More Stamping

I finally had my friends over for a card-making party. I say finally because I used to do this all the time when I was selling stamps and I meant to keep doing it when I stopped but this is the first time I've actually managed to do it. :) I meant to take pictures of the party but I was too busy stamping so I'm posting pictures of the cards we made instead.


First, the bird card. (Yes, I posted this previously, I’m modifying my post). I like this card because I almost created it. That means I didn’t exactly copy it. I used other cards for ideas and came up with a quasi original. I need more cards for men, I think this works.

Second, the car card. I saw a really cool car card on my friend’s blog: http://www.insteadoflaundry.blogspot.com/ and I HAD to buy the stamp set. My dad has spent years fixing up an old Ford and this was the perfect set to make his Father’s Day card with. I also wanted to make wedding cards with it because my Dad often drives the bride and groom off in his sweet vehicle with cans trailing behind.

This is a picture of my cute Dad with Ol’ Henry, it looks black in this photo but it is actually burgundy.

This is the same card modified to be a birthday card.

I made the next card at a friend’s Close to my Heart party and liked that I could also use it for boys so I decided to make it at my party too.

Of course I do love to make girly cards too!  This was my favorite card. You can’t see the crystal effects on the balloons in the picture but it looks snazzy in real life.

More girly cards:

It was a fun party and I want to do it again soon. I just don’t want to do all the prep work again soon! :)

Kayla begged to make all the cards with me the next day. We spent a few hours stamping together and had a great time.

Anyone need to buy a card? :)

Kayla & Hunter in the Ward Talent Show

American Girls in New York City

Kayla and Olivia at Times Square

Kayla and I started reading the American Girl books together when she was in Kindergarten. We started out by reading "Felicity" which was a great introduction to the Revolutionary War and the founding of our country. This series of books is so great for familiarizing children with different eras in US history--Revolutionary War, Civil War, The Great Depression, World War II, Pioneer times, etc. We have had so much fun doing history clubs based on these books. Initially, we weren't interested in the dolls but Kayla eventually wanted the dolls to remind her of her favorite characters. The dolls are expensive but thanks to Santa Claus and Oma, she has been able to collect 3 dolls over the years--Felicity, Elizabeth, and Kit. For several years she has wanted to visit the American Girl store in NYC and we were finally able to go this year for her 10th birthday. She chose to do this instead of having a birthday party with friends. We couldn't have done it without Oma's help, she gave us the train tickets. Kayla had to use her own money for all of her purchases--birthday money really came in handy. We were so happy that Kayla's close friend, Olivia, could join us for our special day.

Here is the report of our round-trip to New York in less than 24 hours:

3:30 a.m. Wake-up and drive to the train station in D.C.

4:30 a.m. Panic because we can't figure out where to park at the train station and our train is leaving at 5:00 a.m. Interesting note: We saw several rats running around the streets of D.C. at that time, a little unnerving I must say.

5:00 a.m. We make it on the train just in time (yes, we eventually figured out where to park).

8:30 a.m. Arrive in NYC. The store doesn't open until 10:00 a.m. so we eat breakfast at McDonalds and enjoy walking around the big city.

10:00 a.m. Enter the 4-story building and make our way to the 3rd floor to visit the doll hair salon. We've heard the lines can get pretty long so we sign-up right away and only have to wait a few minutes.

After the dolls are fixed up and looking beautiful, we head over to the photo studio where the girls have their pictures put on the cover of American Girl souvenir magazines.

The girls go window-shopping until lunch. They want to use their precious dollars wisely. They carefully plan where every dollar is going to go.

12:30 Birthday lunch in the fun cafe. The dolls have their own special chairs. We have fun reading the table talkers. I can't figure out how to turn the flash on my camera, it somehow got turned off and I can't rely on my usual automatic setting. Hence the poor quality of so many of our photos!

Everything about this place is adorable, even the bathroom!

4:00 Our shopping money is just about gone so we decide to leave the AG Store and enjoy NYC. One big problem--we are loaded with shopping bags.

We divvy up the bags and think we'll be okay. They aren't too heavy...until we walk about a mile, our hands really start to hurt! We think to ourselves..."If we can just make it to the famous Toys-R-Us we'll be okay. We can put our bags in the shopping carts once we arrive."

We finally make it to the biggest Toys-R-Us and discover, to our dismay, they don't have shopping carts. I guess they figure people are walking around NYC so they are only going to purchase what they can carry. I don't know but we were pretty disappointed, we were counting on some hand relief!

Fortunately, we are able to put our bags on a shelf while we ride the giant ferris wheel. There are all kinds of different ferris wheel cars--Scooby Doo, Princesses, Cabbage Patch kids, etc. The only car the girls don't want is the Jimmy Neutron/Spongebob car, of course that is the car they get! :)

5:30 p.m We are exhausted and ready to go home. Our train doesn't leave until 9:00. We take a taxi to the train station anyway, maybe we can hang out there for awhile. Guess what? Penn Station in NYC doesn't have ANY place to sit! We finally collapse on the ground but we quickly realize that isn't going to work for 3 hours. We check to see if we can change our train tickets. We can for about $300, uh...nope! We learn that we can store our packages for a small fee which we gladly pay. Freedom!

6:25 p.m. The girls are ready to go back to the AG store that closes at 7:00. We decide to take a taxi to save time but end up sitting in traffic. We bail out of the taxi and run to make it to the store just as it is about to close. While making our final purchases, we realize we have been robbed! Okay, well, that is what we thought at first. We actually just spent all our money without realizing it, I guess that can happen easily in NYC! :)

We use the remainder of our time to walk back to the train station, grabbing a bite to eat at Subway on our way.

9:00 We board the train to go back to D.C. The girls have a great little set-up on the way home.

They make a doll hair-salon on the train and I even put rollers in the doll's hair. My dreams of being a beautician are finally realized. :)

Eventually, the girls fall asleep.

12:30 a.m. We arrive in D.C. and make the final trek to the car with our purchases, those bags are really feeling heavy now. As I drive home exhausted, fighting to stay awake, I ask myself...was it worth it? Yes, definitely.

The next morning the girls set-up a doll hair salon in our kitchen using the cool new chairs, hair-kits, and aprons they bought. They actually didn't buy any new dolls, just doll stuff. These girls have so much fun together, we wish Livy still lived in our neighborhood.

Kayla's 10th Birthday

Today my first-born turned 10!  Kayla arrived 2 weeks before her due date, the day her dad flew to California to train for a new job.  He flew out and hours later, my water broke.  When he arrived in CA, they told him to get back on a plane and come home because his first child was being born.  I was anxious for him to return because we had been practicing natural childbirth exercises for months.  He didn't make it but I did just fine. :)  I even made it without drugs!  My little sister, Mary, was there to cheer me on, she was the first person to see little Kayla.  Jason made it back to VA a few hours after she was born.  He called me at the hospital and I said to him, "I know we promised each other we would never say our babies are beautiful and perfect, but I can't help it.  She is perfect!"

Today Kayla started her birthday off with our family tradition--breakfast in bed.  She requested french toast, hash browns, and bacon.  Jason is usually the hash brown maker in our home but I actually made them myself today so he could sleep in.  (Remember he had to get up early last week).

Yum, yum!

Kayla is very resistant to waking up early herself but she woke up with a smile on her face today.

In the evening, we wen't to Oma's house to celebrate with the family.  I was so happy Kayla asked Oma to host. Kayla requested Oma's famous pasta salad which is absolutely to die for.  As usual, Oma also made a ton of other yummy things like smoked ribs, pork, and chicken--so tasty!  Bonnie (Jason's godmother) brought fruit to dip in chocolate, is your mouth watering yet?

For dessert, Kayla requested strawberry cheesecake from Costco (nice and easy for me!)  The big question was, would she or would she not be able to blow out the candles?  For some reason, Kayla has never been successful at blowing out her candles, we really don't know why.  She would blow and blow, but nothing would happen, maybe ONE candle would go out.  We were all in suspense this year to see if she could do it.

She did it! For the first time ever she blew out all her candles!

Tanner was very sad he didn't get to help.  I later learned that Jason had worked with Kayla at home so she would be able to do it.  He lit candles and had her practice blowing them out.  Pretty funny eh?  Just goes to show that practice pays off. :)

For her birthday, Kayla got what she wanted the most--money! Instead of a birthday party, Kayla asked to go to NYC to visit the American Girl Place. We are taking a train up there next week but I told Kayla she would have to use her own money for shopping. Thanks to her generous relatives, she has money to do that now.

Kayla also got more zhu zhu pet stuff to add to her collection. Grandma in Utah and Aunt Ruth sent her this. Last year it was Littlest Pet Shop, this year it's Zhu Zhu pets. Kayla definitely goes with the trends in toys but it's okay because she actually plays with them. I'm also glad she isn't too old to like toys. I know it won't be long before she only wants electronics, I'll enjoy the dolls and pets while they last.

Kayla is such a special girl, I feel so blessed to be her mom.  She isn't perfect but she's pretty close.  She is very caring, kind, obedient, fun, smart, talented, thoughtful, and more.  She is a joy to be around and I can't wait to see what she does with her life in the years to come.  I love you Kayla.

Oma's gift

For Mother's Day, Jason and his brother gave their mom a photo of all her grandkids.  Jason took 22 photos to get ONE photo they could use.  Group photos with small children are certainly tricky!  It's worth it in the end, right?

Kyle, Hunter, Sloan, Tanner, Kayla

Happy Mother's Day!

Hello all you mothers (and especially to my own),

Happy Mother's Day!

And to my wonderful sisters, aunts, and friends who haven't had children...

Happy Mother's Day!

I know you "mother" in so many ways and I love you.

My favorite Mother's Day gift came yesterday...I was able to hibernate in my stamp room for hours and hours and stamp, stamp, stamp!  I used to be a Stampin' Up demonstrator but now I just stamp for fun which means I don't have urgent appointments to force me to stamp which means I don't get to it often enough.  I love to do it but there are so many other urgent things that take priority.  I decided to abandon all the things I SHOULD have done yesterday and just do what I wanted to do. :) 

A friend asked me to make some cards for her grown son who likes baseball.  It is really hard to make cards for men because homemade cards tend to be cute, not manly.  This is what I came up with. 

Little Michelangelos

Every two weeks we have "Variety Class" at our house.  We do a little geography, a little writing. and learn about famous composers and artists.  Today we learned about Michelangelo who painted the ceiling of the Sistine chapel.  The kids tried painting while lying on their backs, the way Michelangelo might have done his famous painting.

Jeff was the first to attempt painting lying down.

Hunter lasted the longest on his back

Kayla and Hunter hard at work

Most of the kids decided it was too hard to paint lying down.  They opted to finish their paintings sitting up, I don't blame them!

Dylan and Cade

Nicholas and Kayla

Aiden

Jeff and Nicholas

Tanner joins the big kids.

Did Michelangelo paint dragons?

The work is done, time for lunch!