pool one day...to the snow the next

last friday after school, i took the boys to the pool to play with their friends. yes, the pool in the winter... in the middle of january! it was probably in the high 70's or low 80's.brybry is like me when i was little. i tagged along ALL THE TIME when my older sister hung out with her friends! [hi sis :) love ya]

so that was friday. saturday, we decided to take a drive to big bear. although it wasn't snowing, it was fun for all of us. the boys don't get to see snow all but 1x a year! and does this even count? it was man-made snow blown out from a snow machine! LOL

this place was better than the place we went to last year. no scary chairlift!! plus i didn't have to hear whiney boys tell me they're tired from walking up snow hills! let me introduce---the "magic carpet". it's a moving escalator that takes to to the top of the hill! genius, right?

ok ok....brandon doesn't look that happy but daddy is!

bryan was happy. he's holding snow :)

ooops--picture is upside down! who has an iPhone 4s?? when my pictures from my phone are uploaded via iCloud, i cannot edit/rotate my photos. apparently, it's not compatible with windows. grrrrr. i managed to fandangle pictures from my phone by emailing them to myself and then editing them from there. does anyone have any other tips for me for editing iPhone 4 pics?

snowball fight!!

let me tell you having a good, inflated tube with no holes or rips makes for a smoother & faster ride down the hill! see how the blue one is 'puffier' than the yellow?

can you tell brybry was ready to call it a day? he actually wanted to go down one of the smaller hills by himself and he did. at the bottom of the hill, he said, "that.was.AWESOME"!!

fun saturday for us. and we were lucky we didn't choose sunday to go...it rained sunday off & on.

we went here a couple weekends ago, bruxie. it's a gourmet waffle house.

i had the bananas & nutella waffle. YUM!

no crafty cards to share this post but this store front caught my eye. love the pompom garland!

and this cute sign was outside that same store! super fun!

be mine

i have a card to share today. not much time these days and i don't know where all the hours go during the day! made a cute little valentine's card!

this little guy has been growing like weeds! he is REALLY into scooby doo right now! i remember that cartoon when i was little. ahhh, the cycle continues! he'll be 5 later this month!

have a great day! thanks for stopping by!

happy new year!

happy new year! finally feeling better (from last year ;) and have time to post 2 cards. this is a new set from lawn fawn called love 'n breakfast. super cute!another card i made for aunties who sent us a big box of pears for christmas. they were juicy & delicious! just had to make a pear-specific card using cosmo cricket, lawn fawn & hero arts.

sorry for this not so good picture below. hubby asked me last minute to package this gift up and i made a quick card to go along with this movie-themed gift. this little cake here, we bought for the guys at our favorite sushi place to wish them a merry christmas. we go there every week on wednesdays. the boys both grew up eating there in their carseats! LOL! they treat us real well there and knows all our drinks and our favorite foods there. i think both brandon & bryan have a job there when they can legally work!since we are talking about sweet treats, here are pictures from last month when we went to extrodinary desserts.

pretty treats

love that color green on that flower

and some pictures of the boys from last month

love the tinsel snowman....so vintagey

did you make any resolutions for the new year? i did. one of them being going to bed earlier! well, it's 2:40am right now and i'm still not sleeping! i suppose my blog title still suits me.

santa's not coming to our house!!

happy holidays and merry christmas to all! this was our photocard (below) we sent out this year. i made it with this template here. love that it was easy and let me put multiple pictures! the only thing i didn't remember to do (or if it was even possible) was to put a message on the front. i ended up writing the boys' names [after i got tired of writing all our names]. a thing i do is to take a pic of the boys on a ride with their age on the side...hopefully, people got that that is how old they are. we went to legoland on both their birthdays and it worked out great! :)made this wreath out of old vintage mercury bulbs.

this picture below is more of what the color is like. it took about 36 to make this. i was picky about the colors so i didn't use all the bulbs. BTW, hubby managed to knock over the pretty light blue bulb on the bottom right hand side :( it shattered to pieces.

it took me months & months of collecting these.

so, let me tell you a funny story. last friday, it was brandon's last day of school before they went on their 2 week break.

we were sitting around at home after school and the boys must have been bored. they both disappeared for a while and here comes brandon, running upstairs and says, "look at what i got mom!! a new toy! it's SO cool!" i was like, "WHERE did you get that toy???" busted. bryan was right behind him waving his toy around too!

my 2 boys opened up 2 out of the ONLY 4 presents that were under the tree at that time. mind you, the tree wasn't even decorated and there wasn't even a tree skirt down yet. they know exactly when christmas is too. we've been counting down the days with a chocolate advent calendar (trader joe's). i couldn't believe they opened up thier presents before christmas!!!!

i gave them a yellin' and a loooooong lecture. and i told them those 2 toys they opened will have to be donated to a toy drive of some sort. there were LOTS of tears but hey, you have to lay down the law. i'm sorry if the 2 peeps who gave these toys to the boys see this.....it's a hard lesson for them but it's one they have to remember.

the boys holding their toy they opened, ready to donate.

i read that sprinkles (cupcakes) was having a toy drive where if you donate an unwrapped toy, they'll give you a free cupcake. that's where i chose to have the boys donate to. when i told eddie this, he said, "wait......so they are donating toys they opened and in exchange, they get a cupcake?" well, if you put it that way....yes, it doesn't sound right rewarding them with a cupcake. the double whammy too was if you say their secret word of the day, you get a free cupcake so we got 2 free cupcakes each.

secret here----me & my sister used to always peek in our presents when we were little. we'd open them carefully and tape them back shut. bottom line, we did it subtly. the boys don't know what that means yet---obviously!!!

here are the other picutres we took with santa.

luckily, we visited santa BEFORE the incident! LOL

i made some altered calendars for school staff, the crossing guard and some co-workers.

thought this one looks so simple, it took the longest! lining up the owls just so was time consuming!

thanks for stopping by! i'm sick as a dog right now. been going to sleep early this week. on monday, i thought i had strep throat. luckily, the next morning, it wasn't as severe but now, it's full-blown. good thing all our shopping was done & i had wrapped mostly everything so there's not much left to do.

merry christmas and happy holidays to you all!!

santa

took the boys to go visit santa on tuesday. wasn't too crazy. i used my own camera...3 shots for $8. luckily, the boys cooperated and i got nice pictures on those 3 shots! i actually got 6 shots but more on that another day ;)

the boys are getting excited about christmas!

been busy making card sets still for brandon's teachers. i stuck with the same layout as the previous set. it works for fast & easy, clean & simple cards. this one is an orange and green combo.

this set is yellow & green

just changed out the sentiments
TFL!

card sets

this time of year is when i start thinking of gifts for brandon's teachers and school staff. i always resort to something hand made. card sets are always useful, right?
i like how these holiday card set came out that i might just keep these for myself!

i love how this set below came out and the color combo. i have so many other combos in my head that i want to make....now if i can only find the time.

been dealing with the sickies in our house, holiday decorating and gift buying. eddie put up lights this weekend and we also bought our christmas tree. the lights are on the tree and now, i have the fun task of decorating with the boys.

2nd grade homework takes up a lot of time too! 3 digit math (the subtraction is killing me! i really don't remember as a 7 year old doing the kind of math brandon is doing!). the spelling words are tough too! 20 words a week they have to learn in 4 days!

bryan has been keeping my patience at bay too! he has become a very stubborn 4 year old (wasn't the terrible 3's supposed to gone by now?). i cannot wait til bryan turns 5!! on my days off while brandon is in school, we "play" school at home. we have a schedule---we come home after walking big bro to school, we have breakfast and then we do our writing ABC's and 123's. we've recently started doing our own spelling tests too with basic everyday words. he has a book log that he writes in his own notebook of the books he reads daily. he'll have his quiet playtime (building legos, action figures). and then i'll let him watch 30 minutes of tv. he's a pretty good boy for the most part but there are those days..................

ok, onto the cards. :)

thanks for looking!