Beautiful Thailand

I just got back from a 2 week trip to Phuket, Thailand . . . Wow!  Really . . there are no words to describe the country, the people, the culture  . . . it was AMAZING!  My mom, sister and I went over for my brother's wedding.  Here are a handful of photos of some of our adventures:

We only spent one day at the beach - Nai Harn Beach - beautiful!

My sister & I at the Fish Spa - yikes - look at the grip she has on my leg!

We had to take an elephant ride . . . don't have to do it again, but we can say we did it once!

Ellen and I with our cold drinks after the elephant ride:

My brother and Nu during the wedding ceremony - awesome!

My brother with his son and step-daughter - such a beautiful family!

My brother, sister, Mom, Nu and I at the wedding reception - such a great time!!

Bo, Nu and Sam

The sun coming up as we swam in the pool on our first full day in Phuket:

The beach at the gypsy village in Rawai:

Pina Colodas by the pool!

We went up to Big Buddha and were all blessed by the monk - very cool!

Patong - or "Crazy Town" as we called it - wowzer!

Finding our chairs at Nai Harn beach:

Mom, El and I sipping coconut water at a very cool bar on the way to Kata:

It's been raining (really hard) on the Olympic Peninsula the last few days . . . . *sigh* . . . I miss Thailand and my brother.  Can't wait to go back again.

Now I need to get busy and get an album together of my trip . . . I saved everything (currency, receipts, ticket stubs, etc.) and took TONS of pics . . .so I just need to put it all together in an album so I can show everyone what an amazing trip it was!

More later!

New garden chair

I purchased this adorable bent wicker chair from one of the highschool students who was making (and selling) them to earn money to participate in a CTE competition . . . I got it for a great price and I knew it would go perfectly in my new garden!! I was thrilled to finally pick it up today!

The garden is almost done . . . just a little paint (and a roof) on my greenhouse and some pea gravel and we'll be DONE!  I'll post before and after photos as soon as the last of the work is complete.  It's been a long process . . . we started our complete backyard renovation last summer.  Glad to be able to enjoy it this summer . . . from my new chair!

Thanks for stopping by . . . enjoy your day!

Daddy's new toy . . .

My husband drove down to Oregon last weekend . . he's been researching boats for several months and finally gave in and bought this one! He's like a kid at Christmas!! It's a great boat . . . a 2007 North River. He got home Friday evening from Oregon and we ran outside to check it out . . . this is a photo in front of our house . . .





and Saturday morning we got up and took the boat out to Lake Sutherland for a maiden voyage . . .



The boys had a blast . . . I can't wait to see them when the weather is actually sunny and warm. It was raining lightly on us at the lake, but that didn't stop them from totally enjoying themselves on the new boat . . .



Here's a photo of me and the boys giving Daddy a "thumbs up" on our new toy! :-)



And . . a photo of the inside of the boat. It comfortably seats 6 people . . the 2 front seats have shock absorbers in them, which will be nice out on the ocean when salmon fishing this summer! There is a little room up under the bow that will serve as storage for the downriggers when we're not using them, but will also be a great place to throw a foam pad and a sleeping bag so the boys can crash if they need to while we're out crabbing, shrimping and fishing!



Now I really can't wait for summer!

Beautiful paper . . .

. . . makes for simple, but lovely, cards. I had this velvety soft paper in my stash and made a couple of quick cards with it.







It's snowing here in Port Angeles today . . . our first snow of the season . . .



. . . a perfect day to spend some time playing in my scraproom (after a snowball fight with the family, of course)!!

Have a great day and thanks for stopping by!

Point No Point Lighthouse

Just wanted to share this beautiful photo I took the other day. We took a little detour on our way home from my niece's birthday party in Woodinville on Sunday and stopped at Point No Point Lighthouse. Pretty neat, huh?!?!

Has it really been 2 months . . .

since I last posted? Wow . . . well, I am about to take quite a longer hiatus as I have just enrolled in school (FULL TIME!) to finish my BA in Education. As I will also be working full time, continuing to be a Den Leader for my son's cub scout den and being a wife and mother . . . the next 2 years are going to be BUSY and STRESSFUL. All of this will leave me very little breathing room so I don't know how often I will get on here.

We did get away last weekend to a wonderful camping trip at LaPush (yes, Jacob Black's stomping grounds!). It's about a 90 minute drive from our house and I just had to share a couple of photos to let you know just beautiful and fun it was . .







Our trailer was just about 50 feet from the beach . . it was beautiful!




The surf was amazing and the kids had a blast running from the waves all weekend!


My youngest son preferred to play in the little creek that ran down, through the driftwood, to the beach!


We had such a great time, we're going back with my SIL and her family for several nights after the 4th of July!

And I have actually been making cards, it just takes so long to upload and crop, etc. that I just don't get them on my blog. I thought I would post one that I made this morning (all CTMH) for a birthday party we're going to tomorrow . . . .



. . . and then I'll just have to say, put your name on my email if you want to see when I post next . . maybe easier for you then coming back to nothing new on my blog time and time again! Putting your name on my email will mean that you get an email from my blog whenever I post something new - try it! It's a great way to keep up with what someone is doing without having to remember where you were!

I hope I can eeek out some time to play with my paper crafting, but I'm not planning on too much . . .so, please be patient with me. I will try to post something every now and then.

So, here I go . . . off on another adventure! I'll keep you posted on my status!

:-) jeani

Superheros and Santa

Here is a photo of my little superheros on Halloween:

My 3 year old was Batman and my 6 year old was Ironman ~ aren't they adorable!



The day after Halloween, we went to visit Santa. He is such a fun Santa . . . this is the first year that Joe actually sat on his lap willingly (although you can see he is pulling a little to his right - away from Santa!)!





Hope you all had a great Halloween with your kids! We had 11 kids (and their parents (our friends!) over before trick-or-treating to have pumpkin pizza. It was a lot of fun and something we've decided to do again next year and maybe every year! Here's a photo of most of the kids in costume in our front yard (4 of the kids weren't there when I took the photo and then I forgot to get another one when everyone was there!):





Have a good week!

My Scrap Space

Ok . . finally got these photos uploaded. I rearranged my scrap space about a week ago and here are the before and after photos . . . my space is arranged in an L shape around the bed in our spare bedroom:

BEFORE:
I had my large table by the window, but never really felt like I had a good work space . . everything was spread out . . .


I had my husband build a wood block to raise my desk up so I had a cutting area that I could stand up at . . . still no good working space . . .


My stamps and misc. junk were stashed on my bookshelf in the corner and my CTMH paper is stored in the white cubes:


Misc. accessories are stored in these drawers and my inks were on the far wall - away from my desks . . . (at one time my desk had been underneath these shelves so ink was more convenient):


These old Ikea shelves held mainly photos:


More storage . . . my contraband papers are mostly stored in these pull out drawers, along with all of my scraps . . . my albums etc. in the wire cubes . . . ugh!! Such a hodgepodge . . . IT DROVE ME CRAZY!


AFTER:
My small desk is now in front of the window (and off the block my husband built for me!) with all of my papers TOGETHER to the left. I'm getting 2 more white cubes this weekend to replace the drawers (that are falling apart because they're overstuffed!). . .then my little shelf will sit level on top of it.


Some of my ribbons, flowers, raffia, chipboard, etc. are stored in these old jars that sit on my white cubes in front of the window . . . I'm an "out of sight - out of mind" type of person and if I can't see my stuff I forget I have it . . .so these jars are great for keeping stuff in my sight!





My larger table is to the right with BOTH of my storage shelves above it and EASILY ACCESSIBLE . . . .


these are the shelves that hold my stamps, ribbon and misc. embellishments :





and, finally . . . my bachelor's degree from CTMH training program . . just had to embellish it a little! LOL!!



Finally . . . a space I actually enjoy sitting down and working in . . . still have a couple of things I want to do as far as organizing papers, etc. . . but it's the best use of the space I've had so far and I'm very happy with it! Hope you enjoyed the photos and hope you enjoy your space as much as I'm enjoying mine!