Sympathize with me...

Did I ever tell you that I am a big worry- wart?

My hubby teases me all the time.. that I make things worse in my head and that I drive myself (& probably him) crazy. And most of the time, he's right.

And they're already watching my blood pressure with this pregnancy so I'm probably not helping in that department.

But still, most of the time, it's the woman who deos the worrying in the family, am i right? I hate it cuz i feel like i'm carrying this burden while he is sitting around, twiddling his fingers. *sighs* But that is why I married him and love him. He balances me out.

And I am so grateful for this blog and this hobby of mine. Keeps my mind off stupid stuff.

Today, I finally got some crafting done! So happy! From my previous post, I mentioned that I have a hard time making sympathy cards. When the time comes to make one, I am running around like a chicken with its head cut off.... never knowing which stamp to use and always looking around for a purplish-colored patterned paper.

For my birthday, a good friend got me a couple of Magnolia stamps. I was ecstatic. In fact, her presents delighted me -- all Japanese-themed gifts!

I sure hope this stamp isn't a bride. But I thought that with her expression and her kimono colored a melancholy blue, she'd fit in a sympathy card. I dug around my old boxes and found some dated supplies for this shabby chic card. The paper was from a 2007 Label Tulip kit (i loved their monthly kits. too bad they didn't last). The leaves were so old that they started breaking apart.

And I am utterly in love with Kim's sentiments!

Anyway, thank you for visiting. And please pray that all my worries disappear :).

Love,

Sympathy card

A quick sympathy card I made for a friend whose father had passed.

Don't have a lot of stamps suited for sympathy so I tend to use butterflies or flowers. The main butterfly stamp is from Stampin' Up, given to me by Sunghee. The smaller ones are from All that Scraps.

Sorry to be so short. This has been a stressful week. And not in a good way :(. Will share more soon.

Hope things are better on your end,

Easter 2011

I am laughing as I'm typing this because MK looks so awkward here. He was afraid of the Easter Bunny and his face/ body language sure show it.

He has never taken a pic with the EB before. He loves animals, but I guess this experience tells me he's not quite ready to go back to Disneyland and take great pics with life-sized characters just yet.

I was lucky enough to get Easter off this year as this is my regularly-scheduled weekend on. I hope you all have wonderful plans for the weekend. I'll be celebrating my birthday with my family and doing a little Easter egg hunt at our place. Pics to come later.

All supplies except for the cardstock, mists, animal stickers, and twine are from the Studio Calico MAke 'Em Laugh add-on kit.

See you later, homies!

Snapshots

Good mornin', blog world!

So I decided to scrap those pics from the weekend. Didn't really change much since the background was busy. But I really wanted to use this Jillibean PP. Those whimsical polaroid cameras are really fun!

I just added some American Craft tags, Making Memories flower brads, and a Maya Road cardboard word that I misted. All are from Studio Calico's Make 'em laugh add-on kit this month. The sketch is also from their blog. The Hello Kitty ribbon was from a gift.




The tag is hidden in one of the pics :).




Today's post is pre-scheduled as today is my actual birthday. If I'm lucky, the hubbster's request for a day-off today was granted and we would be off for a little day trip with the tot. Cross your fingers and toes! If not, we'll celebrate tonight, and I'll be doing something low key with Mattie during the day.






Aurevoir!!

First Movie

As part of my birthday week, I wanted to try to go to the movies with Mattie. It would be his first time, and I wanted to see if he was ready to share in one of our fave past times.

At home, he could mostly "sit" through a Disney DVD. He especially likes Toy Story 2 and Finding Nemo.



Here's a pic of my big boy in his cute skinny jeans and very own popcorn. He loved munching on it but thought the blue Icee that I got was weird.




For the most part, he did well. The last 20 minutes or so consisted of getting out of his seat and walking down the aisle, flipping chairs up and playing with the drink holder. He kept looking back at me and pointing at the "bok-kok." That's his word for birds (he mostly says animal sounds for animals :)). I couldn't help it, I had to take a picture of this.




After the movie, I asked one of the theater workers if Rio had a poster we could take a pic with. They only had the gigantic beach ball up on top but I knew I didn't want to miss taking a photograph of it.

Rio was hilarious, very entertaining! I knew that Mattie would love it as it had lots of animals and music/dancing. I enjoyed it as well! We were dancing along- at least our top halves of the body were trying to mimick the samba!



Here's a shot of MK outside the theater. I had a hard time getting him back in the car. Thought he'd be sleepy by then since it was close to naptime, but I think he was still too excited! So proud of my l'il tater tot!!



As part of a reward, I got him a Happy Meal that featured a toy from the movie. I saved the box to maybe make scrapbooking embellishments to scrap these pictures, but maybe I'll try to find some acid-free stickers of the movie characters instead. I'm even thinking of making Rio the theme of his upcoming bday :).

Thanks for stopping by!

Three Years later....

A Happy Third Anniversary mini-card for my DH.

Time has passed so quickly. Seemed just like yesterday we were saying our "I do's."

And now, an almost 2-year-old, a new home, and a pea in the pod later, I love him more than ever. :)



Card Supplies are mostly from Love, Elsie (KI Memories).

Celebration Part Uno.

Who knew that this tiny thing....

picture source

could produce such instant little beauties that I would treasure forever?....



And isn't this PP from Jillibean the perfect pairing for these pics? I feel the scrapbook bug inspiring me!!

These pics were taken by my sis' new toy, a toy that is going on my growing wish list! I am usually the paparazzi of the group ... the camera is always by my side and I take TONS of pics. Most of the time, it's way past the comfort zone of my peeps. But you know what? Who do they come to when they want proof of this outfit or documentation of their special day?? Moi, of course!!

So last night, I celebrated my early thirty-somethin' birthday with most of my close girlfriends at Cascal, this lovely Spanish restaurant I had gone to just a couple of weeks before. The ambience was super fun, although the food wasn't as good as my first time there (but was still yummy).

I am blessed with a lot of supportive ladies, and this little girls' night out is much needed time for this busy working mommy. It keeps me well balanced and preserves my sanity, and sometimes, there is nothing like laughing out loud with your friends about stupid lady issues!!!! Topics covered included the joys/ mishaps of breastfeeding, weird pregnancy symptoms, girl crushes, and a ridiculous new dress code for work (to name a few).

I am a HUGE proponent of celebrating birthdays, no matter how old it makes you feel. I've decided it was just too much to throw a little themed shindig at the home right now. But it was so much fun and intimate to share some tapas (small plates of Spanish food goodness) and gelato. I am pretty much celebrating this whole week :), so hopefully, there'll be more stories and pics to come.

Thanks for visiting! Have an amazing Sunday, folks!!




P.S. These are probably the only preggo pics you'll see. I am big, and love my baby bump but not the thighs and the large a$$ that go with it! But it's very good that I haven't really gained weight....although, that is kind of bad as well!! haha! yikes!

Gone are the days of being a Spelling Bee contender!

Hello folks!

I am at work today, but have scheduled a post on a recent card I made.

It features Cheeky Cherry Pie. Now can you all see the mistake I made with a certain spelling of a word?

Now, the perfectionist that I am, I would usually extract that photo, fix my mistake, and re-take a new one. All before finalizing this blog post. But I am just happy I get to post a new card so please forgive me for being lazy :).

The patterned papers are from 7 gypsies (polka dots), Basic Grey (plaid), and Love Elsie/ KI Memories (gifts).

Hope you have an amazing day! TGIF!!!

Go SF Giants!

With tax season, work evaluations, extra classes coinciding in the same two weeks, I haven't been able to sit down and craft much. So thought I'd share some pics from the Giants game my friends and I went to two nights ago. Sorry LA Dodgers, we won that game! Woot Woot!!!

I've been meaning to take the li'l tater tot to his first baseball game. But I have to wait till we go to a day game...the night ones are just too cold and crowded. But here he is enjoying my Pablo "Panda" Sandoval hat! And of course, I also wanted to get something for baby2 :).

Have a wonderful day!




PS. Above are pics of a couple of my two favorite players - Tim Lincecum and Brian Wilson!

Sheena's card

Happy belated birthday to my good bloggie friend, Sheena!

For my creation for her, I wanted to use more muted colors as I noticed that Sheena rarely uses bright ones (which is more my style). Just goes to show you that when you try/ think outside of the box, it pays off. Because I really like how Birthday Gretel came out.

And I love how she has short hair like Sheena's :). Sheena has been a great friend ever since we formed our Team International Ink at the TGF Royal Battle contest. She is always so sweet - commenting on my blog and sending me cards for my birthday and when we bought our house.

Thanks, hon! Sorry your card was late! Hope you have gotten it by now!

Scarves

Hello! Just thought I'd share....this is cool!

NEWS flashes!

What's that, you say?

Are those {AAAACCCCKK!} sentiments??

Yes, it's true! I gave in and actually bought sentiments.

For me, personally, I'd rather save my money and get more stamps. I tend to just hand-write on cards.

But, c'mon! Who could resist Kim Hughes' writing? I just LOVE her style! Unique, fun, sassy!

I also like these sentiments. Yup! For now, those are the only two I'd buy.

Anyway, here's a simple card I made using Kim's new Boob Tubes stamps. Aren't they super cute and retro?

No coloring here, just paper piercing. It's a perfect card for my DH, but since I've already made him a mini card for our upcoming anniversary, I may save this one for later.

In other news, do any of my 7 blog friends wanna come with me here?:





In case you were wondering, this is what Spark is all about.

I actually didn't hear about it till last year when I read about it on Ady's post. I just swooned at all the decorations and stuff they learned.

I still don't know if I can afford to go but if I know that I won't be alone during those two days, I would be more inclined to whine till Gil says yes!

Any of you going? I want to meet her. I'm so intrigued by her. And I'm a huge fan of her!!!

Hoarding!

Did you ever have a favorite line of patterned paper that you collected? And hoarded? And not used even after much time has passed?

For me, it started out with anything Love, Elsie. I mean finding this link and seeing that I missed out on a lot of the 2008 lines is kinda making me anxious right now! Hehe!

But seriously, I had bought every product from my local scrapbooking store. And went online for the other stuff that were unavailable. It took me a good year or two to probably start breaking into the packages and using them.

Then came the Dear Lizzy (Spring Line). I was smitten by the bright colors and girly themes. I am already partial to bicycles but flowers and tiny birds and a clothesline?? *GASP* I was in HEAVEN!

The difference is I used them right away as I had bought multiple pages of my favorite papers.

I mean, just take a look at my card for today. Isn't that just a lovely scene? The whole thing was created using a portion of the fabric paper. Which I've used many times before.

Cupcake Birgitta celebrating her birthday in the backyard ... LOVE! Just added some ribbon and a cut-out of this cupcake from a Basic Grey PP.

Speaking of parties in the backyard, I can't wait to start planning Mattie's 2nd birthday. Our backyard is pretty big.



Now, I just gotta think of a theme :).

Insomnia

So I've been having insomnia again. And I pray to God it doesn't last. I know that pregnant women experience this towards the end of their pregnancy... be it because they're so big that it gets so uncomfortable to rest. Or some even say that it's Mother Nature's way of getting you used to what's to come when the newborn arrives. Anyway, I am only almost 26 weeks. That means 14 more to go. So I really hope I'm not doomed to lay wide-eyed at night just yet. Especially since I get up at 5 am three days a week to work my 12-hour shifts. And I've got the tater tot to take care of when I'm off.

Last night, as I lay there listening to my two guys snoring away, I read one of my favorite blogs. Like all the way from 2008 to present day. Right now, aside from my favorite card blogs, I really enjoy the ones that share a bit more personal tidbits of their private lives.

I originally chose not to do that with my blog. I mean I already have Facebook, which I meticulously edit to make sure my privacy settings are up to date. And that my boss, who also happens to be a friend, do not see the partying pics..if ya know what I mean. I already fear that I share too much out there in the FB world.

But upon reading my fave blogs, I noticed that what brings me in is exactly those tender, personal moments. I would love to document here what Mattie is like when he is 22-months. And what it's really like to be pregnant with my second child. I've always kept a diary/ journal in my younger years. I just gotta make sure it's not TMI, right? :)

What I also like is how I much I relate to these wonderful women. It must be therapeutic to write your feelings in almost-poetic fashion and be able to read it back after all these years. I'm not saying I'm a great writer by any means but this would be wonderful practice.

I believe the cause of my insomnia has a bit to do with all the stresses that are going on in my life. Nothing super bad but I'm kind of a worry wart. Tried talking about them with my sisters about them so I do feel better. Anyway, that's a-whole-nother post/ story.

Wanted to share this pic of Mattie:



Buwahahahahahahahahah!!!! Doesn't it just make you wanna laugh out loud?!!! My sis showed me a new iphone app that allows pics to look like comic books. I am thinking of doing a future post on all of my iPhone photo apps -- I've got like 5 faves and am constantly getting asked on FB "How'd you do that?"

He looks just like my dad in his college yearbook. Too bad I don't have that pic to show you!

Right before bed last night, M cracked me up. It was late and he wouldn't go to sleep so I started singing (more like humming to) him the Pajanimals' lullaby:



He started singing along! I was so happy! It had been the first time I heard him 'sing.' It's been a struggle trying to get him to speak more words so I really loved hearing his version! It was off-key, but who cares? :)

Oh, and before I forget, here's a recent simple card I made:



I was too lazy to do the fussy cutting and opted to cut the images out in squares. I don't like how the scene came out. I also had a fence to add but it was just too darn big! Oh well, I may add a ribbon or something to it, but for now, it's gonna go on my pile.

Have a great Sunday!

Love Blossomed

A super quick lay-out of a pic I found recently. It's about 5-6 years old!

In other news, so sad she's gone from AI :(.



Have a great Saturday!

Sorry so short! I'm off to bed to take a nap. Had a bout of insomnia and I didn't sleep till 3:30 am :(.