Scrapbook layouts

We got our first photo book last week, our Nauvoo Vacation. I love how it turned out. Dear hubby loved it so much he requested to have all of our pictures put into a hard bound book like this.

Seeing it in reality is so much better than on the screen. Everything just popped and the pictures seemed bigger. 

I figured I would have to wait until the next sale came up....BUT WAIT, the winkflash flat rate sale is on until the 31st!!!

Now to see if I can finish another set of pictures. So this weekend I frantically tried to get as many pictures scrapped as I could. I spent some time organizing my finished pages into chronological order. I had been putting pages and pictures together randomly; which ever pictures seemed to come together quickly in my mind. 

Here are a couple of the pages I put together. I don't know if I will have another set together in time for this sale but I plan on being ready with a couple of books for the next sale.

I nearly always work with templates. I love how simple they are to just drag and click. I have done some fancier pages with only a couple of pictures but for me, the whole point is to see the pictures. After all a picture is worth a thousand words so I am partial to templates with lots of pictures.

And, if you want amazing word art check out Bethany at Elegant Word Art.

She does an amazing job and offers a daily download.

How are your pages coming? What is your favorite way/place to print your pages?

Cooking from my Pantry Menu....Oatmeal Cookies recipe

With finishing the bedroom and having my family retreat here this last weekend my budget has gone overboard. In a desperate effort to keep it somewhat on track I have planned a menu to last through the end of the month to just cook from my pantry. I love trying new recipes but I also love having an assortment of recipes to use supplies I generally have on hand. Learning to cook from your pantry is also important in rotating your food storage and all those great coupon deals. Most family cook about 10 different meals. We do more than that but it can be said that my pantry is stocked based on about 10 different meals. I am also hoping to cycle through some of the "goodies" that are collecting dust at the back of the cupboards....

Menu

Crockpot Stroganoff (I have planned this several times but never actually made it)

Spaghetti- dear hubbies favorite, if he is NICE I may even make homemade bread sticks!

Homemade Pizza and sauce with green salad

Chicken and Rice Soup- yummy since we are in the beginnings of a series of storms to hit ever 24hrs.

Roast, Potatoes and Carrots

Parmesan Chicken

Pancakes- my boys love breakfast for dinner

Ham and Potatoes with home canned pickled beets

Some of the goodies I hope to make:

Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

Bread sticks

Jumbo Pretzels

Raisin Bread

My favorite cookie is Oatmeal Raisin. I have tried lots of different recipes but Quaker just GETS IT! I got this from the lid of their oatmeal. Yep, the cookies vanished all right. Occasionally I add chocolate chips too.

Vanishing Oatmeal Raisin Cookies

from Quaker

2 sticks margarine or butter

1 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup sugar

2 eggs

1 tsp vanilla

1 1/2 cup flour

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp cinnamon

1/2 tsp salt (optional)

3 cups Quaker Oats (quick or old fashioned)

1 cup raisins

Heat oven to 350. Beat together margaine and sugars until creamy. Add eggs and vanilla; beat well. Add combined flour, baking soda, cinnamon and salt; mix well. Stir in oats and raisins; mix well. Drop by rounded spoonfulls onto ungreased cookies sheet. Bake 10-12 minutes or until golden brown. Cool 1 minute on cookies heet; remove to wire rack. 

Makes about 4 dozen. You can also make bar cookies. Bake 30-35 minutes in ungreased 9x13 metal baking pan.

Spring project....

My family came down this last weekend for a fun retreat. My mom and sister made these. They were from supplies I had on hand already. The beadboard was scraps from our bedroom build. The flowers were a find at a scrapbooking store that is going out of business, sad.... And of course I have lots of riboon and paper handy for any project that might come up.

This is mine.

This is my sisters.

 We didn't plan to coordinate our colors. Great minds just think alike!

I think they turned out great. They were simple too. It only took about an hour. Maybe more but we like to talk and the kids needed to help too. I gave the little girls cardboard eggs and butterflies to embellish while be did our project. 

The best part was just relaxing and visiting with my family. The weather was cold and nasty but we stayed in and crafted. Ohhh, we did go to Tai Pan Trading too. Nothing exciting there but fun for the girls. hehehe!

T-shirt refashion tutorial

I have learned that when I find a post I like I have to share it, more for my benefit than your but it's all good right. 

Here's one about making a peasant shirt out of a t-shirt. Dear hubby loves when I wear peasant shirts. I love them cuz of the cool comfort. I actually prefer them over a t-shirt. We are planning on going to Disneyland this summer so I may have to pull out the sewing machine and get busy redoing some of my tee's.

My Gramma Said

Boys room decor....

It's finally done. At least the walls and paint are. We've been working so hard on my second son's room. (Thus the reason for a little MIA last week.)

It is temporarily set up for a guest room but looks great! I have to touch up a couple of paint places and finish the wall art but thought I would give you a peak at what we've done so far. I am thrilled with it. It was a lot of hard work. Dear hubby HATES this kind of stuff. He can fix your computer but building walls drives him nuts. Between the two of us we make quite the team. I use my experience as a kid helping dad build on the house and google what I don't remember to build the master plan. Of course this master plan is in my head and translating that into something tangible is always more work than you'd think. I did the taping and texturing and am loving this more than the first bedroom we did. I learned a bit and of course practice does make perfect.

I'm not sure where the idea to mix blue and green came from but I really like it. It is bright and cheery in a masculine way....

My youngest was determine to sleep here. He even crawled under the blanket and said "ni, ni". He is just too blasted cute!

I managed to find the curtains a Walmart. They were perfect and you can even flip them end for end.

We had the blue paint left over from Josh's room so I was excited when the two matched so nicely. Of course navy is not a hard color to match.

I can finally hang his pallet coat hooks up too. The door will still hit the hooks but not as bad and I think I can find a stopper to fix that.

His closet has two doors. One is at the base of the stairs. We had to leave this one so that furniture could be moved down the stairs. The two walls are weight bearing walls so we couldn't change them. At least the builder thought to put the door at the base of the stairs. I don't know why they didn't leave it open more but oh well.

His room is a bit small. We are also short one dresser so we decided to just build shelving in his closet to accommodate both problems. His closet is rather large anyway. I found the square bins on clearance at Home Depot. They know me oh, so well now. lol! So now he will have shelves for toys and clothes. His bed is a captains bed and does have drawers in the bottom so that will help too.

I love it when a plan comes together. Keegan is thrilled. Although I think his baby brother is gonna give him a run for his money, he was all set to go to sleep. Tucked in for the night and everything! I will post more pictures when I get his wall decor up. I am loving it. What do you think?
And since there are so few BOYS room ideas out there...I'm sharing this with DIY Show Off.

Thrift Store Nightstand....

Remember this nightstand I picked up for my sister?

I finally finished it.

What do you think? I started painting it black but it wasn't going well. I decided on this chocolate brown. I spray painted the handle black and added the legs. I had to glue the legs on one at a time so they took the longest. I think it would look lovely in a shabby chic white with brown glaze too. 

I hope my dear sis likes it. She will be here this weekend so I'm keeping my fingers crossed. Of course, it's not a big deal to change it if needed.

***UPDATE***
My dear sis L.O.V.E.D it! And her friend was ever so jealous. YEAH!

Menu Plan, Pinwheels and Olive Garden night!

Have you been over to Jaimie Cooks it up yet? I have linked several of her recipes but if you haven't yet checked her out you should. I love her recipes. They are basic cook from my pantry recipes. I only have to add a couple of ingredients for them. Plus she has great variety. With 4 hungry boys to feed I love the size of her recipes. Of course it's nothing compared to feeding her brood of 5 kids. I have yet to find a recipe of hers we didn't enjoy and get rave reviews from. I am hoping to upgrade my mixer so that I can try more of her yummy bread recipes too. My basic Kitchen Aid is lovely but gets a work out when I make recipes that call for 10-12 cups of flour. I usually cut those in half. Just trying to preserve my prized appliances. 

We love Olive Garden! It is my favorite restaurant. I go just for the soup, salad, and bread sticks. Dear hubby loves pasta so he is a happy camper too. Imagine my utmost delight when Jaimie pops up with the Zuppa Toscana soup, bread sticks and their salad with dressing! OHHH YEAH! Tomorrow night is Olive Garden night here. You are all invited to join us. Dinners at 6pm! Mom cooks, all others do dishes.

I am also on the lookout for a fun St Patty's day dinner. I think I will make Mint Chocolate Chip cupcakes and plan on having a green salad and I might serve it in that order too ;-). I still need a main dish. I have seen (in the past) fun meals for this holiday but I will need to search a bit more tonight. If you have a suggestion please let me know!

The end of the week will be with family arriving for a Spring Family Retreat. I planned something easy that everyone could munch on as they arrived in town. 

On the menu this week....

Monday: Zuppa Toscana, Olive Garden breadsticks and salad

Tuesday: Chicken and Black Bean Quesadillas

Wednesday: Hamburger Pinwheels

Thursday: St Patty's meal with mint chocolate chips cupcakes

Friday: Papa Murphy's Pizza as family arrives for our retreat

Family Retreat Menu

Saturday: B: Pancakes, fruit, bacon

L: BBQ or else eating out

D: Ham, Cheesy potatoes, green salad, jello

Sunday: Farmers Breakfast Casserole 

L: Sloppy Joes as everyone heads out for home.

One of my favorite recipes is so simple. 

Hamburger Pinwheels

1# hamburger browned with an onion

mix your favorite biscuit dough (I use bisquick) and roll out. Spread hamburger over dough and roll up like a cinnamon roll. Bake according to biscuit directions. Serve with tomatoe soup or gravy over the top. We like the tomatoe soup along with a green salad or green beans. My boys love this a gobble it up. It's not dear hubby's favorite but he enjoys it. I just have to plan spagetti or some other pasta dish to keep a balance he hehe.

Publishing Scrapbook pages

I have determined not to let too many more of my pages build up on my computer before I start printing some of them. Winkflash is having a special that ends today. All books are one flat price. I arranged our pictures from our trip to Nauvoo in 2009 into a 12x12 book. It ended up being 88 pages and was $40 shipped to my house. I have heard good things about Winkflash so I will let you know what I think. I am suppose to get the book on Monday. That's less than a week. I can't tell you how excited I am. I hear Winkflash has this sale a couple of times a year. I may finish up another book and have it ready for the next sale. Oohh, maybe I can have a couple ready??!!

Check it out. Use the code ALLBOOKS and just enter it at the end for the discount. Most of all

GET THOSE PAGES PRINTED! They are never as fun to look at on the computer screen as they are in a book or binder.!

The Joys of Sheetrocking

I have been busy this past week finishing DS#2's room. We are having a family retreat next week so we wanted to finish this room and have it set up as a temporary guest room. DS#2 sleep walks so we can't move him downstairs until the bathroom is finished too. That is planned for next month. 

Anyway, I am way excited for this room to be finished. I share several of my ideas and now I just want to see it finished. Dear hubby is great with computers, not so much with construction. I have to say though, together we make one heck of a team. Walls up, insulation done, wiring in, sheetrock up and now the texturing. I actually finished the texture this morning. Now to let it dry overnight and prime tomorrow.
Ooohhh, we're getting so close! Of course the retreat is creeping closer and closer as well....

Keep watching. I will post pictures of more boys room decor ideas and our finished project. DIY in it's truest form!

Oh, and I am hoping to finish my sisters nightstand redo in between paint coats. Lots of happenings around here. Be patient and you will get to see them all!

Digital Scrapbooking pages....

I managed to get several pages done this weekend. I like my pages to be more about the pictures and less about the embellishments. I also think that sometimes I just need to get the pictures in an album and organized. If I get too far behind and don't get pictures done they don't do any good. I take pictures to remember and document our life. With all this in mind you may find my pages rather simple but I like them....

 
 One of the scrapbooking sites I frequent and love is Scrapping Sisters. They have lots of great stuff and frequently have freebies. The too like to keep with the paper look and have simple pages. I enjoy working with templates and they have great ones with coordinating kits. This month they have the March of the Animals kit available to download- FREE!

 Or maybe you need some Winter Solstice pages

They also have great word art....

That is what is great about digital scrapping, so many great kits and freebies.
Check these ladies out! You'll be impressed!

The things I love; a personal note....

What would you do if you had an extra day each week? I can think of a lot of things I would do. Lucky for me I will be able to attempt to do each one of them. I have been working full time as a RN for 11 yrs and now get to cut back to part time. That's just 2 12hr shifts. I work nights so my boys don't notice that I am gone as much. They are usually with me or dad but let me tell you what! Sleep is a high commodity for me. My favorite time of the day is 6am to 10am. Crazy? Maybe. But I love the calm quiet of the morning and I can generally be ever so productive. So imagine my delight when Dear Hubby left at 5 something in the morning and I felt wide awake and refreshed. I stayed in bed until 5:45 am then decided to get up. Yep, wide awake and feeling GREAT! 

I enjoyed a uninterupted and unrushed shower. Took time to lather lotion all over and just enjoy the morning. Now with bread in the oven and, surprisingly, boys still in bed I had to put a few thoughts down. 

I thought of all the things I love and I am going to savor today. Starting now I am going to enjoy the journey a bit more. 

I am thrilled to be able to focus more on my boys and family.

I love early mornings and am going to try to enjoy more of them.

I love cooking and mostly baking. More homemade bread!

I love to read and look forward to more time reading with the little boys.

I love seeing dear hubby come home and wrap me in his arms for a hug and kiss. He is great about doing this but sometimes we are going opposite directions. I miss my kisses then. My favorite is when he has just gotten out of the shower and shaved. Ooohh! I love a freshly shaven face. SMMOOTH! Yep, it melts me every time.

I love crafting. Thursdays are my dear friend and I's day to craft. We'd gotten away from that a bit but I have missed it. Simple things. Time well spent.

I love making memories. I look forward to spending more time scrapbooking those memories to share with my family and friends. It's always a treat to watch my boys pull out their baby books and share/brag about their own pictures.

I love Christ. I have an increasing desire to study the scriptures like never before. More scripture power stories for my boys. What better hero's to read about?!

I love the refreshing feeling of having a good start on the day. Ok-maybe this is more of my type A personality but when I feel good enough to get up early I know I can accomplish so much more. 3 of my 4 boys take after me that way. They are early risers and are usually up before 7am. It is great when we travel. We can hit the road or attractions before most of the other families get up. School doesn't start until 9am. Think of how much we can accomplish, the time we can spend together when I can join them in their early rise!

I have looked forward for a long time to only working part time. I have counted my blessings to have a career that could sustain my family through job loss, trials, and moves. That is WHY I went to college to begin with. I watch my parents struggle and wanted better for my family. Now, I look forward to the blessings of being MOM!

What are you thankful for?

What are some of your favorite things?

Today's project finds....

I have to blog the great projects I find more for myself but perhaps you will enjoy them too. There are lots of great ideas.....

Shamrock Clips- I have lots of neices...

LUCKY tiles

Bathroom door additions