Hope everyone had a great Christmas! Haven't blogged in awhile due to getting ready for the holidays, graduation, etc.

Here are a couple of photos from our last all day scrappy. We didn't do a group shot until later in the day and most of the ladies had already left. It was a day where everyone "came and went" all day long! We had a lot of fun and got alot of projects done. We tried to make the last one of the year extrea special with packages made up for each person with paper made just for the occassion, stickers, stamps, tags, candy canes, santa forks, etc.


The best part of this event was that Lorrie was able to come and play with us! Made it feel like home. Hope she can make it to more of them in 2009.










Here is the photo of the "utensil" project I hinted about earlier. They were a big hit. Used them as small gifts for grab bags and friends. Enjoy.





I want to give a special Thank You to all of the ladies that donated products for door prizes: Pam Sivage of Heart of Texas Studios donated Acrylic Ligth bulbs, and a Santa word bloom, Jimmye Sue Mitchell of Texana Designs donated stamps and cards, Janet Bradshaw of Janet's Gems donated cards she made with the iris folding techniques, special tags, and of course I donated paper and stickers from My Town Papers!


I want to thank all of the ladies who have been so faithful with helping to clean up after the scrappies, Patti, Pam, Janet, Christy, Sally, Nancy and I am sure I'm forgetting someone and I apologize if I missed you, please know that it is greatly appreciated.

A Super Special Thank You to all of the ladies that attended. We collected 2 1/2 boxes of canned foods for the Round Rock Serving Center plus $50.00 cash. They were very appreciative.

A recap of what we were able to collect and donate this year:

September $60.00 for Red Cross,
October $90.00 for Make A Wish Foundation
November $100.00 for the Epidermylosis Bullosa Foundation
December $50.00 cash and 2 1/2 boxes of food for The Round Rock Serving Center.

Not only did we have fun but we helped make some families lives a little bit easier. Thank you ladies. WE have and AWESOME group!


And last but not least Patti, for all of the hard work she does to coordinate the food, emails, cleanups, etc. for all of the teasing she endures at each scrappy and for being my dearest friend. Love ya girl!


Can't wait for the 2009 scrappies to begin! Get your Christmas photos ready, I see lots of layouts being done in January!

Are you ready

Are you almost ready for Christmas? I have been working on projects and can't wait to finish so I can upload some photos. I'll give ya a little hint.

Did you know that utensils can be used for things other than food? LOL

What is your favorite project for this holiday season?

I did it!

I am by NO means a techno geek. Whenever faced with a new challenge to do something (like a blog) or adding elements I usually freak out. But this time, I didn't call anyone to hold my hand or walk me through it. I did it (in the words of one grandson) By my own self! I added the Christmassy border. I think I may be creating a techno monster! Who knows what else I'll be adding as time goes by. LOL

Happy Thanksgiving

It's that time of year again. First we talk about pumpkins and Halloween and the next thing you know it is Thanksgiving. Wow where has the year gone? We've had a rough couple of years with the kiddos health issues. But things seem to be looking up.

Brandon had his yearly MRI a couple of weeks ago and everything is NORMAL! What a wonderful word that is!

Jameson had another foot surgery a couple of weeks ago and just this week had one cast taken off (it'll go back on next week) and his little leg and foot looks NORMAL! Again a wonderful word! We will get to see the final results of these past 12 or so months of casts and surgeries around the 16th of December.

So what am I thankful for???? My husband, my daughters, my grandchildren, my puppy and all of my wonderful friends and family who have been so supportive these past 2 years.

Take time to reflect and see how many wonderful things you have to be thankful for this year. For tomorrow- may all of your Thanksgiving dinner be calorie free!

Soups On!

I forgot to mention that we had the most wonderful soups at the scrappy on Saturday. Here is one of the recipes that Desi brought. Thank you Desi! Try it you'll love it!

Southwest 3 bean cheese soup

2 lbs of ground beef
2 lbs of Velveeta
1 can tomato soup
1 can stewed tomato
1 can kidney beans* (*drained but not rinsed off for all the beans)
1 can black eye peas with jalapenos*
1 can pinto (or black) beans*
2 can rotel
1 can corn

Fry beef in stew pot and drain off the grease. Pour all the ingredients into the pot and stir. Let it simmer for 30 minutes on low. Add the Velveeta cheese and stir till the cheese has completely melted. Serve with chips

This soup makes a lot. What I like to do is make it in advance with out the Velveeta and freeze into containers. I take out what I need and when defrosted I just add Velveeta to the pot and serve when hot.

Anyone have a great soup recipe they would love to share? Especially now that the weather is getting cooler. I love it!

I can't believe......

That it has been so long since I posted. So much has happened in the past couple of weeks. I'll try and catch up!

Jamie had his last (hopefully) surgery for his feet. He is in casts yet again until Dec. 16th. Bless his little heart he doesn't let anything keep him down!

We had our all day scrappy on Nov. 13th. We had about 17 ladies show up to scrap the day away. Pictures to follow. Decided that the December scrap will be all finger type foods. I'll be sure to get pictures of that food table! LOL

We have already filled the December scrappy! Should be lots of fun.

Our Fever Friends Group donated $100.00 total to the EB (Epidermylisis Bullosa) Foundation. This touches my heart since this is the rare skin disease that Jameson has. Research is slow to find a cure for it. So far there is not a cure. We sure hope and pray that they will find one in his lifetime. Thank you ladies! I'm sending it out today!

I finally delivered the last of the racks and stickers to the Wag A Bag stores. Look for them all over Round Rock, Pflugerville, Georgetown, Hutto, Austin and Liberty Hill. It is a 6 month trial so let me know when and where you spot them!

Hope everyone has a great Thanksgiving in case I don't make it back with another post before then.

Voting

Well it's official. We have a new President elect. Whether you voted for McCain or Obama isn't an issue. We all have to rally as Americans and support our new President. What an election. This election brought out more people than ever before to vote. That in itself is remarkable. Either way it was going to be a landmark event. Either our first Black President, or our first female Vice President. Wow! What a time to live in.

Trick or Treat!

Two of the grand kiddos stopped by this morning to show me their costumes. Imagine my surprise when I got this treat!

That is what I call DETERMINATION!

Halloween

I love Halloween, don't you?? Each year I look for new ideas to make cards for the grand kiddos and keep finding wonderful designs. This year my dear friend Janet showed me a technique I just had to try. So for the 3 youngest, I did this type of card. Happy Spooking and don't let the goblins get ya!

Fever Friends Scrap Club

We had our 2nd Fever Friends Scrapbooking meeting on Saturday Oct. 25th. What fun! We had around 20-23 ladies come and go throughout the day with lots of laughing, card making, project finishing, layout designing fun! We even had a digital scrapbooker! Plus all of the food everyone brought.

We collected $90.00 for the Make A Wish foundation this time. Way to go ladies.

Jamie photos at last

As promised here is a picture of Jamie. He really is a trooper. We took him to Chucke Cheese and he had a ball. The amazing thing about children is that they don't know that they "can't" or "shouldn't" do things when they have a handicap of any kind. He is not letting having casts on both legs keep him down, BRAVO Jamie, your nani loves you to pieces!

Dear Grandson

We spent most of the day yesterday at the Simply Pediatrics outpatient clinic for my youngest grandson Jameson. Jamie needed to have his casts put back on. He was born with club feet. It was a hard decision and I think his mom was more distressed then he was. Jamie turned 1 in August.

While sitting in the waiting area we heard this awful screaming and sure enough it was Jamie, his mom went running to the recovery room (he needs to be put under for the casting and un-casting process due to a rare skin disease he was born with). Anyway, bless his little heart, he was completely distraught with waking up and seeing all these strangers standing over him. It took us awhile to calm him down.

Last time (he has had casts off and on from Dec. 2007 - July 2008) he was just learning to sit up and try to move around. Was not a happy camper being limited in his movements, so we were really concerned that this was going to be monumental now that he was trying to walk, crawled like maniac and pulled himself up on EVERYTHING!

Well the saying that "kids bounce back fast" is so true! By last night he was sitting up by himslef again and CRAWLING! With casts on both legs! He was his old laughing, smiling, chatting self again! Whew!!!! God Bless my baby boy! Pictures are comin!

Jungle Java

We found a new place to take the kiddos called Jungle Java. What a fun place for kids to run, jump, climb and just be kids. Came home and finally did a layout! Yeah!! I'm excited because my daughter asked me to design a paper for Jungle Java that she could use for her layouts. I did and then decided to ask the owner of JJ if they would like to buy my papers and sell them at their location, they said yes!!! So here is the unveiling of the newest paper in the My Town Series complete with my own layout!

Wordle

Found a new site that I thought would be interesting. Check it out. http://www.wordle.net/. I've been having trouble uploading the image I created so if you have better luck, let me know. I kept trying to download the image so I could do a layout and lost it. I may try to recreate aother one and try it again. In the meantime, enjoy the site.

Last Hurrah

Last night was a Last Hurrah for the Scrapbook Fever team at Pam's house, and we had a blast! Everyone brought a dish to share and we ate all night long! I don't think I have laughed so much in a long long time. We each shared a story about our time with Lorrie. We then played a game (Chinese Swap?) ,where we brought a wrapped item and drew numbers. Then we got to steal it or pick one that hadn't been opened yet. We couldn't stop laughing all night long.

These ladies have so much talent, humor, fun loving attitudes, and passion for scrapbooking. I will miss all of the different techniques each one shared with me. I will miss seeing everyone come in on their day off to visit with whoever was working that day. I will miss going to Scrapbook Fever just to say hi.

We cannot lose touch and plan on having a get together in December. Plus we will have our monthly scraps to look forward to!

Until next time....

Fever Friends Scrappy

Well Ike missed Austin all together and we had our Fever Friends 1st all day Scrappy on Saturday. Had a great time with a total of 16 scrappers who stayed most of the day. A couple more who came to visit with promises of scrapping in October! Took a couple of pictures but haven't had a chance to download them yet. I will post them later.


We decided to take up a donation at each scrappy and everyone who donates can put a charity name in a jar to donate the money we collected. This time we collected $60.00 and drew the Red Cross. I'm sending the money today to the local chapter. Great job scrappers!



More later.....

9-11

I know it's been on everyone's mind and in everyone's prayers that today is the 7th anniversary of that awful day. I hope every one has taken the time to say a prayer for future protection of the U.S. and healing for all of the people who lost a loved one that day. I hope that all of us will remember the unity we all felt in the days that followed, and keep it alive throughout the rest of our lives. I pray that we never again have another attack on our soil. God Bless America.

IKE

Alot of news about Ike hitting the Texas coast this weekend. I hope he slows down and does not cause alot of damage. The weather people are saying we'll get some severe weather up here in the Austin area.

We're planning on having an all day scrap at my church on Saturday. I know the weather will affect the turnout. This is a way for the Scrapbook Fever group of ladies to keep in touch. We all were so saddened by the closing and did not want to lose touch. It won't replace SBF but it will keep new friends in contact. Hopefully a little rain won't stop us! All I can say is "BRING UMBRELLAS"

Mohawks

I just had to post this photo. My grandson saw a guy with a mohawk and asked his mom if he could get his hair cut like that. She saw no harm in letting him have fun prior to starting school (he is only 4) better get these things out of the way before he has to conform to school rules. So here he is. He really thought he was "hot stuff" At least it isn't blue!

Did ya ever?

Did you ever start a project and just know that you had the perfect embellie "somewhere" in your stash? I had one of those days yesterday. I was working on a layout and remembered I had a stash of flowers that would be perfect for the page. So I started looking in all of my bins, my bags (since I've been going to crops and retreats), etc. After about 2 hours and finding things I had forgotten I owned, I gave up. In fact I almost forgot what I was looking for! Moral to this story??? I need to get more organized. How do you store all of your embellies?

Day 2

Thought I would share a photo of my sweet little puppy. His name is Chico and he turned 1 on August 5th. We have had Chico for about 5-6 months. I have to brag here, he is just too darn cute and we have taught him to sit, beg, down, shake, and toy. He loves to get his toy and play for as long as you will toss it for him. He has the sweetest disposition I've ever seen and thinks all humans were put on this earth for him!

First post ever

Alrighty Then. I've been told it is time for me to start my own blog spot so here I am. I've been enjoying several blogs in the past few months and hope I can be as creative as my mentor Pam! Thanks for all of your encouragement! Since picking the name Nani I can promise that I will do my best not to bore you with grandmotherly ramblings. Although with 5 wonderful grandchildren it will be hard not too!

Off to learn more about how to add photos, profiles,etc. Wish me luck!