I ♥ Mini Albums...

And I love it even more when people order them! I love to make them, but I never seem to make them for myself. HAHA! So when people come looking for gift ideas it is the FIRST thing I suggest. They are so versatile and so fun to make.......this time I made another "Flip Book" - - - I am not sure if that is what they are ACTUALLY called, but that is what I call them....LOL

I have made many of these in various themes but this particular one is for a baby shower. She called me Thursday night and asked if I could have one ready for her by 5:30 this evening. (MONDAY!) Eeek.......especially since I was in the hospital and then slept most of Saturday away after my morphine "trip"

I don't know how I did it, but I pulled it off!! Here are a few photos I snapped of it so I could share it before it was picked up and off to it's new home...

In total, she can get 10 photos in this one, and I left 2 spots that she can either add some journaling or two more photos, depending on what she prefers! It's a pretty cool gift and it is being delivered along with a photo shoot by one of our local photographers :)

Must get back to my other BIG project I am working on! It's a 12 x 12 wedding album!!

SALS Challenge #44

I have been slacking in the DT responsibilities lately, to say the least! I have been designing the sketches for the team but not actually making any cards myself! Until this week, I am finally back on track!!

Our sponsor this week happens to be one of my faves.....Bugaboo! Woot! Their digi stamps rock and for Challenge #44 the winner will receive SEVEN images of their choice!

Here is the card that I made for Challenge #44's sketch........



To see the sketch and play along come on over to Seems A Little Sketchy and jump right in!! Hope to see your card linked up this time around :)

Happy Craft Time peeps!

*~*The Broad who wants to blog.......EVERYTHING!!*~*

A tune...

This song ALWAYS ends up stuck in my head........maybe this will get me movin' ;)

Epic Fail......already!!

I am already failing MISERABLY. I spent Friday night in the ER and they kept me there over night, doped up on morphine and did a CT scan first thing Saturday morning. I was sent home after being told my "colon is inflamed" but I have no idea why, or what caused it, or what to do about it. I have spent the last 2 days with my ass planted firmly on the couch, hurting. I haven't even been drinking my water. *sigh*

What's it going to take?! I think I need a work out buddy, or something.

I long to walk into a store and be able to buy something off the rack, put it on and feel confident. And pretty. And maybe even a little sexy. Not head straight for the plus section and find the biggest baggiest shirt that will hide everything. I'd love to put on a pair of shorts and a tank top and head out into the hot sunny weather. Not wool sweaters and yoga pants, to hide myself away.

Get off your ass T, and do something!!

My Creative Resume

CURRENT DESIGN TEAMS
Seems A Little Sketchy
February 2012 - Present

GUEST DESIGN TEAMS
Use It Tuesday
May 2012 - June 2012

PAST DESIGN TEAMS
Use It Tuesday
July 2012 - December 2012
Kaboodle Doodles
January 2011 - July 2012
Colorful Creations
January 2010 - July 2011

Blog Prompts...

Now that I have this pretty little blog all designed the way I want it, what the hell am I going to write about?! I think that my "tabs" show some of my intentions, but a big part of me also wants to just WRITE. I loved to write a million years ago, and I hope to start again.

So, off to google I went. And I searched for "Blog Prompts." I have found many, but the first one that I am going to write about I found over at Mama's Losin It

These are the choices she has up right now:

The Prompts:

1.) A bad habit you’d like to break.
2.) “Currently”. A simple list of things you’re currently feeling as seen at Sometimes Sweet.
3.) Write about an argument you once had with a parent when you were a child.
4.) List 10 things you are afraid of.
5.) Write a limerick!

Though #5 is rolling around in my brain and may make an appearance before this post is done, I have decided that I am going to go with lucky #2.

My "CURRENTLY" is pretty intense right now. Crazy things are going on in our life, and if I had to sum it all up into one word, I think that word would be OVERWHELMING.

I am working way too hard. I am sleeping way too little. I have started my weight loss journey, as of today. Monday my Mister starts a new job, that is going to allow us to have a "NORMAL" day-to-day routine that most people take for granted.

*PAUSE*

I need to write about that :)

My Mister and I have been together for 10 years now. Married for 6. And he is a truck driver. He has spent about 9.5 of our 10 years together, on the road. Sometimes gone for a couple of days and then home for a few hours or if I was really lucky, a day or two. Sometimes gone for several weeks, and then home for a day or two. Many birthdays, Anniversaries, even Christmas and New Year's have been spent apart. And I have missed him so.

As of Monday, he will be working Monday - Friday, day shift, home every night with weekends off. I can't even begin to tell you how excited I am to be able to WAKE UP every morning with my love beside me. And fall asleep with him there, EVERY night. And have dinner together EVERY evening.

Such small things, I know........but we have never had that! In a way, I am nervous about it too....

I am not used to having him in my space all the time. I am not used to sharing the bed, or the bathroom, or cooking for 2. I find myself wondering if we will get on each other's nerves......HAHAHA! In a way, we are kind of learning to live together, all over again! How bizarre is that?!

But mostly I am excited. And happy. And he is as well, he has been counting down the hours since he left his last delivery last night. He will be home in about 30 minutes, have the weekend off & then start fresh Monday morning.

I will have to keep you posted on how it is going.......for real!

:)

OK, *UNPAUSE*

My son is also having a hard time with his new found "adulthood" and the decisions he is faced with. The poor kid.....young man.

His dad and I are no longer together, and haven't been since he was just 2 years old. He lived with me most of his life, visiting his dad on the weekends, and then when he was older we had shared residency, so that our son could live with each of us for equal time. He would live with my husband and I for 2 weeks and then he would go and live with his dad and his wife for 2 weeks.

Fast forward to post-graduation..........mom now lives in BC, dad lives in Alberta and our poor son doesn't know where to go or what to do or how to start his life. He is torn with "choosing sides" and no matter what I say or how many times I tell him he is wrong, he feels like no matter what he chooses, someone is going to get hurt.

All I want is for him to be happy. And thriving. And Content. I don't care if he has to be on the moon to make it happen!

(But the mama in me sure does hope he comes home to BC ;)

Our home flooded a month ago, and we are renting so we are waiting for the landlords to FINALLY start renos. From day to day, I don't know if the house is going to be torn up or if I will finally get the call to start packing our things out of the rooms so they can get started. And yes, I said a MONTH ago, so I am genuinely concerned about mold.

So, as you can see my "CURRENTLY" is a little crazy right now and I really could use a vacay!!! And as you have read, the prompts really DO work! LOL!

Peace out readers, I'm off to enjoy some sunshine!!

~*~The Broad who wants to blog.........about everything~*~

Getting Real...

I am overweight. Obese. And it is time that I do something about it. I seem to go through phases, where I will eat healthy. And drink water. And go to bed at a decent hour. And do planks. But then I "fall off the wagon" and all my old habits come back.

I lie to myself. I make excuses. I blame others. And I eat. I really need to get a grip on reality, as I am now just 4.5 years younger than my dad was when he had his first heart attack!! How scary is that?! All this graduation talk, and I might not be around to see my own grand-babies!

That is unacceptable.

So, today I am beginning......and I am going to try really hard to do it this time. Each day I will set myself 3 small goals to try and reach. I am going to forget the "need to lose 50 pounds FAST" way of thinking, and realize that it is going to take time and patience.

I have decided I will use a part of my blog to post things, share my journey, photo updates, etc. In a way, I am considering it a place to be held accountable for my actions and the promises that I am making to myself right now.

I truly believe that this is going to be the hardest thing I have ever done. And I truly believe that I will need some support, encouragement and help through this journey.

Here is to finding the Skinny in me, and releasing her..........once and for all!!

Today is Friday, July 19th. And here is my starting photo:



I can't even tell you how hard it is for me to post that photo. I am the girl that is always re-taking photos 400 times, cropping and ONLY posting the most flattering ones I can find. I hate this photo. And want to look like the girl in my profile picture again.

So here I go. Please stay with me, and encourage me and hold me accountable. I know it's not fair to ask, but today......Day One......I need you.

My goals for today:

- at least 8 glasses of water
- create a new account on MyfitnessPal to track my calories
- walk around the block

I am not sure how often I will weigh in, or post photos. Probably every month, on the same day. So I think my next updated photo will happen on August 19th. But I hope to see you before then!

Thanks for your help :)

Smoothie Heaven...

One of my favorite things to look for on Pinterest is recipes. There are SOOOOOOO many recipes!!! I don't think I will ever get to try them all, but I am certainly going to give it a go!

**HUSBAND CHEERS WILDLY**

Here is a quick little recipe/trick I found for SMOOTHIES.........SOOOOOOOO GOOD!! I found this one posted over at Lacey in Love and knew as soon as I saw it I had to try it out myself! YUM!!

First step, is your ingredients. I am making mine with French Vanilla Yogurt, Oatmeal, Strawberries, Peaches, Kiwi & Banana. Use whatever you prefer, but these are my faves and I am adding in oatmeal to make my smoothies a little more filling, as I plan on making these my meals. I am also using the citrus blend juice from Five Alive.

Next, scoop yogurt into a muffin tin. I chose to use regular yogurt, instead of frozen yogurt, because I think it tastes better, it's cheaper and there are many more flavor options too! So I used a good sized heaping tablespoon and filled up all the cups with my french vanilla yogurt, and then added in my oatmeal, and mixed it up.

Next, I sliced my fruit and divided it into muffin tins as well! I used frozen strawberries and peaches, simply for a cost saving method that would save me some time. So all I had to slice up was my banana and my kiwi.

I threw both muffin tins in the freezer overnight and this morning, I put one frozen portion of yogurt into a ziploc baggie with one frozen portion of fruit. I now have 24 fast and easy smoothie baggies, ready to go in the freezer! All I gotta do it pop 'em into my magic bullet, add a bit of my OJ and away I go!!

The best part though.......I got ALL of these ingredients for a grand total of $19.67 and that includes HST tax! I made 24 smoothie baggies, (and still have some fruit leftover!!) so that means my smoothies cost a grand total of about 0.82 cents each!

BEAT THAT STARBUCKS!!

:-)

Graduation...

My son is officially a high school graduate. We travelled up to Sherwood Park for his ceremony in style, and with quite the convoy I might add! My parents came along, as well as my sister and her family and one of my brothers and his family.

The Mister and I headed up on Wednesday and got a head start on celebrating and helped the Graduate with some last minute details. We got to spend lots of time with the boy & his lil lady. The 4 days we were there were somewhat of a whirlwind, to say the least!

Thursday night we had dinner with my parents and the boy's lil lady got to meet his grandparents for the first time. Friday was the big day, and we headed to the Leg grounds for photos and then all 18 of us headed to Boston Pizza for dinner before the ceremony!
(This was the graduates request :) We had a blast! BP's impressed us with how well they took care of us! After dinner we were off in convoy style to the Shaw Conference Center to watch him walk across that stage...

Man-oh-Man.....I can't describe the feeling in one word. I have never been more proud in my life. And I was so happy. And sad. And excited. And scared. Much like he was feeling, I am sure! Sitting in the stands watching him move into the next chapter of his life was surreal :) And boy you should have heard us cheer!!

Here are a couple of my favorite photos to share......I am still waiting to get back the REAL ones, so these are just some I snapped with my iPhone....

Brad and his Girl...



Cap toss at the end...(Tay actually took this photo, my battery had died by the end!!)



And finally, before I share with you the "MONEY SHOT" I have to tell you a short story...

Flashback about a million year ago, or 14......and my little sister was graduating from high school. Brad had just turned 4 and they were buddies. This is my FAVORITE photo taken on my sister's graduation day...



We decided that this photo HAD TO be re-created on HIS graduation day. Minus the upside down part, since she was in a dress and that would have just been weird. Everytime I see this picture I giggle like a school girl and tear up :) It turned out ABSOLUTELY perfect...



On Sunday, we left Edmonton with two newly graduated teenagers in the back seat. Taylor came down and spent 2 weeks with us and Brad is still here until the 31st. He has said he is coming back in October, once he has his driver's license.......FOR GOOD. I am one happy mama :)

I don't know what the future has in store for my "boy" but I do know that he will be good at whatever he does and I will be forever proud...

MOST of the crowd, but not all....

"Pin"-speratioinal...

I am a Pinterest JUNKIE. I love pinterest, and I love to try out new things inspired by the things I see while surfing there. I'm gonna share some of those with you too, just cause I can :)

(This post is solely to get my PIN-spirational tab set up)

:)

Crafty Challenges...

These are just some of the challenges that I love to play along with, when I have the time!


SUNDAY CHALLENGES:



MONDAY CHALLENGES:

Craft Your Passion
Let's Get Sketchy
Mojo Monday
The Shabby Tea Room

TUESDAY CHALLENGES:

Color Q
Paper Take Weekly
Pinsperational Challenges
Shopping Our Stash

WEDNESDAY CHALLENGES:

Color Throwdown
Fab 'N Funky Challenges
Freshly Made Sketches
Stampin' Royalty

THURSDAY CHALLENGES:

Pals Paper Arts

FRIDAY CHALLENGES:

Alphabet Challenge Blog
Clean & Simple Stamping
Just Add Ink

SATURDAY CHALLENGES:

Allsorts Challenge Blog
Retro Sketches
Sketch Saturday

SEMI-MONTHLY CHALLENGES:

Scrap Our Stash
Sketches in Thyme
The Scraproom Blog

MONTHLY CHALLENGES:

Creative Scrappers
The Counterfeit Kit Club
Fusion
Grand Diva's Scrappy Place

Blogs I ♥...

In case you are looking for some new reading material....here are some of the places that I frequent!

Good Reads...

No More Chewing
Delusional Mom
Simple As That

Crafty Reads...

Bev's Crafts
Catch The Bug
Glitterbabe
K Werner Designs
Land of Stamping
Noel Mignon One Scrap at A Time
Paper Meets Glue
Scrappy Sticky Inky Mess
Shimelle
Somewhere Over the Rainbow
Trails of Paper

Yummy Reads...

Amanda's Cookin
Bakerella
Family Squabbles
Handle the Heat
LuLu the Baker
Plain Chicken

About Me...

Let's see. Where shall I begin!? My name is Tess and I am a 30-something mom to one son who is my pride and joy, and all growed up! And also to two fur-babies who are just as spoiled as my human baby. I am the proud wife of a great man, who is my very best friend. I am a DIE-HARD Aunty.

I love to papercraft, read, watch movies, surf this world wide web, cook, organize, start a million projects and finish NONE of them. I love music and driving and long hot baths. Chai Tea Lattes, watermelon and anything with chicken in it. American Idol, The Bachelor & Grey's Anatomy. Gossip mags, Dragon Story, Mario Brothers & Chocolate.

These are just a few pieces of who I am and what I love :)


The Mister and I :)

My pride & joy :)

I am a paper whore...

Those who know me know that I love LOVE LOOOOOOOVE to paper craft. I love to make cards, and scrapbook and various other things that involve paper. As of late, I have not done a very good job of showing this part of my life off. I have been doing it behind closed doors and really only posting occasionally to my business page on Facebook or my OLD blog.

Well my fellow crafty friends, the buck stops here! I have a room full of paper and bling and tools and ribbon and ink and stamps and........well, you get the idea. And from now on, I am going to pull them out and play and do the challenges I used to love to do and create. This is a big part of who I am now, and I shall get back to it!

So I shall share with you a recent creation, just to start with........but also so I can create my "Crafty Things" label too....HAHA!

So here is a card that I made recently! I rented a table at a local craft sale market and went to town making items to sell! It was a good day and I got to share it with a fun group of ladies too :)



Here is the thing about my CRAFTY posts.......I will not be posting supplies used. *GASP* Here is why.......my scraproom is a reflection of my OCD when it comes to organizing. Most things are no longer in original packaging, or came from swap kits, or have been in my beloved room for so long that I simply do NOT remember who made it or where it came from. If you have any specific questions, please ask and if I can answer I certainly will! But in the meantime I am no longer going to stress over not knowing which brand that brad came from! And focus solely on sharing my creativity with you.

More crafty things to come......

Playing around....

I am trying to figure out the best layout for my new blog.....so if things look strange or change on a dime, bare with me while I figure this all out :)

My first review!

This is my first review. I have been uninspired to write one so far, but alas......I have one! And it is a gooder!!

I live in a small town, in BC, Canada called Cranbrook. And way back in February it was my birthday. (Yes, I am 29 again...) So my mister, my parents and I went out to dinner after spending the early evening at my Niece's birthday party!

We went to a restaurant here in town called Mr Mikes. Now, before I begin there are two things you must know.

1) I am an incredibly picky eater...and
2) My mom and I just started a new diet.

So needless to say, I had my doubts about going somewhere new. Boston Pizza was the first choice but when we arrived, it was FULL of drunk rowdy patrons enjoying the fight.

ANYWAY......mom, dad and I all ended up ordering the same thing off the menu. Smuggler's Cove Chicken it was called. And it was ABSOLUTELY TO DIE FOR. Seriously! The chicken was perfect. The shrimp and scallops were perfect. The rice was DELISH and the veggies were seasoned with dill to perfection.

This will be my new favorite place to go out. And that will be my new favorite meal to order.

Everything from the atmosphere, to the food & the service was perfect. If you are ever in our sleepy little town or are a local, go and check it out if you have not yet!

You won't be disappointed!

Life is short........and sweet......

This morning I woke at roughly 5:15AM. Lastnight I fell asleep on the couch, fairly early for me, without a blanket or anything! When my eyes popped open I realized I was FREEZING cold. And my neck was stiff. And I was still quite tired. But then I remembered...I am alive to feel all of those things. How lucky am I?

It's now 7:45AM and I am still awake. I will be for the day. I have already cried, and read the blog of a local gal who just passed away after a long courageous battle. I have never met her, though I feel like I know her just from reading her blog. She was amazing. Funny and witty and real. And beautiful. And her family is incredible too.

Knowing that she has passed on now has brought me an overwhelming number of emotions. I have cried. I have felt anger. I have felt desperate to do something for her loved ones. I never even met her and am not sure why I feel so connected.......it's either stalker-ish or she was just that amazing. :)

None-the-less, I am reminded this morning of how precious life is. And how short. And how fast it can change. The time has come for me to live each day to the fullest. Stop procrastinating. Make sure my loved ones know they are loved. Remove people from my life who continue to hurt me and leave me feeling used and abused. Connect with friends near and afar who leave me feeling loved and content. Enjoy my son, who is now a man. Love my husband like it's my last day to do so. Live.

As of today, this is my blog. My other one no longer exists. I had been avoiding documenting my own life on said blog, for personal reasons and today that stops. In a way, I feel like life is starting today.

Thanks Geneva, for sharing your journey and touching my soul. I have a surprise for you too, now. And I promise to make better choices and live life to the fullest. You are one awesome soul...

RIP beautiful. And give my pops a hug for me, OK?

The sun is shining. The birds are chirping. And I have much to do today!

I hope that you will join me on my journey, through life :)

Until next time, hug your loved ones and play safe!!

xox

~*~The Broad who wants to blog about everything~*~