So long 2009

This is it my last post for 2009. Overall it has been a good year for us...we have our health, we both have jobs and our children are doing well and having fun being kids. Really what more could one ask for?

No big plans for us tonight...just had a nice family dinner including MIL (who leaves tomorrow) I tried a new recipe... Mashed Sweet Potatoes & Bananas with honey. I saw it on the FoodNetwork at Thanksgiving and have been dying to give it a try. It was delish!!!

Other than that it has been a dreary day...a mix of snow & freezing rain which appears to have finally stopped. It was a great day to spend a few hours working on some scrappy stuff. Got another project with the Confetti kit done and I'll give you one last peek for 2009....


It's all kit accept for the black cardstock, MM Tiny Alphas & the MM Glitter Bling frame. The Glitter Bling Frames are available as addon's this month over in the store at Coordinates Collections....and see a frame doesn't always have to hold a picture. Here it highlights my title.

Well that's all I got for now...Talk to you next year!

{ahhh...}

A nice "normal" Sunday and after the last few hectic weeks my mojo returned to full strength and I played in my scraproom. I got a 2-pager done with the January "Confetti" kit over at Coordinates Collections. So that's 2 projects down and I got ideas for a few more. Can't wait to show them to you on reveal day.( Remember because of the holiday and the fact that the DT didn't get kits until late...the official date has been moved back to January 5th)

Here's a little peek...


The yellow pattern paper is from the addon and the Heidi Swapp snowflake & Pink Paislee fashion script letters are from my stash.

I'm off to work tomorrow. Just working 3 days this week...since I didn't have any travel plans I volunteered to come in so others could travel. MIL will be arriving tomorrow night for a few days, so we are still in the throws of celebrating Christmas. One more round of gifts to open on Tuesday night.

Merry Christmas!!!

Merry Christmas everyone...I hope you are enjoying your holidays and time spent with family & friends. Our festivities began early yesterday evening with the 5:30pm Children's Mass.(Dan nearly missed due to his EMT duties apparently around 3:30 a rash of calls start going out and everyone available was paged...he called from the hospital at 4:45 saying he'd meet us at church)
Here's a look at my angel before the service...

And here is a shot of the angels looking on as "Gabriel" speaks to "Joseph".

I can say that all the little "angels" played their parts perfectly...they were so "angelique" and cute. Now all the little shepards were not so well played... I think one almost brought down one of the candles at the end of the pew.

Due to our connections with the local fire dept. we found out that Santa had just passed by our house before we got home. When they found out we were home, they drove back to our street to deliver the 1st presents of the night. Everyone was pleased as you can see here...
Fritz received a "paintball" game for his Playstation and Becca received the Tinkerbell movie which included a little treasure box & necklace. We had a delicious meal of filet mignon with redwine hollendaise sauce, mashed potatoes, and spinach souffle.

Surprisingly Dan & I were the first up this morning, but by 7:30 we had 2 children bouncing beside our bed eager to go down to see what Santa dropped off.



Fritz's big gift was a new improved paintball gun and this picture is Becca showing off the Precious Moments figurine Santa left for her. Behind her is a dollhouse which she has played with all day. She really wanted something for her Barbies and this does the trick! To top it off it was 1/2 the price of the Barbie house and is built much better.

Dan is now putting in a few hours at the Rescue Squad(they are normally 12hr shifts, but on the holidays they break them up into small sections so that people can spend time with their families...if only the PD could operate that way too.) Tonight is just the 4 of us for dinner we will be having lasagna. Tomorrow we will travel to my Dad's for a big family dinner/gift exchange and then next week my MIL & SIL will be here for a few days.

So that's what we've been up to the last 24 hours.

Merry Christmas to all!

I am officially ready

I took today off, ran a few errands this morning. Picking up candies at the local candy store, buy extra tape and wrapping paper at CVS, running to the grocery store for a few needed ingredients for the upcoming meals, etc. Then I came home and wrapped. By the time the kids got home everything was done.Whew! Cranked out some of that Bacon Bleu Cheese dip from Thanksgiving and passed out containers to a few people to enjoy over their holidays. (Lisa, if I had a way you would have gotten one :wink:)

Going to just chill with the family tonight knowing that I'm ready.

The only thing on the list tomorrow is a little prep work in the kitchen for dinner tomorrow night and on Christmas. That way when we get home for the Children's service tomorrow night it won't take much effort to get dinner on the table. I think this is the first year that I won't be wrapping on Christmas Eve. Someday (probably in another life), I hope to be one of those super organized people that have it all done well before the big day.

Wishing you all a very Happy Holiday.

14 inches later...

I know for some of you it's not a big deal, but here along the southern NJ coast it is. Especially since it isn't even winter yet.

Dan left his car at the end of the driveway so we were able to get it out relatively easy this morning and get to church at 10am (not many people were as brave as we were) Once we came home we now had to dig everything out.





Luckily for us our neighbor came over with his tractor and plowed out our entire driveway before we got to far into the manual digging process.

This left me free to do laundry and scrap this afternoon. Have you seen the January kit's yet??
They are called Confetti & Champagne. Such great names and so very fitting. I'm working with the Confetti kit this month.



A mix of papers from Bella Blvd "Flirty", American Crafts "Teen" and Basic Grey "Sugar Rush". Add in some goodies from Prima, Hambly and Pink Paislee you get a totally rocking kit! So very bright and fun. Here's a peek at a layout I did this afternoon ...



The green Prima "Sprite" & the Doodlebug "Shin-Dig" letters that you see in the picture did not come with the kit but you can pick them up in the CC store.

This kit is so fun and versatile...parties, girly layouts, and any other thing you might want to add a fun pop of color to. I'm even thinking of using some of this weekend's snow pictures with these papers.

Snow Bound Saturday

This is the view from the front door about 8am this morning at that time we had about 3 inches.



It didn't take long for the boy to decided he needed to be out in the snow. Here I caught him throwing a snowball...just waiting for someone to come out and join him.

My plan for today was my annual cookie baking with a close friend and our daughters. Drinking my morning coffee and listening to the forecast I knew I'd be on my own baking today. I did manage to bake 4 different kinds of cookies and add that to the 2 varieties I baked during the week, I'd say I got enough for some cookie trays to give away. Here's a picture of some cookies that I made from a new recipe I found this year....


Coconut Lime Shortbread cookies. MMMM, the smell was heavenly when grating the lime peel. This is a shot of them right after I spooned the lime glaze over them...they were draining over the sink(love easy clean up :wink:)

So after I heated up soup for the family as todays lunch du jour, I headed of to my scrappy space. Last weekend I mentioned that I printed out some pictures to scrap. Well I got as far as choosing the pattern papers and cutting a few pieces to size...then it sat all week! Band concerts and other holiday activities interfered.



Due to the weather conditions I had a hard time getting a good picture of the layout.(sorry) Used some Pink Paislee stuff on this...mostly stuff from the Mistletoe Collection, but there is a small piece of paper from the "Vintage Moon" collection too (remember that cool blue & silver pattern?). A few clear Prima crystal swirls, a chipboard piece from the "Enchanted Collection", some ribbon from my stash and Pink Paislee Expressions chipboard letters & whimsy stickers.

After finishing this off I cleaned up my table and I'm already to get started on my January DT projects for Coordinates Collections. My kit came in yesterdays mail...perfect timing!

Finally...

...it's beginning to feel like Christmas at our house. Got all the decorations up and most all of my shopping complete. Whew!

Yesterday the "big" cut tree in the family room went up...completing the decorations.



Yes it's big....close to 9ft. I had to trim a bit off the top to get the angel to set properly. So many fun ornaments on this tree. Handmade stuff by the kids, a picture of Becca from each year at dance(these are so fun to look at...seeing her change), ornaments from my childhood, some old glass ornaments from my grandmother and even a few from my great grandmother's home. Lots and lots of memories.

While out shopping this week I found some cool glass candy canes at Pier 1. These suckers are big (and they even had some bigger). I decided they would be cool placed in a clear glass vase/ container in the kitchen.



So here's what I have on one end of the kitchen island.
(The brushes used on both of these photos are by Ali Edwards...purchased @ Designer Digitals)

Taking a break from the holiday madness and just printed out some pictures from the "Tree Lighting Ceremony" that Becca danced in earlier this month. Hoping to find time to scrap them soon. Stay tuned.

Mixed Media Album

So, so very glad I bought a few of these albums earlier this year! Yesterday was a rainy, icy, snowy day ...great for finishing up this album. Now I can get it out in the mail this weekend. I'm sending it to my brother and his family. So I started with the Fancy Pants Mixed Media Album and the pulled out the scraps from the "Oceanside" kit (I think it was just this past July's kit over at CC)...lot's of Fancy Pants Summer Soiree and Cosmo Cricket Snorkle. I then added in some more FP Summer Soiree and loads of other stuff like Jillibean Journaling Sprouts, MM cork letters & Tiny Alphas, Creative Cafe embellishments, some Pink Paislee letter stickers and some other stuff.



















Well after taking pictures today I sorted more pattern papers as I am arranging the new space. I have a nice donate pile going...I know some of it will be going to the school real soon. Also got some of the Christmas decorations up. It's finally beginning to feel like Christmas around here.

Hope you all enjoyed your weekend.

12 Giveaway's of Christmas

Check this out...


Lot's of fun stuff being given away each day...even a cool kit from Coordinates Collections.
Go check it out!

December!!

Where is the time going? I have started shopping, but the decorating has to be done soon! Boxes have been drug out of the attic...just need to get it all up.

Well it is the 1st of the month so I can finally share my work from the South Pole kit over at Coordinates Collections!



This layout uses papers from the kit and the diecut paper is from the pattern paper addon and so are the chipboard pieces. The chipboard letters are leftovers from last months Pumpkin Pie kit.



This layout is a quick simple one using product from the kit. The only addition from my stash were the Pink Paislee Whimsy letter stickers (gosh I LOVE those things!)

So that's 2 of my layouts for the month...the rest are all uploaded to my gallery at CC.

Heading out to a "Tree Lighting" ceremony. Becca's dance class is performing a tap routine to "Here Comes Santa Clause"...hoping I get a good picture or two. My photo skills at night need some work;).