Firsts

Now that school has started, I can say honestly say that I feel a whole new level of stress and relief. Stress that there are extra calendars to keep up with, stress about new deadlines, and stress that bedtime is earlier than even and I need to make the most of the time I have with A~ in the evening. On the other hand, there is relief. Relief that A~ likes school, relief that she's adjusting just fine - even without the daycare experience, and relief that she is willing to take a quick bath every night instead of the extra long ones that we used to indulge in (this could be due to my mommy creativity and the development of the "car wash" bath... it involves sudsing up two mesh scrubbies and bathing my little girl as though she is going through a car wash... complete with sound effects, of course!).

The first day went really smoothly for her... and luckily we survived too. Here are some shots of her waiting for the bus, walking into school (yes, we drove to school to watch her), and running off the bus to give Papi a big hug.







Other firsts... I scrapped a picture from Bolivia. I tend to hold onto these, as well as other vacation pictures, because I'm not sure if I want to keep them separate from the day to day pics or not. This layout is Sergio's mom with A~ the first time that we visited... so A~ is 2 years old in the photo. There is a lot of flocking on the layout... since that is the technique this month over at ScrapGoods. :)



much love,
erin

Can you believe....

Can you believe it? As I'm writing this at the computer, I'm wearing my fuzzy robe! What is wrong with this picture? A~ is in her sock-monkey robe too! And it's only Labor Day? Wrong I tell you, just wrong!

Later, when Sergio gets up, we have some cookin' out to do and a present for the birthday boy. We may set up the waterslide again and enjoy it before it's too late.... thankfully it is supposed to be hot later on despite the chilly start!

Last week Sergio picked up some back to school jeans for A~. When we tried them on, she promptly announced that she looked just like Hanna Montana. She really is too funny! Here's our starlet photo shoot:

Also, here is my last layout for the SG Telephone Scraplift... you basically get a layout and use it as your inspiration. I really like this one... very simple with lots of white space, but not at all plain.

Supplies: patterned paper is Rusty Pickle (painted with Inkabilities), cardstock from Bazzil, ribbon from Walmart, thickers from American Crafts - colored with an American Crafts marker that I also used for the outlining, Maya Road journaling sheer painted with Inkabilities, part of an American Crafts plastic "&" that I cut down to leave only the flourish, Slick Writer from American Crafts, flower from Making Memories, brad from Scrapgoods, and bling from Scrapgoods, Scraptivity, and a swap (I think?). Wow for a simple layout... there sure is a large supply list! :)

Have a great holiday!

much love,
erin

TGIF!

How nice that it's Friday! And the Friday of a holiday weekend seems even sweeter than a normal Friday. Ahhhh....

Today we went to the open house at school. After the welcome and introductions, we all went to find A~'s classroom. All the K-level bus riders got a bus-shaped tag for their backpacks with their name, their teacher's name, and their bus number. It's something new to help the drivers, teachers, and helpers get everyone in and out easily. While the parents stayed in the class, the students got a little tour and some activity with one of the specialists. In our case that was the music teacher. A~ was practically at the front of the line, but she wouldn't go anywhere without making sure from us that it was ok. It was too cute to here her calling "Papi, Papi" loudly to make sure that it was ok. She must be listening to our be-careful-to-stranger stories. (We've been practicing!) A~ was fine throughout the morning, and luckily Mom and Dad survived as well. Now we just have to make it through Tuesday! It'll be interesting to say the least. I'm sure that I'll be snapping pictures of her getting ready in the morning, packing her lunch, showing off her new backpack, getting on and off of the bus. etc. So get ready!

Here are a few of my more recent projects:

take care,
erin

PS. These were my last 2 entries for the Crop Til You Drop contest at ScrapGoods. I ended up coming in third! Yeah!

Fairground Fun

Last week... the same day as A~'s five year check up... we made our first visit to the Prince William County Fair. It's a good-sized fair with a large Midway...and it was Dollar Day and was pretty packed. Some of the lines were really long and it was hard to explain that to a five year old who had a bad day and too many shots. We checked out most of it... although didn't see all the animals and none of the home arts buildings. A~, of course, wanted to go on as many rides as possible... which is why we went on Dollar Day in the first place. That way if it didn't turn out so fun, we didn't really invest a lot in it.

The highlights...

• A~ dressed as a princess in the play that anyone could take part in. They filmed it and had DVD's available for purchase. I am STILL hearing about how I didn't buy one from you know who! :)
• The funnel cake... which A~ called "fungal" cake (not quite as appetizing!) the entire night. Five dollar each, and SO worth it! Yum!
• The rides... any of them... she enjoyed everything she went on! Me, not so much. I still don't know how I managed to climb to the top of that slide on the little metal staircase. The entire way up I was leaning to the right and clutching the slide itself... not the little skinny railing - no way! Let's go back to the carousel, honey.. please?!
• A~ wanted to play the games... and most had a good chance of at least someone winning. After one loss though, she had me play... and what do you know - I won! Way to go, Mommy!

Here are the pics! Enjoy!

much love,

erin

New Layouts

Yesterday was the due date for our monthly projects at Scrapbooks Plus. This month we were working with fun and bright papers from American Crafts. They are bright, happy... and you only have to use a little bit to have a big impact. I have tons of scraps leftover (and a couple of projects still in progress... as always!) and these papers will make some lovely birthday cards. If you are lucky, you may get one! ;-)

Here are three layouts:

... and a card:

I have another cute project... but someone special will be getting it as a gift...so no peeks!

much love,

erin

Seeing Green!

I've got a bunch of things to post, so check back in the next couple of days as I get everything up here!

First off, the garden.

We don't have a big garden... just a little stretch next to the fence that's about 1.5 feet wide by 30 feet long. It's as much as I can do without a tiller or free manual labor. :) This spring, I slowly de-weeded and worked up the soil in hour long stretches after work each day. It took forever! So... everything went in a little late. Oh well! Currently everything is green and doing fine. A few bugs here and there, but I do this for fun and if I happen to get veggies out of it, that's great. If not, no harm done... I just try something different next year. I try to water a little, fertilize a little, weed a little, and let nature take care of the rest.

I planted 5 tomato plants... 3 reds and 2 yellow. Right now we have tons of green tomatoes weighing down the vines. I've gone out a couple of times to tie everything back up! I thought I spaced them apart enough... but I have one plant that I've ended up tying to the tomato cage next to it. Oops! Guess I'll need to spread them out a bit more next year! :)

A~ wanted a watermelon plant SO much. So I bought one... since we really don't have space for it. It had a slow start, but has since taken off. We now have 2 good-sized watermelon laying in the grass... and 3 that have grown through the fence and are in the neighbors yard! Hmm... I guess I should have been more vigilent about pulling those vines back through.

We also planted some brussel sprouts. A~ actually likes them and picked them out at the garden center. Some bugs have been eating the leaves, but the plants seem well enough and we are starting to see the actual sprouts forming. They may be the only veggies that we harvest on schedule!

More later... scrapbooking, the county fair, and whatever else I can think of coming soon!

much love,

erin

Birthday News and More

Hi All!

I've been a little bit busy and delinquent in getting an update here. Here goes the new news...

A~'s birthday was fun... allbeit last minute. Friday shopping and cleaning was followed by Saturday organization and yard work, but all was fine in time for the party Saturday afternoon. Sergio ordered a giant inflatable slide (which we may rent out to friends for a good price!) that finally arrived on Friday - not cutting it close at all, huh? The kids all loved it... and since it's big enough to hold up to 400 pounds, I went down a number of times too. (I know, I know... I have to watch that weight limit after all the cake!) As you can see, she's in heaven... after all, we used it twice Sunday before putting it away!



I made it through last week's voting at ScrapGoods for the Crop Til You Drop contest. This week's layout had to be any shape but square, use buttons creatively, and have a bird somewhere on it. I decided to make a layout in the shape of clouds featuring A~ sleeping. Everynight when I tuck her in we go through the same "good night" routine... and as I'm leaving the room she hollars, "Mommy, sleep with the angels!" Every night I think how cute that it, and how I don't want to forget it... so now it's captured! :) Now we're in the top five with voting next Monday for the top three! Yikes... I'd better come up with something fab!



I have a new Design Team kit to work on... so I busy creating. With work this weekend, it'll be tight to get everything finished... so cross your fingers for me! Here's a couple more layouts from last month's DT kit:


much love,
erin