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Dreamgirls challenge blog was mentioned on American Crafts Studio Blog!
How cool is that? There's still time left to do the current challenge:
Create a page that features 80% American Crafts products, uses a flourish and a heart. The prize is a fabulous bunch of American Crafts goodies. So whadda you waiting for? :0)

Here's my page - my flight home from CHA was delayed, so I had time to kill. I sat outside and soaked up the last bit of warmth and sunshine. I snapped a bunch of pictures just to occupy myself.




Good thing I enjoyed the sun, because I flew home that night to a car covered with 4 inches of ice! Worse yet, the airline had lost my suitcase that had my coat and gloves in it. Grrr. Needless to say, I didn't take any pictures of that.

Gonna go to sleep early tonight. I'm just exhausted. Have a good one, everyone!

Catching up

Look what amazing yumminess I found this week in Stop & Shop:



You remember Girl Scout Samoa cookies, right? Caramel, coconut, chocolate? Well this is vanilla ice cream mixed with bits of samoa cookies and fudge. Pure heaven and it's going right to my hips as I type.

So February is flying by, isn't it?
We survived the kids' weeklong winter vacation.
The weather's been still so cold and crummy here.
I'm SO ready for spring. It won't be long now, though.
We're heading to Disney World with my parents in two weeks.
Warm weather is just 14 days away.
I'm dreading packing for 7 people.
The kids are getting excited. Three of them have never been on a plane.
The other two were too young to remember the experience.

February was my first month designing with an I Am A Scrapaholic kit.
It features a variety of papers from Jillibean Soup, along with goodies like paint, an acrylic stamp, and super fun Candy Dots from Pebbles Inc.
Here's what I made:










Have a great night, everyone!

Blessed

This is how I'm feeling. Two years ago today, my dad had his cancer surgery. It was an awful day for so many reasons. We were just getting on the roller coaster of being diagnosed and getting a poor prognosis. Colon cancer with liver mets. Seven visible spots on the liver with likely many more not big enough to be seen on MRI.

I was so afraid that I was going to lose him. Every moment suddenly became even more precious, and I couldn't look at him without fighting back tears thinking that he might be taken from me soon.

The care he received in the hospital was horrific that day. I was so afraid to leave him, because I saw how little attention anyone was paying to him. His pain medicine pump wasn't working immediately after surgery. It took a few hours before anyone believed him that he wasn't getting any relief. He was dehydrated and no one considered that was why his heart was beating so fast. He was transferred to an ICU stepdown bed and no one even checked him for two hours after he was there. None of the right things happened until I begged the oncoming night shift nurse to call the surgeon. The lack of attention to detail made me embarrassed to be a nurse.

But here we are two years later, and he is still fighting hard. Lord knows it hasn't been an easy road for him or my mom, but he's still here. He has good weeks and bad weeks and lives his life around his chemo schedule. He's amazed everyone, including his doctors, at his endurance for the chemo that he'll likely remain on the rest of his life. If you didn't know him, you'd probably never realize he is a cancer patient. Here is a picture of him with my sister and me, taken on Thanksgiving:



Dad,I'm amazed by your strength and sheer will to battle this disease.
I pray that you'll stay strong and keep fighting for a long time to come.
Love you.

Hump Day

Crabby.

This is me today. I can't put my finger on any particular reason, but I'm just feeling like a crab today. The kids were rambunctious and bickering, which definitely elevated my grump o' meter. I've been getting a taste of what life will be like with a house full of adolescents. C & B seem to challenge everything I say. I know this is normal, but it can be exhausting. Add a spirited four year old into the mix and it's no wonder I'm seeing more grays in my hair lately. Oh well, some days are just that way, I guess.

I started reading Eclipse this week. I needed an Edward & Bella fix, having finished New Moon right after getting home from California. I swear, I get lost in this series. I'm glad this book is long!

So let's see, what kind of scrappy stuff do I have to share tonight?

Hmm, well, here is a mini I made for the MOSD booth at CHA. It is a Build a Book Perfect Shapes album. There are 18 different shaped chipboard pages available, so I was able to combine the shapes of the pages I wanted to use. I also used my February DT kit (kit #1)from Treasured Scrapbooking to make this mini. The kit is full of beautiful Little Yellow Bicycle and Teresa Collins goodies.

I masked the letters and heat embossed silver embossing powder for the title. The covers were colored with alcohol inks that I repetitively swirled.

Speaking of Treasured Scrapbooking, here is my Feb challenge LO, using Kit #2:



My challenge is inspired by traditional Valentine's gifts - use the color brown (for chocolate), bling, flowers (a dozen) and lace (for lingerie, wink - wink!)

Well, I probably should go get some sleep so I'm not crabby girl tommorrow, LOL!

Back in the Saddle

So it took me a bit longer than I expected to recover from my trip to California. I came home and became sick. Add the time change, the jet lag and trying to catch up with my kids and hubby. But I'm back in the saddle now.

It's a new month, which means that I have lots of new scrap stuff to share. Tonight I wnat to show you the new kit at Scrap for a Cure, called Vintage Flair. Let me tell you, this kit is filled with yumminess.



My husband has a scrapbook made by his sweet grandmother about 15 years ago, filled with old family photos. It's a beautiful album with precious history, but it's in magnetic peel back pages. I've been planning to relocate the pics, complete with the captions to a more archival environment. The vintage pretties in the SFAC kit worked perfectly!

This first page is my husband when he was 1.5 years old!




This next page is my in-laws on their wedding day:




I found a tutorial on Tammy Kay's blog on how to make the damask flower. I used the lace in the kit to create a rosette to layer on top of the bloom:



The kit is equally usable with newer photos too. Here is my Ryan at his cousin's wedding - didn't he looks so handsome? He's gonna be a lady killer some day!




And last, but not least, is my silly boy, Jimmy. These pictures of him just crack me up!



Speaking of Scrap for a Cure, there are some pretty exciting things coming soon, so come register on the board and say hello!