Saturday, June 24, 2006

8 1/2 x 11 ??

8 1/2 x 11 is all the rage, but I have been bucking this trend for my beloved 12x12. I haven't scrapped this size since I first started 6 years ago. But today was the day. I have seen so many awesome pages this size I wanted to give it a try myself. hhhmmmm, not so sure I like this too much, but I am going to make at least one album of my niece.

So here are my first layout for the book.

Thursday, June 22, 2006

Nothing to share...

I feel like such a slacker. It has been so *HOT* around here the past couple of days I haven't done a lick of scrapping since Sunday. My new house does not have AC (something we will fix next summer) and it just gets too hot in my scraproom to enjoy myself back there. So for the past 3 nights I have literally done nothing. So I have nothing to share.

I am hoping that the weekend is a bit cooler and I get some mojo going. I want to start work on my next article so I can get ahead of the game. I am also still thinking about entering MMM again this year.....but I would do it much different than last year and probably not obsess over each layout. Even with a more light hearted approach I would need to get working this weekend to finish by the deadline.

I promised this winter when the rain wouldn't stop that I would not complain about the sunny weather.....but I really want to scrap and right now it is just too darn HOT. We are having overhead light and ceiling fans put in all the bedrooms on Sunday....so that should help for sure.

Q: Are you a Pea?

Last night Danea called me after getting home from a fun visit to Suzy West's garage where she hung out with the celbs. During the conversation I re-told her a story about how my mom meet Suzy.

A few months ago I saw that Suzy was teaching a class at my mothers LSS in Goshen NY. Now you see I live 15 miles from Suzy here in California, and Goshen NY is 2,000 miles away, literally in the middle of nowhere. I was so shocked to see that she was going to be there, and as a surprise I signed my mom up for all 3 of Suzy's classes. Now in classic Suzy fashion, when my mom got to the store she was greeted with a big warm welcome from Suzy (who she had never meet) and was introduced as mjneal's mom. During the class there were several conversations about Peas and Pea names.

My mom called me as soon as she got home and just raved about the classes and how much fun she had. After telling me all about what she made she said in a very cute voice "Are you a Pea". To which I responded yes. Then her next question in a very stern motherly sort of way was "What the Hell's a Pea". After telling her a Pea was the nickname of people who chat over at the 2peas site she laughed. She had no idea what they were talking about all day, and no idea why they were referring to me as mjneal. Even though she has been scrapping for several year and even shopped at 2peas on several occasions. LOL....I thought that was funny.

Monday, June 19, 2006

Weekend Happenings

3 cheers for a great weekend. I left work around 3:30pm on Friday to continue getting ready for our Garage sale on Saturday. Danea and Jeff came over to help transport our larger items to their house. I kept the stuff I was still working on organizing and pricing and stayed up until almost midnight before finally calling it quits. The alarm went off bright and early on Saturday so I could be at Danea's house by 6:45am. We had a really good day, with the exception of the 90+ degree weather. Danea blogged all about the details -- here. In summary I made just under $400 and Zee ended up with well over $250 so it was a good day. What's funny is I have never been a garage sale person - don't like going to them and have never had one in my life. Danea had to talk me into having this one, but about 1/2 way through the day on Saturday we were already planning out the next one for late fall...

On Sunday I was planning to sleep in, but the birds were having a chirping field day at 7:00am. I was able to get a few more minutes of sleep but was up before 8. I spent the morning packing up the garage sale items that didn't sell, doing a little work work, and then sitting outside to read the paper. Jim and I had a great lunch out back and did some yard work before going inside around 4. I cleaned up my scraproom that was a disaster, ate dinner around 5 and then started scrapping around 6. I made 3 pages just for fun (posted below) before calling it a night.

So all-in-all it was a great weekend.

Sunday, June 18, 2006

Playing Together

I used photoshop to over expose this picture...This layout uses 7 gypsies paper, a GinX heart, Heidi Swapp letters, and my very own ugly handwriting (No, I don't Love my handwriting even after reading the book).

Lazy Days of Summer

More of the Tucson pictures. This one uses the BasicGrey Color Me Silly line.

Sweet Girl

Just playing around with some of the pictures I took in Tucson last weekend. This is one of my niece using the BasicGrey Urban Couture line.

Friday, June 16, 2006

Finally having our garage sale

We moved into our new house the first week of Feberuary. As we were unpacking we decided to use the dining room (which we have no furniture for) as a holding spot for items we wanted to put in a garage sale. Almost 5 months later the dining room is still jam packed with stuff we want to get rid of. Tomorrow is the day. Danea and I are combining our stuff and will be having our sale at her house tomorrow. Danea lives right around the corner from one of the better LSS in our area. Since we both have a ton of SB supplies we are going to put several signs down that way and hope to attract the SB crowd. I did a major purge of paper, magazines, books, and embellies....not to mention so general household goods that would be great to get rid of. Woo Hoo....I am so excited to get all that stuff out of my dining room and hope to get a little mad money as a bonus.

Monday, June 12, 2006

A weekend in Tucson.....




was exactly what I needed. Jim and I took a very quick trip to Tucson this weekend. My brother and his 2 older ones were out there already so Jim and I decided to join them for the weekend. Other than the weather (which was an oven like 105 degrees in the shade) it was a great weekend. Totally relaxing and a great way to take a mental break from the stress at work. Plus I got to spend some real quality time with my brother and his kiddies. I took literally a couple hundred photos....Deleted about 150 of them immediately but still have a ton of great scrapping material waiting for me.

Saturday we spent the day outside with a trip up and down Mt. Lemmon (the kids loved the ski lift), a ride in a golf cart and some lessons from Pops, and a great dinner at my dad's girlfriends house. Sunday was equally as nice. We meet up with my cousin Colleen, her husband, and their 4 year old son. I hadn't seen Colleen in over 10 years so that was a nice treat. We took the kids to a play area in the mall (as outside was just too hot for them), a quick dip in the pool at Pops house, and then back to the mall to eat dinner (somebody special wanted Chicken and rice from the mall and didn't want to hear any other meal options). Right after dinner it was already time for Jim and I to go back to the airport. So it was a really short trip but well worth it.

Due to the unexpected weekend adventure I am now a little behind on my current article for SBM, but I work best when under a little time pressure so I should be able to finish on-time. As I am about 75% done with the article and 66% done with the layout samples.

Thursday, June 08, 2006

Beach Babe



This is one of my favorite pictures of my niece (SIL took the picture). I'm not crazy about the actual layout so you will probably be seeing this picture again in a different layout. I just went a little overboard with my Rhonna Farrer stamps and Scenic Route papers.

Wednesday, June 07, 2006

Just an update

Work has been incredibly stressful the past two weeks and the next two look even worse. The company is going through a major effort to reduce costs and be more efficient. My group is being put under a lot of pressure to get a ton of analysis done very quickly to help with cost cutting recommendations. Everyone has been working long hours and are just generally grumpy about the tough economic times and possible work force reduction (although nothing has been announced regarding this).

I have been finding my sanity in the few minutes I get to scrap. Yesterday was a great day. I finished up my Christmas projects I have been working on for Becks new book, made a few cards, and finally got a copy of Scrapbooking in a Weekend (woo hoo, I had 13 layouts in the book and joined some really amazing scrappers).

Not much else to blog about. Jim and I are headed to Tucson this weekend to see my dad. My brother and his oldest 2 kiddies will be joining us. It will be a short trip but will be great to see the kids again so soon,

Here is my latest card: