Sometimes you just have to try!!!

As most of you know, I'm about to embark on my 1st half-marathon. My husband, Uncle Dick and I will be running the Rock n Roll in San Diego. We fell off the training bandwagon but we tried to pull it together in the end. We have 4 hours to finish 13.1 miles. It should be doable but I'm nervous as hell!!! Yep, I said that! I hope that it will be more on the fun side than the painful, miserable side but I really have no idea what to expect. This is something that I have been wanting to do ever since my cousin lost her sweet daughter Ravyn to cancer last year. I am running, in part, for her tomorrow! For both Ravyn who had to leave this Earth FAR too early at the age of 7 and Kathy, my cousin, because her strength through this all has been amazing to me. Tomorrow is also exactly one year to the day that we lost my Aunt Amy to cancer. Even in her fifties, it was an unfair loss. She still had so much life to enjoy and grandbabies to play with. We miss her! Finally, this particular run benefits the Leukemia and Lymphomia Society and this year my cousin, Alison was diagnosed with Lymphomia. She is the reason I signed up for this race. At 25, she is an amazing person and handled this diagnosis like a champ! She is running the relay tomorrow! The relay is with 4 people for the full marathon. They each run between 4-8 miles each. My cousin Alana and her husband, Tim are running legs of the relay too! I'm excited to take on this adventure with them and for a good cause. Everyone knows someone who has been impacted by cancer but this is my turn to give a half-marathon a try! Night all! 3:30 am will come early!

Like Mother like Daughter...

I have been trying to post this picture FOREVER on my blog but life has just been FAR too busy lately and I haven't even been at the scrappin' table in what feels like months. But being that today is Mother's Day, I figured that I just HAD to get this one posted today because this blog is all about how I LOVE PAPER!!!! This seems to have been a trait that I have passed along to my oldest daughter Madison. She appears to have more fun tearing apart the paper in her coloring books, rather than coloring in them. At first I didn't mind... then I got REALLY annoyed with the constant piles of torn up paper laying around the house... finally, I have accepted the fact that she is just like ME!!! She just loves paper. Whether she is coloring it, cutting it, painting on it, or tearing it... so I will continue to clean up after her messes... while blaiming myself. LOL!

Happy Mother's Day to all the fabulous Mom's out there and especially my own!!! She is truly amazing and I am so thankful for our close relationship. Josh made a full spread for a late breakfast for my sister, my mom and I this morning. Of course all the kids and my Dad were there too! And did I mention the Chandon... FABULOUSNESS with fabulous company! I hope that your day was just as wonderful and that I will be back to share some layouts with you all very soon!

Spring Break Accomplishments

It's my Spring Break from work... well, it's actually almost over. We spent a week up in San Jose visiting my In-laws but we are back home now. I'm sure that you will be seeing plenty of pictures from that trip soon enough as I have already ordered the prints (thanks to Snapfish having a great deal) and will be scrapping them soon enough. For me, as you've probably heard me say before, I measure the success of a vacation or weekend by how many pages I get scrapped. LOL! Well, here are the two that I just finished. I still have one more day off (tomorrow) and with any luck, there will be more to share.

First is this layout, which is for my In-laws album. More left-over Bo Bunny papers!! The pictures are of my In-laws and Maddie making Candy Cane cookies. If you haven't had them, they are DELICIOUS but I don't cook/bake (if I don't have to) so I leave this part to them, and my husband. Margaret (my Mother-in-Law) bought Madison this cute purple apron and they had a great time baking. Steve just came in to steal a cookie. I always see people adding the little dots to their lettering and so I decided to try it on this layout (which I will refer to as an lo for now on, for those of you who don't scrap).



These next pictures are from June 2007 when Madison was 13 months old. Josh is a HUGE San Francisco Giants fan so for Father's Day I took Madison to get her picture taken in this Giants outfit. I also did this lo in Giants' colors. Josh loved it... I think it's just okay, because I'd rather it be PADRES!!!!!!!!! LOL!



I love when I get some pictures from the past done. I have SOOOOOO many pictures to scrap so when I can get some pages done I feel a sense of accomplishment. Did I mention that my mom took Madison to the movies?? Only having 1 kid at home helped too! Josh is building and installing a new garage door at my parents house yesterday and today... he's never done this before... let's hope it all works out. I tried to help today, but I was useless. Crossing my fingers for a successful, WORKING garage door at the end of this. Thanks for visiting!

Sketchy Thursdays from the past...

I've mentioned them before but Sketchy Thursdays is one of my favorite blogs to visit. I just love the sketches. They are supposed to be done weekly but I can never seem to find the time to do them ON TIME so here are a few from their previous weeks that I have recently completed.
I don't have a family album, or an album of just Josh and I so I'm not too sure where this layout will end up but I wanted to scrap these pictures. Maybe someday when I get around to ACTUALLY doing a wedding album for us, then I can add this to the back! LOL! I wish I had more pictures of my parents when they were young so I'm hoping that no matter where this layout ends up, someday my kids will appreciate it. These are pictures of us at Justin and Jamie's wedding in San Francisco. It was great because my In-laws met us at the airport and got to keep the kids for the weekend while we enjoyed some time alone. The colors reflect their wedding colors, too!

If you know me well, you know that I hate turquoise! This layout doesn't reflect that! LOL! I just loved how Maddie's pajamas popped off these pics so I ran with it. I stitched the lines and added some splattered red paint. It is the first time I have "painted" on a layout. Now I wish I had done more red but it's okay. I still like it. I mostly love that she really was proud that she "READ" the book "One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish."

A busy day at the table...

My idea of the perfect day is a day at home sitting at my scrapbook table and doing what I love. I got to have a day like that today and here are the results of it. Thanks for visiting!

I loved the color combo on this one! This is a priceless picture! How many people did YOU have at the hospital? LOL! We have great families, as you can see here! We were all very excited for Madison to arrive. This was May, 2006.

This is a picture of Madison cruising around the coffee table. I used some left over Bo Bunny papers from over a year ago. I LOVE their papers. They are beautiful and thick! He, he! I stiched the black to pull that color out from the stripes. I cut the swirls and LOVE from the "Home" cartridge on my Cricut. Then I added some jewels to the swirls. This pic is from March 2007.

These pictures are of Madison doing an egg hunt in April 2007. I printed the pictures over a year ago but have had a difficult time scrapping them. I guess Springy layouts are not enjoyable for me. After reading Jennifer Priest's blog Hydrangea Hippo today, her latest use your supplies challenge is to use patterned papers. It's amazing how quickly that CUTE paper you bought, isn't so cute anymore. I tried to use this green flowery paper as inspired by her challenge. Jennifer is very talented and I started following her blog after attending one of her classes at The Pink Pineapple when I made a Father's Day book for Josh. She has been doing a challenge to encourage us to use the things you already have at home! I've been wanting to play along, but you know how busy life gets! All patterned papers that I used today, I have had for over a year. Thanks Jennifer, for helping me use it up and make space for more supplies!

Tea Party Bridal Shower

My best friend is throwing a Bridal Shower for her future sister-in-law. Since Erica's family is from Scotland, they wanted the shower to be a traditional English Tea Party. (The wedding is full of Scottish features!)She called me MONTHS ago to ask me to make the invites which I of course said, "YES!" Then it took me a while to find the stamp that I wanted. Then comes the hard part... trying to design something easy enough to make because she needed 27 invitations but still making it look cute! I decided that I would make her three examples. They looked like this:



I had opinions about all three... I liked this, didn't like that... but they chose #1... I didn't really care for the top part of #1 (I thought it looked like a birthday party!)... so I changed it and ended up with this as the final product. I really hope that they liked them. They arrived at Erica's house today!



I love when things rhyme... I think that's the teacher in me. So for the inside I made it say, "Come enjoy a cup of tea, as we shower with gifts, the Bride-to-Be." And of course all of the details for the party. I also can't stand a plain white envelope anymore, so I stamped and cut the teapots in the plaid print for the envie. Much better and fun!

Thanks, Shad, for letting me make them for you!

Altered Composition Book

I mentioned in a previous post that I have been venturing into the world of altering various items (although when I go back to read that post, all I can notice are the typos!) I guess that I shouldn't be doing these posts so late at night. : ) Anyways, I decided to try to alter a composition book. I didn't really use any guidance other than the fact that I have seen other people do it, so I decided to try it too!!! Obviously I made this one for Madison. I covered it with paper and stuck it down with Modge Podge. Then I used a strip of ribbon to cover the separation between the cover and the binding strip of paper. I used my Cricut to cut out the letters for her name from chipboard and covered them in Stickles. Then I cut out the flowers and layered them around the edges. I also added some Stickles to the flowers. Finally, I found it to be a little too plain, so I doodled the stitch lines around the edges and added the swirls and such around the flowers. She of course loved it, because she is three. I wasn't impressed but I will be better next time, if I decide to try again! LOL!! It's just fun for me to try something new, so that part I enjoyed!