Back to School Freebie

Well, today was the first day of school for the kids.  Randy was so excited that she was going to be in first grade because that means she is a BIG girl and not a baby anymore.  Last night I threatened them, I mean cautioned them, not to wake me up in the morning when they get up.  They get up an hour before I have to get up and usually make enough noise to wake the dead.  Well first off, Ryan’s alarm woke me up, twice.  The kids did pretty good until Randy ran down the hallway yelling to her mother that Cheyenne was trying to kick her.  Then Brandi was yelling because Sam had gotten out when Randy went out the door.  Now Sam can’t stand it when the kids go to school and he usually sits on the end of his lead barking until he can’t see the kids anymore.  Bear in mind we have no fence in the back yard and that is connected to the open field that leads to the school, so you can watch the kids until they walk into the front door.  Well, this morning he got out and proceeded to run all over the field barking excitedly as he “accompanied” Randy to school.  Brandi chased that stupid dog for almost an hour until one of the school office workers took pity on her and helped her trap him between two cars.  So much for Sam’s first day at school.

So then after the kids went to school, Bob took Brandi and Ryan shopping for a new couch.  Here is what happens when two dogs decide to attack a couch.

That poor couch is so old and has been falling apart for so long that I guess the dogs decided to “help” get rid of it.  A new couch was bought and now we have wall-to-wall furniture.  I cannot understand what would possess them to think we had enough room for such a big couch.  It is definitely pretty though.

So in honor of the first day back to school, here is the freebie for today.  It is a Back To School frame and tag, using Clipart by Tina.  Hope you enjoy it and have a God-filled day.

Download here.

Scripture for the week

Here it is Sunday again.  The weekend always seems to go by pretty fast.  But boy, did the summer really fly.  Friday Brandi and I had to go to the school to sign the residency form out for the kids since they all live with me.  And Tuesday they start school.  Cheyenne is pretty excited about going to middle school as she will be in the 5th grade.  When I was a kid, we had elementary for grades K-5th and then junior high for 6th, 7th and 8th.  But now I guess there are just too many kids because they have middle school for 5th and 6th then junior high for 7th & 8th.  Randy on the other hand will be in first grade and, according to her, means she is now a BIG girl.  She is no longer a baby like she was when she was only five.  Bob took them to see G-Force at the movies today and they really had a ball.

I am trying to post more often and put up more freebies, so today I am starting something new.  Each Sunday I will offer a Scripture WordArt, along with something to go with it, like a frame or paper.  This first one is with a frame from Granny Art.  It is from Deuteronomy and is the greatest commandment.  Sometimes we have a tendency to get so involved in day-to-day living that we forget our real purpose on earth.

You can download here.  Have a God-filled day.

Dogs can be smarter than people

I have to tell you about our dog Sam. He is a one-year old yellow Lab who is the friendliest dog you can find. He loves chewing on things and over the course of the nine months we have had him, he has chewed up a lot of stuff. He loves my granddaughter Randy and sleeps next to her whenever possible. The other morning when I left for work, Randy was sleeping in the recliner chair, side to side, and Sam was sleeping on top of her. All I saw was her head and feet sticking out from under Sam. Most of his body was scrunched in between Randy and the back of the chair, but a lot of it spilled over onto Randy.

Sam has a habit of letting my son-in-law Ryan know when he wants something. He will go up to Ryan and bark at him. The other night, Ryan was sitting in the recliner when Sam came up and starting barking at him. Ryan, figuring that Sam needed to go outside, got up and started walking towards the back door to let him out. As soon as Ryan was clear of the chair, Sam jumped up into it and settled down for his nap. Sam wanted the chair and Ryan was in his way. And it worked too, because Ryan just moved over to the rocking chair and continued to watch TV. No wonder Sam is king of the household.

The kids start back to school next week. During the summer time they stay up quite late and usually make enough noise to keep me up. They go to bed much earlier during school, but they make way too much noise in the mornings before I have to get up. There are lots of Back To School kits available (check out the Back To School Blog here for an enormous free collab kit by over 100 designers.) So I made this cute little sunflower pot for you.

(Link has been fixed. Sorry about that)

You can download it here. Have a God-filled day!

Windows Live

I have just discovered Windows Live, which has all kinds of components, including Windows Messenger, Mail, Photo and Writer.  I could care less about the Messenger or Mail, but I am definitely interested in Writer and maybe Photo.

Windows Writer is supposedly a WYSIWYG editor for writing to your blogs.  So I am writing this post in Windows Live.  I had all kinds of problems getting the settings done correctly, but once I got it right, it was a breeze.

We were watching TV yesterday and Ryan decided he wanted some of his beef jerky as a snack.  He was sitting in the recliner, but had to move to the desk because he had an audience.  These pictures will show you what I mean.

 

 

In case you can’t tell, that is Squeekers the Cat and the two dogs, Dixie and Sam, that are determined to have a share of Ryan’s snack.  Squeekers had the advantage because he could almost get his face into the bag, but Sam and Dixie had to wait their turn.  It is tough eating anything around our house. 

You might also notice the couch behind Ryan.  The dogs have made this couch their own.  And when Ryan accidently tore a small piece off the edge of it, the dogs completed the act by tearing it to shreds one day when we were gone.  Sometimes when we leave them alone, they retaliate by tearing things up.  It is usually just paper or plastic hangers we give them, but sometimes it is more destructive, like the couch, shoes, or the latest victim: the remote control for my big TV.

And they say dogs are FUN.

My Biggest Challenge

I am really getting into doing color challenges. This month it is one at Hummie's World. Because I am just now starting to design, the color challenges present a great way to get inspiration. And that is my biggest challenge. I have always said that I have the talent to do, but I just don't have the talent to create. In order to create, you have to have a really great imagination, of which I have none. When I used to paint ceramics, I could not "see in color". That white piece of bisque I was getting ready to paint was just that....a white piece of bisque. My daughter Brandi can look at it and "see" it in color, so she knew what she was going to paint. I knew how to paint it but I just didn't know what colors to use.

Now I am faced with the same thing in learning to design for digiscrapping. God gave me the desire to create all kinds of things, but in his infinite humor, He left out the ability to create. That I have to struggle with. So color challenges are one way to help give me that push I need. So over at Hummie's World, I decided to participate in her August color challenge. And this is what I came up with.















This kit is for personal use only and is created at 300 ppi. There are 6 papers, 4 frames, 3 ribbon wraps and one flower corner for the frames. You can download here.

July Color Challenge

This month the colors for the Color Challenge at Plain Digital Wrapper were a whole lot better than last month's very vivid colors. I must say though that I love primary bright colors alot. July's colors were more muted and very pretty. I dove right in and made up a few papers to scrap the first layout of Brandi and Cheyenne's baptism. I have been wanting to do a word art for one of the songs we sing at church and thought this would fit right in.

Here is the layout for Cheyenne and Brandi. This page will also be used for Cheyenne's scrapbook I am doing for her birthday.













And since Ella's 80th birthday is this Saturday, I am still working on her Life Book. This layout is for her book and is of Travis' family. Since Travis won't be able to be in New Braunfels this weekend, it is okay for him to see the page. Actually, he probably won't see it as he is in Kansas for another school. This one only lasts a week and he will actually be back to San Antonio Friday, but he has to stay for Drill. The closer he gets to deployment, the more important the drills are.

Anyway, here is one of his pages for his grandmother's birthday present.













And since Brandi never looks at my blog, here is one of her pages.













The first two layouts were done with the kit I designed for the July Color Challenge. I am having a lot of fun learning how to design, although they are no way as good as so many other kits out there. Anyway, here is the preview for it.













And you can download it here.

Clip Art

I really like clip art. I like the bright and colorful ones and I especially love the patriotic ones. When you walk into a scrapbooking store, it's the same as all those wonderful stickers. They all look so cute and I want to buy them all. I buy what I can, take them home and put them in these nice little piles in my room. And there they still sit. You see, I don't paper scrap. My older daughter Dana has done that for several years, and every once in awhile I go to her house and we make cards or a page. She and her husband have this big two-story, four-bedroom house and no kids. So she has her own room where she can put all her scrapping supplies and she loves it.

So I keep collecting all these cute little stickers and they have no place on my digital pages. That is until I discovered digital clip art stickers. So, true to my nature, I bought some and then set about incorporating them into my layouts. They don't really have a place in my heritage pages, but they fit right in on the pages I am doing for my youngest granddaughter Randy's scrapbook for her upcoming birthday.

So here's the newest page I did for her Kindergarten graduation picture. Can you believe the school took cap and gown pictures for graduation from Kindergarten? When she brought the pictures home from school, she was quick to point out to her mother that "those aren't real books in the picture", just in case her mother didn't know that.

This is a page I created using clip art from Country Clip Art by Tina, which is the the bus, books, blackboard and pencil frame. I created the Kindergarten word art. The little hanging buttons are from Diva's Creation - GrazyJelly Beans.

I liked it so much I decided to offer it as a freebie. Randy is in Kindergarten, but I went ahead and did the other grades in word art. In this little mini kit, you get all the grades word art, two frames (one with the bus and one without) and the background paper. Here is the preview and you can download it here. If you like it, please leave a comment.

June Color Challenge

I get lots of emails from various different digiscrapping sites that I visit. Some I buy from and some I just browse their forums and galleries. Yesterday I received an email from Plain Digital Wrapper about their June Color Challenge. I guess I had never noticed this particular challenge, or else the colors just intrigued me, or maybe it is because I have finished Ashlyn's book and now need to do Randy's. Whatever the reason, I decided to participate in this challenge.

So here is the color chart they gave us to work with.













Now it just so happened that I had a pretty good picture of Randy that was taken at Ashlyn's birthday party that would work good with these colors. But starting from scratch with my own elements and paper, etc, is a little bit harder than pulling in items from kits. So it took me awhile longer on this. With a little imput from Brandi, here is what I came up with for the layout.













The challenge said we could make a layout or a mini-kit, or both. So since I created everything to make the layout, I decided to put it all together into a mini-kit too. And I also converted my layout to a quick page. I added a few more papers to round it out. The pink flower is a template from Atomic Cupcake and the sun is a CU freebie from JosDZigns. It is not included in the kit but you can visit her blog at http://www.ccountry.net/~gmimlost/JosDZigns.html. The clip art is from Country Clip Art Graphics by Tina. Here is the preview for the kit.




This kit is for personal use only and you can get it here.

You can find the quick page here.

Military Ancestors

It has been awhile since I have uploaded a scrapbooking page. I have been busy doing tutorials, trying to learn all I can about designing. I would like to slowly get into designing my own stuff.

Anyway, here is a page I have been planning for awhile. It is a heritage page for my genealogy, listing all the direct ancestors who fought in an American war. I started with Travis and moved to his father and then my father and up the ancestor line. The list is pretty impressive, so I hope the page does them all justice.



I used a combination of three kits from Heritage Scrap; Revolutionary War and Civil War Kits by Jean Daugherty and Army Life by DigiZines by Teri. Go on over to Heritage Scrap and check out all the wonderful kits and layouts.

Wouldn't You Know It

Okay, so they delivered the new stove and table today at pretty much the same time. Which meant DD was trying to sweep the floor where the old stove was before they put the new stove in at the same time she was trying to direct the furniture people on where to put the new table. Then having to sign both sets of delivery papers at the same time. That's a lot for her. So she calls me to tell me that they have been delivered, and is she excited about either of the new items? Noooo, she is excited about the new little dog she found by the mailbox.

First, here is the picture of our new stove.







It's a pretty cool stove. But the top looks like a BBQ grill. I do like how the whole top is one smooth layer so you can just slide a pan over without having to pick it up. And that big burner in the middle is supposed to be great with a griddle. We ordered a griddle for it and that should be in Friday. The burner on the right is what is called a power burner. Supposed to heat real fast, real quick so you can boil water in half the time. Bet you didn't think I knew this much about stoves, did you?

And here is the new table Bob bought for the kids.



Bear in mind that the kids have been sitting at this little picnic table that I bought 1-1/2 years ago at Ikea. Poor Cheyenne was really getting uncomfortable at it because her knees kept hitting the bottom of the table and she had no where to put her legs. This table has both sides that are drop-down as you can see, so we can slide it completely up to the wall for the kids or move it out so four people can sit there, which doesn't really happen much. There are four chairs that go with the table, but we really don't have room for all four chairs. Not sure what we will do about that. It amazes me that whoever designed this house must have had something against eating at a table because there is absolutely no place for one here.

Now here is the new little dog that got everyone so excited.





Now this little dog looks like a small black version of Chelsea that the kids had when they were young. But this one is a toy version. She has taken to Brandi like I have never seen. Doesn't like to be more than a step away from her and gets real excited if Brandi puts her down. She is most content just sitting on Brandi's lap. You should have seen her dance around on my bed while I was trying to take her picture. She was trying so hard to get back into Brandi's arms, but she couldn't reach her. It was so comical, I should have gotten my camcorder out instead of the camera. Brandi doesn't want anyone to claim this dog, but she has agreed to put FOUND signs up in the neighborhood and make a concerted effort to locate any owners. Just what we need - another dog.

Bad Stove, Bad Bad Stove

Now this is a first. How often do you open the oven door while cooking dinner and have the door fall off in your hands? Well that happened to Ryan Friday night. He tried to put the door back on but that was impossible. He finished cooking dinner while all the heat escaped into the kitchen. One of the burners had not been working when we moved in and another had gone out since. Now this. And our landlord stated in our lease that he would not repair or replace the stove or refrigerator. Our landlord does not want to spend any money on this house; he only wants to collect the rent.

So we went to Sears and bought a new stove today. We took Bob's credit card with us as it felt lonely because it never gets used. We bought the stove on a 12 month, no payment, no interest special, and on sale too. This will give me a year to pay it off and not incur any interest charges. I like buying that way. I get it now and still don't have to pay interest. I bought my washer and dryer from Home Depot that way and managed to pay it off in plenty of time.

Here's a picture of our broken stove and you can click here to see the new stove that will be delivered Tuesday. The new dining room table and chairs will also be delivered Tuesday too. There are some advantages to DD being at home all day and not working.

This has been a very hard weekend. I spent all day Friday and Saturday re-formatting my computer because of the virus I had. Then I had to re-install all my programs, which was very time consuming. Then the bad thunderstorm we had on both those days. Our back yard fronts on a big grassy area and then the school, and this was nothing but a huge lake. I tried to put the dog out Saturday night because he kept barking that he wanted to go out, but each time I took him to the back door, he took one look outside and backed up. I tried to grab his collar and he actually dug his feet in and we had a tug-of-war. He was smart enough not to want out.

So the upstart is that I have not had time to do any scrapping this week. I met Travis and his gang Wednesday night at Joe's Crab Shack for dinner to celebrate Kelsee's 14th birthday. Fourteen years old!! She will be entering high school this fall. Oh, and BTW, she made the cheerleading squad. Way to go Kelsee!

Here are pictures of our night out at Joe's.


This is Kelsee with her scrapbook I made her. She really seemed to like it. And I had fun doing it. Now I can start on Ashlyn's as her birthday is next.

This is Kelsee being a very good sport. Dana told the waitress that it was Kelsee's birthday, so this is what she had to do for the entertainment.

And this is my sweet granddaughter and me. Isn't she gorgeous?

Military Layouts

Just a quick note today. Wanted to post these new layouts using the American Soldier and Army Life kits of DigiZines by Teri. They are so great to scrap all my family members who have served in the military, which is everybody but Brandi. Dana's made a comment or two about wanting her own scrapbook, so I guess this would be her first page of a future book.

Here are the layouts.












This is my Dad, who served in the Marines for 30 years, seeing action in WWII, Korea and Vietnam.

This one is of Bob, who was also in the Marines and served a tour in Vietnam. The black and white photo was taken in Vietnam. Talk about young and skinny.












This next one is of Travis, who was in the Army and then the National Guard. He went to Iraq and is due to go back in August.













And the last one is Dana, who was also in the Army. Thank heavens she didn't have to go to war. I know that may be sexist, but I would just as soon my daughter stay closer to home.

More Layout Challenges

Got back last night from Trinity Pines where we had our Ladies Retreat. It was absolutely beautiful weather the whole weekend. And the place was really gorgeous, although I wasn't really enthused about their food. When you are a picky eater like I am, it doesn't help to have someone decide what I am going to eat. They had one meal only which they handed you on a plate when you walked into the dining hall. The first night there they gave me a plate with chicken and a bunch of green stuff. Yuck! I do not like vegetables. The food was good, I just wish I could have had a better selection for my finicky palate.

We had a really good time. It was great meeting some new people and being able to put faces to the names. The videos were Beth Moore and these were pretty good. I like Beth Moore, but I do have my issues with some of her videos. We crammed a lot into the 24 hour period, which left this old body very tired when I got home. And bad me, I didn't even get up and go to church this morning. I just slept in.

So here are two new layouts I did for some new challenges at Heritage Scrap. The first one is with the kit Fabulous Fifties by Roberta T. Designs. This was a fun kit to use. I was only a kid during the 50's but I figured this picture of me in front of the car would work. It shows the 50's style car of my parents.












You can find this wonderful kit here.

The next layout is one I did for the Easter challenge using one of Victoria's Easter kits. I used both of them: Old Fashioned Easter and Elsie's Easter Violets, both at Heritage Scrap. This is a picture that was taken quite a few years ago up in Giddings. Of course the three older kids are mine; Dana, Travis and Brandi, along with their young cousins Laura and David. This is the only picture that I know of that was taken of all five kids, the only grandchildren of Jack and Ella. Laura and David live in Michigan and this was the only trip to Texas they both took. This page will also go into Ella's Life Book that I am making for her birthday.












You can find these kits here and here.

Getting ready for the Ladies Retreat

I am getting excited about leaving tomorrow for our Ladies Retreat. I haven't been in on all the planning, but I know how excited Janet has been while she gets ready for it. I definitely need to get away from all the stress in my life.

One of the great things about going away for a retreat is the abibility to leave behind all that stress and worldly things. Sometimes I get so bogged down in day-to-day life that I forget exactly why we are really here. And that's why I love working at my church. It helps keep me a little more focused on God.

I remember when I was a young married, my mother-in-law Ella used to try to get me to go to church with her. She also worked at her church as a secretary and sometimes when they had functions there, I would go with her. I didn't mind those kind of church goings, but the idea of getting up early on Sunday (my one day to sleep in) was just out of the question. I remember telling her many times that just because one didn't go to church did not mean you weren't a Christian. You didn't neet church to believe in God and live your life according to the Bible. Oh, the folly of youth!

It took me living the majority of that youth and making so many mistakes to make me realize the folly of my words. When you don't live the life of a Christian and seek the fellowship with other Christians, it is too easy for the enemy to lead you astray. Oh how my life would have been so different if I had heeded the Lord's call much earlier.

My mother-in-law, though, did just that. She told me not too long ago that she prayed for 60 years for her husband Jack to be saved. Talk about persistance in prayer! Jesus teaches us to be persistant in our prayers. That is hard sometimes. God answers prayer in His own timing, for His own purpose and in His own way. We may not understand how this works, but perseverance can bring unexpected blessings.

1 John 5: 14-15 tells us that God does hear our prayers. “And we can be confident that He will listen to us whenever we ask Him for anything in line with His will. And if we know He is listening when we make our requests, we can be sure that He will give us what we ask for.” Did you notice that part of “in line with His will”? Therein lies the problem. People often pray for things that they want instead of what God wants for us. After all, God wants the best for us, but we just want material things.

Getting back to my mother-in-law. Wanting Jack to be saved had to definitely be in God's will. After all, that is his will for all of us. But He has this bothersome rule about not interferring with man's will. He doesn't want robots. He wants to lead us gently, not push us. I think there are some people who need a push once in awhile, while there are some who need a giant shove (and I am thinking of one person in my life in particular).

Well anyway, Ella quietly prayed and persevered and God granted her the desire of her heart and Jack was saved and went on to be quite active in their local church for several years before his death. I have a desire of my heart, but I don't think I have 60 years left to wait. I keep praying that God's timing for me might be just a little bit quicker than Ella's.

So, here is my layout that I scrapped for Ella. It was also for a challenge at Heritage Scrap using Vicki's new kit called Faith, and I think it turned out pretty good. I will also include it in Ella's Life Book I am doing for her 80th birthday this summer.

Blue Willow

Over at Heritage Scrap, all the designers got together and each designed a kit they call Blue Willow. Put all seven kits together and you have one whopping big kit. It is absolutely gorgeous. Well, of course, then they had to have a challenge to design a layout using one or more of these kits. There were so many things to choose from I had a hard time coming up with this one. I had to re-do it three different times. But I finally was happy with it.

This is my sweet youngest granddaughter Randy. These are her school pictures for Kindergarten. I will also use this page for her Life Book when I do it this summer for her birthday.











I liked these kits so much and the LO I created that I just had to do a quick page also. So here is the freebie.











Download here