My So-Called Life

Some Layouts and a Sale!

Well, I wish I could have posted about this earlier in the weekend, but a sick little girl (she ate some moldy turkey from a newly-bought Lunchable - long story for another time but consider me ticked!) prevented me from getting much computer time this weekend. 

Nevertheless, I'm here now, and wanted to share some layouts and let you know that there is still time to take advantage of the quarterly sale at Designer Digitals.  Just about everything in the store is 30% until Tuesday morning, 6am!!   Plus, there were so many new and fantastic items introduced this weekend; double incentive to shop! :)

Here's a layout of Emma and her beautiful (yes, I'm biased) natural highlights.  Where she gets this hair, I do not know...

For a full list of credits, please see Natural Highlights at Designer Digitals. 

And here is another football layout of Ryan.  This was taken after their last game about a week ago.  I'm just blown away when I look at this photo.  Where did my little boy go?

For a full list of credits, please visit Quarterback at Designer Digitals.

Some of my fave photos of Em are in this layout. This was for the Saturday Scraplift a couple of weeks ago at Designer Digitals. 

Full credits can be found by visiting Life Itself...at Designer Digitals. 

I'm hoping to get a couple of pages done this week.  All the new stuff in the store is really inspiring me to create. Now...if my crazy schedule will allow me some creative time this week...

Happy Monday!

Halloween 2009

Busy, busy, busy....that's all I am these days, but I wanted to show some photos from Halloween.  Here is Em in her pink kitty cat costume.  She had such fun coming up with "cat poses" and leaps and twirls in the air. 





Ryan and his friend decided to hang back from trick-or-treating and hand out candy (and scare kids).  Here he is with a predator mask and the afro wig he wore last year hiding behind one of our hedges and waiting for his next victim!



Em and I had a good time in the kitchen Friday night and Saturday morning.  We made these ghosts out of vanilla chips - super easy!


And here are the cookies we made from scratch and then decorated.


And though I probably won't scrap these photos for a while, I did manage to finally scrap LAST year's Halloween photos. 



All supplies are from Designer Digitals.  For a full list of credits, please visit Halloween 2008. 

And I don't know about you, but I'm still trying to get used to the time change.  I haven't been able to stay up as late as I usually do which is driving me crazy.  I mean, I'm WAY more tired than I should be, and it's throwing me out of whack.  Oh well, I'm sure it's only a matter of time to adjust.  Hopefully soon...

The Pumpkin Patch

What a weekend!  Roland and Ryan were out-of-town as Ryan had yet another baseball tournament.  Emma and I stayed home as there were a million and one things to do.  On Friday, we headed to Chuck E. Cheese for my dear nephew's 6th birthday party.  On Saturday, we visited the Halloween Spirit store to pick out Em's costume (a pink and black kitty), then to the movies to watch Where the Wild Things Are, then on to my brother's for his birthday dinner (where Em was in doggie heaven with Hilo and Kona).  Finally, today, we cleaned house, started to put up the Halloween decorations, then, when we heard thunder, we realized we had to rush to the pumpkin patch before it started raining. 

We got to the patch as the dark clouds were rolling through, but the rain held off right until we were ready to purchase our pumpkins.  And even though we were a bit rushed, I think I managed to snap some decent pictures. 

This crow was too funny!








I can't wait to scrap these.  Katie Pertiet and the other designers at Designer Digitals Digital Scrapbooking have so many cool fall-themed products, and I'm dying to use them.  I'm feeling inspired after taking these photos AND after having some fall-like weather lately with more to come later this week.  Now, if only Halloween won't be so hot and humid like it always is.  Rumor has it that it might actually be pretty nice.  We'll see....

Helloooooooo...

Wow, I can't believe it's been over a month since I've blogged!  We have had a rough time in the Rodriguez family over the past few weeks, that's for sure.  In a nutshell...

• Emma came down with strep throat
• Ryan (who is never sick) was sent home from school with fever, chills, sore throat, etc.
• We spent 3 hours in the doctor's office for him to be diagnosed with the flu
• We had to cancel his birthday festivities that weekend
• Two days later, Emma began having flu symptoms
• This time Emma and I spent 2 1/2 hours at the doctor's office
• I began feeling sick but had to suck it up to take care of the kids
• Emma missed 5 days of school, and I missed 5 days of work
• I finally went to the doctor myself and found out I had bronchitis
• I was prescribed super strong antibiotics that had horrible side effects
• Emma had to go back to the doctor two more times, and we found out that she had mild pneumonia
• We did manage to celebrate Ryan's birthday finally

And of course, when I finally went back to work, I had tons of catching up to do and actually just had a big event on Sunday.  Em is still fighting the pneumonia, but she is doing pretty well all things considering.  She's back at school, just on restricted activity.

Anyway, I hope to be back and blogging more regularly now.  Here's hoping we all stay healthy! 

Here are a couple of layouts I created before we all got sick:



I created this with one of Lynn Grieveson's cool Scrap Express templates and with one of her school kits.  For a full list of credits, please visit First Day of Kindergarten at Designer Digitals.

And here is Ryan's first (and only so far) 7th grade football page!  Check out my little man as quarterback:


Katie's newest Grid Iron Brushes were perfect inspiration for this page!  For a full list of credits, please visit Game Day at Designer Digitals.

Tomorrow is Ryan's last game (I think), and I hope to take some more photos.  I've been taking lots of video, but I'd love to take some more photos.  This season has flown by! 

Rainy Day Football and New Puppies

Meet Ryan.


Meet Mark.


Both are football players for their 7th grade team.  Ryan is at the quarterback position, and his friend Mark is a receiver.  They decided to get in a little extra practice on Saturday before their first game this week. 

 

Obviously, a little rain didn't stop them. 



No sirree...after months and months AND MONTHS of no rain whatsoever, a little rain and mud didn't bother them one bit. 



And because my lawn was extremely happy, I was happy...and I didn't mind one bit either.

 

As you can see, I took lots of pictures. ;) 

Emma was dying to get in on the action, but that was where I drew the line.  I knew I would have to be the one to clean her up, and truly, I wasn't THAT excited about the rain.

After Ryan had had enough mud, we headed home.  Thank goodness the field was just down the block as there was no way Ryan was getting in my car!  I had driven over with Emma when the boys were already playing as it was pouring rain.  It had pretty much stopped by the time we made it to the field.  Anyway, I drove back while the rest of the gang headed home on foot. 



Emma raced to get to the house before her Daddy.  Ryan already had the hose...

 

Until Roland turned it on him! 
 

Hey, I was happy for him to get most of the mud off.  And Emma, well, she just wanted to get wet.


Later on Sunday, my brother had posted on his Facebook page that he and his family were at the Humane Society *looking* at dogs - emphasis on looking.  A bit later, I saw that he had updated with a picture of not one, but TWO cute little puppies in a basket with a pink collar on one and a blue collar on the other.  OMG! 

Both Emma and I are allergic to cat and dog dander and that is one among many other reasons why we don't have a pet ourselves.  That has never stopped Emma from absolutely LOVING animals - dogs especially.  When she saw the puppies her cousins now owned, she begged and pleaded and pleaded and begged for us to take her over so she could meet them. 



Needless to say, it was love at first sight. 

This is Kona on the left and Heelo (not sure if I'm spelling that right) on the right.


We had a hard time tearing her away from the two pups.  She was especially in love with the girl, Kona.

Since we left, all we've heard is how much she wants to go back!  I don't blame her, they are pretty cute.  I can only wish my brother and SIL good luck in dealing with TWO puppies - yikes!

Don't forget, you still have time to visit Designer Digitals, Digital Scrapbooking Community for the 30% off sale.  The sale is through Tuesday, 6am and boy, are there some awesome new things in the store!  Hope to see you there!

Football, Dinosaurs and a Sale!

When we found out that Ryan's first football scrimmage was going to be held this past Wednesday, I was excited for the opportunity to watch him play and to take photos of him.  Well, after more than a year of very little rain in the area, we got almost 3 inches on Wednesday alone.  And...you guessed it...the game was canceled. :(  Darn it!  He was very disappointed, as was I.  I mean, the last time he played football, he looked like this:

For one brief season at 8/9 years old, he played on a Pop Warner league.  And after that, he decided he liked playing baseball better.  I was kind of glad he'd decided football wasn't quite for him as I was always worried about him getting hurt.  Sorry, it's just the mom in me; can't help it!

So now, I get to worry about him all over again.  He'll have another scrimmage next week and then the *season* starts the week after.  Should be exciting and nerve-wracking, I'm sure. 

In the meantime, I wanted to post a couple of layouts I've created for Designer Digitals.  This is one I just finished a couple of nights ago. I've also wanted to scrap these photos of Emma, but had been uninspired until now.  Anna's Emergency Elements were just what I needed.  For a full list of credits, please visit Pneumonia at Designer Digitals Digital Scrapbooking Site.

  
Sweet girl!  She's had pneumonia two more times since these pictures were taken - can you believe it?!  This was the only time she was hospitalized, however.

And here is another one of a trip a couple of Spring Breaks ago.  We were actually in McAllen for a baseball tournament but decided to take advantage of the Gladys-Porter Zoo nearby in Harlingen.  Well, lucky for us, they had just opened a special dinosaur exhibit THAT day.  Emma was thrilled as she is a big dino lover.  However, when she actually encountered the huge animatronic T-Rex, she was scared!  It took a lot of coaxing to get her to realize it was not real.  It's easy to forgot how big things can look to a little kid! 



Notice how she is looking away in that one photo?  She couldn't take her eyes off the the giant T-Rex.  For a full list of credits, please visit Dinosaur Exhibit at Designer Digitals, Digital Scrapbooking Site.

I have actually scrapbooked some of these photos before in paper version. 



Pretty much everything used on the page is from Basic Grey, and I handcut the titles. 

And I just wanted to let you know that Designer Digitals is having their super fabulous quarterly sale right now.  Just about everything in the store is 30% off until Tuesday, 6am.  And today, there are chats around the clock with lots of freebies and prizes being given away.  Check out the Designer Digitals Chat Schedule!

Right Now...

Reading

Shopping

Needing

Loving

Wanting

Creating

And desperately waiting for the long weekend.  Here's to a quick workday on Friday!

First Week of School Musings

So we've survived week one of Kindergarten and Seventh grade, and the start of week two will be here in a few short hours.  Phew.... Can I admit that I'm already looking forward to the Labor Day holiday next Monday?  It will be so nice to have that one extra day.  Seriously, I think weekends should be 3 days. On Sunday night, I almost always feel like one more day off would give me just enough time to get *everything* done.  Sigh...

Anyway, here are the kiddos on the first day of school.

Can you believe that just a short year ago, they looked like this:
 

Sniff....geez, why am I such a sentimental old sap??  They shouldn't be allowed to grow this fast.
 

Ryan's already immersed in the world of football. He's hoping to play quarterback for his 7th grade team, and it looks like he will definitely be given a shot.  Felt weird to be buying football shoes instead of baseball shoes yesterday.  Of course, this doesn't mean baseball is going by the wayside. Are you kidding??  He's already played in 3 tournaments since we got back from vacation! 

And here's a weird bit of trivia.  If you'd been following the Little League World Series, you probably know that a San Antonio, Texas team was a contender for the championship game.  Well, Ryan and his team played against them earlier this year in San Marcos, Texas, and Ryan actually hit his first grand slam during that game (which Ryan's team ended up winning)!  Isn't that something?

Anyway, on to Miss Emma's first week.  She was a little nervous on that first day.  She looked so small walking to her classroom.  Ryan walked with her for moral support.



There was a kid at her table sobbing on that first morning.  You could see how all the other kids who weren't crying got a little panicked thinking, "why is he crying...should I be scared?"  Emma put on a brave face, but I could tell she was a little nervous. 



Sweet girl.  :) 

So on that evening after the first day of school, Ryan asks Emma who her PE coach is.  Emma can't remember.  Fast forward to the next evening, and she proudly announces she has learned her coaches name. 

"I found out my coach's name!" she exclaimed.
"You did?  What is it?" I reply.
"It's Coach ''Ta Bueno'" she says in all seriousness and with a Spanish accent to boot. 
"Whaat?" I say as I'm wondering if my daughter really did say "Coach 'It's Okay' or I misunderstood her. 
"Coach 'Ta Bueno'" she repeats.
I burst out laughing, and I tried to figure out how Emma had come to that conclusion.  "Ta Bueno" or "Esta Bueno" means, "It's okay" or "It's good" in Spanish.   

Poor Em got really embarrassed when I told her that could not be her name.  The only thing I can figure is that another teacher or someone used that phrase when talking to the Coach, and Emma thought she was addressing her by name.  We've since learned that her coach's last name is Gutierrez.  I don't know if we'll ever find out how Em came to that conclusion, but it still makes us laugh. 

Emma was also excited to tell me that day that she had saved a little girl's life.  She was so proud of herself, and described how she helped a classmate of hers get across a certain part of the playscape that was "scary."  Of course, it turns out that this "little girl" is the teeniest little girl in her class who happens to be seated next to Emma, one of the tallest/biggest kids in class.

By the third day, according to Emma, she had saved the little girl's life yet again, AND had declared that she had a made a new best friend.  Turns out the best friend happened to be the the same girl!  When I asked her new best friend's name however, she replied that she didn't know.  Makes perfect sense...not!

So, here we go with week two.  I'm sure it will be interesting!

And I can't post a blog entry without posting a layout.  Here's one I just finished up tonight called "Little Fishy."



A full list of credits can be found at Designer Digitals Digital Scrapbooking Site ~Little Fishy

Have a great Monday!

Is It Real or Is It Memorex?

Okay, does anyone get that reference to those old Memorex commercials?  I'm sorry if you don't, but not *too* sorry because that probably means you're younger than I am, and well, that makes me old, doesn't it?  ;)

Actually, I'm referring to some of the photos from our vacation.  More on that in a bit.  But first, thanks for your comments here and on Facebook on my last blog entry.  Looks like I stumped Carol on where we were on vacation.  Carol!  You call yourself a Texan???  LOL.  So here's the collage again with some descriptions:

We traveled to San Antonio, Texas and spent some time (and money!) at Ripley's Believe It or Not and Louis Tussaud's Plaza Wax Museum, the Rivercenter Mall, and at a Malibu Castle to play miniature golf, ride bumper boats (a dire request of Emma's) and drive go-carts.  Then we headed to Houston for more shopping and a visit to the Museum of Natural Science where we explored the Cockrell Butterfly Center and the main exhibit halls.  We packed a lot in over the 4 days we were gone.  Here are some pics of some of the fun:

Ever wonder how you'd stack up against the tallest man in the world?  Here are Emma, Ryan and Roland at Ripley's Believe It or Not.   

Emma was fascinated and a tad bit scared of this animatronic dinosaur head at the entrance to the Wax Museum.  Love how she's *hiding* from the dino; looks like a movie scene where the dinosaur is sniffing her out, lol. 



Check out Johnny Depp.  He was doing a promo at the Museum for an upcoming movie. 


 

Hmmm....What do you think?  Pretty good likeness, don't you think?  Hence my title about the "real or Memorex..."  Yeah...whatever, lol. 

Ryan made the rounds of the talk show hosts.  Roland dared him to pull a Tom Cruise on Oprah's set.


Then it was time to hit David Letterman's show.  Ryan's friend Chris was with us.  They shook hands as if they were guests greeting one another.  Dorks, I know!


In Houston, we visited the Cockrell Butterfly Center (in the Museum of Natural Science).  Emma was SO excited to see it as she is always chasing butterflies.  She was excited, until we actually made our way into the giant terrarium, that is.  Then she actually RAN AWAY from the butterflies!  And they were everywhere.  She said she didn't want one to land on her.  Ay yi yi yi yi!  Crazy girl.  Needless to say, I didn't get ANY pictures of her inside the terrarium.  BUT, I did get this cute kid walking by:



What a great ad for the Butterfly Center, don't you think?  Wish I could have gotten more some fun pics of Emma.  :(  Got some cool butterfly photos though.



Have you stopped by Designer Digitals lately?  Lots of awesome new stuff in the shop.  Here's a layout I finished this weekend.  For full credits, please visit Love the Way at Designer Digitals Digital Scrapbooking Site.



Look at that sweet face - so radiant.  Can't believe that my baby is starting Kindergarten tomorrow...sniff...  And my big guy is starting 7th grade!  Wow - what am I doing still up?  It's going to be a busy morning for sure! 

And if you haven't been by the Creating Keepsakes blog, be sure to visit.  They are giving away a Tamron lens valued at over $600!


By leaving a comment on their entry titled: An Insider's Look: CK's September Issue by August 27th, you'll get a chance to win.  Check it out. :)

Off to bed now...

Sports and More

Ha - don't you love that blog title?  Sounds like the name of a sporting goods store, huh?  But part of the *theme* of this blog post is sports (yes, once again - can't help it as all my son does is live, eat and sleep baseball), but I do have a couple of other things to share as well.  ;)

And, of course, again, I've been remiss in keeping up with the 'ol blog, but that's really cuz the last week of summer camp was hell on earth and then I went on a much needed vacation.  Soooooo...I'm back, work is crazier than ever, but I'm feeling recharged and organized...kind of. :P

Anyway, I think I may have mentioned that Ryan traveled to Florida in late July to play in an Elite World Series tournament at Disney's Wide World of Sports.  Roland only took our little digi camcorder which also takes low-med res still photos.  He took lots of great video but only a few pics, but I had to scrap this experience for Ryan anyway.  Here's the layout - hope you can read the journaling (but if you can't, the important thing to know is that his team came in 4th out of 32 teams; Ryan scored 3 of 4 runs in one game, AND he struck out 5 guys from the #1 team in the nation):

Can I just say that Katie's photo cluster frames were perfect for all these lower-quality photos??  Heck, they are perfect for ANY quality photos, but truly, they were a lifesaver for me here.  For a full list of credits, please visit Designer Digitals Digital Scrapbooking - Welcome to the Big League.

I also recently posted another sports page of Ryan.  This was actually one of my Hall of Fame entries and was published in the June 09 issue of Creating Keepsakes. I *think* it was one of my freebies if I'm remembering correctly.  I might not be.  It's tough getting old...

He looks so little here compared to the more recent pictures...awwww.  For a full list of credits, please visit Designer Digitals Digital Scrapbooking - Game Face. 

On to the *more* part of this post.  I want to give a shout out to my favorite brother (ha - my ONLY brother) and his beautiful wife who recently got back from Hawaii after celebrating their 10th anniversary by renewing their vows.  You see, they eloped the first time.  None of us got to be there when they drove off into the sunset (or New Mexico as they called it) 10 years ago and tied the knot.  So we got to celebrate with them last weekend, and I was lucky enough to get to snap some photos of them.  Aren't they a beautiful couple???

  

And lastly, here's a teaser for you.  I created a collage of photos from our vacation last week.  Of course, I took like 400 photos (or something like that), but here's a few.  Can you guess where we went?  I'll give you two hints:  We visited two different cities.  Both cities are in Texas.  ;)