I've Moved!

I've moved! Please come for a visit at my new blog home:

http://www.xanga.com/Tanya1968

Quirky!

Here's the layout for my June BOM (Book of Me) class. I'm sure I've mentioned this before, but I teach a monthly BOM class at a local scrapbook store. The class itself is about 2 years old and was started by my friend Kimberly. I took over as the instructor last November when she moved to Colorado. It's a fun group. Some people have come and gone but the core group has stayed the same for almost the whole 2 years. It's strictly a BOM class so all the layouts focus on ourselves. The theory being, that regardless if we scrap for family or ourselves, often our layouts focus on others and we are left out of the picture, literally. A couple people in class have children so they are doing this as something to leave to or share with their their kids, so they can see who Mom really is/was. The rest of us do not have kids and are simply doing this for ourselves. And what better reason is there? :)

Anyway, the theme for June was Quirky. All the little things or idiosyncrasies that make you... You! It was funny because none of these things seemed quite so quirky until I started putting them down on paper. LOL I'm not sure if the journaling will be visible... but that's okay. Not sure if I necessarily want my quirks out there for everyone to snicker at, anyway. Hee hee!

Father's Day card

Thought I would share a photo of the card I made for my dad for Father's Day. The journaling block, important message and original stamps are all from the Stampin' Up Office Accoutrements set. Love that set! I used the Doodle Alphabet to stamp Daddy, and "best" was from the Everyday Flexible Phrases set. Oh, and I used the spiral punch that I just got last week... I can tell that one is going to get a lot of use. :)

Shane

My friend Danni posted a great Friday Night Challenge at our Scrap101 group last week but unfortunately I wasn't able to get to it. The challenge was to create a layout using a pocket (or envelope). I still wanted to do it so I did this layout Sunday night. The photo is my nephew Shane when he had just turned a year old. Hard to believe he is now 11! Most patterned papers are by Crate Paper but there's some Foofala in there, too. The chipboard "X" is by Lil Davis, the white rub-on's are Making Memories, the flower is Heidi Swapp, the polka dot brad is either Making Memories or Bazzill (can't remember which), and the stamps are from Ma Vinci. Really happy with this one. :-)

Tuesday, June 12

I just walked into my boss's office (where there is a wall of windows) and it is pitch black outside. I do believe it is about to POUR. I just went and checked the local weather and radar and there is a severe thunderstorm warning in effect. The National Weather Service is reporting that hail up to 2" in diameter and wind gusts up to 70 mph are possible. Sheesh. Wish I was at home with a good book.

Friday thru Sunday

A little weekend recap...

I did some scrap shopping Friday night and had fun doing it. My Yahoo scrapbooking group, Scrap101, has a monthly "Diva" and everyone sends her gifts throughout the month. This month the Diva is none other than Danni! I had so much fun picking out what I wanted to get for her... and of course I couldn't help getting some goodies for me, too. LOL I still have one other item to find before I can box it all up and ship it to her but I plan on looking for that during my lunch hour today.

After shopping, Robert and I stopped at The Loop for a late dinner. Oh my goodness, was that ever tasty. I'm not much of a burger fan (not like Robert... he could live off of them) but once in a great while nothing beats a good burger. And that's just what I had Friday night. A Loop n' Bleu with fries and a side salad. So, so good.

Saturday morning I met my mom and my two sisters for breakfast at Village Inn. We usually meet for dinner the first Wednesday of every month but we decided to do breakfast this month instead. It worked out really well. I love our Wednesday dinners but it does make for a very long day. I get up at 5:45am, at the office by 8:00, rush out at 5:00 to make it to dinner, and I don't get home until after 8:00 that evening. Long day. We all had a good time Saturday morning and spent two hours chatting, laughing, and catching up. I love our monthly get-togethers.

After breakfast my younger sister, Terri, asked if I wanted to stop by the scrapbook store on that side of town... and of course I couldn't resist. I ended up spending $60 (ouch!) but I got most everything I will need to put together my London album. I'm going to use the Love Elsie Toby Collection for the London album... I love the colors. Can't wait to get started on it.

While I was out Saturday morning, Robert took my car to the dealership to have the oil changed and then took it to a car wash for a thorough inside and out cleaning... $35 later it looks wonderful. He's such a sweetie. Later in the day he took his car back for the same treatment (not the oil change... just the wash and cleaning). Saturday evening we went to an early dinner (I had skipped lunch since I'd had a big breakfast) at Smokey Bones. We started with some barbecue chicken nachos and oh my goodness were they ever tasty! Even better than my dinner, I think. LOL

Sunday was more low-key. We left the house once to go by Wal-Mart for a couple items and then stopped by my parent's house to help them. They were changing ISP's and needed some help getting set up. Other than that we stuck close to home. I did one layout Sunday night. Used a photo of my nephew Shane when he was a year old (he's now 11). Love the way it turned out... I'll have to get it scanned tonight so I can share it. Then I watched Music & Lyrics (again!) and called it a night.

It was a good weekend... just HOT. Sunday it hit 95 degrees and was humid... just miserable. I think we're in for a long hot summer!

Hope everyone had a great weekend!

It Could Be You

I just recently finished this one. I had high hopes for it as I really enjoyed everything else I've read by Josie Lloyd. For the last several years she has co-written with Emlyn Rees (now her husband) but this was her very first novel (from 1997) and she was still writing on her own then. It was pretty good... although not as good as the later books. I really got into it about two-thirds through the book when all kinds of things started happening and had high expectations for the rest of the book. But then it reverted to sappy romanticism in the last two pages and that left me disappointed. Not that I don't like a happy ending... I do. And not that I don't like romance... I do. But this wasn't a romance novel. And to have everything end up all neat and tidy and sappy there at the very end was something of a disappointment. I'm so glad this wasn't the first thing I'd ever read by her... I might not have given her a second try. LOL The novels Come Together, Come Again, The Boy Next Door and We Are Family were much better and just really great reads.

Next up is Breathing Room by Susan Elizabeth Phillips. I've never read anything by her before so we shall see.

Do I Need This?

According to Google this is what I need...

Tanya needs anti-nausea drug Zofran - actually I'm feeling quite nicely today, but thank you all the same

Tanya needs a new battery - well, I never!

Tanya needs a new home - um, no, not really... I love my home

Tanya needs to be the one to reassure Whitney she does not want to take her daddy away from her - hey, I don't even know Whitney... and I certainly don't want her daddy

Tanya needs to be a critical thinker - yeah, I'll work on that

Tanya needs a way to get rid of her fat - okay, now you're just being mean

Tanya needs the money - well, who doesn't?

Tanya needs to be created - uh, hello? I'm right here

Tanya needs to get her ass across to the UK and rock the house - um, I was just there but I did not rock the house... sorry about that... maybe next time

Tanya needs this information - that's right... so spill it

Tanya needs to be at the table to smooth things over - well, if I don't have my Zofran you probably don't want me at the table

Thanks for a good laugh, Google! :-)

Cards

I must preface this post by saying I am not much of a card maker. I scrap myself silly as often as possible, but cards... not so much. I've made maybe... 5 total. LOL So keep that in mind as I share the two that I made this past weekend. For the past week every time I went into a store I looked for cards for my two nephews but nothing seemed to be appropriate. I finally decided that I would just make my own. The reason for the cards:

Jackson (age 8) - Jackson ended the school year (second grade) with straight A's. Also, he is a real star player on his baseball team (they won the Atlantic Beach championship) and he was chosen to be part of an All Star team (for the second year in a row). Jackson is such a reserved little guy and to see him excel both academically and at sports is so great.

Shane (age 11) - Shane also ended the school year (fifth grade) with straight A's. He is such an exceptional student and has been in the gifted program since he was in first grade. He was honored week before last at a ceremony at the University of North Florida for being in the top 5% of all fifth graders in the city. (To give you an idea of how many kids we're talking about, there are 105 elementary schools in Jacksonville.) To be in the top 5% of all fifth graders in the city is just incredible and I am so proud of Shane!

So, I just wasn't able to find appropriate cards for Jackson and Shane so these are the cards I made for them. Robert and I also included $20 in each card so they can do a little something fun with their money. :-)

Note To Self

I think I'm behind on sharing layouts from the Book of Me classes, so I thought I would put one up today. I think this was from February's class. I really loved the patterned paper on this one. Unfortunately I can't remember what it is so I'll have to check when I get home. The chipboard accents are from the Basic Grey Undressed Chipboard Hardware, painted with acrylic paint, and are not as bright blue in real life. The "note to" letters are Making Memories rub-on's and the "self" letters were cut from my Cricut. And the library pocket and insert were made using a Coluzzle template. I've yet to go back and add any journaling (shame on me) but I was really happy with how this one turned out.

London Pics

The whole write-up about the trip to London is in the previous post, but I thought I would also share some photos from our time there.

Our hotel in Notting hill:



Robert outside of a typical British phone box:



Piccadilly Circus:



Outside of Harrods:



Buckingham Palace:



Me and our friends Kev and Nicky on the London Eye:



Robert crossing Abbey Road... his homage to the Beatles :):



Roast beef and Yorkshire pudding at a pub:



At Kensington Palace (former home of Princess Diana):



At Her Majesty's Theatre to see Phantom of the Opera:



Me and Robert in front of Buckingham Palace:

Welcome Home

Ah, there truly is no place like home. After spending the last week in London I have come to the conclusion that I am truly a very spoiled American and I am so thankful to live in this country. I do not say that to mean that I did not enjoy London, but just that I quickly found out how much I take for granted all the little things that make my life easier/nicer/more pleasant on a day to day basis. All the things that I didn't even consider throughout the course of my day... I now have an appreciation for. As much as London was a vacation, it was also an eye-opener in that regard.

We set off on Saturday the 28th, flying from Jacksonville to Atlanta (of course... I swear, the Queen herself must have to go thru Atlanta LOL)and then on to London. The flight to Atlanta is a quick one (roughly 45 minutes) but the flight to London was almost 9 hours. Unfortunately, I do not sleep well on planes so it was a looong flight. Robert and I amused ourselves with movies and games (lots of Bejeweled and Zuma for me). :) Once in London, we took the Gatwick Express into central London, then the Underground to Notting Hill and checked into our hotel. It was early and our room wasn't ready so we checked our luggage and went around the corner to the Bagel Factory. That was our first taste of the expense of dining out in central London. Robert had a ham and cheese bagel and a Coke and I had a raspberry muffin and orange juice. Eighteen dollars. (Eye-opener #1) We were so exhausted that we went straight back to the hotel instead of walking around and checking out Notting Hill. Even though it was almost 10am in London, it was 5am to us and we had been up for almost 24 hours. I actually fell asleep in the hotel lobby. Luckily, our room was ready by about 11:00. We took the tiny lift up to the second floor (actually the third since they consider the first floor the ground floor) and let ourselves into our room for the next week. The first thing we noticed - no air-conditioning. (Eye-opener #2) Silly us, we didn't even think to ask about air conditioning when making our reservations. Unfortunately, as everyone kept telling us, it is the hottest spring on record in London for the past 200 years or some such insane number. Lovely. LOL When it came to unpacking, we discovered there was no closet. (Eye-opener #3) Instead there was a wardrobe for hanging things, but no shelves or dresser for folded items. So we resorted to stuffing things in the little tiny desk drawers. LOL Who knew?! :)

Once we were settled, we hit the streets and started wandering. We explored Notting Hill, taking in the beautiful old buildings, the tiny little cars, all the traffic, people walking everywhere, the shops and restaurants and cafes. We quickly became old pros at using the Underground... which was a good thing since you really have to use it to get almost anywhere. We had purchased 7-day Oyster cards for travel on the Underground so we just scanned our cards as we entered a Tube station and scanned again when exiting a station - no money or tickets needed. Made it easy! On Monday we did the total tourist thing and went on a red double-decker bus tour. You could hop on and hop off at various stops and it was a fun way to see a lot and start to get our bearings around the city - figuring out which sections were where.

On Tuesday, our friends Nicky and Kev took the train into the city and spent the whole day with us. (They live 2-3 hours north of London in Grimsby.) I think that was my favorite day. It was wonderful to see the city with people who knew it so well... not to mention it was great to see them again. We walked miles and miles that day and saw and did so much: the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace, a boat cruise on the River Thames, the London Tower, a fish and chips lunch at a pub near the Tower, the London Eye, the exclusive shops on Bond Street, and much more. We ended the day with a delicious meal at Bella Italia. We saw and learned so much more with Nicky and Kev than we ever would have on our own.

Wednesday, Thursday and Friday we were on our own again and spent our time shopping, sightseeing, and just taking it all in. We had tickets to see Phantom of the Opera at Her Majesty's Theater on Thursday evening and that was a real highlight for me. I adore Phantom of the Opera. We were way up in the balcony since we had only bought our tickets about 3 weeks previously but it was still absolutely worth it. On Friday, our last full day, Robert was determined to see Abbey Road so we figured out which Underground connections we needed and managed to ourselves there. And, yes, I took a photo of Robert walking across Abbey Road. :)

Then our time in London was coming to a close. We flew out of Gatwick Saturday morning, back thru Atlanta (of course!), and then back to Jacksonville. Unfortunately our luggage got hung up somewhere in Atlanta and didn't make it back to Jacksonville when we did but we tried not to let that put a damper on our homecoming. It would have been much worse if we had arrived in London without luggage! Thankfully, everything came in later that night and they were delivered at home late that night.

It was amazing to see so many of the places that I had only read about in books or seen in movies or on television. To see things like Buckingham Palace or even the red double-decker busses in person was such a thrill. It was truly a trip to remember and we have some amazing memories of our time in London.

Tagged

I was tagged recently by my online friend Dianne to come up with seven random facts about me. Hm, this should be interesting... :-)

1. I like even numbers. Or multiples of five. If I'm adjusting the volume on the radio or television I would never leave it or 9 or 11 or 17. Always an even number or a multiple of 5. Don't ask me why... I do not know. ;-)

2. I'm a major list maker. It appeals to my sense or order. I have lists for almost everything. Lists of the DVD's we own (we have so many that I keep a list so we don't buy something we already have - that's my excuse, anyway), a master packing list for anytime we travel, to do lists, lists of the Stampin' Up stuff I have (and that really *is* so I won't duplicate)... and it goes on and on. I've been known to invent reasons for lists. It's a sickness, I tell you.

3. Robert and I have been married for almost 8 years (May 1 will be 8 years) but have been together for more than 15 years. When we started dating I had just turned 23 and he was 37. Now I'm 38 and he's 52. I adore him and get positively giddy when I see him at the end of each day.

4. I read magazines from back to front. Again, don't ask me why... I do not know. ;-)

5. I have two sisters - one older and one younger. My sisters are my wonderful friends and are each very different and special. Tammy is 44, married, and has two little boys - my nephews Shane (age 11) and Jackson (age 8). Terri is 34 (well, she will be tomorrow) and is married with one step-son. I wish we all spent more time together but we, along with Mom, meet for dinner on the first Wednesday of every month and I always enjoy that.

6. I have a love of teddy bears. One I have had since I was approx. 4 years old, named Ted (yes, I was an imaginative child - lol). Over the years, Ted had developed a nasty tear in the back of his neck and his innards were spilling out. I ended up stuffing one of my father's handkerchiefs in there. Not long after Robert and I started dating, he came over with medical supplies in hand and actually gave Ted sutures (stitches) and made him good as new. I fell a little more in love right then. :-)

7. I have worked for the same company for 15 years. I started off as the receptionist (at age 23) and am now the executive assistant to the Board of Directors. (There was a short stint in HR but that last only 18 months and I try not to remember it at all. That was a bad period.) I simply love my job and the three men I work for. They are incredible people, I love what I do, and know how wonderfully lucky and rare that makes me.

So there you have it... 7 random facts about me. I don't want to necessarily call out 7 people by name and "tag" them, so if you're reading this and want to play along... consider yourself tagged. :-)