Reunions!

This has been a year of reunions already. I have been reunited with close friends and family that I have not seen in years and I am truely amazed. First, my cousin- hey Jamie- surprised me at work one night. I had not seen her in years and had lost touch. We chatted for a few minutes and arranged another get together. We met with my sisters over lunch and had a great time. I'm not sure any of us wanted to leave but the kids had other plans and time does tend to pass. She left to go back to Texas but thankfully we have e-mail and now blogs. Yeah.

Then last night we ran into one of my best friends ever. After I married she moved to Boise. I tried to stay in touch but lost track of where she was. I would often think of her and wonder what she was up to and if she was living the dreams we shared in high school. Last year I ran into her but once again life happened. What a surprise to look up and see her smiling 'sunshine'! We had a nice although short chat. She mentioned that she had postpartum depression and thus was unable to return my calls. I'm glad to say all is better and hopefully we will now get together and be able to reminice. I will be calling April!

One of the sites I frequent, ok, it's more like live at, is Pinchingyourpennies.com. I have been couponing since July and having great fun; not to mention saving money. Well, I posted a message that included my blog link. Low and behold, another high school friend saw it and sent me an e-mail. I had seen her posts before but since we use usernames and not our real names we didn't know each other online. She had actually been trying to find me to reconnect but had been unsuccessful in finding me. Now we will be making plans to get together. How funny that after trying facebook, myspace, phone, and other sources she would stumble on my blog through a coupon site! How 'bout lunch Kim?

To top it all of, Kim, April and I used to double date together. We all hung out together and had a lot of fun. I look forward to remembering all those crazy things we did. By the way Kim, Nathan is a nurse in Blackfoot. I see him once in a while but mostly keep in touch through his dad at Fred Meyers. The world may seem big but it truely is a small world after all.

Jamie, well said, God truely has blessed both of us with the gift of reuniting with loved ones.

I made up this bag from an online tutorial. It was really easy and only cost about $4 total! I plan to make more for Easter Baskets. Inside I will have "Easter rolls"; you take crescent rolls (representing wraps for Christ's body), cover them with butter and cinnamon & sugar (representing the spices used to prep his body), then roll a large marshmallow in the rolls (this represents Christ's body). Then bake the rolls. When they are done the marshmallow is no longer there (representing Christ's empty tomb- His risen body). It is fun to do with kids to talk about the Easter Story and yummy to eat afterward. Picture this bag with bright Easter/spring colors. What do you think? I am excited and think it will be a hit- I hope! By the way, we got our new camera. I plan on playing with it lots when I am off work again.

Find the tutorial at http://mamaspocketbook.com

Give it a try and have fun!

My latest shopping haul!
You just have to love getting free groceries. Since July I have been using pinchingyourpennies.com to help with my shopping. In that time I have dropped over $1000 from our food/hygiene/paper products budget and have built a years supply. I love to go grocery shopping and see what kind of deals I can get. This week Albertsons is having a General Mills deal, buy 10 get $10 back for your next shopping trip. A lot of the stuff is snack/sugar foods but hey, my boys like these things too. We have our share of healthy food but comfort food is part of the pantry as well. So here is my latest deals. I was soooo excited this week. My best was paying only $0.62 and saving $49.57! Here is my total.
22 cake mixes
7 brownie mixes
16 chex mix/cheerios mix
10 progresso soups
10 Pillsbury grands biscuits
3 Nature Valley granola bars
19 fruit snacks
hersheys syrup
3 bags chips
2 Breyers ice cream
3 toaster strudels
4 packages cheese slices

I spent $43.84 - $20.00 of my next trip= $23.84
I saved $258.06!!!

The progresso and grands ended up being totally free! No problem with having coblers this summer!! Check out the website= pinchingyourpennies.com. They do all the work for you so I just have to print the shopping list! THANK YOU PYP!

YES!!! I am getting it! The learning curve is beginning to straighten out. This is fun! The first picture I did this morning with a little help from the printed instructions. The second one was what I worked through last night with the tutorial. The tutorial, by the way, is from TheShabbyShoppe.com -Couldn't have done it without the tutorial!!!

Last night I finally found a tutorial for digiscraping in photoshop elements. I had been getting quite frustrated with not being able to figure out the program. After walking through the tutorial I am once again excited to learn digiscrap. I think I may actually catch up on my pages. Now I just need to figure out how to download it so you can see what I have done.....Stay tuned to see when I actually accomplish this.

Ok, I finally did it and created this blog. We will see how well I can keep it up. I think it will be fun though. I love to be crafty. After checking out other blogs of friends and many others I decided it could be fun to display my own projects. Admittedly they are seldom my own ideas but creating shared ideas is fun too.

My hobbies are: crafting, scrapbooking, camping, and reading. I am currently trialing digital scrapbooking. If you have any suggestions with this let me know. I am also a nurse and work with cardiac patients. I will be taking a National certification in April. It is tough to study with kids around, I am just thankful I finished school before the boys came along.

I am a mother of 4 incredible boys. They keep me hopping! Our house is high energy and often times loud. Thankfully they have just enough room to wrestle and play as only boys know how to. I have a wonderful husband of 12 (almost 13) years. He spoils me rotten and is the love of my life. I grew up with 1 brother and 2 sisters so living with a house of boys has been an adjustment at times but just as rewarding. You know, boys are unique creatures. No pink allowed, just bugs, snails and puppy dog tails......