THANK YOU!

It seems like forever since I've had the chance to sit down in my office at my computer. Everything seems so strange and distant. I'm trying to get back into the groove of things, but after spending a week looking at the same four sterile walls in a hospital, it isn't as easy as I imagined. My daughter is also making a comeback. I have to tell you that a three year old on steroids isn't a pretty picture. What a tough time. If anyone out there has had to watch their child suffer while being stuck in a hospital bed hooked up to IVs and monitors, then you know how much it takes out of you. You literally do not feel like the same person when it's all over.

I am so thankful for the doctors, the nurses, the respiratory therapists, the dietary staff, the supportive people my husband works with and, of course, friends and family. How could we have made it through without any of you? THANK YOU!!!

(the marks on Kenzie's face are from the tape they used to keep in the nasal cannula)

So this past week was spent making thank you cards and coaxing my daughter to take her NASTY medicine along with her breathing treatments. She had a follow-up visit with her primary care physician on Wednesday and was given a clean bill of health. Yea!!! We only have three more days of antibiotics and then it'll all be just a distant nightmare. One I certainly hope never to go through again.

Here are a few of the cards I've sent out :
The first card was sent to my husband's colleagues. They were so great and supportive during the week he missed of work. They also sent to the hospital a nice box full of goodies for Kenzie...coloring books, crayons, puzzles, cards, a stuffed Dr. bear, and so much more. A wonderful bunch of people.

This second card was for "Miss Regina" (another of my husband's colleagues). She was very kind to send Kenzie a special friend from the Build-A-Bear workshop. Kenzie hasn't put it down since she received it. I tried to get a picture of her holding the bear, but she was being a typical three year old (on steroids!) and wouldn't cooperate, so it's just a picture of the bear itself on the card.
Because of everything that was going on, I found that I didn't have the time nor the focus to continue in the Urban Anthology Design Star Challenge. I "resigned" with much trepidation and angst, but I knew it was the right thing to do. This layout was the last challenge I completed for UA. It was a "green" layout challenge...recycle, reuse and reinvent.

I started with K&Company paper, scraps of green paper from my stash and an old purple file folder as my background, and I went from there.

Up-cycled items:

OLD BUBBLE MAILER: used part of it as an embellishment and I also used the bubble side to stamp the folder.

MUFFIN CUPS: purchased them at the dollar store but they were too thin to bake with, so I used them on this layout as part of a flower and tucked behind one of the pictures for interest.

CLOTHING TAGS: I used some of my daughter's old clothing tags for embellishments because I loved their designs and they reminded me of them.

BUTTERFLY: The little blue butterfly came off one of my daughter's shirts

MEASURING TAPE/PAPERCLIPS: This little bit of tape was left-over from another project. I used it here with paperclips to show their ages at the time of the photos.

COTTON CLOTH/RIBBON: from an old pair of pajamas and the ribbon was from a shirt

WIRE TIE: I used a wire tie from a loaf of bread to highlight the "U" in my title...it was getting lost with the pink in the tag underneath.

I've also up-cycled a clip, buttons and and an old film strip.

I used Scenic Route rub-ons, Versa Magic chalk ink in Malted Mauve, Sage and Thatched Straw, Scenic Route Chipboard Alphabet that I inked and embossed with skyblue and antique linen. I'd have to say that 90% of this layout is "green".

Emergency

I haven't been able to blog for the last two weeks...my youngest was hospitalized with pneumonia for a week. It's been hectic, gut-wrenching and exhausting, but I'm finally back to somewhat of a routine and promise to get everything updated either later on today or tomorrow. I've been able to create a few cards here and there - mostly "thank you" cards to all those who showed great support during Kenzie's ordeal.
Thanks for your patience.

Happy Easter!

Since I won't be able to update my blog until next week, I thought I'd wish everyone an early Happy Easter!

Oh, Internet where art thou?

Okay, so it's Friday. Normally I'd be ecstatic...a few less kids for the weekend (I watch my two nephews during the week so I have a total of five kids Monday thru Friday) and more time to myself, but I've been without a computer and Internet for three days. I'm so far behind in my blog hopping, my deadlines for scrapping projects are creeping closer and closer, and I haven't read my email in a week. I'm waiting for the server police from roadrunner to show up on my doorstep with an invoice for crashing their mail server. That would just top my week off, now wouldn't it? Anyway, I thought I'd take a few minutes to show you some of the things I've actually managed to finish in my panicked state.



This is a layout I did for a challenge over at Urban Anthology. We were asked to highlight three manufacturers. I used K&Company, Me & My Big Ideas, and Making Memories. I also did a layout of my two oldest daughters and my nephews using Vintage Plum's March kit. They just released a gorgeous vintage-looking April kit called "Hopscotch". You should stop by and pick one up. I did this morning.



I also made a couple of cards with items from Vintage Plum's March kit.



I'm actually pretty proud that I got this much done considering. So, I'll be spending my weekend with the keyboard and mouse attached to my fingertips and avoiding the server police. Have a good one!

Slow Mojo

Created some cards yesterday. I'm having a hard time with my mojo still. I just can't seem to find my creativity...my style. I've been looking everywhere for inspiration but nothing seems to be working. Maybe I should take a break for a while...focus some of my attentions elsewhere...and my mojo might get the hint and come back. Who knows how these things work, right?
Card created for the design team challenge over at Urban Anthology. We had to use stamps and fabric. A little simple but it follows the challenge outline.
This is a card I made for Father's Day. I embossed the tree as well as the letters in the title. It's hard to come up with masculine cards, but I think this one turned out okay.
A card for a wedding or anniversary. It's about the same as one I did a while back except I added the stamped sentiment onto the white ribbon.


Thanks for looking and have a great day!

Survived

Made it through April Fool's without a dent to my ego. My two oldest played a couple of cute pranks on me, but other than that, fairly quiet. I can't say that I've been so lucky in the past. I've had my bed short-sheeted with sugar poured in it (my Mom), I've had the knob to my bedroom door coated with honey (my step-sister), I've had my picture (with phony number-thankfully) run in the local newspaper asking for a date (an ex), and I've also had all the gas siphoned from my car (a friend who knows who she is)...just to name a few. I can handle an innocent prank as well as the next victim...just keep in mind that April Fool's Day will be back. Don't dish it out if you can't take it.

Ya Havta' Laugh

Top April Fool's Jokes of All Time

#1: The Swiss Spaghetti Harvest

1957: The respected BBC news show Panorama announced that thanks to a very mild winter and the virtual elimination of the dreaded spaghetti weevil, Swiss farmers were enjoying a bumper spaghetti crop. It accompanied this announcement with footage of Swiss peasants pulling strands of spaghetti down from trees. Huge numbers of viewers were taken in. Many called the BBC wanting to know how they could grow their own spaghetti tree. To this the BBC diplomatically replied, "place a sprig of spaghetti in a tin of tomato sauce and hope for the best."

#2: Sidd Finch

1985: Sports Illustrated published a story about a new rookie pitcher who planned to play for the Mets. His name was Sidd Finch, and he could reportedly throw a baseball at 168 mph with pinpoint accuracy. This was 65 mph faster than the previous record. Surprisingly, Sidd Finch had never even played the game before. Instead, he had mastered the "art of the pitch" in a Tibetan monastery under the guidance of the "great poet-saint Lama Milaraspa." Mets fans celebrated their teams' amazing luck at having found such a gifted player, and Sports Illustrated was flooded with requests for more information. In reality this legendary player only existed in the imagination of the author of the article, George Plimpton.

#3: Instant Color TV

1962: In 1962 there was only one tv channel in Sweden, and it broadcast in black and white. The station's technical expert, Kjell Stensson, appeared on the news to announce that, thanks to a new technology, viewers could convert their existing sets to display color reception. All they had to do was pull a nylon stocking over their tv screen. Stensson proceeded to demonstrate the process. Thousands of people were taken in. Regular color broadcasts only commenced in Sweden on April 1, 1970.

#4: The Taco Liberty Bell

1996: The Taco Bell Corporation announced it had bought the Liberty Bell and was renaming it the Taco Liberty Bell. Hundreds of outraged citizens called the National Historic Park in Philadelphia where the bell was housed to express their anger. Their nerves were only calmed when Taco Bell revealed, a few hours later, that it was all a practical joke. The best line of the day came when White House press secretary Mike McCurry was asked about the sale. Thinking on his feet, he responded that the Lincoln Memorial had also been sold. It would now be known, he said, as the Ford Lincoln Mercury Memorial.

#5: Nixon for President

1992: National Public Radio's Talk of the Nation program announced that Richard Nixon, in a surprise move, was running for President again. His new campaign slogan was, "I didn't do anything wrong, and I won't do it again." Accompanying this announcement were audio clips of Nixon delivering his candidacy speech. Listeners responded viscerally to the announcement, flooding the show with calls expressing shock and outrage. Only during the second half of the show did the host John Hockenberry reveal that the announcement was a practical joke. Nixon's voice was impersonated by comedian Rich Little.

#6: Alabama Changes the Value of Pi

1998: The April 1998 issue of the New Mexicans for Science and Reason newsletter contained an article claiming that the Alabama state legislature had voted to change the value of the mathematical constant pi from 3.14159 to the 'Biblical value' of 3.0. Soon the article made its way onto the internet, and then it rapidly spread around the world, forwarded by email. It only became apparent how far the article had spread when the Alabama legislature began receiving hundreds of calls from people protesting the legislation. The original article, which was intended as a parody of legislative attempts to circumscribe the teaching of evolution, was written by physicist Mark Boslough.

#7: The Left-Handed Whopper

1998: Burger King published a full page advertisement in USA Today announcing the introduction of a new item to their menu: a "Left-Handed Whopper" specially designed for the 32 million left-handed Americans. According to the advertisement, the new whopper included the same ingredients as the original Whopper (lettuce, tomato, hamburger patty, etc.), but all the condiments were rotated 180 degrees for the benefit of their left-handed customers. The following day Burger King issued a follow-up release revealing that although the Left-Handed Whopper was a hoax, thousands of customers had gone into restaurants to request the new sandwich. Simultaneously, according to the press release, "many others requested their own 'right handed' version."

Lunchtime Pacifier

Vintage Plum promotes weekly challenges and this week the challenge was to create a layout without using black or white. What?! I originally though that it was impossible. I think that just about every layout I do has some element of either black or white. I did finally manage to create a page (I used cream) of my youngest and her lunchtime pacifier...a teal blue T-Bird!