Two Months

It has been over 2 months since Carolyn joined our family. At her two month check up, she weighed 12 pounds and 2 ounces and was 23 inches long. CJ is smiling more, which we all love. This month, she met her Uncle "Shrek" and visited San Francisco. Most of our days are quiet and spent around our house and neighborhood. We are happy with our current rental house and can easily walk to the school, library, and a Friday farmers' market. She likes playing with the toy bar on her Pack 'n Play and sitting in the "monkey" seat. She sleeps through most of her brother's soccer games.

Green & Rainbows

We enjoyed St. Patrick's Day around here. I made a rainbow fruit salad for Alex's lunch and for our dinner. We still need more rain in California, so it would be nice to see some real rainbows this spring.

Here is a silly leprechaun after school on Tuesday. He enjoyed decorating a rainbow cookie at school and getting some Lucky Charms cereal.

I don't have any green clothing, but I still have the necklace that my brother gave me from Ireland.

I ended my day be making a green card for Jennifer's color challenge. I don't use green as much in my cards, so this was a fun way to use my various shades of green inks and card stock.

Supplies Used:
Whisper White, Mossy Meadow, & Old Olive Card Stock
Mossy Meadow & Pear Pizzaz Inks
Crazy for You Stamp Set
Big Shot
Retired Embossing Folder (You can use a variety of embossing folders instead.)
Hello You Thinlits Dies


I am planning to blog about card making and Stampin' Up! on Wednesdays, so I hope you will check back regularly for updates. Here is a link to the current Weekly Deals.

Hello February!

I hope that your 2015 is off to a good start! I have been looking forward to February. We made it through some hectic holiday travel and a local move. We are still unpacking and getting settled in a new rental house.

I recently helped chaperone a kindergarten field trip to the Children's Discovery Museum and enjoyed the trip. Here is Alex in the bubble room:

I am still unpacking and organizing my craft supplies, but my friends in the Fun 'n Crafty Stampers group will have some fabulous love and Valentine cards to share on Wednesday. Check out Jennifer's blog on Wednesday for more details.

The last card that I made was over the holidays with my mom using the December Paper Pumpkin kit. These cards were fun to make together!

Have a great February!

Project Life App

Happy Holidays! We are enjoying the holiday season around here. I am documenting our fall and holidays with the Project Life App on my iPhone.

Dudley Dog from Alex's kindergarten class spent a few days at our house. Alex shared their adventures in a class journal.

Our November included bike rides, a craft fair, and lots of reading. I really enjoyed the fall colors!

Alex's school takes the week off at Thanksgiving, and we all enjoyed a break with lots of family time. We cooked a great meal for Thanksgiving. Before the rainy days began, we got in another family bike ride.

We had a fun afternoon at Christmas in the Park with our friends.

We cannot keep all of Alex's artwork from kindergarten, so I enjoy making pages to remember the items he brings home. We recently made gingerbread cookies for Alex's class to decorate as part of their holiday celebrations.

I am looking forward to easily documenting Christmas this year with my phone and this app. I printed a few 12x12 pages exported from the app and am happy with the results. Photo books are another great option with these pages.

Halloween Fun

We've had a fun Halloween! Last weekend we carved our pumpkins with some of John's work friends.

Then we went to a Halloween party hosted by one of my crafty friends.

Today Alex was able to wear a simple costume to school for the day. It was a rainy afternoon, so I helped his class with inside activities. They decorated a cookie and made some halloween crafts after lunch. I am so glad that I have the time to help at Alex's school!

We all went trick-or-treating around the neighborhood tonight, including Paddy. We had a great time, especially Alex.

(The bowl went missing, so next time we will use an extra box!)

Bike MS: Waves to Wine

We are back from a weekend in Sonoma for the Bike MS: Waves to Wine Ride. It was John's first year participating in the event, and I hope to join him next year. I will have some training to do to get my milage up since the shortest ride option is almost 40 miles.

A big THANK YOU to our friends and family who donated!

The event had approximately 2400 riders with different route options. Many of the riders started in San Francisco and rode to Sonoma. John dealt with flat tires on the route but still made it back. Alex made friends, and we entertained ourselves while John was out riding. We decided to camp out, which was convenient to the ride location. We had sleeping bags and sleeping pads, but I really missed having a mattress. Is that a sign of my age?!

First Week of School

My Facebook and Instagram feeds are showing lots of fun back-to-school photos, and the first week of school has come and gone for us.

Alex started kindergarten on Monday, August 18th. We live a short walk from the elementary school, which is a great perk of our current location. Our drop off time is late morning since our district has not moved to a full-day kindergarten. I was not too nervous until it was time to walk to school. I quickly snapped some pictures as Alex lined up and did not get too emotional when it was time for him to go. I was doing well until I walked away from the school and choked up. Now what? It was a LONG four hours as I waited to pick him up.

Of course, Alex did great and is enjoying school. He told me about lunch, recess, and the special toys reserved for Fridays if you do all of your homework. He enjoyed making puppets at school and performed his own puppet shows at home. We are slowly getting into a routine, and his school day goes by faster for me now.

After my big change in employment, I wondered how fast we would see changes in our lives. We are slowly working on decluttering around the house. I do not have an exercise routine yet, but I do ride my bike more. It is easier to keep up with housework, and Alex has started making his bed. I know that change and new habits take time, but there is one big change around here that is already helping our family. Our mornings are less rushed and more enjoyable. I no longer push the snooze button (multiple times) on an alarm clock. We are not all watching the time and rushing our the door. John actually gets to leave earlier for work while Alex and I have extra time to get ready for the day. This is a really nice change for us!

I hope that everyone is having a good start to the new school year!

Maker Faire 2014

As usual, we had a great time at Maker Faire. This was our third time attending the big Bay Area Maker Faire. Taking the Caltrain and wearing good sun hats helped the event go smoothly for us. This year, we stayed from about 11:30 AM - 5:30 PM. Even though we could not see the entire event during that time, we still saw lots of neat stuff. I think that we also saw lots of different things from last year.


One of our first stops was to see the robots made by Pasadena City College students from their engineering club. There was a walking robot made from cardboard.


John is standing in a 100 square foot space that can be built in only 4 hours.


It's bikes to pull the dog sled.


Alex made his own rocket with John's help and launched it 3 times.


John and Alex made a magin wand at the Intel booth.


Alex made a circuit with some magnetic tiles.


The robots squirting water were a hit.


And then there was the scary clown robot...


Ice cream time!


The light-up water fountain was really cool.


Alex really liked all of the hands-on booths.


Towards the end of our day, Alex played with Legos and we found some chairs to sit down.


I managed to find a new craft product. Cricut just came out with the new Explore electronic cutter that cuts everything from paper to fabric to balsa wood. It does not need cartridges with is a benefit in my opinion. It will cut SVG files, which I have on the My Digital Studio software or you can design your own things to cut.

There are Maker Faire events all over the world and they are so fun! We attended our first Maker Faire in Austin, Texas before Alex was born.