Strawberry picking

On a whim today, I decided to take the kids strawberry picking. It was the first time for all 3 of us! We had a fun time and got lots of yummy, sweet strawberries!! We have eaten about 1/3 of what we picked already!! YUM!!!







I'll share some pictures of our visit to the zoo soon, too. I just have so many that it will be hard picking which ones to post!!

Also, remember a few days ago when I posted about the July guest designer spot for ILove2Create? You still have time to submit for it! Once you see this little peak of the July kit, I don't think you are going to want to pass up this opportunity!! These kits are truly incredible every month! Melynda is always on top of (or many times ahead of) the trends, plus you learn a cool new technique each month!!

On to today's blog challenge from Lisa: list the last 5 things you do before you head out the door.

1. Start the big hunt for the kids shoes. They can never seem to find them!
2. Everyone goes to the bathroom
3. Fix up the hair and make up
4. Yell at the kids to stop putzing and get their shoes on!
5. Make sure all the lights are off in the house

Tagged!!

I was tagged by the talented Edith Turk!!

These are the rules.... each player starts with 7 random fact about themselves on their Blog. People who are tagged need to blog 7 facts about themselves and post the rules as well. At the end of the blog list 7 people you are tagging. Let them know that they are tagged by leaving them a comment.

**I LOVE to hang out wash on the clothesline in the spring and summer. I am known to go around the house looking for stuff to wash so I can do it everyday!

**I was a goody, goody in school! I never ever had detention.

**I am part French. My great grandfather came from France. I was going to minor in French in college but it didn't fit into my very structured nursing curriculum.

**I was once addicted to nasal spray, back when I was in high school or college (can't remember which). Yeah, I know you are laughing, but it happens!! I finally kicked my "habit" with an allergy pill prescribed by my doctor!

**I love me some Disney Channel!! Hannah Montana is my fave! You can find me belting out her songs when the kids and I are listening to her music in the car!

**Tags sticking out of shirts makes me cringe!! If I am behind someone that has one hanging out, I must fix it. This goes for strangers too, unless they look mean! LOL

**I have to get a bath at night. I can't stand the thought of going to bed with the days skank on me! YUCK!!! If for some reason I cannot get a bath, like if we go camping or something like that, I still must wash my feet off before getting between the covers. Clean feet are a definate must!! I always wash my hair in the morning!

With that, I tag:

1. Tracy
2. Karen
3. Kimberly
4. Lora
5. Nicole
6. Rollie
7. Sarah

It's the weekend!!

Yay, it's Saturday and Chris is home! I love the weekends, it's so nice having all four of us together for the day! Sad that it is only 2 days long though!

We may go on a bike ride/picnic today, depending on how hot it's going to get. Those are always fun, nice to let the kids run off some steam while Chris and I can relax a bit after lunch! I really, really want to get mulch today. I'm so behind on that this year, I'm usually done by Macy's birthday. Also hoping to go check out some furniture for our porch, we really need some new stuff besides the old resin bench and chair out there!

Yesterday we hit the pool for the first time this season! It was a sweltering 94 degrees and the frigid water felt so good! The kids had a great time! It was finally the time to move away from the baby pool area! Gosh does that feel good! We moved way over to the other side of the pool grounds! It is less crowded over there and it is not filled with the little cliques that seem to accumulate over on the baby side! We actually spent 3 hours there! That broke our record, we usually last 1 hour, maybe an hour and a half! It should be a fun summer, a lot of Macy's friends will be there and hopefully Jack can meet some little boy buddies!

What sort of shoes do you wear in the summer? I'm definately a sandals girl, I do not like wearing sneakers, ever. I have a few pair that I love and wear over and over again. Bass are always my favorite! I did buy a pair of those new Crocs wedges but don't seem to have anything to go with them! They are comfortable though. I have a pair of black beaded sandals that match my bathing suit. I need to get a few new pairs of sandals, the ones I have are old!

Here is a layout that I did last week for my recipe challenge at ScrapGal. Lately, I have been having SO much fun mixing up different papers! If I like it, I use it, who cares if those colors aren't usually viewed as matching! I really love the back side of the Love, Elsie papers, they are all kinds of fun ledger papers! This is a picture of my kids and my cousins daughter with my Grandmother (their Great Grandmother) at my Aunt's 50th bday party last Saturday. Love this picture!



Lastly, I want to let you all know about a great guest designer contest going on at ilove2create. This is a great monthly kit club that focuses on techniques! This month we did printable fabric! It was a lot of fun, we got cotton inkjet sheets and organza sheets! If you scroll down a bit, you will find some projects I did using it! Here are all the details!

ILove2Create.com is looking for a Guest Designer to work with its Scrapbooking Society kit for the month of July. We are hosting a contest that ends June 14, 2007 for this position.

Because the Scrapbooking Society kits are developed around an art technique that can be used for scrapbooking and other paper crafts, the requirements for this contest are as follows:

1. One layout that includes using one of the following art techniques
Monoprinting
Colored Pencils
Making Memories Paint Effects paper glazes (gloss, glitter or pearl finish)
Stampbord
Beeswax
Fabric inkjet printer sheets
2. One other item that you feel represents your best work. This item may be a layout, card, altered item, etc.

Only one entry per applicant. Please email .jpg files of your layout and other item to contests@ilove2create.com. Resize the photos/scans to a maximum of 100K. The contest will begin June 1 and concludes June 14th. The winner will be announced by/on June 17th.

If you are chosen as our Guest Designer, you will receive the July Scrapbooking Society kit for free. During your term as our Guest Designer, you will be required to create two layouts and two other items assigned to you by the Design Team Coordinator by the newsletter deadline (typically, you have about 5-7 days to complete your assignments) with the supplies in the kit and post them in our gallery. You will also be required to post on our message board and leave praise in our gallery during your term as Guest Designer.

Please note: to be eligible for this contest you must be an active member of the ILove2Create message board. A member would be considered to be active once they have a post count of more than 25.

If you have any questions about the contest, please email them to contests@ilove2create.com .

Recap

I feel like I haven't blogged in weeks! I guess it's only been 3 days though.

It's been busy!! We've had birthday parties galore!

This past Saturday was my Aunt Barb's 50th bday, so we had a party for her at my Aunt Jean's house.


Here are the cousins boating in the pool!


Sunday was Macy's 5th birthday! We had her party at an inflatables party place called The Jump Factory. It's new and town and oh so cool!! The parents are even allowed to play!! What a great time! We will definately be going back there!! She had 22 kids there and got a ton of great presents! We ordered a Cold Stone cake for her - YUM!!! For favors, she gave out a Macy's Music Mix CD with 8 of her favorite songs on it. Here is the cover she designed:


Some pics from the party, they didn't turn out very good because of all the movement!











And now the SG Blog Challenge from yesterday, name 5 things that I am grateful for today!

*our wonderful home
*my kids - even if they do drive me crazy
*my wonderful hubby who tolerates all my craziness
*my extended family
*my friends - both real life and online - who also tolerate all my craziness!

Not a fun day!

I decided not to go to the gym this morning since I've had to set the alarm the last 5 days (I am NOT a morning person!). We've been so busy and I've been so tired, so I decided I was going to sleep until whenever I wanted to.

Mother Nature woke me up at 8:50am. I go to the bathroom and hear the kids toilet running. It happens all the time, they push the handle too hard and it gets stuck and the flap thingy doesn't close. I went about my business and would fix it as soon as I finished putting in my contacts, brushing teeth and washing face.

I go down, to be greeted by about an inch of water in my second floor bathroom. I quickly fix the toilet. Jack loaded it with t.p. and since the flap didn't close and it clogged, the water just kept going and going! I yell for Chris and he comes down and all freaked out. He goes to our laundry room, which is right below that bathroom and it is raining in there! UGH!!!! Nothing like getting rained on by toilet water!! Luckily it was clear!

So, guess what I did today? Sure gives you that boost to clean!

So not fun!! Maybe I should've gotten up to go to the gym this morning, this may have not happened if I did!

I've got the laundry room all done and am now just working on cleaining up the stuff that got wet in the hallway. Glad we don't have carpeting!

Macy's birthday party was great yesterday! So much fun!! I will try to get pics edited and posted tomorrow!!

Happy Birthday my sweet girl!!

I won't have enough time to post tomorrow morning but I wanted to say HAPPY 5TH BIRTHDAY to my sweet Macy!!! I cannot believe that she will be 5 years old tomorrow!! How fast did that go? WOW!!!

Five years ago at this time, I was so excited and nervous. I was making sure I had everything in order in the nursery and all my hospital bags packed with a sweet baby girl and a sweet baby boy outfit! We didn't want to find out the sex, we wanted to be surprised when my doctor yelled out "it's a boy" or "it's a girl"! We picked the name Macy for a girl and Joshua for a boy. I was going in at 8am the following morning for a scheduled c-section because he/she was breech!

The c-section was rough for me, I have a horrible time with anesthesia. But it was all so worth it when I heard my doctor yell "it's a girl!". It was a Macy!! She was so precious, so small. She weighed in a 6lbs 13.7 oz and 18.5 inches long! She was the sweetest thing! The joy of our lives!! Wow, we were parents!

I watched my whole surgery. Yeah, I know, kinda gory, but I was a critical care RN working in that same hospital at that time and it was fun! I did't watch him cut me open, but I watched the rest of it on a huge mirror that they brought over for me! Dr. Ferry even pointed out my tubes and ovaries, etc to Chris after Macy was out! LOL Very interesting and neat to see!

So, happy birthday my sweetheart!! Mommy and Daddy love you so much and we are so proud to have you in our lives!!

Here I am waiting to go to the OR:


Here I am holding her:


Macy and Daddy:


Sweet Macy minutes after her birth:


Macy today, the little diva that she is!

Feeling yucky today and a few fun things

Just need to whine for a minute.

I didn't sleep well last night. Lots of tossing and turning, feeling hot, woken up by the thunderstorm, just couldn't get comfortable. Plus we had to get up earlier than normal because Jack's speech therapist comes at 10:15 on Friday mornings.

I've got a horrible pain in my neck, besides my kids! LOL It is so tense and stiff. I've got a huge headache going on. I am going to the chiropractor tomorrow to hopefully get things all back where they belong. It's really not fun!

I've been trying to rest on the couch, take a nap, and watched Over The Hedge and the end of RV. The kids didn't like that idea so they were off and I'm sure their rooms are just ripped to shreds! I got Macy's room all nice and cleaned up this week and now I'm sure it is back to a disaster area. Jack just goes to town in there ripping everything out.

I finally remembered to pop some ibuprofen, so hopefully that will make things a little better. I'm probably going to have to forego the gym tonight and hopefully be able to get there on Sunday morning before I have to pick up Macy's cake.

Ok, enough whining from me.

Here are 2 layouts that I did for the Scrapgal June newsletter. The theme this month is Relax, just what I want to do today!

and a little project