Decorated Notebooks

Here are three composition notebooks I decorated to give to my three nieces in Guatemala. I think they'll like them. I think they are cute. I did the two green/brown/blue ones for the 16 yr. olds and the pink for the 14 yr. old. I thought they looked a little more "sophisticated" for the older girls. Thanks to my great friend, Christy, for the Sparkle Mod Podge, it made them very glittery! The borders along the left edge were a cream color and I sprayed them with Glimmer Mist to match the colors in my papers. The brown border I sprayed with "coffee bean" but it wasn't dark enough so I then chalked it with dark brown shimmer chalk. Thanks for looking and have a great week. I promise when I get back from the trip and get settled I'll post pics of my recent layouts!!

I'm back

That was a long couple of days....sorry! My laser eye surgery was a breeze. I am now without glasses or contacts and can see better than ever. We've been extremely busy and were on vacation. We had the most amazing time in Niagra Falls, Canada. It was so beautiful and the weather was perfect. I have managed to do a few things in between all the chaos. I will try to take pics and post in the next couple of days, when all the kiddos are back to school. Hope all have been well. It's good to be back!

This is us getting ready to go on the Maid of the Mist boat ride. They take you as close to the Falls as you can get. It was so cool!!!!

This is Christine holding a Loorikeet at the Bird Aviary. I was lucky enough to snap the picture at the exact moment the bird bit her on the neck. She was done with the birds after that.

We went to the Butterfly Conservatory and we were all lucky enough to have butterflies land on us. Christine was gettting a little anxious because it took a while for one to land on her. Thankfully it finally happened (it's on the front of her shirt right above the document holder she's wearing).

This is Adriana with her butterfly. She was the first one to get one on her.

This is a picture of the American Falls and the Canadian Horseshoe Falls taken from our hotel room. The American Falls are to the left. We could hear the roar of the water from our room when we opened the window.

This is a close up of the American Falls.

This is all of us preparing to take a carriage ride through the beautiful gardens that surrounded the Butterfly Conservatory. It was so peaceful and beautiful.

We did lots more stuff but it's too much to post here. You'll have to wait for the scrapbook to be finished.

out of commission for a couple of days

I had laser eye surgery this AM and about to pass out from the abundance of drugs (valium, vicodan, & sleeping pills). Will be back up to speed next week hopefully. Appreciate your prayers for a speedy recovery. Thanks and have a fantastic weekend.

Congrats Party

These are pics from the party I threw for Edwin in honor of him becoming a citizen. It was such a blast. I didn't think we'd have a very good turnout since I did it on July 4th. What a surprise.....we probably had about 75 guests. Edwin and I were so honored that everyone took time out from their holiday plans to come and celebrate with us. It was such a blessing to share such a special moment in our life with so many wonderful friends that are like family to us. I took the drink cups and filled them with candy wrapped in flag wrappers and put a pinwheel and two small flags in it. I used those as table centerpieces. They came out so cute. The tables were covered in either red, white, or blue tablecloths with the pinwheel cups and handheld fans with the flag on them. This is the cake and my cute hubby.

A pic of us with our dear friend Mike.

Edwin & me with our youngest son (really, nephew, but they are more like sons to us), Danilo.

Christine with our oldest son (nephew), Mynor.

Us, together and having a blast.

Christine and Adriana were the welcoming committee. They stood by the door and gave star-shaped necklaces to everyone as they came into the party. They thought that was so cool!

Me and my dear friend, Pauline, and her niece, Mercy.

Our girls with a couple of their friends.

Me and one of my best buds...Christy!

Edwin with a bunch of the guys that work for us.

Edwin with several guests.

The Oath

Here are a few pics from Edwin's Oath Ceremony. It's still a little unbelievable to us. We went today and applied for his new US Passport (we need it right away to travel to Canada at the end of the month). They call out each country and the people from that country stand up. Edwin was the only one from Guatemala (out of 48 people). He's taking the actual Oath in this picture. He's reading it from the back of the handout.

He's saying the Pledge of Allegience for the first time as a US Citizen. It was so awesome! Then he actually received his certificate. He was called first and I wasn't quite prepared with the camera. The lighting was terrible in the room too. Finally, the happy family.

What? I can't hear you....

I had forgotten how LOUD concerts are, especially ones with hundreds of young girls screaming as loud as they can. But my inability to hear was all worth it, Christine had a fantastic time and says I'm the coolest Mom ever! Although, I've opened a "can of worms" because she wants to know when we can go to another concert!! Maybe after I regain my hearing and forget again how loud it was this time and recover from paying $30 for a T-SHIRT (outrageous!). I'm off to get ready to go to Edwin's Oath Ceremony. We are so excited and can't wait to see him complete this journey. Will post some pics from the concert and ceremony later. Have a Great day!

Couldn't stand it....

I just couldn't wait, I had to use my great "new" space to create something. So, I threw this LO together. It's from our trip to Vegas a couple of years ago. One more LO and I'll be finished with Vegas. Yeah!!! It's amazing how "easy" it is to create in a clean space. I did this LO in less than 30 minutes (including picking paper, embellies, etc.). That's unbelieveable for me! You can't tell from the pic (unless you click on it to make it larger)....I ran the PP through a paper crimper and to make "bubbles" all over it. The center of the flower is an acrylic tile that says "fun". I didn't journal b/c the pics have the place and date printed in the corners. Now I need to get some sleep, it's almost 11:00. A long day tomorrow, I'm taking Christine to the Demi Lovato concert in Lafayette. I didn't get much sleep last night, Christine talked Edwin into letting her sleep with me and he went to her room. Well, she apparently had lots of dreams because I was startled awake several times from a swift kick to the head!!!! Now that's a great way to be awakened ;-)