Mom, can you stop taking pictures of me?

This was a tough photography day for me. Sophia barely let me get any photos of her First Holy Communion. I even told her that taking photos of her would be a great Mother's Day gift...that didn't work. Since I didn't have much luck at the church, I decided to try in a whole new setting. I took her to the gazebo up the street from our house. She ended up ripping off the veil and running home!

A Sunshine Jar from my Sunshine!

I got the cutest Mother's Day gift from Sophia. It's called a Sunshine Jar. Inside are yellow and orange strips. The orange ones are redeemable coupons and the yellow are little things she wrote about me. In no specific order...
oranges:
"Good for one batch of cookies"
"Good for one kiss"
"Good for one walk to the park" (is this acutally for me or for her?!)
"Good for one back scratch" (add a massage and I'm all set!)
"Good for one huge hug" (Don't think I need a coupon for that...get those all the time!)

yellows:
"I love you because you always give me hugs and kisses."
"I love you because you make the best cake, brownies, and cookies."
"You are special because you always give me presents" (I do that a little too much)
"I love you because you do crafts with me." (would you expect anything different?)
"You are special because you make the best pasta in the whole world." (I especially love that one)

I'll post my son's mother's day gift after it starts growing!

Camping with the Brownies

Look out Camp Innabah...here comes troop 444! The girls had so much fun camping last Saturday, even if it was for just the day. Each of the troops had to wear a different colored T-shirt. We went in style and wore Tie-Dye shirts which we made ourselves the week before. They day, which was filled with activities, ended in a Pajama Dance Party and singing around the campfire eating smores and singing.

Buh Bye Training Wheels!

Go Sophie...Go Sophie...Go Sophie!
We finally took the training wheels off and Sophie did great, by the second time out she got it. I'm really proud of her. I thought it would take much longer since she really didn't ride the bike all that much with the training wheels.

My own little space (click on photo to see larger)

Last weekend I got a great deal on this new project desk from Pier 1. I couldn't pass it up. So I spent most of this past weekend rearranging and reorganizing, building cubes and putting together my new desk. I still have to hang up some frames (currently sitting on shelf)and maybe do a little something with my Cricut and some vinyl for some fun wall art and fill up the fun little side cubbies. Sophie already claimed one for herself as you can see in the photos.

Toga Templates

I did this layout for Scrapbooker's Garden using Toga templates. They are a French company. I used the Mosaic template for this one.  (The black around the edges in my cutting mat)

Our Miss Potter

Sophia's big second grade project was to read a biography of someone important, do an oral report and project (she made a diorama). All the children had a wax museum exhibit where they dressed as the person they did the project on. They stood still until someone pushed a button for them to talk about themselves. Sophia chose Beatrix Potter.

Love, love, love this book!

I've been searching the craft stores for a few weeks for this special issue of Creating Keepsakes magazine "Computer Tricks for Scrapbooking 2", by Jessica Sprague. The retail price is $14.99. After reading the first one last April, I was convinced that I needed to get Adobe Photoshop Elements. You can download a free 30 day trial of Adobe Photoshop Elements on the Adobe website or at www.creatingkeepsakes.com/CT2
Why this is cool...
This book is perfect for any type of scrapbooker, whether you are a traditional paper scrapbooker, a hybrid scrapbooker or an all digital scrapbooker. I guess if you are using the computer for these techniques to use on paper you're actually doing hybrid, not traditional. The book is divided into 5 sections; photographs, type, embellishments and brushes, design, and albums. The techniques are all very clear and easy to follow. There are layouts by several different scrapbookers in addition to Jessicas (Noel Culbertson, Greta Hammond, Joanna Bolick to name a few) so you get to see a variety of styles.
The "photographs" section has techniques to help your photos from brightening them up to darkening the edges. There is also a whole photo editing workshop in this part.
The "type" section has a ton of ways to do cool things with the fonts we all love and download. Some of them are ways to edit your text before you print them and cut out for titles. Some are cool ways to print type right on the photos, blending titles right into the photos...and more. There is also some basic information on fonts such as how to download and good info. on types (serifs, etc.) margins, spacing, etc.
The "embellishments and brushes" sections talks about how you can use the computer to make your own custom embellishments such as a block of text cut into a shape, or making a custom shape for a journaling block and extracting an element out of a patterned paper. There is also information on creating overlays, using digital corner rounders and using brushes on photos before printing them. There are so many awesome techniques in this section I can't list them all!
The "design" section shows how to use the drawing and design tools of Photoshop elements in your layouts. There are techniques like using a custom scheme generator to create colors for your layouts, making collages that are unique shapes, using digital rub-ons, using the sketch tool, and clipping masks.
The last section is "album". This section talks about being able to design a whole albums in different sizes and themes. Also there are free album template downloads. There's a fun circular album and an entire mini-album made from one sheet of 8 1/2" x 11" piece of paper!
In addition to the five sections there is a reference guide in the back. Another thing I love about this book is that there are multiple examples of the same techiniques so you can see a few takes on the techniques. It kind of helps you gets ideas how you can use the techniques for your own layouts. There is also free digital kit download.
I give this book an A+, it was well worth the wait. Did I mention that I love this book?

the little things...

It's funny how a little thing like putting dot stickers (you know the ones everyone uses for garage sales) on a Puffs box can make a person smile.
I was sitting in my office at work on a really gray and gloomy morning this week. I saw a pack of the stickers and took all the orange ones and stuck them on the box. It was just the thing I needed to brighten up my day.

conversations with Nicholas

I hope to never forget the little things like a typical conversation with Nicholas. This is one we had this morning on the way to school.

Nicholas: Momma, Momma, What lives in trees?
Me: Owls do and other birds, bugs and bees.
Nicholas: Bees don't live in trees.
Me: They don't?
Nicholas: No
Me: Then where do they live?
Nicholas: They live in bee hives.
Me: You're right, they do live in bee hives.
Nicholas: and the Jellyfish live in Jellyfish hives!

It turns out that he got that Jellyfish hive thing from SpongeBob. I really don't get the fascination...he's a sponge and he's square and he wears pants. I did have to laugh when Patrick was wearing fish net stockings and heals, though!

I've been learning how to digital scrapbook

Here are some of my layouts. I created most of them in the Layout A Day Challenge in January. Digital scrapbooking is so much fun!

Wow...I haven't posted in almost a month.

January has been very busy. I participated in Lain Ehmann's "Get a LOAD of this" challenge where everyone makes one scrapbook layout per day for the month of January.
I was so amazed to hear that over 3,300 people signed up for this and I think there were just about 22,500 layouts created!
It was really fun, but took up much of my free time. I learned a little more about digital scrapbooking while working on my Vegas book. I really enjoyed digital, but missed playing with paper and glue. I also completed a mini book kit that had been sitting in my closet, unopened, for about 6 months. Anyway, that's pretty much what I've been doing. I still am surprised at myself that I was able to get all 31 finished. I actually did 34...that's more than I did for all of last year.
I'll have to post some of mine.
What else? Oh, Sophie has been home from school all week as the teachers continue to strike. I hope it doesn't last too much longer because it's going to eat into their Spring break and Summer.
So Nicholas will be turning 4 on Sunday (Superbowl Sunday...go Giants!)
I can't believe my baby is going to be 4 years old.