A Beautiful Sunset and Some New LOs

A couple of nights ago, I saw the most beautiful sunset. The colors were so pretty, lots of purple. Here is the picture I took. This is a LO of me when I was a baby. There is a Book of Me challenge at AMR. We will be doing the pages through the month of December. This one is due June 30th. I put a hidden journaling tag behind the larger picture of my mom and me. It reads in part, "Patricia Anne. I was born June 30, 1968 in Berlin West Germany to Charles and Norma. I already had a big sister, Debbie, who was almost two. Little did I know that Jacqui and Chuckie would soon follow. Daddy was in the Air Force." The rest is along those lines. I wasn't sure about the ribbon behind the large flower, but like how it turned out.
This LO is also from a challenge at AMR. Heather did a progressice challenge giving us different clues every day. After two weeks, we were to adhere it all and post to a specific thread. This is what I did. I used the photos from my brother's wedding. The challenge turned out harder than I thought, but I enjoyed it.

A Few New LOs

Yesterday I finally had a chance to scrapbook some. Which was great because I got some new goodies from AMR. Their June kit came and was fabulous! Here is some of the great stuff that came with the kit.
One of the ladies on the AMR board posted a challenge where we had to create a LO that used at least 4 photos, some of which had to be in color and some in black and white or sepia. We also had to use a journaling tag and at least 4 different types of embellishments. I used 21 pictures! Didn't think it was possible, but I did. I finally scrapped some of the pictures from my trip to Ireland in 2001 with the Arthritis Foundation. This will get me moving and scrapping the rest of the album.
I also created this LO of my grandmom. Wow, was she gorgeous! Anyway, she is now in her 80s, and it is hard to believe she has 6 children, 15 grandchildren and 6 great grandchildren!

Another LO I did is of Jake, Daddy, and Tigger. Tigger was such a good sprt. Jake kept putting him inside the swimming ring with him and Tigger didn't whine at all. He was such a great pal. Andy had just gotten over chicken pox (yep!) and still was feeling pretty bad in this picture, but was a good sport as well.
Finally, I was able to do another LO of my sister, Jacqui, and her daughter (my niece), Courtney. This picture was taken at Chuckie's wedding. Hard to believe it has been 11 years! I've always loved this picture, but didn't know what to do with it.

Wild Wild West Birthday

Jake had his Wild Wild West birthday party yesterday. The kids had a blast. Since it was Father's Day, in addition to the cake, we had cupcakes that said, "Happy Father's Day" for the fathers that gave up their day and came to the party.

The invites turned out great. I used parchment paper which I distressed with brown and black ink. I found a picture of Jake in a cowboy costume looking quite the outlaw, so I added that. I also added a few flourishes and used a cool cowboy font, called "bleeding cowboys". The picture just shows the top of the invite, the bottom had the info like time, place, etc on it.

For the goodie bags, I used a great fabric which I stuffed with some candy, toys, waterguns, stickers, candy. I tied them with a rope ribbon and added badges to the front.
The Pin the flower on the Cactus game turned out great. For the kids' flowers, I put their outlaw names on them. They were: "Jake the Kid", Annie Oakley, Jeffrey James", etc.

We had the panning for gold. I bought rocks from the dollar store and spray painted them gold and then a glitter gol. We burried them in the sand and gave the kids sand sifters to pan with.

We also did a shootout game. They used a watergun to shoot at the bottles. I bought waterguns for this, but they didn't put out enough power, so they had to used the super soaker.


The kids won various prizes for the games. I also put their outlaw names in my pink cowboy hat and had the youngest child pick a name for a door prize.
Jake got a lot of great cards and gifts. One of the kids ran to Jake's room and quickly made him a card. It said, "Your party was awsome!"

Two New Layouts

Tonight I went to a crop at my Church. It is a small group of girls and we scrapbook and chat. I have a great time. I finished two LOs tonight since I had to come home pretty early because I still have a bunch of stuff to finish for Jake's birthday party on sunday.

The first LO is for my Dad for father's Day. Don't look Dad! The top picture is my Dad with my Grandmom. Isn't she gorgeous! The second picture is a recent picture of him. The colors are a little different than I usually use, but I like how it turned out.

The next is a LO using a single picture of the Grandkids taken at Christmas last year. Baby James was born this April, so I'll have to take another picture of all of them soon. We live all of the US, so it can be difficult getting all of them together. The red PP is by Cosmo Cricket. I love it! I layered two ribbons because they were so sheer and I wanted them to show a little better.

A Few New LOs

This weekend was the June crop over at All Moments Remembered (AMR). They have one each month. It is great because, not only is it a lot of fun, but we also have until monday to finish the challenges. Even so, I was only able to complete two of the challenges. But, I love how they turned out!

This first one was for Tracy's sketch challenge. We were supposed to make a ayout using her sketch as inspiration. I actually won this challenge! OK, so it is totally random, but I still feel honored and excited, LOL.

Here's Tracy's June sketch:

And, here's my LO. The picture was taken at Woodloch in 2006.

The picture is of Jake and my nephew, Matt, during one of their games.

This one was for Tracy's layering challenge. The challenge was to use as many layers in your layout as you can, at least three. This one caught Heather's eye over at AMR for monday. I feel very honored for that! Thanks, Heather! For my layers, I used cardstock, PP, diecut paper (2), stickers, ribbon, rub-ons, bling, stickles (did I forget anything?).

Here's my LO. It uses various pictures of me from different ages.

I'm not usually in LOs since I'm taking all the pictures,

so when I decided to do one using a photo of me,

Jake picked out all of these.

Not exactly what I had in mind for a picture of me, but it works.

Beach fun and some new photos

Jake's class walked to the beach with another first grade class for their end-of-year party. The school is in between the highways (the beach road and the main highway here), so the walk is not too long. They played putt putt and listened to the lifeguards speak about beach and water safety, but mainly they played in the sand. The kids had a lot of fun. Ok, so did I.


They just loved playing under the lifeguard stand. Isn't it great how the lifeguards still watched the beach and water even though all those kids were just under them squeeling and laughing?



They started out having a water balloon toss. The other class wore green shirts, our class wore yellow shirts. I thought it was so funny how most of the other class kept on their shirts while our class ran around in their swimsuits.

It quickly turned into a water balloon fight with parents, teachers, and the children.

I took this picture before the kids arrived. It looked a little overcast and had a great breeze. It later turned very hot with no breeze. The kids had fun anyway and we made sure to put sunscreen on them.

Teacher Gifts

Jake's last day of school is this friday. Tomorrow is the end-of-year party for his class. They are walking to the beach and listening to the lifeguards talk about beach safety and having lunch. Then they are going to the putt putt place acrosss the street. So, I thought I'd finish the teachers' gifts and bring them there with us. Jake and I decided to make each of them a little mini book/gift card book using pictures of the class, pictures of the teachers, and some of his work. Jake picked out the colors for each of his teachers and helped me make these. I think they turned out pretty well. Each page has a pocket where we put a gift card to various local places.

This is the one we made for Mrs. Jones. The other for Mrs. Weaver is a different color scheme, but pretty much the same otherwise.

I just loved this picture story Jake made. It says, "I can make a difference by planting flawrs because It will mack the world pritee."

For those that might quick need ideas for teacher gifts, I made these for teacher appreciation week. They were very easy to make and looked great! They candy bars were on sale for a dollar at the grocery store and I used paper, ribbon, and bling from my stash.

Watermelons

Jake and I made our fun watermelon cookies last night. Every time I ask him if he wants to make them, he makes a funny face to which I always say, "no silly, they look like watermelons, they don't taste like watermelons." We both giggle and then get started. Now, I do have a great sugar cookie recipe, but I always use the premade cookie dough that you would find in the dairy section of your grocery store when I am making them with children. It makes the recipe quicker for smaller attention spans. To make these you will need the following:

1 roll of premade sugar cookie dough

flour

mini chocolate chips

paste food coloring in red and green

water

circle cookie cutter

knife

To make the dough: in medium bowl, add the roll of cookie dough with a little bit of flour. I don't measure it but add just enough so that I can roll it out. Add red food coloring. Kneed together.

Flour your cutting board so it the dough doesn't stick. Roll it out with a rolling pin or just have the children flatten it with their hands. Sometimes they like this better. Use your circle cookie cutter and cut out several circles. Cut each in half.

Place on your baking sheet. Add mini chocolate chips. We probably use more than a watermelon has, but we love these chips. LOL

Bake according the the directions on package. (usually it is in a preheated 35o degree oven for 12 or so minutes)

While they are baking you can start the icing. I use a pretty shallow bowl like an oval vegetable bowl. Add confectioners sugar with a few teaspoons of water. Add your green food coloring. Stir. It should not be runny, but not thick like you would spread it either. You should play with the measurements, the kids will like to stir it anyway.

Let the cookies cool completely on cooling racks. After they cool, while holding the straight side of the cookie, roll the other end in the icing (see picture). This should end up looking like the rind of a watermelon. Place on wax paper to dry. After they dry, store in air-tight container lined with wax paper.