TGIF

Tim sent me flowers yesterday! Everyone at work was jealous :) It was a good birthday even though I had to work. I had some authors in to do a program, and it turned out well. Joyce and Jim Lavene live in the area and write cozy mysteries together. They are very interesting people, and we had a nice little crowd who came to hear them speak. Then Tim took me to El Ranchito - it was mariachi night.

We are both off today. Tim is running a few errands - paying the taxes on the Buick (13.50, since we're past due) and getting his drivers license renewed. When he get back I'm going to do the grocery shopping. Then I don't know what we'll do for the rest of the day. I'd like to do some crafting since it's been awhile since I've stamped or scrapped.

Our little miss kitty still doesn't have a good name that she likes. We tried the girls suggestion, but she wasn't interested. And now Tim has sweet talked another kitty. This one is a male and he is light orange. He looks like a little lion.

New Kitty Needs a Name

It looks like we have a new kitty at our house. This little sweetie showed up at our back door several weeks ago. Tim is a big softy and started feeding her. She was so scrawny at first. We said if she was still around after our trip to KY that we would keep her. So now we need to name her. I've been calling her Girly Girl, Tim has been calling her Yowler - neither which is a good long term name. One suggestion from a co-worker is Sheena. She came to us wearing a pink flea collar, and I've discovered that she is declawed in her front paws. Hopefully that means she's been fixed to. We'll take her to the vet and have her checked out. I heard Tim tell her she had to stay outside this summer be when it got cold she could come in. If you have a suggestion for a name, leave a comment.

Sweet Swixteen

This weekend we went to Kentucky for Dylan's 16th birthday. Yes, our little boy is 16! He is a junior in high school this year and has turned into a young man. He's enjoying his classes - especially the two computer programing classes he is taking. Next semester he will get to take drivers ed. This is the first year we have given him cash for his birthday. He's saving his birthday money and almost has enough for the Xbox360. We also gave him the last Harry Potter book and a music CD that Tim made for him. It was a good trip. Our new car was great - I still need to figure out what kind of gas mileage we got, but it was pretty good.

A Weekend in Myrtle Beach.

At the last minute on Friday I decided to make a trip to Myrtle Beach, SC for the weekend. My SCS friend, Darcy from Arkansas, was going to be visiting Donna, another SCS friend. So Saturday morning I loaded the Forrester with all my stamping.scrapping stuff, and one small bag of clothes. It ended up being a very easy drive down there - only took about 3 hours and 20 minutes with me driving the speed limit. I got to Donna's house about noon and Darcy got there just a short time later. In about 2 minutes it felt like we'd all been friends forever. Saturday afternoon we made quick trips to Micheals and AC Moore. After dinner, Andrea, another SCS'er came over and we crafted. We had a blast around Donna's kitchen table. Sunday morning we went to Myrtle Beach State Park but didn't stay too long because it started to thunder and lightning. Stopped quick at Sonic for lunch and went back to the house for more crafting. I had to leave about 6 and I hated to go. I'm sure I'll be going down to visit Donna again. Tim says he might have a weekend biking trip coming up this fall, so that would be a good time for me to take another trip - and hopefully it will be cooler in Myrtle Beach.

I Love Free Books Part 2

Several days ago I mentioned that I got two free hardback copies of The Lottery by Patricia Wood. Well, I finished the book today - and it is great! It will definitely go on my list of choices for book club next year. And the author left a comment on my post - how cool is that?

Four Cats is Too Many

Simon is here on his annual visit. His Mom is on "vacation" for a couple of weeks. It's amazing how well these cats get along, and everything is normal. This is the first time that Riley has met Simon. And I think the first couple of days that Riley was a little put-out by our visitor. or it could have just been the stray cat who was hanging out on the deck (who thankfully is gone). This morning Riley and Simon were playing chase - at 6:30 in the morning. Tarzan and Fitz have just been watching them. When Simon comes to visit we have t-r-e-a-t-s'. Can't say the word because the know what it means. So this is a picture of Tim trying to dole out t-r-e-a-t-s' to four cats. Simon is hard to see, but he's under the chair.

A layout for Tuesday

Ah, it's Tuesday. My day to sleep in and enjoy an easy morning before I go to work. Except the cats were loud this morning and insisted on being fed. That Simon has one loud meow. And it's book club day, so I have to leave for work earlier than normal. At book club we will be discussing Widow of the South by Robert Hicks. Si, I'm sitting here on the couch with my second cup of coffee listening to a load of laundry in the dryer and the the dishwasher running - need to do those things before it's a 100 degrees outside again today.

I want to share this layout of my Great Grandmother Kreber, who we called Granny Two. I did this layout during for the big Virtual Scrapbooking Weekend on SCS. The challenge was to include a recipe in your layout. I have a box full of all of my Granny Two and Grandma Holles' recipe cards. The base of the page in elegant eggplant. The so saffron layer has a enlarged photocopy of Granny Two's Penuche recipe. I also include a couple of photocopied recipe cards in the library pocket. I made some pattern paper with the Pretty Posies stamp set using plum and sage inks for the flowers to accent the top and bottom of the page. One the library pocket are some of the things I remember about Grandma Two: quilting, violets, Granny Buns, and gardening. Tim scanned and printed the photo for me, so I didn't use my original. I love this page, and I hope you do too.

No Fear

Dad and the boys worked together and made some soap box derby cars. Joe's car was made from a kit. Jim's car was totally homemade. After Joe broke his arm, Mom and Dad asked me if I wanted to race his car in the locally derby - no way! They raced down the hill by the Riggs Library. It was a really big hill! Joe said he could race his own car - even with his broken arm. he got 4th place in his class and Jim got 2nd place in his class. Pierre, SD, summer of 1976.

I had to call Mom and Dad to check on some of the details. We had a good time remembering. I'm sure the boys remember the event differently, but this is how I remember.

I used True Thyme, So Saffron, Buckaroo Blue and Close to Cocoa papers to give the page a 70's feel. I stamped the race car from Toy Box and used my SU markers to color them in for the only embellishments on the page. The title is made from chipboard letters and rubons. I love how this page turned out

I love Free Books

One of the perks of my job is that sometimes publishers send me free copies of books, usually titles that are just coming out in paperback. Their goal is to for me to select the title for my book group, so they can sell more copies. Recently I got a paperback copy of The Virgin of Small Plains by Nancy Pickard, and I did like it so much that I put it on the possible list for my book group next year. Then a couple of weeks ago I got a paperback copy of The Book Thief by Markus Zusak. I had already read it and loved it , and it's also on my possible list for next years book group. This week I got TWO HARDBACK copies of The Lottery by Patricia Wood. This book has been getting very good reviews. And it is so new we don't even have our copy at the library yet. One copy is for me to read, and the other I'm going to give away as some sort of prize at the library. It's been a long and tough week for me so I've barely been able to start my news book. Can't wait to read it and see if it's as good as all the reviews say. If it is, then maybe it will go on next years book group reading list.

Exhausted

VSBN is over. We had a wonderful weekend of scrapping challenges on http://www.splitcoaststampers.com/. Thankfully I took the day off yesterday to recover. People are still working on their challenge submission, so we will not know until Wednesday evening how many challenges were completed. I know I filled an entire album with the pages I made for samples - and I love every page. I'll start showing you some of them. Now I need to spend some time making cards.

The theme for VSBN was "Curl up with a Good Book". So all of the challenges had to do with books. Gloria was our kids challenge hostess and she likes the Goosebumps books, so the first challenge on Saturday was to make a page with bumps. My page is from Fitzie's birthday. I used pop dots to raise up the circle embellishments.

Keep watching, and I'll try to share all of the pages I did for this big weekend.

I got a birthday present!

I think Tim is worse about presents than I am. He ordered my birthday present and gave it to me already! Not that I'm complaining mind you. I love getting presents. I got a new Canon Rebel XTi digital SLR camera. A huge step up from the Canon point and shoot camera I have been using. My new camera is too big to carry around in my purse at all times like the Sure Shot is. I took a few photos last night, and I love the quality. I am so excited and can't wait to get out and take some more pictures.

Our friend, Jon, who moved to Wyoming last year, is coming in for the weekend. We are all going to get together to celebrate Jake's birthday. A great opportunity to use my new camera.

VSBN is This Weekend!

The BIG Virtual Scrapbooking Night is this weekend. We'll have 12 scrapping challenges over the course of two days at splitcoaststampers.com. If you are a scrapper, please come join us. I've made samples for each of the challenges, and I've filled an entire album.

Saturday, August 4th starting at 10:00 am EST with the last challenge posted at 8:00 pm EST

Sunday, August 5th starting at noon EST with the last challenge posted at 10:00 pm EST

Now, these two pages are from our 4th of July celebration with out friends the Grochowskys. All the boys; Tim, Steve, Jake and Ben, had fun lighting the fireworks. Tim went down to SC and bought a few large fireworks. We had a ton of fun without spending lots of money. Karen manned the grill, as always. She made burgers and hotdogs and corn on the cob. Thankfully the weather was great and we spent all evening outside.

The challenge at the VSBN preview was to use chipboard, so all the letter "F's" are made from chipboard and covered with paper. Fourth, Fun, Food, Fireworks, Freedom.

A Book, A Frame, It's Both

One of the challenges in last weekend's VSBN was to take a hardcover book and alter it to a picture frame. This is the perfect project for me! I chose the book The Elusive Mrs. Pollifax by Dorothy Gilman because Tim and I enjoy listening to these books on audio. Come to think of it, it's about time for her to publish a new one. I used Basic Grey papers and ribbon and flower embellishments to match the decor of our living room. I can easily change photos to keep it interesting. The picture in there now is of Tim and I in front of the Harry Potter movie poster when we went to see the movie a couple of weeks ago. It is so perfect on the fireplace mantle.

Wet and Wild

Another challenge during this weekend's VSBN preview was to make a layout with hidden elements. I finally scrapped the pictures of Tarzan's bath. The title pulls out to show the journaling hidden away.

And just an update on Tim's big race on Sunday. Sixty-six miles long and 11,000 feet of climbing. he finished 355th of 450 racers. He did have a better time this year than the last time he raced it - and no black eye this time.

It's a Dora Fiesta

Over at splitcoaststampers.com we had our Virtual Scrapbooking Night preview party this past Sunday. Now I can start showing you some of the pages I've been creating for this event. On Sunday we had four different challenges. Each challenge hostess makes a sample page, and I as the event coordinator make samples of ALL of the challenges. The theme for the event is books, so all of the challenges have something to do with books. Needless to say, I've been scrapping my little heart out, and I can't wait to start showing these pages off.

Our first challenge (AUGVSBNA) was to make a page using purple in honor of the Stephanie Plum books by Janet Evanovich. So I made a layout for my niece Sarah's third birthday. She had a Dora party.

Off Road Assault on Mt. Mitchell

Tim is leaving today for the mountains. Tomorrow he is racing the Off Road Assault on Mt. Mitchell. He loves doing these extreme races. The last time he did this race was 3 years ago, and he fell halfway through the race. He finished the race and drove home with this lovely black eye.

While Tim is gone, I'll be reading our copy of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. I'm still waiting for Mr. Brown to deliver. I wish he would hurry. I'll get it read before Tim gets home. Once Tim gets it read, we'll send it off to Dylan.

Tomorrow afternoon I'll be busy coordinating the preview event for SCS Virtual Scrapbooking Night. We'll have 4 great scrapbooking challenges. If you want to join us, the first challenge will be posted at 2:00 pm Eastern time, and you will have two hours to make you page to fit the challenge. It's lots of fun, and a good way to get lots of scrapbook pages completed.

If only Mr. Brown would get here...

Recipe for Today

I'm anxious to get home tonight so I can finish up the layout I have in progress. I was snipping pieces of pattern paper before I left for work this morning. Since I don't have any new stamping to show you until after VSBN, I thought I would share a recipe. Mom wanted me to e-mail this to her, so here it is Mom. My boss brought it as a salad to a work potluck. Tim took it to a bike social and they used it as a dip.

Penny's Salad
1 can black beans, rinsed and drained
1 can corn, drained
4 oz. Monterrey Jack cheese, cubed
1/2 cup salsa (add more if needed)
1/2 cup green onion
1/2 cup celery
2 Tablespoons olive oil
2 Tablespoons lemon juice
garlic
cumin

Mix everything together. Serve chilled.

Harry Potter Mania

We went to see Harry Potter and the Order of the Pheonix last night. Good movie. They got a few things wrong, but over all did a good job trying to condense such a large book into a mavie. Tim and I have a copy of the new book, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, on order with amazon.com. It should come on Saturday while Tim is at work. We buy the book for Dylan, but he graciously lets us read it before we send in on to him.

Here's a silly little quiz for you to take if you are into the Harry Potter mania.

Find out your Harry Potter personality at LiquidGeneration!

Sunday Update

I don't have any new stamping work to show you. I'm busy working on sample pages for the upcoming Virtual Scrapbooking Night (Weekend) on Splitcoaststampers.com. After the big event is over, I'll have lots of pages to show.

This is a card I made awhile back. The base is certainly celery. The swirl is stamped in rose red on Sahara sand, and matted with rose read, all on a certainly celery base. Friend is also stamped in rose read on Sahara sand and matted on rose red and attached to some celery ribbon. I love the colors of this card.

Tomorrow night I am going to go to Inky Fingers, which is a local stampers group that meets down the block at the senior center. I think I want to work on the design for our Christmas cards this year.

Sweet Sixteen

We don't normally celebrate the cat's birthdays. But today is special, Fitzie is 16! And I needed an excuse to make a cake. Fitzie has always been my kitty. She and Tim just tolerate each other. I got Fitzie from our friends, the Fitzgeralds, before I moved from South Dakota to Kentucky. She was a great traveler on her first trip. She has since moved to NC, and then to TN, and then back to NC. She's lost lots of teeth, and doesn't jump as well as she used to, otherwise, she's healthy and will probably live a few more years. The birthday girl did lick up a few crumbs of the yummy chocolate cake I made, and I have some tuna for her later.

Preparing for the Virtual Scrapbooking Night

The last few weeks I have been making lots of cards. I'm trying to have a stack on hand. For the next month or more I won't have much card making time as I will be concentrating on scrapbooking. SplitcoastStampers (www.splitcoaststampers.com) is where I hang out online. Every 3 months or so, they have a huge scrapbooking night - which ends up being over 2 weekends. This quarter, I am the coordinator - or publisher. The theme is Curl up With a Good Book. We will be scrapping on July 22 and August 4th and 5th - so please come and join us. Since I am the coordinator I need to make sample pages for all the challenges. Which means I need to get scrapping.

So here is one of the cards I made for my stash. Several weeks ago the color challenge on SCS was to use cool Caribbean, marigold morning and pretty in pink. I cased my card from Emily, the color challenge hostess. The card base is cool Caribbean. The image is Petal Prints - stamped in apricot appeal and pretty in pink - stamped on whisper white and mounted on marigold morning. I used my Coluzzle to cut the circles. The pattern paper is from My Minds Eye. And the ribbon is pretty in pink. It's a simple card, but I love all the soft colors.

Weekend Catch Up

I mostly spent the weekend reading. I read Simply Magic a romance by Mary Balough. It's third in the series, and the other two also start with "Simply". The other book was also number three in a series. It was The Right Attitude to Rain by Alexander McCall Smith. He writes the No. 1 Ladies Detective series, which I don't like, but I am loving this Isabel Dalhousie series of books he has. They are totally different from No. 1 Ladies.



I want to show you what I made last week for my friend Judi's birthday. Her gift was wrapped in a kraft take out box that I stamped in red, pink and black. I also added buttons and ribbon. I also made her a mini album about friends. I used some SU designer paper to cover some chipboard coasters and lots of different embellishments and stamp sets.

Happy Birthday Judi

My dear friend and SU demo, Judi, has a birthday today! I worked on her present(s) this weekend, but I can't show everyone because she hasn't seen them yet. I told her I'm holding them hostage until I see the new SU catalog - I'm not really. I really excited to giver her her gifts, because I know she'll love them.

I'm Making a Trip to the Vet Today

Tarzan had a bath last night, poor guy. He is nice and sweet smelling and soft today. I'm off to the vet today to get some of the magical flea stuff. It's expensive, but it works so well. Just so everyone doesn't think we tortured the poor guy - he did get a little tuna when he was done.

Sunday is a Good Day for Creating

My online friend, Kimmie, issued another challenge this weekend. I did her long card challenge last week. And this week, she challenged us to create a card using pastels and black. I had the barely banana and creamy caramel out for a SCS color challenge, so I used those. The stamps I used are my first Studio G clear stamps that I found in the dollar bin at Micheal's this weekend. The flower is stamped in real red and the stem in sage shadow. The image is matted on black. The greeting is stamped in black and accented with a couple of black brads. You can't see in the photo, but I also stamped the flower in barely banana along the top of the card. The caramel strip is stamped with the SU crosshatch background. Kimmie is right - a little bit of black makes the whole card "pop".

I sent out some happy mail this week

I meant to post these cards earlier in the week. One of my sisters-in-law had some surgery this week, so my parents had two of their granddaughters for the week. I made the girls some cards so they would get some mail at Grandmas. The mail is so slow, I hope the cards got there before the girls left this weekend. The barely banana and lavender lace card was for Sydney and the pretty in pink and regal rose card was for Sarah. I used the SU set Wild About You.

The chicken card went to Mom and my recuperating SIL, Kirsten. I used the SU set Best of Cluck ( I love chickens) with a kraft base card and blush blossom, bashful blue, and certainly celery strips of card stock and a chocolate chip mat for the chicken image. The zig zag stitching is a stamp - I don't sew!

Relax and Enjoy Your Day

My online friend, Kimmie, posted a challenge to make a LONG card. I'd never made one that was long, so I decided to give it a try. I used a base of Barely Banana that is 8.5x8. I stamped the beach chair from shore thing after I colored it with markers to get the two tone, and matted it with Ballet Blue. The pattern paper is SU Sarah. I made a scallop border with a punch and some Certainly Celery paper. The greeting is from Riveting and says Enjoy Your Day. It is stamped in Ballet Blue on Barely Banana and punched out. And, as always, a little ribbon to finish it off. I mailed out a ton of cards yesterday, but didn't have a good place to send this one. The perfect occasion will come up soon I'm sure. I'll post the rest of the cards that got mailed out yesterday later in the week - I want to let the recipients get them before I post.

Wishing You Well

Miss Stanly County is in Raleigh this week for the Miss North Carolina Pageant. They have a couple of practice days and then several nights of competition. This is the first card I sent Sara. The card base is 4x4 Certainly celery with a Rose Red layer stamped with the Crosshatch background. The center of the flower is Wishing You Well from the Riveting stamp set. A little celery ribbon finishes it off. I thought it was a fresh, young card to send a young woman.

I made a bunch of cards this weekend, so I'll have lots to show you this week.

Happy Father's Day

For once I was on the ball and got my Father's Day cards made AND sent ahead of time. Tim still hasn't seen his, but I will post a photo anyway. I didn't get my Dad's gift sent. I made it several months ago - and forgot! It's been boxed up, and it got buried. It'll get shipped on Monday.

The card is made with an old SU stamp set called Espress Yourself, and the background stamp is Crosshatch. The coffee cups and beans are stamped in basic brown ink, and I colored the coffee cups with my markers. The card base is Old Olive and the layers are Certainly Celery and Elegant Eggplant. The design is from a SCS sketch challenge, and the colors I used are a SCS color challenge.

Tim was going to ride today, but we had a big storm over night - lightning thunder and hail. I laid in bed worrying about my new roof and my new car. But this morning, it looks like the tomato plants were the only things injured.

So happy Father's Day to my Dad, Dennis; my husband Tim who is a wonderful father to Dylan; and to my brothers Joe and Jim who are the best Dad's to Sarah and Sydney, and Hannah and Matthew.

It Was a Hot Weekend

It was in the low 90's all weekend, so I tried to stay cool inside. Tim went riding Sunday, so I had some time to make some cards - lots of birthdays this month. The hot weather made me think of orange and pink, so I used those two colors and a Bella image from my friend Kimmie for a couple cards. They look like summer to me - flowers and hot, bright colors.

I did venture out Sunday afternoon to attend the wardrobe showing of Miss Stanly County. She is a beautiful young lady. The Miss NC competition will be next week, so think good thoughts for Sara. Here she is in her interview suit (Jeff, her "paparazzi" took this photo).

It's Graduation Time

All the high schools are graduating today here in Stanly County. My friend Judi's youngest daughter, Sara, is graduating at 1:00 pm. I made this card for her. I used the Happy Harmony stamp set in her school colors - real red and bliss blue with whisper white. I used my real red and old olive markers for the flowers. The background was stamped in Versa Mark and I mixed clear embossing powder and dazzling diamonds and embossed - so the background is sparkly. I used my red marker to color the words from different phrase stamps. The words didn't come out perfectly since they are stamped over the embossing. I'm so happy with how it turned out.

Dylan has been out of school for over a week now. He is now a JUNIOR! And my two nieces, Sarah and Hannah will now be second graders. I guess since all the kids are out of school, it must be summer.

Some Real Cat Pages

Here are the pages I did last weekend - one is Tarzan and the other is Fitzie. Now I need to get some cute photos of Riley and make a page for him. It took me awhile to make these pages, I think the switch from 8.5x11 pages to 12x12 pages is throwing me off.

"Daddy's Boy" is Tarzan and Tim. Tim found Tarzan in the pump house when we lived in Locust. Tarzan likes me, and will curl up next to me. But the minute Tim comes around I get abandoned. Tarzan is his Daddy's boy. For the base of this page, I used Always Artichoke and a scrap of unknown pattern paper. For accents, I used some Magic Mesh and brought out my stack of eyelets. The title is stamped on chipboard and a tag with Rough Edges alphabet.

"So Very Cute" is Fitzie sitting in different baskets. The first photo is when she was on;y a year old and the last photo is her last week. She loves curling up in a basket. For this page I used a Taken with Teal base and some great pattern papers. I also used some Chocolate Chip, Certainly Celery and Only Orange papers to coordinate with the paper. I used the So Very stamp set for the title and a MM flourish set for the curly stamps. I accented the page with brads, ribbon and a Prima flower.

That's a Funny Looking Cat

This weekend I scrapbooked a few animal pages. One of Fitzie in baskets, one of Tarzan, and the possum page. It seems like I don't get to make many pink pages, so the possum got a pink page. I also pulled out my long unused eyelets this weekend. The possum page got pretty little flower eyelets. I sure hope this possum was a girl :) I did the journaling on the computer because it was a long story. The only stamping is the title - I don't have any possum stamps.

Tim was away most of the weekend. He, and a group of guys, did the Burn 24-Hour race. This was Tim's first 24-hour race. He usually does 12-hour races solo. I think he enjoyed being on a team for this one. After lots of strategy, they placed 10th. They could have placed higher, but there was a prize for "strategic 10th place" and they wanted the prize - a case of Burn energy drink to share and a tube of chamois butter for each of them.

For Memorial Day, we went over to some of Tim's bike friends. They all went out and did a quick and easy ride, while I stayed at the house and guarded the beer. We grilled brats and had a very enjoyable afternoon. Tim's bike friends are good people.

Books have arrived

Today's mail brought the three book I'll be reading and judging. The first one is The Cowboy's Return by Linda Warren, the second is Simple Gifts by Shelley Galloway, and the third one is The Nurse's Longed-For Family by Fiona Lowe. And, they are all autographed! Tim will be gone all weekend doing the 24-hour Burn race in N. Wilkesboro, so I'll have all weekend to just read my new books.

Aspen Gold Reader's Choice Awards

I'm really excited - I'm going to be a judge for the Aspen Gold Reader's Choice Award sponsored by the Heart of Denver Romance Writers. In my application to be a judge, I had to select several romance sub-genres that I would be interested in judging. I choose: single title, historical, or series category. Next week I should receive my package of books and then I'll know what category I'll be judging in. I should receive no more than 5 titles that I'll have to read, so I should be able to handle reading 5 romance books :)

I'll keep you posted on how this goes and what I have to read.

Father and Son Together

I just had to share this adorable page I put together this morning. Well, that's not quite true. I put the pictures on this morning. I actually made the pages several months ago. A group of my online friends from SCS got together and made scrapbook pages for each other. These are the pages I made for everyone else - only they got 12x12 and I made mine 81/2x11. We have one package of pictures of Tim and Dylan when Dylan was a baby. Tim scanned a couple of these for me the other night (don't want to use originals on my pages).

The background paper is certainly celery and I also used some so saffron and brocade blue. The pattern paper is Sarah by SU. The stamp set is Polka Dots & Paisley, which my wonderful friend Judi let me borrow. For accents I used a Prima flower, some ribbon around the chipboard "t" and did some paper piercing along the bottom of the pages.

The perfect page for these sweet pictures of Tim and Dylan almost 16 years ago.

To affect the quality of the day...

We had a great weekend, lovely weather and time spent together. Yesterday Tim and I went for a hike in the Uwharrie Forest. Saw a tree neither of us recognized so took a picture and brought home a leaf. Identified it as a Chestnut Oak. There sure a lots of Oak varieties.

This afternoon we went in to Charlotte for our friend Patricia's graduation with a Masters Degree. Patricia takes care of our cats when we take long trips. She's also our foster kitty, Simon's mom. We then drove out to the Whitewater Center so Tim could show it to me. It's one of the places he races at. Came home and grilled some lamb chops for dinner, and now we're just relaxing.

I had to sit down and make a card for Patricia this morning. I chose The Art of Life stamp set because of the great verse - To affect the quality of the day, that is the highest of arts by Henry David Thoreau. I used two shades of pink and a brown. A little ribbon, a clip and some eyelets finished it off.

All that I am or hope to be, I owe my mother.

That's the quote I used for my latest scrapbook page. It's my Mother's Day present to my Mom - hope you like it Mom. The picture was taken in April 2006 when my parents were down for a visit. I took Mom to one of my favorite events - the Friends of the Pfieffer University Library Author Luncheon. The speaker was Ann B. Ross, author of the Miss Julia books.

This is my first real attempt at making a 12x12 scrapbook page. I really enjoyed the larger, square format, and I will definitely be making more pages this size. Last week, SBTC65 challenge, on splitcoast, was to make a page about Mom. I started the page by CASEing a layout on the Autumn Leaves Look blog. The turquoise and pattern paper are from My Minds Eye, and the chipboard monogram is Lil Davis. I used the CC114 colors of rose red, apricot appeal, tempting turquoise and green galore. The stamp sets I used were Big Pieces and Little pieces. There's also a dab of ribbon - can't do a page without ribbon, and some metal edge tags.

Mother's Day Cards

I wanted to share the Mother's Day cards I made this year. I couldn't share before because my Mom reads my blog - hi Mom. I'll admit I CASED from someone on splitcoststampers.com. Since the card is very plain, I had Tim bring me home some nice, heavy white card stock. I stamped a small square with sage shadow and the retired paisley print background stamp. The leaves are white embossed on vellum. Inside I stamped Happy Mother's Day in sage shadow. I thought it was a simple, but elegant card.

Happy Mother's Day

Tim made us a nice breakfast today. And this afternoon he is meeting some bike people to look over local trail opportunities. I'm going to try and do some scrapping. This morning I made q quick little card. I need to send a thank you RAK to a great stamping friend. I found the sketch on Beate's blog, and that is what I used as my starting point. I had some sei pattern paper out on the table from a previous project, so I grabbed a scrap of that. The I chose one of the darling Bella images that my great stamping friend sent me. I used SU certainly celery solid cardstock, a prima flower, and a colored brad. The pattern paper came with some matching embellishments, so I grabbed a tab to use as an accent. I colored the image with my SU watercolor crayons and a blender pen. Hope you enjoy this card. And if you are a mother - Happy Mother's Day.

What year do you belong to?

I found this neat quiz on my friend Sally's blog. Had to try it for myself.

You Belong in 1987

Wild, over the top, and just a little bit cheesy. You're colorful at night - and successful during the day.

What Year Do You Belong In?

Another Layout from our Trip to the Beach

"Fly" is photos of the day we spent at the Wright Brother Memorial in Kitty Hawk. I was glad it was February, because the place has no trees ans must be miserable in the hot, humid summer with hundreds of other people. But, we had a beautiful day. We even had a picnic lunch on the grounds. I've tried to use the same colors and stamps for all of the three layouts I've made of our trip. I think I still want to make one more layout of some general photos of the trip.

I've Been Tagged

Several of my Splitcoast Stampers friends (Donna and Darcy) have tagged me. I'm supposed to share 7 things about myself.

1. I've lived in lots of states: Minnesota, North Dakota, Utah, Wisconsin, South Dakota, Kansas, Kentucky, Tennessee and North Carolina.
2. I met my wonderful husband in a bar in Kentucky, and we've been married 13 years.
3. I am the step-mother to a wonderful 15-year old boy, Dylan, who lives in Kentucky.
4. I have two younger brothers who married wonderful women, and finally gave me the sisters I've always been wanting.
5. As a young child, every time I would visit the library, I would save my bookmarks so that someday when I was a librarian I could give them to my patrons.
6. I hate doing housework.
7. My undergraduate degree is in Biology and my Masters degree is in Library Science.

Now, I think I'm supposed to tag 7 more people to play this little blog game. But everyone I know that has a blog has been tagged, so the fun will have to stop here. I hope you enjoyed learning these 7 things about me.

A Busy Weekend

It's been a fun and busy weekend. Saturday was National Scrapbook Day. My friend Judi and I used the library meeting room and spent the day scrapping. The weather was chilly and rainy, so it was a great day to be inside scrapping. I didn't get much done, but I enjoyed myself. I did finish up a layout that I had started last week for the SCS virtual scrapbook night. I also did a layout of Ben's birthday this past February. We always go bowling, and have fun. This year I found some fabulous Basic Grey paper that had bowling pins in it. I have enough paper leftover for the next bowling birthday party. The big excitement Saturday night was the fireworks for the closing of the Albemarle 150th birthday celebrations. We stood out on our sidewalk in the rain and watched a great fireworks show.

Today is a gorgeous breezy day. It's too wet for Tim to go riding. This morning we took our new car to Lowe's and got it dirty when we filled it with plants and stuff for a garden. We planted 3 varieties of tomato and 3 different kinds of peppers and a watermelon and a cucumber. I also got a few herbs - basil, rosemary, thyme and oregano. After we got everything planted, Tim vacuumed out the car - so it's clean again.

Tim did get the bike rack on the new car Friday night. We had to buy a new bike holder that goes on the rack that came with the car. Unfortunately, the car is too tall for me to put a bike on (because I'm sure it's not because I'm too short). We bought the bike rack at a new local sporting goods store. They only had one in stock, so we'll have to go back for another one later.

A Librarian in Need of a Bookmark

Tuesdays are my late day at work. So, this morning, I had some time, and I did a little scrapping and a little reading. I started The Art of Mending by Elizabeth Berg for my library book club this month. I was packing up my stuff to go to work when I realized that I didn't have a bookmark - the horrors! I was walking by my craft table (aka the dinning room table) and I just grabbed a scrap of pretty paper. I immediately realized how silly that was. I had a table full of paper and supplies, so I made my self this pretty bookmark. I really need to make myself more bookmarks. It was a joy to see everytime I opened my book today. It was a quick reading book - I finished it this evening.