Happy Birthday to ME!!!!!

Oh, yeah....it's my birthday! And, as Josh at work said, "Your birthday is on Halloween? Well, that explains a lot!" Nice.

I'm the big 3-3. Wow. That's all I can say.

What am I doing for my birthday? The same thing I do every year...take the girls trick-or-treating back home in Mt. Carmel on Cherry Street. Oh, and of course, have my Mom's awesome lasagna and Jell-o cake. Yum.

Sooooo, Happy Birthday wishes are welcome! ;)

P.S. Happy Birthday to Joe, Jim and Griffen! So weird that I know 3 people who share my birthday!

Early Christmas present!!!!

Is he not the sweetest little thing you've ever seen?!?!?!? This is a picture of the puppy (a Yorkie-Poo) that I'm getting for Christmas from my Mom! Her and Dad will be picking him up November 4 from Anna, IL.

I've decided to name him Toby. Why? I don't know, the first pic I got of him back in September, Toby just seemed to jump out at me for some reason and it just stuck! At first, the girls didn't seem too thrilled, but with the newest pic emailed to me last night, the girls were so excited! Steve even admitted that he was pretty darn cute.....awwww. I can't wait to get him!!! Just one more adorable little thing to scrap! ;)

4th and Final Round!

Ok, this is my last layout for the Stuck?! competition! Winners will be announced later this week....*keeping my fingers crossed*.

Notice the "white" space? Yeah, that just about killed me, to say the least! That's why I went with a pattern paper for my background. There's no way I could've used cardstock, it would've drove me CRAZY!!! LOL! I broke out a paper pack that I had never opened and have had for well over a year. And, for the life of me, I actually can't remember the name of the company....I know! Don't fall out of your seats now.

Everything else I used were just odds and ends....Bazzill flowers, Prima flowers, MM Noteworthy flowers and buttons, QuicKutz photo corner, Rusty Pickle hearts painted with Tim Holtz Crackle paint, and Fancy Pants chipboard "sweet". Pic of the girls I took back in August at our regular photo shoot spot for that time of year (the "rock park"as the the girls call it). TFL!

Tell City swim meet

Mara had a swim meet this past Saturday in Tell City, IN. I got some cool pics I thought I'd share! This was my favorite!!! I took it from kinda far up in the stands....thank goodness for an awesome zoom lens!



She looked so good diving in during the relay!


Hanging out between events....


I don't know why I like this photo. I was sitting up in the stands when I saw Mara sitting on the side of the pool. Looked kinda neat thru the camera lens. I wonder what she's thinking....


I'm not really sure where Mara placed. I'll find out when she gets her ribbons at practice, I guess! LOL! I'm not expecting her to have done too incredibly well this time. I know that sounds negative, but she just aged up to the 9-10 year olds, so her times are near the bottom now. She's got some work to do to get her times up now! But, she is only about 3 seconds away from making Divisional in her 50 Backstroke (thanks, Tiffany, for helping me figure that out!) Next swim meet is next weekend at Boonville.

Teacher gifts just in time for Halloween!

Aren't these the cutest?! I saw these on a blog, Cambria Turnbow (I think that's her name), Tiffany made them and then passed her knowledge on to me so I could make 8 of them for teacher and aide gifts! They were made using the Top Note die from the Sizzix Big Shot, tab punch, and various size circle punches for the eyes. I filled little bags with candy, put them inside, tied them with ribbon and voila! I hope the teachers and aides like them!

St. Louis trip (Part 3)

The last part of our trip was to Boo at the Zoo. The kiddos all dressed up in their costumes and we walked around the zoo that was all decorated for Halloween. Here's some of my fave pics....

Mara (Little Dead Riding Hood), Jacob (Ninja type Warrior), McKenna (Ghost)


Little Dead Riding Hood (was totally her idea and came up with the name, too!)


Boo!! McKenna's costume was a HIT! Everybody kept commenting on it, it was so cool! And, it was super cheap...can't beat FREE! And, it was totally her idea, too. She told me she wanted a white sheet. She came up with the face. It was all her and she was getting a total kick out of all the comments people kept making about her costume!


JoJo decided to be a Witch. I swear, she struggles every single year for what she wants to be for Halloween.


Jenna-poosers was an adorable little Bee!


The Birrell girls!

Bridal Shower invitations!

A friend from work is getting married in January and asked me to make her bridal shower invitations! I couldn't wait to get started on them! I finished them up today and thought I'd post. I couldn't decide on which color scheme I liked better so I did half the order in one and the other half in the other scheme. I even stamped the envelope. :) These are so much prettier IRL...the detail of the flower stamp set is so pretty and the colors are so rich.. The bride just let me decide what colors to go with. She is so laid back and easy going it's not even funy.

Stamp sets: Please Come and Together Forever; ink: Always Artichoke, Elegant Eggplant; cardstock: Very Vanilla, Always Artichoke, Elegant Eggplant; ribbon: Very Vanilla grosgrain. I cut the ovals out with my Cricut, George cartridge. TFL!

St. Louis trip (Part 2)

Next thing we did was hit the park across the interstate from the Science Center. What a cool park! There were so many people riding bikes and several weddings having their photos taken, so the place was crazy busy! We stopped to kill some time at a pretty cool fountain. In the background, a wedding reception was getting ready to start and there were 2 wedding parties, 1 senior picture session, and a couple that looked like they were possibly dressed up for like a high school Homecoming dance having their pics taken around the fountain while we were there. The girls and Jacob loved playing around this fountain. If we had been there any longer, I'm sure at least one of them would've gotten completely drenched!

More Christmas cards....

Here are a few more. Whatcha think? If the layouts look familiar, they should....most of them are from the card class I did at Tiffany's retreat earlier in the month. Like Tiffany says...why re-invent the wheel? :)

This is what $5000 looks like...

...thought I'd post some pics of the damage to my car before it gets fixed. Ugly, isn't it?! I take it in on Monday. Who knows how long it's going to take. I'm hoping not more than a week.

Taking Mara and some friends + McKenna and Micah to go see High School Musical 3 tomorrow at the movie theater. Steve and I and 6 girls....oh, boy. Thank goodness they're not spending the night. Mara's got a swim meet Saturday morning, so no sleepover. Besides, I don't think I can handle that quite yet! I'm banning sleepovers until the basement is done....so I have a couple more years, yet! ROFL!

Have a great weekend!!

I've got to STOP!!!

I can not, for the life of me, decide on a layout for my Christmas cards this year! And, I'm not finished....I still have a couple more stamp sets I'd like to drag out and play with as well!! My goal is to have a very simple, easy card, but for some reason, I just can't stick to that criteria. When you make as many as I do (don't ask, it's sickening), it needs to be streamlined. I need to get them done ASAP as I've got some bridal shower invites and Reception invites (no wedding, just a big reception planned by the bride and groom) to get done by the middle of November.

For the next couple of days, I'll post what I've got....tell me yay or nay if you would. TIA! And, suggestions WELCOME! :)

Now, the colors are not negotiable! LOL!! I happen to like this combo of colors and I realize it's not for everyone (Steve just can't get past the colors...he doesn't particularly care for them. I think it's the pink.) but, I already bought the cardstock in these colors to make all my Christmas cards, so the colors stay! So, I don't want to hear about it! ;)

Our visit to St. Louis (part 1)

Last weekend we all went to visit Steve's brother, Brian, and his family. And, for once, we didn't spend all weekend playing Wii! LOL!! On Saturday, we went to the Science Center for a couple hours, played at the park for a little bit and went to Boo at the Zoo and the kiddos dressed up in their Halloween costumes! Here's some of my fave pics of the weekend....

Doing a Conga line in the parking lot of the Science Center.




Mara & McKenna looking at their veins under the VeinViewer (which is so cool, we have one of these at work!)



All the kiddos with their foot inside a dinosaur footprint.


A tornado maker, which was really neat, if you could keep the darn kids out of it long enough to see it form!


Doing some brain teasers....


Uh....where's McKenna's body?!


Fun with mirrors!



The Science Center was awesome. I just wish we had more time there! Oh, well...there's always next time! Stay tuned for my favorite pics from part 2 (the park) and 3 (Boo at the Zoo) to come. It's late and I'm going to bed! :)

Sshh! Don't tell!

Naw, I don't have anything to tell, it's just the name of the layout! ;)

This is for the latest sketch for the Stuck?! competition. I thought for sure Steve would be like "yeah, same ol' same ol'" but he was kinda blown away! It's the opposite of what he likes....he likes lots of pictures (2-pagers preferably) with journaling. This one has neither.

This was using a past BYOM kit, of course! ;) I also used the Cricut cartridge Storybook (that I borrowed from Nicole) for a butterfly, flower and leaves. I still want that cartridge....so awesome. Used some Technique Tuesday chipboard circle, Bazzill letters and some old Heidi Swapp letters for the title. Paper is the Fancy Pants Boy line (Just a Boy or About a Boy or something like that.) Anyway....TFL!