I LOVE this page!!

I saw this pic of my friend on Facebook and just LOVED it and knew I wanted to scrap it since I have NO recent pics of her. I was looking for something really GREAT to lift or get inspiration from because this was a very special page for me and I found this AWESOME LO on the Prima Marketing blog using the Mommy & Me papers. Of course, I don't have those because of the "no shopping for Lent" thing so I just improvised, but I LOOOOOVE the way it turned out! I usually don't use the exact papers and embellies when I lift a LO anyway. I'm going to send my friend a link to my blog so she can see the page for herself since she can't see it in person. She lives in Pennsylvania and we "met" on an online parenting site over 9 years ago. We used to chat on the computer...oops, no...WEBTV...lol all the time (this was before my computer days), send each other snail mail and packages and talk on the phone for hours on a pretty regular basis. Over the years, we have both had kids and gotten busy with our lives, but our friendship has still survived :) I really hope to someday meet in person, but even if we never do, I still love her very much and value her friendship :)

Over the weekend we went to that reunion of Miguel's at Chacho's. It was fun...his friends are really funny! Afterwards, we did our grocery shopping which was kind of nice because it was late and the store was pretty much empty. And we didn't have the kids so that was a plus. We got it done pretty fast. On Saturday, we took the kids to the movies to see "Monsters VS Aliens" but we didn't get to see it in 3D because that showing wasn't until 4:30. It was still a very good movie and the kids loved it. After the movie we ate lunch at Bill Miller's and then went to church. On the way home, we stopped and rented a movie...some Transporter movie I think it was....with Jason Statham I think his name is...don't know if I spelled it right. That is one HOT man!! I mean HOTTTT!!! lol It was a good movie. Also bought a Kung Fu Panda game for the kids to play on the XBox. On Sunday, we took the kids to walk at Woodlawn Lake....we only walked around the lake once because it was kind of windy and Mikey started coughing. I also got to do all my cleaning yesterday so that left me free today to do my scrapping :) Well, I actually did do "some" cleaning today and got on my bike too even though my ankle is really hurting. I did one of the preprogrammed workouts and it was HARD! It was only a 20 minute workout, but the resistance would change on its own from time to time and it went up to 6 at one point and my legs hurt and I wanted to stop...lol, but I didn't!
Hmmm...that's pretty much it for today. I can't even think straight..lol. I've been up since 6:15 and I'm sleepy and Mikey has been up just as long and he is at that point where he's REALLY tired even though I told him a MILLION times earlier to lay down and take a nap,but he didn't. So now, he is tired and wanting to take one, but can't because it's too late for a nap and he's cranky and making everyone just as miserable as he is! I don't like it when he's cranky!! But it's seven o'clock and I can give Mikey a bath in a while and hopefully that will keep him up until at least 9:00 and then I can put him down for the night...woohooo!! And then we will do it all over again tomorrow :)

How Lal Got Her Groove Back....

My scrappy groove that is :D I managed to do two pages late in the day today and finished the second one up a while ago. Both were lifts from someone named muffyvan on 2 Peas. I love her stuff...I have her bookmarked as one of my favorite artists. She has a style that I like to call "everything but the kitchen sink" LOL I just made that up...but because she can put all sorts of different "things", brands, colors, ect and it just "goes" and looks awesome. There are several people who have this style that I just LOVE. My dear friend Gina for instance whose blog I have linked in my sidebar :D See how I did that Gina...I just gave you a "plug"...is that what it's called? It sounds weird...lol

Anyway, umm...not much else going on here...still doing the bike...every day for 35 minutes which always comes out to 10 miles or a tiny bit more. My ankle is hurting less and less and I'm wondering if my theory of using it more/hurting less wasn't so off base. Let's keep our fingers crossed. I am definitely feeling a difference in my body and seeing some changes in my mid section. I hate that I got so off track because I had gotten so far and I was really loving running and now, who knows if I'll ever run again!! :( Oh rue the day I slipped and fell...LMBO...but I'm back on track and hopefully it will only get better :)

Plans for the weekend...tomorrow Miguel has another one of his "reunions" with his school friends. I think they are trying to make it like a monthly thing. This time it's going to be at Chacho's. I don't really want to go...I would rather stay home and spend time with the kids as a family because we never really get to, but Miguel said we'd only go for "a little while" and then we could go do our grocery shopping afterwards so we can get that out of the way and have less "errands" to run on Saturday. We want to take the kids to see "Monsters vs Aliens". It looks funny. I bet it will be good and the kids will love it. I think it's in 3D too which is always a bonus. Ugh, but they charge you so much for those dumb glasses. I think that if you already have them from previous 3D movies, that they should charge you less. Think about it....it would cut down on waste because you know alot of people don't recycle them. You bring them home and then you have like TWENTY pairs of 3D glasses that are good for nothing. Besides, if I paid like $4 or $5 extra dollars for them...I'm not giving them back to you, I'm KEEPING them...lol We also need to..well, I want to..run by Wal Mart to pick up a few things for the house. I can't remember if I mentioned on my blog that I gave up scrapbook shopping for Lent...I'm pretty sure I did. Anyway, so there has been NO scrapbook shopping for like four weeks now I think. It hasn't been too hard. Other than last weekend when Chon and I went to M's and I found an AWESOME MAMBI paper pad that I just LOOOVED and wanted SOOO badly!!! And in my head, I kept trying to think of ways around my Lent promise so that I could get it and then I felt bad for doing that because it is such a small sacrifice...nothing really..compared to what Jesus sacrificed for me. So I put it back. I only have two weeks to go and I know it will still be there later.

What else? I think that's about it. It's getting late and I'm still not used to this getting up at 6:30 a.m. thing yet...it's kicking my butt! So I should go...more later :)

Updating....

I can get so lazy about updating my blog! I didn't even realize it's been almost a week since I last posted.

There's been an unexpected change in our lives and Elijah is now back home with us. I'm glad he is...because I really missed him during the week when he was with his dad and I always worried if he was okay, getting enough to eat, taking his medicine...all those things, but I'm very sad, hurt and disappointed in the chain of events that took place that brought us here. So much has been weighing on my mind over the weekend, but I have decided that there is nothing "I" can do about it and I am handing it over to God and know that he can see the bigger picture and has His plans in mind, so I am just going to sit back and let whatever is to be unfold. Miguel has been a HUGE support for me. It's funny how alot of times I complain about the little things he does or doesn't do, but there are times when I really need him and he is there for me with just what I need. Thank God for him because sometimes I feel like he is my calm in this storm that goes on in my head. Either way, Lij is back home and happy, as am I. I went to bed Friday night with a HUGE sense of peace and thankfulness that he was sleeping only a few feet away and that he was not going to be leaving me any time soon :) Of course, the weekend that followed was full of shouting and refereeing fights between him and Mikey, but who cares! He is home and even if I have to yell all day...it's okay :)

On Saturday, Miguel had some stuff to do for this woman whose yard he cuts who just happens to live on the street we used to live on when we lived by Chon's. So we made plans to spend the day hanging out over there while Miguel worked. We went to M's, Hobby Lobby, Wal Mart and Target I believe. I got the kids some arts/crafts stuff...some pipe cleaners to make those Cheerios bird feeders on Estee's blog and I bought some things to make my own version of Estee's fishing game. I'm too lazy to sew...lol..so I got a couple of wooden dowels,a bunch of foam sheets, some self adhesive foam letters, and magnets to do my fishing game. I think I need to get some stronger magnets on my fish because you have to pick them up a certain way right now for the magnet to "take". And some of the google eyes keep falling off even though I used Glue Dots which SAY they are SUPER strong...NOT! Mikey really loves it. I have a deck of alphabet flash cards and what I do is show him a card, ask him what the picture is and then flip the card over and ask him what letter it is and then have him find it for me. We've played it like three times in the past few days and he is getting better at it :)

I also got these CUTE boxes they had in the M's dollar bins to put my pens/markers in. I used Velcro to hold them together. I think they look really nice and are very accesible to me now. I had also moved some stuff around on my tables on Friday so some stuff has a new home :)

Today was my first day getting up early in a LONG time. I set my alarm for 6:15, but didn't wake up until 6:30...VERY hard to get up that early again, but I knew I had to get Lij up and out the door by at least 7:15. I didn't wake up Miguel until 7:00 after Lij was dressed and had eaten breakfast. Miguel said they left with just enough time so now we know when he has to leave the house.

So since I got up so early, I started my day early and got all my cleaning done by noon. I did a little scrapping and did my bike workout and finished just in time to get lunch done so Miguel could eat after he dropped Lij off afterschool. I did end up "dragging" around four p.m. and ended up taking a two hour nap while my mom took the kids outside to play. Boy, I did NOT want to wake up, but I knew I had to get the kids dinner and start the night time routine. I know it's going to take a few days for my body to get used to this early rising so hopefully, I won't feel so tired tomorrow. I guess I should get to bed then, huh because it's almost one a.m. Miguel just got home a bit ago and is eating and watching tv so I think I'm going to hit the sack because six o'clock will come around all too quickly. Nighty night :)

Sidenote:My pages are lacking journaling...so any "empty" spots still need it. It's always hard for me to think of what to write, but I feel like I have to.

Exercising. Scrapbooking. Soup.

Today is my third day doing the bike. Yesterday was a good day...did 35 minutes/10.0 miles. Today, the same. I used a thicker towel on the seat and it wasn't so bad. It really is a very uncomfortable seat! Other than that, I really like it. My ankle is still hurting...not as much as that first night and I'm thinking...maybe the more I use it, the less it will hurt? It's just a theory :)

I was able to do a page today with some silly pics of Mikey I took a few weeks back. I used one of Stephanie Howell's pages for inspiration on my placement and can't remember who...someone I have bookmarked on 2 Peas, for color inspiration. I am very happy with it :)Oh, I also took a pic of my scrapbook area with my new table setup. I really like it :)

Today I made some homemade chicken soup...I've made it before and everyone just LOVES it! Too bad it wasn't a cold day. It was still super YUMMY :)

Mikey is on his third day of antibiotics and seems to be doing better. Last night, there was very little, if any, coughing and we got to sleep on the bed...HOOORAY!! I really needed some good sleep. I was so thankful that Mikey slept well too. I'm sure he was just as tired as I was and feeling pretty crummy I'm sure. So, he's getting better :)

That's all for now!

Back in the saddle again...

Yesterday, I put my exercise bike together. I was waiting for Miguel to do it, but he hadn't had time yet, so I figured I'd open it up and give it a try. He was the one who put my treadmill together and that was a long, hard process. I didn't think I'd be able to do this, but after pulling out all the parts which weren't too many and reading the instructions, it seemed easy enough. And it WAS! It only took me about thirty minutes. I think it might have taken me less time if Mikey hadn't been right there in the middle of it. It's not a big machine or heavy at all. It fit right into a corner I had cleared in our bedroom with room to spare, but it is "so" light, that I just pulled it out into the livingroom today when it was time for my work out. The seat is a bit uncomfortable...even for a "cushy" butt like mine! :D I tried "padding" it with a towel over the seat and that helped a tiny bit. Anyway, it's a very quiet machine and my ankle didn't even hurt until almost the end and even then it was very little...thank God. I did 35 minutes and I was able to do TEN miles! Funny how I can do 10 miles on a bike in 35 minutes, but on the treadmill in that time, I could only do 2 and a half miles at the most. So, today is my first day on my road back to getting fit. I have "felt" it these past months and SEE it too. I feel it in the way my clothes feel, the way my body feels....it has not made me very happy. But today, is the start of feeling better about my body again. It has been so hard these past three+ months not being able to do anything and just feeling my body "go". I hope and pray that my ankle will not be bothered by this. Working out today made me realize how even though I always hated it. I feel so much better when I "do" exercise and I really did miss the physical activity. So, I'll keep updated on how that is going.
Nothing else for now. Mikey is sick. He'd been coughing since Saturday night and that night was rough. I slept on the couch with him. Although "slept" is not the right word because we hardly got any sleep at all. Poor Mikey kept coughing the whole night long and I kept waking up every time he did thinking he was going to puke. And I was in an upright sitting position with him sitting in my lap too because for some reason, he seemed to cough less this way. Last night was a repeat of the night before and I told Miguel sometime in the wee hours of the morning, that I thought we should take Mikey to the doctor today. So we did. Throat infection and his ears were just starting too. Good thing we caught it early on. So he's on antibiotics and thankfully today, he hasn't coughed as much as he had the other days. I bought him a cough suppresent to give him later before we go to bed so hopefully we can both get some sleep tonight...LAYING DOWN because I am dragging. I got all my cleaning done today...good thing...nothing left to do all week except laundry and my "daily" chores. Maybe I'll get some scrapping done later in the week. I went by Home Depot this past weekend and got that 4 ft. table for my scrap area and I put my Cricut and paper trimmer on there for kind of a "cutting station". It looks nice. Now I have kind of a "c" shaped working area :)
Okay, I think I need to go lay on the couch. I tried to get Mikey to nap with me earlier, but he wasn't having it. I wish I had his energy! More later :)

My new glasses and some LOs

Chon came over yesterday and spent the night with the kids because Steve was out of town with work in Oklahoma. Lij came over last night too so we had a full house of kids. We ordered pizza and the kids played and watched tv while we scrapped. I got two pages done...yay! And it's two pages that I absolutely LOVE! We had a good time :)

This morning, after we had breakfast and we all got dressed, we headed out to Target just to get out of the house for a bit. I bought myself one of those hair straightener things like the one Chon has because I used hers in the morning and really loved it. I don't normally need a hair straightener to make my hair straight because I can get it that way by drying it with the blow dryer. But I usually do that at night after I shower and if I sleep on my hair...which of course I do...lol...it doesn't always look very good in the morning after I brush it out. So, this will help to straighten the parts that go all wacky! I didn't buy anything else really. We came back home, had lunch and then Chon and the kids went home.

I don't know what we have planned for tomorrow. I think I want to go to Wal Mart to get that small table for my scrap area and I need a set of bed risers to put it on too. We also need to do our grocery shopping, but other than that...nothing planned really. Maybe we will go to church. I want Miguel to put my exercise bike together so I can start using it next week, so hopefully, he can get that done.
Well, that's about it for now :)

This puts my LO count at 25.

Almost a week...

since I last blogged. Not much going on to talk about I guess. Let's see..over the weekend, I went and picked up my glasses. Oh, I need to get a good pic of myself with them on. They are just some simple, black, oval-ish metal frames. I like them well enough. There weren't too many I liked. I hate the way I look in glasses to begin with so...Miguel thinks I look "sexy" with them on, so bless his heart for that! :D
Went to my Uncle Frank's wedding on Saturday night. It was nice. Got to see our cousin Ruby who we haven't seen for a while. My uncle looked happy. His now wife is a very nice person from what I know of her. I hope they will be happy together :)
On Sunday, we took Lij back to his dad's and did our grocery shopping. Nothing exciting there...Monday, I spent the whole day cleaning, REorganizing and purging. I think I've got a cleaning bug! But I got ALOT done, got rid of some stuff and I'm very happy with the way I moved things around. Oh, and yesterday the UPS guy brought my exercise bike, so I'm just waiting for Miguel to assemble it for me so I can get back on the ball! I made some space for it in a corner of our bedroom so now it doesn't have to be out in the livingroom. I hope that works for me being able to work out in there while Mikey is out in the livingroom. I also freed up some space under a window in my scrap area where I can fit another one of the smaller four foot tables, so I'm going to hopefully try to get that this coming weekend. I always feel like I don't have enough table space!
Other than that, not much else has been going on. Haven't done any scrapping this week nor have I even gotten to use my Cricut Expression...not ONE time! What has it been now...two weeks since I got it? I think so! Chon is coming over with the kids on Friday since they are on Spring Break right now. Lij is not...don't know when his is for sure, but I talked to his dad yesterday and asked him if he would bring him over Thursday night so he could be here to spend the day with us on Friday. Lij had missed school on Monday because he didn't feel well so I didn't know how his dad would feel about him missing two school days in the same week, but he said that was fine. So, I'm saving my scrappy "mojo" for then.
Ooo, also got my free DCWV 8x8 stack in the mail today. Chon did that video demo thing for me and she picked the Whimsy Stack for me and The Garden one for herself. We're going to split the pads and swap :) Okay, that's all for now. Mikey is waiting for me to watch Shrek The Third with him and Miguel called a bit ago and said he was out of work and on the way home with food and possibly a movie for us to watch later...YAY! It's only 7:30 and he's coming home :)

The Man in My Life....

or ONE of the men in my life because I do have three :) I was due to make a page about Miguel...it's been a while. I saw this LO on scrapbook.com on the Bo Bunny blog and I just LOVED it. I don't have any of the Bo Bunny Flirty papers so I just improvised and used what I DID have which I think looks pretty darn similar to their page! I drew the birds freehand and then cut them out of scrap pieces of paper....love the way they turned out! I see these birds on a card :) Everything else I used was mostly MME papers, some old Daisy D's, Paper Studio, some MM Whimsy dimensional flower stickers, and some M by Kay dimensional heart stickers. I really LOVE the way this one turned out. Take a look at the Bo Bunny gallery @ scrapbook.com if you want to see what the other LO looks like. BTW, this puts my LO count at 23...what number are you on, Chon?

WHEN??

Will Mountain Cedar season be gone? Or whatever is in the air that has been aggravating my allergies! I can't even remember how far back it's been that my allergies WEREN'T bothering me! It's been WEEKS I'm sure! The sneezing, itchy eyes, sinus pressure headaches...and NOW the cough...the nagging cough that kept me awake last night until the wee hours of the morning. I got up and took this cough medicine Miguel had left over from when he was sick a while back. I took it at TWO different times because it just wasn't helping. I took allergy meds, sprayed my throat with Choloraseptic (that numbing spray). I finally fell asleep in a sitting position..for some reason the coughing was less if I was sitting. I guess I must have "slid" down onto my pillow because when I woke up this morning I was laying down. AND it wasn't even "morning" anymore...it was 11:45!!! Mikey kept telling me that Miguel wasn't on the couch or in his bed nor in the bathroom, so I finally got up to check. And sure enough, both him and my mom were gone and then I looked at the clock and realized it was almost noon! I didn't even hear Miguel get up or go into the bathroom...NOTHING! I must have been crashed out!!

So, after I got Mikey's breakfast...lol..should have been lunch, I did my little bit of cleaning up and started a load of laundry. I haven't done much today other than sit here, fold towels and played a couple of games of Candyland with Mikey. Which btw, he cheats at that too! LOL

Oh, and I moved a couple of things around on the tables of my scrap area. Moved my little media shelf up onto one of the tables. I was trying to make room for an exercise bike I just ordered on line from Wal Mart last night. I have decided that enough time has gone by and enough is enough. Whether my ankle hurts or not, I NEED to get back into some kind of shape. I feel like a pig...no offense to pigs...I love bacon..lol :D I'm thinking...more like hoping...that an exercise bike will be less impact on my foot than walking/running would have been, but we will see. No matter, I am doing it even if I'm in pain afterwards. So in making room for my bike, I happened to realize that between two of my tables, another small table would fit PERFECTLY. And it's right under the window which I love because I just love to have natural light inside. SOOO, I think I will wait until I get by bike and have it assembled to see where I will put it and decide if maybe I can get another small table. If it's easy to move...the bike I mean...there's a corner in our bedroom where I think it will fit nicely and still be out of the way. And then I can just pull it out to the livingroom when I'm going to use it.

I did a page yesterday...very simple...all me..no lift, but I really like it. I need to do some journaling on it...on the pink flower...just haven't done it yet. I want to scrap some more later...we will see.
Umm...think that's all for now.

Today I Am...March already??

Today I Am:

Reading: Men are Like Waffles, Women Are Like Spaghetti

Listening to: Matthew West's "Through The Motions"

Obsessed With: My new Cricut Expression :)

Thinking About: Mine and Miguel's future together...things are looking good :)
Planning To: Get a new exercise bike and start getting my butt back into SOME kind of shape!

Dreaming Of: a wedding :)

Enjoying: my life :)

Vowing To: Stick to my sacrifice for Lent and NOT shop for scrappy stuff until Easter.

Working On: Purging....and organizing...everywhere. Maybe I'm getting Spring Fever??

Excited About: getting some new Unity Stamps I ordered BEFORE Ash Wednesday..so it's Okizay :)