Missy’s Muses

So it's been another month.....

2009-01-20T12:40:00.000-08:00

It seems like just yesterday I wrote my last post that next week is Christmas. Now here we are on January 20th. Christmas and New Years have come and gone and we are already into the 4th work week of the year.

Work has been quite stressful. Not overly busy, but this is review time and the time of year when I most dislike being a manager. The company announced there will be no raises this year, but we were all pretty much expecting it. I would much rather have no raises and some cutbacks then layoffs - although if things don't get better that will certainly be back on the table as an option. Our business was hit much harder than the company executives thought, so we are all trying to do our part....and do more with less. For now I am just happy to have my job with no immediate signs of change.

Creatively I have been very busy with various assignments. Unfortunatley the box of Christmas gifts that we sent my mother-in-law never made it to her. I am just devistated by this as I had a handmade quilt and my annual photo calendar in the box for her. The store bought stuff can be replaced....but the loss of the quilt is heartbreaking. So I am still trying to finish up replacements for her, and I'm starting to feel the pressure.

Hey Toni, you could quite possibly be the only reader of this post....so I was wondering if you have a facebook account? If so I would love to friend request you....I seem to be spending much more time at that site and update my page a lot more frequently than this blog. So if you have use Facebook can you look me up: Missy Neal - you will see a picture of me sitting with crossed legs looking up into the camera (there are a few Missy Neal's out there).

Hope all is well.

Missy

Christmas can't be next week...

2008-12-19T10:33:00.000-08:00

The month between thanksgiving and Christmas is always a busy month, but this year it seems almost like a blur. Between work, home improvement projects, DT assignments, and yard work I got really behind on Christmas this year. I finally got all my boxes that need to be shipped dropped off at the post office today, but it was a frantic week getting there. I still haven't mailed out a single Christmas card and I am not done shopping for DH. YIKES, remind me next year not to let myself get this far behind again!!!

In other news, DH and I are getting ready for a nice trip to New York next week. We have some traditional Christmas visits planned and also an event packed day in the City with my mom. Even though I HATE the cold weather NY City really is the best place in the world for Christmas. Seeing that giant tree in Rockafeller center always puts a smile on my face. I'm looking forward to seeing my family and some friends and just having a nice relaxing break away from work.

Blogger is once again being difficult for me and not allowing me to post picture.....so I will do my best to be back to share new cards and layouts soon.

I wish everyone a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!!!!

Looking forward to the Thanksgiving break

2008-11-21T07:27:00.000-08:00

I simply can't believe how fast this year has seemed to go by. We are one week away from Thanksgiving with Christmas right around the corner. I am taking all of next week off work. My MIL will be in for a few days for the holiday, and I plan to get a lot of Christmas crafting done. I've had a busy few weeks with several magazine assignments and filling up my card rack at the consignment store. So I am hoping to use the long break to finish up those assignments and then do some crafting for my own Christmas decorations.

Here are a few of my recent pages that I tried to post last month. The first one is from my trip to NY earlier this summer. We went on a little nature walk with my mom....when we had to step over a few rocks she asked me if we were "Extreme" hiking. She was so funny. The 2nd page is my youngest niece taken last spring.....I just LOVE that doodlebug flocked paper!!!

Thanks for stopping by and hope everyone has a happy Thanksgiving!!

Happy Halloween!!!

2008-10-31T07:46:00.000-07:00

It's hard to beleive that we are already at the end of October....but here we are on Halloween day. With the rain in the bay area I'm not sure how many kids will be out tonight, but I have a carved pumpkin, and some spooky lights to welcome those that brave the rain.

Things at work have finally slowed down a bit. This has allowed me to catch my breath the past couple of weeks and close on some projects that have been lingering. I am hearing the rumors that once again our department is going to be reorganized....so that is sure to bring some excitement when it comes.

My mom came out for a visit the week before last and we had a fantastic visit. Most of our time was filled with scrapbook shopping and card making, but we also got in a trip to the coast and some of our favorite foods. So that was a bunch of fun.

Craft wise I have been keeping busy. After getting a bunch of new goodies while my mom was visiting I have been doing quite a bit of scrapbooking and cardmaking. Here are a few of my most recent projects:

OK....blogger is not cooperating this morning so I will have to try to load the pictures later...errrr

I finally did it....

2008-09-18T11:05:00.000-07:00

I have been himming and hawing for a long time about trying to "sell" some of my cards, handbags, and various paper crafts for quite some time now. I even set up an Esty store many months ago, but never ended up listing anything. But last month I made the decision to once and for all try a consignment store that is really close to my house. So I am now the proud renter of two spaces in the store. One for my handbags, and a card rack for my handmade cards. I busted it pretty good in August to be set up for the September 1st "opening", but was so happy that I had enough to fill both spaces.

It's been almost 3 weeks now and things are going better than I expected....although I admit to keeping my expectations LOW so that I didn't get disappointed. In the end I am more than happy if I just break even on the rent....and if I make any profit I would be extatic.

So that's been keeping me busy for the past month or so. This weekend I am going to start making some Christmas cards, because the store owner said they do 75% of their sales in November and December.

I had to sign a 6 months contract. So I am going to try it out for these 6 months and then see how it goes after that.

In other news....I can finally share one of my favorite layouts in a LONG time. This is a picture of my niece and stepdad goofing around at her sisters birthday party last year. I just love these two:

Cupcake anyone?

2008-08-22T13:35:00.001-07:00

OMG, don't these things just make you smile?

I bought a dingbat font of cupcakes and used my pazzles to cut them. For the flowers, cherries, and strawberries I used doodlebug glitter cardstock (that stuff is so YUMMY), and then I added a bit of stickles glitter glue to finish them off. Seriously, they make me happy just looking at them. This weekend I plan to fnish making them into cards.

Saying Something Nice

2008-08-06T09:17:00.000-07:00

I was catching up on my blog reads and found a very nice comment about me from my friend Wendy. It totally made my day. Just to think that someone with so much going in her own life not only took time to think of me, but also posted about it was really touching.

So I thought I would share some nice things about special people in my life who I probably think about a lot more than they know. Some of these folks don't even know I have a blog so they wont see my messages....but I still hope they know I'm thinking about them

Robin - My very best friend from high school. We meet in the 7th and 8th grade and were virtually inseparable until graduation. Now my dear friend is a school teacher (something she was born to do), a mother of 2 of the most precious and polite litter girls, building a brand new home, and being a stabalizing figure for her entire family. This woman is amazing and her friendship means the world to me. Even though we only see each other once a year when we get together it is like no time has passed.

Karen - I seriously can not imagine college and the first few years after graduation without Karen. I could quite possibly have an entirely different life if it weren't for Karen. We shared the same brain in college, we were partners on virtually every assignment. I really don't know if I would have made it through engineering school without her support. After college we took jobs at the same company (and both of us still work there), we shared an apartment for 2 years in Albuquerque. Today Karen is a super successful manager with the potential to go very high in this company and a mother of 2 little boys. I haven't seen Karen since her wedding a few years ago but I still feel as close to her as ever.

Wendy - www.fragrantblade.blogspot.com - My first real friend who I meet over the internet. In my early days of scrapping Wendy was my main support and a HUGE inspiration. Always willing to give of her time and help with no expectations in return. Offering up a huge amount of advise and know how on all things crafty. As we got to know each other better we found a lot more in common then scrapping. We bonded instantly, and often referred to ourselves as lost sisters....that is the way it really feels with Wendy. I have never thought of Wendy as an "internet friend" or a "scrapping friend".... no way, there is no qualifier needed with her....she is and always will be my "friend". Wendy is a wife to her high school sweetheart (that still blows my mind), a fantastic mother of two, a professional woman, a community volunteer, an extremely talented crafter, and one of the most generous people I know. I seriously have no idea how she makes the time for it all. Now after writing this I realize that I am in need of a scrapping get away soon!!!

Danea or Zee - www.zeedoda.blogspot.com - I also meet Danea online several years ago. At the time she was living in Canada and dating a guy in "California". I later learned that her boyfriend (who is now her husband) lived right here in San Jose. With a year or so of meeting online Danea had moved to California and now lives literally less than 5 miles from my house. Zee is a character with a wicked sense of humar, and this truely amazing talent for scrapping. I have often said that average scrappers can make BasicGrey look fantastic, but it takes a real artist turn the ugliest paper and stickers into something you "have to buy"....seriously she is an amazing artist. Now this is the kicker....she does all this with extreme arthritis (RA) in her hands. Now a mother of a 1 year old boy (completely healthy and cute as a button) Danea has this amazing ability to stay positive and laugh at herself even with all the medical crap (for lack of a better term) that she has to deal with. She is a true inspiration for dealing with dificult times....but I still don't want to be seen with her in flip flops.....cover those toes girlfriend!

Paula - www.keepitsimplemakeitgreat.blogspot.com - Paula....yet another one of my croppers cottage friends. Paula and I have never been extremely close friends....but I think about her all year long as I wait and wait for the annual Christmas photo. Paula is from the Argentina and has a beautiful family (that seems to be growing up so fast), every year they take a picture with Santa....but the thing that gets me is that December is HOT in Argentina, so her entire family wears t-shirts and maybe even shorts when the sit with Santa. For whatever reason this just makes me smile from ear to ear to see.

last but certainly not least
Toni - www.misteejay.blogspot.com - I don't even really know Toni, but she is from the UK and visits my blog. Even when I go missing for over a month so is always the first to welcome me back with a positive post. It's quite possible that she will be the only one to read this post (hehehe) and I really wanted to thank you for your support and let you know that it means a lot to me.

It's August already!!!

2008-08-05T12:30:00.000-07:00

With things at work still so busy it just seems like time is flying by this year. I can't believe that we are into August already. Before you know it the holidays will be here again.

Next week we are getting ready to start our 3rd and final bathroom upgrade. So it will be goodbye to the 1960's pink tile vanity and lenoleum floors and hello to ceramic tile and granite countertops. Nothing too fancy just brining the style up to date. We saved the hardest upgrade for last....the master bathroom. I'm not looking forward to the workers coming in and out of the house, but we can't do it ourselves so I just have to suck it up and deal with it.

I've also been keeping busy on the crafting side. Just yesterday I went to a local consignment shop to inquire about space availability. The owner of the shop seemed very nice, but right now they have a wait list for cards and tote bags....so it might be a while before I get a spot. I picked a place because it is less than 3 miles from my house, so stopping in would be easy. So keep your fingers crossed that a spot opens up soon.

I have been doing a lot of playing with my pazzles tool lately. I got it back in March and am finally getting some time to learn more.

Here are a couple recent pages:

This is my niece at her princess party last year. I normally hate purple, but didn't want to change the background in the pitures....so I went with it and have to say I was happier than I thought I would be with a purple layout.

and this is my nephew also from last summer when he had no front teeth. This little guy is getting ready for first grade next month!!!!

Cards, Cards, Cards

2008-07-17T13:26:00.000-07:00

It's funny that I actually make way more cards than I do scrapbook pages, but I never seem to share them here. So I decided to share a few cards that I have done....some of these a bit old.

I have actually been crafting up a storm lately. After months of sitting pretty in her box, I finally unloaded my pazzles inspiration and got her hooked up. She is a beauty....and I have been playing quite a bit. I joined a few Yahoo groups to get some tips and tricks, and thanks to some very knowledgeable ladies on this site, I am really coming up to speed quickly. The user interface is easier to use than the WinPC that came with the mini....so it has been so much fun.

Sharing some of my latest pages

2008-06-27T07:12:00.001-07:00

A couple pages of my youngest niece....just like her older brother and sister she is growing up too fast. Next month she will be 3!!! I'll be back soon to share more of the two older ones.

Inspired by Wendy

2008-04-28T13:49:00.000-07:00

Well looky what I made last week......

Oh man was this thing super fun and easy. Basically you cut a ton of flannel squares, make a sandwich out of them, sew an X on each square, sew the squares together, fringe the edges, and wash. I worked on the blanket for 2 nights during the week, the better part of Saturday, and Sunday morning....I just love the way it came out. All thanks to the information and help from Wendy.

The blanket measures 4' wide by 5' long. It is 3 layers of flannel and very heavy....this would really keep you warm and cozy on a cold winter day. Just perfect for a lap blanket.

This is a close up of a few squares so you can see more of the details.

I had so much fun making this one that my plan is to make two more of lighter weight cotton for spring type blankets (or when DH has the air conditioning too hight for me). I'll probably make a few more for gifts as I know a few people who these would be perfect for

Thanks again to my wonderful friend Wendy for the inspiration....now you created a rag quilting monster.

Hello again...

2008-04-09T10:22:00.001-07:00

Once again I return after some serious blog neglect.

There just has not been much to blog about lately. Work has once again been consuming the majority of my time....and that is certainly not fun to blog about.

On the house front we started the major remodeling of my bathroom about 3 weeks ago. It is going much slower than I had hoped and that the contractor told us at the start. The good news is, as of last week the tub and tile were all in and it is starting to look like a bathroom again. I'm really happy with the way the tile came out....now I'm just getting anxious for the project to finish. My guess is the end of next week.

DH and I are heading to El Paso tomorrow after work. We will spend a few days visiting his mom and eating some fantastic Mexican food. It has been quite a while since we have been down that way. It's always a boring trip as there is very little to do down there, but I am looking forward to the food.

The best news is that all of my annual reviews for work have been written and delivered. This is always a huge time sink....but this year it wasn't very bad at all.

Crafting wise I have not done much of anything in over a month. With some many people in and out of the house for the remodel I just haven't been in the mood to craft. I don't seem to craft much when my routines are broken....so I hope to get back to having some fun in my room next week.

So if is actually still reading this I really appreciate you stopping by. -Missy

Super Fat Tuesday!!!

2008-02-05T09:08:00.001-08:00

Well it's both Fat Tuesday and more importantly Super Tuesday. So if you are in a state with a primary today, don't forget to get out and vote.

For the first time in a long while I was excited by more than one candidate on the ticket. Over the past few months I have gone back and forth on who should get the vote. My problem is when I listen to my head I decide one way, but when I listen to my heart I go another way. To be honest I will be happy with either Hilary or Barack, but like everybody who votes I had to pick just one.

To my head Hilary represents most of my values and has a lengthy resume of experience. To my heart Barack represents hope and enthusiasm. But the question is which one do I want to see as our president.

It did both my head and heart well last week when the two shared the stage in a debate. They looked very much like running mates - a dream ticket IMO. I only hope that the one who does not get the nomination will consider the runner up prize and join the ticket.

Being an engineer I almost always follow my head....and this seems to be no different. I took the approach that I often do when hiring people into leadership positions at work. It is often a better choice to go with someone with experience and a few battle scars then to go with the new college graduate. With experience usually comes some known weaknesses, but those can often be off set by the strength of experience. While there is a chance the new college graduate may be a great leader, a little experience never hurts. If he/she is born to be a great leader that strength will be with them throughout their career.

So with that logic, I cast my vote this morning. My ideal outcome would be that Hilary wins the nomination and Barack agrees to be her running mate. With 8 years of experience in the VP office I have no doubt where I would cast my vote in 2016.

It really shouldn't be this hard....

2008-02-04T15:02:00.000-08:00

to update a silly little blog at a reasonable frequency, but lately I just can't seem to find the 2 minutes it takes. I know that is really lame as I am on the computer everyday....

With CHA less than a week away I'm getting pretty excited for my trip to Anaheim. I'm taking DH with me so we can have some fun when I am not at the show. I am looking forward to seeing some friends that I haven't seen in person for well over a year!!!! Woo Hoo.

Work is still keeping me busy from morning till night. A few months ago we started probably the biggest project I have ever been responsible for and it's quite challenging....to say the least. The bad news is that this project is going to stretch until the end of 2009, so I need to figure out a way to get balance back in my life. Working crazy for a few months is expected, but working crazy for two years is not good!!!

The good news is that I have been making the most out of the little free time I have. I've been cardmaking, scrapping, and sewing and have learned to be more efficient with my time. Here is one of my latest pages of my beautiful niece....isn't she getting big (and this was taken last summer).

Thanks so much for stopping by. -Missy

Still getting back into the swing of things

2008-01-08T14:30:00.000-08:00

It's hard to believe how slow a work day goes and how fast a vacation day goes....just doesn't seem fair. I'm back to work and still feeling guilty about all those little things I "planned" to do but didn't get to during the break. The good news is the main reason why I didn't get to all my planned stuff is because I got distracted by other fun.

With the exception of a few cards I did for an assignment, I took a little break from papercrafting and ventured into other crafts. I tried my hand at loom knitting, sewing, and before the holiday's I tried to use up some of my ribbon stash by making some styrofoam trees. Wanna see?

Even though it's been a few days of being back to work I am still having trouble getting into the swing of things. It's probably because I have more material sitting in my scraproom just waiting to be sewn into those little bags.....aren't they cute?

I'm hoping to post again real soon with my 2008 goals and objectives!!!

Thanks for stopping by.

Where does the time go....

2007-12-18T07:37:00.000-08:00

In looking at my blog I realized that it has been almost two months since my last post. Yikes even for me that's bad. Sometimes I really wonder where the time goes.

Right after my last post I got busy crating for a holiday craft fair. Then I decided that I would also try selling cards and crafts at our local farmers market. That actually went really well and I am for sure going to do that again once we get past the rainy season. The prep for these events was so much fun and I finally got a chance to use all my great SB supplies on lots of cool home decor type items.

My day job has been keeping me quite busy as well. I have way less time for internet lurking than I would like....but being busy sure helps the days go quickly. Yesterday I was in the office before 7am and didn't leave until after 7pm....on my way home I realized I was starving because I skipped lunch. So being busy at work is not all bad.....but I'm sure looking forward to the break.

Chirstmas is in full swing at my house. This year is the first year ever that I will actually spend Christmas in my own house. For the past 14 years since I graduated college I have travelled over Christmas to either my mom's house or Jim's mom's. So this is a big year for me as I will finally be in my own house. We put up our first real tree two weeks ago, I have decorations all over the house, and best of all we hung lights outside. On Sunday Jim and I took a drive throught our neighborhood to see all the lights. I am amazed at how many people put up lights and how many people go totally crazy with lights everywhere. We didn't get crazy or anything, but the house holds it's own in the neighborhood.

All of my boxes and cards have gone postal and I have just one or two small items left to pick up for Jim. I plan on wrapping the rest of his gifts tonight and maybe tomorrow...then it will be time to relax and wait for the big day. While I never go shopping the day after thanksgiving, I do love to shop on the day after Christmas....so it will be up to San Francisco for us.

Just in case I don't get another update in before the holiday I want to wish everyone a Merry Christmas and happy New Year.

Christmas Crafts

2007-10-31T14:50:00.000-07:00

Back in July I created several projects for a special magazine issue for Christmas:Cards and Crafts for Christmas that I have been dying to share. I just had an absolute blast with this project and crafting for Christmas in the summer was so much fun. So I thought I would share some of my favorites:

2007-10-30T14:31:00.000-07:00

SWEET!!! My blogger seems to be back up allowing me to post pictures. So I thought I would share some recent pages I did for an assignment where I was demonstrating different techniques to frame a photo.

This is one of my DH with his guitar. I found this very cool cement wall in a grade school near by. I used the urban acid action on the photo ans was quite happy with how it turned out.

This is a photo of my niece that my brother took last fall. The entire photo shoot was fantastic and she just look so precious with her little boots and red nose

This one is pictures of me that DH took a few months ago. The page looks crooked but IRL it's straight. I just love these new Daisy Bucket papers and embellies (on both this layout and the one above)

Now that I got the ability to post pictures back I will be back soon to post more. Thanks so much for looking. -Missy

Same ole same ole

2007-10-15T09:14:00.000-07:00

Well it's been a while since I updated and I was starting to feel guilty. I'm still having trouble with blogger not giving me the wysiwyg options in formatting my notes. So I can't format any text or attach any pictures. So at the moment I am really thinking about moving over to typepad becuase my blog seems way too dull without the ability to share pictures.

After a week of jury duty (that was actually quite interesting) I have been back at work and the status quo. I have been so busy at work I don't have much time for anything else. We are just getting started on a major project that will last until the middle of 2009. This project will be a huge resourse drain on my team from now until it is completed....so I am trying to get myself and my team ready for the new work load.

On the scrapping front I haven't been very active in the past few weeks. I struggled to get some assignments done this weekend but haven't made much progress on anything else. I still have a few more things to make for assignments and then it will be back to fun cardmaking for the craft faire I am doing next month. I have actually had a blast making cards and ornaments for the faire so I hope it goes well. Tomorrow I have to go and get a resellers permit for the faire....so keep your fingers crossed that I don't run into any issues with that.

Not much else going on. Please tell the blogger Gods that I need my wysiwyg window back - nothing on my end has changed so I don't know what the problem is.

Memory Trends and More

2007-09-27T13:27:00.000-07:00

Time sure does go by fast when your on vacation. I got back from Memory Trends on Sunday and have been playing catch up at work ever since.

MT was very small and quiet this year. As someone who was walking the floor this was great. The booths were fairly empty and there was plenty of time to look at all the new goodies and ask questions. As a vendor I'm sure it was disappointing being so slow. There was very little that was new just for MT, but since I didn't go to CHA-S there were some things I hadn't seen yet. This will probably be my last MT, but I'm still gald I went for a little while.

With the show being so slow I had a lot more time for seeing Vegas. I dragged DH with me this year and we walked to virtually every hotel on the strip. We did a lot of shopping and saw several shows but by far the most exciting night was watching the Cirque Beatles show. It was just fantastic....even picked me up a $40 T-shirt to remember the night.

Work has been kicking my butt this week. I'm trying to catch up from the days I missed last week and just got a HUGE project to lead for the next 9 months. With my work hours being so long I haven't really scrapped much of anything since getting back from Vegas. I finished a few cards I was working on and that's about all. I have 2 DT assignments that have to be mailed no later than Monday....so that will probably consume most of my weekend.

So just another day and a half for my much needed weekend...even if I have to work a bit.

Silly blogger still wont give me my wysisyg buttons for composing new posts...so I can't edit the format or attach pictures. Very strange.

Thanks so much for stopping by.

On my way to Memory Trends

2007-09-18T10:01:00.000-07:00

Well blogger still wont let me post pictures. My formatting tool bar has vanished from my "create" new post window....so I have no way of formatting or adding pictures.

I made my reservations for Vegas several months ago to make sure I got a good airfare and hotel rate. Since that time the wind has blown out of the sails of Memory Trends. Most of the companies that I am interested in seeing will not be there. I'm sure that Making Memories, American Crafts, and May Arts will provide some good eye candy but nothing like past years.

But it's not all bad news. I just found out that Ginger is going to the show as well!!!! Woo Hoo. That will be fantastic to meet up her for a little while. We already have plans for an extra look at the Quickutz and Ameircan Crafts booths...I'm sure those of you who have been to shows know what I'm talking about. Hehehe.

I'm expecting the highlight of the trip to be the Thrusday night Cirque "love" show - beatles themed. DH and I have wanted to see this show since it came out last year. We got great tickets and are both very excited about going.

The trip also gives me 3 days away from work. Lately that have been a very very good thing.

So all-in-all it should be a fun little trip filled with some good time. The show may not be great but I'm for sure going to make the best out of my trip.

So how was your weekend?

2007-09-10T07:45:00.000-07:00

Mine was great. DH and I had virtually nothing planned and did very little in the way of typical weekend chores. Saturday early afternoon we took a ride to Mountain View for a very cool craft faire. There were so many fantastic booths to look at. After eating some good junk food and looking around we picked up a new set of wind chimes and a very cool wind catcher decoration.

Last week I decided to rent a table at this years Christmas craft show in my local town to sell handmade greeting cards and ornaments - this is a very small annual show. I am planning to make a variety of cards focused on Christmas, Birthday, Thank You, Baby, and General Greetings. This weekend I pulled out all my Chirstmas paper and embellies (some really old stuff - like the Metal MM Charms from 4 years ago) and started on the Christmas cards. My scraproom is a total disaster but I did make 10 styles of Christmas cards with 5-6 cards in each style. It felt great to work that fast. All the cards were based on designs I had already made for DT assignments so I was basically just lifting myself. I was so much fun!!!

In other good news the special issue Cards and Crafts for Chirstmas book came out last week and my advent calendar is the main picture on the cover. I was so excited as this is the first advent calendar I have ever made.

Blogger is being unfriendly this morning so I can't post a link or any photots so I will try to come back soon and post some of my favorites from this issue.

A few more pages

2007-08-24T09:15:00.001-07:00

Two more pages that I did recently. The first one is of my youngest niece taken a few months ago. She is just over 2 and loves to pick up and touch everything. The second page is my other niece who was posing for me during our Arizona trip. She was just adorable playing with her hat.

Last night I had a really good crafting night. I finally got started on a new assignment for some altered items and had so much fun picking out products and coming up with ideas. When I scrapbook I spend so much time picking pictures and printing....but with non-photo altered items the entire process goes by so fast. I completed one project and started on a second one with just a few hours of crafting.

On the work front, yesterday was a really fun day. Our entire department had an off-site potluck picnic for the afternoon. It was a nice break from work to enjoy each others company and play a few games. I did realize that my kickball skills have decreased over the past 25 years.

Jim and I have plans to go to San Fran this weekend just to get out and about for a while. I'll probably take my camera and try to get a few shots. Nothing else major in the way of plans. I do plan to get some more crafting done and want to rearrange my small embellishment and prima flower storage....so we'll see how that goes.

Have a good weekend everybody.

Layouts from our Arizona Trip

2007-08-22T08:10:00.000-07:00

Here are a couple of layouts I made with pictures from our Arizona trip in June. The top page is my niece playing at the waterpark we went to. They had this fountain that she just loved....I have no idea how her mom got her hair in those little pig tails but it was just so cute. I took that picture of my nephew from the balcony of our room - looking at how big he was really made me think about how quick he was growing up. What's funny is how different he looks now, just 8 weeks later, after he lost his front teeth.

So far this week is going so slow for me. Things at work are fairly slow this week, but I have a big presentation on Friday that will be sure to start some fireworks. Scrapwise I just finished up an assignment for SBM issue 26 and now I will move on to some altered projects for ScrapGenie this week....I have a few new ideas that should be fun to try out.

Not much else going on this week. I'll be back soon to share a few more pages from Arizona.

All I want for Christmas.....

2007-08-15T07:37:00.001-07:00

...is my two front teeth. Ohhhhh my just look at him. All toothless, proud and very excited. So between having lost his two front teeth and starting kindergarten in a few weeks he is one happy guy. Aunt Missy loves you!!!

Just being silly

2007-08-06T10:56:00.000-07:00

These two had Jim and I cracking up with all those faces. I took this shot as we were getting ready to leave for the waterpark during our Arizona trip in June. Everytime I turned around the camera the faces started....this was probably the funniest shot of the bunch. I had fun playing with some of my new Magistical Memories chipboard and some old MME paper that I got in the slab from Costco. Thanks for looking.

Missing posts

2007-07-31T08:24:00.000-07:00

It appears that a few of my recent posts have gone missing. I hope that this post will help pop them out again. Very strange.

2 posts in 1 day

2007-07-27T11:05:00.000-07:00

So I decided to break blog tradition and just share some random non-scrapping thoughts that I've been thinking about lately:

Obama vs. Clinton is a tough decision....but exciting and interesting.
My beloved Yankees had a good streak but are still 7 1/2 games behind Boston.
The difference between passing judgement and having an opinion is a very fine line.
I have no interest in Lindsay Lohan or the Tour De France.
I seriouly need a new job.
I miss Wendy.
Cherry Coke Zero is now my favorite soda.
I wish I had a british accent!
It's time for a new car but I don't know what to get.
My new front doors that we ordered in March are still not installed and I am getting very frustrated.

My fastest Layout ever

2007-07-27T10:58:00.000-07:00

Well maybe not ever, but it's close. I got this Imaginise rub-on several weeks ago and just loved the colors in it. It's been sitting on my desk ever since I got it. Just seems like something else always gets in the way. Last night I decided it was time to make a layout with it, but I only had 30 minutes to scrap. In that 30 minutes I selected and printed the photo, created the layout, and scanned the image. If that is not my record it's pretty close to it.

This one's for my mom

2007-07-19T07:57:00.001-07:00

My poor mom called me because she had no idea how to use these large Technique Tuesday chipboard shapes. Since I had the same set I made this quick page to give her an idea of what to do. I just love that my mom scrapbooks - without her phone call I probably would have just goofed off in my room and got nothing done. So she is quite motivational. Her next request is to see something using the doodlebug glitter chipboard.

I'm sort bummed that I am not in Chicago right now drooling over all the new goodies....I am so grateful to lifetime moments for having such a complete sneak peek forum for us to get a look at what's to come. The better news for me is that I have made my reservations for Memory Trends this September. DH is going to go with me and we are going to see the Circ Beatles show at the Mirage. So even if the MT show is slow I'll still have a good time in Vegas.

Other than that not much is going on with me. I have a friend from work coming over again this weekend for a little scrapping fun (she is new to scrapbooking but seems like it so far).

Victoria Beckham - Ameirca gone mad!!!

2007-07-18T12:50:00.000-07:00

So I will admit to enjoying my share of celebrity gossip, but have never seen what the obsession about Paris, Brittney, and Linsday was all about. Now all of a sudden Victoria Beckham (Posh Spice) seems to be getting the same attention. America is just going crazy over the Beckhams move to the US. I have to say I was not the least bit interested in what this family was up to until the other night when they had a 1 hours special program about her house hunting and move to the US.

There was absolutely nothing on TV that night so while I was scrapping I had this show on in the background. Before long I had totally stopped scrapping and was all involved in this show. Much much to my surprise this woman can across and funny and down-to-earth - albeit a bit high maintenance. She seemed to really love her husband and kids, have a great sense of humor (especially when in came to herself), and was friendly to those she interacted with. Some of her facial expressions were just priceless... and her comment about Brittney "running around without her nickers on" had me rolling.

I don't have any plans to watch the series but this show was actually quite entertaining. It just goes to show you that first impressions aren't always right.

Oh and her husband has one amazing body.... I imagine that soccer is going to be a very popular sport when he starts playing.

2007-07-10T13:12:00.000-07:00

No more excuses, no more reasons, no more apologies - it's just a new norm that I blog once a month. I usually don't post unless I have time to check on all my favorite bloggers, and lately that hasn't been much and I don't expect it to change anytime soon. So I am OK with the new norm being a monthly update.

But with that said we are well into July and I'm still getting back into the swing of work after a fantastic 5 day break over the 4th.

Thanks to the wonderful and talented Diane Grimshaw I have been listening to Christmas Music and scrapping my brains out in Red, Green, and Gold. I had so much fun working on this latest assignment which should be hitting the newstands in September.

Here is a page I did based on a theme of "inspired by fashion"... it was really fun - although I am not a huge fan of being in front of the camera.

Hello, Hello, Hellllllllllooooooo....is anyone out there

2007-06-14T12:43:00.000-07:00

Seriously, I can't believe it's been over a month since I updated this puppy.

I have complained enough about work being crazy...but it just hasn't stopped. I'm not going to whine much more other than to say I have been working 65-70 hour weeks with no exception for more than 2 months now.

On a much brighter note....I took 2 vacation days this week and spent a little time with my brother, his wife, and their 3 kiddies in Arizona this week. My brother and his family flew in from New York and we all meet in Phoenix to see my dad. I had such a wonderful time soaking up the love of my two nieces and nephew, swimming in the hot sun, and just relaxing away from work. It was a much needed break.

While in Arizona I made a few small details to some LSS. Holy cow I was just amazed at Scrapbook Etc. That has to be largest well stocked LSS I have ever been in. After a few hours and some damage to the credit cards I was one happy camper.

Scrapwise I have not done too much lately. Outside of assignments things have been really slow. I had a friend from work come over 2 weeks ago for a lesson on scrapbooking. We had so much fun. It's great to see someone who is completely new to scrapbooking look through embellishments....they just pick out what they like and give no care in the world to how old it is or who makes it.

Here is one of my more recent pages. This is a layout of DH and I on our anniversary.

Yeah, I can finally share this page

2007-05-08T11:22:00.000-07:00

I have been waiting for what seems like forever to share this page. It's certainly not my best page in terms of design or anything....but it's me and my mom scrapbook shopping and nothing makes me happier. The LSS near my mom was having an after Christmas sale. The entire store was 25% off between the hours of 6-7am. Since the store is well over 30 minutes from my mom's house we got up before 5am to make sure we were there for the 6:00am opening. It was a little crazy but so much fun. The SB page was also fun to make as I tried to incorporate a little more whimsy than my normal look.

I didn't do anything specifically for NSD this past weekend, but I did get some fun scrapping in. Mainly I just scrapped for me so that was a lot of fun.

I got a new boss today ...

2007-04-26T10:52:00.000-07:00

Well it's finally official...I got a new boss today. This is part of a huge organization change for my entire department (~300 people impacted) and I am not at all happy about it. The change has been in discussion for several months now, but it became official today. So this really has me bummed right now.

On a much brighter note, I had a nice weekend and found some time for a little scrapping. I finished up a couple cool projects for the next issue of Craft Life & Home (The Scrapgenie Magazine) and started work on my next SBM article....where I got to have fun with felt goodies. I should have plenty of time to finish up the article work this weekend and then move on to some non-assignment work. I'm looking forward to playing with some new goodies I bought over the past few weeks.

In other good news - tomorrow is my 5 year anniversary to DH. We were together for many years before getting married but our actual anniversary is special to me. We are planning to take the day off work and go for a drive down the coast and have fun with our cameras. So I'm very excited about that....and it will give me some new scrapping material as well.

Here are a few things I did a while back but haven't shared yet:

Geez....who is supposed to update this blog!!!

2007-04-17T08:52:00.000-07:00

Oh that's me......sorry!!! If anyone is still checking here's an update

I don't want to start off complaining too much but the past 4 weeks have just been insane for me at work. I lost one of my best engineers, got a new boss, and had several high impact project all due over the past few weeks. My working hours have been crazy and I have done virtually nothing but shop scrap wise.

This week I am finally able to come up for air....even if it's for just a few days. Over the weekend I actually got some crafting done for some DT assignments, and for the first time in what seems like forever I felt creative again. Don't you just hate it when the mojo is not flowing.

In other good news, Susanne is coming into town to visit Danea so we are all going to get together tomorrow after I get out of work. That should be fun

Here are a couple pages I did before my work insanity started....I just love the one of my nephew with the floppy hair and my niece in her tap dance uniform.

March Maddness!!!

2007-03-19T09:19:00.000-07:00

Some of you already know that I am a die hard sports fan. I actually love a lot of sports but my all time favorite is the NCAA basketball tournament. Oh my this is absolutely the best sport ever. There is so much excitement that goes along with these games. Although there are clear favorites it really is anyones game. Every team has hope and a possibility to win. Between last Thursday and yesterday (Sunday) we went from 64 to only 16 teams. Jim and I virtually had the TV on in every room just to make sure we kept up with the action. As always there were some upsets and great surprises. Each game will be played with a greater and greater intensity until we have a single winner. Oh yes, this is the best 3 weeks of the year (sports wise anyway).

Given that I was distracted with the BB games I couldn't concentrate on much SB wise. So I decided to continue on the ultimate organization that I started a few months ago. Taking a tip from Wendy I decided take all my chipboard letters and get rid of the outside (shadows) and only keep the inside letter itself. I ended up with a quite embarrassing amount of outsides that were so heavy I needed to double bag. I also dumped all of my precious primas out of the cute little bottles and packaging into a big sterlite bucket and chucked the packaging. Just between those two tasks I freed up a ton of premium space (within arms reach of my desk). Then I conquered the task of re-organizing my paper. Over the past two years my paper stash has simply gotten out of control. So I went through the majority of paper and thinned out the older stuff that I no longer use (although doing this I came across so many wonderful older papers that I had forgotten about) and also sorted my cardstock by color again. I still have several tasks left before I am finished but have cleaned up the area enough to allow for some crafting this week.

I keep telling myself that I need to get moving on the Heidi Swapp BPS class but then I never make the time for it. I am not going to beat myself up about it....but it's still bugging me. Especially since I have the pictures printed for the 1st two layouts anyway.

Since I didn't get much done this weekend I decided to share a couple pages from last weekend:

Wireless wonders

2007-03-07T12:04:00.000-08:00

My internet PC finally crapped out on me. He has been on the fritz for months and I was keeping him alive on life support....but made the decision this weekend to pull the plug. So now we are sporting a core two duo (for all my Intel friends) with 2G RAM more HD space than I will even need and he's running windows Vista. DH and I have several computers in the house but this one is designated for internet surfing only. I used this opportunity to get the wireless router we bought months ago up and running.....so now I can carry my laptop all over the house and surf.

Now for the best part. We also got a new copier/scanner/printer all-in-one thingy when we got the PC. Since it was bluetooth ready we got that bad boy hooked up wireless as well. It works out perfect to put the pinter across the room (so that it doesn't hog up my desk) without any wires. It's totally like magic.

Technology is great.....for this gadget girl!!!

I thought I would share a layout of my nephew daring me to get his picture without the cup in the way. That little stinker can be so funny sometimes. I really wish I could see him more often.

A productive Weekend

2007-03-05T08:26:00.000-08:00

Happy Monday everyone!!

Wow, DH and I had quite a productive weekend. After a couple month hiatus we are finally back on the house remodel kick. This weekend we bought new patio furniture and some wicker furniture for the sunroom....it will be great to finally put something in this room other than our exercise equipment. In addition we meet with the handyman who is going to start work later this week on the living room and dining room areas. We are so excited to start seeing progress again on bringing our house fashion back into the 21st century.

In addition to the house progress I also got a lot done on the scrapbooking front. This weekend I cranked out 7 new layouts. A few of them were very simple pages but I still got 7 done. Woo Hoo.

Last Thursday I got a great surprise by finding out that one of my layouts made the cover of the current issue of Scrapbook Magazine I was really excited about that since I had no idea about the cover. Here is the layout:

Thanks so much for checking in. I'll be back soon with more pages to share.

I'm BACK!!!!

2007-02-27T08:38:00.000-08:00

Whew, for the 2nd weekend in a row I had a good scrap mojo flowing. This weekend I scrapped just for me. No assignments or worries about insturctions and materials lists. I ended up making 7 layouts. That is a good pace for me. I tried to scrap some everyday photos - what's funny is that some of the best memories I have are captured in everyday candid shots. My goal this weekend was to work on my Heidi Swapp BPS layouts. I ended up getting distracted with other pages but did get sketches done and printed my pictures....so I hope to finish those during the week.

Here are two of my favorite layouts.....I will share the others over the next couple days.

This is my DH playing the guitar. I took these shots weeks ago for my HS BPS goal page (so you will see them again), but ended up getting side tracked and made this page instead. Please don't tell him I used crate paper Cowgirl collection on him....ooooohhh.

This page is me playing a game with my niece and nephew at Christmas time. Poor Aunt Missy had to remind both of them (but especially my 3 year old niece) not to cheat. Oh my their parents have some work to do....but I couldn't help but laugh. They were so cute. This layout made me so happy to remember that day.

Email Woes

2007-02-21T10:35:00.000-08:00

With the amount of junk email that I get I should have known something was wrong earlier when I wasn't getting any emails. When I logged on this morning to find not a single email in my inbox I knew something was wrong. uuugghhh that is so annoying. I was able to get the problem fixed but will not be able to recover any undelivered emails....now I probably didn't get anything important....but I'm sort of obsessing over what I might have missed.

On a brighter front, Jim and I had a really great 3 day weekend. Saturday was errand day and lawn care day. We got so much done and we were both really happy with our progress. Sunday and Monday were a bit lazy. I did manage to get some good scrapping time in and for the first time since Christmas actually felt creative. I made 3 new layouts and 4 cards.....whew, it felt so good to be productive again.

This is not a layout I did this weekend, but it is one of my favorites that I haven't shared. It was part of an article on chipboard.

Happy Valentines Day!!!

2007-02-14T08:00:00.000-08:00

One year ago today Jim and I had been in our house less than a week and were living on the dining room floor as our bedroom was being remodeled. For valentines day we had TV dinners and opened a bottle of wine. We were having trouble with our cable reception, his guitars were still packed, and my scrap stuff would still be boxed up for weeks, so we just sat together enjoyed each others company all night.

With the exception of sleeping on the dining room floor I think we are going to do the same thing this year. No TV, no scrapping, and no guitar....just good ole fashion quality time.

We have never really done much on Valentines day. Jim's birthday was just a few days ago and we went out to a very nice dinner last weekend. So this year we are exchanging cards and kisses....and knowing Jim I'll probably get a little Godiva (because he can't help himself).

So I hope everyone has a wonderful night!!!!

I did it again

2007-02-07T08:05:00.000-08:00

Once again I have neglected my blog. Sometimes I really wonder where the time goes.

It has been over a week since I got back from CHA and I am still digesting all that I saw and going through the mountain of catalogs that I picked up. It's amazing how much stuff I missed. Overall I was impressed by the new releases and the show seemed to have a nice buzz but it wasn't crazy. There was a lot of talk about the fate of Memory Trends so it will be real interesting who decides to pull out.

Since I haven't been up to much the past few weeks I thought I would share the layouts I did for Technique Tuesday's booth. I had so much fun playing with these stamps....

On a side note my nephew turned 5 on monday. Oh my, I just can't believe he is alreayd 5. I called him and had a full on conversation with him about his birthday party. It literally seems like yesterday when I got the call telling me I was an Aunt....now he is 5!!!

Oh my I am so sorry

2007-01-16T09:10:00.000-08:00

....for not blogging since before Christmas. I honestly don't know where the time went. Jim and I spent a wonderful week in New York doing everything we planned plus a little extra. Then we were able to spend New Years week at home. We both minimized our internet time and focused on getting stuff done around the house. That was a great week and we got a bunch of stuff done that had been lingering on our to-do list for months.

Scrapwise I have been focused on a magazine assignment and some CHA work. I was overly excited to get an opportunity to make 2 layouts for the Technique Tuesday CHA booth. Now that I have a little break before my next assignment is due I am hoping to get caught up on the Heidi Swapp BPS class as well as on my mission to make Christmas ornaments and decorations for myself (LOL...yes, I am really going to start this early so I have a chance of finishing by December). My goal is to hand make all the ornaments on my main tree. So wish me luck on those tasks.

I will be heading down to Anaheim in 2 weeks for CHA. I am very excited to see the new products and companies. Not to mention I will get to see several of my SoCal friends at the show. I also get to see Becks (from the UK) again so that is cool.

Well I am still trying to catch up after being off work for over two weeks. So I am going to sign off for now, but hope to be back soon with some new pictures.

Happy Holidays

2006-12-20T07:27:00.000-08:00

WOW I can't believe that Christmas is almost here. The past two weeks have been crafting crazy for me. Finishing up assignments, cards, and gifts...I'm sure most of you can relate. So I don't have anything new to share right now....but I will after the holidays.

Jim and I are getting ready to leave for New York on Friday. I am so excited about the trip. Of course the highlight of the trip will be seeing my nieces and nephew, but we also have a day planned in New York City. First the Radio City Music Hall show, then an NBC studio tour, a view from top-of-the-rock, and then if we have time a stop by the Morgan Museum to see a Bob Dylan Exhibit. Since none of us are brave enough to drive in the city we will take the train down and back. It's going to be a great day. To top all of that off, I am going to get real NY pizza and Italian food....something we just can't get here in CA. No matter how many people from "NY" that own resturants here in CA, there is nothing like real pizza from NY. Seriously, I think there is something in the water that make the crust taste so good.

I hope all of you have a happy holiday!!!!

Crazy for Canvas

2006-12-07T08:51:00.000-08:00

I finally tried my hand at canvas creations. They are really very quick and fun to make. Both of these will be Christmas gifts this year. I have always sturggled with how to display handmade creations outside of my scraproom....so I love that these stand up by themselves. I am planning to make one or two for myself to put up on my mantle.

Jumbo Embellies!!!

2006-12-01T08:59:00.000-08:00

I'm finally able to share a few layouts I did on super-sized embellishments. I know Wendy is going to love the picture in the 2nd page.....wozers look at that red hair on my niece.

Holy international blog batman!!!

2006-11-28T15:41:00.000-08:00

OK, it really is the silly things that bring this girl joy. With the link from Pencil Lines my blog has been getting a lot of views since Sunday. In the past 24 hours I have had 50 visits to my blog (way more than usual) with a very interesting distribution that I got from my blog counter (and I love statistics):

Over 50% of the visits came from outside the USA.
People from 9 different contries came to visit. A big huge hello to my UK friends, but I also had visitors from Canada, Australia, South Africa, Singapore, Sweden, Netherlands, and Spain.... that's quite a list!
16 people linked to me from the pencil lines blog
3 people found me using google search for either "Missy's Muses" or "Missy Neal" - on a side note have you ever googled your own name - it's funny what comes up.
8 people leaving the blog clicked out to the Pencil Lines blog

Man, I really wish I knew who was stopping by to take a look. I would love to think about having friends in all these great locations.

Well thanks to everyone who stopped by....you really made my day.

Check out this weeks Pencil Lines guest member

2006-11-27T19:45:00.000-08:00

Woo Hoo....a little tooty toot for me. I am so proud to be this weeks guest designer for the UK's smashing hit sketch challenge website: Pencil Lines. Each week this amazinly talented group of scrappers put up a sketch challenge. This week I was the lucky designer of the sketch and also made the following layout for the challenge:

Totally in LOVE with 8x8

2006-11-26T12:18:00.000-08:00

Gosh, I feel so guilty for neglecting my blog the past two weeks, but it's been a little crazy. My dear MIL was in for a visit this week and we had a lovely time. We even ventured to the shopping mecca of Union Square San Francisco for a little black friday shopping. The good news is that I am now 90% done with my Christmas shopping.
.

Scrap wise I have been working on a 8x8 album for my MIL and found out that I LOVE this size. It's just perfect for a 4x6 picture. I also went on a mission to use up some of my older embellies.....just look at these pages and you are sure to find some blast from the past items.

About a year ago I did CKU masters where had a circuit of these 8x8 pages. I was not impressed with this portion of the CKU and thought I would never do this size again. That was until I found a super cute album that was just too perfect to pass up. So I decided to make my MIL a little album for her birthday. Oh my it was like heaven. The pages were fun and went together so quick and easy. I will for sure be doing another one of these. In the meantime check out some of the super fast cuties that went into my MIL's album:

Sharing my Bling

2006-11-08T06:46:00.000-08:00

I haven't been scrapping much lately and what I have been doing can't be shared just yet, so I decided to share 2 of my favorite layouts from the current issue of the Scrapbook Magazine in the article on Bling.

The first is a layout of my Grandparents who were married for 57 years. My grandpa passed away earlier this year so it's really a tribute page to him. The 2nd page is my niece playing in the flowers at my moms house. I have scrapped this picture before but I just loved the way the colors in this page looked.

Thanks so much for looking.

It's time to vote...

2006-11-07T10:00:00.000-08:00

For everyone in the US today is an important day. Remember to get out and vote...it's important and your civic duty.

Since DH and I moved since last election we had a new polling location. I was surprised when I got to the polls at 7:00am today and there were already 15 people ahead of us in line. It took almost 45 minutes to get our votes cast, but it was well worth it. A lot of my friends are voting absentee, but for me there is something that just feels good about standing in line to cast my vote. I am wearing my sticker today and hope you all do the same.

Inspired by...

2006-10-28T14:44:00.000-07:00

Here is my Sweet and Sassy layout inspired by Carole and Joanne. I was a pop dot fool on this layout. Each flower is pop dot and the petals are bent upward. I wish the scan showed the dimention better. It was really fun to give this look a try....but I have a lot to learn.

Warning...

2006-10-27T19:27:00.000-07:00

The following links may contain unbelievably inspiring work that may compel scrappers to immediately drop what they are doing and scrap.

Whoa, you know with the number of blogs and online galleries out there, it's easy to get used to seeing phenomenal work out there. However there are still times when my heart stops and I am just in total awe. That happened to me today....not once, but twice.

While I was doing my morning blog surfingI noticed on the ScrapGenie blog that Becks added Carole Janson as a DT member. So I just clicked on her blog link and WOWZERS. Then a few hours later I got a comment on my blog from Joanne Bain- so I followed her link back to her blog and was blown away again for the 2nd time today.

Seriously, I am just amazed by the work of these two ladies. Both are from Australia and have left me itching to get into my scraproom and try to create a 3-D layout. Check out the amazingly cool dimension they add to their art by pop dotting and folding the paper. They look so cool on-line I can't even imagine how good they look IRL.

So without further ado, I urge you to go check out the work of these two amazing artist:

Carole Janson

Joanne Bain

I have guests in town this weekend but I sure hope that my next post will be a 3-D layout inspired by these ladies.

I am going to admit it....

2006-10-26T08:00:00.000-07:00

I scrap almost completely for the creative and artistic outlet. Memory keeping has never been my top priority. I am not making scrapbook albums with the hope that they will be passed on for generations. From my first trip to the local scrapbook store it has always been about the creative aspect for me. I think this is why I have never been into long and meaningful journaling and why it doesn’t bother me when my pages sit stacked on top of each other for months in my scraproom. While I do prefer to scrap my friends and loved ones, I have no problem finding inspiration to scrap stock photos or people I don’t know.

There I admit it. Memory keeping is not my motivation.

Recently there have been many well know scrapbook artist taking a step back from the commercial aspect of the industry. Many of them are realizing they don’t have time for what made them get into scrapping in the first place – Memory Keeping. So many times when people get down about not being published or selected for a call their friends will rally and tell them to remember why they started scrapping in the first place – to record your memories to pass on to your children or family. These type of posts actually make me feel bad, almost guilty that Memory keeping is not what scrapbooking is all about for me but rather just a creative outlet. In some ways I feel that I am cheating the hobby.

I do love to look at my completed pages and remember the moment that is being captured, but I can get this same feeling from looking at a photo album as well. All the papers and embellishments do for me is add a creative twist to the photos. I do credit my love of scrapbooking with my desire to improve my photo taking and editing skills. I’m sure that I will be scrapping for a long time to come and hope to continue growing creatively through the process. If the result of this creative growth are scrapbook albums that get passed to the next generation it’s just an added bonus.

So there you have it…..I full confession!!!

Pumpkin Pages

2006-10-19T18:05:00.000-07:00

Here are two new layouts I did with pictures from the pumpkin patch last week. The first one is not my typical style but I wanted to use my new Daisy D's paper and paper frills and had so many pictures I wanted to scrap. The second layout was done for a Speshal dare and I wanted to try out my newly purchased itty bitty actions.....still need practice with that but I love that blown out photo look. Thanks so much for looking.

Rosie will be scrapping on the View tomorrow or Friday

2006-10-18T08:49:00.000-07:00

How cool is that. Rosie has been a scrapbooker for a while and this Thursday or Friday she will be doing a segment on journal/scrapbooking on the view. Linda Woods & Karen Dinino are special gusts who are promoting their awesome book "Visual Chronicles". They are going to be using Walnut Ink TintZ from Fiber Scraps. A huge congrats to Patricia (the owner and creator of Fiber Scraps).

I am just so excited to see Rosie scrap. I will be setting my TiVo for sure.

Fiber Scraps Lunch Bag Book

2006-10-15T10:55:00.000-07:00

I made my first lunch bag book well over a year ago and have been wanting to do another one ever since. DH and I went pumpkin picking last weekend and I figured these fiber scraps paper would match perfectly. What you can't tell from the photos is that the bags were distressed with walnut stain TintZ before being decorated.

Fiber Scraps Projects

2006-10-15T10:51:00.000-07:00

After coming back from Memory Trends I feel so motivated to create. Here are a couple quick projects I did using Fiber Scraps products.

A decoupaged ornamet

And a gift bag

Vegas Baby

2006-10-12T09:44:00.000-07:00

Woo Hoo....I just got back from an exciting and exhausting 2 days in Vegas. I'm actually glad to be back at work - SITTING.

Memory Trends seemed quite a bit slower this year, but there was plenty of great stuff to tickle my fancy. The highlight of the trip was meeting up with Natalie, Becks, and Michelle not too long into the show on Tuesday. I am still feeling quite compelled to speak with a British accent. In fact in my head I am writing this entry with perfect English diction. I learned quite a few new words and phrases that I must practice up on for our next visit. Michelle and Becks were booked with meetings so I had the extreme pleasure of walking the majority of the floor with Nat. Come to find out that Nat and I are like Yin and Yang when it comes to scrapbooking tastes. She is drawn to the contemporary lines with geometric shapes and open space on layouts. I on the other hand still love the vintage, grunge look of Cosmo and similar lines.

There was clearly a theme to this years show: Bling, Chipboard, and Clear stamps. Many companies combined the first two and had chipboard bling. Scrapworks and a few others figured out how to bake the glitter right into the chipboard when it is patterned….this keeps the glitter on the chipboard and off your hands. I can’t tell you how many times I have gone to work and found glitter in my hair or even on my face. So baked on glitter is the hot set up.

Now a few comments about the products and booths:
• Crate Paper, Crate Paper, Crate Paper……OMG, this stuff is just absolutely to die for. The Christmas line was probably my favorite of the show.
• The new BasicGrey fruitcake line was also a fantastic Christmas line and one that will certainly be finding its way to my scraproom.
• The 7 Gypsies booth had some of the most amazing projects. So grungy and yummy!!!
• The layouts and creations in so many booths were just amazing, but I have to say that some of my very favorite pages were in the MAMBI booth. Yup, the MAMBI booth. They have a bunch of new bling words and shapes that are fantastic, but it’s what their designers did with them that impressed me the most.
• Scenic Route was another super cool stop. With a new line and the coolest GOLD chipboard letter. Very very cool.
• Not to be outdone by its last releases Cosmo Cricket is out with new lines that I LOVE even more than the last lines….seriously, I didn’t that that was possible.
• Technique Tuesday (OK I am a little bias here) but OMG the stamp sets and booth layouts are so amazing. I just LOVE the fact that they feature so many layouts with such great texture and polished details…..LOVE LOVE LOVE this booth.

After writing way too much detail that would probably be way too boring for anyone to read I decided to delete that and talk about the highlights:
• My flight was right on time Monday. I meet up with Danea and Susanne at the hotel and we had a good catching up session.
• Danea had her wrist cast all blinged up, looking so cute, and got a ton of comments on it.
• Susanne was as cute as ever and looked great!!!!
• Monday night I hit the shops at Caesar’s and the Venetian before going back to the room
• Tuesday I hit the show floor early and hooked up with Natalie, Becks, and Michelle for a few minutes and walked the floor with Nat until lunchtime when we took a break to eat.
• After lunch we walked the floor a bit more before finding a seat at the QuickKutz booth where Natalie introduced me to her very cool friend Melanie.
• My feet had had enough so I walked back to the hotel and meet back up with Danea and Susanne. Susanne was not feeling too well, so Danea and I went out to dinner after walking all the way back to the show so Danea could order one of those fancy shmancy massage chairs.
• After dinner it was back to the hotel for a little relaxing and tv.
• Wed morning was breakfast with Natalie and Michelle at the Winn Buffet (enough food for the rest of the day) and back to the show.
• We walked for a bit and meet up with Becks for a little rest on the floor outside BasicGrey. A much needed break for my feet!!!
• I got a very nice surprise to run into WENDY at the prima booth. Holy cow, Wendy showed me some of the most amazing creations she made for the show. Totally amazing stuff. Prima had probably one of the biggest releases at the show. Some really great stuff coming.
• We were just about finished going up and down the aisles when I saw Suzy at the canvas concepts booth. That woman is amazing….totally uplifting and bubbly all the freakin’ time. We stayed for a few minutes and snapped a few pictures.
• I finally got a picture of Becks and I as proof that she is ‘real’ and not my imaginary friend. This gives me plausible deniability for when packages arrive and I tell DH they are samples from Becks. He will never know that Becks/ScrapGenie does not distribute Queen & Co, Heidi Swapp, or Autumn Leaves (oooohhh).
• It was about 4:00pm when I meet back up with Danea and Susanne for a little more walking and then back to the hotel to pack up my bags and head for the airport.
• Once again my flight was right on-time and smooth as silk.

So that’s my trip in a nutshell. Blogger Beta is acting up on me again….so I will be back later with pictures.

Be Silly

2006-10-05T08:30:00.001-07:00

Crate-Birdie-Class
Originally uploaded by mjneal.

Well it looks like I figured out how to load a single photo from flickr, but still don't know how to do multiple photo loads. I'll keep working on that.

This is a layout using the new Crate Paper Birdie collection.

Blog neglect

2006-10-05T07:45:00.000-07:00

OK,let me first say that I switched to Blogger Beta and now I don't know how to load pictures anymore. So I will have to figure that out as I have some new stuff to share.

There is no real reason for my blog neglect. Work has been work and I really haven't been doing much scrapping in the past week or so.

I need to get ready for Memory Trends. I am headed out to Vegas after work on Monday and will meet Danea and Susanne who will already be there. So that is something to look forward to. I'll be sure to take my camera and get lots of pictures.

Now I am off to go figure out how to load pictures again so I can load my recent layouts.

Tagged by Wendy

2006-09-26T09:18:00.000-07:00

So I was tagged by Wendy:

The rule is to list 5 weird things about yourself or your pets and then tag 5 friends and list them:

Gosh, I don't know that enough people read my blog to tag but I'll try: Annie, Carrie, Danea, Juls, and Hebe

Since I don't have any pets I guess my weirdness has to be all about me. Here goes:
1. I am the most picky eater on earth. I don't like any sea food at all, the only veggie I will even consider is corn, and I eat my burgers plain. The good news is that any kind of sweets or Chocolate is not a problem.

2. I have to hit the snooze button each morning twice or I am grumpy all day. I NEED that 18 minutes of grog time before I get out of bed, or I am off kilter all day.

3. I eat the same lunch every day (during the week)....and have since I was in grade school. (pressed ham sandwich, small baggie of pretzles, and an applesause cup).

4. I hate feet - especially mine. I have a giant big toe. Growing up my family called it bongo because it was so big. My shoe size is at least one size larger than I should wear just to make room for that darn toe.

5. I talk to my pictures. Most of the time I am just saying hi to my nieces and nephew that I see more in pictures than in real life. But the fact remains that I talk to the pictures.

Oh my, I love this paper line

2006-09-26T08:18:00.000-07:00

In the past I have sturggled with some of the GinX lines with the bright colors and bold prints....but I just love the look of this line. I am so into these colors right now and just love the look of the blue and orange together. To make sure it was girly enough I added the GinX chipboard flowers to the title and the new Bazzill blooms at the bottom. Thanks so much for looking.

Another routine weekend

2006-09-25T07:38:00.000-07:00

So this weekend was yet another routine weekend where I didn't get as much done as I wanted to - both scrapwise and yardwork wise. It was quite nice and relaxing but now that it's over I feel like I wasted time. O'well there is always next weekend.

I did get some scrapping done. Here is a layout I made just to play with my new GinX papers and pictures my mom took last weekend.

Look how big....

2006-09-20T08:27:00.000-07:00

ooohhh my I can hardly believe my eyes. I just saw these two in June and they already seem so much bigger. This is another layout that I did while my mom was out for a visit. I just got that chatterbox paper and wanted something neutral to match their cloths.

Just playing around with some new goodies.

2006-09-18T09:40:00.000-07:00

This is a really quick page I did of my niece at the beach. I basically just wanted to play with my new Queen and Co. goodies.

These are some older pictures of my nephew that my brother took. I just love his little playful smile that he has in these pictures. I am not usually one for these bright bold colors but I love this scrapworks line.

Be yourself - Fiber Scraps

2006-09-18T07:46:00.000-07:00

Here is my latest layout made for my September Fiber Scraps DT assignment. Yes, I have scrapped this picture before but I loved how his shirt matched the papers - so I used it again.

Materials: Fiber Scraps Pattern Paper, Prism Cardstock, Autumn Leaves stamps, and Lil Davis Chipboard letters. The title was cut using the Pazzles Mini.

No Masters for me

2006-09-13T11:43:00.000-07:00

Well the good news about not being selected as a MMM is that I can finally share my layouts. I know a lot of people are keeping them private in hopes of other publication, but I really wanted to share. Here is 4 of my 5 layouts.....and they are some of my favorites.

Here you go:

Remember Me?

2006-09-08T11:14:00.000-07:00

Oh man I feel so out of the loop. With my moms visit this week I have not checked email, blogs, or MBs in a week. It feels like I have been gone for months. I sure hope you haven't forgotten about me.

Overall my week with my Mom was great. We spent a huge amount of time scrapbooking and shopping. We each got 5 layouts done. The highlight for her was a trip to Suzy's garage where we almost mauled the UPS man when he came in with the new bazzill mini blooms. Good times, good times.

We also did a few non-sb related activities. Including a drive up the coast, cloths shopping, and breakfast at her favorite restaurant (twice!).

This has been a very rough work week for the company I work for. There has been a lot of news press about our impending layouts. So it was actually nice to be out of the office not thinking too much about events I can not control.

Here are a couple of the layouts I did while my mom was here.:

This is me and my mom at Suzy's garage - aren't I brave for posting a picture with no make up on?

This is the new Cosmo Cricket Wanted line. Oh man do I LOVE this paper.

These are the cutest pictures of my niece on the beach. She was laughing so hard. This is one using the sassafrass lass papers and stamps.

I still LOVE scenic route

2006-08-31T07:49:00.000-07:00

even though I was not selected for their DT. Of course with 400+ entries I am not too disappointed....I really didn't think I had a chance to start with. While the entries did not have to be "never before seen" I kept mine unposted until now. So here is the first of 3 layouts I did for the contest:

I just love this picture of my nephew taken last year at the pumpkin patch. This is one of the older SR lines but still one of my favorites.

The MMM winners should be announced either late next week or early the following. I am really looking forward to seeing the winners list ... mostly so I can share those layouts as well. One of them is probably my new favorite of my work. So I'm excited to share.

Can you believe I am still working on organizing my room. This turned into a much bigger project than I thought. I still have a significant amount of work left to finish. However with my mother coming in for a weeks visit I could not let her see my room in the state it was yesterday, so I quickly put everything away for now. At least I can get back to scrapping in there....but I am determined to finish up the organizational overhaul after mom goes back home.

Organizing....

2006-08-25T07:39:00.000-07:00

After this last week, I actually think scrapbooking might have been a hobby invented by the owners of sterlite. It seems that finding the perfect storage and organization is a perpetual quest. Over the years I have found some solutions that work for me that will never be changed, but I am still looking for the easiest way to organize others.

After a visit to Wendy's last week I decided to copy what she did with combining a bunch of embellishments into a single little drawer with no packaging. So this week I have been working for several hours each night to unpackage and combine my supplies. I have been working for hours and still have so much more to go. I've already been to target 3 times for additional storage and have at least one more trip to go (and another one to the hardware store for a nuts/bolts container)

Tonight I am planning to rearrange some of the shelves in my storage cabinet's and get everything put away. I need to get working on my next magazine assignment and want to put the final touches on the layouts I did for Susanne's store. Right now my work table is under a huge pile of supplies.

So that's why I haven't posted anything new....or even scanned the other layouts that I did last weekend for the store.

The perfect scraproom.....is a never ending journey!!!

5 layouts in 1 crop....No Way!!!

2006-08-21T22:04:00.000-07:00

but yes it's even amazing to me, I finished (well almost) 5 pages at Wendy's crop on Saturday. Whoa, I am usually the queen of gab and have never done more than 1 layout at a crop until this weekend. I still did plenty of talking, visiting, and eating but also got 5 pages done for Susanne's store.

Here is the first one I did using one of the newer Center City Designs collections:

In short the weekend was just awesome. Wendy has an amazing house and a beautiful family - along with a fantastic scraproom. The crop on Saturday was great to see so many friends and meet new ones. Not to mention all the yummy food. Wow, I seriously can't wait to do that again.

So after seeing Wendy's embellishment storage I have been on a mission all night to take everything out of it's packaging and make it easy and accessable. I worked all night but haven't made much of a dent.....for sure I am going to like this system better. Thanks so much for the great ideas Wendy.

It's been a good few days...

2006-08-18T07:55:00.000-07:00

Scrapwise. On Tuesday I got my hands on some of the new MME Bohemia papers. Love love love them, and cranked out a layout in record time....gotta love that.

Wednesday morning the first email of the day came from Wendy pointing me to the 2peas thread where I was POTD. Woo Hoo.....it's funny how a little thing like that totally lifted me for the day.

Yesterday I came home to a couple of boxes packed with goodies, including the new Heidi Swapp stuff and the 3 bugs new lines. Very cool stuff.

Last night I finished up a Christmas assignment for Papercraft Essentials (a UK publication) and packed for my crop at Wendy's tomorrow. I am planning to make layouts for my friend Susanne's LSS, so I decided to use pictures that were already printed that I had scraped before. So even though I knew what papers lines I was using and what pictures I was using it still took me several hours to pack.

I am so excited for my trip this weekend. Seeing Wendy and her beautiful family... and of seeing so many foxies. Woo Hoo...

LOVE this new line

2006-08-15T21:55:00.000-07:00

I just got a few sets from the new My Minds Eye Bohemia line. OMG, this paper is to die for.....LOVE it. Here is a really quick layout I did of me and my niece taken in June. I really did nothing but add a picture and prima flowers to this amazing collection. The paper is so darn pretty I hated to cover it up.

The Graduate

2006-08-13T22:13:00.000-07:00

This is my 2nd layout made for the Ali Edwards Designers eye challenge. This challenge was to cut a photo at an angle and then add triangle shaped pattern paper to the bottom. This is a photo from last year that has been waiting for me to scrap.

I also attempted the 3rd layout challenge to make your own pattern paper....LOL, that turned out so ugly I can't post....but will attempt again this week. I also got some assignment work done this weekend and have a few more things to finish up early this week.

Not much else going on this weekend. I saw Danea for a few hours on Saturday. Poor thing wants to scrap so bad, but with her right hand all wrapped up can't do much in the way of scrapping just yet.

My Weekend

2006-08-06T22:30:00.000-07:00

This was a super fast layout. The last of many from this weekend. A BIG HUGE thank you to Kirsty for sending me the LUSH blonde moments papers....I just love them. I was running out of steam tonight and decided to see if I could do a layout in less than 30 minutes. Since this queen and co set matched the pinks and purples of the layout it was easy.... printed the picture, made the layout, and even got it scanned in under 30 minutes.....that's a world record, baby!!!

Not much other than relaxing and scrapping this weekend. I decided to enter the Scenic Route DT contest....so I made my 3 layouts for that. I know I will not make the team but it was just great motivation to use some of the cool products I already had on hand.

So it's back to work in a few hours.....I am sure hoping this week is better than last!!!!

You

2006-08-05T17:08:00.000-07:00

Just playing around with freestyle again. I have so many of these queen and co. embellies with all the new ones on order....so I decided to play with them today.

Materials: Prism Cardstock, Queen and Co. Sequins, brads, ribbon slide, Autumn Leaves stamps, Prima flowers, Doodlebug letter stickers, Maya Road ribbon, CTMH white ink, and brilliance coral ink.

Stealing the show

2006-08-05T17:01:00.000-07:00

My friend and fellow SBM DT memeber Annie is organizing an Ali Edwards Design Challenge. Here is my layout for the first challenge.

For this challenge I used pictures that were already printed and I had laying around for a LONG time. This is my oldest niece taken about 2 years ago. Thanks for the challenge Annie....I'm really happy for the motivation to use some of my "less than perfect" everyday pictures.

My first Fiber Scraps Layout

2006-08-01T21:23:00.000-07:00

This is a quick layout I did tonight using my new stash from Fiber Scraps. Paper, fiber, tintz, tag stickers, and letter stickers all from Fiber Scraps. Other materials: Prism Cardstock, Junkitz flower, and bazzill jumbo brad.

2006-08-01T08:42:00.000-07:00

Woo Hoo. Yesterday I came home to my copy of issue 19 of TSBM. I still have the giddies from seeing my article in print. Here is another layout I did for this issue:

This is my first publication of my youngest niece. She is so much bigger now, but this is still one of my favorite pictures.

We have scrap-ation!!!

2006-07-27T22:20:00.000-07:00

Whew, the weather was even cooler today than yesterday....back down to our normal summer weather. I was finally able to get back into my scraproom. First I had to clean up a HUGE mess that I left behind from the last project - from 2 weeks ago. Once I got everything put away I had less than an hour to scrap, but I was bound and determined to get a page finished. I cheated a little and used a picture that I had already printed.....but here she is my first page after the heat wave.

This is a picture of me and my best friend from college taken about 2 years ago at her wedding shower. Materials: Prism cardstock, prima pp and flowers, foofala buttons, and BasicGrey ribbon. Even if she was a quickie it felt good to scrap again....I've got the itch. Tomorrow its back to my scrapbook magazine assignment.

RELIEF*

2006-07-27T08:36:00.000-07:00

aaaahhhh, the heat finally broke. When I got home from work last night the house was only 91 degrees inside, and it cooled off to 84 before we went to bed. I had a good night sleep for the first time in 10 days. It felt so good, but I didn't want to get up for work this morning. Today should be even cooler than yesterday.....so I have my fingers crossed that I might be able to get back in my scraproom tonight. Woo Hoo....that would be the first scrapping in over 2 weeks.

Here is a layout I did a few months ago as part of my doodling article for issue 17 of the Scrapbook Magazine. This is Wendy and I just before we left for an all day class - her DH took the picture.

I'm still melting

2006-07-25T15:36:00.000-07:00

I so wish I had something more to share, but it is still to hot to do anything but lie around and complain about the heat. According to the news the heat is supposed to break tomorrow and be even better on Thursday....but that's what they said two days ago about yesterday and today... so I am skeptical yet optimistic.

I have a DT deadline looming near and if this heat doesn't let up, I might end up cutting my ear off to get it done (because for sure I will be insane scrapping in this heat).

We did call 3 different companies about installing central air....the soonest we can get it done would be almost 4 weeks from now. So we are going to stick with our original house upgrade plan and have it installed this fall (they are taking advantage of the hot weather and increasing the prices significantly)

I promise not to whine so much on my next post!!!

I'm melting!!!!!

2006-07-22T18:36:00.000-07:00

As of this minute it is now 103 degrees INSIDE the house. I am literally melting. We are off to eat dinner in a well air conditioned resturant. Forget about any kind of scrapping. It's so darn HOT. I hope you all are having a better weekend than me.....uuuggghhh.

Good things come in threes...

2006-07-20T09:36:00.000-07:00

Woo Hoo.....I have some exciting scrapbooking news to share:

1. I will be the newest member of the Fiber Scraps DT (starting August 1st). I am so excited about this opportunity and can't thank them enough for considering me. They have some very cool color combinations on their paper lines and I am really looking forward to working with them.

2. I finished my MMM contest entry (with paperwork) and have sent off to have pictures made of my pages. I plan to have the box sealed and in the mail by the weekend. While my experience is much different than last year, I am glad I decided to enter. In the end I enjoyed the process and I am quite happy with my entry. What's even better is that I really found a fondness for bright pages with multiple photos.

3. I got my next assignment for the Scrapbook Magazine (leave it to Natalie to pick a GREAT topic....a really hot trend) and another assignment for Papercraft essentials. Issue 17 of TSM which has my first article just hit the shelves this week. So I am excited to see this issue IRL.

With things the way they are at my day job.....it is so refreshing to get good news on the scrapbooking front. So I'm a happy camper for sure. Now I just need it to cool down a little so I could actually get in my scraproom and work.

Prima Freakin' ROCKS!!!

2006-07-15T22:35:00.000-07:00

I finally got my hands of some of the new YUMMY Prima papers. OMG I LOVE them. They almost scrap themselves. LOVE LOVE LOVE. Look at those black rubons. That flower was so detailed and rubbed off so smooth and clean.

I am working on a special project and got stuck on my last layout. So I decided to take a quick break and play with my new papers. Papers, bloom, and rubons are all prima, Bazzill brad, and Heidi Swapp journaling spot and fuzzy rubon title.

This page took me 2 weeks

2006-07-06T09:55:00.000-07:00

oooohhh this darn page. About 2 weeks ago I finished one of my favorite pages ever. Right after that I had the mojo flowing and started to work on this page. uuuugghh, I have been struggling ever since. I wanted to make a really special page with this picture of my mother and I, but just couldn't find a way to make it feel right. So after futzing around for 2 weeks I decided to call it a day and slapped down what I had and added the stamped title. This is far from my favorite page but I still love the picture and the colors. 2 good things came of this. First I found my new love of the versa magic chalk ink pads and second my mojo came back and I was able to get through two more pages after this. So here she is....the page that took me 2 weeks

4th of July

2006-07-05T12:51:00.000-07:00

Coming back to work after a long weekend is always the pits....but look what I found in my inbox to cheer me up. Thanks to my brother and SIL for having such cute kiddies!!

We had a nice relaxing long weekend. Jim's mom is in for a visit. She has been helping us in the yard as she has quite a green thumb. Yesterday we went to a little festival in town, ate some junk food, and then took a drive down the coast. We were home before dark so we just watched the fireworks on tv. Tomorrow Jim and I are taking off work and we will spend the day up in San Francisco....so that should be fun.

Scrapping wise I have been in a slump but still got a little done. I finally finished a layout (that I will post later) that has been sitting on my desk for about 10 days. That layout just had me stumped, and after essentially giving up, I slapped it together and called it done. After that page I started working on my next TSBM assignment. Thanks to some expert advice from Wendy (suggesting to use the cheapo cardstock from Michaels to cut flourishy monograms on the pazzles) I was able to finish my 2nd page and start on the 3rd. Thank you WENDY!!

That's about all for now. I hope everyone had a nice 4th!!

8 1/2 x 11 ??

2006-06-24T11:53:00.000-07:00

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.

Nothing to share...

2006-06-22T13:04:00.000-07:00

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?

2006-06-22T12:50:00.000-07:00

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.

Weekend Happenings

2006-06-19T07:46:00.000-07:00

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.

Playing Together

2006-06-18T22:59:00.000-07:00

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

2006-06-18T22:57:00.000-07:00

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

Sweet Girl

2006-06-18T22:53:00.000-07:00

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.

Finally having our garage sale

2006-06-16T07:50:00.000-07:00

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.

A weekend in Tucson.....

2006-06-12T13:12:00.000-07:00

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.

Beach Babe

2006-06-08T07:32:00.000-07:00

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.

Just an update

2006-06-07T07:27:00.000-07:00

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: