the moments in between

totally disparate

(that sounds so much more official than "random", yes?)

this omg cute stamp is in the july it kit.  LOVE it.  it comes w/ several seperate leaf stamps, love that you can stamp it anyway you want.  AND..  kelly is having a moving sale - go check out the great deals!!!

sam's fever broke last night, but he was still craaaaaaaaaaaaaanky. all sorts of cranky.  so i called the ped after i dropped the bigs off at their zoo camp and got him an 11:30 appt at the ped.  i changed his dipe at 10 and noticed a rash on his belly.  ding ding ding, he's got roseola.  the ped ran a strep test just to be certain because his rash is slightly atypical and he had some spots on his tonsils, but it was negative.  he should feel beter soon, in the meantime we're keeping him on advil for the sore throat.  poor blotchy boy.

fiskars is kicking off our july "celebrations" month with an article featuring the entire design team sharing their celebrations.  i chose to do a page about dundee days, which is a fun thing our neighborhood does every year.  used lots of my fave heidi grace line - we are family - on this one. =)  keep an eye on the site tomorrow for the project a day to start.  my favorite one goes up on the 8th - i can't wait to share it. =)

stef + kids came up from lincoln yesterday.  the boys had a blast playing wii and riding scooters.  sam shared his swing w/ miss bailey, but wanted back in as soon as she left.  and then fell asleep in it.  i had a blast catching up w/ stef, despite the fact that i was about to nod off at any minute (um, sam hasn't slept since he got sick) and the fact that she wouldn't try dance dance revolution. ;)

and, apparently, 5 hours running around w/ zach wasn't enough, so the boys played w/ neighbor kids for another 2 hours after they left.  oy.  they were pretty well wiped last night.

and that, my friends, is the end of this very long entry.

this is not my house

but it's only 2 blocks away from me.  we had one *heck* of a storm blow through here late friday afternoon.  it was short but strong..  winds were 80-90mph. we lost power from 4:45ish-3:30am.  the strip mall at the end of our block just got power back this evening.  trees and limbs are down all over the city.  matthew posted some pics from our neighborhood on his flickr account.

we went outside after it died down and it was a shock.  the streets and sidewalks were flooded in places.   our next door neighbor's driveway was covered in a large limb from the next house's tree, and there were smaller limbs down everywhere on the block.  the streets and houses were all plastered with leaves.

we went for a walk last night and it was just staggering seeing some of the damage.  we really were lucky.

and just to add to all of the fun, sam woke up w/ a 104 degree temp on friday morning, so he's been a *tidge* clingy.  sleeping in an unairconditioned house w/ a fever-y baby snuggled against you is a bit warm.

in all of the craziness this morning of getting the fridge cleaned out and the yard cleared, we totally forgot it was saturday.  which means that alex missed his art class.  um, ooops.

3 little goofballs

1 made funny faces

1 ate an ice cream sandwich

and 1 sat in the mud.

****

got to escape for a bit last night.  met up with becky and kelly and went to an open house of an artist in fremont and then to dinner.  very happy way to spend an evening.  got home just in time to tuck in the bigs.

a little too much excitement

last night we were eating dinner and heard a BOOM.  and the power cut off.  and then flickered for a bit, and then cut off for good.  we figured that a transformer had blown up, and matthew went outside to see if he could find out who else on our block was without power. he found our next door neighbor outside, and a fire truck coming down our block - mark had gone out back to look at the lines behind our houses when the transformer blew, and it was on fire.  EEEPS.  a large tree limb from a house on the block behind us had fallen and hit it, and he was worried that it could start the limb on fire. the fire burned itself out quickly, but the firemen hung around until the power company got their trucks out to start working.  they even gave alex and ben and the neighbor boys a tour of the truck. =)

the power truck is in front of our driveway, the firetruck is at our neighbors.  eeeps.  the joys of living in an old neighborhood - we don't have underground power lines.  they got the power back on around 9:30 - we stayed outside all evening.  we even read bedtime books outside among the fireflies - that was fun. =)

i finished up a page this morning - the lack of power derailed my plans of getting it done last night. =P

littlest came out on the porch with me while i photographed the page...  he was still a little sleepyhead, and was content to sit and watch the rain.

into a new week

i scrapped this weekend. =)  though this one may get a bit of a redo.  not happy w/ how the journaling over the stamped circles turned out.  i used the june studio calico kit + some amy butler fabric and hero arts stamps (love this set) .

ben had this last teeball game this weekend.  perfect timing for the end of the season - it was starting to get hot out there!!  they wnt to coach pitch as the season went on and ben got a hit at the end of the game - yay!  the season was a lot of fun and i'm glad he wanted to play..  hoping he will again next year.

while ben was at teeball, alex was at joslyn for his life on the nile art class.  he made a brain tomb.  yes, a tomb for a brain. a little black box w/ a pink brain inside.  that'll be a conversation starter, for sure.  afterwards he took me upstairs to show me the model for the work they're doing on the museum, and we checked out the big chihuly piece.  alex quizzed me on what it was made of, and was surprised that i knew.

and sam i am..  well, he hung out in his stroller and ate cereal.  rough life. =)

last night while i was putting the bigs to bed, sam and daddy went for a walk and ended up catching part of much ado about nothing up at shakespeare on the green - or rather, daddy saw some of it, sammy had long since fallen asleep.

i suppose i should get moving...  target and the post office are calling my name. =P

confessions

i'm 213th in line for this book at the library.  while i was standing around waiting for the boys to check out books this morning, i spotted it on the "new fiction" shelf next to the self checkout.  yeah.  totally grabbed it and ran to the counter.

i'm a stroller snob.  i figured out quickly that i'd rather splurge on something that is easy to use and doesn't frustrate me, than to fight something cheaper. my beloved p3 doesn't fit in the back of the new car.  i've been on the search for a good replacement and brought home a maclaren quest from babies r us this morning. the p3 will do walk duty, the quest will live in the car.

eta: another confession.  i NEED these lines by jill mcdonald, like, yesterday.  anyone know where i can find them?? american traditional released them, but google isn't finding me much of anything.  HELP!! =)

laying low

yesterday was a bit too full for me, so today we have nothing on the schedule.  love that feeling.  hoping to get a bit of picking up done around here.  and i think i finally have a plan for the page that's been sitting uninspired on my desk.

our house is currently a little mismatched.  we bought new porchlights this weekend, and got the ceiling light up on sunday, and one of the side lights up on tuesday.  we had a ballgame last night and matthew has golf tonight, so maybe by friday we'll match again??  i'm in love with the new lights and wondering why we didn't change them out sooner.  don't mind the shovel over in the garden..  i've been trying to tame that wild beast.  just another outside project to try and get done before it gets horridly hot...

i love...

..putting books on hold at the library.

a certain little so and so gets cranky when the stroller isn't moving, which makes it hard to browse books at the library.  but it's easy to browse them online at home, request what i want, then grab it off the hold shelf while the bigs go search for their own books.

thanks to allison for recommending this book. i managed to get a good start on it this afternoon while the bigs were out playing w/ the neighborhood kids and sammy and i were sitting on the porch.  i read, he ate cheerios and pointed and "oooooooooooohhhhhhhhhhh!"ed at every car that went by.  loving it already.

the fiskars giveaway winner is...

Wow! Fiskars always has some fun products, but I never seem to come across them IRL. As for reading, I can't remember the last time I picked up a book, so I'm not much help there!

 

Posted by: Crystal | June 13, 2008 at 02:10 PM

congrats, crystal!!!  click on that "email me" link over to the left and send me your info, and i'll get these goodies in the mail!! =)

i have a couple of stamp sets (heidi grace & fiskars) to giveaway later this week... so stay tuned. =)

heading to the library later today..  i've made a list w/ some of your book suggestions - thanks!

full tilt into summer

busy weekend.  alex had an art class, ben had a teeball game, we went to grandma's, we did yardwork and planted some new flowers, matthew cleaned the garage gutters, the bigs and matthew washed the car, we got groceries, ran errands, celebrated father's day...  whew.

sam helped garden.  in his own special way. ;)

mmmmmmmmmmmm, dirt.

we're trying to plan a short vacation and are finding that we don't have much open time this summer.  teeball finishes up this week, but alex's basketball clinic has another 6 weeks.  we have art classes, an art camp, another zoo camp - and we promised the bigs they could do swimming lessons.  my brother and SiL are coming in july.  i'm going to chicago for cha (and i imagine that cha assignments will start showing up soon, eeeps). sam turns one and he can't very well do that without a birthday party.  matthew has days that he can't leave town because of bundle, whatever exactly that is.  i'm watching the neighbor boys a couple of afternoons when their daycare is closed.  basically, we're down to two 3 day periods that we can sneak out of town without anyone missing anything (well, matthew might have to trade someone for an off week for his golf league).  good thing it's all fun stuff, but dang.  i'm tired just thinking about it.

a few of my favorite fiskars brands things - a giveaway =)

sharing a little love on a friday.....

*fiskars tooltaxi (all sorts of must have tools together - great to grab for a crop)
*fiskars fingertip craft knife (i am craft knife challenged, but this thing is awesome!)
*fiskars tape runner (not in the pic, oops!  but it's orange!)                           
*heidi grace designs we are family photo captions cardstock stickers (LOVE these.  the perfect little touch for a layout)
*heidi grace designs we are family signature hearts (they are shimmery and happy)
*heidi grace designs we are family dimensional flowers (i'm not usually big into flowers on pages, but these seem to end up on a lot on my projects)
*lil davis foiled rimmed acetate stars (i haven't used these yet, but can't wait to get a chance!)
*lil davis shamrock glitter glaze (sheer and sparkley - so many possibilities)

i'll draw a winner from comments on tuesday morning...  happy friday! =)

eta : if you have any book recommendations for my summer reading list, i'd love to hear them.  fiction, decorating, crafty stuff, photography...  i'd love to hear what you're reading!,

back on track.

finished some assignments.

did all the laundry.

bought groceries.

signed the bigs up for the summer reading club.  and went and got a load of books.

went to a teeball game.  which got called for a storm.  and went to a teeball practice, which didn't.

played outside a lot.

updated at goodreads.  and requested a bunch of books at the library for me.

cleaned my desk and got stuff out for my next round of fiskars work.

caught up on my photo a day blog.

and that, more or less, is what i've been up to.

mia

we have all been sick.  stomach bug sick. it started with alex, around 4pm saturday.  ben started at 8.  me at 11.  matthew at 3:30, after we went back upstairs after a tornado warning.  there's nothing like cleaning up kid puke when you're not feeling so great yourself. =P  i thought we were all on the way to getting better but alex was up at 4am throwing up again.

today is all about catching up on the laundry, the dishes, and the scrap stuff i have due tomorrow.  and we *really* need to get some groceries now that most of us are out of the 7up and saltines stage.

ps : that isn't a picture of ben taking a nap, because he didn't.  he "just laid down for a minute" - or, um, three hours.  but don't tell him that. ;)

yesterday

the bigs went to zoo camp, sam and i went to bagels.  they got to ride the tram and pet a penguin (who puked from the stress of being in the presence of 15 5-7 year olds), i got a fun morning with the girls. =)

in the afternoon they played on the swingset.

and chased after a ball.

and practiced running the bases.

and a bonus sam pic - him telling me that his ball is "all gone" while watching it roll away down the driveway.  hee.

happy thursday!  the boys have their last day of zoo camp and i promised them we'd get lunch at the zoo and walk around afterwards.. hoping the weather holds out.

it's starting to feel like summer

loving the weather.  it took spring so long to come that i'm still having trouble wrapping my head around the fact that it's nearly summer.

the bigs are doing an "under the sea" day camp at the zoo this week. they made these mobiles yesterday. and they made buttons that say "oceans are awesome" fun times.  sammy and i cleaned and ran errands. man, when you're used to herding three around, one is simple. =) then last night alex and ethan (the older of the two boys next door) started a basketball clinic and ben went over to play with mason (the younger one) while they were there.

i've been absorbed in a scraproom cleanup gone wrong.  i had the bright idea to switch a couple of things around and it sort of blew up on me.  the finished product will be worth it, though.

stinker

i was changing sam's diaper.  he, as he usually does, flipped and ran as soon as i had his diaper off and let my guard down for half of a second to attempt to get the new dipe under his tush.  he crawled at top speed halfway across the living room, then turned around and signed "all done" at me and giggled, then kept going.

*silence*

bigs are at zoo camp. 
littlest is asleep.
bliss.