Lots of pics and links! Christmas excitement!

   We've had a great couple of weeks. Christmas is coming and we are excited!! We've decorated the tree, learned new songs, gotten some snow (though it was too cold and windy to go play in it), and had Christmas at the in-laws! Oh, and we've been reading "The Night Before Christmas" every night for about 2 weeks now. We are in the Christmas spirit! I can't wait until Christmas eve when we'll bake cookies and put the key on the door for Santa! Christmas here we come!

   Yep, we already had Christmas at my in-laws! Remember when I told you guys we had our pictures done for my mother-in-law? And she was going to love them and I was so excited to give them to her? Wel...she loved them! We all had so much fun watching her open them. We gave them to her before any of the kids opened their gifts so it was all about them at that moment. I thought it was really special! Here's my MIL receiving them:

   After that, the kids got to rip into their presents! Maylee couldn't believe all these presents were for her!

Here's a layout I did of Maylee opening her presents:

Credits:

Dreaming of Christmas by Irene Alexeeva

 One of her gifts was this little puppy that walks and you can play with it in the bath, so it has these little bath goggles. Maylee decided she needed the goggles more than the puppy did:

 

Can you tell they're a little too small? They're for a toy dog head, not your head, Maylee!

     I've kinda been on a scrapbooking streak as of late. I guess I have some creative juices running or something 'cause I'm cranking pages out left and right! And I'm glad! Sometimes I go for a couple days with no ideas and I hate that. Here's some pages I've done recently.

Credits:

Charlie by Digitreats

 Credits:

Shabby Christmas Blog hop by the Studio

Papers – Digilicious, Angel Hartline Designs, Deli Scraps by Min

Elements – Deli Scraps by Min, Designs by Darlene Houghin, Kimberkatt Scraps, Lightning Bug Creations, Digilicious, eqrAveziur Graphic & Design, Angel Hartline Designs, Piggy Scraps Designs

Credits:

Enchanted Neighborhood by Irene Alexeeva

   We're going to go see Santa Claus and one of his reindeer (a live reindeer!!) at the library tomorrow. We're excited! I hope Maylee sits on his lap with no problems...she was kinda leery of him last year, but in the end she sat on his lap without crying. Hopefully this year will be good as well.

Love to all!

New blog design - Chance to win

   I have a whole bunch of new scrap pages to share with you all, but I wanted to let you know about this contest that April Showers Blog Design is giving away. All you have to do is comment on this blog post and you could win a new blog design or a free workshop registration! How cool would it be to have a real professional design your blog? Too cool, I think! I wanna win!

Kids say the darndest things

  Man, kids are freakin' cute, aren't they? I know mine is, when she's not busy hiding crayons in her underwear. Yep, that's what I said. Maylee got into big trouble the other day for writing on the wall in her playroom. So when mom was taking away Maylee's crayons, she had to do a pat-down on her because the little turkey was hiding them in her underwear! Sneaky-sneak!

   Anyway, back to the cute thing. I had to share these videos with you, because I do happen to think my kid's kinda cute. Really cute.

   Maylee learned a new song! Santa Claus is Coming to Town. How 'bout I share a couple renditions with you?

and another:

  Now I know you may not be laughing as hard as I have been over this, but let me tell you, it's cute. And I couldn't get video of the last part of the song. Where it says "So be good for goodness' sakes," Maylee says, "So be good for good and snakes!" OMG!! Hahahaha!

Which is better? Part deux

 I redid another scrap page. I think this one's pretty obvious as to which is the older and which is the newer, but I'd love to hear which you like better, and maybe even why.

#1

#2

Credits:

Vintage Florals by Shabby Princess

  I think I tried a little too hard on this one and I don't really love either page. Which is a shame, because the photos are amazing. They are done by my photographer I have on retainer (LOL), Valerie, at the Sweet Life Images. These pictures seem like they were so long ago! Maylee looks so little...she's such a big girl now. Anyway, I'd love some feedback.

Why do you blog?

  So a friend of mine, Karine, asked on her blog, "Why do you blog?" This is a good question. To be honest, I wanted to blog because I was curious to see if anyone would be interested in what I'm talking about. Turns out, they're not. After 9 months of blogging, I have 13 followers. Two of them are the same person, two of them are digital scrapbook designers and I highly doubt they actually read what I'm writing. A couple of them are blog-hop followers, so they just followed me because I followed them, so they're not reading what I'm writing, either. Oh, and one of those followers in me, LOL! I have a core group of girls, one being my mother, who read what I'm blabbing on about over here. Makes me wonder if it's worth it. But then I remember after I started doing this, a friend pointed out to me how cool it was going to be for my daughter to see this blog one day. I hadn't really even thought of that...a blog for posterity's sake. That's fine with me. And you know what, I like to blog. The followers may come, but it's really just something for me to do and a way to share things I love and are important to me. I'm not sharing to many people, but I guess that's beside the point. Would I like more followers to kinda validation this whole blogging thing on my part, sure, but I'm not going to make it that important. I hope.

  Well, Christmas has come around here. Here's proof:

Credits:

Sugarplum Dreams by Shabby Princess

   Maylee had such a good time helping decorate the tree. Once it was up, she messed with it for about 3 or 4 days, then has pretty much left it alone since then. Thank goodness! And Christmas on my in-laws side was moved up from Christmas Eve to earlier for the first time in 15 years. My mother-in-law understands that now that her kids have little kids, we'd really appreciate being at home for Christmas. I'm really grateful, too. I didn't know how I was going to swing going to the in-laws and put out cookies and carrots for Santa and the gang. Maylee would have been dead asleep before we got home and I don't want her to miss out on those traditions. This will be the first year she may actually remember, though I doubt it.

    I did one more scrap page this past week, too. It turned out pretty cute.

Credits:

Mostly Promise by Shabby Princess

A little bit of Shabby Mommy by Shabby Princess

Victorian hearts by Bisontine Creations

Font: Pea Lovey Dovey

   She's just growing up way too fast. But she's not too old to do naughty things. My mom called me from work today to say that Maylee had colored all over her playroom wall. Mom put her in time out and took her crayons away, but had to give her a pat-down because she was hiding crayons in her underwear! That little turd!

  Well, I'm going to cook breakfast for dinner. Brandon's working a lot of overtime this week, because it's the last week he can get good $$ before he starts having days off for the holiday. So he's home late this week and that makes the evenings fly right by.

   Thanks to my few loyal readers! I really do appreciate you guys stopping by.

Playing catch up and 2011 Reading Challenges!

   Yo yo my peeps. Crazy week. Crazy people. I'm crazy.

   I could be finished there, but I guess I'll write some more.

    So you know the layout I showed you guys in this post? The one done by the designer Adeyeo that I absolutely fell in love with? She put me on her website!! How cool is that?! Check it out here. Yep, I'm famous. Maybe I'll get rich. Rich and famous. My life's ambition. Yeah, right!

   That's the most exciting thing to happen to me this week. I've had such a busy week and I haven't really gotten to get much done! You all know how Christmas gets so hectic? Well I'm there. I've been running here, and getting this, and going there. Phew! Christmas cards are just not going to happen this year, and I hate that because I've got a REALLY cute kid to show off, but oh well.
 Wait, I think I'll make a digital one up real quick and post it for you. Hold on.

Credits: Summer Driggs

   Whipped that puppy up in about 5 minutes. That's the most creative I've gotten all week...sigh, that's sad! I hope to do a new digiscrap page tonight. I've gotten so many freebies this week, though! Lots of blog trains and Christmas giveaways right now.

   So onto the reading challenges I'm going to take on for 2011. I've never joined an actual reading challenge, but I thought that now that I have this fancy new blog and a whole 13 followers, I have an avenue to really put some of these challenges out there. I'm going for it! So without further ado:

Pulitzer 1s Challenge

    This was a great challenge for me. I've been slowly trying to read all the fiction Pulitzer winners for the last 20 years, but it's been slow-going. I figure THIS I can do! This one is made especially easy because in 1941 & 1971, no prizes were given to fiction, and I've already read the 1961 winner, To Kill a Mockingbird, so I only have 8 books to read to finish this challenge!

Challenge rules: Super lenient! The challenge runs from January 1, 2011 to December 31, 2011. Audiobooks, ebooks, and overlaps with other challenges are accepted. The goal is simply to have all the Pulitzer fiction winner for the years ending in 1 read by the end of the year. So if you've already read a couple of the books before the challenge begins, fret not: you don't have to re-read them (unless you want to, of course). Fiction not your thing? Feel free to read all the general nonfiction, history, or auto/biography winners for the years ending in 1.Wanna join with me? Head over and sign up!

And next:

350 Page Books Challenge

   I love a big fat book. I love YA (young adult) fiction. These are combined to make this awesome challenge!

The Guidelines:

·      *This challenge does not have to only include YA, but it should be predominantly YA that means at least 75% of the books you read should be young adult fiction.

·     * Each book MUST contain 350 pages or more.

·      *Only physical copies and e-books will count toward the challenge. (Sorry, but audio books don’t have pages!)
Y  YES, e-readers DO count! :) 

·       -You can add each book as you read them. You do NOT have to make a list.

 

 T      I'm really excited to be participating in these challenges! I may decide to join a few more, too. A lot of them kinda overlap so one book can count for more than one challenge. Multi-tasking! 

 

Thanks for stopping! I'll see ya'll next time, ya'hear?

P.S. I see those random T's up there and can't figure out how to get rid of them =( It has something to do with my copy/pasting the guidelines for the second Reading Challenge. Oh well.

T