Lots to talk about today. :)

Wow! So much to talk about...

First of all, I was supposed to have Cassidy's 3 year check-up. Unfortunately, 10 minutes after our appointment time we were still standing outside and there was nobody there. So, I call to find out if they are hiding in the back or what, only to be told they decided not to open that office today and I should have been called. WHAT?! Oh man, I was ticked. I asked if they didn't have my cell or any of the other 5 numbers on the paper I fill out every single time I go to their office, and she claims no. Ugh. So, now the appointment is set for three weeks from now and mama is not too happy with the ped office.

Silas came home with all sorts of good news from work. I can't talk about a lot of it, but there is a good chance that things may start looking up financially for us. :) The main thing is he is getting all the praise and recognition he has deserved for years. I'm really excited for him. :D

I was tagged by Jane (Jane's World) a few days ago, and I haven't forgotten! I've just been a bit busy. ;) So, without further ado....

rules:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::: List 5 weird things about yourself or your pets. Then tag 5 friends and list them. Then those 5 friends need to state their 5 weird things on their blog, listing the rules and then tag 5 more people. Don't forget to let the person know in their blog that you tagged them or we will never find out their weird attributes.

1 - I can't sleep at night unless my pillowcase is a flannel one. I have no idea why, but for some reason my ear just prefers the soft feel I suppose. Weird?.....yeah. LOL

2 - Another weird sleep thing...I have to have my ear on the cold part of the pillow. I will turn my pillow tons before I can ever actually sleep. We have had a post on Scrappin' Secrets a few weeks now about our quirks, and it turns out this is something a lot of people do. So, maybe I'm not completely weird. LOL

3 - Our dog, Abby, is quite the scardey-cat. We had a very young kitten get into our backyard, and she was terrified of it. Nevermind she was at least 10 times the size of the kitten. It was hillarious to watch her whimper and run to the other end of the yard with her tail between her legs everytime the kitten would meow or start to walk around the yard.

4 - I can't stand the feel of cardboard. It gives me goosebumps even thinking about touching it.

5 - Hmmm, one more....I actually LIKE to vaccum. It's the one chore I enjoy. No idea why. :)

Ok, that took a while to come up with that last one. LOL I'm going to tag Lynds, Wendy, Cassandra, Nellie, and Tiana. :) As Jane said on her blog, "blame Kim J", because it sounds like she instigated this. ROFL

Want to see my new layouts? ;)


This photo of Elena was just too darn cute...it just yelleed "SCRAP ME!", so I did. She loves to choose her own outfits now, and this one is a favorite. She also decided to choose all sorts of accessories while she was at it. LOL It was a very...ummm....different look. HA! If you click, you can see it much better and read the journaling. The papers are fromValerie Fowler's "Princess of the Party" and Michelle Coleman's "Simply Spring Mini " (slightly recolored by me). Ribbon and flower charm are also from Michelle Coleman's "Simply Spring Mini" (slightly recolored by me). Doodles and word art from Lauren Grier's "Girl Notes " (flower and heart colored by me).



I metioned in my last post about joining Bella Gypsy's CT. Wow! They are all so great there! I love it! I got to work immediately and came up with two LO's that I really like. The first one is using the Bella Gypsy kit "Elementary". Wow, do I ever LOVE this kit! I had the perfect photo for it too. :)






And the second layout is "Baby Talk". I used Bella Gypsy's "All Girl" paper and embellishment packs. The colors are so soft...I just LOVE it! I also used some stitches from their Berry Sweet kit. LOL The photo is Elena with my best friend's baby. They appeared to have a nice little conversation going on. :)


So, I guess I didn't have too, too much to say. It seemed like a lot more in my mind I guess. Anyone that knows me knows that I can get to talking at times and keep on, and on, and on, and....I'll spare you. ;)

Have a great evening!

Woohoo!

School has been going pretty well for the most part. I decided to try something new with Jacob. I gave him the entire week's worth of work so he could see what was coming, and I told him that we were going to do all that was on the list by Thursday so we could have a fun day on Friday doing art, digital scrapping, etc. He dragged his feet so badly. He took an hour and a half to do one phonics sheet on Monday and Tuesday, and we never even got to half of the things we should have. So, Thursday we actually had a lot to catch up on, but we did get to everything. I think I will just stick with the daily schedule for now. ;)

Josh did pretty good this week. I am trying to give him work that is mostly play right now. He has a negative view of what school is like because he hates writing. We worked on it a lot last year for therapy. So, this year I am trying not to worry about the writing right now and focus on everything else. We will get to the writing later. We played a game called Train Salesman. We set up a nice curvy track and he sat on one side while I sat on the other. I was the buyer, setting up my own train station, and he had a train yard that I wanted to buy from. We took out all of his Thomas trains and set them up, and I would tell him what I was looking for...for example, a large engine with a green tender. He would then find them in the huge line of trains (which is hard for him to focus on large groups of items), put them together on a track and drive them over to me. I would then tell him my shipping business was doing so well that I needed to either trade in for a new one or buy another. He loved the game.

His other favorite activity was the number puzzles I made. I used index cards....on the left side I wrote the number. On the right side I used glittery puffy paint and made coordinating number of dots. This provided something for him to touch while counting the dots. I then cut them cards down the center in different shapes. He did great. I used the same puzzle idea with the letters to teach him the lowercase letters after he had learned the uppercase.

We also have done a little computer, but not much. He mainly wants to play his car racing game, Test Drive 5, and he does that as his reward after his school is done. He has actually figured out how to manuver the cars a bit now and discovered a track that will actually make him airborne. He also found a spot that is wide enough to make the car do doughnuts. Too many Nascar races, I think. LOL

So, in scrapping news....

I am super excited to say I received an email tonight asking if I would like to join the Bella Gypsy CT. Woohoo! I LOVE their kits, so of course I said YES! I was recommended by Lynds, and after checking out my gallery, they asked me to join. :) In addition to that, I also am now the Scrappin' Secrets CT Apprentice. Eventually somewhere down the road I will be the CT Leader. Woohoo! I'm super excited about it!

I did some layouts this week that I really loved:

I did the sketch challenge at RAKScraps. I was wanting to use a new kit I got by Jeanine Baechtold, and I still had not gotten Joshua's first day of Kindergarten pics scrapped yet, so I decided to put the two together. :) Even though we homeschool, we still do the first day of school photos each year. Stitching is from freedigitalscrapbooking and the kit I used is Jeanine Baechtold's Sophisticated Paisley kit. Isn't Josh cute. He had one of Jacob's Lego cars in hand, of course. :)

Next is a continuation of our ABC album. I used a photo of a huge giraffe we saw at Downtown Disney last October. Everything from RAKScraps May Mega Kit....Papers by: Jeannie Papai and Jane A and the ribbon by Corinne Fragata.

And I saved my favorites for last. I love how these turned out. Be sure to click on these and see them better and read the journaling. :)


Credits: Ginger Thibodeau's Catch Some Coral kit. The journaling is actually lyrics from the Barry Manilow song "I Am Your Child"


Credits: I used Rachel Dickson's Little Man kit. I also used Virtual Photographer on the photo. This one is currently my favorite LO. :)


Credits: Ginger Thibodeau's Catch Some Coral ki


Credits: Papers - Valerie Fowler - Princess of the Party and Michelle Coleman, Simply Spring Mini (slightly recolored by me) Ribbon and flower charm - Michelle Coleman, Simply Spring Mini (slightly recolored by me) Doodles and word art - Lauren Grier ~ Girl Notes (flower and heart colored by me)

ARGH!!!!!

Ok, this construction in my backyard is seriously going to drive me to the nut house! Let me give you a visual to explain a little of why I am complaining.

This is my backyard the afternoon after a hurricane came through our area in August of 2004. It's a mess, but you get to see what the trees that once existed look like. Notice this is from my garage door, and also notice the blue pipe which was sitting in a large ditch. Note also the amount of shade we received from all of these trees.



Now, here is what my backyard looks like as of week before last. Note the lack of a ditch, because a bunch of nice workers in trucks came and filled it in for us. Notice the bright orange truck that was kind enough to pull up a tree from next to our fence and then almost managed to drop onto my house. Also note the wonderful pile of pulled trees (you only see a portion of the long trail here) that they decided to burn this weekend. The smell of smoke in my house was wonderful (being sarcastic here) and the haze was such a wonderful sight - I really think this is probably half the reason Cassie and Jacob are both quite hoarse since that day. And while you are looking at this, imagine the feeling of the trees being pulled and thrown around like little lincoln logs, but on a MUCH grander scale. My house literally shakes all day long when they are out there working. My dog goes balistic because these workers are literally right at my fence. It's a whole lotta noise and a whole lotta shaking in the neighborhood!



Now, flash to today. I wake up to very low water pressure, which is not an uncommon thing when you have all the construction going on. At 9am it was low enough that I was not able to shower or do laundry, both of which were in need of being done. At noon, I fixed the kids their lunch and discovered we had absolutely NO WATER! Nothing, nada, zip. Nary a drop could be found. I was fuming now. So I call the water company to find out what's up. Nobody had reported a probalem, so the woman was sending out a ticket. I explained I had four small children and no water with them here was a very bad combination. She apologized and said they would send someone out as soon as possible. Here in my city, that is usually translated into a minimum of 2-3 hours before it is even looked into.

Joshua was panicked about not being able to wash his hands, Jacob's imagination was completely running away with him as to what would happen if we turned on the faucet with no water at the house....I have no idea what he thought was going to happen, but he was scared to try turning it on. The girls could have cared less...it meant no bath today, so they were happy. LOL So, I headed over to my mother's house for the remainder of the day. Luckily, we had finished school by the time this happened. The water was fixed by the time Silas got home.

So, now that I have explained a little more what our big complaint is right now, I guess you can imagine what it is like trying to get my highly distractable, autistic child to concentrate on doing school of any sort. I mean, it is hard enough for any of us to think some days with all the noise and shaking, but then for poor Joshua whose senses are extremely heightened...man, I feel for him.

So, hopefully they will finish all of this majorly annoying construction projects soon.

A new scrapper and a new activity

As a new activity for homeschooling this year, I decided to take a cue from Jacob and let him learn digital scrapping. We had his first lesson yesterday and he LOVED it! I let him choose the photo, papers, elements, and what to write. The main goal of the lesson was for him to learn to move the items he wanted onto the background. He chose 2 papers from Wendy Nelson's Back to School Basic kit and the elements he chose were from Melany Violette's Vroom-Vroom kit. The font was ITC Garamond (we'll cover changing the font later). I think he did a pretty good job for his first time! I even posted his LO at RAKScraps and Scrappin' Secrets for him, where he received quite a few wonderful compliments. (Thanks again everyone!) So now he is asking to do another page. LOL I think this will be a lot of fun for him when we go on field trips and when we study things he is actually able to take photos of on his own.



I've been doing some scrapping myself. I now have my letter F page done. Silas took the photo while out of town on business last month. Everything I used was from the Gotta Pixel Design Team's April kit. Papers by Brenda Miller, Ribbon by Stacy Carlson, Charm by Christina Wall, Glass Buttons by Michelle Pieters.




I love this photo Silas took of Elena. She brought a frame out of my room last week and I had it sitting on a shelf. She decided to be cute one evening and frame herself. LOL Silly girl. The kit I used is Misty Cato's Wonderfully Made.









This next one is a photo of Elena opening gifts on her actual birthday. It's so funny seeing how she knew what to do this year and actually ripped paper to get to what was inside. She was excited about her Crayola dominoes. Star clip and Birthday Girl Word art are by Jen Reed from the BirthdayZ elements kit at Scrapdish, Candles by Krista Mettler from the BirthdayZ elements kit, Celebrate Word art by Melissa G from the BirthdayZ elements kit, Star Background by Lisa West (Zephanee) from her Summer Celebration kit, and Patterned background paper by Robin Cabana from her You Rock kit available at Scrapbook-Bytes.


Finally, I participated in the Ad Inspiration challenge at Scrappin' Secrets and came up with this layout. I have so many photos of Josh with a car or train in his hands. I had to use them at some point. LOL he paper and truck are from Melany Violette's Vroom-Vroom Kit. The fonts I used are Mad's Scrawl BRK, Long Island, and Little Trouble Girl BV.






I received the latest issue of Family Fun Magazine this week and finally got a chance to sit and look through it. I came across a really cool article on Letterboxing. I have been looking for something like this and finally, here it is! It is similar to geocaching, but instead of using a GPS and leaving trinkets, you use a compass and clues to find the letterbox. You then take a rubberstamp (most people make their own) and stamp the logbook inside the box and then take the stamp inside the box to stamp their page. Then you hide the box back where it was found. Jacob is always wanting to find treasure, and this will fulfill the desire, improve thinking skills, get us some exercise, and give us some cheap family fun. There are several in our area and nearby areas, and in our state there are at least 3 mystery boxes. I can't wait to get started. My plan (we know how that goes!) is for Jacob and possibly the others to make their own rubber stamps. There are so many easy options for them that it is very doable.

And the year begins

We started school Monday. Jacob is in second grade, Joshua is in kindergarten, and the girls are "preschool". I had these great plans of how things would go and my schedule was worked out. Everyone would have something to do throughout the day. The boys would take turns entertaining the girls and the girls would love every minute of it since they adore their brothers. During naptime for the girls I would work on things together with the boys. Life would be nice and school would be fun. My schedule looked so good on paper that it was frameworthy.

Well, as we all know, life has a funny way of taking your plans and laughing at you. Half an hour into trying to get the kids to listen to what we were going to do first, I realized the joke truly was on me. I overhear Jacob mumble that he thought second grade was going to be fun. Uh oh! That's it. Time to rethink this whole thing.

So, with a huge sigh, I proceded to tear up my beautiful, happy schedule and go into my room to rethink the entire thing and how I need to work it out to everyone's benefit, all the while being serenaded by Joshua's drumming on my door. I gave that idea up quickly, and told Joshua he could play in his room while I worked with Jacob. Sweet Joshua actually peeked out his room about 10 minutes later and asked me if I wanted to play Legos with him. WOAH! This is one of our goals that we have been working on - initiating play by asking someone to play a specific thing with him. I was excited, but there was no way in the world I could just drop Jacob's school. So, I came up with a solution and explained that I had to do school with Jacob, but could play later. Until then, would he like to play with Cassidy? Oh yes! Great idea! Score one for Mom! And even better, Cassie was chomping at the bit to get in the boys room and help make a mess.

I decided to try easing into school a bit this year. So, Jacob worked on his Bible lesson and some Math. We are using an old 3rd grade Holt Mathematics book and supplementing as necessary and for the Bible lesson I am using Calvary Chapel Children's Ministry Curriculum. It's nice. It has mazes, crosswords, true and false, fill in the blanks, and word searches. I also have been getting "Keys for Kids" which is a free daily devotional for kids that we receive in the mail each month.

Joshua worked on several things so far. We have been sorting some magnetic letters by color. My letters come in 6 different colors, which is a lot for Josh to concentrate on at once. I had him sort about 100 letters into their proper place and it took him a few tries before he fully seemed to understand what I was wanting. While they were up today he asked me if some of them spelled car. So, I showed him the c, a, and r and explained that they make the word car. He giggled. So funny to see him get excited over something so simple. LOL I then decided to take it a bit further and took away the c and added f. I went over the sounds again with him, and explained the ar sound and how to put the f sound with it and make the word far. Ok, not impressed. So then I did a couple more and came to the letter t. I asked him what sound the t makes, he told me, and lo and behold he actually told me tar spells TAR! He didn't know what tar was until I explained it to him, but he smiled a little when I told him how proud I was that he just read a word by himself.

I also discovered this week that Joshua has a great sense of rhythm. He was playing a Reader Rabbit music game and actually enjoying it. All of the rhythm exercises that he tried, he did awesome on! So, that was exciting. :) Maybe there is a musical future for my little guy. He has always been able to hum and sing a tune amazingly well compared to other kids his age. I remember when he was only one and we were in the car and he was humming. I thought it was Jacob because of how accurate it was. Just amazing.

And he can use a computer mouse. Another thing that amazes me given that until this week he always prefered to watch others do the computer. Now he has one of his own and he seems to have completely taken to it. I'm really glad, because I think that he will benefit a lot from using it.

We did some drawings in shaving cream yesterday. Joshua hated it, but with guidance and my convincing him to draw some cars, we made it through. Even the girls enjoyed that one, though I learned next time we will probably try using whipped cream. Elena was way too tempted by the look of it and kept trying to taste it. Yuck!

So, that brings you up to date for now. RAKScraps has just started releasing their August Mega Kit and the theme is school days! Woohoo! Run over and join the message board to get the links to this awesome kit, and while you are there, why not say hello? Everyone there is great! I plan on trying to scrap a bit this weekend as time permits. I want to get the first day layouts completed ASAP and try to stay up on them for the end of the year, especially since Joshua's portfolio is going to be made up of a lot of photos. :)

Rumble Grumble

I have been busy, busy, busy preparing for this school year. I'm pretty much ready. Only 4 more days! Yay! I can't wait. :)

Here is my biggest concern right now - the noise. We have some major construction going on, practically in my backyard. What used to be a ton of trees and a ditch on the other side of my back fence, now appears to be completely empty space with the ditch completely filled in with dirt. Now, because the ditch was HUGE and is now full of dirt, obviously we have had work trucks bringing dirt, scooping dirt, dropping dirt....all of this after they already spent a day knocking down trees. They are very close to my fence - so close that their trucks keep bumping the branches of trees in my yard. My house literally shakes ALL DAY LONG. I had a horrible migraine two days ago, and it is near impossible to get rid of it with the house rumbling.

So, now that my grumbling is done, would you like to see my latest layouts? :) I've been busy
making new pages, but have neglected posting them on my blog. In my defense, blogger hasn't been very cooperative for me.

My first three layouts were made using the Pampered Princess kit by Sheri Smith, SheLynn Designs at Scrappin' Secrets. The layouts just flowed once I got started. The first two are of sweet Elena. I used the ShangriLaNFSmallCaps font in the first one, and Scythe font in the second.

My third layout was of Cassidy. Don't you just love that silly smile she had? LOL It was taken on her first real Halloween. She was Sleeping Beauty and was thrilled, as you can tell. :) I used Pea Catherine as the font on this one.

Next is a layout I did for the Ad Inspiration Challenge on SS. I am far from thrilled with it, but I liked the concept. I decided to do a layout on Cassidy's favorite things. What you see is the result. LOL Barbie, the color PINK, Disney Princesses, My Little Ponies, friends, and of course, her Purple Baby, which she never leaves home without. The font I used is Kayleigh, and the kit is Miss Mint's "To My Mother" kit from Peppermint Creative.

What's next? Hmmmm. My Abc Album is coming along nicely. I just finished my letter E page. I just realized I never showed the C and D pages either. Yikes! I am WAY behind!

C always stands for the older princess around here. LOL I'm still trying to get my tears to look halfway decent. I'm not thrilled with how they turned out here, but they will do for now. All of the papers and elements are from Ginger Thibodeau's Softly Shining kit. I love this kit. I have used it on at least 3 layouts and could keep using it over and over. It is a beautiful kit! The font I used is ITC Garamound. I decided right from the start that I was going to use the same font for this entire album to sort of tie the entire thing together.

My D page features a photo of some ducks that I took on Jacob's first fishing trip. The little babies were so cute. They would follow their mother into the high grass at the edge of the lake and simply disappear in it. Do you see the little white duck among all of the brown ones? He is too cute. LOL I used V. Kim Smith's Woodland Meadows 2 kit.

Just as C stands for Cassidy, E is for Elena. Scrappin Secrets has a new Mega kit out right now for free (so go get it - good through the month of August!) and I loved the lightly colored papers in there. I really loved Colleen Shibley's background that I chose to use, as well as the little tag. It just seemed too perfect. :)

Let me see. Wow, I did not realize how long it had been since I posted my layouts. LOL Next is one I did for the SS Quote Challenge. Journaling reads:
"Joshua, you have always had a special bond with Elena. I remember when this photo was taken in the hospital only a few short hours after Elena was brought into my room. You were so proud of your new sister. At that time you were still not very verbal, but the joy you showed us was amazing. Elena is so lucky to have such a wonderful big brother." I used Robin Carlton and Mandabean's Deco Fabulous kit. The fonts are Libby Script, Pea Jennifer, and Kayleigh.

I took part in the lyrics challenge at SS as well. I didn't think I had a single photo to go along with it, which is why I didn't do the same exact challenge at RAKS. While looking through my photos for one to use on the quote challenge, I came across the photo I decided to use. It needed something done, so I played with it a bit. You see the final result. The lyrics are from Natasha Bedingfield's song "Unwritten". The font I used is Apple Chancery, and the kit I chose is Funky Bunches of Flowers by Tania Cordova aka luna designs.

Finally, I made two layouts using Julie Major's Spring Time Kit. The first is A Little Cake. I got the stitching from Atomic Cupcake, and the font is Pea Becky. Gotta love those Pea fonts!

The other is titled Smile. I took this photo on Elena's birthday. She was so cute. She sat on the seat and kept smiling and saying "Cheeeeeeese". What a ham she can be at times. LOL I used Pea Becky on this one as well. Now that I am looking at it, I wish I would have kept her eyes colored when I desaturated the pic. She has the most gorgeous blue eyes. I may redo it one of these days.

I think that pretty much brings you up to date on the happenings and the layouts from this month. I'll try to be better about updating regularly so I don't overwhelm you with the layouts like that. ;)

Angel Madison

Baby Madison, who I have mentioned a few times here on my blog, passed away this morning. My thoughts and prayers are with Shelli. Madison fought so hard, and she beat so many odds. She just celebrated her 2nd birthday on July 29th - something the doctors did not expect to happen.
She touched so many people across many miles. To read her story, please follow this link:
http://www.memoriesofmariam.com/madison/

Happy 2nd Birthday, Elena!

I can't believe my baby is 2 already! She is such a joy. Happy birthday, baby girl!

Credits: Mindy Terasawa's Autumn Blossoms blog freebie Font: Antsy Pants

The boys and their growth issues

Well, if you rememebr all the way back to January, both boys were referred to an endocrinologist because one of them has a low Insulin-like Growth Hormone (IGF) and the other had a high according to the peds office. So, today was our appointment...finally! Nothing like 7 1/2 months of waiting! The endo is wonderful though! I really like her a lot, and the kids do as well.

So, we started with Jacob. He is still in the 5th% for height. His bone age scan (the xray my peds office supposedly couldn't get was miraculously there in the office) shows his bone growth as delayed by about a year. From what she explained, the IGF they tested is not actually a hormone, but a protein that binds to the bones. It increases as you grow. Jacob's isn't actually low like the ped thought...it is actually in the low range, but borderline. She thinks he is what they call a late-bloomer. They start out mid to high on the growth chart and then steadily decline until they level off. He pretty much has leveled off at the 5% now, which is great. She did a full exam and said he is still missing 2 of his 6 year molars which goes right along with the delay in bone growth.

The awesome thing? She said most parents have been told there is a window of opportunity that you need to get growth issues taken care of in. It is not true and we have plenty of time to just observe him and see what happens. Most likely he will stay at this % and wind up a normal height but on the shorter side. My brother stopped growing when he was about 8 or 10 and stayed the same height for 5 years...he is taller than me now. :) She said it is definitely something that tends to run in families, so this isn't really surprising. So, basically he has likely found his place on the growth curve and that's all. Yay!

Joshua had the bone growth x-ray today and we will get the results by the end of the week. The reason he was sent in was because his IGF was high according to the ped. Now, that wonderful office never bothered to send over his test results for some reason (I guess 7 months wasn't enough time to get them over) I told this doc what I was told and that I don't know whether or not it really was high since they weren't correct about Jacob's. She said it wouldn't make sense for it to be high, but she will look into getting the results from the lab and see what they say. So, when I call for the bone age scan results I can get that info as well. She may decide to run more tests. At this point though, Josh seems to be following the same path Jacob did and will likely be fine as well. Yay!

So, we go back in 6 months to check and see if they remain on their paths and will likely go twice a year for a while. I can deal with that. :)

The funniest part was the fact that Josh loved talking to her. She has a GREAT bedside manner and he just took right to her. The questions on paper asked about delays developmentally and I put on there about his HFA. She said she was really surprised he is autistic because he is so chatty and friendly. His eye contact wasn't great, but it is nice to know we have progressed to being able to even fool a few docs now for a little while. ;) He really has progressed a lot socially, so I am very pleased. :)

So, that's it. No hormone shots, so I am SO relieved! LOL 7 months of worry have been lifted off my shoulders in just a few hours time this morning. I'm not even worried about what Josh's test results will show from today because it is likely the same as Jacob and will be ok.

Oh! I also asked about the girls and whether or not we will see the same pattern. She said it might happen, but it is more common in males. Weird, huh?

It's almost that time!

I'm getting excited about getting back into our homeschooling routine. Josh really needs it, and I am chomping at the bit to get started. I still haven't decided exactly when I am going to start either. It will be sometime in August, but I want to wait until after Jacob and Josh see the endocrinologist on the 1st for the growth hormone problem. After we know what they are going to do, how much testing they are going to do, etc, then I will be able to better judge when to start. There are still some things we need, and things I need to finish preparing a bit, and I am trying to also declutter this house of mine. We have way too much stuff for our little 900-something square foot home.

Speaking of Jacob's growth, he has suddenly shot up! He is now 45 3/4 inches! Yay, Jacob! What is different? I have no idea. Maybe his body just decided it is going to follow its own growth pattern. Who knows? Anyway, it puts him just above the 10% as opposed to the 2-3% on the chart, so he is growing. Joshua, on the other hand, has not grown a bit since November. But, maybe he will follow the same path as Jacob seeing as they are brothers? No idea.

I took Cassidy to the new main library in town. We had never been to the new one, and there was a book I was really wanting to get (I'll tell you about that one in a minute). That place is HUGE! I couldn't believe how large and nice this place is. We parked on the conference level, and walked up some stairs to the main floor. I couldn't find a map, so we headed upstairs...yes, actually up the stairs. Cassidy was hillarious! She wanted to walk up the steps. There is a series of steps, a platform, and then another series of steps. We would get halfway up a set of steps and she would start saying, "We're almost there. Almost. Not much more. We're THERE!" LOL We'd search the floor a bit and then head up to the next level. The children's section is actually on the 2nd floor (our third set of steps) so she was tuckered out by the time we got there. And I think the sheer number of books there was completely overwhelming to her. She found a My Little Pony book and was ready to leave. LOL

There were tons of maps in the children's section, so we grabbed one and found the elevator. We headed to find the one book I went after: "Homeschooling the Child With Asperger Syndrome: Real Help for Parents Anywhere and on Any Budget". I haven't had time to fully dive into it yet, but so far it is wonderful! It is so nice to read what other people have done and what curriculums have worked with their child. It also has some instructions on making our own therapy items, a list of social skills that many Asperger kids have trouble with and idioms commonly used. I can't wait to really sit down and read this one. Though Joshua was diagnosed with High-Functioning Autism, at the time we received the diagnosis, we were also told that the only reason he didn't qualify as having Asperger Syndrome is because of his speech delay. So, I'm hoping this book will be a fountain of info.

Dropped

Yep! Apparently my bloodwork was too good to continue on the clinical study I was participating in. Hmmm. Good news for me, not so good for them. ;)

My triglycerides went down below 150 to 134, so they can't use me. My good cholesterol went up to 50-something (writing from memory here), and something else went up which wasn't so good...either the total or the bad cholesterol, but I can't rememebr which. Anyway, Lisa (the coordinator) headed over to talk to my doc. He reminded her of how bad my numbers were in April and how by diet I totally turned everything around by June. He is not choosing to medicate me at this time. Instead he wants me to keep on doing what I was doing and go back in a month to see if I qualify for anything else. Even my fasting glucose level was good last week at 83. Woohoo!


I made a few layouts since my last post. I was even chosen as Layout of the Day at Gotta Pixel again! Twice in five days time! Talk about exciting to see! The layout chosen this time is "Loose Tooth Questions". Jacob wanted me to take a picture of his mouth with all of his baby teeth still in "in case he forgets what his mouth looked like with all of them in". LOL He cracks me up! So I figured, what better way to use that pic and write down all of the questions that have been on his mind the past few days. I used Melany Violette's Color Me Happy kit. I had to tweak the journaling strips a bit, but it wasn't hard to do once I dove into playing with it. Fonts are Occidental and First Grader.

I also got to play with one of Tennessa Allen's kits this week. I was so excited, because I have been eyeling her stuff for the past week. I LOVE her Purple Pajamas kit. I am a sucker for anything butterflies, and this kit has several. And I love the colors! SO pretty and feminine! My favorite is the layout on the right. This kit was perfect for the photo I took of Cassidy in her Easter dress in 2005. Those butterflies and hearts are just perfect for my little girly-girl. Check out the rest of Tennessa's stuff. She has a small line of pajama kits, and they are all so cute!

First loose tooth

Well, it has finally happened. Jacob finally has a wiggly tooth. He was eating lunch and told me that his tooth was hurting a little bit. So I took a peek and checked to see if there was wiggling, and sure enough there was! I told him that he had his first loose tooth and he was really growing up. The look on his face was so cute. It was panic and joy all in one. He even had watery eyes. LOL I asked him if he was scared, and he told me no. How is it that at only 7 years old, males have already learned to not tell when they are scared? Boggles my mind.

So, my little overanalyzer has been asking me tons of questions in the past hour since his discovery. Will it hurt? Will I swallow it? How will I not swallow it? What if I do swallow it? Has anyone ever swallowed a tooth before? What will I do with the tooth if it comes out during the day? Will I put the tooth under my pillow right away or wait until bedtime? Will it have blood? Why? I'm sure there were more, but you get the picture.

I took a picture of his mouth today, full of his baby teeth. lol He seemed relieved to know we have pictures now. LOL I'm going to have to scrap it soon. :)

Speaking of scrapping, I just got my first assignment for the Scrappin' Secrets CT. I'm using one of Tenessa Allen's kits. So exciting!

I also made a couple of pages:

The first is one I made for a friend of mine. I call it Amanda's Garden. It's not my usual style, but I thought Melany Violette's Garden Girl kit was too cute not to use.







I also made the letter B page for the kids' ABC album. I used Melany Violette's Color Me Happy kit.

A scrapping toot and convention to boot

One of the requirements for the Scrappin' Secrets creative team is that I have 3 galleries off of a particular list. Two of my galleries were already on the list, but I needed one more. Our team leader suggested I go to Gotta Pixel. I always feel so weird jumping into new boards, but I did it. Oh my goodness, the people there are so friendly and supportive. And talk about challenges galore! I love it there so far. I made my first post the day before yesterday and have been slowly adding some of my layouts.

When I got home from the homeschooling convention (which I will talk about in a bit), I checked through the gallery to see if anyone left a somment or two. I like seeing what other people think about my layouts. As I'm looking at the number of comments, I notice that most have anywhere from 1-5 or 6. All of a sudden I see one that has 14. What in the world made that one pop out for everyone, I am wondering. So, I start reading the comments, and lo and behold, My "Simple Pleasures" layout was chosen as the site's "Layout of the Day"! I could not believe it! I was so excited!!! Check it out! http://www.gottapixel.net/blog/

So, that was my big thrill of the weekend. :) I have to say, I was feeling pretty bad about my abilities after being rejected from a few teams, but my confidence is starting to build up once again when it comes to my little hobby. :)

Let's see...I attended a homeschooling convention yesterday and today. Some of the workshops were fantastic! My favorite was on the temperments and how to teach a child with each type. What a great tool for me to have! All of my children are completely different, so it is nice to know exactly what will likely work with them. I also attended one on organization and homeschooling which was neat, but most of which I pretty much had already figured on trying. And then another on teaching multiple ages at the same time was high on my favorites list. So, a very informative weekend.

Yay!

Woohoo! I got an email today telling me I have been chosen as a member of Scrappin' Secrets new Creative Team! I am so excited and I can not wait for my first assignment. :)

I also realized last night that I forgot to post one of my layouts. This one is for Elena's book. This is a page I have been wanting to put together for a while, but I could never really find a kit I really wanted to use with the pics, until I picked up Ginger Thibodeau's Softly Shining Kit. The lace and papers were perfect, and with a little color tweaking on the pic, I was very happy with the results. I can still remember the moment we told Meemaw we gave Elena her middle name in honor of her. She was so excited. Meemaw had Alzheimer's and though many times she couldn't remember our names, she never once slipped in calling Elena "Frances". :) Don't forget to click the photo to see it better. ;)

Busy week

We have been enjoying our summer break so far, with this week having all sorts of fun things. It started on Friday night when Silas and I went out. We intended to see Pirates, but they were completely sold out until the 10:45 pm show. WOW! So, we headed to Chili's for dinner and went home. I think we were homw by 8:45. LOL On Saturday my best friend, April, and I went to the local dinner theater for a Mommy's Day Out. We saw Beauty and the Beast, the Musical. It was great! I had never been to this theater, so it was such a neat experience. And it was wonderful haivng time out with another adult and NO KIDS! I love my children, but a break from them every now and then is certainly necessary for my sanity. ;)

Yesterday Jacob had his first fishing trip. He was so excited. One of his birthday gifts was a fishing pole, and he has been chomping at the bit to go fishing with Gramps (my grandfather). One of the local parks has a pond and it is specifically for seniors and children to fish at. In addition to the pond, there is a playground for the kids, so the others were somewhat occupied for a bit. My mother came and she sat with Jacob and Gramps while I brought the other kids to the playground. We had barely gotten them going and my cell phone rang. Mom was ont he other end telling me she was going to switch with me so I could see the fish Jacob helped to reel in.

Now, flash forward a minute/minute and a half and I walk up to a very excited Jacob and Gramps telling me they caught a 12 inch catfish. "Where is it", I ask with my camera ready to click some pics. Gramps replies, "Oh, we threw it back. He was just a little fish anyway". They threw it back before I got up there. I was so disappointed.

I did help Jacob toss a few lines out. We were using hot dogs as bait and some turtles decided to come up and check things out. Jacob got a little concerned that the turtle was going to eat the meat. I told him that I didn't think he needed to worry about it since they hadn't been going for it so far and I thought that turtles don't eat meat. I barely got these words out of my mouth, and what happens? You guessed it! Mr. Turtle decides to take a little dive and get caught on Jacob's line and can't get loose. So Gramps tells me to reel him up and he'll take him off the line. I tried my best, but that sucker was heavy! We got him halfway up and the line broke. That turtle took off. Poor guy.

Naturally, I had to make a scrap page of Jacob's first trip. You can click it to see a large and clear version. ;) I used V. Kim Smith's Woodland Meadows 2 Kit. The fonts are Pea Karynsig and First Grader.











There is a new scrapping site I have been frequenting called Scrappin' Secrets. Everyone seems so friendly and I really enjoy being somewhere new. I have done a couple of challenges there. The first one was the ad challenge. Those are always fun. :) I used photos that were taken at the nursing home garden last year. I have always liked that pic of Cassidy peeking from around one of the columns. I used Zaunwinde Kit by leacindy at RAKScraps. The font is Pea Stacy. I am loving the Pea fonts, in case you couldn't tell. LOL Click the pic for a better look.





The other challenge from SS that I am really excited about is the ABC challenge. I have been wanting to do one of these albums for ages, and I finally have the motivation to get one done. My "A is for Apple" page features a photo Silas took about 2 years ago of Jacob with his cousin, Lark. Silas entitled the pic "Adam and Eve". LOL I think it is too cute! I used the A Lot of Love Challenge Add-on kits by Jenn Patrick and Vicky Shaw. Fonts are ITC Garamond and Kayleigh (another well used favorite of mine, btw).




My last show and tell piece for the night is something I put together for my buddy, Lisa. She sent me three pics of her kids and asked me to put something together for her baby board signature. I decided to use the Tropical kit one of our friends, Lyndsay, put together. I also added some arrows from Amy Wolff's RAKScraps May'06 Mega Kit contribution. I did recolor one of them myself to fit the layout. Love those arrows! Aren't these kids adorable? It made this layout so easy to put together. :)




BTW, you can download Lyndsay's Diva Kit on her blog HERE.

This weekend I am attending a homeschooling convention. I'm excited. It really gets me motivated and ready for the school year. :) I also will probably take part of the lunch break on Friday to pick up the forms to register Joshua. Wow! I can't believe how fast the summer is flying by!

Hope everyone is having a fantastic week!

Oh how cool!

Well, I happened upon Ginger Thibodeau's blog, R U Square?, about a week or two ago. She does rectangular scrapping, which I do occasionally. She has some great sketches, and I used one of them for my Cassidy layout for Silas to print for work. I happened to be sharing the link with my buddy Lynds today and was reading the latest updates. I scrolled down and found out I won something for my Cassidy photo. :) How cool is that?

We went to my parent's house for 4th of July. They had a cookout and then headed out to the fireworks. I wasn't thinking Josh would be able to handle the noise since the movie theater is a bit too loud for him, but he did surprisingly well. Elena was so tired by that point that she was ready to go once they started. I hope everyone had a great Independence Day!

I also did a layout today for Jacob. We bought him a camera for his birthday last year, and he loves using it. Some of the photos he takes are pretty funny, and some even come out really good. I decided to do a layout of some photos he took this weekend. :)


Journaling says:
"You got a camera for your 6th birthday. You love taking pictures with it and it is always fun to see things from your perspective. These are photos you took while waiting for the Space Shuttle Discovery to launch. Unfortunately, the launch was scrubbed, but you had fun regardless. You even got to see the brand new GoodYear blimp. I can't wait to see your next batch of photos."

On the photo of the blimp, I added, "Yes, you turned the camera upside down for this one."

LOL Silly Jacob. I used Melany Violette's Unique Boy kit. Fonts used are Rhumba Script, Agent Orange, Pea Amy, Pea Grethchie Print.

Warning! Scrap Heavy Post Ahead!

I'm going to attempt to use Bloggers little image adding feature today in the hopes that I can start posting small photos you can click to see larger. I tried it once before and it would not work for me. We'll see what happens. :) I realized this morning that I didn't post my final layouts from the CT call or any of my newer stuff. I was too worried about getting my blog template corrected. LOL

When we received our final kit for the CT call, we were asked to do a double page layout. I don't usually do DPs, but I did do some when I was doing paper scrapping long ago. The kit she gave us to use is so neat! The papers look like water, dirt, grass, etc. Here's what I came up with:I used Heather Roselli's "Boys Love Critters" kit and add-on stickers, both available at thedigichick.com.

RAKScraps just happened to have a sketch challenge that I joined in and decided to use some other papers from the same kit on. I have always loved this photo of Jacob from about two years ago, and the BLC kit seemed so perfect for it.

Soon after, UKScrappers had a sketch challenge in their growing digital forum and I participated. I loved this sketch! I took the photo of Elena the week she turned one. Seems like ages ago in a way. I used Sarah Senior's "Simply Girls" Kit. I think it turned out pretty cute. :)


And my latest project was given to me by my husband. Apparently the most recent photos he had of the kids were from before Elena was even walking. Yikes! So I told him I would throw something together for him to stick in his frames. Here are the results:

Credits: Susan Godfrey's Green With Envy kit, since it is Jacob's favorite color. Font: Cheri

Credits: LizzieGrace's Urban Monkey kit. Font: Knuckle Down

Credits: Ribbit Kisses Kit by Rebecca Gold, Lauren Grier, and Amanda Rockwell Font - Pea Leigh-Leigh Sketch by Ginger Thibodeau

Credits: Kimberly Geswin's Fresh as a Daisy Font: Pea Alesa

My favorite out of the group is the one of Joshua. LOL I love the monkey stamp next to his cute little smile. All of them printed out great at 4x6 and Silas happily has new photos for the office. :)

Alrighty...

So, I redid the entire template and I *think* (hesitantly saying this) that I got it right this time. Those of you who are using Internet Explorer, could you let me know if it looks correct now? Thanks!

Update time, now that I think the template might be correct. ;0)

I had Jacob's homeschooling evaluation this past Monday. It went excellent! We were in and out in 15 minutes. I apparently was organized better than I thought, and she just flipped through everything and looked at a couple of lapbooks we brought. I was a little disappointed that she didn't have him read out loud for her, but she was really doing well to get him to talk. I told my handbell group it was the quietest I think he has ever been his entire life. LOL He must have been nervous, though he claimed he wasn't.

I found out today that I did not make the CT I was trying out for. I'm being a good sport about it, but kind of bummed at the same time. I'm somewhat hesitant to try out for another one right now. We'll see. I would really love to be on a team at some point. Heather was sweet about it and emailed me letting me know what she based the decision on. I wouldn't have wanted to be in her shoes making the decision. I did email her back to show I hold no grudges and that I plan to stay on the forum.

I think I am going to find another gallery as well. I have three...two where I actually participate on the forums and then a third that I mainly just post layouts at. It's so busy at that one that it is rare to get comments, let alone seen. So many of the calls seem to want you to have 3-5 galleries. So, we'll see.

The new template

I am so sorry guys! I had no idea until yesterday that this template is not working in Internet Explorer. It looks fine in Mozilla, and whereas I usually check everything in IE, I totally forgot to do it this time. I have played with the settings and tried tweaking it to no avail. I'm going to have my husband take a peek tonight and see if he can figure out where my code is wrong for IE. Hopefully things will look a bit normal soon!

I was tagged!

Tina from Autism and KC tagged me. :)

5 things in my refrigerator:
1. Salad makings
2. Tea
3. Cheese
4. Jelly
5. salad dressing

5 things in my closet:
1. My clothes
2. shoes
3. presents for elena's b-day in August
4. presents for Josh's b-day in October (yes, I'm a planner LOL)
5. Silas' clothes

5 things in my purse:
1. wallet
2. cell phone
3. brush
4. receipts
5. keys

5 things in my car:
1. seats LOL
2. a CD (not sure which though)
3. 4 car seats
4. double stroller
5. trash bag

5 people I am tagging:
1. Lyndsay - http://cest-la-vie-lynds.blogspot.com/
2. Sarah - http://www.timsellers.net/homeschool/index.html
3. Kim - http://www.dailyrelease.blogspot.com/
4. Captain Tealbird (LOL) - http://tealbeard.blogspot.com/
5. Sunshine - http://letsinger.blogspot.com/

Have fun!