Happy Birthday NANA!!!

Happy Birthday to YOU!!!

Here's some artwork straight from Joshua's pencil to you!
Front

Back


Front

Back


Don't mind the sghetti faces!

We love you NANA!

I hope you had a wonderful fun filled and PAIN FREE day!

SnowTubing

We all headed up to our local snow tubing park and had a blast Thursday night! The boys loved riding down the hill. Even though my tailbone was still quite a bit sore from my fall last Friday, Gene convinced me to ride down twice....on my tummy! Lord, I was praying I didn't roll off the tube on down the hill on my back! LOL!

Funny thing was the tubing park was the ONLY place in our entire county with snow! They had two feet of the beautiful white stuff. And all of it was "made" by the snow guns. We've had some unusually high temps this past week all the way up to 65 degrees, but it dipped back down on Wednsday and they were able to create the snow hill for us to have fun on Thursday.

Here's the hill. You'll notice just beyond the lights.....all green grass! LOL!


Gene


Kyle


Joshua


And there's nothing like a good game of Air Hockey to complete the night! Joshua won!


No there's no pics of me! Gene didn't have the chance to pry the camera out of my hands!

Bad Blogger!!!

I know I should come visit here more often! I promised mom that I'd drop by and share some photos of the boys. It's been awhile since I've shared anywhere. Mom asked if I was sharing my pictures somewhere else than my spot at DST. No mom.....I'm not hiding from you, ok? LOL!

Here's the boys when we put up our tree. They jumped right in the tree box and posed for the camera.


I promised I would share these little photo frames that I made up for decorating this year. I loved these and found them at Wal-mart for only $1.50 a piece!


Here's a few pics from Kyle's school concert. Always the comedian and Drama King he is. He kept hiding from the camera so the video didn't turn out so well. So much for telling him I was taping so Nana and daddy could see later.



Here is our tree on Christmas night. (Just after Santa visited)


I'm ashamed to say that I got absolutely NO photos of the boys dressed in their Christmas outfits or opening presents. But I'm going to take a different approach to scrapping the holidays 2007. I plan to take pics of each of us with our top presents "in use" and showcasing them on a "Year In Review" page. My own take on using a template like that. That's the plan anyway.

And with that.....Happy New Year everyone!!!


I'll be back soon to share some recent snow pics and Kyle's birthday pics. Just as soon as this poor tailbone will let me sit at the computer for a bit.

~Random Kiddie Stuff~

Let me start by introducing you to one of our elementary schools yearly traditions. Every November, all students are sent home with a brown construction paper with a "turkey" outline traced. It's a family project to "dress" the turkey to help disguise it to get out of town before Thanksgiving. EVERY grade participates in this and it is so neat to see the creative results. As the turkeys are finished at home and start to trickle in, teachers post them outside their classrooms and pretty soon the entire school hallways are filled to the brim with fully dressed turkeys!

Kyle has done two turkeys so far and Joshua has always helped with the projects. Since Joshua started a new Pre-K program at the elementary school this year, he gets to participate with his own creation!

Joshua chose to do a Christmas Tree Turkey. We used green Floam.....ick!!! That stuff is so gross! Even Joshua said, "Eeeeww, mommy this stuff is gross!" and promptly went to the sink to wash his hands. So yes.....I had to finish spreading the "gross" floam myself! He decorated his "tree" with beads from our craft bin. And strung jingle bells on pipe cleaners for "garland". The presents I cut out of construction paper and he made "ribbons" using markers all by himself. He made the hat to top the turkey all by himself! I cut a star to put on the hat as a "tree topper" out of some decorative foil. He was so proud of his Turkey!

Joshua & Mrs. Blood hanging up his Turkey


Kyle's idea was much more "involved". He came home with the idea that his turkey was going to be "Elvis"!!! So I got a white scrap of fabric from the bin at Wal-Mart and cut out his outfit. Yes, I know I forgot the bell bottoms! Gene cut out the guitar and drew the "chest feathers". He also made the hair with sideburns from construction paper. Kyle decorated the outfit, belt & all with gold glitter glue. It was a hit for sure at school! His teacher got a kick out of the "chest feathers". And all the kids wanted to "play" the guitar. I only got a picture of his turkey laying on his desk, because his class was out when I delivered the turkeys.


I also wanted to share some handwriting samples. Joshua is in Pre-K and I'm amazed at how well he writes. I promised my mom I would share these. He has a little write-on & wipe-off book and he loves to sit and write. I use this when Kyle has homework and Joshua wants to "help" Kyle with it! Kyle gets so frustrated, so this helps to distract Joshua.




Last, I want to share some Turkey cooking instructions. Kyle's teacher had all the students write instructions on how to cook a turkey and photocopied all the students pictures and directions and sent them home in a little laminated book for us! It was so cute looking through all the kids writings and instructions. Here is Kyle's entry:
Front Page

Back Page

Sorry about the show through on the picture. The pages are very thin. But you get the idea. Notice on the second page that one of his directions is to say "gras" and eat the turkey? He was the only student who mentioned praying before eating. That sure makes this mommy proud!!!!

Happy Thanksgiving!!!! I hope your day is blessed with love, family, and happy memories!

{Want Beautiful Eyes?}

Then you need to head straight over to the FPD Blog!!!! Jaime has added a new photo tip that is absolutely stunning and will make your eyes in photos POP! It was so easy to do too!

I tried the technique on my 'lil Joshua's photo. He has such beautiful eyes, but rarely do you see it in photographs because they always appear too dark and do not show the light that's really in there. He has hazel, bits of brown, green and even blue flecks at times and they are gorgeous but my photos never were able to capture them. I was disappointed until I read the FPD blog and tried this:

Very rough makeover at this point....I'm still playing with the settings, but was awed by the results and it only took seconds to do!!!

BEFORE


AFTER


My oldest has beautiful blue eyes and I cannot wait to try this technique on some of his closeup photos!!!!

Thanks Jaime for helping me ROCK my photos!!!!

{Bird Kingdom}

It was such a beautiful Fall day! We wore light jackets but decided to leave those in the car at the parking lot of Bird Kingdom. The ads say come early to experience the quiet rainforest setting before the waterfall starts. It was neat to be in the rooms with all the birds flying around. We moved to the nocturnal reptile area next.

My boys are daredevils....so when they seen this sign....it wasn't enough to stop them from looking down!

And here's what we saw down inside!

Within minutes of being in the atrium, this horrible (Harry Potter) large beaked bird flew down and smacked the side of my head. {see above pic} I read on this page that they are training some birds to swoop down and take food right from your hand or what's thrown up in the air. Maybe that is why I was nearly attacked 5 times by the birds in the free flying aviary??? I must have smelled good or something, 'cause 5 different birds swooshed past my head!!!

Wicked Parrots!!!

These parrots were so wicked! I understand now why they have such high perches. There is even a sign that says do not get too close to the parrots. The boys were trying to talk to them and apparently one took offense at Kyle, squaking and flapping his wings. Kyle ducked and ran behind Gene! LOL! So I guess there are still some things that will scare them after all!

Here are a few more random pics. The Java House is made completely of tongue and groove wood pieces. It was very intricate design on the inside as well as the outside. Very beautiful....the pic just doesn't do it justice! Inside we purchased some drinks and two cups of nectar to feed the lorakeets. There's a pic of us in the walkway behind the waterfall, hence the raindrops falling in front of us. And that toucan was AWESOME!!! The boys both spent a great deal of time "talking" to him. He made noises back to the boys. He perched on a tree branch right below where the sidewalk path the boys were on.

And then we were off to feed the lorakeets....

Kyle loved all the birds around him and he didn't even seem to mind that two had pooped down the back of both shoulders before we were done!

They allowed me to take my camera in and I was so glad that I captured these shots of Josh and Gene!

Yup, that one left a little "present" on the back shoulder of Gene's shirt too! I believe I was the only one who got out of the area without being "marked" by those birds. Unless you count being head swooshed, being marked by them! LOL!

Josh was laughing and giggling....all smiles! He LOVED the experience! Unfortunately, we were one of the first customers to fee the birds that day and they were a bit more hungry than we thought.

Once Joshua's cup of nectar was empty, one of the lorakeets scooped down and bit Joshua on the fleshy part of his skin between his thumb and forefinger. We didn't realize it had broken skin and had him rub the Hand Sanitizer they provide as you are leaving the lorakeet feeding station into his hands. He cried and fussed and once we got to the gift area it was bleeding in two spots! We picked out a frog stuffed animal for him to help comfort him. He didn't want anything to do with the stuffed birds at that point. The lady at the counter doctored up his boo-boo with some neosporin and a band-aid. He kept saying, "That wasn't nice of that bird, Mommy!"

After leaving the Bird Aviary, we strolled down to the falls. I captured some beautiful fall foliage and yes....the animals were not done with Joshua yet. But I'm gonna have to leave those pics and stories for tomorrow!

Credits: (In order of appearance in this post) Cocktail Hour Frame by Christina Renee, Wood Frame & Layered Polaroid from Signature Collection by Christina Renee, Aged Frame from Cocktail Hour by Christina Renee & Tag from Signature Collection by Christina Renee, French Knots by Amy Hutchinson, Piled High Cluster by Christina Renee, Vintage Frames by Jessica Bolton

We're back from Niagra Falls!

It was fun....and we're tired! :lol:

Here's some pics...at the end I have a small video clip of the boys at the falls (yes that's me asking the kids questions!) I'll have the WHOLE story of our trip later!

Our Family


The Guys in front of the Falls


That's totally AWEsome!


Bird Kingdom






(Josh got bit!)

All frames by Jessica Bolton

Here's the boys experiencing the "Thunder"!

{Golf}

I've been promising my mom that I would post this little video clip of Kyle. He is playing with the new golf clubs that my mom {nana} got for him during her visit.

Here you go MOM!!!

Click Me

Baby Nathan

Just wanted to post my layout for today! I didn't think I'd get this done in time since I went back to work this morning and have been running all day. But the house is quiet and I had some time to relax and scrap.



I loved the story "behind" this photo so I knew exactly what I wanted to do to scrap this photo.


Full Credits for the layout HERE....and leave me some love!!! :-)
Journaling:

Joshua held Nathan for the first time on July 16, 2007. Just after I snapped this photo, grammy came in and asked, “Joshua, did you pinch that baby?”
To which Joshua replied with great big eyes, “NO! He pinched ME!”



We went to my SIL's for my nephew's birthday party and this was the first opportunity that the boys were able to hold their new little cousin. He shares the same birthday as my husband Gene. The boys were tickled pink to hold the baby. I couldn't resist some photos....even though little Nathan was NOT a happy camper!



Photo Frames are from Shadowed Frames Collection by Sarah VanDyke available at PDW

Life's a Beach

We had fun at the beach....well, the kids did. LOL! Anything that involves dirt and seaweed and possible animal parts....leave me out. Yup! I'm a crystal clear pool kinda girl.

But the boys sure did have fun. The waves were coming in directly to shore. Which means that the sand was being gently moved that direction as well. So even though some of these photos "appear" that the boys are in the very far deep end....they both could still stand up and the water was only waist level on Joshua.

Here's some pics I took of them.....having a blast!




We just got our first assignment for the "Amazing DigiScrap Race II". We need to create a layout about a museum AND use the word Amazing somewhere on the layout. I have the perfect pics for the layout and hope to get that completed soon!

And I'll leave you with a layout that I just finished up for the CRD "CRAZY" Challenge.