My new favorite song...

I love this happy song !!!

A couple of layouts to share

I was going through some old photos the other day & found some pictures that I decided to create pages with.

The first is a photo of my Dad & I dancing at my sisters wedding more than 30 years ago ( I was a senior in high school when my sister got married ) This picture reminded me how much I miss him. We were so much alike in so many ways. From him I learned to love photography & travel. The first trip I took after he passed away was very sad for me because I didn't have him there to go over maps with deciding which would be the best route to drive. And I didn't have him there to help me enjoy going through my photos after the trip was over.

This next one is with my grandparents. My grandmother had a hard life....she had one husband who left her & her children to fend for themselves. Another who went overseas to Germany & was not allowed to return...and ended up dying while there. And a third who also died. But when she met my grandpa (who was the only grandfather I knew) she met her match. They were inseparable & very happy together for many years.

I love the photo on the right so much. You can just feel the love they share can't you?

The sister act strikes again

So my sisters & I did another race together today. A 5 mile "turkey trot".

My sisters ran it but as I am not a runner I did the walk...which was also a race. And nope...I didn't come close to winning but it was really fun to challenge myself to keep at a fast pace. And I finished 20 minutes quicker than I thought I would so I was really happy with my time. The guy that was in front of me for the last 3 miles had on the most cloyingly sweet cologne....yuck. I swear he must have been wearing half the bottle...it was torture to be behind him.

The walk finished just before the run began so I waited at the finish line to try to get pictures of Kim & Deb as they passed me. I got one of Deb and then waited & waited for Kim to come by. I finally gave up thinking I must have missed her.

When I found them in the crowd I told them I was only able to get a picture of Deb as I must have missed Kim....thats when they told me Kim was right next to Deb & they finished together side by side in 38 minutes time.

So my one & only picture that I thought was just Deb....and look who's there just to her right. Perfect !!!

And they are looking pretty darn good aren't they...considering they just ran 5 miles.

Basic Grey does it again...

Does anyone out there love Basic Grey as much as I do? Some of their recent collections have not been my favorites ( Eerie, Porcelan, Lime Rickey, Wisteria) And others will forever be my all time favorites (Marrakech, Ambrosia, Urban Prarie)

But now they have released 2 more lines (shipping in December)...one of which I can not wait to get my hands on. Origins is full of beautiful shades of greens, yellows & browns. Beautiful !!! The other...Sugar Rush is...well...a bit too "sweet" for me. But I think if I had baby photos to scrap....especially girl photos...I'd probably like it a lot more.

Want to check them out for yourself?
http://www.embellishonline.com/basicgrey

Layout share

This layout was a first for me. Usually I choose photos I want to create a layout with & then choose papers & embelishments that compliment the photos. But with this layout I designed the whole layout before even choosing a photo or title name. It was a fun challenge for me and when I went looking for a photo this picture of Amanda in Italy was the perfect fit. And all those stairs behind her helped me choose a fitting title as well.

How would you like to climb all those stairs? Makes me tired just looking at them !! But the tiles in the front of them are beautiful aren't they?

Bad dog...bad, bad dog !!!

Oh my god !!! I think I'm going to blow a gasket.

I went down to tend the fire and stay for a few minutes visiting with the cats. And when I came upstairs I found the dog chewing on another memory card from my camera. (the second one he has ruined) But it gets worse...so much worse. My camera was knocked off of my side table next to the chair.....and now it doesn't work. I am so stinking mad at that dog right now I don't dare go near him.

Remind me again why I thought it would be a good idea to get a dog. He is seriously going to send me over the edge...or to the poor farm.

Going to bed to try to sleep...I feel sick to my stomach.

A couple of layouts to share

I finally have a couple of layouts to share. First another round layout. I am loving using die cut papers lately. I'm thinking I might trace some of them and cut my own die cut backgrounds for layouts sometime.

This one with the brown scalloped edge & leaf design was perfect as a backdrop for the photos from the foliage drive Jake & I took to southern Vermont a few weeks ago.

A pretty simple layout that was very quick to make. My favorite thing on the page is the tree sticker that is layered over the photos. Its from a sticker sheet I picked up by Websters Pages. The Autumn Splendor sticker is by Pink Paislee.

The next one is with my new favorite photo. It was taken of Amanda by a friend in Iraq....I played with it a little in Photoshop to give it a grainy aged look. Love how it has the plane she works on in the photo behind her.

I think the Navy should really think of using her in their advertising. She is so photogenic isn't she? And the best thing of all about my girl...she's not in Iraq anymore. She is currently in Italy & headed to Greece soon. And even better than that...she will be home on American soil in about a month. Can't wait to see her over the holidays. Miss her tons.

A bit of New England history

I have been meaning to post these photos for a while now but I have been such a blog slacker lately that I just haven't got around to it till now.

Living in New England there is so much history around that sometimes I take them for granted. I took Jake to Sudbury a few weeks ago to the area where all of the following historical buildings are located.

This grist mill was our first stop.

Isn't this such a beautiful old building? You can't tell from this photo but that water wheel is turning. And they are grinding flour inside. From what I understand local growers are allowed to use the mill in exchange for contributing their hours educating the public who come to see the facility.

Jake enjoyed learning about the history of this place...even if it was a dreary rainy day..

This photo is from the back side of the building...

fun to photograph at any angle...

These are the grinding stones used inside. There is a whole row of these old ones set into the hillside outside the building.

a view of the inside grinding area & grain elevators...

And the gears in the lowest level that are powered by that big water wheel outside.

Next stop just down the road is the Wayside Inn...if you go inside & tour the Inn you can see the room where George Washington once stayed. It is still a functioning Inn & Restaurant (the food is said to be fabulous here) If you want to learn more about this beautiful place you can find it here

Martha Mary Chapel is also on the same 1/4 mile stretch as The Grist Mill & the Wayside Inn. If you have seen Matthew McConaughey's recent movie "Ghosts of Girlfriends Past" then you saw this church in a scene from that movie.

And just behind the church is The Little Red Schoolhouse. You've all heard the children's story "Mary had a little lamb" right? Well this is the schoolhouse from that nursery rhyme. Mary actually was from Sterling which is the next town over from where I live but in the 1920's Henry Ford had the schoolhouse moved here to this location.

Of course we couldn't go to the area without going to the place my grandparents took us to as kids when they came to visit...the Wayside country store.

Its very much the same as it was all those years ago...and I can remember that old cash register on the right side of the photo from my childhood trips here. Nana & Grandpa would give each of us a quarter & we were in heaven picking out our 25 pieces of penny candy to take home with us. It was really nostalgic for me to come here & to see Jake enjoying the same thing I had done as a kid.

The phrase "like a kid in a candy store" comes to mind here..

Of all those jars of candy I was only able to find these 2 that were still a penny.

Hope you all enjoyed this tour of Sudbury history. Have a great weekend.

Photo share

I took these 2 photos a couple of weeks ago on a hike with Tanner. Love how pretty the colors & reflections came out in them. Even a little mudhole in the woods can be a beautiful thing...

Caprese salad

We had this yummy salad for dinner recently. If you'd like to give it a try the recipe can be found on my other blog. I hope you enjoy it as much as we did.

Noooooooooooo.....

No ! No! No! Its too soon...this is not right...I'm not ready. Its only October 15th..not November 15th... not December 15th.....

I looked outside earlier and my deck is not brown anymore....it's white !!! Covered with a layer of snow !!!

Ugh....I hate winter !! I hope this is not a sign of how rough this winter is going to be.

Fall in New England

This past weekend was peak foliage time around here so Jake & I decided to take a ride out to western Mass and up into lower Vermont. Before we left I needed to mail a package to Amanda with some fall goodies since she is most homesick this time of year. I needed one more thing to add to my care package...a small pumpkin.

We stopped at this pretty location near my house....but alas no mini pumpkins here. Aren't the colors in this photo gorgeous though? In Vermont I thought I would get so many great photos but this one right near home ended up being the best one of the day.

Next stop in the search for a pumpkin for Amanda was in Sterling at this farm...

Lots of pumpkins here to choose from. And we did find the perfect little one to add to our care package. So we were off to the post office & then on our way to Vermont.

Every town we passed through had a pretty little church. This one was in Jacksonville Vermont. We stopped at a winery here that was having a wine tasting. I don't like wine at all but it was a festive little gathering & they were serving complimentary cheese fondue, mulled cider & sliced apples with caramel sauce. Yum. A nice break from driving and a snack to hold us over till lunch time.

Jake made a friend there too...

We headed a little further north on Route 100 (voted one of the most scenic roads in America) We were trying to get to a little restaurant in Wilmington that a girl at the winery referred us to. Apparently we weren't the only ones out enjoying the colors of fall. We got stuck in this traffic for a while. At 2 miles per hour you can imagine it took us a while to get through it. Ugh !!!

Finally we arrived at the cafe and at 2 pm it was still packed so we had to wait a bit for seats. Jake passed the time amusing himself by taking goofy self portraits : )

After lunch we headed toward home and after a bit of a climb in the car the view opened up to the gorgeous scene.

and a bit further down the road we saw these on the hillside. Pretty cool to see them all spinning in the wind (10 total) My town is actually in the process of putting these in on the side of the mountain to generate wind energy here as well.

After getting back into Massachusetts in the Berkshires we came across these people kayaking in what I'm sure must be very cold water. It was only about 50 degrees out...brrrr. We watched them paddle upstream for a while practicing in the white water areas just ahead of them. Fun to watch but I wouldn't want to be them. I hate being cold.

It was a long day of driving on pretty country roads like this one...

and this one...

I was so tired when we got home...but it was a nice day spent with my favorite boy.

Do you like blueberry muffins?

If you do... this is the best recipe ever. And yours will look so much better than this blurry photo. Enjoy.

lucky number 28

I've come to the conclusion over the past few years that 28 is my lucky number. It comes up everywhere in my life....

I was born on the 28th
I have one phone number that ends in 6028
one that ends in 2815
I bought my house on my birthday the 28th of Sept in 2006
on that day my new phone number was given to me....ending in 2806 (the same day I bought my house...28th day of the month in the year 06) Freaky right?

So this year for my birthday I bought myself another gift....after all it is my lucky day.

I spent a long time making this decision...

Because I had been driving this Jeep.....and I loved this car.

We have so many memories with this fun vehicle...including a trip cross country for a 4 wheeling vacation in Utah. But much as I loved it...it was a huge gas hog and with the miles I drive for work each week I was spending $100 a week on gas. Crazy right?

So it just made sense to go green & trade it in for this hybrid Honda Insight. This car will save me almost $300 a month in gas. Bought on my lucky day of course....the 28th.

Its cute isn't it? And so far this week I am averaging about 55 miles per gallon. Whats not to love about that?

This boy is pretty excited about it too. His favorite part is the navigation system and the hands free functions that go with it. Pretty cool to be able to just say "call home" and your car makes your phone call for you, or 102.5FM and it switches to your favorite radio station. Very cool to be able to do everything from heat, phone, radio & navigation just by speaking what you want.

This car is just so much fun to drive. I'll miss my Jeep for sure....but I think this car is going to help me get over that pretty quick.

If I could ever stay awake long enough....

I'd post my big news on here...

But again I am falling asleep in this darn cozy recliner. I'll give you a hint though....Monday was my birthday & I got a pretty cool gift (from myself) Can you guess what????

I promise I'll share soon...

Snickerdoodles for soldiers

These went to my daughter & her friends in Iraq, but its the best recipe for snickerdoodles I have found yet. If you want to make some for yourself you can find the recipe here at my other blog. Enjoy!

A mother's pride

Feeling so proud tonight and missing this beautiful girl so much.

She's been on deployment in Iraq and due home in December.....she can't get here soon enough for me!!!

She's spends her working hours in these tracking submarines...

Even with the brutal heat she is living in wearing full gear she has kept in good spirits & has formed such a strong bond with her crew and still manages to have fun. I think she has also gained an even stronger love & appreciation for her country while there.

Even in this environment she is still smiling, having fun and loving life.

So very proud of you my beautiful brave girl !!!

working long hours in between the fun with friends...

While we are cozy at home in our with our soft beds & home cooked meals...this is where they are living...

And they are there for us, our country & our freedom. Let's not ever forget what they are sacrificing for us and if you pass a soldier on the street don't be too shy to thank them for all they do.