two days after christmas...

and i have been feeling lazy! yesterday i cleaned up the mess and vacuumed the house, but i stayed in my pyjamas all day! we had leftover turkey with all the trimmings for dinner, yeah, i love leftover turkey, it tastes even better to me than the first day, because i did not have to make it!

today i didn't do much of anything either, got up late, read a magazine, scrapped a little and then did my walk on the treadmill, the first time since i was sick last sunday.

i will leave you with a layout i did a few weeks ago with some photos of the girls that i took when we went shopping just before santa arrived at the mall.

elki's unusual art!

i made this layout last week about an unusual way that elki drew this picture! she did it completely upside down and if i was not there to witness it myself, i would have had trouble believing it. she was laying on the kitchen floor and zoe was helping me take photos of her drawing this cute little picture of her family. now how she could do it, i don't know because she is only 4, but then again i think she is quite talented!!! :)

busy weekend...

usually we have no plans for the weekend, but end up seeing the family on one of the days. this weekend it will be busy, tomorrow i am treating lisa to a day at the spa which is her belated birthday (which was in june) present. and sunday it is a annual 'cookie bake', so the whole family will be here baking and taste testing! ;)

here is a layout it did from when my sister-in-law and i took a walk by the river in the fall.

a.c. blog challenge!

this week it was to make a holiday card with 2 a.c. products. i had this pp which i was dying to use, so here is what i came up with!



supplies:
cs: bazzill
pp, rub-ons & chipboard: american crafts

tfl!

the rockettes...

we were lucky enough to go and see their show at the bell center at the beginning of november. even though it was not my idea to go, i was pleasantly surprised to enjoy the show as much as i did, but then again, our fantastic seats might have had something to do with that! the dancing was fantastic and the costumes were absolutely gorgeous. here is a layout i did about it and the best part of the show as far as i was concerned was the toy soldier dance, well walk actually!



sorry about those 2 black marks, they must be on my scanner and i didn't notice them til just now when i clicked it bigger! :(

yellow is the theme today!

since i just posted a photo of my lemon tarts on my photobug blog i thought i would post this layout i did of elki and her new favorite color that i did last week! she is too funny because lisa would try and get her to wear yellow, the color of sunshine, all summer and she refused (lisa's getting pay back now, because she used to do the same to me when she was young), but now, she only wants yellow!!!

finally, another a.c. blog challenge!

even though it's not me that is thankful, i thought that justin being more 'grateful' on his 8th birthday would be even better!



supplies:
cardstock, pp, thickers, rub-ons and button: all american crafts
other rub-ons: hot off the press & karen foster
pen: signo uniball

tfl!

the last halloween layout for 2009!

ok halloween is being put to bed for this year with this layout.

cupcakes anyone?

these layouts are about elki and zoé eating cupcakes at 'pop puce' (a craft sale connected to 'pop montreal') back in october! i did this one of elki first and then just scraplifted for zoé's with a little twist. i must tell you that those cupcakes were to die for! the 2 small photos on the layouts were actually photos of the 2 of them sitting side by side enjoying eating while i snapped away and i just cut them up so that they could go on each of their layouts.

the last of our cruise album...

i actually made this album like a book would be made, the cover page, index and then each port as we visited them. i don't know if they will enlarge when clicked because it seems my blog has a mind of its own. i have not done anything different and all of a sudden some can enlarge and others can't, so good luck!

sunday summary

another busy weekend here! friday night i met julie and nathalie for a vietnamese dinner, saturday did a little window shopping at dix 30 with hubby, babysat the girls saturday night and today lisa & the girls came over so that dom could work on his music! it's a good job i scratched a couple of things off my to-do list last week, (finished my tinkerbell painting for elki and the christmas stocking for zoé) so i could play on the weekend.

here are a few more layouts from our cruise album.

our cruise album...

i just realized that i could only post 4 of these layout at one time, so here are the last 4 places we visited on our september cruise. i will upload more in a different post sometime this weekend. since i was also doing an ibook, because i had taken so many photos, i chose 9 or 10 photos from each port and scrapped them to satisfy my addition! the first 3 you can click to see them bigger, but for some strange reason, some of mine don't and venice will not, go figure!

you might notice that i do not have any journalling on them, but rest assured i had lots to say for each port, but too much for the front of my layout, so for each layout i made a pocket in the back with a slide out piece of cardstock with a tab on top.

it's wednesday...

and i feel like uploading a couple of layoutss! these are both about justin's visit to the great escape in lake george, n.y. this year. i purposely did not make a double page layout because the one about him getting a special delivery of milk and cookies from daffy duck i felt, deserved a page all to itself, but of course him meeting all those other looney toon characters needed one too. so here they are!

even though they are individual los, i think they will actually look like a double pager when they are beside each other in his album.

sunday night...

and the weekend is over and it was another fun one.

saturday morning we went to see 'the rockettes' at the bell center. we had great seats, first row off the ice and close to the stage and what a fabulous show it was, the dancing was flawless and the costumes were absolutely gorgeous. saturday afternoon we went up to laval to celebrate justin's 8th birthday, so the whole family was together and playing with their wii (bowling) and justin beat the pants off of us!

and today i finished up preparing my ibook of our mediterranean cruise for print, so i am a happy camper!

here is a layout i did a few weeks ago.

unplanned busy weekend...

for a weekend i didn't have any plans for, i ended up being fairly busy. yesterday lisa called to invite us to join her family to go to a bazaar in a church near their house and they love to go to these bazaars for the home made lunches and of course if you find a little something in the bargain it works out well. reg had some work to do, so i went with them and bought a cute little oriental teapot with 2 little cups and 2 marguerita glasses, my drink of choice, after a bowl of delicious pea soup, because they were all out of the carrot and a i shared an egg sandwich with elki. after that we all (except dom who was going to a class reunion) came back here for supper and reg made a nice lemony custard dessert. my husband is quite the baker!!!

today, first thing after reg left to play golf, i went and put the cover on the tempo frame since it was such a lovely day. then i made a trip out to scrapbook centrale to pick up my a.c. album and a few other goodies, getting caught in traffic both ways (an accident in both directions, go figure!)

after lunch we went to visit an open house apartment block in brossard for retired people, which was to die for. it had everything from a pool (my pleasure) to a movie theatre to a dining room and a beauty salon, very beautiful but very expensive, so needless to say we won't be moving there any time soon, unless we win the million, hahaha!

i will leave you with a layout i did last week about the day dom, elki & i went out to visit the ecomuseum and met up with ruth & julie & mimi and the kids.

last but not least...

and here is my last layout for the a.c. blog challenge. i did not have any a.c. halloween pps to go with the red for this one (but the requirement is only using 2 products, period) so i found these a.c. papers in my a.c. scraps and did something i found myself unable to do in the past. as a matter of fact ruth and i had agreed on this very thing at our weekend crop a few weeks ago, and that's putting a title on patterned paper. i think it works here though since the patterns are not that busy. and usually i hate red eye, but in this photo it works!!!

supplies:

cardstock: american crafts and bazzill

pattern paper: american crafts

thickers: american crafts

chipboard: little yellow bicycle & reminisce

felt stickers: mm

ribbon: little yellow bicycle

gems: dollarama

pen: sakura & signo uniball

my second a.c. blog challenge layout

this is justin's layout and my second one for the a.c. blog challenge, he opted for a mask since i cut the eye slits bigger because the mask sat away from his eyes too much and he said he couldn't see that well.

supplies:

cardstock: american crafts, bazzill, colorbox & provo

pattern paper: american crafts

thickers: american crafts

letter stickers: my little shoe box

chipboard: little yellow bicycle & reminisce

one for the a.c. blog challenge!

i have done one layout for each grandchild. my first one is 'our hungry leopard' about zoé who would not sit still to have all her face made up. her costume was a leopard, but she chose to have her face made up as a tiger, so she is a half finished tiger leopard but she started eating candy before we even went out trick or treating so that's what i focused on since in the photo she has her mouth full of it!

supplies:
cardstock: bazzill & provo craft
pattern paper: american crafts (some of my cut out bats are pop-dotted)
thickers: american crafts
rub-ons: american crafts
brads: american crafts
pen: sakura

a layout from our weekend crop...

i finished 8 layouts during our shortened yearly fall weekend crop and as always, a lot of fun was had by all, along with a lot of eating, kidding each other, drinking and a little bit of scrapping thrown in for good measure! the only thing we did not get to do as usual, was take a walk to take some fall foliage photos, because it was pouring rain most of saturday, grrr...

here is the first layout i made friday night. these are just a few of the photos i took of the grandkids on thanksgiving day trying to get my christmas card shot.

a layout for the a.c. blog challenge...

yeah, i'm finally getting back to doing one! it didn't turn out exactly how i had planned, but it's done and i'm happy i have an entry for this week.

other than the cardstock which is bazzill, everything else, patterned paper, thickers, rub-ons and plastic flower and brad are all by american crafts!

saturday sadness...

today i went to the funeral of an old and dear friend. when i was growing up in dorval, her family lived across the street from us so we have been friends for at least 50 years. she would have been 51 years old in december, but will not see it. one of her brothers and her husband made fantastic eulogies holding back tears the whole time. we laughed and we cried and she had a great send off because it was a full house. she had m.s. and was in a wheel chair for the last couple of years, but that did not stop her, she was a dynamo. she was very involved with the m.s. society and had actually organized their golf tournament this summer, so there were many people at her funeral today.

as sad as the occasion was i was very happy to see her 2 brothers, one of which i have not seen in probably 33 years and the younger one i see every time i go out west to see my sisters since he lives in vancouver. i was very happy also to spend some time with the younger one's wife and i also met back up with their cousin who when she would visit them back in the day, i would chum around with. it brought back a lot of good memories!

sorry for the sadness, so i will leave you with a layout i did awhile ago of my bleeding hearts, but i just never got around to uploading before.

happy thanksgiving!

there are things we should have been doing this weekend, like closing the swimming pool and getting all the outdoor furniture put away, but we were glued to the tv watching the 'president's cup' instead. golf is the only sport i enjoy watching on tv and it was disappointing that the international team didn't give the u.s. team more of a run for their money, but we watched anyway!

tomorrow is thanksgiving and the whole family will hopefully be here (justin was sick today), so the house will be smelling delicious. happy thanksgiving everyone!

i leave you with a layout that i did quite awhile ago. i know it's a funny subject for a layout but when i saw those colorful cans in the water fountain, i knew i would make one about the best photo i took at the jazz festival.

it's been awhile...

so here i am not having too much to say but i had a very nice weekend even though the weather was lousy again!

saturday julie and i went to scrapbook centrale for another one of their sales to pick up some much needed cardstock. since we are both making travel albums a lot is being used quickly.

yesterday lisa called and had a day full of activities and asked if i would join her and the girls. first we went for elki's swimming lessons where she is doing very well, then downtown to a craft sale on st. viateur and man of man it was packed where we had a polish lunch and even though i was tempted by a few jewelry pieces i resisted. to top off the afternoon, we went to the children's 'purple pop party' at the metropolis where the kids had a lot of fun with drawing, playing with big purple balls, lots of music and dance and elki got some purple streaks in her banks which made her very happy.



i leave you with this layout i did before our cruise of elki at st. lambert days the night of her daddy's concert with her magic star! tfl :)

the friday file...

here is a layout i did last tuesday morning at 3:15 a.m. we had just arrived home from our cruise monday night and it would have been 9:15 a.m. if we had still been in venice, thus...the early hour.

since dom's first solo album is very turquoise oriented (check out his nice guitar) i just had to go with that color and of course it happens to be my birthstone and a favorite color of mine. tfl! :)

a.c. blog challenge!

here is my layout for the a.c. blog challenge for this week to use 2 a.c. elements on a page!



supplies:
cs: bazzill, colorbox & provo
pp, button and brads: american crafts
letter stickers: basic grey, doodlebug and heidi grace
pen: sakura

tfl! :)

friday photos!

here are a few of my favs from the first places that we visited on our cruise.

this first one is park guell in barcelona and it was our favorite spot in that city, well worth climbing that hill, eh reg!!! ;)



next stop monte carlo, where we visited the 'oceanographic museum and aquarium', wonderful, wonderful!



now onto pisa and yes we did the goofy holding up the building shot but this is my fav!



this palace in florence was where we ate lunch just like royalty!!!



and last but definitely not least here is st. peter's and words cannot describe the feeling of standing in that huge square, tv just does not do it justice!!!



more to come in the next few days. :)

i'm back!!!

bet you didn't even know i was gone did ya!!! well we went on a 2 week mediterrean cruise and it was fantastic. it was a lot of work preparing all the itinerary for it because we decided to do most of our own touring instead of the easy way of booking an excursion with the cruise line which were ripoffs if you ask me.

my 2 sisters from vancouver were taking this cruise and we decided after much coaxing from them to join them as an early celebration of my 60th birthday!!!

we started out in barcelona, spain and we arrived a day early to see a little bit of the city before getting on the ship, and i'm glad we did. we took a hop on, hop off bus and that is a great way to see the sites when you only have a short time in a city. we did both the green and orange line, but we were so zonked by the end of it that we didn't get off the bus too much. our favorite part was 'park guel' which was designed by gaudi and there is a fantastic view of the city from there, he had such a great imagination.

after boarding the ship, our stops were monte carlo, livorno (pisa/florence), civitiveccia (rome), naples, mykonos, istanbul, kusadasi, athens and last but not least, venice where we stayed an extra night before flying home on tuesday.

i still have my sea legs and i've had an upset stomach ever since and i think it's coming off the gravol that i was taking for the prevention of sea sickness! oh well no pain, no gain as they say! ;)

i took 2,122 photos, so i think i'll be busy for a long time checking all of them before i will be able to scrap any of them. once i have looked at some i'll post them to give you a taste of europe's best in my eyes!

i'll be checking in on what i have missed on my favorite blogs, so be patient!

sunday, sunday!

another week has come and gone and the summer is dwindling down, who am i kidding, WHAT SUMMER!!! since we had such terrible weather, maybe we will have a nice indian summer to make up for it, eh! :)

here is a layout i did last night about justin and his abs!!! i know there is no lighthouse in gaspé but that cute little button goes with the sea and it went very nicely with my cardstock and trim! ;)

two layouts for today!

i made these two layouts 3 weeks ago just after we celebrated laura's birthday, about the fact that her and donald have the same sign, but not the same birthstone and lisa and dom have the same birthstone, but not the same sign. and as you can see i was into the flowers that day and black and white!!!

they look like they are not happy, but in actual fact they were listening intently to some story that reg was telling and i like to take shots like that.

good weekend!

we didn't get the rain they predicted for the weekend, so i'd say it turned out pretty good. laura came to pick up justin friday afternoon and we went into st. lambert for st. lambert days and to mind the girls while dom had an interview on a radio station that was there, which only took about 15 mins. then we came home for some yummy sushi.

saturday i went on a very successful shopping spree and then last night we went back to st. lambert for dom's outdoor concert and today lisa, dom and the girls came over to swim. i predicted that elki would learn to swim without her wings this year on a recent layout (which i have not uploaded here yet) and she did it today!!! she was even jumping into the pool without them, but of course we were there to catch her.

i didn't get to scrap, but here is one i did a few weeks ago which i find fun!

freedom friday!

as much as i love my grandson, a week is almost too much for me to take!!! because he is an only child, he never wants to be alone and it's me he wants all the time, never his grandfather. of course his grandfather has played golf 3 days this week so he hasn't exactly been here. justin had his moments too of missing his parents and all the exercise he is getting swimming lengths in the pool with me ;) makes him so tired at night that he gets sad because he is not with them! so this afternoon his mom is coming to get him and we will go to the movies as a treat for him and tomorrow we'll be back to our quiet house again! :)

here is a layout i did last week before justin arrived and of course i don't get to do any scrapping when he is here either, so i'll be glad to have some time for that again!

this weeks's a.c. blog challenge

was to use remarks stickers on a layout, so here is mine using all those new cute little critter & flower stickers. as a matter of fact this is pretty much an all american crafts layout! :)


supplies:
cardstock: american crafts & bazzill
pp, thickers and stickers: american crafts
pen: staedtler fineliner
brads: american traditions & karen foster

tfl!

summer has finally arrived!

we waited all of july for this to happen and it's finally here, yeah!!! i love the heat! today will certainly be a lazy day spent mostly cooling off in the pool. i must rest up, since justin is coming to spend the week tomorrow. camp has finished for the summer and he only starts school the week after next, so he will be spending his last week here. why do summer camps finish one week too early, does everyone have this same problem that works? what a crazy system!

anyway here is a layout i did of zoe singing happy birthday to elki after everyone had left the party. of course, we didn't actually understand the words except 'aki', she even plays the orchestra leader!

hope everyone has a great weekend!