Dinner by a nine-year-old

I hope everyone had a wonderful Thanksgiving! Some of you may know my son has decided to stop eating meat and fowl so we didn't have a turkey this year. We had planned on delivering Meals on Wheels again this year but that stomach thing my son had a few days ago... well, unfortunately it was my turn. It's been almost 48 hours and I still feel like crap. What was so sweet though was that my 9-year-old son made T'giving dinner almost completely by himself - with my watchful eye, of course.

He made stuffing (or dressing if you live here in the South) and corn and mashed potatoes and gravy and baked apples. He did such a great job. I'm so proud of my baby. I ate the wonderful dinner he made regardless of my temporary illness and was thankful for every second I was able to sit at the table. Now, it wasn't so much fun about an hour later, but I'd do it over again. Can you imagine how proud he was of himself? It was great to watch.

I regret not being able to deliver meals to those unable to leave their homes this holiday but will do double duty on Christmas Day to make up for it, and hopefully volunteer some between now and then, as well. Anyone want to join me?

Have a great weekend, all. Hope the shopping was fruitful for you if you dared to do so.

Hello around the world!

I am always amazed at the internet. It links much of the world together in a way not possible not so many years ago. Now, I can chat back and forth with my friend in London in real time for free. :-) Remember letters? I still love letters and still write them occasionally... not often enough. I think I'll write a letter today to someone special.

I was looking at my stats for my web site today. I'm in awe of the people around the world that actually look at my site and then come back to read more! So a big welcome to all my i-friends in the United States, Canada, Denmark, France, United Kingdom, Australia, Philippines, Spain, Germany, Japan, Sweden, Singapore, and Italy. I'd love to know more about you! Leave me a comment and introduce yourself!

Working on a few things around the house today since Cory is home sick. Some stomach thing. Poor baby. I hope you all have a wonderful Thanksgiving, if you are indeed celebrating it.

Thank you Freestylers!

Once again, the class was a blast last night. I just wanted to say thank you to everyone who has taken the freestyle classes and I will think seriously about teaching more technique classes! Thank you for asking! I get so tickled every time someone says they've enjoyed my classes.

I think the big hit of the night was the technique using frisket and adhesive shelf liner paper. For anyone out there buying all those expensive masks.... this is a more affordable way to mask and you can create all your own shapes and designs and alphas.

The OTHER big hit was of course, the FREE SET OF SOUFFLE PENS from SAKURA!!!!!!!!! For those of you who paid for the series of classes and weren't able to make it, I'm putting together a kit for you (including your Souffle pens!) with supplies and instructions from last night's class. In addition, I will also be putting together an instruction sheet for the first two classes... it may be hard to remember all those cool techniques!

I may be teaching one more doodling class before the end of the year. I wasn't planning on it, and the timing around the holidays is usually not great, but India at Scrapbook Mania said she's had some people asking about the class. So, if you want to take 90 minutes out of your busy holiday schedule to learn some doodling, call the store and let them know. I'll hold the class if there are 6 people who sign up. The date is December 18th - the week before Christmas. It's a Monday night.

Have a great Tuesday everyone!

Freestyle Class - Final Class!

Well, it's the third class in the Freestyle class series sponsored by Sakura. What a bummer! I've had so much fun!

Anyway, here's a quick list of what you can bring tonight. I will have extras on hand just in case. Oh, and by the way, I can't wait to give you your freebie from Sakura tonight! It's awesome!

• 1 or 2 craft paints, whatever colors
• a paint brush, small-ish
• a paper piercer or craft knife (like an X-acto)
• black pigment pens (like the ones you got during the first class)
• scraps
• chalks or ink pad
• a few photos to play with - one with a person
• colored pencils
• scissors

Again, I have extras of everything so if you don't have something from this list, don't worry about it.

Looking forward to it ladies!

Yay! Check out Scrapbook Trends!

There's always those couple months between the time your layout is requested for publishing and when the actual issue is published when you are curious to see if it actually makes the cut. Working at a magazine, I know how that works. It's never a done deal til the pages are actually at the printer and being printed. And even then, there's a chance we'll have to stop the presses for something crazy. But I'm happy to report I made the cut for Scrapbook Trends' November issue with this layout entitled "Tradition." I created it for a creative alphas class I taught at Scrapbook Mania several months ago. Well, I hope everyone had a great Halloween. I'll be posting pics as soon as they're uploaded.

Crop-a-dile

I know some of you already have the Crop-a-dile. Most of you have seen it I think. It 's this pink-handled tool that does all kinds of stuff - can put holes in metal and sets eyelets and grommets and flattens brads.

It seriously cuts through chipboard like buttah!!! I thought there was no way I was going to spend money on ANOTHER tool but I'm glad I did. But be careful with those fingers! It's a powerful little tool. Check it out.