A Real Nice One!

For Jim having to work yesterday, it has been a very nice weekend. I hate it when he pulls a Saturday!! I could go on and on why, but it wouldn't change the company's ideas so I will spare you all. But at least they let him come home when he got back to the shop. Usually, even if you have finished all they have sent you to do, you still have to sit there till 4:30. How stupid is that?? Oh well, I said I would spare you and I sure don't need to work myself up again over things that won't change.

So he got home early and we had the late afternoon to relax and then went out to do just a couple of errands. Came home and had a nice quiet evening. Now me...guess what I did most of the day? I know. Why ask. I scrapped of course. Now give me a break, I did a few other things, but...

Today, he computered and I of course scrapped. I did a page for a friend. I have all these people who want pages done and I try to work them in, but somehow I don't do that very well, I end up scrapping for myself. And then...Joe...at work who wants me to scrap his dog...when I do a LO and give it to him he greets me with..."Only one?"  Really helps you want to do more, right?? It takes time to do these and he thinks I can whip them out like a guppy giving birth to newborn. Ugh! I should add that Joe and I are very good friends and pick on each other that way all the time. He was only kidding!! LOL (I hope!)

Then we got going and went to Sears to exchange some things he got, and went to a free festival in a town near Clearwater. As it turned out...a bummer. So, as payment for the disappointment we just happened to cruise past, well, not past but in, to Krispy Kreme...Jim's biggest weakness...and had donuts!!! He has SUCH a sweet tooth. Me...it's fats and salts. I could look at sweets forever and never touch them. BUT since we had not eaten...I did touch.

Thank goodness for Jim, we DO NOT have a Krispy Kreme near us!!

Then it was on to Clearwater Beach. Of course, we knew this was a big mistake but we are not too smart anyway so we went. Bad traffic. Only drove through. Seemed like hours. Note to Gloria...if you haven't seen the beach for a while, you wouldn't recognize it. I will send pics. Beautiful, not functional.

So that is about it for this weekend so far. Nothing planned for tomorrow. Same ole, same ole. Side note, that is ole as in old...not Spanish like Ole!!!! Well, I guess it COULD be ole like Spanish...however...I don't really think so. Sitting at the computer and watching TV doesn't quite qualify for an Ole!!! Know what I mean?? But...thinking on it...we are old...er older...so it might just...nah...

Going to post the two scrap pages I did yesterday and today. I don't think I am caught up from last week but I am going on from here.

Hope you all will have a great tomorrow. Spend time with your family. They're everything. Relax and have fun.

This is an Okapi, a relative of my love, giraffes, not the zebra, at the zoo in Tampa. He does have a longer neck as you can sort of see in the bottom picture. He was so cute. Could have taken this baby home with me.

This is baby Jesslyn. Isn't she adorable?? But really, they can have her. As sweet as she is, I served my term...er I mean, been there done that...er I'm past that...what I mean is...never again!!! Thank you very much. It was great while we were there, I just couldn't handle it anymore!!! LOL As my mother always said, God knew what he was doing when he gave you kids while you were young. True, mother, so, so true. I could never keep up anymore!

I keep saying "What?" to everyone...

and then they point to their ear!! What is with this? Those earpieces that everyone...well, it seems like everyone...wears in their ears so they don't have to hold their cell phone up to their ears are driving me crazy!! It used to be that if someone's mouth was moving or you heard them talking to what seemed to be no one...they were the crazy one. Now...they act like I am the crazy one because I forget to check their ear before asking them what they said!!!

I think it is probably time we start ear implants so you don't have to have those things that look like a very overgrown boil or wart growing out of your ear! I do agree that they are probably safer than holding a cell phone and trying to drive, but I am not even sure about that!

I do all the driving in our family and if I get a call, Jim puts it on speaker. I find that I am not nearly as connected to driving while I am talking on the phone even though I have nothing to do but talk. And I am just doing idle chit chat. So I can only imagine what concentration loss there is on driving when salespeople and businesspeople are trying to talk about projects and so forth while driving. Just not a good thing.

I guess I just have not gotten hip yet, but oh well, I would like to think about safety first. I know all of us have had close calls or jerky drivers near us only to see their first priority was talking on the cell phone.

Wow, Feel so much better. LOL I am sure I have changed so many people's thought on this!!! By the way...forget making a law about it. Who has time or manpower to enforce it?  We just need to use common sense.

It has been a fun week. Another one of Jim's cousins he had lost contact with has found us thanks to Ancestry.com. We are starting to catch up on all the things in their life. That has been really nice.

And...da da. I have met up with friends that used to be our closest friends in Ohio. In fact, we even came to Florida together with our families. It was a hoot. Four adults, six kids. We would go into restaurants and adults at one table, kids at another. We had a system. We told the waiters and waitresses to make two bills, one a "C" bill and one a "H" bill. The kids would tell them what bill they went on!!! LOL We had a great time.

So now, we, too, can get to know each other all over again. It really has been a great week.

Gloria, my old friend...well not old...as in age...oh no! She is my age...and that IS NOT old, but old as in knew a long time...asked me what LO meant. So, it is short for layout, which is a scrapbook page. I forget that others don't know that, so I will have to mention it from time to time.

I finished a "LO" LOL today so I am going to post it tonight. It is our granddaughter , our DD's middle child.

Hope you enjoy it. Remember you can click on it to enlarge it here or go to my gallery by clicking on the link at the right side of the blog. Credits are there. I don't post credits on my blog. You know how I HATE to do credits.

Have to run. Lots to do tonight. Everyone have a great weekend.  Be creative and enjoy your family.

Humm. Just Wondering

Just sitting here, doing my normal afternoon stare out the window while I backup, and I notice something. The girl across the street that was running and pumping her arms out in front of her is there again today. But, oddly, the girl that was doing all those climbs up the deck is missing in action!! Do you suppose...that she is in a bed somewhere so sore she is on the disabled list??? Could it be that she over did it just a tad??? We will never know but my legs hurt for her over the weekend. See...all pain and no gain for all the grunting and groaning I did for her!! LOL

I had a wonderful weekend. Saturday, did nothing. Did not even get dressed!!! Wore my lounger all day and it was so nice just to do nothing. Well, I did something! I hemmed pants, potted around at house things and listen...did FIVE LO's!  I have never done five LO's...even in a week!! I think I am beginning to get the hang of this digi thing! Now I need to keep it up. To heck with the organizing!! Jim is no help! He says...you can never keep caught up on that anyway! Please, I don't need help ignoring it!!! LOL

I don't know, I must have used the tablespoon instead of teaspoon when I took my Geritol or Jim slipped me some extra in my morning coffee!! But it was a very fun weekend, except for not winning the lottery. Bummer.

Did a quick tutorial today on how to remove power lines etc. from a picture. Good thing, because I went to start a  LO and sure enough, it was one outdoors, and there on both sides of the person's head...you got it...power lines!! So that really paid off. I am really surprised at how good I did. (Patting myself on the back!!) Wish I had time just to sit and do tutorials. I love doing those. I love learning. I could be a professional student.

Well, I want to wind things up around here so everything is ready when it is time to leave so I had better start by winding it up here first.

Let's see, I want to post a LO and don't know which one I want to do. Humm. Guess I will do Brian while he was shark diving. Silly boy. Don't know why he does that. He says it scares him to death but he is an adrenalin junkie!! Right. If I want an adrenalin rush I will step on the scales!! Perhaps he is missing a chip or two. But to each his own!! I would rather scrap!! So let me go find this LO and I will post it and be out of here. Hope you enjoy it!!

Later taters!

What A Beautiful Day!!!

It has been a gorgeous day here today!! But, I have spent it inside all day and enjoyed it immensely. Have scrapped, talked to my kidders, hemmed pants, done a bunch of little things and watched a bunch of movies. Just finished watching Ghostbusters!! It was great to see that again! Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd, Harold Ramis and Annie Potts! What a cast!! So now I thought I would blog a bit before starting supper.

One of the regular visitors to this blog, Ben (He Stamps), is on his way to Florida today. Sadly, his partner's sister has leukemia and has gone home under the care of Hospice. They are coming down to spend some quality time with her. Please keep her, Eileen, and them in your prayers as they go through this difficult time. David, Ben's partner, just lost his mother this past fall, so this is really coming at a very bad time for him.

Not much else going on today. Do want to finish the LO I am on and start on one that I am itching to do. Got some great pictures of Princess, our kitty. They are so cute I am wanting to get going on them. It is not too often I have a backlog of LO's I want to do. I thought I would have to do some scanning of my old pictures this weekend, but it can wait a couple of days.

Here is the LO I finished today. It is of Oliver. Oliver is a little boy I know through Nancy. He almost drowned a year ago and they didn't know if he would even live. Well, here he is, at his 2nd birthday party! He, too needs a lot of prayer. He has come so far and is improving but the doctors are not real promising about his future. But...I am a believer in miracles and to me that holds no water. So I continue to pray for Oliver and his family.

I hope you enjoy it! It makes me smile when I see it! He is a beautiful boy!! God has blessed him and will continue to do so!

Isn't he just adorable?? I love him!!

This blog certainly has not gone where I thought it would go, but when I blog I just start typing like I would be talking, and it ended up with this...so I guess this is where it was meant to go! 

As always...have a great night...and enjoy your family!! They are a blessing we too often take for granted!

Very Nice Day!!

It has been a really nice day today. Couldn't have had an easier day at work. One guy and me here and the other guy left on and off and now for good!! Nothing going on and it was nice to have a day of ease for a change!! Just phones and I like them. I can talk to anyone all day!! But you would never guess I hate to talk on the phone. When I get home, I am very picky who I talk to, so you know if I talk with you...you are indeed special!!

You know, as I sit at my desk, across the six lanes of highway there is a women's correctional halfway house. I sit everyday and watch these girls walk and walk and do jumping jacks. Yesterday I watched on girl step up onto a deck about a foot or foot and a half off the ground. Then she would step back down and step up starting with the other foot. She did this for I am not kidding...a good 15 mins rested about 3 mins and did it again for 15 or so mins. That is work! Especially in the 90 degree heat. 

But my point...I watch them do this stuff every day and I grunt and groan with them and I have not lost an ounce. Now what is with that? If I am exerting the muscles in my head with each one they are and grunting and groaning with them, it should count for SOMETHING!!! What a bummer. Oh good grief. Now one girl is walking at a nice pace and as she walks is punching one arm then the other out in front of her. (Do they need to do this in the hottest part of the day??) I think if I were the house moms or whatever, I might be a little concerned letting them build their muscles up so good!! LOL Just kidding. LOL

Anywho...oh my golly, there is the deck stepper upper!! She is at it again. Must be some kind of addiction thing I don't know about. Don't know if I want that addiction any more than any other!!! LOL

I am going to post the LO I did last night. It is funny. It is about what is in your purse. It was a challenge on Designer Digitals that I somehow missed, but it sounded like fun so I did it anyway.

I just started a LO of a little boy of a friend of Nancy's. He had been critically injured when he fell into a pool when someone was watching him while his parents went away for a weekend. He has come so far but there are questions about his future. Please pray for little Oliver. I eventually want to document his journey to recovery, but not now. But I am doing his second birthday picture!! Not sure where it is going, but I hope to finish it tonight.

You all have a great evening and keep the home fires burning...or I guess I should say the air conditioning on!!

Back later.

It's Blogging Time

Hi everyone. I am back after a time off. Have been really busy, with just fun stuff. Been scrapping a lot and working on my ancestry. I am having so much fun finding Jim and my relatives.

I have connected with a lost cousin of Jim's. That has been a lot of fun. We are finding out about both sides of our families. I felt bad. He had tried to keep family reunions on Jim's side going. Sorry to say we never responded. Out of the area and at times really not into reunions. Now I would go. But he said the last one no one came. I felt bad for him.

I ask for prayer for him and his wife. He (Bill) was to have surgery for breast cancer (he is 67) and canceled it so his wife (Sue) could get a pace maker. So they sure could use our prayers.

I have been cooking supper the past few nights giving poor Jim a break. I can't stand that long so I just keep a chair handy and work a little and the rest. I can do most anything it just takes doing it a little differently. I think he has enjoyed having some of his favorite dishes. Some he had forgotten about but he sure did renew his memory quickly!

I will be back in a second. I need to see what the last LO was I posted. Don't leave!! OK. I am going to play catch up and post my LO's up to today.

This one is Vita di Amore. Life of Love. That is what I think of when I think of my Mom and Dad. They were so in love and so committed to each other.

My favorite part of this is the bird carrying the heart to them. I think of it dropping it off on them and flying on!

This one is of Jim and his Mom. Those two were a pair. He was the only son with three sisters and was very close to his mom. I remember once when she was kneeling down to scrape dog food out of a can to feed the dog and he walked by and gently pushed her shoulder and she sat right down on her tush!! She got up and took off her wedgie shoe and chased him through the house clear out into the street where they both looked at each other an laughed!! Family fun is the best kind, isn't it?? You seem to remember them forever! Hope you enjoy this one...it was fun to do.

BTW, she was a great mother-in-law!! Never said much about how you were raising your family, but if she did, you knew you needed to listen, because she was very concerned!!

And this last one I really like. I think because of the embossed paper. I used it on the rectangle and then "clipped" it to the heart to give it texture, too. Clipping for you hands on people is like gluing paper onto something like chipboard.

So that is what I have been up to!

Now I need to get busy again and scrap. Have to organize. That has been on hold not to mention other things. I am sort of tense right now so stuff I don't like I am not doing. That is my new strategy. Well, sort of. Some things, like bills, I don't like doing but am still doing that. I guess I mean stuff that can be put off WILL be put off!! LOL

Got to go wrap up the cooking. Ummm Pork chops and rice pilaf!! 

Enjoy you evening!!

Been A Fun Weekend

Boy since Friday I have been having so much fun. I have been scrapping, of course. But I just found another past time that is so, so much fun for me.

I have never been a biggie on family ties, but for some reason, probably because I have seen so many heritage LO's on Designer Digitals that are fantastic, I have become interested in heritage.

So I subscribed to Ancestry.com and started tracking the family. I am telling you, to me, at least, it is so addictive. I would even go as far as to say it is about as addictive as scrapping, and I thought scrapping held a category of it's own on addiction.

I started briefly on Thursday. Then Friday everyone was gone at work and I really hit it. I am really into this and having a blast. I only had a free 14 day subscription, but DS, bless him, offered to get it for me. I am totally excited. 

I have found a copy of my great grandfather's WW1 registration card AND my other grandfather's draft card. To be able to see these is awesome. Their actual signatures and all. Anyway. It is special to me. I haven't even really gotten into tracing events. I am still trying to get the family located. I have even received messages from family members. Do any of you trace your ancestry?

This is all I needed. One more thing to volley time for. My poor organizing is going to go on the burner. I can tell. Ugh. That is not a good thing!

But I did get another LO done.This is of Jim's father. We really don't have many pictures of him. I was thrilled to find these among our pics. He really was good at hiding from the camera!! I struggled with this one. Not that it was hard. But time consuming. I used a template, because I like the frame placement. But I totally redid it. Changed the print behind the pics from summer words to snapshots. Then had to recolor them all. Cut and pasted another frame so I would have seven frames.Changed all the ribbons from summer theme and colors. So it was just a lot of work. But I am happy with how it turned out. And being that this is probably the only one I will do of him, I wanted it to make me happy.

Got my car cleaned this weekend. Didn't wash it but got it all swept out and all the windows done. I have never seen a harder place to wash any kind of windows that in Florida.  I guess it is because the glass is so hot the cleaner dries too fast. Then any little smear shows up so dog gone good in this sunshine. But I did pretty good if I must say so myself. I swear. The windows were so fogged inside it looked like we smoke, and we don't. What in the world causes that? The only thing I can think of is that it pulls smoke in from keeping the air on outside air and when you stop next to cars that have smokers it pulls it inside. I mean these windows were almost impossible to see out of!! So now I am back in business. I hate a dirty car. (Thanks, Dad, for that pet peeve!!)

So, it is back to the grist mill tomorrow. How much fun is THAT??!! Aw, I guess that is what makes the weekends so dang much fun!! Here is the LO. Not posting it anywhere else till Monday. You are the first this time. Hope you enjoy.