Coming out of hiding

Well, at least for a few minutes! LOL

I am missing all my sweet blog friends! I thought I would post an update on what we have been up to and maybe post a couple of projects.

The girls' party was a HUGE success. One of their friends' mom told me she was told "it rocked!" :) We went with a luau theme, with palm trees and pinapples and leis. The kids did the limbo, played coconut bowling and hot coconut (like hot potato). Here is a picture of the birthday girls.

The visit with my parents was wonderful, as was our anniversary and DH's business party.

I have been busy the last two days trying to get caught up on projects before we head to Arkansas to visit some good friends next week.

I decided to use one of the fabulous mini albums from Magistical Memories a little differently for this month's projects. There are three different pages in the Star book so I used them for three separate projects.

In the first project I used one of the pages as the base for my photos. After covering it in pattern paper I used a second star behind it and added a chipboard fancy frame for the journaling block at the top.

I used the second page to create this door hanger.

I used the last page as the exclamation mark on this card.

Better get going, we have neighbors coming over for dinner tonight. Thanks for stopping and have a fabulous weekend!!!!

Crazy Days of Summer

I love having the girls home and we have been enjoying our summer to the fullest. Sadly, that does not leave a whole lot of time for my poor neglected blog.

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I thought I would stop in real quick and catch you up on what we have been up to. We have been enjoying all of the beautiful parks there are around this area...

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And of course lots of gymnastics and this...

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My brother and sister came down to celebrate the girls' birthdays and give us a chance to see my brother before he ships out to Hawaii. We had a short but wonderful visit.

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Today we got to spend the day with some friends who moved to California several years ago. K and their daughter had been best friends during kindergarten and first grade. All of their family lives in the midwest so they make the trip East every summer and I am so thankful we get a chance to see them. Miss them so much!
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Tomorrow DH's parents come.

Thursday is DH and my 15th anniversary.

Friday is the girls' birthday party.

Saturday DH's parents leave.

Sunday my parents come.

Monday is L's birthday.

Wednesday my parents leave and

Thursday night we are having a bunch of people over for a party.

I am exhausted already.

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I have been getting a little bit of scrapping in but not nearly as much as I would like. I created this gift set for Emma's Paperie. You can see all the instructions and supply list on the Emma's blog as well as the other AMAZING projects.
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Thanks for stopping by and I hope to be back to normal in a few weeks. OK, so maybe I won't be normal but our schedule might. LOL Have a fabulous week everyone!

Happy Birthday K

Happy Birthday to my sweet girl!

I can't believe it was 10 years ago that I held her tiny newborn body in my arms. 10 years ago that I found out what living outside of yourself really means. I can still feel that awe and amazement I felt when I first looked into her sweet face. I am so very proud of the young woman she is becoming.

Have a wonderful day, I plan on celebrating a most special day indeed.

The greatest place on Earth

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Last year we had the chance to take the girls to Disney. It was the first time they had been there and my first time too. Although the weather was quite warm, we had such a wonderful time. At some point I plan to create a mini album with all the pictures from the trip but for now, I have done a few layouts.
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I did this layout for the Easier-Than-Ever special issue from Creating Keepsakes. I wanted to highlight a few of my favorite pictures from the trip.

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I finished up this layout yesterday with some of the pictures from a character dinner that we went to. The girls had so much fun getting autographs from all the characters as they came around to our table. Needless to say, I don't think they ate a lot that night. :) The layout was inspired by a layout called Fetch by Erin Clarkson. I loved how she used one large black and white picture and the smaller colored ones.
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Have a happy and safe 4th everyone!

(all chipoard from Magistical Memories)