The Perfect Spot

Last Friday night was my friend Judi's monthly crop. I got 2 pages done and a good start on 2 more. The Perfect Spot has pictures of the three cats - Riley, Fitzgerald and Tarzan - all resting on the back of the couch. They all loved that spot on the couch so much that we were able to get a picture of all three of them up there. I've been carrying around this paper and these pictures for a long time - notice we bought our new couch this winter and moved it to a different spot. I love how the page turned out.
For dessert for the crop I made some Chocolate Chai Cupcakes. I got the recipe from the Land O Lakes web site. I wasn't real happy with how they turned out - the cupcakes were dry and I didn't like the frosting. But I did love using the new Kitchen Aid to make them. Judi is having a Fall theme for next month's crop, so I'm looking for a dessert idea - maybe something with pumpkin.
No scrapbooking this weekend. We are off to Kentucky to see Dylan and celebrate his 17th birthday.

Happy Birthday to ...

Matthew-
My darling little nephew had a birthday on Saturday. He is all little boy and loves trucks and tractors and heavy machinery of all sorts. He told his Grandpa that he wanted a quarry for his birthday. Or a real dump truck. Darn stinkin' cute kid. When the SU By Land set retired last year I bought it specifically to use for Matthew. I've used it for several birthday cards and for a scrapbook page. I'm sure I'll get a lot more use out of it. The wheel stamp I bought to use for Tim's biking pages, but I get a lot of use from that stamp too.

And Me -
I have the pleasure of sharing my birthday with Matthew. This year, Tim bought me a Big Shot die cut machine (ok, he really didn't buy it for me - I bought it for myself). This is the newest toy - I mean tool - available from Stampin' Up. Die cut machines are fairly expensive and there are several different types. I had never been willing to make the investment. But this summer, SU started offering this one, and they have a good price. The machine came yesterday, but I'm still waiting on the dies that were included with the purchase. My wonderful friend Judi lent me some of her dies to play with. This is a great little machine and so easy to use. I also bought the cute doctors bag to carry everything when I go to crops. I don't think our Christmas cards will have any stamping on them this year - I think it will all be die cuts.

There are still a few more birthdays coming up this month, so I need to start making some more cards. I'm sure I'll be using that wheel stamp again.

But now I have to go to work. I have book club this morning. We are discussing The Tortilla Curtain by TC Boyle.

The Birthday Season Begins

The Birthday Season begins for us at the end of August and goes until the end of January. Between Tim and I, almost everyone in our families has birthdays and anniversaries during this time. Maybe this holiday weekend I should sit down and make up a stash of cards to have on hand so I'm not creating at the last minute.

Last week I sat down and made a couple of cards that were needed for this week. Since it had been awhile since I had done any card creating, I needed some inspiration to get me started. I came across a color challenge on Kristina Werner's blog, http://www.kwernerdesign.com/blog/, to use black, white, grey, and a small amount of any other color. I needed to make a card for Dylan, so thought this would be a great color combination for a boy. Instead of using grey I used some silver paper I had - Dylan loves sparkly things - a strip of black and a strip of white. I used a circle of orange for my accent color and punched a black star and a black tab. A silver star eyelet and two silver brads accent it all. No ribbon because he's a boy. Actually, at 17 he's not a boy, he's a young man.

While I was at the craft table and had this basic color scheme in mind I made a card for my friend Karen. It's a great color scheme that will work as well for a masculine as for a feminine card. For Karen's card I also got inspiration from Beate's sketch #54, http://beate.blogs.splitcoaststampers.com/. It's white for the card base with a strip of black that I scallop punched and punched eyelet holes. The large scallop circle is Cool Caribbean and I again punched eyelet holes. There is no stamping on this, it's all SU's rub-ons. I added some sparkly silver ribbon and turquoise rhinestone brads for some bling.

I hope everyone has a great Labor Day weekend. I'll be laboring on cards for the Birthday Season. And a big Happy Birthday to Dylan and Karen.

I know, it's been awhile. We physically got back from vacation, but I think my brain stayed up in BC. Tim brought back a cold as his souvenir and shared it with me and that didn't help. But I feel like I'm back in the swing of things. I sat down and made a couple of cards this morning which I'll share with you later - after certain people's birthdays have past.

Tim and I had a wonderful weekend together this past weekend. The weather was great so we spent lots of time outside - none of the time working in the garden. Fay is here right now giving us lots of great rain.

On Saturday, he went riding at Sherman Branch park and I went along. I took some books, but didn't read them. Instead I went walking/hiking the trails and took some neat pictures. I've got a great idea to scrap some of them, so hopefully I will have a neat page to show you soon. After lots of fresh air and sunshine, we drove across Charlotte to the home brew store. Tim picked out a couple more beer recipes to make, so brewing will begin again soon. To end our nice day together, we had dinner at our favorite restaurante - El Ranchito.

After a slow start on Sunday we drove back into Charlotte to McAlpine Greenway. And I actually rode my bike! Had a great ride of about 6 miles. I felt great. I'm really looking forward to getting back on my bike. I've run into several old riding partners lately, so I'm taking that as a sign that it's time. And Tim was very happy to get my bike out and get it tuned up for me. After our nice little ride, we went to another favorite place for lunch - the Chicken Roasting Company. We don't get to go often enough because it's in Charlotte.

I was also able to get some reading done this weekend. I'm reading some books to judge for a romance writers contest. I've also received a few complimentary copies of new books from the publishers and from several book bloggers. I'm thinking about starting another blog where I will review books. I don't know that I want to post reviews on the library blog, because that blog is not really just for fiction reviews - it's for library news. And I don't want to post lots of book reviews here - I know lots of you would be interested, but this really is more for my crafting stuff with occasional food and books. I'll be sure to let you know if I do start another blog.

Watch here for upcoming birthday card posts and hopefully some more scrapbook pages.

Last Day

It's a rainy day today. Tim has gone to check if they are riding down the mountain today.

Here is the view from our balcony this morning.

The wedding yesterday was beautiful. It was held on Whistler Spit of Green Lake. The weather was perfect.

The first full day we were here Tim and the group from Charlotte did a cross country ride.

While they were out riding I wandered around the Village. I managed to find the Public Library. It's a new building and it's fabulous.

It took a full day of traveling to get here. A delay leaving Charlotte made us late getting into Dallas. The airline met us at the gate with a van to drive us across the runway to make our connecting flight to Vancouver. Customs took some time but we had no problems. The Vancouver airport is under construction - they are getting prepared to host the 2010 Winter Olympics. We got our rental car and headed through downtown Vancouver traffic to the Sea and Ski Highway. The view on the drive up were incredible.

This has been the best vacation.

Vacation Here I Come

What does a librarian take on vacation? This has taken a lot of thought - I want to have enough to read, but I don't want to add too much weight to my bags.

The Bridge of Sighs by Richard Russo. Tim and I started listening to this on audio and both enjoyed it. We weren't able to finish listening to the entire thing (it's about 21 CD's long) so I am taking the book so we can finish.

Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers by JRR Tolkien. This is a book that Tim loves to read. I have never read it, but I love the movie, so I'm going to give it a try.

That makes two books we'll both be able to read. I also plan on downloading The Tortilla Curtain by TC Boyle onto my MP3 player. My book club will be discussing it this month so I need to get it read.

And, of course, we have a Vancouver/British Columbia guide book.

And that's what a librarian takes on vacation. We aren't forgetting to take our cameras - don't worry - there will be pictures.

Farmer Tim

I do believe I promised to show you Farmer Tim - and here he is. He borrowed the tiller from our friends Steve and Karen and tilled up most of our backyard. I think he just wanted to get out of mowing it. Tim selected all of the plants and seeds one Saturday while I was at work, and then got everything planted. He's been the one to diligently water most evenings and do the harvesting. We learned a lot with this garden - what needs to be planted early, what needs to be planted later, and things like what blossom end rot is. We are already planning for next year's garden. For this page I used a bunch of the vegetable tags from the things we planted. For the title I used several different tags. I even stamped some leaves in green on green and cut them out. The journaling is hidden on the yellow paper at the top of the page and tucked behind the photos.

Favorite Things

This weekend Tim went to the mountains to do the Off Rod Assault on Mt. Mitchell. 68 miles and many feet of elevation changes in 9 hours and 15 minutes. He had a good time.

While he was gone I went to a crop with my friend Judi. We sat next to Nancy and Wendy and just had a blast. Nancy gave me some great ideas for the pages I was working on and she graciously shared some of her supplies. In only got two and a half pages done, but I love what I got done.

When I was visiting my brother and his family in March I had both of my nieces tell me what their 5 favorite things were and I took a picture of each of them. Sydney was wearing a maroon-y colored dress that I've been having a hard time coordinating colors with. I was so excited to find the perfect papers from Creative Memories. The ribbon on this page came from my friend Judi and the great maroon flower came from my new friend Nancy. I used some pearls and crystals out of the Stampin Up Pretties kit. I can not believe how beautiful this page turned out. The tags that are threaded on the ribbon are Sydney's favorite things: Friends and Family, Teachers, Dressing Up, Ice Skating Show, and Dance Show.

Just call me Suzy Homemaker

I don't know what's gotten into me this summer. First I decided I needed to make cookies - and I never make cookies. Now I'm making jam and freezing tomatoes. Just call me Suzy Homemaker.

One of my co-workers was kind enough to bring me a bag of plums. I spent about 15 dollars on cute little jars, Sure-Jell and sugar. And now I have jam. It didn't set up as nicely as I wanted it to. But it's pretty tasty and I did it with no special canning equipment. Yes - I'm proud of myself.

We are starting to get tomatoes out of the garden. We've had an issue with blossom end rot, and Tim is treating that, but we are still getting a good edible crop. Instead of just freezing them plain, I am roasting them with garlic, onion and olive oil. I'm using my friend Melissa's recipe (http://fromlaptoptostovetop.blogspot.com/). I just cut up the tomatoes, add some chopped garlic, and chopped onion (I cheat and use the frozen kind), drizzle all with olive oil and bake at 300 for about 2 hours. It's so good that Fitzie helped herself to the last batch.

Next time I'll post about Farmer Tim.

Not All Business

Guess it's time for another scrapbook page. The butterscotch oatmeal cookies were very good by the way. I made this layout about my trip to Minneapolis in March. I got a grant to go to the Public Library Association meeting, but I was able to extend my trip and visit lots of family and friends. My friend Judi made the little booklet that is in the middle of the right hand page. It's a travel journal made of library cards and library pockets - get it? Library conference, library cards and pockets? There was one pocket and card for each day for me to jot down notes and memories. So I put the entire journal on the layout and included a variety of pictures from the whole trip. I had so much fun seeing my extended family and old college roommate. Plus the library conference was so inspiring.

I have book club this morning and I just finished the book. We are discussing a memoir: Stolen Lives: Twenty Years in a Desert Jail by Malika Oufkir and Michele Fitoussi. So what should I read next? People of the Book, which my online group has just finished discussing or The Story of Edgar Sawtelle which we'll be discussing in a few weeks?

What a great weekend.

We had a wonderful 3-day weekend to celebrate the 4th of July. It was so nice to stick close to home and spend some time together.

I got to started my holiday on Thursday evening when I drove to Matthews to buy my new toy - a Kitchen Aid 5-qt. Artisan stand mixer in red. Friday morning I put it to use making Cindy McCain's Butterscotch Oatmeal cookies. I like the oatmeal cookies better than Michele Obama's shortbread cookies. But everyone at the cookout liked the shortbread better. I don't know that I've heard Tim say which he likes best.

We had our traditional cookout with our friends the Grochowskys. It was such a nice evening - good food and great company - and fireworks. We were so relaxed that I didn't take any pictures.

On Saturday, Tim started brewing his beer. It is fermenting away in the dinning room. I think it will be a couple of more weeks before he starts bottling. I need to work on stamping some labels for the bottles. Isn't it sweet that we can combine our hobbies?

And now it's back to work. I hope everyone had a great weekend.

Honoring Freedom

This is the week we celebrate our freedom. Friday we'll be grilling with friends and shooting off some fireworks. I'm planning to make grandma's macaroni salad and some cookies. Tim is going to buy the fireworks tonight. We can't wait to get together with our friends.

I made this page this weekend for a VSBN challenge on SCS to scrap someone in the military. I've done a nice page about my Dad being in Berlin, but I hadn't done anything for Tim's Dad. Tim had to call his brother Brent to see if he had any old photos scanned and Brent was able to email Tim several old photos of their Dad in uniform. In place of journaling, I used a newspaper story about James' service and being captured by the Germans at the start of the Battle of the Bulge. The title is simple chipboard that I embossed in white to give the page a red, white, and blue color scheme. There is a circle of stars under the title that I made by punching the shape out of a transparency and edging with white ink. The page is very simple to highlight the meaningful story of James' service to our country.

Happy Fourth to everyone and thanks to all who have served our country in peace and war.

Where did the week go?

Wow - it was a long hectic week. I didn't get any scrapping done. But I do have this adorable page to show you that I made last weekend. I am getting some more scrapping done today.

The title of this page is: Grandpa Makes the Best Playmate. And yes, I know I have a typo on the page - it will get fixed. These are pictures of my Dad playing with my brother Joe's girls when we were up in Michigan in March. Grandpa just played and played and never seemed to get tired. He's a great Grandpa.

I Made Cookies!

The other day I saw an article about Michelle Obama's and Cindy McCain's cookie recipes in Women's Day. They both look delicious, so I have decided to try them. I started with Michelle Obama's Shortbread cookies. Tim has a big 12-hour race today and since he loves shortbread cookies, I made these for him. Hopefully these freeze well since I have most of them in the freezer right now.

I'm not going to the race. It's just too long for me to be outside in the heat. I'm spending the afternoon and evening scrapping at today's Virtual Scrapbook Night on Splitcoaststampers.com. Which means I'll have a bunch more pages to show.

Michelle Obama's Shortbread Cookies

1-1/2 cups (3 sticks) unsalted butter, softened

1-1/2 cups plus 2 Tablespoons sugar

2 egg yolks

2 Tablespoons Amaretto (I used 1 tsp. almond extract and a little water)

1 teaspoon each orange and lemon zest

3 cups cake flour (not self-rising)

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 beaten egg white

chopped nuts or dried fruit (optional)

1. Heat oven to 325 degree F. Line a 17x12x1 inch pan with non stick foil. In a large bowl, cream together butter and 1-1/3 cups of the sugar.

2. Slowly add egg yolks, and beat well until smooth. Beat in Amaretto and zest.

3. Stir in flour and salt until combined.

4. Spread dough evenly into prepared pan, flattening as smoothly as possible.

5. Brush top of dough with egg white; sprinkle with nuts or fruit (if using) and with remaining 2 Tablespoons sugar.

6. Bake at 325 degree F for 25 minutes or until brown, turn off oven and allow cookies to sit in oven (with door ajar) for 15 minutes. Cut while slightly warm. Makes 6dozen 2x3-inch cookies.

Trick or Treat

Here's a layout I did for my nieces. I made two pages almost identical - one for each of their albums. The girls are bigger now since these pictures are from 2006 (correct me if I'm wrong Kirsten). I had some Cars paper that I cut the emblem and Lightning McQueen out of to use as embellishments. I also had some stickers so I used those to flank the title. I ran a wheel stamp across the page in a couple of places - that has been a versatile stamp and I use it a lot. It's a simple page with bright colors - so saffron, real red, brocade blue and black. I hope you like it girls.

Celebrating the Seasons

I got a bunch of pages scrapped this weekend. But I'll share this one with you first since I just finished it last night - and I love how it turned out.

The pictures are from Easter when I was in Minnesota. My Uncle Gerry and Aunt Sandy had the Holles family over for Easter dinner. The siblings also exchanged their Christmas gifts. I got to see my cousin Elly and spend some time with her. The group picture is Uncle Gerry, Aunt Jean, Aunt Julie and Dad. The other picture on the left page is my Dad and Uncle Gerry relaxing and visiting. On the right side is a picture of my cousin Elly helping my Mom with her cell phone, a nice picture of Aunt Jean and Uncle David, and then a picture of all the women sitting at the table visiting.

Every week on Splicoaststampers.com there are challenges to get people stamping and scrapping. So for this layout I used the sketch challenge and the variety challenge which was to use pattern paper from three different manufacturers. That was really hard for me, but I did it - and it worked. I used a red pattern paper from Stampin' Up and a tone on tone paper from Basic Grey and the black pattern paper is unknown. I put everything on a vanilla background. The title and journaling were done with a SU font. And the simple embellishments are black painted chipboard.

The Prize

Here is the page I made to show off the Blue Plunger Award that Dylan won for his psychology project. Dylan wrote out the journaling part for me that explains what his project was. Stamping Up has a cool punch that makes it look like the paper was torn from a notebook. I bought the papers on my last shopping trip because I knew the blues would work well with the very blue plunger and then I could use browns to tone it all down.

Summer Hair Cut

An interesting Southern tradition is that every year after school's out young boys get their hair buzzed for the summer. Tim decided he would try it this year since he has so much hair and it grows so fast. Turns out, we both really like it.

For this layout I used a sketch my friend Sally made for me, SBSC143. I used Not Quite Navy for the background and some new pattern papers by Paper Studio that I bought on my last shopping trip with Judi. And I used a little ribbon for accent. The other pages I made this weekend are a secret until the next Virtual Scrapbooking Night on Splitcoast - but they turned out darling.

Mojo!

My mojo's back! I'm creating today, so I'll have some scrapbook pages to share with you this week. Stay tuned.

Creative Cooking

At least I'm being creative in the kitchen if I can't be creative at the scrap table. Tonight I made Mexican Egg Rolls. I got the idea from an appetizer at Chilis. I didn't have any corn in the house, so these aren't very colorful. But they were yummy.

Mexican Egg Rolls

1 lb ground beef, browned with onions and garlic

1 can black beans, drained

1 can green chilies

1 cup frozen corn

taco seasoning and/or lots of cumin and chili powder

2 cups grated cheese

I used 2 won ton wrappers for each egg roll and about 2 good spoonsful of filling. Makes 12. Spray with Pam and bake at 400 for 15 min. Serve with sour cream and salsa.