Christmas, but I sometimes get bummed out about all the commercialism (is that even a word?) of it. I love the Christmas spirit. Just the way I feel, different, better, happier this time of year. For some reason I am not feeling it as much this year though. We were getting way behind on our decorating. We just put our tree up last night and finally completed decorating it tonight. Now I am feeling it (just a bit!) We love to go through all the ornaments that we have collected over the years. It is one of my favorite traditions. Here is our tree. I know the photo is a bit blurry, but I really like the look of it:

I also made some cupcakes for our Christmas potluck at work tomorrow. Who doesn't love a good cupcake. These definately make me smile. I even had 2 extras that would not fit in the container. Bryant and Daddy sure were happy to scoff those up. LOL!!

So just remember during this time of the year, as hectic as it may be, take time out for yourself. Even if for a few minutes and enjoy all the special little moments.

Happy Birthday LaVerne!!!

Happy Birthday my friend!!!

I hope you enjoy "Your Day"!! Eat lots of cake, celebrate and enjoy the time with family and friends!!

Ice Storm

Gotta love new England weather. It was 62 degrees on Tuesday! Wednesday day it was very windy and starting to get cold and Thursday it rained. So last night that rain turned into a very dangerous ice storm. We lost power and heat sometime in the middle of the night. It has been practically raining tree branches for hours. It is quite a mess. Bryant was happy to not have school today and to have Mom and Dad home. Both of our work places were closed due to inclement weather. Here are a few pics I took earlier today. This is looking out our front door:

Here is one view of our backyard. Lots of ice:

Another view with just some of the fallen branches:

I had to throw in this happy picture. One of the sales reps from my company sent it to me this week. Just a little Christmas spirit, 3000 miles away. It makes me smile:

Our power is back on now,and we have heat. Yay!! Tomorrow it will probably look like nothing ever happened. It sure was one heck of a way to get a 3 day weekend. Happy Friday!!

Cookies for Santa

I got some more pictures scrapped (Thanks to the 'Got Sketch' Mini Class). Yay me! This was the final of the three sketches. I really have been wanting to scrap these pics from last Christmas Eve. We had the most (and messiest) fun making these cool reindeer cookies. I have it on good authority that Santa loved them too!

Since I was in the 'cookies for Santa' mood, I thought that I would share this old favorite of mine from the year before. So simple, but still one of my faves!

Hope you are having a great week! Thought I would send some Christmas spirit and a little mojo your way. Enjoy! And as always, TFL! :-)

My December Daily, Week One

I wanted to share the first week of my December Daily album. I am really enjoying this creative photo (or photos) a day project. I did a project similar to this last January and it is really fun to look back on the memories now. I know I shared the cover a while back, but here it is again to get this started. My color theme is blue, brown, cream and white. I have been using Bo Bunny and My Minds Eye Bohemian papers. I LOVE the colors and they really seem to blend together well:

The first day shows a view of my little Christmas tree on my office window ledge. I love the veiw. Simply makes me smile:

Day two was a fun day that Bryant and I made some really yummy Christmas cupcakes. He was SO excited! Day three was a happy (spur of the moment) pic taken at the grocery store. I am sure the other shoppers thought that we were crazy snapping pictures, but that was one huge (5 lbs-$25) chocolate bar:

I really love to watch Bryant sleep. I always have and have many pictures to prove it. Day four I took another one of him asleep in my bed. He is just so excited about Christmas. Day five is a picture I took outside my office of my little Tony Stewart Christmas stocking. Just because the Nascar season is over, does not mean I stop supporting my favorite driver:

Day six was a day we spent at Chuck E Cheese for Bryant's friends B-day party. Of course we were drawn to the Dale Jr pinball machine. Always have Nascar on the brain! Day seven, our first snow. It was not much, but just enough for my little guy to feel like a good little helper.

So this is what I have so far. Trying to keep it simple and colorful. Mixing it up with sepia, color and maybe black and white photos. This will be great to look back on next year. That is what keeps me inspired to complete this project. Are you working on a December Daily? I am looking forward to everyone elses take on this. It is so inspiring!!

A Few "Sketchy" LO's

I have gotten a few LO's completed lately, with the help of a few fabulous sketches. I have recently been digging through old photos and feeling a bit sentimental. Lots of pics that I really felt the need to scrap and to document that moment in time. This first LO is some cute baby Christmas time pics of Bryant. So sweet! LOVE this new Christmas line Fa La La from Memory Makers. I know the Poinsetta flowers look very dark. They are actually a burgandy color. The little (rain)dots are from Cloud Nine. I like how cool they looked:

I was inspired by a sketch from Donna Downey (for the LO above), in this AWESOME new book of hers:

I also, have been holding onto these pics from last year. A few stolen moments of Bryant with Santa before the actual picture was taken. This sketch comes from the ' Got Sketch Mini' free online class. This is the mini challenge that went up before the actual class sketches. Loved this basic sketch and plus I got to use my Teresa Collins Tis the Season papers:

This is my take on the actual first sketch from the GS Mini class. These are some old pics of me that I came across and I literally thought 'Who's that girl?' I LOVED this sketch from Janna Wilson ! Plus I got to use my new Pink Paislee Vintage Moon paper. AWESOME!!

So double score for me. I got some old pictures scrapped AND I got to use a lot of my new favorite scrap products. Well, off to work some more on my December Daily album and hope to post pics of it soon. Have a wonderful weekend!!

Pretty Little Tree

I bought this last year and transformed it into this with a little help from Love, Elsie Christmas paper from Ki Memories:
This was a fun little project that I literally threw together while I was watching tv one night. It is so cute and colorful and makes me smile whenever I look at it. Love this! Love Christmas! Happy Crafting!! Happy Friday!!!

BASB Challenge #3

Challenge #3 is up at the BASB site. This was definately a challenge for me. It really pushed me outside of my creative 'comfort zone' and I LOVED it. There is nothing that I can not do, as long as I put my mind to it. So, here is my LO for the challenge:

The challenge this time around is to create a LO or card based on this ad below:

Very different and I went for it. I am really happy with the result. So, come play along and challenge yourself. We would love to see what you come up with! :-)

December First

Yay! It's December 1st! The Christmas season begins! Here is my first new Christmas project it is a cute little Advent calendar from Karen Foster Designs. It comes like this and I decorated mine with the fabulous 8 x8 Tis the Season papers from Teresa Collins and a little bling:

Oh! Did you hear about this? It's totally free! Thanks to Janna Wilson and Valerie Salmon. So what are YOU waiting for??!

Also, the absolutely GORGEOUS December Scarlet Lime kit debuted today! I can not wait to get mine. Snatch one up before they are gone. I promise that you won't regret it!! :-)

Happy Monday!! Hope your week started off great!!