Happy Birthday Sandy

Check out Sandy's blog to see how she has come to term's with new year's eve being her birthday.........she's my personal banner maker....and she can make one for you too!

Happy New Year!

Count Down to the New Year

Tonight it's Sunday, December 28th....Wow only 3 full days til 2009. I am so looking forward to 2009 and having even more fun with friends creating art and sharing ideas.

Our remodel is in the drywalling stage and we can see the light at the end of the tunnel. It is pretty stressful and then add Christmas to the mix and it makes it a frenzied time. Every year I declare I will take the time and enjoy the season but every year there is something going on....hey, I guess that is just life. I have enjoyed the holidays and have been able to see christmas thru my niece's and grandkid's eyes.

When the clock strikes Midnight on the 31st I will give thanks that I have been blessed with family that supports and loves me, friends that share my joys and accept that when I talk to myself that I'm not crazy. ha ha

Do you like the picture on my banner. I had fun with Elf Yourself this year. You can import pictures of yourself and/or friends and put them on elves and email them off. This is one I did with some of my friends. If you don't see yourself there, fear not (or maybe fear) that sooner or later you may appear on my blog :}

Happy New Year...........

Cricut For Sale

You may or may not have read on my blog but I picked up a Cricut Expressions on Black Friday and so now I don't think I need a Cricut and Cricut Expressions sooooo anyone out there need a Cricut? $80 like new. I have the box. It WILL NOT come with any cartridges or extras.

Oh, I also have an extra Cricut power cord (don't ask :} but if you are missing one, this one is $40 BRAND NEW bought directly from cricut.com.

If you're in town we can meet and exchange. If you are not, I will only charge you the exact shipping cost.

I was going to list these on Ebay but I have decided to start listing some of my items on my blog.

Today we got Insulation in our remodel Woo Hoo it's warmer already. Now it's like 60 in here instead of the 50's. We have become adapt in building fake walls to block the air flow from the living room to our family room....where we live during the day...it's small and compact and pretty cozy when we have our floor heaters on :}

The room addition is moving along pretty smoothly so at least we can see the light at the end of the tunnel and all will be amazed when they see it...I hope.

Night...stay warm.

Holiday Tour, Friends and Presents

It's that time of year, rushing around making gifts, shopping for gifts, hoping to fit in time for friends and family before the BIG Day!

I found out about a Home Holiday Tour in my sister's neighborhood and decided to invite 2 friends and take the tour of 7 beautifully decorated for Christmas. Then I imposed a little on my sister, whose home was one of the homes in the tour and asked if after the home tour we could end up at her house and have lunch and do some gift wrapping.

What could see say to her older sister except SURE!

So I invited Bonnie and Jane a couple of dear friends to join me. I wish I could of invited more of my close friends but sometimes smaller gatherings are fun. Hopefully my other friends will understand sometimes bigger groups are harder to organize and I'm clearly not organized at this time of year :}

Jane, Bonnie and myself met and started the tour in Rancho Santa Fe. Here are a few pictures of the homes we toured. Oh I wish I was a better photographer or able to capture the magnitude of some the things we saw but it was beautiful and put me in the holiday spirit.






Jane had to take a ride in this home's elevator! If you know Jane, you know this is her FaBUlUoUs Pose :}








Now after the tour, which we could have used a few more hours to drool over all the decorations and collections....we went to my sisters and had lunch and a then went to work like little elves to create presents of beauty from my stash of "junque". I got this idea from Heather Bullard....she has so many elegant ideas. Thanks Heather :}

I wrapped/created the following two presents before the party. For the first one I used wallpaper and a twig from a bush and the cute clip-art from Kristin of Retro Cafe. The second package is for my niece and I hope she appreciates the uniqueness of the package. I used alumunium foil and then covered it with bubblewrap.




Here's some pics of our wrapping party.








Here's some of the "finished" presents....they were so fun and beautiful. I know the people receiving them will be crying when they have to unwrap them.







Here's wishing you and yours a happy holiday season.

The Art of Building

I haven't posted in awhile but it has been hard to be creative with the remodel going on here at our home.

We decided to add a bedroom, bathroom and shower downstairs to make it easier for my husband to get around. Wow, no more dragging laundry downstairs fun!

Remodeling does come with some drawbacks...noise, dust, no privacy, arguements over accessories, cold drafts, etc. but we must keep our eye on the prize :} Soon this will be history and we will be happy campers.

We are using Marrakol Construction and have used them in the past. Great company to work with very professional.

We started at the end of October and it seemed like it was dragging on but now here we are in December, demolation was done, concrete poured, framing up, roof and windows this week...oh my....it's moving right along.

Here's some pictures to give you some idea of what is happening.