First haircut...

Well, he got his first haircut and mommy survived. Actually, the more I look at him the cuter I think he is! Now we have to get Cameron's done at some point, he just has one little spot but other than that he is fine. My babies are growing up. He did so fantastic too! They had these little race cars they sat in...not one peep out of him until I tried to take him out of the car when we were finished. He didn't want to leave! And you can bet there will be a page soon with Noah's first haircut. :)

What happened to Friday?

Wow, yesterday just disappeared. What happened to it? I dunno. Oh well, I did get to scrap a page this morning. :) And I still need to finish the page this was based on for my lesson this week. I just felt the need to do this one for some reason. Gotta get it done when the inspiration strikes...or at least I do. Kit I used was Dee Dee by Amy Sumrall, Overlay by Veronia Autumn Kit, Circle template for photos by Jessica Sprague.

I am really enjoying the class by Jessica Sprague, just had some technical difficulties with the good old computer this week so haven't had a chance to do the whole lesson yet. Hopefully tonight after the boys go to bed.

I think we are going to get Noah's first haircut today! I am so nervous. My little guy is in desperate need of a haircut. I have been in denial but there is no longer any way I can deny it...he NEEDS it cut. Sniff, sniff. He isn't going to look like my little baby any longer I know. He will be instantly transformed into the little boy he really has become (and mommy just hasn't been ready to deal with that). They have both just all of the sudden grown into little boys and are no longer little babies. They like to snuggle but not the old baby way they used to. Now they crawl into your lap and want you to read a book or they lay their head on your shoulder. Before they would curl up in your arms and just be all snuggled. Hard to explain I guess but it is just different. Or maybe I am just not ready for them to start growing up. Or maybe it is both. :)

Baby books

I am so determined to get the boy's baby books done this year. Or at least caught up I guess I should say. I actually have 2 different ones. One that has all the "info" in it and this one that I have started with photos and such. The paper one is all the info about my husband, myself and our families. This one I want to be about their lives with lots and lots of photos and info. I want them to know about when they were born and who all the people in their lives are/were. That is one thing I don't like about my past...I have no idea who most people were/are from when I was a child. Maybe guys don't care as much as gals but they will have it none the less. :) Kit used is Precious Boy by Erica Hite and I also used her baby book template. Font was Orlando.

The house is coming along. We went yesterday and met with the builder. They got the basement framed, had put the plumbing in for the bathroom in the basement and the surround sound ran. The lighting fixtures had arrived but were the wrong ones so he had them redo so that will take a little more time. Over all I think it is going to end up a pretty home. I am excited and anxious to just get in!

Working on some more papers for the MCA Overlays. They are so fantastic and I am learning so much by playing with her tutorial and overlays I just don't want to stop. I am so addicted now!

It's her birthday and a Freebie

And she isn't crying, she is having a fabulous sale!



Mel of MCA Designs is celebrating her birthday with a brand new Commercial Use kit, and she has put it on sale. You can purchase "3 Ways to Use Overlays" at the sale price of just $10 during her birthday week only. On July 1st, it will go to its regular price of $14.95. This kit contains an overload of 100 Commercial Use Overlays along with a Tutorial, "3 Ways to Use Overlays" created with designers of all skill levels in mind. The tutorial was written for Photoshop CS/2/3, and adapted by me for Photoshop Elements. It has been published as a Microsoft Word document and an Adobe PDF. Even if you use another program to design, the kit is still a bargain at this price. Credit is not required but is appreciated.

And to show how fabulous these are I made a few little goodies myself. My first freebie! You can download them here and here.

Scrappin the day away...

Well, not really but a gal can dream. :) I did get a page done. I was surprised yet again how quickly it came together. I always love those sorts of layouts. Noah has decided he likes to sit in the toy bin. I thought it was the funniest thing the other day. Cameron did it as well the next day, have to download those photos and get them scrapped for his book too. I did this page with MCA Design's A Fish Tale. Font was Manga Speak.

The other fun thing I did today was make some papers with MCA Design's new overlays. She will be releasing these tomorrow (on her birthday). There are 100 overlays! I don't think you will ever need to buy another, she has covered all the bases with these and I can't stop playing with them. I had the honor of testing these out for her on PSE6 so got to sneak a peek before they were released. Boy was I a lucky girl. So you'll have to come back tomorrow for the goodies I created and then head over to My Scrap Shop and pick them up.

What a nice weekend. We took the boys to a Children's Festival Saturday morning. Next year will be even more fun because I think they will actually understand and participate. But they still seemed to enjoy things. I think all the noise and happenings wore them out quickly. We lasted about 30 minutes before we hit meltdown status. M took them to some car thing this morning. Don't get me to lying and try to tell you what it was because I couldn't if my life depending on it. I just know it had to do with race cars. I at least got some much needed cleaning done while they were away so that was a good thing.

This will be the new place once it is complete. As you can see by the front yard it isn't finished. :) The inside has a lot left to do as well but hey, it will be home in about 5-6 more weeks...if we survive the tiny apartment. :)

In kind of a scrapping rut. I got ACDSEE the other day and am obsessing about getting all my stuff organized. And I did this right now because? I don't know. I have been wondering about the software a while now and came across a heck of a deal I couldn't pass up. So I bought it and have been spending my time on the computer trying to get all my items tagged and ready to use. I think it is going to make my scrapping life SO much easier. Am loving the software so far. Just wish I could take an entire day and get the stuff organized. I am terrible when I have a project hanging over my head...just want to get it done.

The problem with the world today...

The problem with the world (maybe I should say people) today is that people don't listen. I was transferred FIVE times and it took over 30 minutes to get it resolved. The very nice gal who finally got it resolved did it in a matter of minutes. Ugh! I am so frustrated today I should have waited until another day to take care of this I guess. Just knew I only had a short time to be able to keep my email active and the boys were napping so timing was working out...so I thought.

Another week down...

Wow...it's already the end of another week. I am amazed at how time just goes whizzing by. My little guys aren't going to be so little before I know it! They have discovered how to put my shoes on and walk around. I have to say it is the cutest thing ever! Noah had one of my sandals on his foot and the other on his hand and was just having a ball walking around like that. Of course I took pictures but they are still on the camera at the moment.

Kind of at a stand still on the scrapbooking. Funny how I am inspired for a few days and then couldn't do a page to save my life for a few days. Creativity is a funny thing indeed. Maybe all the excitement from the house buying gave me that boost for a few days I needed to get some pages done.

This weekend should be fun. Have a few things planned for the guys and getting out and having some fun. Will take lots of pictures and share when it's all over with. They are getting so big and are always so curious! Kind of anxious to have them weighed again. Cameron feels like he weighs a ton when in reality I guessing he is about 25 or so pounds. He is a solid little guy! I think I am going to be able to graduate him to 18 month pants soon! Woo-hoo! They are always just so big in the waist on the 18 month and too short on the 12 month. Kind of stuck in the middle of sizes for a while with them every couple of months. :)

We found one!

We finally found a house and signed paperwork yesterday!!!!!!! Now we can start really enjoying our time here instead of stressing about finding a place. Woo-hoo!

And of course that means more time for scrapping! I did this one last night for two things. First, I am taking a digital class and second I am hosting the letter "B" in our ABC Challenge. So this killed two birds with one stone. Always love when I can do stuff like that when in a time crunch.

Keeping my fingers and toes crossed for now

This is what my new home will look like hopefully. We have decided to go with new construction. The outside is finished but they still have to finish the inside and the good news is I will get to pick the carpet and fixtures and such since they have not gotten to that part yet. Yippee!!!

Ahh, it feels so good to almost be done. Now we just have to wait until the end of July for it to be ready. I can suck it up for 6 more weeks as long as I know there is an end in sight.


I have actually be able to scrap a little the last few days. Kind of nice. Did this page last night for a challenge over at My Scrap Shop. I am not one to do pages about myself but I thought this would be really nice for the boys to have when they got older. So this is the title page. :)

Hanging in...

We are hopefully bringing this home search to a close tomorrow. We went and looked at a neighborhood we had looked at before and liked. Happened to stop by the sales office and went to look at the house again. Going one more time tomorrow to look at several homes and hopefully make the decision. Praying we make the decision! We want our lives back!

Cameron's laugh is just infectious. I was tickling him yesterday and got these photos. He is just so cute!
We took the boys to the park today and they had a ball. I think they like playing with the mulch and climbing up the slide more than anything else in the park. I always have to laugh about that. But they seemed to have a good time and they needed some fresh air. And I can't believe it is June and in the low 80's! I know it won't last forever but we took advantage of it today.

Hope everyone is having a fantastic weekend!

My little troopers

All I can say is my little guys are such good troopers. They have put up with so much these last few weeks and I am so thankful to have such good little guys! They are in the car constantly and are still just as happy as little clams. Now that isn't to say they don't have their moments but...for the most part they are SO good.

This house hunt is going to be the death of me. I think if I hadn't already gone through everything with getting here it wouldn't be so bad, but I am about done. I am worn out and ready to just find a house. I am ready to just say the next one we look at is it and it's over. Ugh! There are too many to choose from and we just don't know the area. End of whine...I'll go and get my cheese to go with that now. :)

My little guys playing peek-a-boo in the cabinet...just as cute as can be!

Can I just say wow

There are a few authors out there that I truly respect and admire. Rick Warren is one. I think his insight is dead on and this was a wonderful interview with him.

(REMEMBER Rick Warren WROTE "PURPOSE DRIVEN LIFE")

People ask me what is the purpose of life? And I respond: In a nutshell, life is preparation for eternity. We were made to last forever, and God wants us to be with Him in Heaven. One day my heart is going to stop, and that will be the end of my body-- but not the end of me. I may live 60 to 100 years on earth, but I am going to spend trillions of years in eternity. This is the warm-up act - the dress rehearsal. God wants us to practice on earth what we will do forever in eternity. We were made by God and for God, and until you figure that out, life isn't going to make sense.

Life is a series of problems: Either you are in one now, you're just coming out of one, or you're getting ready to go into another one. The reason for this is that God is more interested in your character than your comfort. God is more interested in making your life holy than He is in making your life happy. We can be reasonably happy here on earth, but that's not the goal of life. The goal is to grow in character, in Christ likeness.

This past year has been the greatest year of my life but also the toughest, with my wife, Kay, getting cancer. I used to think that life was hills and valleys - you go through a dark time, then you go to the mountaintop, back and forth. I don't believe that anymore. Rather than life being hills and valleys, I believe that it's kind of like two rails on a railroad track, and at all times you have something good and something bad in your life. No matter how good things are in your life, there is always something bad that needs to be worked on. And no matter how bad things are in your life, there is always something good you can thank God for. You can focus on your purposes, or you can focus on your problems. If you focus on your problems, you're going into self-centeredness, "which is my problem, my issues, my pain." But one of the easiest ways to get rid of pain is to get your focus off yourself and onto God and others.

We discovered quickly that in spite of the prayers of hundreds of thousands of people, God was not going to heal Kay or make it easy for her. It has been very difficult for her, and yet God has strengthened her character, given her a ministry of helping other people, given her a testimony, drawn her closer to Him and to people.

You have to learn to deal with both the good and the bad of life. Actually, sometimes learning to deal with the good is harder. For instance, this past year, all of a sudden, when the book sold 15 million copies, it made me instantly very wealthy. It also brought a lot of notoriety that I had never had to deal with before. I don't think God gives you money or notoriety for your own ego or for you to live a life of ease. So I began to ask God what He wanted me to do with this money, notoriety and influence. He gave me two different passages that helped me decide what to do, II Corinthians 9 and Psalm 72.

First, in spite of all the money coming in, we would not change our lifestyle one bit. We made no major purchases. Second, about midway through last year, I stopped taking a salary from the church. Third, we set up foundations to fund an initiative we call The Peace Plan to plant churches, equip leaders, assist the poor, care for the sick, and educate the next generation. Fourth, I added up all that the church had paid me in the 24 years since I started the church, and I gave it all back. It was liberating to be able to serve God for free.

We need to ask ourselves: Am I going to live for possessions? Popularity? Am I going to be driven by pressures? Guilt? Bitterness? Materialism? Or am I going to be driven by God's purposes (for my life)? When I get up in the morning, I sit on the side of my bed and say, God, if I don't get anything else done today, I want to know You more and love You better. God didn't put me on earth just to fulfill a to-do list. He's more interested in what I am than what I do. That's why we're called human beings, not human doings.

· · Happy moments, PRAISE GOD.
· · Difficult moments, SEEK GOD.
· · Quiet moments, WORSHIP GOD.
· · Painful moments, TRUST GOD.
· · Every moment, THANK GOD.

Get along with each other, and forgive each other. If someone does wrong to you, forgive that person because the Lord forgave you.

I did some scrapping today! Can you believe it????

Credits: Cool Like That by Colie's Corner, Glitter splatter by Rachel Donald, Word art by Sarah Belle, Font is Kids

The boys are having a hard time adjusting to it stayng daylight so long. It doesn't get dark until 9:30ish! Strange for me but I never go to bed that early so won't be a problem on my end. :) I am going tomorrow to try and find some of those black out shades or something. Poor little guys are so exhausted and they won't go to bed until it gets dark.

Where did you learn that?

The boys were playing with calculators and keys today. Noah had taken the keys from Cameron at one point and went to the door and was trying to put them in the door knob. Where did he learn this? I know they see me do it numerous times a day now but that has only been a few days. Wow do they pick up things so easily at this age. I was so shocked he did it and just amazed. They continue to amaze me nearly every day.

They are really getting good at pointing to various body parts. Very cute...especially when Cameron does his nose. Most of the time he actually takes his thumb and points to his nose so it is too funny to me. They learned their knees and hands today. Fun, fun.

House hunting can be so frustrating! We found a house tonight that fits nearly everything we are looking for in a house, even in the price range we were looking. Just not sure about the neighborhood because it is very new. Ugh...I hate not knowing an area! I know we will find the right one at the right time and have to be patient. But this is getting very tiring already. Especially with M out of town a lot.

Noah has taken to wearing Mardi Gras beads. I think his daddy isn't too thrilled about this. Especially when he puts the pearl ones on. :) I think it's cute but he isn't encouraging it. Noah seems to become very attached to things and right now it is the beads...

Getting in the groove

Wow, I didn't remember how long it takes you to get in the groove of a new place. And I have never done this with kiddos before. I think in some ways having them has made it a little easier. Sounds funny I know but they are my buddies, my little travel partners. I just wish the dog would adjust a little better. He has taken to the patio to escape the craziness of the kiddos running after him. Before he had somewhere to escape, now we are in a small apartment and he has no where to go. Poor thing!

I tried to scrap last night. Didn't get much done because the boys kept waking up. But I have a page in mind and am putting it together as time allows. M returns tonight so that may be my "break." I am wiped out from taking the kiddos and dog up and down the stairs. Who needs a gym when you live in an apartment on the second floor with 2 toddlers and a dog. They will learn how to go down the stairs shortly after we move I am sure. He, he.

There are so many funny things about being in a new city. I will have to snap a picture on one of our walks today because I find this too funny. So you'll have to wait for that one. But they have no street lights here so it is really dark at night. The highways have no feeder roads so if you accidentally get on the highway it may be a while before you can get off. (Can you tell I did that yesterday.) :) People are very friendly and will just chat with you no matter where you are. I went through a drive thru yesterday afternoon and the guy at the window was just talking away. I thought it was kinda cool. Hmm...I know there are tons of other things but must get finished getting dressed as I hear the boys stirring. Hope everyone has a great day!

We made it!

Okay, so we made it safe and sound from Texas. What a LONG trip! We got delayed a day so didn't leave until Friday. Late Friday night we had a flat on the trailer so that took an hour and a half to get fixed (thank goodness U-Haul came and did it). Saturday the trip was going well until we made it to Indianapolis. The freeway was shut down to one lane so we got stuck for almost an hour in that. We got to the apartment and were not able to find the key. So that was another hour and a half of of fun. :( But at nearly 1 am we got into the apartment and were able to get us and the kiddos in bed by 2 am.

Man, the sun comes out early here and sets late. Very strange for it to still be daylight at 9 pm and then have the sun come up by 6 am. Going to take some getting used to I am sure but I didn't realize it was daylight that many hours here. Me likey! The weather is beautiful. In the 70-80s and loving every minute of it. Already not missing the 90 degree stuff in Texas. I miss my friends but that is about it so far. Oh...and I miss knowing where everything is. By the time I find everything where we are it will be time to get the house and start over again. He, he. But it is good experience in learning to adapt, eh?

Started house hunting yesterday and may have found one. We are going to look at it again tomorrow. I went without M and the kids yesterday so we will all go and look together. It fit what we are looking for. I got a good feeling while I was there but it is close to a pretty busy road so have to do some looking around there to see just how close and how busy that road is.

My head is so foggy right now. I am running on fumes and just want to lay down and sleep for an entire day. Not going to happen but it sounds good. I am going to get to meet some new gals tomorrow so that will be fun. Hopefully we can get settled in here in the next few months and get life back to normal. Whatever that is...