Not enough hours in the day! {edited}

I have to work tonight. I love my job at WW but I want to stay home and play.

I'm trying to make up for it by making as much as I can today. I made these two cards this afternoon. That is after I got home from going to the scrapbook store, Ever After, again, this time with Sue and we saw Marg there too. I am not going tomorrow. Really, I'm not.

I used the scalloped circle with shrink plastic, and the circle turned into an oval.

I used the packaging from the embossing folder to make the 'transparency'. I ran it thru the Big Shot and then inked it with White Stazon, it's stapled on under the felt ribbon.

And then I made this...My little Oreo was screaming to be decorated and I know these pictures are for Kah-Mei's class, but I had to make this...here's a few pages.

I will add more journaling to it.

Seriously, I LOVE it.

I am totally waiting for my Top Note die, but in the mean time, I'll make do with my large scalloped circle. I made this with all the circles I cut earlier. I'm a keener. I know.

It's my Oreo Cookie book. Blackboard covers, acrylic and 4 round coasters.

It's so cute I could eat it.

I've "Die"d and gone to Heaven

I was holding out, I wasn't going to get the Big Shot. I was going to wait. And I did. I waited until Kerry was asleep, told him I needed one and took the drooling to mean "Go ahead and get it".

So I did. Most of the stuff is back ordered, but I did get the machine, and the large scalloped circle. I bought the Stampin' Up one. It's a decent deal, all black.

And in the minutes I have before my students descend on me, I have cut out a bunch of scalloped circles. I cut them out of the brand spankin' new blackboard chipboard that I got at the brand spankin' new scrapbook store in Kelowna, Ever After. Amanda, formerly of Memories and More, has opened her own shop in the cultural district right next to Prospera Place. http://www.everaftercrafter.com/ She's got lots of new products, unpacking more as I type this! She's very enthusiastic and loves what she does. Check her out.

Anyway, back to my circles. I cut them out using felt, plastic, fabric, velvet framing mat board, acryllic and whatever else I could find. I regretted selling my Accucut a few months ago, for a few minutes, and now I don't. The Big Shot is sturdier, and heavier. Love it.

Not My Calling

I need a pile of pictures for the classes I'm taking in less than 2 weeks. I had forewarned the kids last week that there would be a mandatory photo shoot in the near future.

Today was the day. With lots of grumbling, lots of 'hurry ups' from both adults and kids, lots of name calling, lots of giggles, eye rolling, snot, and 83 shots later, I have at least 8 decent shots.

These are the kind of shots they would like, action ones, with goofy things going on. And I do like it, it's what they do best, but I wanted serious 'portraits'.

I realized afterwards that one kid, Emily, is quite tanned, has been out in the sun shine, and day light and fresh air and has a healthy glow, while the other kid, Shaun, has not. He's white, porcelin, glowing. Very noticeable in the photos(that are a tad over exposed)

I love the way she's looking at him. I think she was remembering this moment....

when she got to put her arm around his shoulders, this would be almost a hug.

I'm paying better attention to things, like lighting, this last picture would have been great if I had paid attention to the lighting when I actually took the picture.

The first shot, kids and dogs, the dogs were awsome, didn't move, blink, giggle or snot. I had to take about 8 shots to get that one.

All colour phots are sooc, all black and white are doctored with Pioneer Woman's actions.

Tagged

I made some cute fabric tags, 3 to be exact, tonight for my MIMI tote. Gotta look good for the crop coming up. They are my own pattern, made with ribbon, fabric, and felt. The other two are T and M for my little cohorts, because in exactly 2 weeks, we wil be meeting Donna Downey, C.D. Muckosky, and Kah-Mei Smith!

I LOVE MY DOG I LOVE MY DOG I LOVE MY DOG

This is what I have to tell myself, my mantra, if you will. The last 3 days have been very trying, and tiring. Linus needs an attitude adjustment. I need a break.

Today, we played 'pick your own switch'. Back in the day, my dad said he that when misbehaving at school, he was told to get a branch from a near-by tree. So he picked the nicest one he could find, only to find out it was to be used as a switch to punish him with. That's what I pretended we were doing today. We, me and Linus, pruned some trees. Hazel nut, plum, forsythia, and lilac. The lilac switches were the best. No, I didn't beat him with it, as much as I wanted to. We played strip the leaves and eat the branch instead. And now he is napping because it was too much work for his big clumsy body. We also picked up poop, deposited more, ate more plums and tried to dig up the grass.

I'm getting tired of the constant barking, biting, and pawing. We had a mishap last night involving 2 12 year olds and Linus, the 12 yr. olds know better and were pretty sheepish afterwards. Linus escaped twice yesterday and this wouldn't be a big problem if the jerk didn't run across the street. He doesn't look both ways and with the school traffic, he could easily get hit.

So today, I have been practicing sit/stay when he is misbehaving. Sally is getting the grinds too. She is one of the problems, she gets so nervous and excited that it gets lazy bones going too.

I'm not a cat person, but lately I'm thinking of becoming one.

DQ treat

Music class started up tonight for Emily. It's almost dinner time. So for a treat tonight, we stopped at Dairy Queen, we usually only stop for Blizzards. But tonight we had the full meal deal.
I remember when $20 would feed our family of 4 at a fast food restaurant. Tonight, 3 of us ate not even full meal combos, 3 got Blizzards and it was well over $30.
I decided that since I'm back on the WW wagon, I would make smart choices. I ordered small poutine and a small caramel sundae.
I realize now that if poutine is not in the WW Dining Out Companion that does not mean that poutine must not contain any points. So I checked other companies poutines and went with 12 pts. The sundae was 7 pts. The Blizzard I decided not to have, small Cheese Quake, would have been, (are you sitting down?) at least 16 pts, a medium Cookie Dough Blizzard is 22 pts. When you only get 20 a day, that means a lot of veggies for the rest of the day. And you think that small dipped cone is low in points, check again, it's 8 pts.
I'll eat veggies tomorrow.

And this is because Linus and I have too much time on our hands.

Last year, as a puppy, he started jumping up to pick his own plums. We thought he might not start this year because he was just picking the ones he could reach, but today, he started jumping. This causes a few to fall and then Sally gets to eat some too. They have learned not to eat the pits. Too bad plums cause gas.

Place Title Here

Another Christmas card, with non-traditional colours. And these...love the stamp set. I can see the possibilities with this tree! There's glitter on each card, snowflakes, flowers, and leaves. The birds are on square clear SU buttons, I always wondered what to do with them.
I'm thinking of printing a bunch of my own pictures to hang on my walls. Since we painted, I have hung a few black & whites, in black frames. I'm thinking I need to print some of my favourites and hang them up so I can appreciate them. Why not? They aren't just for scrapbook pages! I dare you, print, frame and hang some of your favourite photographs that you took.

Cool Dude Lovin'

Like I said, I can't wait to use my new stuff.
So I didn't wait and this is what I made. I prepped it for my Stamp-A-Stack and now I'm thinking that might be crazy talk.

Christmas time is HERE!

Okay, so Christmas time isn't really here, but Fall definately is! It just felt like Christmas because I got my SU pre-order of the Holiday Mini stuff.

After I taught my card class with the following cards, the orange and brown one features the Dahlia Fold. I pre-punched, and pre-scored all the circles for the girls and they just had to do the folding. It's a bit time consuming but is a very nice touch on a card or layout. The second card is slowly building up to Christmas.

This is the Autumn Vine Designer Series paper and Season of Friendship stamp set. Love it!
But I love this paper more...Ski Slope. It's very similar to Chatterbox's stuff, before they changed, and I like that the pattern is the same all across the paper. Love the colours! Check out the ribbon!!! That's striped grosgrain, like a candy cane, it's 1 1/4" wide, probably not a great size for cards, but whose going to use it? It's way to beautiful. And that Ribbon Originals! That's Alpine, it has 2 spools of FELT ribbon in Chocolate and one yummy striped spool!

Stamp set is Too Cool Dudes. AND I can't forget the felt SNOWFLAKES, in 2 sizes, Little Felt Flurries and Big Felt Flurries. I can't wait to see what I make!
Emily really wanted the Tart and Tangy stamp set. I didn't really know what I would do with it, but yesterday, I was playing with it and came up with this layout. Check out my fancy scalloped edge punching on the photo, I cut that right into the photo and layered red cardstock underneath.

Not a pretty picture.

We ate dinner outside. I went to close the curtains on the deck to block the blinding sun, but instead got an eyeful of this...

So of course, I had to get my camera. I could only get this close from the deck, so then I had to get closer and that's when Kelly-Next-Door came home and I went to get some shots from her side.Which disgust me even more. I detest spiders and would die if this thing dropped on me. It's huge, and I'm not exagerating. If you look in the picture, you can see fruit flies in the web. With the legs out, this thing is the size of a loonie or bigger. And it's orange. And has hairy legs. Gross!

Clogged Arteries 101 or How To Get Your Kids To Eat Veggies.

Emily is not a veggie eater, she'll eat lettuce and raw carrots, maybe pickles.

But today I found the Golden Ticket!

We have a plethora, an over abundant amount of veggies. My mom's been bringing us beans, cukes, apples, Terrell brought peaches and nectarines, Jaynee gave us beets and carrots and then we got our Urban Harvest box and now have more beets, sweet potatoes, fruit, and more veggies.

So, in my infinite wisdom and hunger, I decided to deep fry things today.

First off, sweet potatoes and beets sliced super thin with my magic slicer. Deep fried until crispy... Lightly salted and handed over to children without telling them what they were eating. They ate the 'chips' and asked for bowls more, said they were delicious.

Second into the hot oil, eggplant dipped in tempura and panko crumbs, over kill I know but how else am I supposed to get Kerry and Shaun to try them.

Thirdly... zucchini, mushrooms, beans, bananas, all battered with a nice tempura and ...

this will kill you...

seriously, it will kill you...

WW fudgy chocolate bars in tempura...I think the deep frying increases the 2 point value.

Sweet potato and beet chips.Whole empty bottle of oil, it was full.

Layout and tin made before my arteries were clogged. Before my hands, eyes, and face were covered with a fine, thin layer of oil.

Chapters Inspiration

Last night, Kerry and I wandered around Chapters looking at the 'Not Books' section. It was very hard to resist the urge to buy some of the funky note books. I kept telling myself "Go home and make some notebooks, you'll never use them either way". So that's what I did. I made a Sally/Linus one for me, an Emily Williams' Original Artwork one for her, and a Pokemon Card one for Eli. They each took literally minutes to make. I love the Bind-it-all.

Another post today?

I forgot to tell you about my roasted corn. I peeled back the husks, removed the silks, melted Becel and olive oil together and added salt, pepper and cayenne pepper, then spread this on my corn. I wrapped the husks back over the corn and tossed them on the bbq. The sun came out for a few minutes, late afternoon sun is always nice for dog portraits. I was trying to get some lens flare. Didn't work, but I did figure a few things out. The sun is behind the dogs, upper left corner, my ISO is 200, flash on. The pictures are a bit blown out, but I really like the fact that ...
1. both dogs find something in the corner more interesting than me and my treats (my secret for getting decent pet shots)
2. both dogs sat within striking distance of eachother.
3. that even though the sun is behind the dogs, I managed to light up their faces! Yay ME.

Shortly after the above picture the dogs were on to me and my not-so-generous treat giving.

Yay Friday!

Not that I have any plans this weekend, but I'm glad it's Friday. I want to gather my family around and give them a big hug. I believe both kids will be home tonight and whether they like it or not, hugs are free. Go, give some away.

Not to break my week long obsession with turning the oven on, I made naan this morning. And then I had to make butter chicken to dip the naan in. It's not even 3 pm and dinner is done. I so hope to not do this next week.

I started up our Urban Harvest delivery again. If you have any interest in getting fresh, organic veggies delivered to you door for a decent price, check out Urban Harvest, and if you sign up, tell them I sent you, unless of course someone else sent you. I love getting the fruits and veggies delivered. It's like Christmas every week, because most of the time I can't remember what I ordered so it's a surprise. And it's organic, I'm all for spray, I detest eating food with bugs in it. But I haven't found one bug, or nasty looking veggie in the bunch so we'll stick with our healthy stuff for awhile.

I haven't been taking that many pictures lately. It's dismal outside, at best. No great colour changing foliage yet, no fall flowers and I missed my chance at first day of school. So here's one of Kerry, at Mardi Gras a few weeks back.(sooc)

Is it wrong to wish you had younger kids so that they could go as the UPS man for Halloween?

Thursday BLAH

Some stuff happened in the last couple days that has made me really dislike the medical system in B.C, Canada, whatever. I'm not political, I don't know who is responsible, but I'm guessing it's who ever makes the budget, who ever decides that the money should go to a weird giant bridge, a large wave pool in the Mission, 'art work' to beautify the cities, but not to the hospitals for beds, or staff, or whatever it is that would benefit people that need to be in the hospital in their time of need.
Okay, my rant is finished.
Anyway, I, in my great frugal-ness, decide every year that we are not turning on the furnace until October 1st. No rhyme or reason, it just makes me feel good to declare these things. So for the past 2 days I have been getting up and turning on the oven and not just to warm up the house, but to actually bake things. Yesterday, it was cookie bars and spaghetti squash from my garden. Today, I quadrupled my recipe for Chocolate (from my garden) Zucchini cake and made roasted red peppers for our dinner tonight. I'm so Martha Stewart-y it makes me gag. It won't last. Kerry will get cold in the early a.m. and will turn the furnace on in no time. Then I can drop this facade and get back to my lazy warm self. At least I have zucchini muffins, cakes and loafs.
Some things to ponder...
...is crud worse than crap? Eli and Emily had a 'discussion' about which was worse. Apparently crud is the dirt on your body and crap is poop. One kid says crud is worse, no one wants to be crud. The other says crap is worse. I'm for crap, it's worse. I'd rather wallow in my crud for days than in my crap.(this is dinner-time conversation)
...when someone asks how old your dog is, do you tell them in months, as if he were a baby? Like Linus, he's 19 1/2 months old. He's not 2 years old, which is the magic number everyone says will turn him into a mature, well behaved dog. Personally, I think we messed up somewhere, everywhere. Kerry says when I tell him about some bad thing Linus has done during the day he thinks "And she's the one that wanted him". Nice, real nice. I thought Sally had her problems, her fear of strangers, and her ear problems, and that if we got another dog, it had to be a 'normal' dog, one you could walk on a leash, throw the ball for, keep your shoes in the open without them getting chewed on, but no. We angered the "Give-These-People-A-Normal-Dog-They've-Suffered-Enough" Gods and got Linus.

Finally Caved

That's right! Say good bye to cards with not quite straight score marks. I've been converted to the Scor-Pal. Barb and Sue said I needed one a long time ago. Tara got one recently and is loving it too. So I had to get one after making a mess of 3 Stationery Boxes(see yesterday's post for pictures) with my Fiskar's trimmer and scoring blade. I picked one up today and have used it to make more Stationery Boxes. I'm going to make them everyday for the rest of my life! I love how accurate it is and how easy to use it is.

Today was/is the first full day of school for Emily. I still didn't take any pictures. I was a bit sad after dropping her off and watching her walk into the big kid school. She looked so very small but at the same time so grown up to be going off on her own. Waaaah!!! Now it's just me and the dogs again. DRAT! I'm not sure I love being a stay-at-home mom to two mutts!

I'm not going to bore you with a count down of days until I see Donna Downey, but I will tell you that there are 23 days until I see Donna!!! What am I going to wear, let alone take to crop?

A real post with piles of pictures and lots and lots of words.

This is an upcoming class. $25 gets you all the supplies to make the Stationery Box, 4 cards w/envelopes, 4 tags, 4 note cards w/ envelopes, a small note/address book, pen, and postage stamp holder. I love it!

I caved to peer pressure and bought this stamp set...Tart and Tangy. Is it peer pressure when it's your 12 year old telling you to buy it?
I just love this new patterned paper, Urban Garden and stamp set,Upsy Daisy.

Beautiful Italian Prunes. Not quite ripe. I love this picture. I'm not the only one that noticed the prunes are almost ready... Super smarty pants realized he doesn't need to jump to reach the prunes this year. The branch should have been trimmed and now that it is heavy with fruit(sounds like it's pregnant), Linus can reach it with out exerting himself. Just watch...


Oh, shit, did you just see that? I didn't pick a prune, nope, no prune here.

We, Kerry and I, build real, sturdy stairs. Yes, I really helped make them. See those shiny bolt things, or maybe they are the nuts, whatever they are, I put them there. I tightened them until my kitten powered arms were screaming in pain, which was about two turns of the ratchet thingy. See those Crocs, they're dusty, not because I have been wearing them a lot, but because I haven't. That's going to change. I got a carrot cake. A late birthday cake. I got to pick the inscription, which I think is the wrong word, but anyways...


The dogs got a new toy. Tara and Shawn picked it up for them, don't get all excited, we paid for it. And the dogs love it.

Linus had a growth on his nose. It was pretty big, and gross, kind of scabby. The vet said it might go away, if not, they would cut it off and send it away for tests. Well, he was playing with his ball, and I think the edges of the holes helped it along, because when I kicked him in the nose, the growth fell off. (I didn't really kick him so much as use my foot to direct his nose away from the hole he was digging)
Sally wanted some new head shots done for her modeling portfolio so I took a few shots of her. She's such a good photogenic girl.

It's been a busy week since we've been back. Kerry has been 'retired', which I heard as retarded. And he didn't think that was funny and said that I better be careful because 'this retarded guy was going to rotate my tires'. Which he thought was funny, I didn't. Really, he's just had the last 11 days off. Must be nice!

Tomorrow is the first day of school. Yippee. Back to a routine, although I despise making lunches for that super picky kid of mine.

Dogs!{said emphatically with a tone of disgust}

I have pictures and stuff to blog about later but I had to share my eventful morning. It's 8 am. I let Linus out, he decides it's too quiet and since no other neighbour dog is barking, he'll start them off. So I yell at him and tell him to get his butt inside. At this time, he turns, looks at me, looks at the pool. You can almost see the wheels turning in his big Retriever head..."Go around the pool or take the fastest path and go through the pool." And that's what he did. We are draining the pool so he can actually see over the side of it. He jumped in, walked across the cover for a few feet and then sank into the dog-belly deep water and had a few drinks before finishing his trek across the pool.
I left him on the deck to dry off, I didn't talk to him. I can only shake my head at him.