Happy Halloween...............

Happy Halloween and we have a winner for the Halloween goodies RAK. It is Laura...........please send me an email with your address and I will get it in the mail.

I have been busy raking leaves and covering all my gardens with them for the winter. Today it is actually 60 degrees but very windy and tomorrow the high will only be 45...........which is kinda sad for all the kids going trick or treating. Last year we had Allayah here for the 1st time for Halloween and it was so nice she actually didn't need a jacket until later in the evening. Not sure what she is going to be this year but I know I sent her a cute little costume that was a long velvet dress complete with a muff for her hands...........this year it would be very appropriate.

We have to bowl tomorrow nite in couples league and then are heading to a bonfire so that will be our entertainment. How about you............any plans for Halloween?

Arizona was GREAT!!

You just can't have a bad time in Arizona..............weather is always the same..........sunny and warm......and even tho one day it was 102, it never felt like it since it is a dry heat. You don't even sweat there.....well at least I don't.








We arrived on Saturday afternoon and was surprised to see BOTH of my brothers picking us up at the airport so we all had a nice visit on the drive home (1 1/2 hours). Went out to eat in the evening and they served Spumoni (Italian ice cream cake) for desert. Here's a picture of Kevin having his and it also has a candle on it!







Sunday after church we headed to Riverside casino for their champagne brunch. It wasn't as impressive as I remembered...............not like the seafood buffets we normally hit on Fridays. We watched the Packers play in the Losers Lounge since they weren't on regular tv this week. After that we headed back to my moms and sat in the hot tub and did some more visiting. This picture is of my 2 older brothers, my mom & I out on her deck in back.






Monday was golf day..............first time I played in over 7 years. It really wasn't as bad as I remembered. I only lost 5 balls............one to the water, 2 to the bushes, 1 across the street and the last ended up on someone's patio (hoping it didn't hit or break anything). This was an unusual course as it was surrounded by condo's so lots of windows just begging to be hit especially from someone like me who doesn't hit it straight and far yet! What a great way to spend 4 1/2 hours ..............getting some sun, exercise and enjoying some wonderful scenery. Here's a picture of my mom, Bob & Kevin just before we went out to play. The 3 of them just LOVE golfing................mom & Bob play almost daily. I think they are hoping that I will get that bug too.

Palm trees, mountains, cactus plants...........and look at how close the houses were. I finally got in a picture too......not a great hair day when wearing a sun visor!

































Just had to get a picture of this sign since the comedian playing at the Riverside Casino was Kevin Johnson (same name as my husband). We didn't go see him but the 4 of us did go see Couples Retreat which was a very funny movie.









Now we are back in Wisconsin with temps in the 30's & 40's and lots of rain. I even put our electric blanket back on the bed Thursday night as it was so cold even with flannel sheets. Where is our Indian Summer?

BOOO -- I'm back with a RAK!

Just got home tonite from a wonderful vacation with warm weather and wonderful family time. Unfortunately came home to chilly rainy weather with maybe even some snow on the way.

So before I go to bed ...........I wanted to offer a Halloween RAK..............all you need to do is leave an easy favorite recipe that you enjoy making...........maybe something for the slow cooker, a desert or hot dish. I know from the past that coming back from vacation means catching up on lots of stuff including laundry etc so you could make my life easier with your recipes. I will draw a name next week-end and this is what you can win. Lots of nice spooky goodies including a set of Fiskars trick or treat clear stamps!

Will tell you more about my trip tomorrow!

Gonna Leave this snow & head out west

Here it is 36 and snowing outside............as pretty as it looks......I sure am glad that I'm am packing to head to sunny Arizona where temps are in the 90's! This fall has just been too wierd and so was summer! Anyhow tomorrow we will be spending the night at my brother Andy's place in Madison and he will drive us to airport there early Saturday morning. We arrive in Las Vegas at 1:22 and my oldest brother Norm will be picking us up and driving us 1 1/2 hours to my mom's place in BullHead City. We will be celebrating Kevin's and Norm's birthday that evening at an Italian resteraunt and my brother Robert from Milwaukee will actually be there too. How exciting for my mom to have 3 of her children together at the same time! I will have seen 3 out of 4 brothers within 24 hours and I spent an hour on the phone last night with the 4th brother Tony in Texas. Gotta love family time!

So while cleaning up my scraproom I got sidetracked and started organizing things. I received this neat bag from Fiskars with some garden tools so I decided to use it for all my adhesives. It is large enuf even to fit my ATG gun (a tool that I love).

Then I had this neat bag that I got in a RAK from Karen (Ladydoc) so I decided to put all my inks organized in there. It too was large enuf for lots of ink pads and stamp cleaners too!

Now I have an empty drawer so course gotta fill that....... so I organized a bunch of my squeeze punches in there. It fit 18 punches and some corner punches too. I like the way they sit nice on top of each other and now I can see which design I have 2 sizes of or 3 ( I actually only have the circle set in all 3 sizes but some of the scalloped ones only came in 2 sizes so they are complete too). The other 16 fit into this nice box and are very handy. The orange ones are the seasonal (Halloween) ones so aren't used year round. The drawer above this one holds all my border punches nicely! Don't ya just love being organized?

Last but not least I organized all my stickles and smooch into this nice little round basket. I put a piece of styrofoam in the bottom so they could all stand upside down in there and actually stay put.

By this time all my laundry was done so I carried it up to our bedroom and started putting it away. While doing that I thought hmmm I should pack socks etc for my husband and next thing I know I was cleaning out his sock drawer, sorting, matching and taking out all the ones that were wearing out. I did get his socks packed but it just shows you how sidetracked I can get from one chore to the next. Does anyone else have this problem LOL??????

Well not sure what free time I will have while on vacation so you might not see another blog until I get back. I'll try to bring back some sunshine!

crafting while it snows!

Yup it has been snowing all day...........little white flakes that could add up to be 1 to 3 inches. Doesn't seem quite right for October 12th does it? Course it will all be gone tomorrow but still made a nice day to say inside and be crafty!

I spent hours making a birthday card for my granddaughter Allayah who will turn 8 on the 24th. Knowing we wouldn't be seeing or talking to her this month I wanted it to be extra special. The felt frame on the front blends so perfect with the picture I took of her in our gardens back in August. I love the beading in the flowers and even the cake and present are made of felt.

On the top half of the inside I filled it with butterfly kisses and each butterfly is prettier then the next. On the bottom half I used my Cuttlebug folder and in the middle of it used a happy birthday rub on. I used my glitter pens to make this look special plus I remember how much Allayah liked using them and I think she will recognize it too! I enjoy making special cards for special people and hope they will be treasured for many years.

I also made my brother a birthday card and what was unique about it is that I used samples from a wallpaper book. I like the crackled aged look to this lighthouse envelope. I used the coordinating paper to make the card and on the inside I found a sweet picture of a girl on a beach which is so appropriate since I am his only sister. So next time you are near a paint store stop and see if they have any "old" sample books...........the best part is they are FREE and now you have another ideal of what to do with them. I have also used them to make frames which is fun.

As much fun as I had crafting today..........it is almost 3pm so I better get something constructive done around the house too! Thank goodness I made a nice turkey yesterday and fresh apple crisp so I don't think Kevin will mind leftovers tonite especially since he has to rush out to bowl.

I'll try to post again this week before we head out to warmer weather this week-end!

48 pages in 8 days!

8 days ago I booked a trip for my husband Kevin & I to go out to Arizona by my mom. It is Kevin's last week of vacation for the year and he normally needs some time to regroup before the hustle and bustle of the holidays start..........at his job that is! Right now he has been working some 12 hour days and comes home just beat so we leave next Saturday on his birthday and will spend 6 days where it is nice and warm.

Kevin shares his birthday with my oldest brother Norm so my mom is planning a little get together that night at a local Italian restaurant for us all to celebrate. When my brother was here visiting earlier this summer he left his 2 photo albums with me and said it would be nice if I would make him a scrapbook like I did for our other brother Andy. I sorted through some of the photos but that was as far as I got since my gardens keep me pretty busy during the summer and of course there was also just the big warehouse sale.

Needless to say, the same day I got our flights booked, I started Norm's album and I have been working on it non stop (well at least the days that I wasn't fighting some dental problems). I found this neat album in blue jean material and it even has a pocket on the front. I spelled out his name in brads........kewl huh?

I think the hardest part doing 48 pages was finding paper to match......especially stuff that wasn't "girlish" with flowers etc. Also working with pictures that were 40 to 50 years old..........lot of them in black and white. I won't bore you with many pictures but here are a few. This page was of his 8th grade graduation and I used Hannah's Story line.

I loved finding pictures of both of our grandma's and we had a special name for them too. Grandma Close just lived a few blocks away in Milwaukee whereas Grandma Faraway lived all the way across the city LOL! Here was the one chance for me to use some prima flowers.

I did a page on each of my brothers and spelled their names out in foil trimmed Cloud 9 letters. Simple but sweet. I also did one of both my folks. I am going to bring along a pen in case he would like me to add some journaling but there sure are allot of pictures and memories in this 48 page album I made him. I know it will be something for him to treasure no matter where he moves to or ends up in life. I just wouldn't recommend trying to do it in 8 days!

Computer problems???

I love computers..........when they are working..........when they are not .......... it's a headache! I was smart enuf this time when we bought our Gateway to take out the protection plan so I gave them a call last week to tell them I was having problems with my wireless mouse. I put batteries in and within a few hours it was telling me I needed new batteries.........hmmm something not quite right with that huh?

So while discussing this with the tech guy, I mentioned that the computer froze allot & I couldn't do ctrl, alt, delete to reboot it either. So it was decided that they would need to take my computer back to how it first came to me.........in other words erasing the hard drive. When I heard that I got scared knowing how many pictures etc I have that I would not want to lose. So it was off to Staples to buy an external hard drive. I was lucky enough to have a clerk who knew the pro's and con's of each type and I walked away buying one that I feel will meet my needs.

It wasn't hard to hook up and only took 30 minutes to backup all my stuff then came the hard part of getting on the phone with the tech guy again and re-doing the hard drive. I spent most of yesterday afternoon & evening re-installing programs and of course my anti virus protection. Today I am trying to find some things that don't seem to be there and the one thing I really miss that I didn't think of copying was my favorite's list. Every morning I would get up and there were a number of sites I checked out daily for deals etc and now I don't have their websites and it will take time for me to remember who they were too LOL! I also have some different things on my screen that weren't there before. Why oh why do they not give you manuals with computers? I love reading, high lighting and taking notes rather then going online and trying to find what I'm looking for in an online manual.

The good news is I haven't had any problems in the past 24 hours besides my computer going to sleep and me not knowing how to wake it up?? But I will learn again and soon things will be back to normal.

I hope in my next blog I will have some pictures of the scrapbook that I am making for my oldest brother Norm's birthday which is in less then 2 weeks.

Back to watching the Packers play the Vikings..........GO PACK GO!!!

Fall is here

It has been a busy week packing and shipping out boxes of Fiskar goodies to my friends which is why I haven't been on the computer much. Plus the weather has changed and we had one night with a frost and the next night with a freeze. Some of my flowers survived but most took a big hit between that and the HIGH winds we had one day. The wind tore the rest of my canopy on my swing right off (earlier storm started it) and also pulled out my gorgeous butterfly screen that I had in my garden so you can imagine how strong those winds were. All the really tall spider plants were also destroyed. But you know we had a nice September with temps in the 70's and it couldn't last forever.

The temps now are only in the 50's and we are finally getting the rain that I have been waiting patiently for weeks. It is in the forecast for most of the next week so it will be a good time to be doing some inside stuff this week. Luckily we have all that wood stacked and stored as we do have our wood stove going right now!

My favorite part of fall is waiting for the leaves to change. I love taking a long drive just to see all the gorgeous colors at this time of the year. Normally we do it this week-end when we take a drive to Eagle River for their annual Cranberry Fest but if it's going to rain and be in the low 50's I think I can skip this fun craft show this year.

Have a great week-end all and enjoy the beginning of fall!