Almost Christmas!

I have been trying to get some Christmas cards done and sent out but things are moving slowly around here. Hubby had his bday, so here's a page I did about him. Wasn't he so cute? He's still cute :) Here's a Christmas page I did that I'll add just because it's Christmas. It's our first Christmas as a family (with kids!) The girls are excited about Christmas. They still believe in Santa and I think that's awesome. I need to buy some wrapping paper and start wrapping presents. There aren't that many, but I gotta get it done before they start snooping around in my closet.

Were you a closet snooper? A looker of under beds trying to find what your parents got you for Christmas? I was! I even unwrapped presents that were already under the tree and then re-wrapped them. And to tell you the truth...I still hunt for my gifts. The year before last my hubby hid my gift in the shed out back. I never found it...he's getting too smart for me.

Anyway, I am trying to keep the true spirit of Christmas which is of course, Jesus. He is the reason for the season. Here's a verse for some perspective:
But the angel said to them, "Do not be afraid. I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people. Today in the town of David a Savior has been born to you; he is Christ the Lord." Luke 2:10-11

MERRY CHRISTMAS!

Where I've been!

So...i haven't been here, but I have been around. I am 5 months pregnant so lots of stuff got put on hold. But I got some mojo back and here is 2 pages I've done that took the past two weeks! TFL!

stolen from Jaime

ABC's of me
A - Age: 32
B - Bed size: Queen
C - Chore you hate: dishes
D - Dog's name: Princess
E - Essential start your day item: coffee pot
F - Favorite color: greens
G - Gold or Silver: silver
H - Height: 5'6"
I - Instruments you play(ed): i play A song on the piano and A song on the guitar :)
J - Job title: um...phone caller and home school teacher and mom
K - Kid(s): Harley and Chloe and Cody
M - Mom's name: Lori
N - Nicknames: J, Jenn, Jenny
O - Overnight hospital stay other than birth: None
P - Pet Peeve: Kids sitting on the laps of parents in cars! Are those parents stupid!!!???
Q - Quote from a movie: No one saw!!! Outrageous Fortune
R - Right or left handed: Right
S - Siblings: a brother and two sisters.
T - Time you wake up: depends on the day
U- Underwear: hole-y :)
V - Vegetable you dislike: I have to agree with beets.
W - Ways you drink your coffee: with sugar free sugar and milk usually...but you can entice me with flavored creamer.
X-rays you've had: teeth
Y - Yummy food you make: my kids like potato bake
Z - Zoo favorite : monkeys...they are so funny to watch!

Card Swaps & Promotions

I am becoming addicted to card swaps. It started with the stamp camp. I had to make 10...fine. 10 is a nice rounded number. This week I made 20 cards for a card swap at Pink Pineapple. 20 is wayyyy too many. But I'd do it again..lol. I am going to participate in the 1st card swap at the lss here in town too. We only have to have 5 cards. I am trying to get my kids to participate but we'll see. I don't think they can make 5 of the same card yet. Anyway, here's a pic of the 20 I made.
Pretty simple, right?

The girls had a promotion ceremony at school! They got promoted to 3rd grade! I am so proud!
This is their teacher at school. There was absolutely no way I could have homeschooled these two this year without her help. She was sent from heaven! Thank you Mrs. Millen!

Charles Card Challenge #2

It had only been two days and they wanted another card challenge. Fine with me! I love cards. On Wednesdays we go to a free make n take at the lss. They usually make cards. So we decided to use whatever card we make there as our base and then add the rest of the challenge which was:
1. Use Brads
2. Use pop-ups
3. Use Bling
4. HAVE FUN!

Here is Harley's take:
Here is Chloe's take:Here is my take (I couldn't find my card from the store :( :
TfL!

Charles Card Challenge #1

So the girls and I started doing some card challenges at home with each other. No one wins or loses, just for fun. So our first challenge was:
1. Use blue pattern paper
2. Use ribbon
3. Use bling
4. Have FUN!

Here is Harley's take:
Here is Chloe's take:
Here is my take:

TFL!

USE it Challenge!

USE IT Challenge #12

Here is Patti's challenge:
1) Use some old chipboard
2) Use buttons- one of my very favorite embellishments
3) Tear some paper.
4) Optional: Stitch.

And here's my take:

Use IT Challenge #11

Here is Ingrid's challenge:

1. Size: square card base

.....
2. Theme: Summer

.....
3. Embellishments:

use a flower(s), ribbon, pin(s) and twine
.....
4. Tools: Punches

Here's my take! Hope it's still in on time!!

A coupla pages!

I need to do my use it challenge card...i think it's due today! But I wanted to post these pages I did.

I love these papers! I got them from Holly. I think they are a new stampin' up set!

This lo is for the Hearts and Crafts Design Team. We had to do something for Father's Day with all this stuff. We also got some other stuff. *Edit...since I took this pic...my hubby wanted something on this page...so I let him, he messed up and didn't like it. So now the yellow strip is a black strip with a quote...A Bird in a cage...is worth two in a bush.

This was for a BOM challenge. It was really hard. The blue rectangle with the arrows is an accordian style hidden journal. It's kinda personal. I hid it...
And, I finally scrapped the puppy pics of Princess! She is huge now...but got this page done...
TFL! Off to make the card!

Weekend

What a busy weekend. It wasn't really...it just went so fast it feels like it. The girls went camping at Fiesta Island with the girl scouts. I can't wait to get their cameras developed. I always send them with disposables. They said they didn't take very many pics. I think Chloe will use the rest of her film taking pics of the cats. I find so many on my digital camera! For example:


But anyway! I wanted to post some lo's I did at the lss night crop on Friday. Since I had no children, I stayed reeeaallyy late and I was exhausted on Sat. morn at 8 a.m. when I got up. ...For no reason cuz the kids were still gone. So Sat. morn I watched the finale for Ugly Betty. And guess what? I missed the end cuz I recorded it and it went past the cut off time for the recorder. So if anyone knows, can you tell me if Daniel's wife died or not??? Thanks.
So here's a lo that I did last week for the Scraptathlon chall. I love the distressed look of this. I also like the topic and inspiration. I got some points from votes. I have to load it anonymously.

SO Sat. around 12:30 or so, Holly picked me up because she had a bbq at her house at 2 p.m. and I had no car. Then I hung out until 10:30 p.m. and went home. Shawn came for a little while. It was nice. I held a baby that is 4 weeks old and I want one. sshhh..don't tell. I will change my mind soon.

Another lo. This one is for a Scrap the Beach chall. (75% blue and brown) and for the Mother's day chall.

Today the girls came home at about 11a.m. I missed them soooooo much! I held them like babies ;) Then I scrapped and they watched t.v. because, you know, they had to camp with no t.v. God forbid! ANYWAY, I have dispersed the lo's throughout the whole post so you wouldn't get bored! This was long..sorry.

A lo for the Scrap the Beach chall. journaling.

A lo I did of my friend's sons. For the Scrap the Beach Chall. stamping.
Just a random lo. I wanted to do a page before I forgot about soccer.

Scrapbook Challenges DT Blog Hop!

I was checking out a blog hop and it is so much fun! It started at Pamela's blog and then hopped to 9 others. Here's my take on the sketch they had to win a RAK.
The sketch:
And my take:
TfL!

Use IT Challenge #10

Here are the rules of the challenge:
1. monochromatic scraps- All of it is scraps but all the green is monochromatic scraps.

2. rub-ons or clear stickers- the part that says is You & Me are rub-ons

3. chipboard- Both stars are chipboard covered in paper. The LOVE is chipboard also.

4. (optional) non-traditional ribbon- I don't know if my rope ribbon counts as non-traditional. But it isn't traditional to me!

And here's my take on it!

I got this sketch from the CTMH catalog. Thanks for looking.

Church in Jamul

I had my final conference with the teacher today and she is so great! I love how re-assuring she is. She said the girls are doing wonderful. We have enough work turned in, but finish up the reading in the books we have and maybe do a couple hands on activities out of the book because we have to turn them in and then this summer work on multiplication up to 5's and work on the computer on compass learning. She said take the summer off! No work...lol. The compass learning is cool because it is games that introduce them to things they will learn next year. I am so darned happy!

I still haven't done my 10 cards for Stamp Camp tonight! I gotta do those right after this post :)

So today the girls were talking about how a kid in their class has an uncle who is a pastor. I said, we have a cousin who is a pastor. They were shocked! So I looked his church up on the www and found him. He's a youth pastor though. No biggie...but then I clicked on his blog and he talked about how he speaks in the main services about once a year and this weekend is the weekend he is doing them! Talk about a God thing! I haven't been in church in a few weeks months and now we are going to watch my cousin speak. I called my aunt and she said she goes to the 9:30 service. Looks like we will be up and gone really early Sunday. Their church is in Jamul.

Just wanted to share cuz I thought it was great. By the way, that pie was nasty! LOL...but the girls liked it!

End of school year stress!

I am totally tripping on having everything done and turned in by the end of the school year. In case you don't know, this is my first year homeschooling my girls and we homeschool through a montessori program. So they get to go to school a couple days a week and there are only 4 more "school days" left. Two more Tuesdays and two more Wednesdays. I emailed the teacher today to find out just how much work I need to pack into the next two weeks to pass 2nd grade. Ugh, I'm stressed!

On a happy note, Holly and I are attending Stamp Camp at the Stampin' Up ladies house tomorrow night! I am so excited! I love going and learning new stuff. The best thing is the card swap. Last month I didn't participate, but Holly did and she got some amazing cards. I am excited. So I guess I better go get started making my 10 cards to swap. :/

On Memorial Day weekend, the girls are going camping with the girl scouts from Friday - Sunday. Isn't that awesome!! And guess what else?? :D Hubby might be going to the river with a couple of his buds too! Could you imagine...an entire weekend at home by myself! Holy mackeral! I gotta find me a crop or two or three! The only bad thing is we only have one car and hubby is talking about taking it. Guess I'll be staying home :)

Here's a pic of this wonderful looking Lemon Meringue Pie I made tonight. I say wonderful looking because I haven't actually tried the pie itself yet and this was my first time making one. Doesn't it look yummy? :) Has it been 3-6 hours chilling yet?

Use It Challenge #9

Here's my entry for the USE IT Challenge #9:
These were the must-haves:
1. Color challenge: PINK, BLACK, WHITE
2. Accents: SCALLOPS, RIBBON, AND BLING,
OH MY!
3. Pattern: POLKA DOTS, BABY!
4. D.I.Y.: aka 'do it yourself'
Create something to add to your card....
I made a flower by sewing some ribbon into a circle and then pulling tight and adding a button to the middle.
The button doesn't look very pink, but I promise it is. On this pic it looks more red to me.

Anyway!!! I have to get some scrapping done because I joined way too many challenges. But wanted to get this card in today while I was in a missing mood. I miss my friend.

Use It Challenge #8

I am following a new blog called Use It! that has challenges to use my supplies in the way of card making. Here's this weeks challenge. I had to use flowers, metal (brad), fiber and as an extra, a tool I haven't used in a long time...didn't do that part. TFL.

Stuff from Scrapbook Expo

Here are a couple of the things we made at the scrapbook expo:

This was the make n take at the Tattered Angels booth. It was so fun. We used tons of glimmer mist and the mask/stamp set they have there. These are the new Framed fonts that they have. Super cute!!
Just a free make n take we made at a booth. It was cute.
a sand shaker box we made at Heartstring Designs. They made these using a bag. I thought that was neat considering I learned from Holly using pop up tape and a little piece of plastic as the window. They also have a unique product called Matboard. It's this board above here, double matted. It's thick. I like it.
An Acrylic album that we made using a Bind It All Zutter. I love it! I want one so bad. Do you know how many books you can make as gifts with this thing! It was so cool. I also now love acrylic!
I made more things there but they are half finished so they will be posted later...


Some cards I made for one of the NSBD challenges at scrap-diner.com. I had to make 6 cards using titles of songs as the sentiment. Here's 3 + the 1 below. Still have two more to make.

This card is for the Card Challenge at Scrapbook.com. The theme is a thank you card. Plus it has a song title so it counts for the challenge above! TFL!

National Scrapbooking Day

Well...it was today but I was too busy to participate in anything on the site I live on SOOOOO...I joined another site because they have 10 challenges going on all month! That's right! I don't have to download anything until May 31st! Of course, I'm gonna. Hopefully I won't have to wait all stinkin month to scrapbook.
Here's a page I did this morning before we left for the grandma's house while hubby and the girls went fishing. This is done for a few challenges on Scrapbook.com but mostly for the design team at Hearts and Crafts:

I had so much fun with Holly at the scrapbook expo yesterday! We went to every single booth. Did many many make n takes and took a class that we weren't too thrilled about. It kinda sucked actually because we thought we were going to learn a whole buncha techniques that we didn't know...but we didn't learn anything new at all. However...we did learn lots of new fun stuff at the make n takes at the booths and Holly bought lots of fun stuff that we are going to play with very soon. I will post pics later of the cool stuff we did there. After I finish unpacking it...

So gotta go...off to scrapbook..lol.

Today and tomorrow and the next day...

Tomorrow my friend Holly and I are going to the Scrapbook Expo in Del Mar. I am very excited. We are going to take a class or two and go to all the booths and do all the make and takes. I can't wait to come back and post everything I do!

I had the busiest Thursday today. I took hubby's grandma (Grams) to the doctor. She could barely walk because of her back. Please pray for her. Then I picked the girls up from some friends' house (they had picked them up from school for me) and then they went straight to girl scouts while I went to the bank and the lss to beg Debbie to alcohol ink a piece of metal ribbon holder that I stole from her. Then picked the girls up from gs..came home, threw them in the shower. Checked my email...helped the girls pack, fed them dinner, then headed to the school for Children's Night. It was so cute. They sang songs and showed me a mural they did on the wall in the kitchen, went to the book fair and bought 2 $5 books! (Post pics later!) Then we came home, hugged daddy good-bye, they changed AGAIN! and then the girls went over to my dad's house to spend the night because we are leaving around 8 a.m. and I didn't want to make my dad and stepmom get up early to babysit. I know they are over there getting spoiled to death! Hubby is going to pick them up after work tomorrow. They will probably fall asleep in the car on the way home from sugar crashes and exhaustion from staying up too late. Grandparents are wonderful :)

We are going to Grams' house on Saturday for dinner so hubby can put up a screen door. I got her a cell phone and she is too funny. I had to try to teach her how to use it today. She is 83 years old. That's all I'm saying.

Saturday is National Scrapbooking Day and I really really want to sit at home and scrap online with all the challenges and contests that will be going on virtually! I guess I can try to catch up on Sunday...and I'll have all morning on Saturday...besides...I will probably be so sick of scrapbooking after Friday's expo...right..right?

Yeah, right! And yes...if you were wondering...I am obsessed lately. Here's a page to share that I finally finished. Have a good weekend.

P.s. On the way to grandma and grandpa's Harley asked me what 5 x 4 is...I told her and she said, "At least I got one right." On Monday I am having a phone conference with the teacher. I can't wait to find out that they passed those tests with flying colors!

almost bedtime

Just wanted to put up the soccer pics before I head off to bed. This is just the team photo with the coach. We had so much fun this season.


One of my best friends' mom had a heart attack today and was in the hospital. Please pray for her and for their family. They are really on my heart tonight. Thanks. Nighty night!

Another day...

I am feeling kinda somber today. I dropped the girls off at school and I cried. Now...I know it's probably PMS but Harley is stressing about her state testing! They are 8 years old and she is worried about passing a test. I told her to not worry about it...she said and I quote, "Mom, I can't help it. I am stressed out!" I didn't even know she knew what that meant! So, anyway, speaking of stressed...

I have so many handmade items to make it's ridiculous! Why do I sign up for these swaps? And I have to get the page done for the DT team. I have the pics picked out and I have the papers and embellies they gave us...it's just getting them onto a page and designed. All I want to do is crawl back into bed....

It's already been one of those days and it's only 9:30...

Cable Probs...

Our cable box won't let me watch my recorded shows. The cable guy is coming out today to fix it because they couldn't do it over the phone. They better not charge me and they better fix it...(I'm so demanding.) Anyway, yesterday the girls had their last soccer game and won against a team that was undefeated! I really like cheering them on. I can't wait until the next sport starts! Happy Monday!

Crops crops crops!

I had so much fun at the Friday night crop at the lss. We got our new stuff to make a page with for the design team and it has to be mother's day-ish. Something to do with being a mom, having a mom, etc. Bright bright colors which I do NOT deal with well...but we'll see how it turns out.

I got 8 pages done at the two crops I went to this weekend. Hopefully tomorrow I can sleep, go to the girls' last soccer game and then sleep go grocery shopping...maybe make dinner...then hopefully go to bed! I am exhausted but drank too much coffee. Here's a few pages I uploaded from this weekend..

Thanks for looking!!!!! Oh and by the way, my sister didn't come to the crop today with me...I called her this morning before I left to pick her up...she still hasn't called me back...

Hope she's okay...
Have a good week!

what happened?

Where did all the time go??? Maybe starting next Monday???

All I've been doing is working...not even scrapping really. Oh yeah and homeschooling. The girls have state testing next week so we've been doing tons and tons of packets with little bubbles for practicing. The girls aren't happy about it...but they got 100% so far on all the packets. So I am very happy!

Anyway, last weekend we got to go camping at Dos Picos park which was awesome because it's right here in town! The girls stayed with their brownie troop on Friday night and Shawn didn't want to go because he got home late, so I went to a Stamp Camp with my friend Holly at a Stampin Up Consultant ladies house. It was so fun. I learned how to make 3 new cards and a little 3 drawer dresser out of paper. It's so cute. Anyway, about camping...lol...I stayed Friday night in the tent by myself and froze my butt off! The next day Shawn came and the girls came over to our tent because the rest of the gs went home (they only stayed one night) and we had so much fun! I love camping.

So today I have a dr. appt...just a regular yearly woman one...but gotta go ya know?

Then today the girls have a girl scout jr. bridging meeting telling them all about bridging to juniors. I personally don't think they are old enough yet. I think they should be in brownies one more year, but they've already earned all the brownie patches. The troop we are in has already been Brownies for 3 years, we joined the group late and missed a year. That first year we were with a group that were Daisys.

ANYWAY, who cares...on to more important matters. (I'm in a hurry here!) Tonight I am going to a crop at the scrapbook store. I don't think I said before but I got accepted onto the design team at our scrapbook store here in Ramona. It's exciting. They give me stuff...I make it into stuff and turn it back in...it's kinda cool :) Then tomorrow I am going to an all day crop in Vista with the Scrapbooking Mom's group. That should be fun too. I invited my sister Tamara. We just recently became friends again. I did a page about it.



And here's a page all about me...LOL.


Okay, enough of an update. Gotta go back to work...I was really on here just to get a sketch from Shanna....LOL!!!!

Shout out to Angela! I got your bday gift in the mail and I left you a message like a week later saying thanks. Hope you got the message! I love you tons and tons...the pizza was delish! HUGS!