Things that make me happy!

I won't lie, I love organization! I love lists and tags and labels and containers to hold things. This stuff is like candy to me!

My Dhubby and kids got me MM new tag maker for Christmas and this is the first thing I did with it. I labeled all my albums. I love how other scrappers have all these cute albums, well as anal retentive as I am I can't give up the old chronological scrapbooks but I can have cute little tags on them all.


These are all my completed albums. My Wedding album, Volumes 1 - 5 of our life {which by the way starts at our first date}, and my kids first year albums.


Up close on the wedding and first 2.


Up close of the last 3.


Up close of the kids' first year albums.

I am so proud of these and that tag maker is da bomb! It is really easy to use, doesn't take much pressure at all.

Thanks for looking!

Santa was good to us...

...the boys got more toys than they could even play with. I. was so busy bouncing from one toy to another and poor little E. was just plain overwhelmed by the whole experience.

We spent the day with my parents, my sister and her husband and my grandma. The funniest part of Christmas day was I. saying after openning up about his 5 box of clothes, "Please tell her not to buy more clothes!" My sister is my sons' fashion advisor. She makes sure they look all GQ. But I. really wanted to find the toys. :)

What did I get? Well my big present was the newest version of Adobe Photoshop Creative Suite. Dhubby got it with his student discount and decided that I should have a real version of it and not some weird version that had the manuals all printed in some Afghany language. He also got me the Dummies Guide to Photoshop CS2. That will be helpful. I also got Harry Potter book #6, which I have been dying to read, another Store-in-style cube for my paper, a pretty shirt that Dhubby picked out all by himself and new pjs. The boys got me the new MM tag maker and a bunch of empty tags and a shiny red cookbook holder and Santa renewed my Creating Keepsakes magazine subscription. All in all I did pretty good. My in-laws got Dhubby and me new stainless pots and pans and monogrammed silver setting for 12 {it is gorgeous}. My parents got us a wet/dry dust buster and a weight bench and weights. They are for our New Year's resolution to get 'buff & sexy' for each other. My sister got us a gift certificate to the new Japanesse steakhouse in Dubuque and a coupon for free babysitting. :)

I am glad that Christmas is over though and that things can get back to normal {whatever that is right}. Next year I want to work on not spending so much money and making sure that everyone knows that I love them. I think everyone would agree with this, we are all getting older and it is harder to find things that we want that we don't just run out and get when we want them. It sucks because I want presents but don't want to spend money just to spend it. I will have to think more on this, but like I said it was a good Christmas.

Today is my BABY's BIRTHDAY

Today is my littlest guy's first birthday!



I let him have one present already this morning. I found this little shopping cart at Target and he loved walking around the store pushing it so I decided that he should have it. He is also wearing his new outfit {also from Target}.



He finally started to walk just a couple of days ago. It is so cute to watch my oldest try to get him to come to him and everything. Priceless -- as the commercial would say!



I still feel bad the little tyke couldn't wait until his actual due date (Jan 26th) and now his birthday is Christmas Eve. But we are trying to make it special. Today we are going to take him to McDonald's for his first Happy Meal all to himself. Don't worry I will bring the camera, Dhubby wants to bring a #1 candle and put it on his hamburger. I am excited.

Friendship

is a very special thing. There is a great quote that I saw on Quoteland today.

"Friendship is the hardest thing in the world to explain. It's not something you learn in school. But if you haven't learned the meaning of friendship, you really haven't learned anything."
-Muhammad Ali

And I think it is true.



Here is a layout that I did. The kids had a play date which was rare since her mom worked and we rarely were able to get together during the week. I miss them, wish we lived closer still, but they are still friends.

So now I get to say I TOLD YOU SO!!!

After all DHubby's ranting and raving about quitting school and how bad it is, he got his grades today. Guess what he got...

STRAIGHT A's

He said that I could say it so I am...

I TOLD YOU SO!!!!!!

Don't get me wrong I am very proud of him but wouldn't it just be easier on us both if he would just listen to me. I mean how often does it happen that I am wrong and he is right. The odds are against him and my track record speaks for itself. TRUST ME!!!!

I feel so special

I have been tagged I guess by Kim {Creative Chaos}. I feel very special but I also feel like this is the beginning of a new form of chain mail!!! UGHH!!

The rules for this particular tagging are as follows:
Remove the blog name in the top spot from the following list and bump everyone up one place. Then add yourself to the bottom slot.

1. Beth
2. Deanna (View of Life)
3. A Scrap of Life (Annette)
4. Creative Chaos (Kim J)
5. RaNdoM THouGhTs (Jen)

Then you get to select five people to pass the love on to. Ok for me these might have some repeats!!

1. Julie
2. Lacey
3. Shari
4. Krissy
5. Shelia

Now, on to the questions!

What were you doing 10 years ago?
celebrating my first Christmas ever with my new husband

What were you doing one year ago?
getting ready to give birth {I have a Christmas Eve baby}

Five snacks you enjoy:
1. chocolates {especially dark chocolate}
2. pizza
3. movie theater popcorn
4. doritos
5. frosting

Five songs to which you know all the lyrics:
1. Bob the Builder theme song
2. Jingle Bell Rock
3. A Few of My Favorite Things from the sound of music
4. Happy Birthday
5. Who Let the Dogs Out {the kiddie version on Radio Disney}

Five things you would do if you were a millionaire:
1. Pay all my bills & buy a house
2. Take care of the kids for life
3. Take care of our families
4. Invest {I am not stupid and I am also kinda cheap}
5. Buy myself and Darren really cool cars

Five bad habits:
1. Too much time on the computer/internet
2. Not dusting
3. Doing a load of laundry and then the next day putting it in the dryer
4. Spending money on stupid stuff
5. Not eating well

Five things you like doing:
1. Scrapbooking
2. Being quiet
3. Doing family stuff
4. Watching movies
5. Being silly with the boys

Five things you would never wear, buy, or get new again:
1. a perm
2. thong underwear
3. pantyhose {a girl can wish right}
4. sweaters with animals/characters knitted on them
5. stretch pants

Five favorite toys:
1. computer
2. scrapbook supplis
3. iPod
4. my Denali
5. my boys!!!

Changing Things

Well I finally had it with my banner. I was so mad at Blogger, I emailed them and I still {even after reading the message they sent back that I think was written in greek or maybe that is GEEK} don't have a clue as to why I can't see it myself or see some of my friends who have made their own too.

So I decided to go back to something simple! I think it looks pretty nice. Maybe after the first of the year I will get some books and try to teach myself HTML, xHTML, XML & CSS. Because supposedly Blogger is written in a combination of all those languages.

We are at my in-laws for the weekend celebrating Christmas with Hubby's family. I. is so excited to open presents and I am so excited to watch the boys do it. We are also going to try to make gingerbread houses too hopefully we will have the time to do it because I know last year I. and I decorated cookies and he loved it.

Pictures to follow I am sure! Have a Merry one!! :)

Self-Portrait

I did it, I created my first totally digital layout using Photoshop CS. I am pretty impressed for someone who still hasn't cracked open the how-to manuals I think I did pretty good, especially for my first try.

So here it is, the first entry to my BOM -- my self-portrait!

My Grandma

It makes me sad to think that the people that I love won't be around forever. I know that is a weird thing to think but it is true, it is life. My grandma is starting to forget things and Alzheimers runs in the family and I hate to think that someday she might not remember me or the kids.

I did this layout with an old picture of her and I. and myself. I love taking the boys to see her because she gets such a kick out of them. I. never called her great grandma, he calls her grandma great and it stuck, that is what we all call her now. And she is great.

Luray Caverns

We took my parents to Luray Caverns one year when they came out to DC to visit us over Thanksgiving. It was a really nice place. VERY family friendly, the entire cavern was wheelchair accessible so I could take the stroller and not have to carry I. the entire way.

I took so many pictures though that if anyone wants to see the caverns but isn't going to be in the area, I could set all the pictures up as a slideshow and if you turn off the lights and turn the A/C up really high, it would probably feel like you were there.

Here is the layout that I did...



I am not sure if I like it yet or not. Have you ever had an idea in your head for how you wanted it to look but couldn't get it to translate into the "real thing"? That's how I feel about this layout. I knew how I wanted it to look but first I couldn't find the brochure and I had wanted to make a pocket where the mountains are stitched but I don't have a clue as to where I put it and it has been since 2003 so I may have even finally gotten rid of it. Then I love the word "caverns" but when I went to stamp the word "Luray" on there I smeared it. So I had to fix it and I still like how the title turned out it just isn't how I had originally pictured it. Then I had so many pictures and I printed out 12 and cut them with my 1 inch square punch and was going to do a border of them but then it was too close together so I ended up staggering them and then I had this empty space so I filled it with smaller black squares {and you can't tell but I stitched around them and the black squares that spell 'luray'}.

But it is done and a done layout is always a good layout...
... now onto the next one!


** OH and let me know what you think of the size of the layout, I made it smaller but I am now thinking that the larger size is better for viewing -- what do you think?

I finally got these pictures scrapped!

They have been sitting on my desk for about a week now, I have just not been motivated to do them. I don't know but for some reason when I see B&W photos, I freeze up. I guess maybe because there is no color scheme for me to work with. I used up some of my BG - Black Tie paper on this layout, tried to challenge myself to do an all B&W layout but I ended up using some red on it. It is a really shiny red though so it didn't scan very well. The word "favorite" is my own handwriting and then I cut out around it and glued it down. Still trying to work on my handwriting, I also wrote on the little file folder at the bottom.



This is my oldest and he is playing in his favorite spot at our old house. He used to spend all day playing by the big picture window in the great room. It had a view of the whole neighborhood and a really wide ledge to put all his toys on.

** oh some other things about this layout... I also used my old Gelly Glaze pens {the old embossing ones}. They aren't great for writing but for coloring in the letters in favorite they work really well. I have been playing with them a lot lately, writing notes with them and stuff. Probably will get used to them and start to want to use them on my layouts about the same time they run out of ink. My luck you know. :)

So I want to share another really great layout that I have done. I say great only because that is what everyone tells me. I really think it looks pretty messy but then I really never liked wrinkling up paper. I just did it on this layout because when I put everything down the first time -- it just looked very... flat, too neat! And lets just say, I don't know this sounds so "I am a graphic designer" {which I am not} but it just wasn't the feeling I was going for.

Well here it is...


I also cut up the one side of the paper and then inked it all. Now the inking I do a lot of but man the last time I used my pinking shears I was making jammies! And the other side looks like I stuck it in my shredder and then at the last minute decided "WAIT.... maybe I do like that paper!" It is Basic Grey, and I love their paper just wish there wasn't so much flowery stuff in the packs.