MORE SNOW!!!!!!

We got great snow Saturday (March 8). In our area we got about 4-5" and by 10:00 it was perfect for sledding, which we did ALL DAY! Our friends, the Holmes', came over with their two girls and we had at least 5 sleds to use and eventually brought out another one later in the day. The grown-ups even had fun. We had a Four-wheeler that we used to bring us back up the hill, which I think helped us sled longer. Plus after the sun came out, it was pretty comfortable if you weren't wet. I'll post pictures soon, promise.

The only thing is I didn't get to go to my crop Friday night because the weather was headed in and DH said if I went he wasn't coming out to get me if I got stuck. So I opted to stay home and you know what, I only got 1 double page spread started ... not even finished. Of course, Friday night I didn't do anything but watch TV. I love "Bones" and for some reason, I rarely get to watch it. Then I watched "Ghost Whisper" and then flipped the channels, looking for something - but really didn't find much after 9:00 pm. Then Saturday sledding all day. Em had a friend over Saturday night, so I did start the layout, but ended up reprinting all the pictures to make them work in the sketch I wanted to use. So I did a little Saturday, did a little Sunday and even sat down and put the starting of the title on the page last night. Maybe I get it finished tomrrow .... how terrible is that. 5 days to do one double page layout, using a sketch no less!!!

By the way, I love Becky Flakes sketch ...... great ideas!!!!


What about Day's of Our Lives. I can't believe that Bo is leaving - he is right? I think I read that on the front of Soap Opera digest. Why would he be leaving - maybe that is totally wrong!! I would hate it! Anyways, gotta run!

Blogy ya later - hopefully with pictures!

SNOW day! YEA

We finally had a snow day yesterday. We got just enough snow that the roads up where we live were pretty yucky, so no school for Em and no work for me. I actually got to sleep till 7:30, cook lunch & dinner and scrapbooked about 3 pages. It was so very nice!!! I even got the house swept and some clothes washed.

We went sledding for a little while, before the snow melted. I was the camera-man for a time and then I gave the camera over to Steve, so he could take pictures of Em and I sledding together. Then we had a little photo shoot. I really love snow pictures. I don't have the pictures downloaded to a disk yet, but I'll post some of them soon.

Have a great day!

I'm going..........

to a crop next week!!!! YEA! I can't wait. I have two weeks to get my pages preplanned and get in a creative mood. Really, I'm pretty much there. Cheerleading is over, remodeling is over and scrapbooking is on the horizon!!! I stopped by MIB this weekend and picked up a couple of magazines. One was the March CK magazine ... it's okay. I enjoy looking at the ads since I've been out of the loop for several months. Then I bought this special issue. I really like it. I've gotten several pages marked with good ideas. I basically print in 4x6, occasionally in 3.5x5

I've also printed off several layout off the internet. Megan Hall is one of my favorites, because she does multi-picture layouts. I usually have more than one picture to include on a layout, at least one of two pages will have several pictures on it, so her layouts are really close to my style.

Anyone else you enjoy for multi-picture layouts? Let me know!

Christy

DAYS of OUR Lives

If you've read any of my past posts, you'll know I'm a DOOL fan. Have been since I was about 6 yrs old, staying with my grandmother, who watched all the channel 4 soaps. I've never been into the other channels, just channel 4. DOOL, Another World, Santa Barbara.... I loved watching those, especially DOOL and Another World. Of course, there was a period when I didn't watch (work gets in the way of everything!). Now, I don't watch but I read and every chance I get, I watch. Soap Net has it on at 10:00 CT, but I'm usually heading to bed at time. So, if you watch it, I understand (from my reading) that there are some pretty intense scene's coming up on the airplane....... Bo has cancer? WOW! And the plane is going to crash! Kayla and Steve are pregnant and I get Hope is too ..... Shawn, Belle and Claire are on the plane and I read someplace they are leaving the show, so I wonder if they will decide to go live someplace else to get away from Philip, who is trying to get over Belle and scooping on Chloe. AND John, poor guy. How many times can you get your memory erased? And Marlena is getting lots of play time, she turning into a regular DIVA! Anyways, love the show and currently I'm reading the day before's at http://www.salemspectator.com/forum/forumdisplay.php?f=58. Love knowing what's going to happen the day before!!!!

So, a thread about ktichens got me thinking ......

What's your style? Since I haven't scrapbooked in about 9 months, this is about your house. Do you have a style? Up till we started the kitchen remodel, DH and I had never bought a "new" couch/chair or appliances for that matter. Our downstairs couch was bought from the couple across the street that was barely used. It is a burgendy leather sectional. Other than TV's, we really haven't purchased anything for ourselves. We moved into our house fully furnished, so we just kept it till we could do something else. So even though the kitchen remodel was little stressful, it was totally fun. Learning so much about countertops, tile, flooring options, making decisions that where sooooo hard at the time. Looking back, it was very worth it. BUT our "style" changed a bit during this process. I LOVE antiques and as you can tell my kitchen table (my beloved antique table) I like it pretty natural. BUT, we decided to go more classic/traditional in our furniture. I think eventually I'll sprinkle more antiques in as I can, but I like our "netural" style........... what's your style?

Christy

New LIVING ROOM to go with New KITCHEN

See blogs below for kitchen pictures and the story about our house. Here's pictures of the new hardwood floors, new living room furniture and my 100 yr old farmhouse kitchen table.

I bought these pieces at a unfinished furniture store that was going out of business. I knew I wanted black distressed but couldn't find exactly what I wanted. So this worked. It took me about 3 days/nights to paint and distress. I still need to seal it, but I'm not not really in any hurry. I have one more piece to paint and distress that will go by the recliner when it's bought.

I have a photobuckett account that has all the pictures in it. Before, during and after. Plus pictures of the 40 yrds of concrete we had poured during this remodeling project. Take a peek if you have some time to spare.http://s234.photobucket.com/albums/ee293/CABurch/

So do you want to hear the ktichen story?

Our house is 18 yrs old. My grandparents built it. Nothing fancy, about 1200 sq feet, open floor plan, full basement, 3 bedrooms, 3 baths. If I had built the house, I might have picked the same floor plan and if I would have picked it, I would have bumped up the sq ft for larger rooms, probably adding about 500 sq ft to the total design. I'd love to have a larger master bedroom/bath and a seperate laundry area, since it's at the end of my kitchen.

So, the story. We were kinda ashamed of our house. We invited very few people over. Emilee had just a few friends that I'd allow to come over because our house was kinda yuck. Not dirty yuck, just worn out yuck. Since my grandparents paid cash for it, they went with very builder quality stuff and probably really didn't think anything about it. They knew they wouldn't be in it forever. The carpet was a great color but the quality wasn't there and after 18 yrs it needed to replaced BAD. The linolum in the dining room/kitchen was okay, but kinda blah. My cabinets were the only thing that I though were of any quality and having a closet pantry allowed me to use all my cabinets to store dishes, cookare, etc. We finally decided we need to update our "common" living areas of the house. Either that or buy another house. Remodeling was a lot cheaper!!!

It wasn't any easy project and it was a tad bit stressful. DH was great and did what he could himself. We ended up paying for all the tile work and hardwood work that we did in the dining room/living room since our deadline was Thanksgiving. Needless to say, we met a Christmas deadline!!!

Here's BEFORE pictures. The next post as AFTER pictures!

AFTER pictures of the kitchen

New countertops: Granite - Verde Butterfly

Faucet: Delta Saxony

Sink: Stainless Steel (10"deep bowl, 8" deep bowl) Ferguson brand

Frig: Maytag

Dishwasher: Frigidaire

Stove: Frigidaire Duel Fuel

Washer/Dryer: GE front loads with Pedastals

Floors: Ocre 12x12 italian tile (Happy Floors); 2x2 floral dot accent piece

Backsplash: Golden Sienna 6x6 mexican travertine tile; 2x2 floral dot accent piece

Only things left to do:

1 pesky plug plate

cabinets over the washer/dryer

We also updated our hall bathroom with new tile, new paint, new faucet, new accessories and new toliet! WOW!

JUST SO YOU KNOW

I haven't really forgotten about all you people in blogland. I'm just obessing this kitchen project. AND work has been super busy. We hired a new director and he doesn't have an assistant yet, so I'm his assistant till 10/1/07..... included his job is event coordinator for an event I know nothing about! NOT FUN and very busy!!! So, just wanted to let you know, that we haven't started on the kitchen yet, but we're planning like crazy.

Granite countertops,
new applicances
tile backsplash
new floors (ceramic tile)
paint

Then for the living room/dining room:
new hardwoods
new paint
new couch/loveseat/endtables/lamps

ALL of which have to coordinate in some way since it's an open floor plan!

Wish me luck!

I know you think I've forgotten you .......

but I haven't. I just haven't felt inspired to blog anything.

Nothing new happening around the house yet. Expecting a concrete quote any day now. Can't wait for that figure. Been looking at tile/hardwood/counter tops a little. We've decided on the hardwood and counter top and probably the tile, but I'm not sold on it yet. And I can't decide on backsplash tile.... I want something that coordinate with my countertop, but I'm having a hard time picturing it from a small little chip. I'm sure it'll come together soon. I'm hoping to get the countertop and new sink soon and then the tile on the floor and backsplash. I think new countertops will make a world of different in the look of our kitchen. Our kitchen is pretty blah now, butcher block counter top.... no color what so ever!

Maybe I'll get up enough nerve to post a before picture and then an after picture. We'll see!

More later!!

Wow! It's been a while

Nothing big happening in my life........ other than

Eventually our house is going to be a wreck!!!! We're planning on a putting in a huge amount of conrete (like a full basketball court!) and then some landscaping (hopefully can do that myself - when it cools off!) and then my beloved hardwood floors. We've been saving forever for some of this and some of it will have to be a loan. We just can't do all that on our own. I hate having borrowing money, but that will so pay off in the long run - an investment. Oh yea, plus the hardwoods I'm getting new counter tops and a new sink and eventually new couch!!! YEA. I so need it all. My counter tops are so dated and fugly! I really want a deep sink - my mom sold me on this when she got hers. It's great!!! And all the flooring in our house needs replacing so, hardwoods here we come. The concrete is a Steve thing. We are pouring about 41 yards .... what, thats HUGE!!!!! But it will be nice to be able to use that space for more than just grass cutting.

I've finished all my consigned project. Should start working on craft fair projects soon. I dropped out of the Livery Stables, I just could keep up with the seasonal things. I think I'm keeping some cards up there since they sold really well. I really just want to concentrate this year on craft fairs and Christmas presents.

Work is work ....... lots of changes, new challenges, just stuff.

I've been keeping up with Christy Tomlinson blog.... have you? http://christytomlinson.typepad.com/ She's been giving great tips and information about make-up. She recently used a "minerals" make-up similar Bare Essentuals and loved it. So much that she hooked her readers up with a make-up rep. Then she's turned us on to E.L.F makeup, which I think I've seen at KMart, but on this site the makeup was only $1.00. Can you imagine? I bought $14.50 worth of stuff, including a set of makeup brushes, cause I soooooo need to replace all of mine! Anyways, take a look at her site, it's fun.

Gotta run to a meeting, blog ya more later!

Up to my ears in consignment projects

I have 4 clipboards I'm trying to complete by tomorrow and a 11 x 8.5 baby book - boy..... you know how I struggle with boy stuff. Although with an 11 x 8.5, it should be all good.... more room to play with than the 8x8. The client wants some 4x6 mats and some 5x7 mats.... mostly by the month with a few "extra" pages thrown in! Need lots of rubons to do "month" 1, etc..... I'd love to run up tot MIB tomorrow while by boards are drying, might try that pretty early, so I can come home and clean/laundry and then deliver the boards to my best buddy.

Wanted to share some recent pictures, but blogger is being bad. Let me try just one at a time.

Nana, Em & Me

Me and Em being silly!!!

I had another to share, but can't get the orientation to stick, so I'll have to upload it using blogger, maybe Monday.

Have a great weekend!!!!!

Great Weekend.........

Just wanted to say thanks to the ladies at Scrappuccino's for hosting such a wonderful National Scrapbooking Day celebration. I had such a good time!!!! If DH hadn't made plans for us for that afternoon, I could have stayed to 9:00 that night (of course I'd probably be outside on the sidewalk, but as long as I was cropping, I would have been happy!) I love working at the store. Such a fun enviroment!

So, I got 3 12 x 12 pages done and one 11 x 8.5 page (for Tracie Claiborne - scroll to the bottom for the layout). I was on 2001 pictures. DD was so cute!!!

I used these for one of my layouts of Halloween that I need to fit a lot of pictures on (all the pictures were cute, so I couldn't pick!!!). It worked so well. I hadn't thought about using the few templates I have in a year or two, but wow... they saved my sanity on that page!! And let me tell ya, I paid a lot more that $2.00 for them!!!

I'm sad to see Deluxe Design so away. I've always liked them, especially for these templates and their diecuts. I love going to the coventations and buying a whole bunch of them! Now that they are going out of business, I find myself hording those die cuts because I'm afraid I won't ever get another one!!!!

Gotta run!
Busy week. Say a prayer for me. I'm teaching ladies "Historical Scrapbooking" Wed, Thurs and Friday!!!

All about our wedding....

1. Where/How did you meet? We grew up in the same town, but a couple years apart. He went to a different school, etc. So we offically met at Union Hill Drag Strip. I was going out with someone else, we was trying to met my friend. We all ended up at my parents house, they were out of town and the next day, my friend made me tell him she had a boyfriend. He then started calling me to go out. We went out the next week. That was May 1990.


2. How long have you known each other? 17 yrs... talking, but always knew "who each other was".


3. How long after you met did you start dating? A week


4. How long did you date before you were engaged? 5 months


5. How long was your engagement? 11 months


6. How long have you been married? almost 16 yrs



7. What is your anniversary? September 7

8. How many people came to your wedding reception? 100 or so



9. What kind of cake did you serve? Traditional white cake with white icing. Grooms cake was chocolate with a UT theme


10. Where was your wedding? Nashville

11. What did you serve for your meal? No meal, just fruit, ham biscuits, cake, punch


12. How many people were in your wedding party? 8


13. Are you still friends with them all? Yes, most of them. My maid of honor is still my best friend. I talk to 2 of 3 of my brides maids about every other month, sometimes more. The bestman was my hubby's brother. We talk to at least one of his groomsmen every couple of week and the other periodically.


14. Did your spouse cry during the ceremony? No, he was too nervous.


15. Most special moment of your wedding day? Hmmm, I don't really remember. The day was a blur. Now, I'm grateful for pictures I had made with my grandparents since they aren't living anymore.


16. Any funny moments? Me walking around in shorts, button up shirt, house shoes and my veil. The best was on the video though, DH had an itch in a "manly" place. When everyone was praying, we moved up on the stage some and he decided it would be a good time to stratch his itch. As soon as he did, he looked up with the deer in the head light look cause we had a video camera set up at the front of the sancuary to get our faces, it caught a lot more!!!!!


17. Any big disasters? Not that I know of or remember.



18. Where did you go on your honeymoon? Panama City Beach FL




19. How long were you gone? 6 days, was suppose to be 7, but we got homesick......



20. If you were to do your wedding over.... for my first, I'd do nothing different, other than the brides maid dresses, I'd pick something else.

21. What is your song? Don't think we had one.



22. Describe your wedding dress: Straight, off the shoulders with "flowers" on the shoulders.


23. What kind of flowers did you have at your wedding? LOTS AND LOTS of really flowers. The accent color was purple. We had lots of white flowers with purple accents and a little pink.

24. Other interesting details: My photographer was from Sweden. He took great pictures (very expensive, but great!) and he made the funniest noises to get people to smile! His wife did the video. And our flowers were beautiful. I love flowers and I wanted a lot of them. We got married in a Methodist church, which wasn't our church, because I wanted a center aisle to walk down.

*** Consider yourself tagged. Leave me a comment so I can read about your wedding!!!*****

By the way, the pictures of the frame above is the only picture I have of us at work. I was looking at my hair stylist..... I was surpise she came!!

Mocha

So, it's been forever since I've blogged and I'm gonna be sad. Sorry!

See that sweet face? That's Mocha and this morning he went to play in doggy heaven. I think he was about 7 yrs old. And at this very moment, we aren't sure what happended to him. All we know is that his body stopped making blood and we'll, you know what happens when you don't make blood. You get reallllllllllly sick. It started about a month ago. His right eye became discolored, bulging and pretty gross. He spent 3 days at the vet and they said he probably suffered some sort of head injury/eye trama. More than likely cause by our other dog, Koda. They play pretty rough - both 90lb labs. Anyways, that got better then Tuesday, the left eye started looking funky. DH put Mocha in the garage to keep him from the other dog getting to rough. That was Wednesday around 4:00 pm., by 5:30 pm, he was a sick puppy, having a hard time breathing and looking sick. I called the vet and they said to watch him and to take him to the Emergency Vet if he got worse. He didn't really get worse that I could tell, but he wasn't getting better either. DH stayed home yesterday morning to take him to the Vet. The vet said heart worms at first, then he said rat poisioning and then this morning when the vet came him, he was much worse and wouldn't/couldn't even stand. They said we said two options. Send him to Knoxville Vet School or put him down. We opted to put him down, not knowing if he'd ever get better. At this moment, all we know is that his body wasn't making blood. They did a mini-autopsy and didn't find anything. The lab is doing more work, free of charge, because they are so baffled at what happened. Plus, we are concerned it could be enviromental and we have another dog in the same yard, plus my house dog. So, love your pet today and tell them you love them! Somehow I knew if would end up like this, I told DD to tell him by and that she loved him yesterday morning cause we never know what could happen.

Wow - two in a row!!!

I went to Scrapn' Memories yesterday during lunch with the girls. It was fun. I spent money (imagine that!) and got one of the two patterns I'm using for a wedding album. My friends Beth talked me into making a wedding album for her to give as a gift. If you know me, I hate doing wedding albums. But this one is going to be very simple and elegant. So maybe I won't stress over it too much.

I'm going to the ScrapHouse in Joelton this weekend - I can't wait. I'm so looking forward to getting this wedding album done and working on stuff for Em. I'm so far behind in her books. And I thought with digital cameras it would be so easy to get pictures printed, but since I see them instantly, I don't print as often as I should, so I'm even behind on getting pictures printed! Crazy!!!! I've got pictures in my cart at winkflash and I need to order them.... maybe I'll do that this afternoon!

I made a yummy roast yesterday. Goodness it was yummy. I was a great cut of meat. We had sweet potoatoe casserole (with marshmellows), carrots, green beans and butter noddles with it. GREAT supper in my opinon! I've got a little roast left, so I'm going to attempt to make veggie soup with it.... never made that before, if you've got a good receipe, please share it!

More later!!!

It's been a while ....... sorry

Nothing exciting to report on .... really boring at my house. We did go to Memphis March 9 & 10. That was fun. Graceland & Elvis was interesting. We had to visit for Em's school project. Now, I've got to get the pictures developed and the poster made - oops, she has to make the poster (yea right!) and write her report. She also has a report due Monday on James and the Giant Peach (a book report). She's doing well at school. Of course, we constantly harp on her. She really could care less if she makes good grades or not! Well, let me rephrase that. She likes to make good grades, but doesn't like to work at it. And she has to work at it. It doesn't come natural to her (guess what, it didn't me either). The only thing that comes pretty easy for her is English/Language. She struggles at Math and Reading (she can read, it's the comprension that she struggles with). Anways, mostly A's & B's on her report card... I can't complain too much!


I going on a SCRAP-RETREAT this weekend! Just the girls. I can't wait to spend 24 hours scrapping with people who want to do nothing but scrap and eat! How much fun is that!!!
I'll try to post pictures next week!

Today is the first day of spring.... my favorite time of the year! Happy Spring to everyone!


Gotta run....... more later!

Nothing exciting!

I shipped out my stuff to the consignment store Friday (see link below). She got it Saturday and called yesterday to tell me she loved my paper bag albums. She (Dawn) doesn't think the 6x6 "hard" books will sell for $40, but there's a lot of work and time in those things. She's probably right. She knows her clintel better than I do.
http://www.funtiquesconsignment.com/index.html


Nothing exciting going on. Went to the NWTF convention this past Saturday. Saw some "hunting" celebrities. It's funny. Reminds me of scrapbooking!

This weekend we're headed to Memphis to visit Graceland. Em has a report due first of April about a historic TN place. She picked Graceland. Fun ......

Gotta run and read blogs :-)

More later!

Birthday; Valentines; Scrapbooking; Tax Time

So, my birthday was last week. We celebrated with my parent on Sunday, the 11th. Chinese buffet and Red Velvet Cake - after this birthday, no more celebrations .... no more birthdays. I'm stuck for the rest of my life at 36!!!! See, that's only 4 away from 40 and I'm having a hard time with 40. I've already started panic mode ... only 4 more years and I'll be 40! YEEEKKK!!!
It was a good birthday. I got money - more on what I do with it later in the post.

Valentines is the day after my birthday, so really they are combined. I don't blame DH for doing that, I probably would too if it were me! So, DD got money and a small box of chocolates since I knew she was getting a lot of candy from her party. On Valentines, the 4th grades classes at her school had a singing program. My little Em stole the show (in my opinon). They sang classic love songs and that sounded really good. Some of the songs had some dancing with them and we all know that Em loves to dance. She was on the front row and really getting into the dancing. During the last song, I heard a few comments on the little girl on the front row having rhythm. That's my girl! After the show I had a few friends ask where she got it and it's not from me. Must be the good dance genes that skipped me! Everyone kept coming up to her telling her how well she did and how good she danced. I don't think she realized she was the only putting so much effort into the dancing. She asked "Why does everyone keep coming up to me telling me I did good?" Too cute! I video taped the performance and then we bought a DVD. Good memories!

I'm taking a few days break from scrapbooking..... maybe. It seems when I get home, I don't want to scrapbook. It's too cold in my area of the basement. I don't like going down there and freezing. So I'm not motivated. I did make some cute cards that I copied from a card magazine yesterday using scraps, which is always a good thing. But not much scrapbooking, although I took off Friday and really planned on working hard this weekend. I did however make a major purchase this weekend! I put my deposit down on a Silhouette! I can't wait for it to come in! Now, just to figure out where to put it!

Taxes are down. I did them myself. Just to have them double checked by a friend and they are ready to be submitted!

Gotta run .... more later!

My life is so boring

that I don't even have anything to blog about. We'll at least not anything I want the world to know! :-)

I have been working pretty hard on getting some paper bag albums, cards and other things ready for the lady in Murfreesbboro. I need about 3 more paper bag albums to feel like I'm giving her something she can sell. I need to call her, because I'm not sure how she want to handle the cards - individuals or several packaged together.

I did make two "tear bears" this weekend. Did you see them when they were huge? I mean some of these cute little bears sold for $100's on ebay! They are cute, but not that cute!!!

These little guys are cute. I just found them on ebay - 1scrapbooklane is the creator. Mine aren't this cute yet, but they are cute. Her's are much fuzzier than mine. I did find out that different color handmade paper tears differently. The white I used was much easier to tear.

As soon as I get my cards scanned, I'll post them. They are very simple, except the bears.