Miss You Card

I had leftover pink paper (Lush by My Mind's Eye) from making cards for Stephanie and have been using it to make other cards (of the same colors though, because light pink and brown just go so well together).

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Greg took some graduation announcement pictures this afternoon for a friend who is finishing up at ASU in May. I'll have to post those later - I thought they turned out well, although the lighting wasn't quite what Greg wanted (sun was still kind of high in the sky).

Lucy's Cards Challenge 7

Supposedly, I started studying for my last section of the CPA exam last Monday, but instead, I only got through one measly lecture. Spent more time being crafty than being studious. Made a love(ish)-themed card for Lucy's Cards Challenge 7.




Used the Friends stamp set from Daisy Bucket Designs. Made me laugh when Greg called it "b'grl" stamps. (b'grl = boy/girl, courtesy of HomestarRunner.com's Teen Girl Squad).

Goal for tonight: Get through lecture 2 of Regulation.

Apothecary Chest Layout

Mmmmm . . . apothecary chest. So fond is my memory of finding and acquiring it that I decided to immortalize the experience in the form of a layout (and a blog post, which ends up being more "real time" than my scrapbooking will ever be).


Die cut 12x12 paper, mini bingo card, apothecary sticker, and chipboard button from Jenni Bowlin. "SOLD" tag came with the apothecary chest. Red 25¢ tickets came from Lucky 15, when it was still open. There was a lot of journaling, so I just printed it on white cardstock. I'm debating whether or not I just call it good now or if I want to add a couple more things, but I'm leaning towards just calling it good.

Exercise

This week, I ran. For exercise. It was tough considering that the last time I ran for exercise was 8 years ago during my senior year of high school and I've done basically no exercise of any type since then.

On Monday, we hiked up about 3/10 of a mile to a paved road on South Mountain that is closed to traffic and jogged a mile or so. I had to stop three times to walk/rest, but still - I did it!

Yesterday, I jogged a mile around the neighborhood. I still had to walk/rest three times, but I can only get better, right? Took me just under 15 minutes to run/walk the mile, which Greg referred to as "abysmal," but meh. I recognize that I've been a sloth since high school under the guise of being "busy," so it's not really a surprise that I'm bustin' out with a 15-minute mile.

All this exercise business was prompted by an email I got from a co-worker asking if there were any other ladies in the office interested in doing a women's-only triathlon in May. I'm not ready to tackle a triathlon (even one that's only sprint distances), but maybe I'll work my way up to a 5k run and do the Laveen Turkey Trot in the fall.

December 2009 Mini Album

Every December, I see a lot of peeps in the blogosphere working on December Daily albums. I'm not dedicated enough to tackle an album that involves entries/pages every day (at least not yet), but I can handle one that is just about December in general. I'm not exactly on top of it since we are well into March, but I'm okay with that.

I saved a Starbucks coffee cup for the covers because I had originally thought that I would make a coffee cup minibook, but then decided to just cut the cup in half:


On the inside, I used printed photos and ephemera (tickets, brochures, trail map, coffee cup cozy, etc.), as well as pieces from this Christmas tag kit.




















I wanted to include the whole Bryce Canyon brochure, but I didn't want to have to take it out of the book rings to be able to open it up. Then I remembered this video I saw on Amy Tan's blog about including tri-fold brochures in a travel journal. I'm pretty happy with the result, though I wouldn't recommend regularly folding and unfolding the brochure.

This Boy

Gotta be honest. There were a couple/few years in middle school that I thought this boy could go either way. I'm not talking getting into drugs or anything like that. But I thought there was a chance that the allure of video games and other leisure activities would consistently win out over school as a priority, to the detriment of his grades (which I make no effort to hide that in my opinion, grades are extremely important).


I've been impressed over the last couple of years though. 5's on AP tests? Studying on Friday nights for the SATs? Getting a first place medal at Science Olympiad? Man, sounds like even more dedication than I gave to school. Looks like he's turning out to be a good kid. :)

Pink Hi There Card and Card Exchange

Card exchange this last time involved using staples, buttons, and 3-D embellishments. For my card, I used this card as an example. I made the paper flowers, put on the buttons, and considered myself done when it dawned on me that I'd forgotten to incorporate staples into the design. Oops. I added some pink staples on the sides, which Greg gave me a hard time about because he said I was just tacking them on to a finished product (which is true).



Collage of the other cards and the make-and-take card:

D-Land

"Shirley, you've just finished school, what are you going to do next?!"

I'm going to Disneyland!


And then when I get back from Disneyland, I'm going to get sick and not feel like blogging and/or checking my blogs for several days! As Greg can confirm, it must be pretty bad for me not to check my Google Reader for a few days. Heh.

Stephanie's Work Baby Shower

Cute dress? Check.
Cute boots? Hard to see, but check.
Cute pregnant friend? Check.

Cindy and I planned a work baby shower for Stephanie last week. We got together a couple weeks before to put together some decorations (I'll be darned if a baby shower isn't the perfect excuse to be crafty) and it turned out well:


Along with the pink and brown baby banner and cupcake toppers, we also had clear plates stamped with jungle animals, chocolate-dipped pretzel sticks for favors, and children's board books with balloons as centerpieces.

For games, we played:

• Guess the total number of diapers in the jars (one of the managers was only one off!)
• Match the gestation period (days) with the animal (I think this was the hardest)
• Guess the baby food flavor (Mmmm doesn't that macaroni and cheese baby food look and smell delish?)