Lofty Ideas, Lazy Days

First of all, hello. I've been blog-absent for a whole month. My! How time flies where you're doing nothing. We came home last week from the grandparents house where we spent a wonderful month enjoying their company. Getting back to this blog is kind of like that old friend you have on your mind. First a couple weeks will go by and you'll think 'I really need to call her/him'. Then a month or two will pass and you're almost embarrassed to call them then. After that you rationalize the times you think of calling with 'oh, I'll call her/him when I have something important to talk about' and guess what. You let LOTS of time pass you by when you could have been catching up. Kind of like this blog. I kept telling myself, 'I'll post when I've taken pics of my new work' (not that there was a lot of that on vacation.) 'I'll post when I have a minute, I'll post when its important. Well here I am. Nothing important (until tomorrow - just forget that its 224 am right now) going on at this moment.

We had a great vacation. We come home with lofty ideas of having a garage sale once and for all, remodeling DD Alex's bedroom so instead of 2 tiny closet size rooms, she will have one big room and cleaning out and painting DD Sophia's room with the paint we bought in March. Also thought to get sewing on all the gorgeous fabrics I bought while thrifting in GA on vacation (I neglect to mention I have yet to go purchase a sewing machine.) All projects have been started, and then kaput (learned it was a german word on 'Who wants to Be a Millionaire' in case you were interested) , we're not doing much of anything. One very big thing I should be doing is organizing and planning our homeschool year which starts in September. Honestly, I'm hot. Lazy and unmotivated. The heat is putting us in a stupor. So, those projects are in the 'stay tuned, hopefully not until you-know-where freezes over' stage.

I did accomplish one thing though. Okay, 3 things.
** I finally mailed out my 'Just A Kid Swap' package to my lovely partner, Angie. What a fun swap! Hopefully Ellia will host another one soon. I'm game!
** Last month on someone's blog I found out about Swap-Bot. I joined a Fabric swap and that is #2. I finally mailed out my package to my partner. I hope she likes all the fabrics I sent. (I kept a little piece of each for me of course. *wink*).
** DD and I started a new diet (she doesn't really need to, she just wanted to eat rice/beans with me! ha) I've done lo-carb off and on for years and it just wasn't cutting it anymore for me. I think I needed a more restrictive thing for just a bit. Or maybe its just so simple even I can't mess it up. It's the Rice Diet Solution. Mom says its an older, consistent successful diet. I figured it was worth a try. So far I've lost 11 1/2 lbs this week (water weight of course, but I'll take it!) Hallelujah!

Okay I lied. I also caught up on 6x6 page swap and ATCs I owe. AND I started a fabric swap of my own on Swap-Bot. Come join me!

More tomorrow. Come back when you can celebrate with me...

Party Time, Collages & Summer Reading

Can you eat too much food? Then I think I have done just that. The spread at our fourth of July party was downright sinful. So much mountainous food the guests were sent home with plates full for future gorging. DD and I finished making the American Flag cake we set out to make. YUM! Spongy lemon cake, fluffy cool whip and tangy sweet fruits. Perfect!

I don't know what it is about your first piece of corn on the cob, on the 4th of July, but it's pure heaven. I don't muck up the flavor of my sweet corn with butter, salt or sugar. BLECK. I like it natural, sometimes grilled in the husk on the grill. There is nothing better.

The day was filled with food, fun and games. We played 'toss the waterballoon' like they were eggs. Watermelon seed spitting contest (except dad forgot and got a seedless and we had to use sunflower seeds as a substitute. *eyeroll*)

** Pic is of dorky DH spitting. He kept doing a shotput move, spinning around and around and THEN spitting. I have crazies in my family, I know! **

We ended the day playing the card game GOLF. Have you played this game before? Holler if you want instructions. We managed a pretty good game with 9 players at a time!

At this party, all of the guests were either going to and/or had graduated from the Savannah College of Art & Design (or whatever the exact name is). We talked about it a bit. DD wants to go to school for graphic and fashion design and I would love to someday take some art classes. Listening to them describe some of the course work made DD & me want to run off to college right now! Maybe someday. She has 4 more years of HS to go... I've told her if she is moving near any beach to go to college, we will be following her (like DUH! That's a given!)

I've been working on some Circle Journal pages in th evenings when everyone else is sleeping. I'll post them when finished. In the meantime, here are closeups of my ScrapAddict Altered Design Team Kit. We were given 8x8 chipboards (4) and 7gypsies papers and embellishments. I got this idea to make a 4 piece wallhanging (spells out my name) to go above my doorway in the art room. Sorry for the scans. Parts of the pieces were bulky with wiring and beads. I love how this came out, must have something to do with the 7Gypsies papers (my favs!)
** CLICK FOR CLOSEUPS**


NOTE: If you're looking for some good summer reading... at this time, I'm reading Bet Your Bottom Dollar by Karin Gillespie and listening to Artemis Fowl, Arctic Incident by Eoin Colfer. Yes, I know it's a kids book, but it's so interesting! Read Artemis Fowl first though if you're going to pick it up. Of course I brought favorites on this trip with me as well; Alphabetica and The Decorated Journal. I also checked out The Decorated Page, and a couple books on sewing with wool and quilting: Purely Primitive, Warm up To Wool and Folk Art Quilts. The wool books have great patterns to use for anything. Oh! And I have my book club's next book bought and mailing to me as I type; Watership Down. If you've read this let me know. I'd love to know your thoughts. Happy reading!

Oops! Almost forgot the picture of Wilbur (see post below...) Isn't he quite scary? He needs some 'gussying' up or at least some altering by yours truly. *wink*

Let's all say it together now "POOR WILBUR!"

Family Trips can be...

Fun... Or Exhausting, interesting, fabulous, challenging and many other adjectives I can't think of at this time. We made it to HOTlanta, GA in one piece. I didn't see much of the scenery because I was doped up on tylenol and goldfish crackers. DD developed an adversion to sitting in the back seat. It made her car sick. So I jumped in the back seat because its not too bad for me. WRONGO! Sick the whole time. Goldfish were my stomach's friend. We drove straight thru so I didn't have to stand a second day of driving torture.

It's so relaxing to visit with family. Sometimes it can be an adjustment. You're used to doing/having things a certain way and so are they, but then you start to meld and it all works out hopefully.

We haven't done much but just 'be' since we've been here. This morning we went blackberry picking at the Adams Farm and then DD #1 made blackberry cobbler. It is fabulous with vanilla ice cream.

Tomorrow is our country's Independence Day. A day to be proud we're Americans. Mom and dad have invited lots of people over from their work. It should be an interesting time. Many of them are from other countries and are here going to school, but working in my parents office during the summer months. The fridge is so stuffed with food we were instructed to eat all the leftovers for dinner so there would be more room. Sounds good to me!

DH painted the pig today. I wish I had gotten a picture of it before DH shelacked him. He is this adorable ceramic pig my parents have on the porch. 'I' thought he was cool looking, but dad apparently thought he should be spruced up for company coming. He was black, overpainted with peeling white paint. Very 'altered' looking. I offered to 're-alter' him, but dad bought pink paint instead. The darn thing now looks just like WILBUR from Charlotte's Web. It's really quite weird. DH was outside sanding the paint off of him, and then spray painting it. Interesting things we did today! ha I'll get a pic of him tomorrow when the sun is out. I think he needs a bow or collar now.

I'll write more later... Happy July 4th to Everyone!