Mi Vida Ocupada: My Busy Life!

Stuck!

Well, we got all 8-10 inches overnight as predicted.  They cancelled school in all the districts around the Twin Cities except mine.  Go figure! So I got ready for work, and stepped out of the house at 7:30am to find this scene:

And it was still snowing like a mad man!! It took 15 minutes to clear my car off....just for me to get stuck at the bottom of the driveway.  The plows hadn't come through yet and there was too much snow for Bessie to handle.  Poor, poor Bessie. E had to shovel me out and push to get me un-stuck but I still wasn't going anywhere until the plows came through.  I had to call in to work because it was impossible for me to drive anywhere.  I feel really bad about it, but when you're stuck, you're stuck.  What was I supposed to do? I have no idea how many people or students were actually able to make it in.  Seems like lots of people did the smart thing and stayed home today.  There were 600 accidents in the Cities this morning from all the snow.  Crazy! Sometimes the risks just don't seem worth it, kwim?

Of course I used the day for some "me" time.

I scrapped...too bad you can't see the ghost letter titles on this one (it says Xero Fanclub). Much brighter and cuter IRL!

This one is of 's grandma's memorial service last month in Chicago. 

I also finished My Sister's Keeper.  I knew there would be a turn of events at the end but it happened much different than I had predicted.  A very ironic twist!  I enjoyed the book, and plan to read more books my Jodi Picoult.

The snow finally stopped at around noon but the plows didn't come through my neighborhood until 4pm.  As of this moment, our HO association still has not come out to plow our driveways(9:15 pm Monday).  I had to shovel half of our driveway so that E could get up the driveway when he came home from work...took me over an hour.  Very heavy snow and LOTS of it! Like waist high on me.  Those plows better be out here soon to do the rest of my driveway and our sidewalks! Grrrrrrrrr.

Can't wait to go to work tomorrow and be back to normal!  I can't wait to go to the gym too!

Family Time, slideshow, layouts

I spent a lovely day at my parents house today.  It was cool to hear about their five week vacation in Florida... They rented a condo that had 3 bed/3 bath and had invited me and E down, but neither of us could get away from work during February.  I hope I get to go next year!

It sounds like they had a lot of fun with my aunt Connie and my brother Jeff who each came to visit for a week or longer.  Jeff even had one of his friends fly down for a week. You can read about Jeff's adventures in Florida by reading his blog.

It was so nice to see my niece Annika....6 weeks is too long! She is almost 7 months old now.  Here is an adorable little slide show I made of the pics I took today.

I spent some time Saturday scrappin.  It took forever playing around with different ideas before I decided what to do for this one, but this is how it turned out.  The flowers on it were a gift from Adrienne.  She sent them to me for my birthday, what a sweetheart! Love this new Basic Grey paper!

This one happened while I was half asleep! It probably looks unfinished because I went to bed in the middle of working on it...I didn't even add any ribbon or flowers! This is the cool new Scenic Route paper. 

And now I better go to bed...it is snowing as I type and the News said 8-10 inches by morning.  I can't even remember the last time we had a snow day, but that would be super cool!!  I'd scrap all day and try to get some of my Mojo back!

I'm going to VEGAS!!!!!!!

I am soooooooooooo excited, and I just can't hide it!!!! 

I have to give the biggest shout-out to my girl Heather who is taking me, E and Rich to Vegas in April!!!!!!!!!  I had all but given up on going somewhere for Spring Break (since we have to come up with all sorts of $$ to fix our damaged garage) when Heather e-mailed me a few weeks ago, wanting to know if E and I wanted to go to Vegas with her and Rich.....for FREE! As a frequent visitor to Vegas, she has a million travel perks saved up with the airlines and room comps at several of the hotels on the Vegas strip.  How could we say no to that????? Especially when she wanted to go during the time when I already had a week off work. 

So our trip is now completely booked....and we are staying at The Luxor!!!!!!!!!!  This hotel is amazing!! It is like a trip back to ancient Egypt.....with a giant pyramid and an Egyptian motif.  Check out the website and the videos they have.  I am soooo pumped!!  This is an even bigger motivation for a diet right about now!

While we are there we are going to see a band that E and R really like, God Forbid, at the House of Blues, and we are also in the process of trying to score tickets to see Lance Burton.  I love magic shows and he is The Best!!  We will only be there for 3 days, but we plan to pack a ton of excitement and adventure into our short stay. 

Can you tell I am excited???  The last time E and I went to Vegas was for New Years Eve 1999.  That was way too long ago! I cannot wait to see all that has changed!! Good thing my memory card holds 500+ pictures, because I plan to take about that many!!

***Today is the 1st of the month....CJ ship-out date.  I hadn't had any time at home to finish Chriselda's 2nd layout for her CJ (the color one), so I took my stuff to school yesterday and worked on it during my lunch!  Sooooooo bright...soooo totally April's favorite colors! And I just realized it has no title.  Oh well!

And here is the layout that I made on Saturday while scrappin with Shannon and Sarah.  Old pictures from Halloween that were not working out with the original paper I had chosen to use, so they sat there for almost 4 months!!  Glad to have it done and put into its place in an album.

Have a wonderful, glorious, (and as April would say), humpday-alicious!

Circle Journal Entries for February...

Today was a holiday from school...President's Day.  I got up as early as I usually do and got right to work scrappin'.  The first CJ layout is for Alette in the Netherlands.  Her theme was "What is your dream of life?".  My dream is to "travel the world".  This one took me all dang morning! I had been waiting to use Word Art for something and it seemed perfect to put a map of the world in the word World. Pretty cool, huh?

And this one is my layout for Chriselda's White Circle JOurnal (that just arrived in the mail. Wheew!)   Black and gray were okay to use, just NO color!  This one was fun to do, though my paper stash is very low on color-free products!  I chose not to write anything, but let the symbols speak for themselves :)

I have not yet done a color entry (is this optional??) for Chriselda!

** The rest of my weekend was purposely boring.  I opted to stay in the house all weekend and do pretty much nothing.  Well, actually I finished my latest book....Star by Pamela Anderson.   Its about a pretty young thang named Star who makes it big in Hollywood.  Pretty racy in some scenes...shes does half of Hollywood! A lot of the story parallels Pamela's life, though it is a "work of fiction".  Also went to Best Buy and got some movies.  Elizabethtown was great! I think I love Orlando Bloom even more than I did before! He is sooooooo hot!!! Hung out at Lanee's and had lunch with several of my best friends on Sunday afternoon.  Lanee and I finally (kind of) celebrated our birthdays.  Scrubbed-out, picture-free day! Later on Sunday E and I went to visit our friends Jeff & Toni and their girls.

I Scrapped tonight...

And I got this layout done.  Pic is from my last dinner with Susan W. Finally used up these big letters and couldn't be happier with how it turned out! Only had one "s' to use though, hence the "z" in friendz.  Gotta love those Sakura Glaze pens too...that is how I outlined the letters.

Fajitas!

We had a yummy dinner at my parent's house on Saturday night.  Since they will be in Florida for the month of February and will miss my birthday (Feb 11...same as Christina P), we celebrated it then.  As the guest of honor,  I got to pick the menu...chicken fajitas with all the fixin's and cheesecake pie for dessert.  My little brother Jeff made the fajitas....

Ahhh, I love fajitas! Just not the lingering smell of peppers and onions in your hair and clothes after cooking it inside, kwim? I hate that! I had to shower and change as soon as I got home because I smelled like one big Fajita Mama:)

On Friday night  I went out to dinner with friends to  Khan's Mongolian Barbeque.  Good stuff! I ordered an aqua-colored drink so that I could take a pic and use it for when I do my layout in Valerie's Aqua Circle Journal.  It was called Surf Monkey and wasn't quite as blue as I needed it, so I tried tinting it in PS.  If someone can help me with doing a better job than I did, please help me! I also need to blur the background or something. I will e-mail you the original to work with.

Today  I went to Quack's for lunch and then we had friends over all afternoon.  Somehow I managed to finish this layout for my friend Trudie's Circle Journal.  Her theme was "the essence of nonsense" which to her means "theme-free, no rules, let your creative spirit flow" in a 12 x 12 format.  I thought and thought about what I wanted to do...no theme? Yikes! I also had a hard time getting into a collage type feel so I just went out there on my own and this is what I came up with:

I arranged some of my silk flowers into a glass bowl and took pics to use on this layout.  I think it turned out just as colorful as I wanted! Isn't it pretty!? I see Trudie at work every day but she does not want to see my creation until she gets her CJ back at the end of August! I am glad all of you wanted to see it!

I also wanted to post this pic of me and my friend Farrah that we took at work the other day.  We work together but we have also been friends since college!

A few new LOs to post

I've had a bad sinus headache since last Friday so I have been taking it easy all weekend.  I feel bad that I had to cancel the plans I had both Friday and Saturday nights because of it.  I hate canceling plans because I don't feel good.  Makes me feel like a crappy friend.  It felt really good to just chill out at home though.

My scanner has been acting funky lately so it took me forever to get these scanned and posted. I am totally not diggin the dull colors of this one.  It just doesn't feel like "me".  I do love the interlocking hearts with the ribbon though :) I also like the journaling strips. I am soooooooo unoriginal when it comes to my page titles!

This one is self-explanatory. Wow! No big flowers...I used Primas instead!

And this last one from my dad's birthday (pizza party!) I seriously had no idea when I would ever use this paper, but seemed to work good here!

And I am finally posting the tag I made for Raina's birthday.  Sorry I didn't post it a week and a half ago on her actual b-day!

 

Thanks, MLK Jr!

Today was a holiday from school, in honor of the great Civil Rights movement leader, Martin Luther King Jr. I sit here thinking about his "dream" and can't help but feel proud of the progress our country has made.  I know we still have a LONG way to go in the fight for racial equality and the end of hatred, but I appreciate every single day that I can go to work at my inner-city school and see the positive relationships and attitudes among our diverse student population.  My students get so angry about the injustice and racial attitudes that many of our citizens faced prior to the Civil Rights movement, they cannot even imagine it.  Their positive attitudes give me hope that each generation will become more and more united and less hateful. It is a beautiful dream.......

Did I mention how great it is to have this day off? Especially when one is in the mood to scrap and has a million other things going on this week! LOL.  So of course I scrapped all day long, with a long break at lunch to meet my honey:)

Created this layout for April's Teal Circle Journal.  I LOVE teal too!! I think it looks much cuter IRL!

Then I did this one.....tried to make it masculine, since the event was a heavy metal concert! It was sooooo hard for me not to put a flower on this!!

And then this one of me and Jenny, having lunch downtown right before Christmas.

And now I must sign off....working out with my personal trainer tonight!

Getting Full......

My current scrapbook album, that is!  Here are my latest efforts.

Another:

And one more! This one is soooooo much cuter IRL.  It didn't scan well at all, but colors do match!

And to all a goodnight.....

My Favorite Restaurants

By now you all know that I go out to eat a lot.....so what a perfect topic for my new Circle Journal! This is my own entry in my "Delicious Dining Destinations" CJ.

Each "flap" on the right page opens to reveal a pic of what I order when I eat at that particular restaurant.

I wish that I had typed this out rather than making spelling mistakes and writing all sloppy.  Oh well, at least that part is hidden! This didn't come out how I had envisioned, but it still looks pretty cool in real life.  Going out by mail TODAY since I am feeling a tad bit better and need to get back to work after my long vacation!

A Famous Birthday

Dec 30th is an important day in my family.....it not only happens to be my dad's birthday, but also the birthday of both his sister and his brother, each of them being exactly one year apart in age.  My father's birth on 12-30-47, made national news because exactly one year earlier, on 12-30-46, my Grandma had given birth to my aunt Janice, and one year prior to that on 12-30-45, gave birth to my uncle John. All of the babies being born naturally on their given due dates, within just a few hours of each other's birth times. The odds of something like this happening naturally are several million to one.  Pretty cool, huh?  These were the first three children out of 7.  I have a huge catholic family with lots of cousins!

So every year around this time the entire Sauer clan gets together for a big Birthday Party...complete with a Foosball Tourney, in which the winner takes home the coveted Toilet Bowl Trophy.  I will be posting more on this grand event next weekend after this year's party. This pic above is my uncle, my aunt and my dad with their "birthday platter" in front of their cakes at last year's party.

I spent the last few days of my vacation getting a few more layouts done.  Love these colors on this one!

This one is from when I met (my college roommate) Laura Brown's little baby for the first time. 

and this one was from the purse party/girls get together that my friend Kara had back in November.  I am now just one month behind in scrapping my recent pics! Yay

***A special thanks goes out to the 16 of you who shared your World Destinations with me.  I will remember that each of you named a place and I will draw one of your names and buy one of you a trip to *the place you named* if/when I ever win the Powerball Lottery Jackpot.  I promise! This blog shall serve as proof. *But this offer only stands for the 16 people who commented prior to 12am, 12-31-05. And as I mentioned in this post about the Powerball, I plan to win the jackpot sooner or later! Aren't some of you glad you commented, in case I ever actually win?!

My Latest Layouts....

I think I scrapped more today than I have any other day...ever! Or at least close to it. This first one is from Laura Blonde's wedding.....

This next one is from my mom's birthday when my niece Annika got passed around (like usual!) to all of us.....

These two are my entries for my own purple Circle Journal...not exactly what I envisioned, but cool anyway. They are not necessarily meant to go together, but you know I just had to put a picture of my man Prince on there!!

These next layouts are the Title, intro and sign-in pages for my other circle journal with Maria and her friends.  My theme is Delicious Dining Destinations.  I thought these spicy colors were perfect to introduce my theme!  I am not an *orange* kind of girl, but I still think it turned out cute! I used a Chipboard monogram on the first one and covered it in hot pink ribbon.  I needed to add some texture.  The flowers are standard, of course!

This is a different kind of sign-in page than I have done in the past.  The tags are attached.

That's all for now, kids!

Secret Layout Challenge

One of the girls at Scrapjazz posted a challenge a few weeks ago....everyone who wanted to participate would send her a pic and she would randomly assign the pic to another girl to scrap.  Once we all scrapped them, they were posted in the gallery for everyone to guess who created it!

I did this one for Gemmysnap5.  Her daughter is so cute, it was a pleasure to scrap this for her! It was also fun to scrap one page with just one picture!

And Hobbit did this one for me.  I LOVE it!!!!!!!  It is sooooo cute.  Of me and my friend Jenny.  I guessed correctly that she was the one who did it for me too!

I've Had a Busy weekend!

What a relief...it looks like Typepad finally fixed their "technical difficulties" or whatever it was that made a week worth of my posts disappear and access to their site  unavailable.  Glad it is fixed now, but I have been too busy to worry about it anyway, to tell you the truth!

I am now on vacation!  Yayyyyyy! It started Friday evening after a wonderful last day of school before the break. We had a schoolwide enrichment day (organized by yours truly) in which all of the teachers and support staff taught a mini-class of some kind to a mix of grade levels and the kids signed up for classes of their choosing.  The classes that our staff taught were really fun... friendship bracelets, beading, mini scrapbooks, volleyball, creative dramatics, learning to play Cribbage, Jeopardy, holiday craft projects, making quesadillas, Mardi Gras Masks, senufo cloth drawings, hmong culture, cardmaking, etc.

I did cookie decorating for 1st & 2nd graders.  We had a blast!  They loved frosting the cookies and putting lots of sprinkles on!  This pic of me with some kids and our cookies was taken with the school camera...my camera battery had gone dead. ) I got a ton of positive feedback about the day  from both my colleagues and the students and we will be doing it again on Valentine's Day. It takes me many hours to get everything organized, but it is totally worth it!

On Saturday I went to Fashion Bug and took advantage of their latest sale....got about $500 worth of sweaters and tops for half-price.  Not bad!

Came home from shopping and scrapped these two layouts.  This top one is the first one for me to use Prima flowers and no large silk flowers! My stash is getting low...I need to head to Michael's to get some more sometime this week!

This next one is of me and Susan when we went out for Mexican a few months ago.  I love the bright colors of this one! Don't tell anyone but I accidentally made a mistake in my journaling and totally had to move the picture from its original location.  Live and learn, I guess!

Saturday was spent helping  Rich transport all of his drumming equiptment to THE ROCK in Maplewood, where he was going to have a show with his band, XERO late Sat. night.  This took us a few hours of running around, etc.  We stopped for a pizza and then went home to change before going back to the show.  Poor E...he has been really sick all week but has put in 50 + hrs nonetheless...still made time for his buddy and a night out at the bar to hear the band!

We had a lot of fun during the show....

Xero is a band that has been together on/off for like 10 years.  This was Rich's first band, in fact.  We was with another band for a significant amount of time before getting back to jam with Xero.  This is Xero's first show together in a really long time...and my first time seeing them.  Here is Richie Z on the drums....this boy is a bad-ass drummer! 

And here is Matty playing his guitar!

Even though I am not into this really heavy headbanging music, I still enjoyed myself.  I had a ton of fun with Heather, drinking beer all night.  Here we are with Richie after the show...

Here is one of our friends Becky & Miles....they leave for Costa Rica on Tuesday (staying in a Tree House) and I am soooooo incredibly jealous! That is my # 1 dream destination.  I have wanted to go there for at least 10 years now, but that is a different story!

And here is Pods, sportin' the new Xero tshirt

Good times!

So much fun, in fact, that we stayed out until 3am.  Went out to eat and then hung out with some friends and watched The 40 year Old Virgin.  I LMAO!!  I thought it was very funny throughout most of the movie.  Don't watch it unless you don't mind lots of sexually humor....it stars Steve Carrell and he did a great job of playing this role.  It is very, very funny.

I still have a lot of catching up to do on all the blogs and stuff, but I will do my best this week!  Who am I kidding that time off work means relaxing? hah! I have too many things to do and people to see this week! 

Catch ya'll later :)

For my Circle Journal......

Spent most of Sunday scrappin.....

I am starting two new Circle Journals on January 1st this year....

***The first one is a Color Themed Circle Journal.  We each picked a different color scheme and all of the pages in each book will be based on those colors.  I picked Purple & Silver. Its a 8 x 8 book.

This is the Title Page.  I used up a bunch of purple scraps I had....

This next one is the Introduction Page, complete with details for the girls to follow.

And the Sign-In page.  I made big tags so the girls can each put a picture of themselves on it.  I made big tags like this for my last CJ and they look really cool!

So now I just have to make a two page layout for this book and I will be ready to send it to Alex W !  I hope those of you who are participating with me are looking forward to starting as much as I am!

***I have not yet started on the other Circle journal, but I have decided on my theme:

Delicious Dining Destinations

Since I love going out to eat so much, The layouts are going to be about each girl's favorite restaurants....I think it would be fun to hear /see pictures of the foods, snippets of menus/match book covers, napkins, etc.  Should be a fun one!

Thanks to the Travel Channel...

...I now want to move to Portland, Oregon!  (Well, at least take a trip to see if I like it as much in person!) I know I have mentioned many times that I do not watch much Prime Time TV...its too hard for me to keep to a schedule and I would want to catch every episode.  So when I do actually want to watch TV, I usually turn it to the Travel Channel first to see what cool places they want to tell me about today!  I have found that I can travel vicariously just by watching these shows :)

The show they had on Tuesday night was all about the cool things and places around Portland.  The Pacific Northwest looks sooooooo gorgeous.  And it is one area of the U.S. that I have not yet traveled to, but have always wanted to visit. All that natural beauty not too far from the city.....the best of both worlds.  Did you guys know that they have these enormous red sand dunes in OR that kids go boarding down? Its just like snowboarding but you don't have to freeze your ass off! 

You can also go panning for gold in the Columbia River, whitewater rafting (which I would never do), fishing for salmon and maybe even look for Bigfoot while out camping or hiking.  I want to go there and discover all of the reasons why so many settlers risked the trek across the Oregon Trail just to get there.  Thank you, Lewis & Clark, for your remarkable voyage and opening up the West to the rest of the settlers.

One thing I would love the most is being close to the ocean and being able to have fresh seafood everyday if I wanted! The special on the TC highlighted lots of cool things you can do and places you can go around Portland....I can't remember all the details, but I do remember that they showed a donut shop that had out -of- this- world looking donuts! And Mo's World Famous Clam-Chowder.

Anyone been to Portland? Was it as cool as I the Travel Channel made it out to be?

Chipotle Chicas

I whipped up this layout when I got home last night....I just got a bunch of Prima Flowers and wanted to use them, but it just didn't feel right.  They are so cute and tiny, but I just need to use BIG flowers on my layouts.  I don't think they would be me without them.  Aren't these big lilies beautiful? I thought they mimicked the flower in the paper perfectly.  I bought them at Michael's and pulled them off the stem, just like I do with all my bigger silk flowers. These pics are me with me girls Lori and Jen.  We are the Chipotle Chicas!  We love meeting for lunch there whenever we get time away from students!Using just one pic on a layout is something new for me!!

Peace out, peoples!

New Scanner!

I mentioned that my old scanner just bit the dust, so I took it back and got the newer version, the Canonscan LiDe 500f.  It is still very small and lightweight, but this one seems to be more true to the actual bright colors that I am scanning....here is the layout I completed on Sunday night .....

Weekend Cuteness......

We spent Saturday with our good friends, Jeff and Toni.  Their newest baby girl, Cidney is now 5 months old and boy is she CUTE!! Always smiling and happy...scooting/crawling already too! It was nice to spend time with them....they moved up north about a year ago so our visits are much less frequent than they used to be!

I went out for a lovely steak dinner at The Lakeside Club on Saturday night.  The outside of this restaurant was filmed in scenes from the movie Fargo.  And by the way.....only people who live REALLY FAR north in Minnesota talk like they do in that movie!!!!  But I am not going to say we don't have a midwest accent because we do :)

I got up extra early on Sunday morning so that I could go shopping.....drove all the way to Archiver's to discover that they do not open until 11am on Sundays.  Say what???!!! I drove all the way out there for NOTHING!!!  Next stop: Fashion Bug.  And wouldn't you know that they don't open until 11am either???  I took this as a sign (that I shouldn't be spending money!) and went to Target and the Grocery Store to get the necessities.  Ran into my friend Julie...so great to see her! We e-mail each other all the time but hadn't seen each other in a few years.  So that was fun!

I had plans Sunday night to see King's X, but it was a late show and I figured since I have to work 12 hours both Monday and Tuesday, I would want to stay home and relax instead.  So I got out my scrap stuff and came up with this LO from Laura's bachelorette party.  I finally got to use these Fontwerks pp's that I have had for-evah.  Gonna do some hidden journaling somewhere too....have to write about the "mean greenie" I drank that night!

And now I just have to grade about 50 more projects from my Geography students and print report cards out by 4:30 tonight when conferences start!  No problemo!

Another Lo

Just did this one tonight....LOVE how it turned out...these Basic Grey papers are awesome!! This was from an outing with a bunch of my HS friends about a month ago.... Notice that I didn't use any silk flowers on this one like I usually do?! My stash is running a little low.......

Scrap Saturday

Urg! My original post was just wiped off the map.....

It is a dreary, rainy Saturday and I am home alone.  Scrap on!!!  I did these two layouts, finishing up the last of my pics from Mary and Mandie's weddings. The first one is me and my best friends lovin' each other up on Mary's big day! These are my high school BFF....Lanee (Roger) , Sonja, Kim and Mary.  And a few with our other amazing girlfriends, Kara and Leah too!

This one was at Mandie's wedding Reception.  I finally got to use these KI papers and the yummy purple shiny ribbons I've had for awhile now!

***Yesterday we didn't have school.  It was a day for teachers to get report cards together W/O kids.  A perfect opportunity to meet my friends Lori and Jen for lunch at our favorite place, Chipotle!  We all used to work together at The Bluff and since have moved on to other schools.  I sure miss working with them!

Note sure what we will be doing the rest of the weekend..... hopefully relaxing!

Indulging the Scrap Bug

You like this new banner and colors? Halloween has come and gone and I have been wanting to use raspberry and light green for awhile now....you also gotta love Ricky Martin and this hot new video! Thanks to April for reminding me how awesome this song is and not making me feel ashamed that I still love Ricky after all the rumors.  I'd still let him rock my world!

On Saturdays  I usually clean the house.  Not today! Today was all about indulgence.  Indulging my need to read (finished the 7th Stephanie Plum novel) and also indulging the scrap bug inside me.  Trying to lessen the huge stack of pictures/papers sitting on my dresser.  Got these two finished.  Sorry for the pathetic scans! These colors are much more vivid IRL.....There is actually journaling in the 2nd layout, but you cannot see the pink writing :(

Going to have SukiYaki tonight and then hopefully watching Star Wars III later tonight!

Random Scrap Friday

I had a ton of things I wanted to talk about today, but since I wrote none of them down, we'll just see what happens with this little post!

Last night I met some friends at the brand new TGIFridays restaurant in town.  Good stuff, Maynard! I had the brushetta chicken pasta in all its garlicy goodness. Its always nice to have another option for dinner :)

We went to the mall and then to Shinders afterward.  I picked up the new Creating Keepsakes magazine and was pleased to see so many ideas that I might actually use! There was a really cute Christmas Tree layout in there by Kristi Contes.  It is always fun to see layouts done by familiar faces! I have not jumped on the publishing bandwagon YET.  My layouts are almost all two pagers and I think it is harder to get noticed that way.  Plus I can hardly ever remember what products I used and that is a faux-pas in the publishing world.  Maybe one of these days I'll actually visit scrap submit and see what I would need to do to get noticed! Another reason I haven't tried is because I would hate to have the pressure of feeling like every layout I do has to be perfect and publishable.  I am doing this for ME, because I enjoy pictures and displaying them in a fun way.

Speaking of layouts, I finally got these two finished.  Not my best work, but two less to worry about now! (The stack continues to grow!) This one was fine until I ruined it by stamping the title with ink.  I should of used paint or large letter stickers instead. A friend at Scrapjazz also brought to my attention that I made a spelling error in my journaling.  I visited the Bazaar, not the Bizarre.  Whoops!

And I think the background on this one is too busy.  I have patterned paper coming out of my ears so I am trying to use up as much as I can!

And now I have a question for those of you "PEAS".  Which message boards do you frequent at that site? I am curious because I have always been a Scrapjazz girl and most of us there jump from forum to forum freely.  I have heard rumors here and there that the NSBR board at 2Peas can get a little feisty and that most of the girls at 2Peas stick to just one board, making many "mini communities".  I know I have several friends at 2Peas (as well as at SJ) and I would like to know where to find you there! Where will I be welcomed?  Also, if there are any Peas here, could you tell me your usernames??

One last thing:  I bought the new Disney Movie, "Aliens of the Deep", directed by James Cameron (who did Titanic) and we watched it when we got home late last night.  What an AWESOME video! They do real-live dives to the very bottom of the ocean to see what kind of life they find there.  It is soooo cool! It makes you realize how truly incredible our planet is!

Alrighty everyone, have a fabulous weekend!!!!!!!!!!!!    

Breakfast for Dinner!

Dinner time is one of my least favorite times of the day.  At least 50% of the time I do not have something planned ahead of time and work late several nights a week.  I am  really sick of fast food and all the local dining establishments within 3-8 miles of my house. 

Usually when all else fails, I make breakfast for dinner.  You know, bacon, eggs, hashbrowns, toast.  Sometimes french toast or pancakes.  Corned beef hash!  Breakfast burritos!  Cereal.  It saves me from starving most of the time :) 

Does anyone else ever make breakfast for dinner? Is this weird?

After dinner we went to our neighbors Jere and Shannon's house to hang out for awhile....I didn't want to stay and visit too long because I was determined to finish the last entry for the Circle Journal that I am in.  I was up until after 11 finishing it up, but now I am all done and I can mail it off today!!!!!!!  Mine should be returned to me sometime in the next few weeks.  I can't wait to see all the hard work that these girls put into it! I will be sure to post all the entries as soon as I get it!  If you want to see all the entries I have contributed, check out my album in the left side bar that says "Circle Journals"

This one is for Jenn K and her topic is, "What you love about where you live." 

I am still interested in starting another Circle Journal, and I know I have at least one on board with me.  I am thinking it would be cool to do a color themed book....we would all choose a different color scheme and Layouts would be based on that.  Anyone game?

Friday's Scrap Frenzy

Its amazing what hours and hours of sleep can do for ya.  I felt much better by Friday night and got together with Shannon and Sarah at Sarah's house for "scrap night".  These two girls are the only friends living near me who want to get together and scrap so we make a Friday night date every few months.  Sarah has been scrapping a lot longer than I have but hasn't discovered the online scrap communities (where I have learned everything I know...so much inspiration and influence)  She scraps mostly during hunting season when her hubby is out stalking something.  Shannon scraps only on these scrap nights...its kinda funny because she lives two houses down from me and we see each other all the time.  You'd think we'd scrap together all the time too, but she is a mommy and that makes it hard for her to find the time for fun things like scrapping. Anyway, its funny when we get together because we spend so much time talking that one never knows if anything will get finished! 

I was successful at accomplishing something this time.  Here is my proof, both from Matt and Colleen's wedding. I had to really step out of my box to go with the orange in the first LO...I am not usually an orange kind of girl, but the season has gotten to me!

 

This black and white one was pretty fun to do....

Two other layouts are just about finished...they just need some last minute touches.  I'll post those soon!

And a huge thank you to Angelique for helping me with my photo album problem.  It was so easy that I overlooked it the first hundred times I tried to fix it. Problem now solved!

The Powerball

Tonight could be THE NIGHT.  The night that all my dreams come true.  It is possible that I will win the coveted Powerball.  Tonight!!!! The Jackpot is now at $240 MILLION.   I have been trying to win this sucker faithfully for about 7 years now.  $5 for every Wed. drawing and $5 for the Saturday drawing. Even when the Jackpot is low (You can't win unless you play!) Double that when you include the tickets that E has also been buying.  Just about every month he buys a new issue of the Dupont Registry, the guide to America's most luxurious homes and cars.  So every month we have our cars and homes picked out, just in case we win!!  I have to admit that together we have spent about $20 in tickets for tonights drawing, including a pool I have going at work. 

So what am I going to do once I win?  First of all, I will quit my job...or at least take a LONG leave of absence. Second, I will call a travel agent and have her book us tickets straight to either Costa Rica and Hawaii.  Hopefully we'll get married there.  Then we will honeymoon all over the world.....buying souveniers from all the exotic countries that we visit. Boy, I kind of sound like Becky Bloomwood-Brandon in the book Shopaholic and Sister, don't I?  When we get home we will move into an amazing house and maybe start some kind of business.  Who knows where home will be at that time....if we actually win the Powerball, it is likely that we will have homes in a number of places!!!!  We would throw a huge party for everyone we know...YOU ARE ALL INVITED!!!! We will make sure our families are set and then give some to charity too, of course.

Okay, I am just dreaming, but you just never know...someone has to win it!!

And now on the more negative-side.....Holy Crampola..... This is definitely TMI, but man, do I have some terrible cramps going on today.  And my back hurts something awful.  I've worked 22 hours in just the first two days this week. And I am really looking forward to another 10 hours today. Woe is me!!  I finished a couple of layouts last night when I got home and then went straight to bed.  E said I kept him up all night long, tossing and turning, moaning and groaning.  Oops! And I can tell that I didn't sleep well at all either...I feel like I took a fall down the stairs or something (and I have actually done this several times before, so unfortunately I know exactly how it feels the next day).

Wanna see my latest Layouts?

Have great day....keep your fingers crossed for me!!!!!!

Oh, and later today I should have several answers to the movie quiz that I posted yesterday....leave me a comment if you would like me to e-mail them to you!

Rain Rain Rain

We've had a ton of rain here the past 3-4 days!  Many places got flooded out and it is pouring into basements everywhere.  No problems in my neck of the woods...thank goodness.  Its finally gotten cool enough for us to turn off the central air and it has also been the perfect opportunity for me to get a few  LOs done while watching Law & Order the past 2 nights :)

This one is for Cassie in my circle journal.  Her theme was "A good book to read on a rainy day".  So I picked my new favorite book that I wrote about a few weeks ago, Memoirs of a Geisha.  I was able to use up some Asian-themed goods I've had forever.....these characters are probably Chinese, not Japanese, but I figured it would still work! The charms are lumpy so this scan is pretty bad.....Click on either picture to make it bigger...you can read my book review :)

And this LO is from my July get together with my old buddy, John.  I had been waiting to get the right shade of Bazzill for these pics and papers, finally ordered some and got this baby done!  I still have like 15 LOs from the summer that I still need to work on....geez, when will I ever be caught up???!!! The good news is that I already have the pictures printed and papers picked out to go with all of them :)

I cannot wait until this weekend.....gonna lay low for the most part :) E and I have both been working lots of hours at our jobs, so it will be nice to hang out and relax.  My niece Annika is getting baptized this Sunday and then Bri and Mich are having a little party for her afterward.  Should be nice! I can't believe she is already 2 1/2 mos. old!

***I hope I didn't scare any of you with my last post about the bachelorette party!!  I am a responsible girl who just happens to let loose once in a Blue Moon. I have grown up a lot since my college days and rarely party like that anymore....its just that with all these weddings and bachelorette parties the past few months, I've had lots of opportunities to have fun!!!   :)

Peace out, peoples!

Rock Rock Rockin.....Queensryche!

I had the pleasure of seeing Queensryche at the Myth Nightclub on Saturday night.  First, let me tell you about this club....it is GINORMOUS!!! Brand-new with all the hotness of a Vegas club; complete with VIP suites, huge dancefloor, several bars and an ass-kickin sound system.  Knowing that this would NOT be the mosh-pit style concert that I usually go to, I was able to stand with E and his buddies about 8 ft from the stage (despite the fact that the club was packed!).  This band has been around for 24 years now, but singer Geoff Tate was in incredible shape and his voice is still as good as it ever was. 

Queensryche is a band that has special meaning to me and E, at least according to me :) He has loved them since Jr. High....he used to talk about them every single day back in 8th grade geography class when we sat right next to each other.  That was in 1990.  At the time I instantly fell in love with Silent Lucidity, the song that got the most radio-play.  I didn't immediately hop on their band-wagon, but for many years later I always thought of E every time I heard anything about Queensryche.  He has continued to love them ever since and I have also grown to love them over the past 7 years.

Check out these pics I snapped at the show

***Sunday was a nice and relaxing day.  E and I got up fairly early (for a Sunday) and went out to A World of Fish just to browse all the cool fish they have there.  I spent most of the evening just chillin and also got these two layouts finished.

This one is me with my friends Ra and Lori. Pics were taken after Ra's month-long trip to Cambodia.  She came back with gifts and lots of stories! The journaling on this one needs to be re-done but I went ahead and scanned it anyway :)

This one is for Shauna's circle journal.  Her theme was "The Song remembers when...".  I had to find just one song that brings back a memory and do a 6 x 7 two page layout.  I did mine about seeing Santana at the Hard Rock in Vegas on 12-31-99.

So now maybe I am starting to get my scrappin' groove back.  Yay!

Speaking of Japanese....

E and I have gone out for sushi not once, but twice this week.  It has taken me about 5 years now to acquire a taste for it...but I become a little more daring with each experience.  Last night E and I went for a late night dinner at Saji-Ya on Grand Ave and sat at the sushi bar.  It is fun to watch the sushi chefs prepare it in front of you! I really enjoy the california roll, spicy tuna roll and hamachi sashimi, but last night I also tried kaibashira for the first time.  I was somewhat leary at first but was deliciously surprised at how much I liked it! Part of the sushi experience is the presentation....you can see why it is a culinary artform.  I took this picture to show you just what it looks like in case you've never had the pleasure. Isn't it pretty?? I won't eat everything you see here, but I do appreciate how it looks! Here is a Sushi Guide ....very useful when ordering!

I can't believe this myself, but.......

I actually scrapped!  I put the finishing touches on these layouts that I started last weekend, then scanned and stitched them together.  A great way to spend a rainy Saturday morning!   

This first one is from the day my niece Annika was born.....

Mary's Bachelorette Party.......

The limo ride after Mary's wedding ceremony.....

I think I need to buy...

a sewing machine!

I worked on these two layouts over at Susan's house yesterday.  She is the SB Stitching Queen and showed me how to make the nice zig-zag stitch that is seen on these layouts.  I finally got the hang of it after the 3rd page and now I am hooked! After having some margaritas, Susan also taught me this cool trick to get white journaling. I know everyone wants to know how to do this, but I have already confessed the secret to Christina P and Lindsay T but I am reluctant to tell the rest of the world.  If everyone knows how to do it, will it still be the coolest new thing???!! Of course not! So the rest of you can keep wishin'! Just kidding!

I can't wait to use up the rest of my KI patterned papers.  Love 'em, but soooooo sick of them too.  I just looked through my latest album and 9/10 Los are KI.  Time to move on, baby!

This LO is from Mary's bridal shower:

Click on pics to make them bigger

And here we have some funky painting on these Heidi Swapp ghost letters.  Why? Not only because it is so cool, but because those darn glue dots show right through those effin letters...what else can I do???? Notice how great my stitching is on this one! I am so proud of myself.....imagine being Susan W's sewing protege'! lol

What else is new??

**I re-watched Napolean Dynamite the other night.  It is soooo much funnier the 2nd time! In fact, I thought the movie was pretty stupid the first time I saw it.  

**Borrowed Sex & the City Season 1 from a friend.  I never watch TV, so I am really clueless about all these popular shows.  I figure if I don't see it from episode 1, why bother? so I never bother!  Anyway, I watched the first 4 episodes this morning.  Slightly entertaining, but I won't be watching it is fast as I can and then be off to borrow the 2nd season or anything.  I just can't commit myself to TV.  The internet, yes.  TV, no! But it was pretty funny and there were some pretty cute guys :)

**Got my new Motorola RazR phone from Cingular a few days ago.  Still haven't done anything to it but turn it on and a couple fo calls!  I think I am off to download some funky ringtones. This phone seems pretty cool and the sound/reception has been great so far

**A little embarrassing moment this afternoon. While at Shinder's, E and I took a little venture to the "back room".  No need to explain myself here if you know what I mean(lol!), but I was a little embarrassed to leave the room and coincidentally running into a good friend of ours and his 6-year-old daughter standing directly outside of that room, looking at the comic books. She says to me, "I saw you come from that room!" Ummmm. What does a 6-year-old know about a room like that? So I say, "I know! That is so cool that we saw each other! Are you excited to start first grade next week?"  Yikes!

**Lanee came over tonight and we made tacos.  Yummy!!  I am a Mexican Food Freak.  Love it!!!  Made a lot extra to have some for lunch tomorrow:)

**Only one more week of vacation and then back to school (work!)

I guess that is all I can think of right now!

Scrap Away!!!

I stayed up way past my bedtime last night and worked on these LOs.  Spent the morning scanning and stitching.  Pain in my arse! Now I am about half-way through scrapping my July pics!

This one is from my cousin Andrea's graduation party in June. Geez, I have gone KI crazy, AGAIN!!!  So many of my recent LOs have KI products.  Love it!

This one is from our friend's Mary and Dubber's annual 4th of July bash.  These were the very first pics I took with my new Canon SD500.  They turned out so sharp and clear! A great purchase on my part :)

This one is from when two of my mom's sisters were in town over the 4th of July.  We had a family picnic at my mom and dad's place.

Picnic at my Gram and Gramp's house on the 4th of July.  Love this new American Crafts pp!

   

Annual Sauer Family Picnic held at my mom and dad's lake home. I inked these Heidi Swapp ghost letters. A very dirty look!

And that is all for now!

Today's Visuals

Thought I'd post a few pics from the past few days:

**Went boating up at my mom and dad's place on Wednesday.  The weather was perfect...FINALLY!!  My tan has faded a LOT and I need to get some color  (and get rid of my strap lines) before Mary's wedding next Friday. Here is me with my good friend, Jennifer.  We had really wanted our friend Lori to come boating with us, but she had no babysitter :(

***I went out for Mexican with my friends from work on Thursday afternoon.  We made it through another year of teaching summer school...today is the last day and then I have four weeks of vacation!!

***Here is my brother Brian with newborn daughter, Annika.  I thought this was such a sweet picture that my dad took yesterday!

   

***I was also able to finish this LO that I did of me and one of my best friends, Jenny.  She is one of the best out there!!

Statix X and Harry Potter

Its still incredibly HOT.  Thank God for my Central Air....I am so spoiled! I have been reluctant to leave the house at all this weekend.  I almost opted-out of a rock show.....Static-X at First Avenue.  For those of you who haven't heard about First Avenue, it is THE club in the movie Purple Rain with my man, Prince. Well this also happens to be the HOTTEST effin club in ALL of Minnesota.  So wouldn't it be a great idea to go to a heavy metal show in a club on the hottest day of the year, the humidity higher than my bathroom during a long, hot shower? I knew what it was like and it was all I could do to get myself motivated.  I seriously debated between staying home and finishing Harry Potter or going to see this band who has so much energy, they kick my butt every time I see them.  And I hadn't seen them in like 3 years.  So, of course I had to go!  There were a few opening bands so E and I hung out in the A/C'd bar upstairs where it was only 87' instead of 110' or hotter out on the floor.  I stayed up there by myself for the first part of Static-X's set, but I just couldn't hear the music...so I braved the heat and sweat and went down closer to the floor.  These guys were rockin out...one of my favorite heavy metal bands!  ****For those of you who do not know this, E is a BIG time metal head.  He LOVES all kinds of music, very ecclectic taste, but loves some head bangin' shizit.  It has come to grow on my after all these years of us together :)

***So I finished reading Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince this morning. WOW! What an ending! Bring on Book 7...NOW! This is now my favorite book of the series because it explains so much and so much happens.  It totally leaves you wanting to know how it all ties together in book 7.  I have been following discussion of the book on a few message boards and find the theories pretty fascinating.  I might even re-read the book soon, that is how much I liked it!

***I also got some scrappin' done this weekend.  Did this layout. The letters that say"summer" are the Heidi Swapp ghost letters and I 'daubered" them and the ink smeared all over, so the little circles were my way of covering them up! I don't love how it turned out, but I have to prove to myself that I can make mistakes and let it go!

Waiting to Hear....

I am not doing much this afternoon, just waiting for Brian to call me and tell me the good news.  Michelle should have had Annika by now :)

I ran to the post office earlier this afternoon...a package that I had sent three weeks ago to Danielle (who used to be in my circle journal) came back to me as "address unknown".  I realized I had written Mount Terrace Lake instead of Mountlake Terrace on the address.  Whoops! I hope it gets back to her this time :)

I also mailed out this layout that I did for Renee in my Circle Journal.  Topic was "My Favorite Things".  These colors are sooooo NOT me, and I hate my own handwriting.  It seems kind of boring for my usual standards , but I hope Renee likes it!

**The ribbon and inking are gold...its hard to tell from the scan!

More Creations

I finished all three of these layouts this morning...I was wide awake at like 6am, so why not scrap???!! I am so relieved to finally have this layout from Kara's birthday finished...I started it like a month ago! It feels so good to be back in my groove...hopefully I can get a little more caught up with current stuff this week sometime :)

Scrap Like Crazy!

I got quite a bit of scrappin' done (FINALLY!) on Friday night over at my friend Shannon's house.  She and Sarah are the only friends I have living around me who scrap, so I love it when we can get together for some drinkin, eatin' and scrappin!  I was on a mission to get a lot accomplished, and got these layouts done for Mary's album:

I got two other layouts started that I hope to finish this week.

The Facts:

**Today is Mary's shower.  Made some fabulous (no-bake) cheesecakes with strawberries.  Also going to bring Salsa di Parmigiano.  Shower is at Pioneer Park in Stillwater, MN.

**We've had like 9 consecutive days of 90' or hotter weather and it is incredibly humid.  Miserable!! 

**My cat Phoenix is so funny...he saw these sandals that a friend wore over and crawled right into them! Isn't he gorgeous?? He's one of my Abyssinians.

I created!

Mary's bridal shower is tomorrow....crunch time for finishing this album!!!  I have very few pics of them to work with, so the album is not going to be too many pages.  Here are the latest layouts:

ABC's of ME

I did this LO for one of the girls in my circle journal.  Theme was ABC's of you.  I used SP Purkage Stamps by Kelly Purkey for the title....still have to mount them, but I was too anxious to wait!!

Keepin' Cooool...

It s a "scorcher" out there as my dad would put it.  95' or something like that. Oof da! (Thats "Minnesotan" for holy shit its hotter than he** out there today!!)  I could go to the pool, but I did that all day yesterday and the day before and I thought I better give my tan the day off before you can't recognize me anymore.  Seriously! 

So I have been sitting around the house doing nothing really, other than scrappin' and chillin'.  Just enjoying my last day of vacation until August, when summer school is over.Here are two layouts I just finished up.  My scanner is not doing these justice, I might need to find a different scanner because I can't stand the shadows and how "off" the colors look from real life. Plus its a major pain in the butt to scan both sides and then stitch them together in photoshop. 

*** I got a bunch of pictures from the Kodak Picture Gallery yesterday and had fun picking out papers to go with all fo them.  You will be seeing tons of Layouts with those fun KI papers plastered all over them

***I am planning to start my childhood album sometime this summer (once I get caught up with current stuff) and I have decided to do it 8 1/5 x 11 after seeing the awesome layouts in Nicole's Gallery and I'd like to start doing just single pages too. Gasp!! Only one page, not two??!! Wanting to try something different and I think I'll get soooooo much more done that way!

A couple more for Mary's gift album

It is fun to scrap something other than myself for a change! LOL Here are a couple of Layouts I was inspired to do tonight for my best friend, Mary.  She and Troy are getting married on August 5th and I will be one of her bridesmaids, along with our other two best friends, Sonja and Kim.

The colors in these layouts are soooo much prettier than it looks from this scan. Darnit! I have been hoarding yummy patterned paper and was so glad to use some cute Junkitz and KI on these two layouts!

The one that says "unconditional love" and "forever and ever" at the top was picked as Layout of the Day today at Scrapjazz. How cool is that??

I LOVE being on vacation from work!

There is nothing quite like the freedom of having the day off...especially when the weather couldn't be any more gorgeous at 80', low humidity and no clouds to be seen anywhere!

Yesterday was my first day off...

* Blogged and read blogs in the morning

* Scrapped for a few hours

* Sat on the deck and started In Her Shoes by Jennifer Weiner (is that pronounced how it looks or do you think it is "whiner"? Just curious!)

* Went swimming  for  a few hours later in the afternoon (getting pretty brown...I was white before boating last Sunday!)

* Met my old college roomies for dinner at TGIFridays (Laura brown is having a baby in Sept & Laura blonde is getting married in October)

* Came home and scrapped some more!

Could summer be any better than this???!!  (Only if I won the lottery!) Now if only I didn't need to go back to work in a week!!

Baby Shower Layout

My sister-in-law Michelle is getting ready to have my niece Annika in about 4-5 weeks.  This is my first-ever niece (or nephew for that matter!) and I am so excited! Here is a layout of her baby shower back in April....

Ssssh! A surprise for Mary

One of my best friends, Mary, is getting married on August 5th. I spent my entire night hand-making the invitations for her bridal shower (thrown by me, Kim and Sonja)...for 40 people! Ay, thats a lot for just one shower, but they turned out cute, so it is worth it.

I am surprising Mary by making her a 8 x 8 album of her and her fiance Troy.  I am the only person who has any pictures of them (he is very camera shy) and even those are limited.  She's gonna love it! She always talks about getting started with her scrapbooking, but barely had time to think about it with planning the wedding, and taking care her new baby and daughter Taylor. Here is the first Layout for the album:

I also finished and scanned a layout that I started last weekend.  This one is from Mother's Day of this year:

A Moving adventure!

I spent almost the entire day Saturday helping my friend Jenny move into a new apartment...she moved just 2 miles down the same road as her old apartment, a great location near many fun shops, restaurants and bars.  Her new digs are at the top of a very charming building, built long before elevators were invented.  So much of the day was spent lugging furniture and boxes up these many flights of stairs.  Not that I mind...it was a reasonably cool day and it was good exercise, after all.  It was nice to have some help from her family too!

A quick stop at the Mall afterward found me at the bridal shop picking up my bridesmaid dress for my best friend Mary's upcoming wedding.  I was too tired to stop at the cell phone store...so I am yet to catch up to the rest of the world with a fun new camera flip-phone with a variety of hot ring-tones.  Oh well, my goal is to have a new phone before the end of summer.  Maybe I will accidently drop my current phone in the pool again this summer and be forced back to the mall to get the new one I have aspired to get for approximately two years now!!

I came home later that night to find E and Rich grilling a ton of chicken and ribs...I was just in time to stuff myself full of all the calories I had burned earlier from moving.  It seems this is "grill" week on the Food Channel and the boys could not resist cooking up their own concoctions of spices after spending the afternoon watching the Pros cook up the best ribs and meat in the USA.

Several other friends came over after dinner to hang out and whatnot.  I was in bed shortly before 2am.

I spent the morning today finishing a book called Wedding Season.  It is about a woman who deeply opposes marriage but finds herself attending 17 different weddings in just 6 months.  Not a bad read!

I also whipped up one of my last Cancun Layouts:

My Favorite Restaurant is Moving

Tonight E and I went to Tai Pan for the last time in its current location. This is my all-time favorite Chinese restaurant and has been since the day it opened its doors in the shopping center near my childhood home 15 years ago.  The convenience store that has been next door to it for the past 15 years is expanding and Tai Pan has been forced to look for a new home. We talked to the owner for awhile and he assured us they would be re-opening in about three months, but he was not yet sure where they would move.

Pray with me that he finds something soon and can re-open before I need a major Sesame Chicken and cream cheese wanton fix!!

I spent almost all of this evening re-organizing my closet in the guest room.  I was sick of my scrap stuff taking over the dining room so I was forced to find a new home for it in the guest room.

I also found a few minutes to put the finishing touches on this LO that I have been working on for 10 minutes here and 10 minutes there for what seems like at least a week.

Now I am almost finished scrappin' my Mexico pics!

One More Mexico Album Layouts

Okay, so I just couldn't seem to stop scrappin' today!! Here are two more I did tonight.

Would you believe that I also baked chocolate chip cookies tonight? Now I am going to take a nice bath and get ready for another nice week at work.

Tomorrow night I am having dinner with Jenny and I am also expecting to see my cousin Katie sometime this week while she is in town for her sister's wedding this upcoming weekend.  Should be a nice week, now if only the weather would start cooperating!

A little More Mexican...

Yay!! I made it to the weekend after all!! I was able to come home right after work today and get a little scrappin' done before going to have homemade tacos at my friends Lanee and Roger's house. Sonja and the baby also came over for dinner...can I say it enough how glad I am that all my best friends love Mexican food almost as much as I do?? It doesn't hurt any that these two girls have it in their blood!

Here are the latest layouts I finished tonight for my Mexico album, I'm about half way done now! The pink layout is of me at the Market shopping, and also a pic of the fabulous pink opal bracelet that I just had to have :)

And here is one from my Snorkeling "Mis" Adventure...cause I didn't have fun at all... it was way too rough and windy that day and I ended up going by myself

National Scrapbooking Day

I slept in today and haven't left the house once.  Its been great! Today is National Scrapbooking day and being home alone has afforded me the luxury of scrapping most of the day today! I have been working on my Cancun album...here are the ones I did today. The scans look terrible, but they are pretty cute in real life!

On Lockdown!!

My drive to work this morning started out like normal, but as I got closer and closer to work, I knew something out of the ordinary was going on...  you see, every corner on the main street that I drive down had a police officer parked with its lights on.  So what could this be all about???

Was the President of The United States visiting today and I somehow didn't know about it?  What else could cause police from all neighboring cities as well as the St Paul Police to be out full-force on a Friday morning at 7 am??

As soon as I got to the school I was informed that we were on lock-down because a St Paul police officer was killed a few blocks away from the school at like 2am.  Apparently he was working undercover when he was shot 10-12 times and the suspects fled.  So now they are doing a thorough search of the neighborhood in which I teach.

So how am I going to get through this already-hectic Friday, with kids that are scared to walk down their own streets??? This neighborhood that I work in is one that I am glad I do not also reside.  Too much crap like this happening all the time.  I am fortunate that I will only have to work another 30 days or so before school is out and I move to a new school.  Scary!!

Last night I relaxed a little and finished this Layout for Nicole's Circle journal.  I do not LOVE it, but I think it turned out okay.  Very small size 6 x 6...

Diva Night

My friend Jen had me and a few of her other girlfriends over last night for some wine and chit-chat.  I brought Deidre along with me and also invited Lori, but Lori wasn't able to make it.  We spent the evening discussing books, men, work and sex.  Aren't these fabulous topics to discuss?  I made a connection with Jen's friend Sara who loves many of the same authors that I do. Sara also happens to be moving soon and offered to send me a box full of books that she has no more use for.  Yay!!  This will likely be my summer reading supply, since my ass will probably be very broke this summer and not able to buy books by the stack full like I usually do!

It was a nice evening and a chance for us all to get to know each other better.  Divas as lovely as us deserve a night away from everything else every once in awhile!

I also wanted to post the first Layout I got done of my trip to Cancun.  Spent some time working on this one before heading over to Jen's.                                             

Feeling Stuffy and Groggy today

Maybe it is because it is Sunday, but I am feeling absolutely under the weather today! My house majorly needs to be cleaned, I am supposed to have dinner with the fam for Bri's bday, but I do not feel like going anywhere today!!!

I put the finishing touches on a couple of LOs this morning, like this one below from Easter, but I am even feeling too unmotivated to scrap.

Okay, pass me some Sudafed please!