A Cozy November Afternoon...

 Just sitting here with my family on this cold November afternoon, enjoying a cup of coffee with the gas fireplace on while we watch our very first rented movie in 3D on the new tv -  Alice in Wonderland. B. wanted to watch it, and so her daddy rented it. So here we all sit with 3D glasses on our faces, lol!

My husband noticed that there was water leaking out of the side of our pool yesterday afternoon thanks to the tree that fell on it earlier this week when the remnants of Hurricane Sandy came through here. The neighbor from up the road had stopped by yesterday to say he'd help with the tree and would be back in the morning since he uses the wood to heat his garage with. He went home and then called to say he had something to help us with the pool and he gave my husband  a patch for the pool and a grabber thing on a pole to help patch the hole. So, hopefully, it works and we'll still have a pool come next summer to use. When he came over this morning to help cut the tree up with a chain saw, he was a little bit late showing up because he had gotten a phone call about his uncle who lives out around Philly on a farm somewhere. Apparently, his uncle was cleaning up trees that had fallen on his farm due to Hurricane Sandy when his big farm tractor started giving him trouble. He was under it, trying to fix it, when it rolled over top of him & it was awhile before anyone found him. :(  Needless, to say the news our neighbor got this morning wasn't good. My thoughts and prayers go out to their family. So very tragic & sad. :(  Needless to say, my husband told him that the trees that fell way down back on our property can wait until spring.

I "thought" we were supposed to be spending the day out in Amish Country yesterday before going to the football playoff game. However, since we were going with my in-laws, we didn't leave until 3:00 in the afternoon for whatever reason. It takes us about two hours to drive out there, so we only had time to stop to eat dinner before the game at the Dutch Valley restaurant in Sugarcreek before heading to the game which started at 7:00. We all got the dinner buffet which was really good. There were quite a few people there that had the same idea as us, apparently, including the entire high school band. Quite a few people showed up to show support for our school besides our family... but our team lost. At least we even made it to the playoffs, right?  There is always next year...

I did manage to work on my 2011 December Daily album a bit more and got another day scrapbooked. I also added some baker's twine and ribbon to a couple of the previous pages....

Well the battery on my laptop is about the die, so this will be it for now. I hope you all have a pleasant day. We're having dinner at my husband's parents' since Matt's fiancee, Stephanie, is in town to visit us all.

'til next time...

Cold, Rainy November 1st

I hope you all had a happy, safe Halloween. It was freezin' cold with temps in the 30's and raining out. We took the truck out this time and didn't walk the whole length of the road and back this year like we usually do. B. had fun trick or treating in her Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz costume...

We only saw six other trick or treaters besides B. out.  The bowl of candy we left out on the front porch had a lot of it gone when we got back though. Which was good.

We lost a few trees when the brunt of Hurricane Sandy came through here Monday night with 60 mph winds. One of the trees landed on our pool and put a hole in the cover. Quite a few schools in the area were on two hour delays Tuesday morning, but not us. It hasn't stopped raining all week, plus we've been having some car troubles that we've been having to deal with. So the trees are still laying out there waiting to be cut up with the chain saw. The yard is a soggy mess.

I've been working on my 2011 Dec Daily some more, trying to get it done before Thanksgiving when  I'll be starting 2012's. Not being caught up actually worked out since I found some more holiday photos (and stories) on my mother-in-law's camera SD card that I decided to include in our holiday album as well...

These first three photos are all of the same day. We had a lot going on that day family-wise. I also included the pictures that my mother-in-law took of her Christmas decorations on that day. We spend every Christmas with them and I'm sure B. will appreciate having pics of her grandparents' home decorated for Christmas in the years to come...

This day was a bowling birthday party that B. went to...

Nothing much happened on this next day. So I took pictures of the Christmas village we've had for more than several years now. It is displayed on our dining room hutch during every Christmas season.  In my journaling, I tell the story of where I got it and how B. has always loved playing with the tiny dog....

Mailing out our Christmas photo cards...

Another photo from my mother-in-law's camera. The journaling talks about her Questers group and includes a copy of a newspaper article about a meeting that was hosted by her at her home.

I'm enjoying the process and it's putting me in the Christmas spirit a little earlier this year. This was my first December Daily and I think it was so worth the effort. I look forward to doing another one for the upcoming holiday season...

Cold, Rainy Monday

Great news - my nephew, Matt, got engaged over the weekend! We are all so happy for him and Steph. He had just moved out to California a couple of months ago when he got the job as head baseball coach for one of the colleges out there. His fiancee is from Jersey and is a LaCrosse coach at one of the PA colleges, but plans to go out to CA within the next year. My husband and I have known about this and kept it a secret for well over a year when Matt bought the ring! lol! And we didn't tell a soul in all that time because my sister-in-law had sworn us to secrecy when she showed us a picture of the ring on her phone at a football game we were at. Although we did come to find out that my husband's mother knew (how long she knew I don't know). Because while we were on our recent family vacation in the car she asked "do you think Matt and Stephanie will get married?" And I said "it's a good possibility". Not knowing she knew of course. Then my husband almost blurted out "didn't he buy her a ring?" I had to smack him from the back seat because I didn't want us getting in trouble with his sister (Matt's mom). His mother laughed and admitted she already knew and that she had even seen the ring! lol!

I just wanted to post here quickly on this cold 40 degree, rainy Monday morning to show you what I've been up to in my scrapbook room this weekend. I finally decorated the cover of my December Daily 2011 album. And have been trying to finish the days in the album that I need to do yet. Although I took pics everyday from Thanksgiving through New Year's, and I have them in the page protectors where they all go, I still need to adhere things down and do the journaling for quite a few days yet. I want to get this completed before I start on our 2012 holiday album here in a few weeks....

I had gotten the DCWV Christmas & Winter Stitched Stack on clearance after the holidays last year, and so I used a couple of the papers from that for the front and back covers. Love the texture of the stitched flourishes. I added a few tiny buttons with embroidery floss threaded through them, glittered chipboard Thickers, twill ribbon, and stamped an Ali Edwards sentiment from her Dec Daily stamp set from last year. The cover is also glimmer misted with iridescent gold. I didn't like the way it comes off on your hands, so I ended up wiping the cover off very well with a paper towel. It's still a bit glimmery, but doesn't come off anymore.

And here's the back cover...

and the inside covers have this pretty, glittery patterned paper from last year's DCWV Merry Christmas stack on them...

I painted the edges of the chipboard covers with metallic gold acrylic paint. As you can see, it's rather chunky. But this album worked perfectly for me considering that I started on Thanksgiving and went clear through New Year's. I plan to use the same album and page protectors again this year...

I picked up the DCWV Evergreen stack and the cardstock stack yesterday both 50% off at JoAnn's. The Evergreen stack is very pretty and has green and red foil accents on some of the papers. I didn't buy any Christmas cardstock last year because it was rather thin. But this year it's not which I am happy about....

I hope everyone in Hurricane Sandy's path stays safe in the coming days. We are on the border of OH and PA  and we are supposed to get heavy rains with 30-35 mph winds and gusts up to 60 mph at times later on today when the brunt of the storm hits our area. Then more wind and heavy rain in the next couple of days. Hopefully, we won't have any power outages though. *crossing fingers*.

 It's hard to believe how much the weather has changed since Friday when  B. had her Fall Festival at school. She got to wear her Halloween costume to school and she made a cute Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz. It was hot, sunny and gorgeous out that day and the days before during Indian Summer. Now it's freezin' cold and rainy. It's a good thing we made our annual trip out to the pumpkin farmers' back on Oct 17th...

Thanks for stoppin' by and I hope everyone stays safe while they ride the storm out. Gotta go bring the trash cans in before the winds kick up later on today....

Two Days of Dec Daily

Since my SD card wouldn't let me take anymore pictures yesterday morning when I was out and about because it needed reformatted, I only got two pictures last night while we were watching Christmas movies on TV. But nothing really happened yesterday anyway. I try to put at least one positive thing each day in my December Daily since sometimes the holidays can be hard for me....

We had a busier day today and so I got more pictures than yesterday. One of them was me mailing out the last four Christmas cards that I had to wait to get addresses for....

When I pulled up to the mailbox, there wasn't anyone behind me. I had to put stamps on two of the cards real quick and I snapped a picture very quickly as I was putting them in the mailbox. Hey, when you don't have the most exciting life and you're doing a December Daily, you gotta get a little creative with the daily pictures. lol! Where did the woman in the van come from that drove around me and was she really honking her horn at me?? lol! B. seemed to think that she was. I think the older I get, the less I care about what other people think. I'm documenting our holiday season and traditions for my family and future family and if I feel like snapping a picture in the oddest of places, well then that's just me and so be it... I have to say I'm getting a few good laughs and having a lot of fun with the whole process of creating this album for my family...

Have a good night and thanks for stoppin' by...

December Daily Progress & Other Misc. Ramblings...

We had a very busy weekend and so I am like 5 days behind on my December Daily plus today. I spent a good bit of time this morning editing and photosheeting my more recent photos, backing up some videos I made with my camera, transferring some pics from the DSLR SD card to my point and shoot SD card because I had to have all my photos from clear back to the end of Sept backed up onto three CDs today. Went to have it done at the "instant" photo at Wal-Mart today and it took over 40 minutes for them to get done and come out of the machine. Ugh. My SD card has been acting up and that probably means that I'm going to have to reformat it again soon. Will probably do that later on this evening in fact. I plan to sit down hopefully sometime here this evening and work on my December Daily. Gotta help B. with her homework first and get dinner started.

Today's December Daily photo is of the stack of Christmas (photo) cards that I just mailed out earlier this afternoon. $50 to do Christmas cards this year including postage. Half for photo cards (the 4x8 kind you get done at Wal-Mart) and the other half was all postage. Ridiculous.  It's actually one of my favorite things to do during the holidays believe it or not.  I did them online and sent them to Wal-Mart this year. But since our local Wal-Mart's machine was down on Saturday for the internet, I had to go to the one 20 mins. away instead. So much for "convenience".  I mailed out 40 and there's still a few that I need addresses for yet. But at least that's all done for the most part. I finally used up every single one of my Christmas (and winter) address labels after only seven years and had to order a new set over the weekend...

Yesterday's photo(s) are of our Christmas village that we just set up on the dining room hutch last night. We've had this village for probably 6 or 7 years now....

Saturday was a fun bowling birthday party that  B. went to....

 Friday was our attempt at a decent Christmas card photo, and of my older step-daughter and her fiance. And one pic of the outlets my husband and I went Christmas shopping at that morning....

I still haven't wrapped any Christmas or birthday gifts at all yet and B.'s birthday is coming up next week. We're having a family party on her birthday and then a smaller party with maybe 5 of her friends the next day. The last day of school just happens to fall on her birthday this year since they're only getting 1-1/2 weeks for Christmas break instead of a full 2 weeks like they've always done. First time she's ever had to go to school on her birthday. I will send cupcakes or something in to the school for B's birthday either the end of this week or the beginning of next. Plus I need to pick up and wrap a small gift for a gift exchange they're doing. I'm not allowed to spend more than $3.

Before I go, here are some pics from my December Daily/Holiday Album....

Thanks for stoppin' by and I hope you all have a great week! :^)