Day 59, 2010

Doug's daughter, Julie, came in town this weekend. She lives a couple hours away. We spent time catching up on photos and stories. She was more than happy to be my POD for the day.

Oh... and another Surprise for ya:
..... still snowing! LOL

OK... I just had a very BLONDE Moment. I already had my POD.. I already completed and printed my 2-week layout. Well... anyway... this is my Picture (and a half) of the day! :)

My 2 page 1 week layout for Feb 21-28

Here's my two page layout. I went Sunday to Sunday this week so that I didn't end up with an odd page before starting March. I like how this one turned out. I'm excited about my new colors for March.

Day 59, 2010

I have never been a coffee drinker, I just don't like the taste. I've tried adding flavors, flavored coffee, milk, sugar, but I just don't like it. I do, however, LOVE the smell of coffee beans. I think it makes a house smell so homey.

Day 58, 2010

I wasn't going to bother you with another picture of snow... though you guessed it. It's snowing again. However, I took this picture from a window and look, you can see the camera's reflection. I thought it was so cool! I used it anyway.

Day 57, 2010

Today Ashlea went back to relook at the dress she liked before, but I wasn't with her (I was working). She sent me this picture (the lady chopped her head off in the photo)of yet another one she found. I tell you, every dress is pretty, it's hard to narrow it down, but I still think I like the dress she picked out when we went shopping the last time.

Day 56, 2010

Tonight's menu... Pork steak, Au Gratin Potatoes and Green Beans. When Alex gets home from practice he's starved, so I try and have it ready. They are my POD for today, obviously. Oh, here's big news.. it's SNOWING!

Day 55, 2010

Had a hair appointment after work today. I was going to post a photo of my hair dresser, but she had an appointment while I was processing and I didn't want to embarass her. So instead you get a before/after shot. Brightened it up for the summer. Now if we can just get that sunshine!

After

Before:

Day 54, 2010

Today Doug sent me this photo on my phone with a message that said.. "Have a nice day". I thought that was very sweet!

Day 53, 2010

Well, guess what folks.... IT SNOWED TODAY! I was so excited when I got home and saw that my card kit from Snowmanlover (Barb) arrived today. The colors are so springy it was just what I needed so I whipped up a few cards. It's going to have to serve as my POD because everyone is gone and that just leaves me and the animals! :) Hope you're having a great day!

Day 52, 2010

Katie's most favorite thing in the world.... A TENNIS BALL. I am not exaggerating when I tell you that if you toss her the ball she will be your friend for life. She is absolutely NUTZO about tennis balls. Doug went outside and tossed her a few. With all the snow it's been awhile since she got to go out and play ball. She was in heaven. Doug and I went to see Shutter Island this weekend. It's a great movie, a real "mind bender". Barb, it's not a movie you would like, there's some violence in it. I love DiCaprio and he does not let you down in this movie.

my 2 page 1 week layout for Feb 14-20

Here's my two page layout for the week. Doubleclick to see it close up.

Day 51, 2010

Ashlea, Alex, Doug and I went to breakfast the morning. I attempted to take the kids picture who were sitting opposite of us in the booth, but they refused to look my direction, so Ashlea suggested they take our photo instead. So here's Doug and I just before our Eggs Benedict. It was certainly yummy!

Day 50, 2010

Richie (my daughter's fiance') got an office job today. He's very excited. He is about to graduate from college majoring in business and starting next week he's going to start utilizing his business degree in the real world. He was looking at Vintage lettercarrier style briefcases online. I remembered that Doug had an old vintage briefcase up in the attic, so I asked Doug if he minded and he didn't. Richie was so excited. I get such a bang out of him, he gets so excited over the smallest things.

Day 49, 2010

Ashlea decided to make No Bake Cookies tonight. They are one of our favorites.. chocolate, oatmeal, peanutbutter, what's not to love!?!?!

Day 48, 2010

A picture of my son Alex. He's sooo busy all the time. He never stops, but on the rare occasion he has a second to sit down he crashes. Here he is just before getting ready to leave for practice, doesn't he look tired?!?!

Day 47, 2010

Burgers anyone? Yep, you guessed it.. SNOWWWING.... AGAIN! Oy. I've had enough snow. I am really hungry for a burger and have not been able to get to the grill... and yes I did not get it covered last time I used it so it's covered in snow. It doesn't look like much in the picture but that's about 6-7" on top. I was going to take a night shot of the backyard which is actually quite pretty with all the snow.. but when I put the camera on night setting the flash won't go off and it's too dark and if I put it on auto setting and put the flash on, well it's just not a pretty picture... so you get my grill. Notice the icicles in the background hanging off the roof. If any of you have an abundance of sunshine and coatless weather you're not enjoying, please send it to Indiana... we've had our share of the white stuff this season. My snow plow man, on the other hand, is putting a down payment on a new condo in Florida by now! :) However, in light of my new way of thinking... it's pretty (not really) and I'm so blessed to have heat when it's cold (yay), and I will appreciate this picture come July and it's too hot to go outside. :) See I can still see the beauty in my day.

Day 46, 2010

Breakfast for dinner?!!?!? Ashlea requested Biscuits and Gravy for dinner last night. I have to admit, it sounded good to me too. So that's exactly what I made. It's snowing here again and something about B & G is so warm and cozy... Do you ever have Breakfast for dinner?

Day 45, 2010

This is not a picture I took today. I took a photo of our dinner (Spaghetti Bake), I took a photo of Doug and Katie watching TV when he came over tonight, I took a picture of the Valentines gift Doug gave me.... but if I'm going to record my life as real as I can, quite frankly those photos would've been irrelevant, even though they were taken today. So, as I thought about my weekend and my day and what it was really about, it was about reflection. So often I am guilty of rush, rush, rushing through my day, through the precious little moments, taking them for granted. I promised myself at the beginning of the year I would make it my goal to slow down and not put so much pressure on myself to see how much I can accomplish in one day and instead to take a step back and enjoy the little things and if I only accomplish one thing, but do it well and make a precious memory, well you know what I'm trying to say. I succeeded for a short period. Here it is Feb 14 and I'm doing it again. I'm in such a hurry to get the next task done, or finish this or that that I forget to take pride in the moment, give it my full attention and remember to live in and for the moment. I run, run, run until I crash and burn. So, my picture of the day is just a little reminder. I took that photo last summer while sitting on the deck relaxing, recharging and was just for once noticing the beauty around me and how lucky I am. It's so easy to blame our happiness or unhappiness on others or to say TOMORROW I'll take the time to write a nice note, or call my aunt or say I love you.... but one never knows what is in store tomorrow... Lorrie, enjoy the moment, slow down, notice how lucky you are and appreciate it - Happiness is a decision.

My 2 page 1 week layout for Feb 7-13

I'm thinking I may change this layout. I like my template for this upcoming week so much better than this one. It's a nice layout, but too busy for so random photos... oh well

Day 44, 2010

Spent my Saturday doing something I NEVER do. Absolutely nothing. :) I layed around with a blanket on the couch and watched chickflicks and cuddled with my baby, Katie (the dog). I went to bed at 7:30 and slept till this morning. Now, I need to get this house cleaned up. WHEW!

Day 43, 2010

I took today off work. It was a long week and I really just wanted to sleep in and do nothing. Instead Ashlea and I got up, went to Michaels, then the Mall, did a bit of shopping, then it was home to clean up a little, then make a Valentines card and then my dear friend Jodie came over to scrap. It was a nice day. As I've mentioned before, Jodie is the one who taught me about scrapping. We always have something to talk about. Ashlea took this picture of us before she left to go to Richie's Hockey game.

Day 42, 2010

I've had a really long and stressful week (not in comparison to a lot people with real issues, I've been very blessed), but you know how you have a bad week when it seems like everything goes wrong and every step forward = two steps back... not a pity party going on here, but I wanted to say how blessed I feel to have Barb (aka Snowmanlover) as a friend. I met her on the Cricut Messageboard when I asked a simple question about Stampin' Up ink pads and she has since become one of my dear friends. Barb knew I was having a rough week, even though I hadn't given her the details, she stood behind me and listened when I wanted to talk and let me be silent when I needed to be silent. And most of all, when I thought I just had enough.. she sent me this sentiment that she saw posted somewhere. It was so appropriate and so appreciated. Love ya, B! Thanks for being you.

Day 41, 2010

This is Sean, my computer Guru. He owns his own computer business. He was nice enough to make a house call and set up my new mac so that I can run Windows when needed.

Day 40, 2010

Still SNOWING!!!! This is a view from our office window. Not real pretty considering we're the tallest building in that particular area and so our view is the roof of the other buildings around us.. but here's the snow! The storm itself has almost worked it's way through, but now we get the Lake Effect snow... which is worse than the storm itself... hello another 10" expected today.

Day 39, 2010

Well the weatherman has bad news... and that's about it! lol We are supposedly in for a doozey. It's supposed to start tonight and not stop until sometime Wednesday. Here's the weather alert from my phone. Look at the high-lighted circle!! Guess I'd better get the shovel and salt ready... for those of you with sunshine and coatless weather... PLEASE share! :) (You may have to double click on the photo to read it.)

Day 38, 2010

February 7, 2010 - Today I baked a favorite recipe of my mother's, Peanutbutter Cookies. They are soooo yummy! I love to eat the batter just as much as the cookies. They just melt in your mouth. I'm not a big peanutbutter cookie fan, (more of an oatmeal cookie kinda gal), but I do love these. They always make me think of mom... now where's that glass of milk??

Mom's Peanutbutter Cookies

Preheat oven to 350

1 C Shortening

1-1/3 C Brown Sugar

1-1/3 C Sugar

1-2/3 C Peanutbutter (I use creamy)

3 Eggs

2-1/2 C Flour

2-2/3 tsp baking soda

1/3 tsp salt

3 tsp vanilla

Cream shortening and sugars. Add eggs & peanutbutter, add remaining ingredients. Roll into balls, press tops with fork to make impression. Bake 10 minutes, remove from oven, while still hot sprinkle lightly with sugar.

Just a few notes: #1 you won't think they are done when you take them out, bottoms will be lightly browned, but they stiffen a bit when cooled, and #2 yes, those 1/3 measurements are very strange but they are correct. :)

My 2 page 1 week layout for Feb 1-6

Here's my 2-page layout for my album for this week. I'm so glad to be on a new color scheme.

Day 37, 2010

Today, Doug, Ashlea and I went to the movie. We went to see Edge of Darkness (the new Mel Gibson movie), it's good, but a lot of violence - don't take young ones to see it. Anyway, I took a couple of photos at the theater, but we decided to make Shrimp Gumbo for dinner and I thought they were much more interesting photos... so here it is.. Shrimp Gumbo.. and it was YUMMO, if I do say so myself. :)

Day 36, 2010

February 5, 2010 - Barbie's 50th Birthday!

I got this email today.. I thought it was too funny not to share, it made me laugh on a very LOOOONNNG Friday.

Day 35, 2010

OK ladies, I'm still messing around with the new computer, so I have nothing exciting to take a photo of... I just took this with Photobooth from the computer. LOL (Yes, I have no life!) Anyway, I had a great opportunity for an awesome picture. this is what happened: I was coming home, (I live on a fairly busy road) and I noticed the traffic up a ways was backed up and I couldn't tell why.. well I figured it out pretty quickly. There was a big deer just walking down the middle of the road, not scared, not trying to get away.. just walking down the centerline of the road between two lanes of traffic. When he got to my car he decided to get over and I thought he was going to walk right up and over my car, but then he moved over at the last minute, if I would've rolled my window down I could've touched him. He continued down the middle of the road until he was out of my sight. I'm pretty sure he was heading to McDonald's, as I saw they had a sign out about their new BigMac Wraps. So, the long and short (ok, not so short) of it was I was so shocked to see him I didn't think to TAKE A PHOTO! I think he must've gotten hit or been injured because he was just dazed walking down the road.

Day 34, 2010

My new computer arrived today! I'm so excited! I've been working on a laptop since I went mac a few years ago. We've got desktop PC's in the house, the kids have one and we had a general one in our den, but I never use it, I really prefer mac and have always used the laptop for everything, now I can sit and use a big screen which will be really nice for my digi work. I'm sooo excited. I had it delivered to my office because I didn't want it to sit outside all day... it wasn't supposed to be here until tomorrow and it showed up today, I almost cancelled my hair appointment after work because I was too excited to get home and play. I still can't play, I'm working on loading my software which is going to take awhile. Isn't she PRETTY!!! :)

Day 33, 2010

Now that's what I call a CAT NAP!!!!!

The end of January Extra Page for Layout

I told you in an earlier post I was debating what to do with my January odd page since I needed to fill in an empty spot. It's kind of plain, but I think I like it.

Day 32, 2010

Today's POD is just some items from my office. I work in an office that is now serving the 6th generation, needless to say, we have some old items lying around. I really don't pay much attention to them as they are part of my everyday environment, but as I was at my desk today I was looking at my scissors and thought.. wow, these are old (I know... deep thought, eh?!?! LOL)... anyway.. I grabbed a couple of things that were lying around and took a photo. Check out that stapler and Emily Post "Book of Etiquette"... too funny to read.