Mom, I love the paths!

When I was a kid one of my favorite things to do was make paths in the yard with the leaves. For some reason, it was just fun. So Tuesday, I made some for the girls. They loved it. Emma was so excited for them to be finished that she was just following me around while I made them. Once they were done they just ran and ran, then we got out a couple riding toys and they used those. Emma also was playing "town" as in over there was the grocery store, and over here was her house and right here is where you park your bike. I love it. I love her little creative mind, her imagination. I love watching them play. They're awesome.



This one will be two Sunday. My, oh my...

I got these today

at Target. Aren't they cute?


I have small ears. And both the earbuds that came with our ipod and the ones I bought back when we got it fall out of my ears. This is annoying when attempting to run. I already dislike running, so having to constantly put my earbuds back in my ears while running makes is worse. Last week I was talking about this while working out and my friend Megan suggested getting child-size earbuds. I'd never thought of it. Today at Target I found these, called Sweet Little Earbuds, made for small ears! Hooray! I love them. They're comfy and don't fall out. Of course I was only fake-running around the kitchen to the amusement of my girls while testing them. But still. They didn't fall out! I actually want to go run tomorrow just to use them. And that's saying a lot.

In other news, Mackenzie chipped my tooth last night. I noticed it while flossing but didn't figure out Mackenzie did it until my dentist was fixing it today. Good timing though, since I already had the dentist appointment scheduled. That girl has got a hard head.

Five on Tuesday

1. Got this picture of Emma last Thursday at the park. I love it. And her shirt could not be more fitting.


2. Love this one's hair.


3. So we thought Emma had chicken pox. She's vaccinated, but on Saturday night she had a small rash that we all thought looked like chicken pox. After a visit to the doctor yesterday, it looks as though it's just a virus/rash that seems to be on it's way out. As long as that continues she should be going back to school Thursday which I'm so happy about - it's her Halloween parade. We missed Truck-or-Treat and the parade at the fitness center Sunday. Plus Saturday is Halloween and we were planning to have friends over and Sunday is Mackenzie's birthday and party.

4. Golfing.


5. After she fell off the tricycle on the driveway and got a nice bump on her head, she wears a helmet no matter what she's riding, big wheel included. Thankfully, she really likes the Dora helmet. She's very Dora here - helmet, outfit, bike.

Menu Plan Monday

Disclaimer: While these are the meals we're having this week, I'm not exactly sure this will be the schedule. It could change tomorrow, I'm being a bit indecisive. Big surprise, I know.

Monday - breakfast for dinner
Tuesday - Chicken and dumplings
Wednesday - Mom's homemade spaghetti and meatballs
Thursday - fajitas
Friday - eat out before football game
Saturday - pizza pies
Sunday - Mackenzie's birthday party

Scrapbook Sunday

Finally! I finished Emma's 3rd birthday layout. I've had these pictures printed since March, I think. A rare two-pager from me.

(Imaginisce papers, accent; Thickers)

A much more recent event, Emma's first day at preschool. (Unique title, right? Very straight to the point. Have I mentioned before I hate coming up with titles?) There was a lot of dead space in the top right photo, except for a random mini-van so I wanted to cover it up. That, and I didn't know where else to put the journaling. Not quite sure on this yet, it could change. And I realize I left the date off. I like this when I look at on my table, but not as much seeing it here. I have a feeling this page might get reworked a bit...

(Love, Elsie, Crate Paper and KI Memories papers; Thickers)

Have you seen American Crafts new Letterbox line? It was on their blog a couple weeks ago. Oh, so good! All patterns, not theme-y (from what they showed) and I love it.

give.away.day.

It's Thursday, which means it's give.away.day. over at Write. Click. Scrapbook. So head over to WCS for your chance to win a gift certificate from Libby Weifenbach. She has some very cool digital designs that you can use to make very cool projects like the ones Cheryl had been posting this week. Or, if you're like me, you can use them to make some digital or hybrid pages since I am strictly a layout girl. :)

Ten on Tuesday

1. Today was Emma's (my) turn to take snacks to preschool today. She chose grapes. Green and red. I had no idea how many grapes three-year-olds eat as a snack. But since they only ate about half of what I took, I now know that it's not nearly as much as I thought. Also, all snacks in the Sweeney house for the next week will be grapes.

2. After preschool, we went to the park. Awesome weather the last two days, we'll be hitting another park tomorrow after our church playgroup.

3. The park was my second attempt to get a nice fall picture of the girls. I got these two of Emma.



4. And this of Mackenzie. Not exactly what I was going for. But it's awfully cute. She was flying. Emma had been doing the same thing moments before, and of course Mac had to copy her.


5. We played peek-a-boo in the tunnel.



6. Mackenzie's hair is finally long enough for pigtails. (Shh, they still need a little help from teeny tiny barrettes. Don't tell.)


7. Attempt number one at the photos was yesterday in our backyard. Again, good picture of Emma.


8. And here's the munchkin. Hee hee. I love it! This is so her. If you've ever heard her laugh, you can hear it right now. This is the look on her face when she makes her loud, low, gravelly, adorable, evil laugh.


9. And of course I tried to get a picture of the two of them together. This was the best one. Even though it looks like Emma is strangling her little sister. She really wanted to put her arm around her for all the pictures and all Mackenzie wanted to do was get away!

And this one's pretty cute with the leaves.

10. So Emma is always doing this really cheesy smile where she crinkles her nose and her eyes disappear. I told her to think of something that makes her happy, thinking I'd get a big, natural, smile. I got this. It's cute. She told me what she was thinking about. It was funny, because it wasn't the answer you'd think you'd get from a 3 1/2 year old girl. Of course, now I can't remember what it was.

Menu Plan Monday

Monday - leftovers (had flank steak, ranch rice, roasted zucchini, squash and red onion)
Tuesday - chicken wraps, mashed potatoes, asparagus
Wednesday - leftovers
Thursday - chicken and dumplings
Friday - I'm not quite sure yet, I need to look through my recipes so I'll add it in later.
Saturday - birthday party
Sunday - pizza

PS, I'm going to fix my banner tonight - it obviously doesn't fit the new layout!

Scrapbook Sunday

Finally, it's done! I finished my 2008 December Daily album! Whew. I'm thinking I'm going to skip this December, that took way longer than I thought to complete. Of course, putting everything album-related in a box and ignoring it for months at a time probably had something to do with that.

Album info: The pages range in size from 6x6 to 6x8. When I started it, I wanted to use up all my Christmas paper and embellishments I had. I used a good chunk of them, including some of almost every Christmas paper I had. It felt good to use stuff I'd been just collecting for years and not actually using. I only bought two items for the album - a 12x12 clear page with trees by KI Memories and epoxy stickers from Archiver's dollar spot. (Which, by the way, is actually $1.99.) There was no rhyme or reason to the design, some are single pages but most are two page spreads. Some are multi-photos, some single. I included some memorabilia, including the girls letters from Santa, our church Christmas concert program and tickets from the Cavs game we went to. I really liked being able to include those things in it, instead of sticking them in a box.

Here are a few of the pages. Eventually I'd like to get the whole scanned and posted, in a slide show maybe. These are just all I've scanned so far.





(The journaling is on the back of one of our tickets, and they're punched to lay in front of the page. The journaling ticket is second so when you open it, the journaling is next to the pictures. I just scanned it wrong.)

(Two single pages, just scanned together.)

Now, on to another album on my list. Maybe I should start working on the mini-album I have planned about the week Mackenzie turned one...she'll be 2 two weeks from today. :)

Five things today

1. I was in the car this afternoon listening to Ryan Seacrest when he said Jamie Foxx was coming up. But I heard Jamie Lee Curtis. I wondered what movie she had coming out this weekend that they were promoting. Then I thought about the Activia commercials. Except not the real ones, the SNL spoofs with Kristen Wigg. Then I thought abotu an article in EW with her where she talks about how she started out really eating Activia but the side effects weren't so good so they switched it to regular yogurt. And then when Jamie Foxx came on, I was confused as to why it wasn't a woman before I realized it was Jamie Foxx and not Jamie Lee Curtis. This is how my mind works.

2. I made applesauce the other week for the girls. They didn't like it. Threw it out.

3. Attempt #2 and using up the apples - tomorrow I'm making apple crisp for the first time. Fingers crossed.

4. I love Glee. I hated the Push It episode, but have really enjoyed the rest. Which is good. Because I've been looking forward to it since it premiered after Idol last spring and would've been sorely disappointed had it stunk once it started this fall.

Here are some sneak peeks from upcoming episodes if you want to see them. So good!

sneak peeks

5. Last night I finally did a major purge of my patterned paper. I've tried this before, and have successfully gotten rid of quite a bit. But there's always been certain sheets that I've held on to, some 5 years old, that I was certain I'd use one day. Last night I was ruthless, and got rid of them. Actually, I cleaned out about half my paper. This stack will be added to the boxes of scrap supplies that I'm going to sell at a garage sale next spring. Next on my list: embellishments and letter stickers.

Scholastic

I can clearly remember book fair days when I was in school. I would be giddy with excitement all day, waiting for my turn to go to the library and peruse the tables and tables of books. It was peaceful and quiet (I realize that seems weird it was quiet, because there had to be a lot of kids there, right? But I don't remember that part - did we go as a class or on our own every year? Bad memory and all. I do remember going one year when I must've gone during an off time, because there were only a few people in there, I had the library to myself practically. All those books and just me) and smelled good. I know, weird. But it smelled like new books. I loved looking at them stacked in neat piles on the tables. It was so hard to choose which ones to buy, because I wanted them all it seemed. It's hard to put into words, but if I close my eyes, I truly can imagine myself back there, loving to read, being overwhelmed by all the books and just feeling happy to be at the book fair. As you can see, I really, really like books and reading.

For the past couple years I've noticed the signs on our schools announcing the book fair. Each time I think about how I can't wait for Emma to go to her first book fair and pick out a book all of her own choosing. But, we're still a couple years away from that.

Then last week, I found these in Emma's parent mailbox at preschool:


Scholastic Book Fair order forms!

I was unbelievably excited. Giddy all over again. I restrained myself and only chose eleven books. But that was a bit excessive, so I narrowed it down to five and turned my order in today.

We'll soon be adding these books to our collection:
Apple Trouble
Wise Up, Silly Owl
Pumpkin Town
The Silly Turkey Party
The Very Cranky Bear

I'm happy.

This year, we've got pumpkins.

Last year, while we went to a pumpkin patch for a fall festival, we didn't get pumpkins. No real good reason why, just didn't. But this year, we've got some. Four to be exact. Sunday after church we went to a local farm that had pumpkins, a hay ride, some animals, lots of fall fun.

On the hay ride.



Picking pumpkins.



Yet another attempt at a family picture.


The girls with their pumpkins. Mackenzie ended up trading hers for a bigger one, though.


Another attempt at a picture of the girls smiling.


Mac went in the bouncy house. She was only in there for a few minutes, but she loved it. Emma just watched. No surprise there.


Emma as a witch.

Today it feels more like winter than fall. It's cold, overcast, supposed to rain. But we've got pumpkins!

Ten on Tuesday

1. I finally got some strawberry cheesecake Jelly Belly jelly beans.


2. There are 800 jelly beans in a 2lb bag. Just in case you wondered.

3. I got them here, Sweetie's, the best candy store ever. It's huge.

4. I like that the sign in front of Emma's preschool says this.


5. Everyday after preschool I ask Emma about her day. Most of the time she doesn't tell me anything. But when she does, it usually involves Ben. As in, "Who'd you play with today?" "Ben." "Who was line leader today?" "Ben." The thing is, there's no Ben in her class. She told us she just likes telling us Ben. Huh.

6. We ran up to the mall yesterday. After the Gap, we got some Auntie Anne's cinnamon sugar pretzel sticks and headed to the fountain. For the record, I'd forgotten just how messy these can be in the hands of a 23-month-old.

7. Throwing coins.


8. Saying cheese.

9. More "cheese," with a pretzel. Getting messy.

10. Just before we left I was thinking how glad I was no one fell in the fountain. That no one even tried to get in the water. Then I saw Mackenzie on her knees swishing her monkey around in the water. Sigh...almost made it.