Why is "16" called Sweet???

Today is my baby girl's "Sweet Sixteen" Birthday! In preparing for all the festivities this week and weekend for her special day, I started thinking why do they call it "Sweet" Sixteen? How many teenagers do you know that you can really refer to as "Sweet". Yeah, they can all be sweet at certain times, like mainly when they want something, but for the most part when describing the everyday life of a teenager, "Sweet" simply does not come to mind. Maybe it is to remind us that 16 years ago to this day, they were the sweetest thing in the world, although during those 12 hours of labor "sweet" once again was not coming to the forefront of my mind.

Well, although she is not sweet 100% of the time, my baby can be sweet at times and I love her. Happy Birthday Baby Girl!! Hope you have a great day.

What is a Bamberg??

Well, this is a Bamberg. Atleast I think. This is the newest addition to the family. As most of you know, my daughter turns 16 this week and has convinced her father that she wanted (and would take care of.....) a puppy (not sure why he believes her since she has not taken care of any of the other 8+ animals we have had......). But, anyways, he believed her and he went and purchased this cute little thing from the local SPCA yesterday for her, which she had picked out the day before. Don't worry, I made sure they both understood the cute little guy would remain at her father's house and in no way, shape or form, would join my zoo at my own house.

I say I THINK this is Bamberg because I dont really think the poor thing has been given a final name. The SPCA had named him Marley, Jessica had said she was going to name him "Nuffer" when she got him, but then her good ole father named him "Bamberg" on the paperwork when he purchased him which is named after a stupid place he hunts. ( I did remind him, this was not his dog, but his daugther's birthday gift.....) However......when I stopped by to meet the new family member yesterday they were calling him "Junior". Poor guy is not going to know what the heck his name is.

Hopefully by today the two of them can agree on something to call the pup. All I called him was cute!

Emporium Layouts to share.

Here are the two layouts that we did for my workshop today. I was really pleased how well they turned out and they actually involved no stamping this time. Thought I would share them for those that could not attend the class or possibly inspire someone to pull out their paper and cut to working on layouts this weekend. I have the entire house to myself today so I intend to keep on scrapbooking and cardmaking today to see how much I can create in one day. Of course, have to be "creative" at the same time that I am working on laundry, letting the dogs out, letting the dogs back in, going to see what the dogs are barking at....oh that's right.....NOTHING! They bark just to get me to stop what I'm working on I think. Oh well, gotta run while my creative juices are flowing!

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle.....or maybe not.....

Actual Conversation:

Me: "Hey, did you see our new recycle bins?"

J: "No"

Me: "Well come here, let me show them to you." (walking to the garage, showing the bins.......)

J: "Why? We don't recycle."

....hmmmmm.....We shall see if we learn to recycle or not.......what do you think will happen? Geez.

This is a test. Only a test. Supposively if I do this right this text will post to my blog. Let's see if it works. If so that will be really cool that I can update my blog on the go since it always seems I am going.

Allow little things to make you happy....

Jeff is constantly laughing at me. Sometimes it is because I will shout out a loud "Woo Hoo" spontaneously and he'll be like "What did you find?" Then I'll say something like "a dime in the dryer" or "a nickel on the floor" and then he is like "Oh, that's it!" The way I look at it, that is better than finding nothing, or certainly better than finding the random Fruit Gusher wrapper or trails of dirt some family members like to leave behind for me to find - right? Little things make me happy.

Like this morning, I was on my way to work and "pouting" because there was no leftover dinner last night for me to bring to lunch today and I was already STARVING at 7:45 a.m.. I had promised myself I was not going to spend another dime on lunch this week (more like I couldn't spend another dime on food this week since I don't have a dime to spend - LOL, one more week until pay day!) but I was hungry, what is a girl to do. ALAS - I remembered that two weeks ago I got my last stamp on a "frequent lunch card" from a local sandwich shop which entitled me to a free sandwich! WOO HOO! That just made my morning! I been smiling ever since! Can't beat a free lunch. Well.....technically I guess you can, but today, FREE lunch has made my day!

Find something small in your life to smile about! If for no other reason, when you smile it makes some people wonder what you are up to! :)

Time to get busy!

Hello again. I am so excited with all the upcoming scrapbooking and craft workshops I have coming up, along with Easter and other festivals going on in our area. I love springtime and can't wait to make the most of it this year!

Jeff, Jeffrey and myself just got back earlier this week from spending several days at a friend's lakehouse. It was exactly the rejuvenating break that we have been needing. Didn't really do anything spectacular while we were away, but we were simply able to get away from home, no phone service, just a few channels on the TV and simply relax. I for one caught up on many hours of sleep over the 4 days we were there!! Jessica decided that was not her type of vacation so she stayed home with her granny and they did some girly bonding time while we were away.

I took the rest of this week off to simply continue my "relaxing mode" and also did some housework and other things "just for me" this week, but ready to get back to work. Also time to start planning Jessica's "Sweet Sixteen" Birthday. She will 16 on April 30 so only have a few weeks left to get things planned and ready.

I better get off of here for now and get busy. (Actually, I just received the new Close to My Heart scrapbook catalog that goes public on May 1 so I am going to take a little time to ponder through it and see what classes I can plan for the future!)

I hope everyone has a wonderful Easter weekend. Make the most of the time you have - I plan to!