water, water EVERYWHERE!

I am just now pulling my head up for a moment in the midst of craziness. We've been going, going, going and I hardly know which end is up these days. My brother and nephew were here for a visit last week. They live on the east coast so we don't see them often enough. Spending time together was more important than say doing laundry and keeping the kitchen tidy. So after they left on Saturday, it was time to tackle the messy homefront.

After getting the laundry machines going and starting a load of dishes, I left the house for a quick shopping trip with my daughter. In my absence there was a NEAR DISASTER in my scrap area. My dh decided to run the backyard sprinkler while we were out. He didn't check the settings on the automatic sprinkler head, just turned on the water. The other fatal mistake was that he left open the sliding glass doors that separate the yard from my scrap area. Without a backward glance, dear hubby went to the front yard to wash his car.

Well, I think you can guess what happened... yup that's right, the living room got thoroughly sprinkled. In particular, the sprinkler rotated straight into my scrap area for 20 to 30 minutes unattended. (Wasn't there a commercial not too long ago where something like this happened?)

DH called me with panic in his voice asking me to come home immediately and wouldn't tell me why. Sigh. All I can say is thank goodness for my obsession with zip loc bags. I'm still not completely done putting everything back as it should be, but almost there. I lost one photo and some of my storage boxes and other cardboard-y things are now stained and warped. I also had to pull lots of stuff out of packaging and set them out to dry, but thankfully didn't really lose anything much. It did take a long time to hand dry all the critical stuff like my squeeze and cropadile and my rolling tote which has a canvas cover and all the pockets had water in them. Sure took a huge chunk of my time over this weekend and into mid week, but like I said other than that no complaints because I didn't lose anything to speak of.

Gotta love those zipper baggies!

shameless plug

Today is the *LAST DAY* to vote for Scrappin' Good Times as the Best Scrapbooking Store at MyFoxLA's 2007 Hot list. It's super easy to put in your vote. Just follow this link, then scroll down below the pic and click on the yellow "vote" button:
Best Scrapbooking Store -2007

Let's put SGT on the 2007 Hot List!

aquarium of the pacific

Four words: Had a great time!

instant scrapbook

A little footnote on the new dies. Almost forgot to mention that I was already able to use a couple of them for the baby shower album that my friends and I made on Monday. Here is a pic of some of the album pages (tho not the ones I used the new dies on because I don't want to post guests' photos without their permission).



The finished album turned out so cute (if I do say so!) There were four of us who worked on it, but despite our differing individual styles we still managed to put together a wonderful unified album. It really helped to use papers from one manufacturer/line (in this case K & Company). And let me just add that I loved the "teamwork" approach -- the four of us were able to complete in a single afternoon-to-evening.

Today as the shower progressed, we quickly snapped, printed and adhered the photos into the album so that it would be done when the guest of honor finished opening gifts. The completed album was the last gift she opened. She was very happy with it.

Instant albums like this one are great fun to do and are a big hit. If you don't have a photo printer, you can use a Polaroid camera instead.

a warehouse sale to "die" for

Had some big fun yesterday at the big Sizzix/Ellison warehouse sale. Wow, they sure know how to put on a sale! I ended up with a couple of new alphabets, some great "basic" dies and lots and lots of fun wafer dies (Sizzlets). The wait to pay took as long (or longer) than the amount of time spent shopping, but no matter. It was all worth it for such great deals. I saw many familiar faces (some of these were scrappers I don't even know but must have seen around at Expos or in stores). I heard this may just be the last warehouse sale so I'm really glad to have made the trip out there.

Can't wait to use my new toys. I'll be sure to post projects from the new dies here.

check out print & pattern blog

So, you may or may not have noticed that I've linked up a bunch of blogs and stuff on the right side navigation of my blog here. One of my faves is Print & Pattern - they always post the coolest stuff.

Well, if you've never checked it out before, you really need to visit now because they are featuring cool scrapbook papers. This is the first time I've seen SB stuff there (but then again I don't visit it as often as I'd like). They've got KI Memories and in particular stuff from the uber cool Love, Elsie line by the extremelly talented Elsie Flannigan.

Here's a quick "go to" link for you: Print & Pattern

KI had the cutest booth at Winter CHA earlier this year. They were just releasing the Love, Elsie line and had Elsie set up in a cute litttle "kitchenette" with a bar for stoppers-by to sit and do a make-n-take. Wish I'd gotten some pics of the cute kitchen, but anyway here is one pic I did get. You can see the Roxy and Betty lines in the background:

so just what have I actually been up to you may wonder

Well, I'm not exactly sure. All I know is I've been too busy for my computer. Hmmm... let's see if I can do a not too long sum up. If you haven't the patience for a long read, just skip this post!

First there was some mouth trouble. It started the weekend before we went to see Dancing with the Stars. I wasn't sure if it was sinus junk with all the winds and fire, but in the end it looks like I can count on another date with the dentist. Can you say "root canal"? Needless to say there was lots of pain and down time in late October. When I finally got some relief, I went into scramble mode to make up for all the lost time.

And what, you may wonder, was I scrambling with? Well, lots of little things but somehow they all come back to a big project we've undertaken at home to move bedrooms around and reorganize. I feel like my house is much like a giant Rubik's cube at the moment. I have to move and switch things in one room to be able to move over things from another room and then shift, shuffle and cull stuff again to make another move. There ain't no algorithms for a quickie fix with *my* Rubik's cube unfortunately.

As part of the Big Project, we decided to have a big blowout yard sale last weekend. I had also committed to taking part in a scrapbook yardsale at one of my local SB stores. So I was a crazy, cleaning, sorting, pricing machine for the last couple of weeks. And let me say it was totally worth the effort. Not only did I move out 2/3 of the items I sent to the SB yard sale, I also earned myself a tidy little store credit in the process. My home yard sale was also a smashing success mainly in the fact that so much stuff is gone. Honestly, I would have paid these people who took the big things and eased my life. But it was nice to put a little cash in my wallet for the effort.

In the midst of the Great Cleanup of 2007, I also had my monthly make-n-take at the store last week. I was so distracted with all my homefront projects that I neglected sending my reminder email, but bless all my regulars for showing up anyway! I had a great turnout and we had a fun day (plus it was *AWFUL* nice to get away from home, let me just say!)

This past Monday was a holiday with the kids out of school, so we planned a long crop day. My friends and I completed a gift album for a baby shower we're all going to this weekend. It's a pre-made album of the shower. We'll be printing the pics on the sly at the shower and popping them into the album and giving the album to the mother-to-be that day.

I had just a few other little things to take care of that are now mostly under control. My eBay sellers group had selected me for a Member Profile at the blog this week as well as having a blurb for a Featured Listing. In addition, the group had a challenge which I had decided to join, so I had to get my act together on these items. You can read all about it at the Pocket Full of Papers blog.

Hmmm... that's just about it for mi vida loca the last few weeks. However, the craziness isn't quite over yet. My brother and nephew are arriving Saturday from the east coast for a week long visit. I'm hosting a family brunch on Sunday and then the rest of the week is just plain busy. In addition to the family visit, we are trying to finish the bedroom move this coming week. Not sure how we will get it all done. I have visions of our project leaking into December, but oh well. If it must, it must.

Okay, there you have it. More than you ever wanted to know about me. Gosh and on top of the seven weird facts it's really kind of overload isn't it.

not once, not twice, but FIVE times

That's how many times I was tagged! And I'm sorry to be so late "playing". I guess it's kinda like when you're out playing and it gets dark and all the kids start going home and you're the last one out there. Yup, that's me!

So, here goes...

First, I was tagged by
Nancy
Nicolle
Tracie
Christy
and
Tina

Now, these are the rules:

1. Link to the person that tagged you and post the rules on your blog.
2. Share 7 random and/or weird facts about yourself (on your blog, we all want to know them).
3. Tag 7 random people at the end of your post and include links to their blogs.
4. Let each person know that they've been tagged by leaving a comment on their blog.

So here are just 7 random facts about me ('cause no way am I doing seven for every time I was tagged!)

1. I like a little coffee with my flavored creamer
2. I never met a chocolate I didn't love
3. I know WAY to many of the lyrics to Rapper's Delight by the Sugarhill Gang
4. I went to high school with Tommy Lee and we were in a class together (dance class -lol!)
5. I own less shoes than my husband (now that's just sad)
6. I have x-ray vision. Wait, scratch that. Actually, without glasses I am legally blind.
7. I can't sleep unless there are socks on my feet.

I tag:

Trisha
Mandy
Kim
Liz
Terri
Cathi
Lara

Whew!

Some of you may have already been tagged but what goes around comes around. Have fun and pass it on.

up to my eyeballs

Been super duper busy, but then you probably guessed that from my lack of blog posts. I know I've been tagged by lots of fun folks and I promise to get down to business with posting and tagging soon.

In the meantime, I just wanted to post a quick pic of today's make-n-take card. I'll be at Scrappin' Good Times from 11:30am until 1:00pm doing this free project. It is a gatefold "Thanks" card using lots of Quickutz die cut leaves on a Cookie Cutter scalloped circle base. It has a surprise closure feature. Hope I see some of you!