Birthday Celebrations

Yesterday my mother in law celebrated her 81st birthday. I think she looks great for being 81, don't you? This is her with her 3 great grandchildren. For her dinner celebration we all went to Portillo's. If you've ever had a Portillo's hot dog, you know why we choose it for a birthday dinner....They are delicious!!!!!!!!! I know this sounds crazy, but I love the smell of my fingers after eating one. MMMMMmmmmmm.
They also have a to-die-for chocolate cake. Perfect for any birthday celebration. Perfect ending to a perfect meal. Afterwards we went back to her house and hung out. I got a good cuddle from Erick and was lucky enough to have the camera in my hand. I love this little boy, he makes each day a happy day.

I love this picure of Erick and Grandma.
Happy Birthday Barbara. I hope you have many more!!!!

A blast to the past....

Taylor has a new sketch...it is Friday after all. She challenges us to use cupcakes if we have them....we don't have to, put she encourages it. I thought I would try to make a masculine card. I went through my paper and stamps, and decided to go waaaayyy back. I decided to use the loads of love stamp set and the In Colors from 2006 & 2007. Remember Marigold Morning, Buckaroo Blue, True Thyme and Cranberry Crisp? Those are the colors I used. I have tons of it left and needed to clear it out. This is what I created.... I didn't put Taylor's sketch up, but you can see it here if you want to peek.
I was too tired. I went to Disneyland for about 3 hours today with my son and that can be draining.....but it sure was fun. Now, we are off to take my mother in law out to dinner. It is her 81st birthday today. Happy Birthday Grandma. We love you.

Color Throwdown Challenge

So the colors this week for the Color Throwdown Challenge were Old Olive, Certainly Celery, Cameo Coral, and you could throw in So Saffron if you wanted to. This is what I came up with. I was going to try to combine this challenge with Taylor's challenge over at her blog...click here to see her challenge...but I sat there for too long trying to figure it out and finally gave up and decided to do two different cards instead.....
So, you know what that means. I have to go and play with more paper. I guess I don't have to.....I just want to. I'll be back to post my other creation later. Hopefully it won't take me hours to come up with a card. I want to go play at Disneyland some time today.

KWerner's 20th Color Challenge

Here we are at another KWerner's color challenge. I love the colors in the challenge this week. I have always loved pink and brown together.
Here is what I came up with. How many times do you guys change your mind while creating a card? I must have changed courses at least 4 times with this card. I'm not sure I'm totally happy with the stamping images on the card, but I was running out of time. I really like these colors and will most likely create something else again later. {not necessarily for the challenge, but for fun} I have never given the "recipe" for my cards before because I figure why???? But I will say that the light pink I used was sweet blush from papertrey ink. I also used my Polka Dot Basics stamp set from papertrey ink for the background on the chocolate chip. I love my stampin up supplies, but I also have to put a shout out for papertrey ink too. LOVE<>LOVE my polka dot basics stamp set.
Thanks for stopping by today. I hope you all have a wonderful Wednesday. I am off to go have lunch with my wonderful mother today. Love you mom.

A fun giveaway

I was doing my daily blog reading and came across a giveaway of some amazing prizes on vanillajoy.com. They gave away a cricut on Monday....dang it I missed that one. Anyway, if your into family fun, or creative date ideas click on the links and you can read about them there. She also has some other fun things over there. Go check it out for yourself.
I hope everyone is happy and cool. It is hot here in Anaheim, California this past week...ugh. I have had to turn the air on just to stay sane.
School starts next week for us, and I am not looking forward to it at all.

For those who don't know, I work at the local high school as an instructional assistant for the special ed. program. I have been there for over 13 years, and I used to love my job, but now I can't stand the disrespectful students. The students just aren't the same kids that they were when I started this job. Don't get me wrong, not all the students are bad, but the ones that are, make it miserable for everyone else. Oh well, what's a girl to do.....unfortunately I have to work.....someone has to support my stamping habit....ha ha ha
Have a good day, tomorrow is hump day already.....wow!!!

This crazy Blogging World.....

I have had so many mixed feelings lately about the crazy blogging world. I love it, but sometimes I feel like it comsumes too much of my time....I know some of you out there know exactly what I'm talking about....
I have "been introduced" ....I don't know how else to explain it.....to so many fun, creative, down-to-earth people through blogging and comments that are left on my blog.
I feel like these people could be my friends, and wish they would move next door.....maybe they wouldn't call the city and report that our truck blocks the sidewalk.....that is from a previous post if you don't know what I'm talking about. hee hee hee
I have found old friends that have moved away and I miss terribly. I love looking at their blogs and seeing pictures and reading stories of their lives. I still feel connected to them through their blogs, and when they comment on mine, I know they feel the same way.
Sometimes I feel like everyone just shares the "wonderful" things in their lives, and hides the boring, sad, and even mundane parts of their lives. I am included in that by the way.... But, then I read some posts of people who share their tears, and I cry with them through their blogs and feel their pain....and then keep them in my prayers. How would I know that that particular "friend" needed my prayers that day, if I didn't read her sadness on her blog that day???
I have been creatively inspired by others from their blogs and their talent, and then I run to my little creating space in the world, and try to create like they did, or similar to it at least. Then, I realize that I have been consumed by my "need" to create to the point I forget about more important things in my life. Things like reading my scriptures, writing in my journal, playing "roll" on the floor with Erick. Calling my mom on the phone and talking with her about nothing in particular if I don't want to.
Then, I blame by blog for this....HELLO ANDREA!!! I am the one that controls what I do with my time, and not this crazy blogging world.
I love blogging for the aforementioned reasons, I am just learning to have a good balance with "my world", and the "blogging world" I have joined recently.
I have no idea why I felt the need to "spill" all this into cyber space, but I did. I don't know if anyone out there can understand or even relate, but there it is for what it's worth.
To all those who are still reading this post, and those who have left comments of love and support, a GREAT BIG THANK YOU to you for touching my life in a positive way. Many of you are "old" friends, and many of you I have never even met. May friendships continue to unfold in the crazy world of blogging......Now I'm going to go read my scriptures....balance remember....he he he

OCC Challenge

Our Creative Corner has a new card challenge. It was to use these 4 colors on a card. The chocolate chip was optional, but I {{Love}} chocolate, so of course I'm going to use it on my card..... This was a fun card to make.....I don't know why, it just was. I need to get more Ruby Red paper, that little flower represents the "last" of my ruby red paper....
Have a happy Saturday night....wait it's all but over....have a great Sunday everyone.

Edited to add: Does anyone recognize where I got the layout idea for this card???? It's somewhere in the stampin up catalog. I loved the layout so much, I had to give it a try. Go ahead....take a peek....see if you can find it.....

Card Cupcake Challenge {{CCC}}

At Taylored Expressions, she has a cupcake challenge every Friday. The above sketch is what we were to use for our card. The card below is what I came up with. I realized later that I got the square in the wrong place. It is supposed to be on top instead of underneath....oh well....close is good.

By the way, the cupcake in the middle is actually a sticker, not a stamp....is that cheating???? {{smiling widely}}

Have you ever had a day/week like this? I saw this and laughed so hard tears came to my eyes. I'm not having one of those days today, but I have had them and could totally relate. I just had to share. I hope it brought a smile to your face like it did mine.

KWerner Challenge #19

The above photo is the color inspiration that Kristina Werner has given us to work with this challenge.
This is the card that I came up with for the challenge. The background is heat embossed with clear ep with a stamp from "all night media".
For the soft touch of color, I used Sweet Blush from Papertrey Ink. When I finished, a part of me thought it needed something else. Then, I took another look, and decided to keep it simple and have the embossing stand out more on it. Hey, it's just a card right????

Have a great Friday everyone. Where did the week go???/

Hayden's Creations

These are the scrapbook pages that Hayden {he's 8} put together the other day. I was proud of him. He did a GREAT job!!!!! Look out ladies, he's an up-n-coming scrapbooker....hee hee

Our Creative Corner Challenge

Last night I sat and watched the Olympics and "played with paper". It was fun. I used The Creative Corner sketch for my card. You can find it by clicking here.

I've been "playing with paper" this afternoon too. Hayden came in and saw me, and was bored. He asked if he could help. I handed him some pictures, paper, and stickers and said, "Get to work". He is in there now creating, and doing a darn good job I must say. I will post his work tomorrow.

Poor kid, you know he's bored and ready for school to start when he wants to scrapbook. Although, he really seems to enjoy creating. School starts here in a little over 2 weeks. I can't believe summer has come and gone. Wow!!!!!

In-n-Out Picnic

Most people reading this blog know that I have 4 children that work for In-n-Out. They take good care of their associates {employees} and every year during summer they have a company picnic. They get to take a guest with them. Trevor took me, Amy took Hayden, and Heather took Emily. Jeff, of course, took his beautiful wife Nicole. We had a great time together. It was at Wild Rivers in Irvine with SOOOOOOOOOOOOO much food there.....oh my gosh........talk about gluttony!!!!!!! Because it was a water park, Heather, Amy and Hayden had to "lather" up with sunscreen.....gotta love those UV rays. Then off to the picnic for food. Did I mention there was a TON of food????? Oh my goodness. They had a ton of In-n-Out trailers there. We first had chili dogs, then we had an In-n-Out burger....of course....then there was brownies, and cookies, and fruit,and corn on the cob, and ice-cream, and more brownies, and ice-cream, and then we ended with another In-n-Out burger.....well, ok, I might have exaggerated just a bit there, we really didn't eat all that food....we only had the brownies once..... ha ha ha. It was all the food you could eat. Crazy!!!!
Hayden
Jeff & Nicole
Amy & Heather
Group photo....all of us
Trevor and me
Jeff and me
Nicole and me
Hayden and me

Enjoying our "first" burger....hee hee
Amy & Trevor went protein style....no bun.
Emily with her chili dog.
Jeff, Nicole, Trevor and I didn't go into the water park. When the others left to go to Wild Rivers, we went off and just hung out. When we were getting ready to leave, Jeff spotted a horseshoe game and wanted to play with Trevor. So, they did. When Trevor threw one of the "heavy and rusty" horseshoes, it took a hop and hit Jeff right on the bone of his leg. It caused a nasty cut, and bled pretty good. We had to take him to the first aid station.....He was the only one that had first aid that day....lucky us!!!
Kinda killed the moment, so when Jeff was feeling better, we left. He has to go to the doctors today and get a tetanus shot. I know he's gonna hate that. But really, all in all, it was a GREAT TIME!!!!!
Thanks Trevor for taking me along.

Pool Party at LeeLee and Danny's

On Saturday we went to my sister and brother in laws beautiful house to swim, and of course....eat. ha ha ha We had sooooo much fun. If you look real close at Erick's eye, you can see he has a black eye. We were laughing at him later because he got so cold he had blue lips. I told Rick, "He has blue lips, a black eye, and a red toe....a very colorful child."
Even Dallas got in on the action......
But....he didn't like it. Lora and Danny have two dogs, Baxter is a Boxer too. He was concerned with Dallas when he was in the water. In fact, Baxter pretty much kept on eye on everyone in the pool. He was our lifeguard.
You can see Erick swimming here. He looks like he's drowning, but he's not. ha ha ha He is like a little fish. He loved it. He is swimming from Trevor to Rick here. Tough kid.
Rick loves throwing his kids up in the air I guess.....ha ha ha. Haylee couldn't get enough of it.

On your mark, get set, GO!!!! Hayden getting ready to jump in.
Amy,Trevor and Erick just chillin'.
Haylee called this blue floaty "the bed". Everyone loved it.

Baxter watching closely.
Ooops, guess I liked this picture so much, I added it twice. Dallas tried so hard to play with Lora's dogs, but they were more interested in what was going on in the pool. Dallas found someone else to play with.....Lora's cat. Dallas didn't know what to think, the cats in our backyard run when he chases them, Lora's cat is used to dogs so he just sat there like "what do you want?" I think Dallas was amused. It was cute.

Dallas crashed and burned on the ride home. He played so hard, he was exhausted.
We really had a great time. Thanks LeeLee and Danny. Can't wait to do it again.