Wow! Almost a full month since I last blogged. To be quite honest, I haven't even been motivated to blog much lately because most of what I think to blog about is kinda depressing and I don't really want to share that publicly. I've been thinking also about starting up a paper journal again, but I've been to lazy to actually do it. Oh well.

So what has made me come to blog today? Well I realized I didn't really do much over at the Sweet Shoppe this past month and so I wanted to get back into the groove of things again with the latest blog challenge. This one is about what color finger nail polish I'd be, which is so funny to me because anyone who knows me, knows I don't even wear polish. I don't know what it is about polish but it really bothers me to have it on. The few times I have ventured to wear any, it lasted less than a day before I had removed it. Even for my wedding day. I literally had my nails done right before the ceremony (french manicure style) and then I removed it when I went to change out of my gown to leave the reception. What a big goofball I am. Well anyway, here is my result of the little blog quiz.

Your Nail Polish Color is Red

How you're unique: You have an incredible eye for style and art

Why your style rocks: You are classic and classy - and that's hot!

What this color says about you: "I'm smart, sassy, and sexy. And I know it.
What Color Nail Polish Best Fits You?

Is that not the most hysterical thing? I mean seriously me with Red Polish? Oh my gosh! Anyway, I hope you get results that make you laugh also. If so let me know.

Yep it's Friday and there is a new blog challenge up at SSD so here we go:

This week we are linked to a Star Wars quiz HERE to determine which character we are most similar to. And here are my results:

You are Luke Skywalker

Luke Skywalker 68% R2-D2 68% Yoda 63% C-3PO 63% Princess Leia 61% Boba Fett 60% Han Solo 59% Padme 56% Darth Maul 56% Jar Jar Binks 55%

You value your friends and loved ones, but can sometimes act recklessly because of your emotions. Occasionally you resort to whining. You look ahead to great things for yourself.

(This list displays the top 10 results out of a possible 21 characters)

Wouldn't you know it I'm most like the one character I like the least in the whole original 3. Well at least I'm tied with also being R2D2. Enjoy, laugh it up, and go take the quiz and tell me who you are most like. :) Have a great weekend!

Ah it is Friday, it is finally raining here, the girls are napping, and I got some time in this week to actually scrap. Check below for new layouts. Definitely a great week! I have tons of movies DVR'd (is that right or should it be DVRed?) and can't wait to have some downtime with Jamie tonight to kick back, relax and enjoy them. And since today is Friday, there is a new blog challenge up at the Sweet Shoppe blog. This week we are to share our plans for the Fourth of July that is next week. Well in my case since Independence Day is next week that means our anniversary is next week also! I just can't believe that next Thursday Jamie & I will be celebrating 10 years of marriage. It has been amazing to say the least. Jamie truly is my best friend and my rock. He balances my quirky high maintenance self with amazing love and kindness. He is a fabulous daddy and I just can't imagine life without him, and I hope I never do. I can not even begin to tell him how much I love and appreciate him. But to celebrate this great journey I have arranged for my wonderful inlaws to keep the girls for us and I've made reservations at Cooper's Landing for the night for July 3rd (Jamie has the 4th off but not the 6th, so we will just be celebrating early.) This place looks so wonderful, and I love staying in Bed & Breakfasts. We are reserved for the Vineyard Suite for the night, plus have reservations for dinner that night and the best part is we are the only guests (or at least we were when I made the reservation). So that means we won't have to share the jacuzzi. Oh and I also reserved the chocolate dipped strawberry platter, yummy! We had these at our wedding, but I never got to eat any, so now it is like a tradition that we have to get these on every anniversary to make up for that. LOL. I don't really know yet what we will do the following day for the 4th. We usually go to our community parade and then out to watch the fireworks, but I don't think we are going to rush back home for the parade this year nor do I know where we will see the fireworks (although I will make sure that we go see some - I love fireworks!) During the day we will probably do some local hikes or try to find some good local music, or check out some of the small town shops around the inn. Who knows. :)
And speaking of music, the other part of the blog challenge was to link up a You Tube video that makes me smile. So without a doubt that would have to be the OK Go guys singing Here It Goes Again on the treadmills. I just love this song and can't be in a crummy mood when I see this video or hear this song. So here ya go:

Ok so I got this new fancy camera now and my photos are worse than ever! For instance, the other day the girls were outside playing and being cute and I was just snapping away. I had everything on manual but I thought they would be fine (I mean after all it was a gorgeous bright day). Well they aren't fine! Take a look:


UGH! Apparently my aperture (I think) was set too low. So now I have to figure out some way to fix all of these shots from Ruthie's birthday. Someone help me please! Tell me who you think has the best photo actions that can work magic on these. Or do you guys think they are too overexposed to be helped? Please don't tell me that, I will be so heartbroken.

So this week SSD's blog challenge involved taking a pixie quiz to discover our inner pixieness. And I came up as a forest pixie. I have no idea why this is. I mean don't get me wrong, I love the earth (I do happen to live here after all) but I wouldn't consider myself in tune with it and doing anything to protect it. I mean I recycle (most of the time). But today in my disgust with the many spoiling foods in the fridge I admit I threw some glass jars and plastic containers in the trash - I just didn't want to bother with it. So I guess I'm a fair weather forest pixie. I'm a good little pixie when it is convenient for me, but otherwise you're out of luck. Thanks Shawna for that little quiz to help me see just how self-centered I am. LOL. Now I'm thinking I need to retake that cartoon character quiz and see if there is a description for Oscar the grouch on there. :) Oh well. I'm off to do a sudoku and get some sleep.

Yep this was actually last week's blog challenge post from SSD. I have no idea where the week went and totally forgot to post, so here it is. Note: if you want to see the full quiz, visit the SSD link above and play along. But here are my answers:

1. Which one of the following describes the perfect date? a) Candlelight dinner (4 pts.) I actually would have picked coffee at the bookstore, but that wasn't an option so this was the next best thing. :)

2. What is your favorite type of music? b) Alternative (1 pt.)

3. What type of movies do you prefer? a) Comedy (2 pts.)

4. Which one of these occupations would you choose if you only could choose one of these? c) Teacher (3 pts.) DUH!

5. What do you do with your spare time? b) Read (4 pts.) (Sudoku, scrapbook, and stamping weren't choices LOL)

6. Which one of the following colors do you like best? c) Sky Blue (3 pts.) - such a bummer purple wasn't a choice

7. What do you prefer to eat? c) Sushi (1 pt.) Finally a clear cut choice!!!!

8. What is your favorite holiday? b) Christmas (3 pts.)

9. If you could go to one of these places which one would it be? d) Hawaii (4 pts) But really all of the above would be fabulous!

And last but not least:
10. With which of the following would you prefer to spend time with? a) Someone smart (5 pts)

For a grand total of 30 points, and that makes me:

(29-35 points) You are Sponge Bob Square Pants:

You are the classic person that everyone loves. You are the best friend that anyone could ever have and never wants to lose. You never cause harm to anyone and they would never not understand your feelings. Life is a journey, it’s funny and calm for the most part. Stay away from traitors and jealous people, and you will be stress free.

I'm not sure how accurate this is because I definitely don't feel that my life is a calm journey, but it was fun nonetheless. Enjoy!

So the blog prompt for this week from the Sweet Shoppe is such a fun one. Here's a hint:


If I had a million dollars what would I do? Well the first thing I think of is the BNL (Bare Naked Ladies) song - and you seriously have to watch this. :) :

But realistically I actually do know what I'd do with it. First I'd finish paying off our debt, then we'd make the additions (plus a couple of extras) we want to make to our house, then I'd take our whole family (especially my in-laws) on a great vacation. I mean seriously we owe them big time for all they do every day for us. Yet I know they don't see it this way and would never consider us owing them anything. They are just fantastic people in that way. Then, we'd take the equivalent of Jamie's salary for 2 years and open up his own software consulting business and the rest of the money would go into savings. So there ya go. A bit of extravagance and a bit of practicality. That's me. :) If you're reading this, I'd love to know what you'd do with the money. :)

So for the past two weeks I've been in Ella's preschool classroom at least several times a day if not the entire day, EVERY day. Why? you ask. Well because I adore her teachers and her classmates and I just can't say No when I'm asked to help out. Seriously this started back in September when her teacher asked me to be room mom and I've been taking on tasks ever since. So we had the preschool graduation yesterday, which made for a bittersweet day. The kids were so cute all dressed up in their little caps & gowns and it is so amazing how much these children have grown over the year and the friendships they have developed. I know Ella is certainly going to miss so many of them. Here are a few photos from the big day.

So now that the school year is over I'm looking forward to a bit of recovery time. No getting up early, and rushing through the morning to get Ella to school on time (which unfortunately rarely happened). Instead we can enjoy breakfast together and pajama days. However, I'm sure that in a week or so I'll be looking forward to the fall. LOL Especially if this heat and humidity continues as bad as it is now. I mean I can't even stand to walk the dog outside for 10 minutes. UGH.

So I've gotten some time to scrap lately so I thought I'd just pop on here to show them.

This first one is for SSD's Cookie Decorating challenge and uses the new Songbird Avenue kit:


Credits

And this one uses Miriam's new Lolly Pop papers:

Credits

And this one shows off my little Ruthie:


Credits

Well I guess that's all for now. So I'm off to chase Ruthie some more and maybe get a little housecleaning done.

Look at me blogging twice on the same day. :) I completely forgot to add in my previous post about Sweet Shoppe's Blog to Blog challenge so here I am doing it in a new post because it really is an interesting one.

This week's was to blog about our favorite designer, kit, product, etc. Now it would be super easy to blog about the incredible Miriam Lima. She is just such a wonderful person as well as a talented designer, but since I'm on her CT I feel like that may be cheating a bit. So I decided to choose another designer to blog about. But of course that was so difficult because, well if you've been in the digi community even a short while you will realize that almost everyone you interact with is super incredible!

So I've chosen 2 designers to spotlight. :)
First is Meredith Fenwick. She was the first designer that I actually purchased from. And now I think I have almost all of her stuff. Plus she is half of the creative genius that is behind Songbird Avenue (see past blog entries) and I love the whole focus on charity that they have created there. Plus I just love her designs. I don't really "know" her and I'm sure she has no clue who I am but I'd love to be a guest CT for her.

Here's a LO I did with some of her designs (By the way, this super cute little girl is Sarah the daughter of Erica Webster (pne123) who is an amazing scrapper!)

Credits

Second is Jen Caputo. She is the template guru! I absolutely love her stuff! I knew of Jen from her days with The Angel Company (I'm also a demonstrator for TAC) and her amazing Caputo kits. So when I first started playing around with digi and I saw Jen in the forums and later found her great templates, actions, etc. I have become an even bigger fan. Not only are her templates amazing but she is also a fantastic scrapper. I'm always inspired when I look through her gallery or on her blog. And when I am really looking for some honest feedback and critique I know I can count on Jen to be real with me. Thanks Jen! And anytime you need a guest CT member I'd be thrilled to scrap for you. :) And here are some pages I've scrapped with Jen's fab templates:

I can't believe it is already June! Lately I've been so busy that I feel like my life is just in fast forward. I hate it because I feel like I'm missing so much just because there isn't enough time for it all. It's like that movie Click, except I don't have any control over any of it. Which is probably why it bothers me so much. :)

Anyways, it is a new month and that means a new Songbird Avenue kit is available. I blogged a few entries ago about this awesome collab. project. Last month they donated almost $3500 to the March of Dimes! How phenomenal is that! Well this month, all proceeds will go to The American Diabetes Association. Of course I've already bought mine and hope to get a page done with it today. :)



Speaking of getting pages done. I went to Archivers last night with my friend Anne for a crop. Of course I was the only one there scrappin' digi style and I only finished one page, but it was so fun to catch up with Anne.

Here's the page:


Credits

I've been scrapping a lot of Ella's pics lately so I thought it was time to do some of Ruthie's. Ok now I'm off to get some stuff done today before Jamie & I go out on our date tonight. :)

You Are 50% Weird

Normal enough to know that you're weird... But too damn weird to do anything about it!

Just another blog update for the Sweet Shoppe Blog Challenge. The questions were interesting because at first I came up with 40% weird and I know I'm weirder than that, so I went back to change one of my answers that I thought could go either yes or no since there wasn't a sometimes and it was enough to push me up to 50% weird. So can you guess which answer I would have said sometimes to? Take the quiz and let me know. :)

Ok so it seems lately the only time I actually blog on this thing is for the SSD blog challenge. :) Oh well, so be it. Today's blog quiz is all about whether we love or hate certain things and can be found HERE. So here are my answers:

Scary Movies: I hate & love these. I hate them because they really creep me out, but sometimes I like being scared. It just depends on my mood. LOL this could probably be said for everything on this list. I hate the ones that are just senseless gore, because really what's the point? I saw enough real life gore working emergency rescue, I don't really care to watch it glorified in a movie. But I do love the ones that really make your mind think, like M. Night Shyamalan's movies.

Amusement Parks: I love these. I love the games, the rides the oh-so-bad-for-me-but-oh-so-yummy food. Everything except the crowds. I just don't like having to wait in lines or feeling like I have no room to move around. So if it is amusement parks in the off season, oh yeah I'm all for it. Oh wait, though I hate water parks! YUCK! They just seem like one nasty bath tub to me and I don't like to share my baths. :)

Valentines Day: This I could take it or leave it. No real opinion here, because I have the absolute best hubby who loves me every day of the year.

working out: Hmmm, to be honest I don't love the initial part of working out nor do I love forcing myself to do so, but I do LOVE the feeling I have afterwards. I feel so much more energetic and I guess that is what pushes me to actually follow through with doing it every day.

tattoos: Nope, hate 'em. I have no desire to willingly put myself through that much pain and pay for it. I know some are very artistically done, but I always see them as what they will look like when the person is old and wrinkly and to me that is never a pretty sight.

guacamole: Oh YUMMMMY! I love avocados any way they are prepared, but a great bowl of guacamole and chips is always a delight.

Hillary Clinton: This is another one of those hmmm, depends on my mood. I don't personally know the lady so I don't judge her nor can I make any comment about her in any other way other than politically. And although I don't agree with a lot of her political views, I don't really know much of what she really stands for or what she has done in office.

Napolean Dynamite - the movie: Ok we just recently watched this movie, and it had some great parts but overall, it was just weird. So another one dependent on my mood. :)

Meat Loaf: Love both the musician and the meal. :) And I have a fabulous recipe for a southwestern meatloaf that never has leftovers.

Forwarded Emails (videos, stories, etc.): HATE THEM!!!! My email is flooded with so much junk mail already that to also have to weed through these is just a pain. My family knows I don't read them let allow forward them on. I don't care what it is, I just don't want it in my email.

So there you have it. :) I'll try to post tomorrow with some layouts I recently finished and a problem I'm trying to figure out.

So yesterday (well, I realize that it is now technically very early on Monday, but I haven't gone to bed yet so I'm still considering this Sunday, but at any rate yesterday here is referring to Saturday) was National Scrapbook Day and for a scrapper this is truly a wonderful event. I have celebrated NSD in the past as a traditional scrapper, but this was my first year celebrating as a digi-scrapper and I must say this year totally blew all of the others out of the water! I mean there were tons of sales online and seriously good deals to be had and I got the products immediately! Now those of you who know me know that I'm not a patient person, especially when I'm waiting for goodies to arrive so this was a huge plus to my shopping experience. :) Now add to the shopping bliss an entire day of chatting & cropping with the wonderful ladies at the Sweet Shoppe and it was perfect. So how much scrapping did I get done, weeellllllll not a lot, but I did do this LO that I'm really happy with for a speed scrap challenge:

Credits can be found here: http://www.sweetshoppedesigns.com/inspiration/showphoto.php?photo=5632

Also there is a cool lil survey on the SSD blog so here are my answers for that:

Q1: If you could vacation anywhere in the world where would you go and why?

Oh man, I so don't want to give just one answer here. I'd love to travel everywhere! But if I were to pick just one area it would have to be the vacation that Jamie & I are planning now for next August. We will be going to Scotland & Ireland if all goes according to plan. :)

Q2: What cartoons do you absolutely detest & refuse to allow anyone to watch {be it child, spouse- haha, nieces/nephews.. etc just plain don’t want it viewed on your television)?

I have always detested Barney. I don't know what it is about the stupid looking dinosaur but I just don't like things/people that are so damn happy all the time and that laugh is like nails on a chalkboard to me.

Q3: You just woke up, you’re a mess, haven’t showered, there are dishes in the sink.. There’s a knock at the door, what do you do?

Hmmmm. Am I wearing a bra? If so then no problem I just answer the door and hopefully just scare off whoever it is. If it is as it often is at my house when this occurs and I'm not wearing that much needed supporting device then I go into covert hiding mode and wait for them to leave.

Q4:When you looked at yourself in the mirror today, what was the first thought that ran through your mind?

"I wonder what it will take to bribe the girls to go back to sleep for just 30 more minutes?"

Q5. Tell me a story about your Dad..

Oh I love my dad! He basically raised me by himself, well there was a stepmom in the house but she was pretty useless on most accounts. My dad is an auctioneer and so he'd take me with him every Fri & Sat night to the auctions and let me help him out. Sometimes he'd give me the item to show off to the crowds and sometimes he'd just hand me the mic and say "Show me how to sell this, Mandy." I loved those little moments when it was just the 2 of us.

Q6: You open your drawer, find 1 pink polka dotted sock and 1 black sock with reindeer on it.. Do you wear them together and hope no one sees them or go without socks today & hope your feet don’t get sweaty?

This is exactly why I have sandals! :) I'd much rather go without socks than go mismatched.

Q7: Are there any strange stains on your carpet, floor, walls, ceiling or couch? Do you know how they got there?

Well our living room carpet is pretty much just one big stain. LOL There is a particularly bad red one over by the girls' train table and this comes from my need for a nap one afternoon. Ella asks me if she & Ruthie can have a snack in the living room right as I was about to lay down for a quick nap on the sofa, so I said sure, just get something. Well when I woke up they had been eating red jello and totally spilled it everywhere. I can't believe how quiet they are when they are being destructive!

Q8: Are you neighbors annoying???

Hmmmm, not really. They pretty much stay to themselves. The family across the street though has 2 teenage boys that are a bit wild, but they don't bother us like they do other neighbors because we are the cool people on the street, Oh yeah! LOL

Q9: Are you a phone person.. if I called you right now would you chat with me? lol

Oh you bet! I love chatting as long as it isn't while I'm watching my Thursday night TV, that is the only night I watch TV and I hate getting interrupted.

Q10: What colour popsicle would you like.. Orange, Purple, Red, Yellow, Green, Pink or Blue?

I'm not really a popsicle kinda gal. I'm more of a soft serve type. But if it has to be a popsicle I think orange would be the yummiest. I love citrus flavors!

So there you have it! My answers to Lauren's cool little survey. Now I'm off to bed.

Today is a glorious rainy day! I know that I am among a very small group of individuals who actually love rainy days, but seriously I can't be the only one. Now don't get me wrong, I like sunny days too. But this week has been unbelievably hot, I mean we got into the low 90s one day, and it is only the beginning of May. So to have a nice rainy day where the temp is in the upper 50s, is pure delight for me. Plus since it is rainy and "cold" the girls haven't wanted to go play outside which means I've been able to stay in and get some stuff done. I was going to try to scrap some, but there were too many interruptions and I've needed to organize my EHD files for so long so that is what I've been doing. I'm trying to get everything sorted before all the awesome NSD sales tomorrow. But even before NSD starts you can get this awesome new kit:


It is from Songbird Avenue and was created by Meredith Fenwick, Jan Crowley, and Shabby Princess. And boy is it awesome! Not only that, but 100% of the profits go to a different charity each month. This month they are donating to the March of Dimes. So of course I had to support them and applaud their efforts, seeing as how I know first hand how wonderful this charity is. :) Hopefully I'll get some layouts done using this awesome kit this weekend and I'll post them next week here.

Oh how I love a good deal. Speaking of deals here are some blogs you should definitely check out if you want some super cool freebies:

First since it is Friday, Sharon Kenealy has her weekly mini kit available at:

http://artisticmusings.typepad.com/

Then make sure you sign up for the new Little Dreamer Designs newsletter, because you get this awesome kit free when you do.

So to get it just go to: http://www.littledreamerdesigns.com/newsletter.html and sign up.

Next Dani Mogstad has these adorable little flowers available on her blog:

http://www.designbydani.com/blog/

Then Jenna has a new doodle available on her blog:


http://dancinglines.blogspot.com/

And Rachael Giallongo is giving away a cool template for NSD on her blog

http://www.rachaelgiallongo.com/blog/

And if you hurry you might be able to catch a couple of freebies still up on Jennilyn's blog at:

http://www.jennilyndesigns.com/journal/


Now that you've checked out some super cool designs, I'll chat about the other happy parts of my day. :)

First, we got digital cable today! OMG, I'm so excited and goofy about this. Which is just funny to me that it makes me so happy. We really don't watch much TV, usually just a few shows on Thursday night, but the cool thing about the digi cable is that it comes with a DVR, so I no longer have to hush my brother when he calls long distance and I'm watching Survivor (yes I did this last week - sorry about that Dean) and we can record 2 shows at once. This is so revolutionary to me because even though we really only watch TV on Thurs nights, we like so many shows that come on at the same time, so now we can just DVR them. Oh I can't wait to give it a try. :) Jamie of course is all excited about all of the music channels we get.

So after the cable guy left Fed Ex shows up. I thought this was just my order with some aquarium supplies I'd ordered because they were tracked to arrive today, but no it was our new cell phones! WhooHoo! We haven't had new phones since we started our cell plan back in 2001, so these were definitely needed. This is what I got:
It is a Sony Ericsson W300i and is so sweet! I can't wait to get it all set up. Then on top of all of these fun new toys and what not, Jamie & I went out on a date tonight. We actually hired a babysitter (the inlaws are out of town) and let her put the girls to bed so that we could go out to dinner and then hang out together at the bookstore/coffee shop without having to rush home. Ahh it has been a fabulous Friday, now I'm off to bed so I can scrap all day tomorrow - I hope. :)

This is possibly one of my all time favorite desserts to make for guests and I made this last Friday for our friends Stu, Donna & their little girl Erin. We had them over for dinner since they are moving this weekend. We are going to miss them so much, but have enjoyed our time with them over the past few years. And we know that God has given them an amazing opportunity in South Carolina, so we wish them well. This is also for the Sweet Shoppe Designs blog challenge, which if you're looking for some sweet recipes you should check it out HERE. This recipe ISN'T mine. I just have made it forever, but it originally was found in a Cooking Light Magazine, and if you can't read the text you can see the recipe online HERE. If you want the neat little recipe card above, just right click and save it to your computer. Enjoy!

Hokie Hope Day

So yesterday we went to Chapel Hill for Ella's checkup at the Spina Bifida clinic. Here we see the Physical Medicine & Rehab doctor, the orthopedist, a physical therapist and an occupational therapist. These are always long appointments. And to be quite honest I dread them. I mean we already see a PT and an OT on a weekly basis. Plus we go every 3 months to a local orthopedist and regular checkups with the pediatrician, so I feel like we are pretty much on top of things and are good to go. But yet we go to this special clinic every 6 months and they tell us the same thing each time. "Wow! Ella is doing so great." or "I can't believe she is doing all that she can already." or "Ella is such a miracle." And these comments are really the reason we go back each time. Ella loves to show off and she loves seeing these doctors and impressing them. I mean this is the girl who at 2 years old told her Orthopedist that her Achilles Tendon was a little tight. He about flipped out and still remembers that. And these doctors truly are wonderful! I know they love Ella almost as much as I do. And I'm so glad Jamie left work earlier to make the drive up there with us, because the appointment was right during Ruthie's nap time and she wanted no part of sitting still in her stroller. Plus I had a migraine come on about half way through the appointment so it was nice to have someone else drive when it got really bad. When we got home I could barely walk and I was so nauseous, so off I went with my Excedrin and my pillow. After an hour I was so much better. I really need to keep some Excedrin in my purse so I can take one as soon as my headache starts so that it doesn't get so bad. But then it came back again last night, and Jamie was feeling bad too so he took a sick day today and I'm so glad he did. I love having him home on nice days like today. I even got him to help me do some work outside after breakfast. Well speaking of which I have a huge pile of weeds to haul off and I promised my neighbor I'd watch her little boy in a bit, so I'm off.

I have a rant I need to make about Wal-Mart. Why does a corporation that is so wealthy (I just heard one day last week that the CEO or somebody got a multi-million dollar bonus, so I know they are not on the verge of bankruptcy) have such a hard time with cleanliness? I mean good grief! This is why I much prefer to just not go in there. But Saturday night was not a time that I could be picky. It was late, I had to get several things that couldn't all be gotten at the grocery store and Target had already closed. So I had to go to Walmart. Also it should be noted that I was not close to my house. I had to make a delivery to one of my stamping customers who lives about 40 minutes away, so she directed me to the closest Walmart instead of me having to drive all the way past my house and to the Walmart that is nearest our house. This I mistakenly thought would save time. Well first this Walmart, and if you are anywhere near me in central North Carolina this would be the one in Fuquay-Varina, was completely backwards from the Walmart closest to me (Clayton). I needed trash bags, sandwich bags, a plastic storage bin, 1 bar of Ivory soap (for my Sunday School lesson I would be teaching the following morning), and some replacement Brita water filters. Not a long list. I should have been in & out in under 15 minutes, right? Wrong! 1 hour 20 minutes later (at 11:30 pm!!!) I am stumbling out to my car because I'm so exhausted, and I still had a 20 minute drive home! So what went wrong? Well to begin with nothing was where it really should be. For instance, in the Clayton store I would have gone over to toiletries gotten the soap, picked up the storage bin on my way to the grocery side of the store where I could have found the trash bags, sandwich bags, and water filters right on the same aisle. I could have then gone through the self-checkout and been on my way home. But no, that is not the way it happened. You see for some reason those who manage the Fuquay store seem to think that trash bags belong on the aisle with popcorn and chips, sandwich bags really go with the plastic storage section, Ivory soap is only needed in packs of 15, and here is the real kicker, Water filters are easiest to find in the hardware department with the paint! UGH! Give me a break! And the whole store smelled like a giant fart. I could barely breathe in there. Plus I actually had to move heavy carts out of the middle of aisles and shift boxes over so that I could get the few items I needed off the shelves. One box that I had to pick up was a box of canned foods (in the Popcorn/trash bag aisle!!!) that must have weighed at least 50 pounds. It was truly a miserable shopping experience. As I told Jamie when I called to let him know I was finally on my way home, I'd rather bite off my toenails than to go shopping in there again.

Normally I'm not really one who enjoys rainy days, but today I am. You see, Ruthie has had a terrible runny nose (we're talking gallons of snot every 10 minutes - I swear) and just general fussiness all week. Then last night we went to West View's fund raiser auction, and didn't get home until after 10 pm. So needless to say we are very tired. Even my bundle of energy Ruthie is taking it easy today. It's like the weather mellowed her out a bit. Which is why I'm so thankful for this rainy day. I've even been able to scrap a little bit today, but I can't show you what yet because the supplies are super top secret. hee hee.

So guess what? I didn't get on Teresa Ferguson's Creative Team. I guess that is what I get for waiting until the last minute to apply. Oh well, her templates are still fabulous. And it is always fun to apply.

Back to the auction at the Elementary school. This was so amazing. The school is a brand new school and so it is in need of so much. And even though it is a public school there isn't a whole lot of funding available so we've been doing lots of fund raisers this year. In this one, each class put together a basket of goodies according to a theme the teacher chose. Well since I'm the room mom for Ella's class I was in charge of getting ours together. Of course I loved it that the teacher chose scrapbooking as our theme. Anyway, ours really paled in comparison to some of the others that were there. I mean they were amazing! One had a weekend stay at a condo on Myrtle Beach, another had a VCR/DVD combo unit, another had a sweet car stereo system, and the list goes on. And these items were only a part of the basket, there was tons of stuff in each basket. Well at the end of the auction the school raised $17,000!!! Holy Cow! I was so shocked when I heard someone say that number. I mean our little tiny basket brought $150. But it is for a wonderful cause and I'm so glad they did well. Then there was a fabulous dinner served before the auction by the wonderful people who own the Outback steakhouse in Garner. Adult meals were $10, children's were $6. But the owners gave 100% of the money to the school! And boy were our plates stacked. I thought we were either getting chicken or steak, but no they gave us both! One chicken breast and one steak per adult meal! Plus there was a yummy salad, rolls, mashed potatoes, drinks and cheesecake!!!!! The children got chicken fingers, plus all of the sides. What absolutely wonderful people they are! Plus their children go to this school so it was great to know they really do have the school's best interest in mind. Let's see what else was donated.... oh the auctioneers volunteered their time and talents. They were fabulous and extremely entertaining. Plus they are part of the Wester Auction services! Marsha & Randy Wester used to be our neighbors until they moved 1.5 years ago. They were always such sweet people. It was definitely a lot of hard work on the part of those who coordinated everything, but a great end result. Now I just hope we get to stay there next year to continue being part of that incredible school family. Mr. Vetrano, please approve our reassignment request.

So I decided to take a stab at another Creative Team. I know this sounds like a really foolish idea considering the list of songs that sum up my week from yesterday, but I'm such a sucker for templates. And Teresa Ferguson is looking for a few new people for her team. I just recently found her templates at the Sweet Shoppe and I am so hooked. That site has some awesome talent and I'd love to challenge myself in using templates. I so LOVE templates, but usually when I scrap with them I just plop in papers & photos and call it done. I think that if I were on a creative team for a template designer, I'd stretch myself to twist them up a bit. But they really are a great spring board for getting creative juices flowing. Just look, I started using one of Teresa's templates to make my CT application: Credits: Template: Teresa Ferguson (Smarties- Snack Pack3); Papers, ric rac, letter U, file tab, journal box, and brads: Suzy Nunes' Peppermint Tea (From SSD Quarterly Assortment); flower, leaves, and jewel brad on flower: Robin Carlton (Collaged Floral Alpha); Backwards Staples: Jenn Patrick; Photo Filter: Newspaper effect from Virtual Photographer; RubOn Action & Linen Textureplate: Atomic Cupcake; Drop Shadow Actions: Traci Murphy; Fonts: MA Sexy, juiceITC, jr!hand

And in the process of making it, I realized that although I love being on a CT, I really scrapbook and create for my family and myself. So I also did this layout:
Credits: Template: Teresa Ferguson (Smarties- Snack Pack3); Papers, ric rac, letter U, and journal box: Suzy Nunes' Peppermint Tea (From SSD Quarterly Assortment); flower, leaves, and jewel brad on flower: Robin Carlton (Collaged Floral Alpha); Photo Filter: Newspaper effect from Virtual Photographer; RubOn Action & Linen Textureplate: Atomic Cupcake; Drop Shadow Actions: Traci Murphy;Fonts: MA Sexy, juiceITC, jr!hand

I love the way it turned out. And I can't believe how quickly they went. I finished both layouts (shadowing and all) in under 30 min. :)

So I'm participating in the From Our Blog To Yours Challenge from Sweet Shoppe Designs (you can check out all of their cool challenges HERE) So here is my list:

1.) Running On Empty (Jackson Browne) - Just because no matter how early I get to bed, no matter how healthy I'm eating, and how much I'm exercising - I still just feel worn out. I have had zero energy this week

2.)Over My Head (The Fray) - Well considering that this challenge was in fact posted last Wednesday, and I'm just now getting to it..... I've just felt so overwhelmed by life lately. Caring for the girls, keeping the house in order, etc, etc, etc.

3.)Here It Goes Again (Ok Go) - Check out the video HERE. Are you starting to see a pattern here. :) I have to include this song because every time I feel like I'm spinning my wheels, the video of these guys on the treadmills pops into my head, & I start bopping around & singing this song. It just instantly cheers me up.

4.)The Bird (Eddie From Ohio) - OK beside the fact that this band is just awesome and we've loved them since our college days, and really no week is truly complete without a little EFO. This song just needs to be blared out loud when driving around the triangle. There are so many rude, inconsiderate, and just generally awful drivers in this area that I seem to encounter every time I go down I-40. And I absolutely hate it when a driver flashes me the bird. So this song is for them.

5.)We Are Not As Strong As We Think We Are (Rich Mullins) - Because no matter how much I think I have it together (yes I do have weeks like that) I still know that I'm frail and imperfect. And just as a humorous note on this song, I've been doing a weightlifting class at the gym and since I increased my weights this week, I've been so painfully sore. Oh yeah, I'm definitely not as strong as I thought I was.

OK now I have to go get some more stuff done. Especially if I'm ever going to make that 20 Layout/ week goal. Hmmmm I wonder what song I could play for this? Maybe Zombie Zoo by Tom Petty, because if I just scrap all the time I will walking around like a zombie and my house will definitely look like a zoo.

I just can't believe that November was the last time I blogged. Ugh. I know I compose little blog entries all the time in my head. I just never manage to get them out and on the computer. So when I finally sat down 8 hours ago to compose a blog entry I discover that blogger has in fact changed a bunch of stuff and I needed to update my template. So instead of just choosing one of their templates, I had to create my own. :) Well sort of. Actually, Jamie had helped me write most of the code for this that you see now months ago. I just never finished tweaking it until today. I'll probably change the header though. Other than that I'm pretty happy with it. Hopefully I'll be able to change out my photobucket slideshows over there on the left each week. This of course will mean that I have to actually scrap 10 new pages for each slide show, each week! That is 20 pages each week. Oh I will be so excited if that actually happens.

Speaking of the slideshows, all of the layouts featured in the top one are using Miriam Lima's fabulous designs. Wow, her newest collection August Shadow totally rocks! Beautiful colors, beautiful brushwork, it is just perfect. And it even has matching elements.