Shake, Rattle and Roll

Today sometime after 11am, I felt like I was getting sick or like I might pass out. I look up and the walls are moving, I felt the floor rolling and I could not figure out why I felt like I was about to lose it. There was no one in the office today in my area so I figure I need to just stand up and go to the bathroom or get a drink. I finally found someone a row of cubes over and I ask him if he also felt the floor shaking. He said yes and that a chain hanging on his cube wall was swaying. So we both figured it had to have been a small earthquake. That was the first time I had ever felt that 'rolling' feeling. And hopefully the last! I didn't like it one bit. I also never truly believed anyone in Arizona could really feel an earthquake. I thought it was a bunch of baloney. But today I became 'one of those people'. haha

My friend Sara sits down at the opposite end of the building and she sent me an IM asking if I had felt the earthquake. She said she looked up and the hanging lights were swaying. It was quite a rolling feeling.

I can't believe only 1 more day is left of 2009. The year sure went by fast. I hope for a great 2010. Our trip to St. Lucia is coming up in February so I am counting down the days. It is going to be so much fun.

Halloween Week

Halloween is approaching fast and I still have lots to do to get ready for a fun-filled weekend. I have the afternoon off tomorrow to attend Caris's class party. I am really looking forward to it. I hope they get lots of great treats. I think it's sad that everything has to come pre-packaged or from the store now-a-days. The schools do not want anything home-made for fear that it will contain something that would harm the children. Understandable, but my best memories were of school parties with home-made treats.

We are having our 7th annual Halloween Potluck in the cul-de-sac. I've had a few neighbors call and ask if we were still doing it this year so I was pleased that they were interested in participating. It seems to get bigger and better every year.
There's no telling how many people will be joining us this year. I'll be cooking up a storm Friday night and Saturday to get ready though.

This year Zeke will dress as a monkey and Caris will be Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz. Zeke has been fascinated by the inflatable pumpkins and cat we have out in the yard. He goes out every night to pet the kitty-meow as he calls it. I don't know how he will like all the costumes. He will probably say 'scare-you-mommy' as he does not like masks.

Hopefully the sun will come out tomorrow and Saturday and warm us up a bit. It's pretty chilly outside and we're just not used to it!

My 'ALMOST' cat

This morning my son kept looking out the back window so I looked out and saw a cat in our yard. I took him outside to see it, but the cat was not at all friendly and sort of hissy. So we went back inside. My son kept looking at the Cat and soon I looked out again and noticed it had a kitten out near our pool. I was a little freaked out that the kitten would fall in our pool so I went outside and took it a box and some water. I just knew if the kitten were in our back yard by the time my daughter got home from school that she'd want to keep it. So luckily I saw a neighbor as I was leaving and asked if he could check on it or leave some cat food back there for the momma cat and it turned out that he decided to keep the kitten. So lucky for us becuase I'm allergic and not a big fan of cats. It was cute but certainly would have to find another home and my kids would be so devastated if I didn't let them keep it. But it's better that it goes to a person who would want it. So lucky me! I did get a couple great pics of the adorable little thing and it's mom.

Labor Day Weekend @ Big Lake

Just spent a relaxing 5 days in the high country. We took a trip up north to Big Lake. It is in far Eastern Arizona and about a 6 hour drive from my house. The kids had such a great time. I think we all did. The only negative was that it rained a little more than we all would have liked. The thunder was wonderful to listen to, but the mud and puddles were too much for Zeke to resist. He had to jump in feet first and slop around like a little piggy. Thank goodness Fred had put some watersealant on his new boots. They look amazingly good for having been through all that mud. And my girl Caris was quite the fisherwoman; she caught a pretty large trout and the biggest fish in the whole group. She was so proud. The food we cooked was amazing. Fajitas, tortillas, rib-eye steaks with 'secret sauce', breakfast FEASTS. We are truly blessed not only to be able to enjoy the beauty of nature and to get out of the sweltering desert heat but to have all the little luxuries that make a camping trip great.

Creative Escape 2009

Hello out there in blogland! I'm so excited. I am headed across town next Wednesday to the Wild Horse Pass Resort for Heidi Swapp's Creative Escape 2009 event. I am super excited. I can't wait to have class with Tim Holtz, Carol Wingert and all the fabulous people in the Scrap World. Not to mention all the great and exciting women from all over the planet who will be in attendance. This is going to be a ton of fun. My roommate will be my scrappy co-worker Karen Engelder. She and I met several years back at a CK convention and since we knew each other from working in the same area, we made a connection. Since then, we've met up for various classes over the years and although she invited me to join her at CE last year, I had just come back from the Memory Works convention in Layton, UT and I couldn't afford to go to CE right after that. It was a huge bummer but I'm super ready to go this year. I have been picking up my supplies from the class lists but now I have to figure out what to wear and pack. There's so much to prepare. I did the Yahoo charm swap and got all the cute and fun charms and I've been working on that necklace the past few nights. It's so cool. my husband thinks I'm a little nuts with my 'old lady' activites as he calls it. But I love to scrapbook and he's the first one to show off my stuff. My kids are hopefully going to treasure what I make for them (they already love their disney books). This is a hobby I have been in love with for quite a number of years. I only wish I had more time to devote to it.
Here's a photo of me and Heidi Swapp.

Desert Heat Retreat

We headed up to Arizona's high country for a 3 day retreat from the heat. We met up with our great friends Brian and Lindy Francom for 3 days of camping along the Mogollon Rim. On Friday afternoon when we arrived, we were met with a thunderous sprinkling rain which was an awesome way to cool our heels. We set up camp and had a dinner of fajitas, fresh tortillas and fixings, then afterwards a campfire with plenty of SMORES! The kids (and Lindy) were in heaven! Thanks to Brian for cutting all that wood. I don't think Caris would have let him rest if he hadn't gone out and got that wood chopped right away. She was just dying to get that fire going so she could toast her 'smarshmallows'.



The next day, Zeke woke up at the break of dawn and we were up early, ate some yummy breakfast burritos and then Brian used his Arizona map and GPS to find us a hatchery to visit. We were off on a new adventure to God's Country. We found out that we made a wrong turn on a forest service road, but ended up at a beautiful stream called Clear Creek Ranch. It was truly a beautiful place. You could still see the remains of the fire that burned all around the rim a few years back. That ranch was completely encircled by burned trees as far as the eye could see. We then back-tracked and made it up to the fish hatchery. The kids loved it. Thanks to the kindness of strangers who gave me a couple quarters to buy some pellet food for the kids to feed the fish. We had a great time, then after a morning of driving around the forest, went back to camp for some rest.


We then made steaks for dinner and an ominous monsoon storm looked like it might hit us at any minute, but was uneventful. After a delicious dinner, we enjoyed our campfire and Brian and Lindy surprised me with a birthday cobbler in their dutch oven by the campfire. They even brought along ice cream. It was so yummy! I think that with all the relaxation and eating, I'm going to have to go on a serious diet.
It was such a great way to spend a weekend.



On our way home, we took a detour by Saguaro Lake and ended up deciding to pull in and hop in the lake with all our clothes on for a dip! The hot desert had already gotten to us so a cool-off in the lake was just what we needed. I wish we could do it all over again this coming weekend!

PAYDAY Friday!

Hi Peeps! Just rolling thru a Friday afternoon wondering what I'm going to have for lunch. I am due to get out of work at 3:15. I sure hope I can cram all my work into the next 3 hrs! haha

I have been a blog-slacker, but since I saw a chance to get a completely free Bo-Bunny Blinkie AND a chance to win a great prize from them, I decided I better get crack-a-lackin'.





As for some scrap news, I have to say I am SUPER disappointed with Creating Keepsakes magazine. I got the new August issue in the mail this week and happened to notice an article and picture of a Seashell album on page 112. Well, I read and re-read the article 3 times and nowhere did I see any credit to a gal named Glynda Roffman. I happen to follow her blog http://glyndaroffmann.blogspot.com/ and several months back, she sent me an email that she had put together a cute seashell album kit made out of REAL shells that she drilled herself. Well, I was amazed by her creativity and how cute it was, went over to etsy and decided that while I didn't have $25 to blow right then, I'd keep checking back and buy one eventually. Fast forward to this past week and what do I see but her exact same idea with credit given to someone else. I emailed Glynda and asked if she had come up with the idea herself or if she had seen it somewhere before because I had seen the CK article with almost her exact same album. She replied that she was HORRIFIED because it was her own god-given idea and that she had submitted the idea to several magazines months and months ago and after she didn't get any response, she decided to make up kits to sell on etsy and ebay. So for you CK readers and fans-I challenge you to decide for yourself....Cruise on over to Glynda's blog which will lead you to her etsy stuff where she has the seashell albums for sale. Then take a look at page 112 of CK mag./August issue. I'd love to hear your comments. The pictures posted here on my blog are copied from Glynda's etsy kits that she has for sale.

Happy Friday everyone-keep it scrappy!

p.s. in all fairness to the CK contributor, I emailed her directly this afternoon and she replied that she really had come up with the idea all on her own and cited a timeline to when she submitted it. So in all fairness to both parties (neither whom I have ever met in person)-it is a probable coincidence.

Packing for the Bahamas

I can't believe our trip is in two days. We leave for the Bahamas
this weekend and I am NOT READY! LOL. I've only had 12 months to get packed
and I'm a total procrastinator and slacker. I have my kids all packed up and ready to go (somehow the thought of shipping the kids off is more exciting!).
We are going to be staying at the super-all-inclusive Sandals Royal Bahamian Resort in Nassau. I have never been to the Bahamas, but we have stayed at various Sandals resorts in Jamaica 7 times. We have high expectations of the resort because we know
how great the accomodations are in Jamaica. We have 6 other couples (friends and relatives) traveling with us and we are a party crew so it should be a blast. I am looking forward to all the fruity drinks and of course scuba diving. I am hoping we don't run into any sharks, but from what I've seen, there will probably be plenty. We also intend to spend a day at the Atlantis resort so that we can see the aquatic life they have there. When I return, I have stamp club night on Wednesday (I'll be the hostess) and CKC classes and vendor faire shopping on Friday. Sheesh this is going to be one heck of a month as far as spending goes.

Ides of March

Well the wind was blowing yesterday and it made me wonder....does the wind blow EVERYWHERE in the month of March? Is that a 'global' thing that happens? Why does everyone know about March winds? Does the world turn windy in that particular month only?

I can hardly believe how fast time goes. In the past few weeks, we've entertained our friend Leah, who we met while scuba-diving in Kauaii. I truly think she'll be a life-long friend for us. Hopefully I'll get to go visit her more often than she'll get to come visit me! She and her hubby are from Texas and decided to open a scuba shop in Hawaii. Very brave of them, but they seem to enjoy what they do. Doing shore dives is pretty tough work. Especially if someone gets tired. It's alot of swimming and when you're underwater, you don't quite notice how far you've distanced from shore because you're exploring and having fun, it's only when you notice the oxygen tank level is low and realize that you're nowhere near shore and that there's no boat to come pick you up that it's tough. Trust me. I swam a great distance when this happened to me. I never felt so unprepared. But since I was on vacation, I just took a breath and realized that even if it took me all day to swim to shore, I'd get there eventually!

I am planning to help my Aunt with her yardsale tomorrow. I am looking forward to finding some new treasure that she's ready to cast off and I'm looking forward to meeting her friend who has traveled all the way from Pittsburgh. Should be a nice 80 degree weekend too so that should be great.

Our trip to the Bahamas is quickly approaching. I hope we can gather up all our 'loaned out' pieces of luggage so that I can start packing. I'm sure the weekend will be over with all too soon!

Single Mom

My hubby called and said he has to work late AGAIN so he'll have to stay the night up in Globe with his mom or his sister. This makes the 2nd night in a row he can't come home. YUCK! I feel like a single mom when he doesn't come home. I have to do it all and it's no fun!

Kids-I think this means we're having Ramen Noodle soup for dinner again! hahahahaha

TUESDAY....BLAH BLAH BLAH

OK so the Cards lost the superbowl....oh well. I am still happy they were in the big game. And they didn't play all that bad either. Heck I was a Cards fan when they were losing ALL their games so what's another one?! go Cards! Maybe next year I can actually go to a game. I had a hard time justifiying the ticket price, the all day trip just to get out there, finding a sitter, etc. but I'll be there next season for sure. I hear the tailgate parties are awesome and something to see.

I've been trying to find some scrap time. I brought out all my junk yesterday and it looks like I won't have to cook dinner tonight since Fred won't be home. So I am thinking tonight will be a good night to scrap and watch some TV. I joined 'album club' at Scrapbooks, ETC. and the whole point of it is to scrap 50 pages. So I seriously have to get busy so I can go take in some of my work and get my list stamped for my store credit.

SKELETON CREW

Ok I must be one of the only fools working today. It's empty here at work but I must say it's nice and quiet. I didn't sleep well last night. Zeke was crying and wanted me to hold him so I was lazy and took him to my bed. BIG MISTAKE. He tossed and turned all night. Mostly kicking me in the head! I'm such a sucker for my babies though. I love them. I am having lunch with my 2 girlfriends from the office today. I think we're heading over to the new Sauce restaurant on the corner. I could eat a whole Pepperoni pizza there! But my tummy doesn't quite feel like it so I probably won't. I am working on a Basic Grey 2009 calendar while I'm at my desk today. I am hoping I get all 12 layouts done. It's a cute project and I bought it for like $10 or $11 at Michael's with my 40% off coupon.

We Missed It

Am I getting old or what? We all fell asleep on the couch waiting for the New Year to begin. I'm not sure if that's a good sign or not. Hopefully it will mean this coming 2009 will be a well rested year and not so chaotic like years past. I am looking forward to coming to an end of buying diapers in 2009. Potty-training Zeke will be a challenge I'm sure, but I am looking forward to all that extra money I'll be able to spend on other things since at some point, I may not have to buy any more diapers! Wishful Thinking! My house is in disaster mode. It looks like 30 squatters have been living here rather than the 4 of us. EEEK.....getting ready to mop floors. Hopefully I'll get the house under control today.

HAPPY NEW YEAR!