Ever Thankful Always Grateful

According to Susan G. Komen for the Cure, approximately 200,000 American women will be diagnosed with breast cancer this year, and nearly 40,000 will die from the disease.

Please consider helping my friends Emily and Angela Powers in their efforts to raise $4,600.00 for this cause. To make an online donation go to www.The3Day.org. Click on the DONATE link and search for a participant by typing in Angela Powers or Emily Powers. You can also call 800.996.3DAY to donate over the phone. And if your a scrapper you can purchase this kit - i HOPE - at {we are} storyteller.com where all proceeds minus paypal fees will be donated.

Here's a pic of the amazing kit-



Thank you!



A quick update on the family. Well we are out for summer break which is nice. Haven't enjoyed it as much as planned just yet with the weather being so strange and the cottonwood bothering our allergies so much. The kiddos are away for the next few days so its very quiet. I'm cleaning and painting (the ceilings) and just trying to push through even though my sinuses and head are hurting.

Today though, my hubby is home from work and we are going to go out on a date night. Dinner and a movie? I can't remember the last time we were able to do that without children in tow. lol! I'm looking forward to it!

Here's a pic of dear son from the evening of excellence.



Here are a few lo's I've done recently-





And last- I am a lucky girl. I stopped in at the local scrap store the other day and found some really cool tools which I purchased. And when school was winding down I offered to make birthday cards for the employees for next school year over the summer. I was allowed to bring home (for the summer) the schools cricut expression and cartridges. I may use that to make a few hybrid things this summer as well. I guess it'll be a good way to see if I would use one enough to purchase my own after this one is returned. When my hubby returns to work tomorrow, I'll dig in out of the box and set it up. :)

My posts should be more frequent now that the busy time of the year for me is over. If you are still checking in, thank you!

Just a few more days.... and we'll be out of school for the summer. Yay! Can't wait. Until then, my head is just spinning!

We went to the zoo since last post. It was a lot of fun! We snapped tons of pics of course and here's a few. :)



We also went to the Evening of Excellence for my son where he was honor for his grade point average and two department awards. It was really awesome! His department awards were in English and Science. It was really neat that the high school organized this event to recognize all the students that put in the extra effort throughout the year. The pics for that evening are still on my camera so I'll have to share them later.

The garden is growing well and we have all kinds of goodies popping up. The corn is the only thing we had trouble with. It rained for days after planting them and so only half a row made it.

Father's day is coming and I searched high and low and thought of a great gift for dear hubby - an ipod touch. He loves music and games and has a really old ipod. When I was feeling him out, he ended up wanting to wait on that and buy a new GPS system that comes out at the end of the month. lol! So I got the ipod touch I had already bought, he gets my ipod nano and the new GPS when it comes out. lol! I'm a lucky girl!

No scrapping time, or time to play Sims 3, or play with my new ipod, but soon....

Talk to you again soon. Thanks for checking in!

The children are still sleeping. Let's not wake them. It's one of those moments where time has been flying by at what seems like a stealth speed for weeks and then this morning I woke to a lovely, quiet, glorious morning that seems to be lingering. I love it! Peaceful, quiet, and refreshing.

The highlights of the past few weeks? Let's see-

1. Darling daughter did really well in track this year. (Yay!- It's over!) She competed in districts but the coach won't tell her how she did until the award ceremony in a week. Oh the torture! lol!

2. Dear son is being honored with an award Tuesday night at school. He's a freshman this year and has had a GPA above 3.5 all year so our family is invited to attend this special award ceremony.

3. We planted our garden at the beginning of the month and then had a lot of rain the following week and we didn't know how it would affect the seeds. This week, we have everything up but the corn. The corn sadly did not make it. We'll be replanting this weekend in that area. :)

4. My husband has been having a list of troubles lately and finally decided to go see a doctor. He was diagnosed with ADHD. We were both surprised and after looking into it it was kind of crazy because he had nearly all the symptoms listed but we never would have thought of something like that. He started some meds for it and two weeks later, he says he is beginning to feel better. I'm so glad he is!

5. We took the boat out. I don't know why, but that is such a calming and relaxing thing for me to do. I was so happy to hit the water. We've had our boat now going on four years. We were out on the water all of the time the first two summers and then last year we only took it out twice. With the combination of gas prices being SKY HIGH and the water level being SO LOW in the nearby lakes we hardly got out. This year is looking good and that makes me ESTATIC!

Here's a few things I've worked on while I was MIA from the blog-









And this week I am looking forward to- going to the zoo tomorrow with the kids. Going shopping while in Portland at IKEA. I saw in a mag a really neat shelf thing that held photo frames up on your wall (kind of like a chair rail) and it credited IKEA. So I'm going on the hunt. lol! Also, I'm invited to a stamping up get together with some friends from work Monday night. I haven't been to one in eons so it should be all new and FUN! Tuesday is the award thing for my son. This week Sims 3 comes out! I'm thrilled and hope to pick it up even though I know I probably won't have time to play it until I'm off for the summer. And and and.... lol! The best news of all - just 11 school days and 2 hours left before the kids and I are OFF FOR THE SUMMER! We are all really excited!

Did I mention yet the super fab and most awesome sale going on? Well, here's the low-down and you won't want to miss it! :)



Okay- I'll try to post again mid week. Thanks a million for stopping by for a visit!

There are a few hours left of the sale...



And how was your mother's day? Mine was very nice. We had a pj day and watched some rented movies all day long. It was so nice to just stay home and relax. The kids bought me a new coffee mugs from starbucks... its really cool and I'll post a photo of it soon. They still need to decorate it this weekend. They also gave me a bouquet of beautiful flowers and a balloon. And darling daughter made me a WONDERFUL card with a drawing inside that is just so cool. :)

Here's a few pics-



Did I mention that darling daughter made a scrumptious cake?



And here are the kids and I being totally silly in our pj's- lol!



No scrapping since last post. Things are always so busy this time of year. School for the kids and work for me is winding down which always make for extra work. Both kids had parent-student-teacher conferences this week and it was all great news. I'm SO PROUD of my kiddos! Tomorrow I have my own year end review too. About four weeks left until we are all off for the summer. I can't wait!

When my computer was down and they did a restore at BB I lost 1 big file that I apparently didn't have backed up. SO here and there this past week I've been re-creating a Itemized scrapbooking supplies. It's been kind of nice going through the folders of goodies and digging out cool things I haven't used in a bit or at all yet. Did I say that out loud? lol!

And I bought a couple of cool storage containers at JoAnn's for my physical scrappy supplies. I now have a better place for my papers and a home for a few things I just didn't know where to store. I'm really digging them and that I found them 40% off. These are by Jessware and they are awesome!



Well I have got to go. Darling daughter is up to her eyebrows in homework and calling for help. Have a great week all and thanks for stopping in!

Darling daughter had a track meet this week at the high school where they filmed the movie Twilight that is. Really it is Kalama High School a stones throw down the road from us. But the geeks that we are- we had to take a pic in the parking lot. Now where's Bella's truck?!?! lol!

This week has been very busy. Here's a review in pics-

The track meet where daughter placed 1st in her sprint and long jump. Go McKena!





Planting the garden seeds-



Dear son got his permit last Saturday and has been learning to drive this week-



Luckily I have a three day weekend. I hope to get the housework done tomorrow so that I can play with my NSD goodies Friday night and all day Saturday. Wouldn't that be lovely!?! This evening, after taking the kids into the orthodontist, I've been playing around a little with the blog. Changing the look up a bit. So sorry if its making your reader freak out. Please bear with me for the next couple of days.

Before I go- I just wanted to send warm Mother's day wishes to my friends. I hope that it is a special day for you all with family. Have a great weekend!

Me? I spent more than I planned but enjoyed every minute I had shopping. And I found some of the best deals. I love great deals! Look at these-



And in a genuine blond moment, I bought those AGAIN. lol! So, if any of my readers would like these I will give them to the first person who let's me know and provides me their email addy. A little blog give away.

Last weekend I was able to do so much scrapping. It was lovely. Here's some of the things I completed.







Last week was so busy. Darling daughter is doing amazing at track. She did pull a muscle and so she is taking a break from the hurdles but still running and doing the running long jump.

Dear son got a book from the Dept. of Motor Vehicles to study. He took and passed his test Saturday. He's now got a permit now. I can't believe he's this old. Ack!

I didn't have a lot of scrappy time this weekend so this was all I made - TFL!



And now I'm off to work. I hope you all have a marvelous Monday and thanks for stopping by!!!