{easily impressed}

My almost-three-year-old-son, the sponge. Loves video games. Appreciates large animated battle scenes. His reaction?

"WOW! WOW! DUDE! WOW!"

Dude? Oh. Em. Gee.

Here's to those child outbursts that just make life worthwhile.

Cheers.

{as time goes by}

My Jessie girl has been 8 for exactly a week now :( These girls (and boy!) are getting too big, too fast. We had her party last weekend and went to Chuck E. Cheese's for lunch. Ahh...the things we parents do for our children! I hate that place. It's torture for adults. But the kids had fun, and that's what matters. Right? Right?



She wanted a Harry Potter party, and I had no problems with that!





She's either really surprised at the present we got her, or she's an aspiring actress:



We got her this game (had to stick with the theme!), and we have had SO MUCH FUN as a family with this thing! Although, the kids do tend to get a bit competitive.



And one for posterity - my son, the nut that he is.



Ah, good times.

I have had another layout published in Digital Artist Magazine. So if you have the August issue, check me out on page 44.

latest layout

Speaking of the nut child....



Here's to kids being nutty, and to many, many more happy birthdays! Cheers!

{announcement #1}

Ok, it's been SOOOO hard hanging on to this news! I've wanted to shout about it for the last month! I was invited to join the Scrapologie design team! The #1 paper scrapping kit club wants a DIGI gal! How cool is that? I'll be doing hybrid projects for them each month, using their FABULOUS kits. I debuted this month with these projects:









I had SUCH a blast creating these, and I can't wait for next month!

We're gearing up for a birthday party this weekend. My little Jessie is turning 8 :( We're having a Harry Potter at Chuck E Cheese's. Don't know if you can mix those two, but we're gonna give it a shot!

We're also trying to fix up the house, weekend by weekend. For those of you who don't know, we built our own house almost 4 years ago, and there are still things left undone! Thanksgiving will be here this year, with lots of relatives who have never seen the place, so we're trying to get a head start. We still have shower doors to put on, closet doors to finish up, and kitchen cabinets that need glazing, among LOTS of little jobs. Anyone know where I can get a SMALL sectional for less than $2000? :p

Last on the to-do list is to finish up preparations for Huge Announcement #2. That will happen somewhere on or around Sept. 16th (my birthday, and no, that's not the announcement!), so stay tuned for that. I will be casually mentioning it every chance I get, just to build up curiosity ;) *giggle*

And with that, I'll leave you with a layout of my sweetie. I've been scrapping for about 11 months now, I think it's about time I do a layout with him as the sole subject! I did this one for the Hodge Podge Blog - I was a guest artist this week!

{latest layout}

Cheers!

{the first day}

Of school. Of running. Of a new schedule.

It was a lonely day for me and Alex today. We had the house all to ourselves for the first time in 3 months. But wouldn't you know it - the two little ones left their packed lunches on the kitchen counter! It never matters how hard you try to prepare.

We recently went shopping for the girls' back-to-school outfits, thanks to Grandma! I was very pleased with what they picked out (always a challenge when it comes to Morgan):







So...running. Yeah. It's hot! 90 something degrees at 7:00 this morning - ouch! But I'm determined to stick with it. A good way to wake up in the morning before the girls have to catch the bus.

Oh! An interesting story...
Hubby and I were in Wal-Mart yesterday grabbing a few last-minute school supplies. We were milling about in the back of the store, weaving in and out of other proscratinate parents. As we passed one of the emergency exits and made our way around a nondescript "dad," the man suddenly grabbed a big box out of his cart and ran out the door. Alarms sounded as we realized that the man had just stolen a computer! OMG! Seriously, just ran out of the door with a still-in-the box PC (Yes, honey, I am STILL upset about this!). I know this thing must happen several times on a daily basis, but not usually right in front of me! I wanted to run after him and tackle the bast@rd! Geez!

latest layout

Check out the brand-new LilyPad Blog! They're starting it off with a super cool scrap-the-website-colors challenge! Here's the layout I was inspired to create:



Cheers! (and stay away from computer-thieving maniacs!

{home sweet home}

I'm a city girl at heart. I live in the 'burbs for the sake of the kids, because the county schools are the best. But if I had MY way, I'd live downtown for sure. We recently got to take my parents to go see my favorite band, Shinedown, at the Thursday night Peabody Rooftop Party. Almost 10 years in Memphis, and I had never been to the rooftop of the most famous landmark! How sad is that? It just so happened that I remembered to bring my camera. I didn't get a pic of the ducks, but they have very nice digs!

*disclaimer: TONS of photos following!*





Shots, anyone?



My favorite bar in the whole world!







I got to meet the band!



What downtown night is complete without a walk down Beale Street?





I have a thing for neon...













Cool window displays...





Ah, to be Cinderella!



Anyone else think this dude looks a little like George Clooney?

latest layouts

Morgan will try anything once...or twice...or... :)
And Helen wants to be her when she grows up.



I loved this photo so much when I converted it to black & white! I know, a single photo layout! So rare!



Cheers!