Catching up with Life!

I'll bet you thought I'd once again disappeared!  Well, not exactly.  But I do find that I hang out in completely different places this year than I ever have in the past!  You'll find me at High School football games, the Dome for Ram's Games and BOA events, church of course, and volleyball courts.  Occasionally I get to go to my stamping room for some fun - usually on Thursday nights when I watch a whole weeks of television in one sitting while I stamp!

Here are some projects I worked on for a stamp camp that I ultimately had to cancel due to Lauren being sick.  I'm rescheduling and remaking it for more Christmas and Thanksgiving so let me know if you're interested in attending.

 A spooky halloween card partially cased from one seen at Dawn's blog using the background technique, but modifying the card a bit to make it my own! 

 I really love using the spiderweb embossing folder for the Big Shot and can't wait to make a Spiderman card for my nephew's birthday with that as the background.  This one was CASE'd from Amy's stamp camp, but again, I added a few embellishments for my own personal style.  I think she said that she got the idea from another blog as well and had changed it some for her event, so you can see how great ideas can get passed along and the design of a card can evolve.

This card was the only fun kid-colored card I made this year.  My Halloween preferences have been maturing with my children, so I like the more elegant styles now.  I think the saddest thing was that I didn't have to make any treat holders for Halloween parties at school.  Elementary is behind us, so we don't have parties now we have "mixers".   Most of the papers that Stampin UP! had out this year were more elegant than fun with the exception of this multi colored stripe.  I used the Tag dies from the Big Shot to make the green scalloped piece and folded it over onto the back.

Projects, Music, Food and Fun!  That's what this fall has been to us!  We knew that transitioning to High School for Jason, and leaving elementary behind and moving onto Middle School for Lauren, was going to busy.....but I don't think we anticipated the chaos that would come from our kids "growing up"!  Ever since Jason started Band Camp in July we've been going at full throttle.  I have barely had time to breathe let alone stamp or get anything done around the house!  But finally, I think we're starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel...problem is, I think they're Christmas lights which means a whole new kind of busy for the next month!

 So, to catch up those of you who might be interested beyond the few things I post on Facebook, here is a more detailed look at what we've been doing this fall.  First of all, Dave decided to fix some boards that had rotted through on our deck, and then stain and seal it since it had been a couple of years.  Although showing a before and after picture together makes it look easy, this was a HUGE project!  And this photo doesn't show it after it was stained.  He was able to take some of the old boards and cut them down to fill in shorter places, so it looks like we didn't replace much, but we did!

Meanwhile, I decided to make some minor adjustments to Lauren's room.  She wanted a complete redo to make it a tween room, but I had just redecorated her room a year ago so I told her we could tone down the pink and phase it out, but not get all new stuff right now.  I painted her room a "Weeping Willow" green, which is a very neutral color.  We actually turned her Pottery Barn bed spread  upside down because it is all bright pink.  I pulled some pillows from the guest room that I was going to redo, and voila.....

 The mirror peace signs help to add the teenage spin, as does the poster of JB.  I so look forward to seeing him in concert next week (sarcasm).   All that is left to do is the trim to hide the lights along the ceiling.  Who knows when that will happen!  I love it when a room is redone not only for how it looks, but also because underneath all of the pretty things it is also CLEAN!  Moving furniture allows me to vacumn where I can't usually, and just knowing that it's really clean under there makes me happy!

So those were the two home improvement projects that we squeezed into the fall.  Now for the activities!

Of course, band - in it's many forms (camp, rehearsals, football games, competitions, etc...) was a very large part of the fall until last week, but we did manage to do a few other things!  My dad actually had a picnic performance with the St. Louis Jazz Club that we attended.  Lauren and my mom got into the New Orleans spirit with a promenade mardi gras style.  It was such a beautiful day and even my 97 year old grandmother was there - she really enjoyed watching her son play the piano.  Of course, in this photo he's right behind that music stand and you can't see him!

Since I'm having trouble loading my videos, I'll finish this update tomorrow!