Misc. Ramblings...

Well it's a yucky rainy day out there today. B. hasn't been feeling well. Her stomach hurt all day yesterday and she woke up with a fever this morning. Took her to the doctor and found out she's got strep throat. again. Second time she's had it in the past month. :(  It's no wonder she keeps getting sick considering they have like 30 kids crammed in a small classroom and nothing gets wiped down with Clorox wipes. The doctor put her on a stronger antibiotic this time. The pharmacy only had one bottle of her medicine and the other pharmacy in the area only has one, so we picked up the one to get B. started on her antibiotic and I'll have to go pick up the other bottle after it gets delivered. Ugh. Must be a lot of kids/people sick if the pharmacies are running out of medicine. Not good. So B. is staying home from school for the next couple of days. The doctor wanted to keep her home on Monday too, but it's President's Day and there won't be any school anyway. She's fallen asleep next to me on the couch watching the The Last Song DVD we got her for her birthday. Poor thing.

B. being sick means that she'll have to miss the birthday party for her friends tomorrow (twin girls). I had already shown you a card I had made for the one girl who likes Hello Kitty. I had also made a card this week for her twin sister....

Supplies Used: Cricut Doodlecharms cartridge for the cupcake - cut at 2-1/2". Mini Monograms for the scalloped circle - cut at 3" on real-dial size. Circle punch - 2-3/4", DCWV 8x8 pkg of Nana's Kitchen papers I got at Big Lots a long time ago. Fiskars border punches, tattered rose distress ink, Corner Chomper corner rounder, Cuttlebug embossing folders D'Vine Swirl for "icing" on cupcake, distressed stripes for cupcake. And of course some diamond Stickles. "Make a Wish" stamp is from a set of "foot-long" Hampton Arts stamps I picked up at Big Lots last year. And the Happy Birthday sentiment comes from a set of Fiskars stamps.

On the brighter side of things, we are finally getting some new furniture in this house! *major happy dance*. We have needed two new couches for years but never had the money to replace them until now. The living room couch has big embarassing rips in the cushions because the couch is so old I think the fabric is dry-rotted on it (cotton). It's gotten especially bad this past year. And the couch downstairs in the family room is just awful too. We have been using hand-me-down furniture for the past decade since we've been married and so it will be so nice to finally have something that we picked out ourselves and that is brand-spankin' new. We got to pick out the fabric and pillows and everything and so all the furniture is customized to our tastes. The local furniture store is having a deal through the end of the month where they pay the taxes, have free delivery, and they remove the old furniture for free. So now was the time to get it. I am sooo excited. It won't be here for at least another month, but I'm ok with that. I've waited this long, so I can certainly wait  4-6 more weeks.

For the living room, we're getting this couch...

and also the matching loveseat and chair all with this pretty red fabric....

and matching pillows in this fabric...

Now I can go pick out new living room curtains which we also desperately need to replace and we'll be painting that room a more neutral color. Can't wait. We could have gotten whitewash wood instead of the oak if we wanted but we went with the oak . I was originally drawn to the fabric shown in the couch picture above but in red. It comes in that check pattern in red, that yellowish-color, and blue. But it's cotton and it doesn't clean or wear as well as the fabric we chose. Plus we didn't want those small checks to drive people's eyes batty. lol!

 For the family room, we picked out this couch...

 

and we chose this fabric...

This goes perfect with the two recliners we have in the family room, one of them being burgundy. And we got pillows with this fabric....

All the furniture has a 10 year warranty on the cushion cores. So if they ever go flat, or we have any problem with them during that time, we can have them replaced. Which is nice. They have air vents so the seams won't bust out and zippers that repair themselves. Too bad I'm not braver with the sewing machine, because you can buy the fabric by the yard too if you want and use it to make matching curtains, more pillows or whatever. We spent over 2 hours at the furniture store last night picking all of this out. Needless to say, I am soooo super excited to be finally getting new furniture. It's been a long time coming.....

Some Finished Layouts

Hey Everyone,

I hope you all are having a wonderful weekend. I've been decorating the house for autumn and Halloween this past week. It's been really windy here today. B. and I did a little shopping earlier this afternoon for an upcoming birthday party that she'll be going to for one of her friends who no longer goes to B's school. We had her over to our house last weekend and the girls spent the evening giggling practically the whole time. lol! They call each other practically every day so it's nice that they can still keep in touch. B. spotted a pair of PJs that she wanted while we were out and about today, so I got those for her as well. The school always has a couple days where the kids are allowed to wear their pajamas to school so it was time to get B. some nice new warm ones anyway. That girl is growin' like a weed! lol! She's gettin' tall.

Anyway, yeah I know I've been really neglecting my blog, so I thought I'd post some scrapbook layouts that I finished fairly recently. I've been working on back to school layouts lately. I just have two more to do yet and then I'll be all caught up with that particular subject. I'm just waitin' on some new Sizzix school dies to get here that I got from their online outlet store last weekend when they were having a free shipping deal going on with any size order....

Supplies Used: Sketch inspiration: Sketches for Scrapbooking, Cricut carts used: Celebrate with Flourish, Locker Talk, and Doodlecharms. Big brad by Stemma, Bazzill flourishes stitching template, number Cuttlebug embossing folder, Ali Edwards journaling stamp, Lawn Fawn date stamp (Say Cheese Too), twine from The Twinery, star brad, Tim Holtz Tiny Attacher, black soot distress ink, Momento Tuxedo Black ink & Jenni Bowlin Cough Syrup dye ink

I sanded the die cuts a bit. Kinda like how that turned out.

Supplies Used: DCWV Grade School stack, Cricut Locker Talk cart, Ali Edwards journaling stamp, file tab punch by Marvy, EK Success binding edge border punch, date stamp from office supply store, apple brad, Back to School stamp on journaling block from Creative Cafe from Big Lots, Sketch Inspiration: Sketches for Scrapbooking

DCWV Grade School stack, Studio Calico Natalee stamp set (for year), Ali Edwards journaling stamp, Locker Talk, scallop sentiment border punch by Fiskars, big brad by Stemma, Jenni Bowlin cough syrup dye ink, Momento Tuxedo Black

I've been working on moving my layouts from post-bound albums to 3-ring binder albums. I decided to go with the D ring albums by WRMK and recently got two cinnamon faux leather ones to start with....

I got the first one filled up with layouts, lovin' the WRMK page protectors and how thick and roomy they are. The album has stitching along the edges, metal corners, and a bookplate on the spine. Really nice. However... when I went to put layouts in the second album, I noticed this...

As you can see, the binder mechanism is completely detached from the album. :( And I have to send it back to get a replacement. Hopefully, I won't have anymore problems with their albums, because other than this one thing, I really like the WRMK albums a lot. Maybe it's just a fluke thing.

For those of you who like making mini scrapbook albums and using chipboard, JoAnn's is now selling packs of acid-free chipboard *happy dance*. You get 10 each of 12x12 raw chipboard, white board and black board. Really nice. And even nicer with a coupon. :)  I've been contemplating either making a Halloween mini or a December Daily. Don't know if I'll make one of those yet, or continue on with more 12x12 layouts. Decisions decisions...

Thanks for stoppin' by. :)