{bliss}

heavy duty storms

I've been offline since Sunday night's excitement:  we had a band of heavy storms move through the state on Sunday afternoon and evening and a tree in the neighborhood was struck by lightning.  The homeowner's house was ok, but his electronics were fried, and so, to our regret, were some of ours.  Tim was able to restore the router, replace the cable modem, and get our home network back up and running, but my laptop is a little cooked.  Lucky for me, the function of the computer is fine, but the network card is fried and I can't get online with it at the moment.  We had been considering going to wireless internet, and this definitely gave us a nudge in that direction!  By the end of the week, we'll have wireless - woo hoo!

Here's my LOAD for today.  You just know I had this Sassafrass Lass collection dancing in my head when I took these photos.  :)  I'm finishing up some other projects tonight that I will be posting later in the week. 

It is very quiet around here right now.  The girls had a playdate this afternoon, and she just went home.  Shortly after, Jon headed back down to his Dad's house to get ready to leave for his vacation with his Dad and step-family.  They are cruising to Alaska - very cool!  I can't wait to see his photos when he comes back, and I even know what papers I'm going to use to scrap some: Barb T has a wonderful Alaska collection that I can use to do a little Alaska mini book for him when he gets home.  :)

I've a fairly quiet day planned for tomorrow.  Our big excursion will be a trip out to the bank and the Post Office, and that is about it.  I've got some RAKs to mail from the Fiskateer Crop weekend and from the scraplift challenge at Peek.  Thursday is a doctor's appointment, and Friday is a catch-up-with-everything-before-going-back-to-work day.  I am still in shock that it is already nearing the end of July.  The kids go back to school on the 26th of August.  Wow!  If we ever get out of this wacky weather pattern we've been stuck in here in the northeast for the last week, I'd like to plan a trip to the beach...

it's the last day of CHA....

And we're one day closer to the ship date of all the new releases like this one from Pink Paislee! lol!  I have been enjoying all the show photos that I have been able to find.  Jackie from Lifetime Moments has a great Flickr set with a lot of photos, and I found this one that has even more!  I have quite the "wish list" going at this point - so many fab new releases!  I just hope they don't hit all at once!  I can't wait for the CI stuff to begin shipping - all that gorgeous Art Warehouse Halloween and Christmas!  Oh my! 

I had someone ask what the "Eye Candy" crystals are on my "Twirly Dress" layout are - they are new from Creative Imaginations!  They're Swarovski crystals, and they have the most sparkle of any rhinestone I have ever seen!  Here's a link to the CI blog with more information about them.  I've been using them on everything!  The colors are so pretty too.

<<<-----  The "Capri Blue" will go wonderfully with this collection!  And I need to get my hands on some of the "Jet" ones for Halloween projects!

I'm overloading on all the Halloween releases - I am just such a sucker for Halloween/Fall/Christmas/Winter collections! Did you see the new "Spellbound" collection from MM??  SO cool!  I love their stuff - consistently awesome from year to year!  The Christmas FaLaLaLa is wonderful, and I love all the new Paperie goodies too. (did you see that the Halloween & Christmas collections both have the Tiny Alphas to go with?  Woo hoo!)

So, I'm having a sneak preview of my own this morning.  Aileen has gone with Daddy to help Memere and Pepere move into their new house, and Brigid is reading.  It is soooooo quiet - this is what it will be like in the fall when they are both in school all day.  Yikes!  Of course, I probably will not be around too much to appreciate all that quiet, because I'm probably going to change my work schedule so that I am out of the house when they are.  Ideally, I'd like to work for the SAU, because then I would have an identical schedule to theirs.  Snow days, school vacations and the like would not be an issue at all.  I have an application in to the HS library, and am keeping my fingers crossed that something good comes of it.  Almost all of my working life has been spent managing bookstores, or working in libraries, so it would be a chance to come full circle in my "career path".

And since I can't have a blog post without posting some sort of project - here are the Lil Davis tags I made for CHA.  The artists were doing limited edition scissor giveaways, and the tags were tied to the handles for the artists to sign.  :)  Yep, I love Halloween collections!

Making Memories scraplift challenge

Last week I chose a layout by Jill Godon over at the Making Memories blog to build a challenge around.  I wanted to start a weekly scraplift challenge, and her Blossom layout was so lovely, I couldn't resist doing a lift!  Several other folks at Peek participated - Barb and Deanna both did wonderful pages, and I'm pretty happy with the way mine turned out, even if it was too lumpy to scan!

I'm on the hunt tonight looking for the next layout to scraplift for next week's challenge.

The Fiskateers board has been hopping this weekend with hourly challenges and lots of fun during our virtual crop.  I've had so much fun chatting and crafting, and browsing through the gallery looking at everyone's creations.  I did this one for my LOAD and it turned out to be perfect for one of the challenges,  Lovin' the Heidi Grace "We Are Family" collection that I used.

Enjoy the rest of the weekend! 

finally! Basic Grey peeks!

can you guess which one is my favorite???

friends...

...are the best!  ------>  Aileen is missing her best friend a lot, and I'm hoping that I can set up a playdate soon to get those two re-united before school starts back up again.  I've got my fingers crossed that they are in the same class for first grade in the fall.

I'm keeping myself busy today with some scrappy projects and helping Jon with his job search.  He's really discouraged, and I wish there was more that I could do to help.  The job market up here in NH stinks in general, and this summer has been horrible for college students seeking temporary employment. 

Wishing all my friends, near and far a wonderful day today.  Lots of folks are en route to CHA, and I wish them safe travels!  I can't wait to hear about the show and see those pre-show party photos start showing up on everyone's blogs.  Happy Wednesday!

So much going on!

We're doing a massive house-cleaning project this week in preparation for swapping bedrooms with the girls this weekend.  We've gotten rid of bags and bags of outgrown clothes, boxes and boxes of outgrown toys, and a ton of various and sundry other items that we've been holding onto for some reason since we moved in!  I've got one side of the bedroom taped and prepped to be painted tonight, and then we'll move all the furniture to that side and repeat the process with the other side.  Then it is a simple matter of moving furniture from one room to the other and setting it all back up again!  It's fun, but sort of exhausting - almost as much work as moving into a new house! 

I'm making over the kitchen as well - changing the color scheme and trying to make the countertops clearer and more task-oriented.  Right now it is all too easy for clutter to accumulate, so I'm trying to clear out enough "junk" to make sure that everything has an uncrowded place to be put away in, so it won't just end up on the counter "waiting" to be put away.  I am going fabric shopping soon, and want to do some new place mats, a table runner and new curtains in my new color scheme!  As an incentive to keep going, I bought a new bright RED dishdrainer yesterday, and can't wait to pull in the rest of my red and white touches.

I've ordered the new furniture for my scrapbook room re-organization project, and can't wait until it all arrives and I can tackle that project.  I definitely want to take some "before" and "after" shots of that project, because it is a HUGE one.  I've already purged a ton of stuff, but my plan for the re-organization is to take everything out of the room, set up the furniture, and then put back only the stuff that I really want and need.  Everything else will have to find a new home!  I've been searching blogs and galleries checking out great storage ideas, and I think I'm going to pick up a copy of Wendy Smedley's The Organized and Inspired Scrapbooker for some more ideas.  I have this set of Technique Tuesday stamps, and am planning to do some fun labels for the new drawers I picked up yesterday.  I'm going to try to organize my embellishments by color for a while and see if that works for me, and I'm going to grab one more set of Making Memories jars at ACM too.  Everyone has been telling me I need to get this organizer, so if I have a coupon, I think that might be a good tool storage solution for my new worktable...  I have one of these that I won at CHA last year, and that is going to be part of my new set up as well - it'll either continue to hold my seasonal products, or I might use it as a staging area for product for specific assignments, I haven't decided yet.

MEANWHILE, the rest of the scrapbooking world is getting ready for CHA.  My friends who are attending the show are getting ready to fly out tomorrow and I wish them all safe travels and a really wonderful time at the show.  Wish I could stow away in someone's luggage so I could go too, but I've got some plans of my own for the weekend.  If you're a Fiskateer, you've probably already read about the CHA Crop that is going on at the Fiskateer site.  There will be hourly challenges, chats, special RAKs and a ton of prizes given out by the generous folks at Fiskars.  I'll be hosting the festivities on Friday, and my friend Melita will be hosting on Saturday.  I hope that you'll join us over at the board - it's going to be a lot of fun!

I was having Typepad issues earlier, and wasn't able to add my layouts, so here they are - better late than never!  lol!

This one uses Basic Grey Euphoria - looove the colors in that collection, and now I'm wishing I had bought more!

The second one is October Afternoon "Detours" - hands down my favorite collection of the summer!

Melange!

Introducing Melange - A new Creative Imaginations brand created by well-loved artists, Christine Adolph and Marah Johnson! 

The first Melange Collection to be released in August 08 will be Fright Night.  Highly stylized, haunting and elegant, this collection features glitter papers, glitter layered stickers and rhinestone metal cast brads to delight!  Don't miss the wonderful Fright Night Sticky adhesive rub-ons - you'll be able to add frightful foil accents to Bare Elements and other party decorations!

Check out a sneak peek of the collection and great projects created with it today on the CI Blog!

more CHA teasers!

Making Memories has a little teensy teaser up this morning.  I see houndstooth and felt, jewels and glitter - can't wait to see the whole collection!  I'll update my post as more show up today.  I'm sure there will be more CI sneak peeks!  ;)

Here's my page for today.  I really like how well the Pink Paislee border worked with the Daisy D's.  The papers & stickers are from the Chloe Marie collection and I love the colors and the soft, worn fabric look. 

We'll be sticking pretty close to home today - our water softener is finally being replaced!  No more yellow laundry!  Yay!  We have such hard water, and the iron content is off the chart, and we've been doing without the softener since our old one died about 8 months ago.  It will be nice to do the laundry and feel like the clothes are really clean!

Later tonight the town fair kicks off with the Library's Book Sale.  I always look forward to that event, because I usually have pretty good luck picking up some great titles that I may have missed when they were first released.  At .25 a book, I can afford to take some risks and have discovered some great authors from picking up a random book at the sale.  That's how I discovered NH author, Jodi Picoult, and I'll be looking for more of her books to be sure!  Hopefully, Jon will find some too because he has been complaining about not having anything new to read...

I've got some scrappy plans for today, and hope that I can get some clean-up in here too.  It looks like a bomb went off on my scrapbook table!  I'm shopping for a new desk for this room as well.  I need some flat surfaces.  I like my hutch desk, but it is not an efficient use of space, so I am looking for a replacement!  I'm definitely feeling the itch to do some re-organization.

Have a wonderful Friday!

CHA Sneak Peeks!

CI has started posting sneak peeks on the blog!  The first one up is Art Warehouse's "Class Act" - love the shaped papers, and the great embellishments that go along with this collection!  Some of the other CI Artists have school-themed releases as well:  Helen Dardick and Barb Tourtilotte both have new collections as well.  You can see a sneak peek of all the lines in this post, and if you look carefully, you can spot a BE piece that I did for the show.  :)

Danelle has some more Art Warehouse peeks on her blog too:  Harvest Moon and Mistletoe.  Check them out here!  Karen Russell has new Narratives sneaks on her blog too.  New Bloom.  Allison has an adorable "little boy" line posted on her blog:  That's My Boy

I'm still playing with the Scenic Route "Liberty" collection.  I am just addicted to the scheme and patterns in this collection.  As a matter of fact, I have decided that I am going to do my kitchen over this summer and have chosen red, white and blue as my new color scheme. I found some beautiful, classic red and white dishes that I love (now all I have to do is find them in a store because the shipping is *insane* for a set of dishes!) and I'm on the search for new curtains - but if I can't find what I want, I'll just make my own!  I'm going to quilt a tablerunner, and find some red placemats for the table, and my red, white and blue transformation will be complete!  Stay tuned for photos!  :)  Guess that is taking my "red, white and blue challenge" to the extreme, huh?  There is still plenty of time to Scrap Your 4th for the challenge at Peek, so I hope you will play along with us!

I'm starting my CHA wish list - oh my goodness there are so many beautiful collections for Christmas coming - and soooo much cool Halloween stuff!  So far my list includes (besides the CI loveliness - I want it ALL!) Pink Paislee (especially the Vintage Moon - loooove that collection)  Cosmo Cricut "Haunted", "Jack's World" and "Mr. Campy" and the new Scenic Route collections Surprise and Sonoma.  I know that Sassafrass Lass has 4 new collections (but I haven't seen them yet) and I really like the new collections from My Mind's Eye.  I'm watching to see what will be coming from Making Memories too, because I always love their stuff!  I am especially keeping an eye out for the other releases from October Afternoon in addition to "Hometown".  I've heard that there are a total of FOUR lines coming at CHA!  Check this out - isn't it lovely?

Happy Sneak Peek hunting!  :)

Making Memories "Passport" & Daisy D's "Sweet Baby Jane"

LOVE this collection!  I took about 400 photos of our vacation last month, and will be relying heavily on this collection to pull them all together!  :)

One other page to share since I was a bad blogger and didn't post at all yesterday - this one uses the Daisy D's "Sweet Baby Jane" collection, on sale now for half price - can't beat that - or maybe you can...  You have to check out Pat's big pre-CHA sale at Peek.  All clearance items that are usually 35%  and 50% off are currently 75% off!!!

There's a story behind this layout too.  The girls had their annual pediatrician visit last week, and despite the 22 month difference in their ages, we discovered that they are less than an inch apart in height, and about a pound and a half apart in weight!  They had to have the chicken pox booster shots, and for the first time they didn't sit on my lap to receive their shots, and there were no tears at all.  *sigh*  My littles are definitely growing up!  I loved the girly pink bandaids the nurse applied after she was done.  ;)

Have a great Tuesday - it is going to be a hot and steamy one today, making me once again very thankful for our air conditioning - and I know the kids will be in the pool before the afternoon is out!