Christmas 2007

I can't believe time has gotten away from me. I havn't posted in over a week! I have been SOOOOO busy! (you know, cleaning up after christmas, playing the wii, visiting family....more cleaning...playing the wii...did i mention playing the wii?)

Here are some pics of our Christmas chaos. The first two are to show you just how UNORGANIZED I was this year. (NEVER EVER has it been this bad!)

Ok, so I forgot to go shopping for FOOD this year, so....santa and Rudolf got stale cookies (which promptly went into the trash)halloween candy (ditto) and no, that's not eggnog...forgot that too....Santa got Cranberry juice-nuff said!



Another example. This is Christmas NIGHT. After a yummy lunch at mom's house, we came home and realized that we had NO FOOD for dinner. Not even milk, no fruit, nada. I check to see what I could make, and this is what I came up with-french bread pizzas. Of course the kids loved it, but I felt SO GHETTO...next year I will be more prepared! I hope to get some pics from my mother in law to show the fun times we had Christmas Eve!



Here are some pics from Christmas morning. Can you tell what the fave presents from Santa were?







this pic is one of my fave gifts that I gave to the girls. I decided to make them a dress up center, because they have so much fun dressing up at Grandma Brush's house. I went to different used clothing stores and bought high heels, purses, jewelry, hats, and clothes. Then I went to Target and Joanns and bought some halloween costumes at 70-90% off, and filled these bins with treasures. The girls loved it!

Jordyn has great timing...not only did santa come on Christmas eve, but so did the tooth fairy! They are now broke! haha


The aftermath..frightening, isn't it??

Here are some random faves of mine from the day





Non traditional Christmas lunch. We call them haystacks, some call them glorified nachos, either way..they're the bomb! Thanks mom!

Blessings

I've been thinking lately about all the things that I am grateful for this year, and there are TONS of things to list: healthy family, a roof over my head, food in our cupboards, great neighborhood, etc.

One of the things that never fails me though is my amazing friends. I don't even know what I would do without the awesome friends in my life, and I am SO GRATEFUL that I have them! I am so blessed to be surrounded by motivating, supportive, and TALENTED people! I have friends on design teams, I have friends being published in magazines, I have friends being published in books, they're all so crafty and creative and amazing!!!

I went to a secret santa gift exchange last night for my stay at home mom group, and my friend Geena (who CLAIMS she's not so crafty) had her house all decked out with christmas decor. She had a centerpiece on her kitchen table with a glass bowl with dry ice and water so the steam was coming out...and surrounding the bowl were 5 snowmen she made out of socks....it was soooo cute! I'm definitely gonna post a picture as soon as my friend Sandy (hint hint) sends me one =)

Also, my friend Heather just started up a website for her photography. She is amazing, and for those of you that view my blog and are from UTAH....give her a call! Check out her maternity photos, and family photos....beautiful! Most of her gallery is filled with pictures of all of us from our stay at home mom group, and there are even some pictures of my kids in there. Check out her website here.
http://www.heatherbirdphotography.com/-/heatherbirdphotography/default.asp


Christmas is coming wayyyy too fast. I'm not even done shopping, and I'm usually done by Thanksgiving. I havn't wrapped a single gift, the tree is still HALF decorated, havn't made any cookies, and my house is a disaster...but I'm surrounded by the best family and friends life has to offer me, so I'm happy happy happy!

Altered wedding mini book

I finally finished a wedding book that I made for the lady that let us stay at her house while we were in Texas. I would have been done last week, but I still had to get more pictures to put in it!

This book acctually started out as a CIRCUS book that we found in the dollar section of Target while we were in Texas. The first thing that I did with it was cut the edges off of the book with a ruler and an exacto knife. It was already the lengths that it is in the pictures, but the edges were round and in bear shapes and animal shapes.



I then had to cut the paper down to size so that it would fit on each page. This was definitely the HARDEST part! This paper is all from the Laura Ashley collection.

Once I cut all the paper down to size, I applied the paper with Mod Podge. (because it's strong and durable!)



I inked all of the edges of the book with catseye dark brown ink.
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I used my SLIM JIM sizzix alpha on bazzill paper and chipboard to make the WEDDING title



Another hard part was making the pictures FIT into the book. My friend Edie and I are known for getting a lot of closeups and PRE CROPPING pictures, so I didnt have much room for error!

I didn't have much room after the pictures to add many embellishments, so I just added some rub ons here and there, and some flowers with a brad on the front. I wish the pictures would do the COLORS of the paper justice!








I hope Liz likes her gift...we very much appreciate the fact that she let 4 psycho scrapper girls that she had never met stay in her house for 3 nights!!! =)

Visit with Santa

Last night we went to see Alvin and the Chipmunks. Afterwards, we sought out Santa in the mall, and finally found him. Poor guy, he looked soooo hot! As soon as he saw my kids, he gave them some speech about if they fought or not. Of course they both blurted out "yes all the time!" and he told them how when kids fight, he takes their toys and hides them...and the more they fight, the more he hides, until they don't get any presents at all. It was pretty frightening for me to listen to, let alone my kids. See that attempt at a smile from Jordyn? She was terrified of the man! lol Jadyn cried instantly, so we had to use Jacob as a buffer. Had we waited until they all smiled, it would be Christmas of 2008! ha!

Holiday Cards

I made 3 different types of holiday cards so far this year (I know, late start!) and I'm just now scanning them and posting them, because of computer and printer/scanner issues!

All 3 cards are made with Bazzill paper (cardstock) and KI memories patterned paper.
This first card is made using BOSSCUT dies that I bought at the expo. Fast and easy!



For the second card, I took a sheet of KI paper and cut the already made strips up, and spaced them a little bit apart so you could see the red cardstock underneath. After that, I freform cut my own snowman, inked the edges in brown, and used brads as my buttons. I think this one is my favorite!



The last card I made with my new See D's Christmas stamps and brown ink. This card I made for my sister. (no offense Jen) just because I think "HO" is her favorite word, so I thought it would be fitting! ha! (its not crooked in real life, just in the scan, sorry!

Hope you liked my 2008 Christmas cards!

More altered ITEMS to come! I'm working on a mini album for the lady that let us use her house in Texas. Will hopefully be done with it in the next few days, so stay tuned!

The Road is never long between friends!

I wanted to share a mini book that I made for Dona (the bride of the Texas wedding) When Edie and I met Klo at the October Scrap expo this year, Klo and I saw this mini book kit from lickitysplitscrapbook.com and as soon as we saw it and what the quotes said, we instantly knew it was the perfect gift for all of us "yahoo girls" to give to Dona as a wedding gift. I in no way claim to have come up with the creativity for this album, because it was a kit, but it was so darn cute, I just had to show you guys!

A layout made just for me!

So today is my BIRTHDAY! wooo hoo! I'm 31 years young =)
I got an email from my friend Robbyn today, and she made a layout for me for my birthday, that I wanted to share with you guys. I got to be a bridesmaid at her wedding a few months back, and it has some pictures from that event. I dont think I've ever had anyone make a layout for me with me in it before, so it was sweet to get this! Thanks Robbyn!

The coolest scrap store

While in Texas, the 4 of us scrap happy gals decided to go on a scrap store hunt. I know, what's new, right? We had heard of a really cool store, and set out to find it with our handy dandy lil' GPS! When we got there, the store had JUST closed 5 minutes before! We freaked out! (have you SEEN the Mervyns commercial where they're standing at the door saying OPEN OPEN OPEN against the glass? that was US!)
The frightened owner finally came over to see what was steaming up her windows. We told her that we had come all the way from California to see her store, and could we please come in and shop? She was nice enough to let us in, and smart too, cause she made over 300 bucks off the 4 of us freaks! Here are some pics of the coolest scrap store I've ever been to. It was so pretty, and dainty, and you didnt want to leave!
For those of you that LIVE in Texas and have NOT been there, it's called BY DESIGN SCRAPBOOK BOUTIQUE in Houston!

Texas wedding

Ok Y'all, here are the pictures I promised for the wedding! For those of you that DON'T know the story, I met Dona (the bride) 4 years ago in a scrapbooking online group. We have been in the same group/groups together for all 4 years now, and have gotten to know more about eachother than most friends that see eachother all the time do. When she invited our GROUP to her wedding, she never thought in a million years that we'd all say YES! Some of us (including me) met Dona in real life for the first time a couple of days before the wedding. We wouldn't have missed it for the world, and we fell in love with her family and friends and of course her awesome hubby Corey! Here are some of my fave pics from the wedding weekend in Texas!

The Adventures of Flat Klo

Sorry I've been MIA lately. Just got back from a trip to Texas for my friend Dona's wedding. We had the BEST time! Our great friend famous Klo wasn't able to make it because of surgery, so she sent herself to us in the mail in the form of "FLAT KLO" the paper doll-complete with changes of clothes and shoes, etc. We about DIED when we opened the package! I wont be showing ALL of the Klo pics on this site, because I want to keep it G rated, and flat Klo was bad a few times..haha
Here are some of our favorite FLAT KLO moments...

and because I still have Klo with me, the adventures WILL continue....

Movin on up!

I am SOOO excited!
My friend Iris from the Phillipines just made the COVER of the Memory Makers magazine that will hit the stores on Dec 18th, and my best friend Edie just got published in a new book called 601 great scrapbook ideas! I am so happy for them! Both these books are must haves, and I can't wait to get my hands on them!