Good Morning!

I have so many cool things that I am working on that my head woke me up at 4 am this morning!
I just laid there in bed, working through all the things that I need to do in my head.  So when my little man wanted to get up at 5:20, I was okay with it.

What am I working on?  Here are some of the things:
Lego Party for my 12 year old
Travel Party
End of Year Banquet for my Mom's Club
Mom's Club Newsletter (due on Monday)
(at least) 2 Science Fair Projects with my kids
Finishing my Disney Album from last year before I go this year
Just Between Friends Consignment Sale
Trip to the snow
Blog post about creating an Altered Book Invitation


I think that there may be more, but my head is spinning right now!  Wish me luck and I hope to have my blog post up soon about the cool way to invite someone to a party.

Book review: "The Friday Night Knitting Club" by Kate Jacobs

Here is my review from the book that I finished in January:


The Friday Night Knitting Club by Kate Jacobs
My rating: 3 of 5 stars

I decided to pick up this book since so many people suggested it.  All in all it was a "good" book.  Not really my style, but it did keep my interest for the most part.  There was a lot about knitting in it that maybe if I knitted, I would have found interesting.  I did enjoy how knitting brought together women from multiple backgrounds and abilities, but I did not really "love" the main character, Georgia.  I found her bad self-image hard to keep taking.  All the self-doubt bothered me, so I just couldn't get into her.  I know that most people, especially women, are plagued with huge amounts of self-doubt, but hers was a bit over the top.

I don't plan on reading any others in the series.


View all my reviews

maybe you will like it more than I did. . . 

Meagan

Book Review: "11/22/63" by Stephen King

I just finished Stephen King's new book and realized that I have not been updating my Good Reads site since last fall.  So, although, I completed my goal for last year, it doesn't look like it.  I am going to have to go in a update what all I read.  I hope that I can remember it all!  :)

11/22/63 by Stephen King
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

This was a huge book by my favorite author.  It took me a lot longer than his books normally take me.  I found all that "history" hard to sift through.  I thought he had an interesting theme though and I really enjoyed the parts that intersected his "It" storyline.


View all my reviews

I hope you enjoy it.  Stay tuned for some more reviews!  Plus, I have a new book challenge for this year - 15 books!

How to work with cool fonts

Fonts are Fabulous!
My favorite thing about choosing the perfect font, is that it really sets the tone for what you are typing.  A great font conveys feeling, style and thought.  That's a lot for just what each letter looks like.  I mean an "a" is still an "a" right?

Obviously, there are times and places for "neat" fonts.  If you are typing your resume, for instance, it is probably not the time to use "Catchup" (which looks like a kid wrote it).  "Catchup" would be the perfect font for an invitation to a 2 year's old thank you card.

Ironically, as I type this, I am forced to use 1 of 7 regular fonts!  Ug, I hate being stifled!  So, before I finish an invitation, scrapbook page, letter, etc, I always look at my font.

Here are some cool regular fonts that came pre-loaded on my Window 7 systems

Have you ever wished that you had a particular font or alpha for something you are typing?  

Well, I found a great website that provided free downloaded fonts.  

dafont

These are all fonts that are created by individuals, which upload and share them for free.  If you like them, you can donate to the creator.  

I have found such cool fonts as Buka Bird, Tron, Alice in Wonderland and Mickey.  

Do you have someone obsessed with Mine Craft, like my son is?  Try this one, minecrafter.

With Easter coming up, would like your font to be made out rabbits? - or other Eastery fonts?

Are you looking for a font for Halloween?

Want to type in Elfish or Runes?

How about something Christmasy?

How about Chinese/Japanese, Mexican, Arabic, or many other nationalities

Would you like your words to sizzle or freeze?

Super Mario Brothers

Goonies

Another tip that I have.  For those of you working in a spreadsheet and creating a check off list.  Try using "zbats" for the font.  Then, try out a "4".  It is a checkmark!  

Well, I hope this gets your creative juices flowing!  Now, go out there and try out some fonts!

Happy Valentine's - How to make V-Day treats

Hello Everyone,
I am just popping in to say Happy Valentine's Day to you all and to share some yummy treats that you can make for Valentine's Day.  Most of these are super easy that don't need a lot of instructions.

First off, Peppermint Hearts

To start with you need left-over mini Christmas Candy Canes!  I happened to have a whole box that I only used a few from.

Line them up on a sheet of parchment paper in a heart shape, like this.

Next, you will need to melt down your white chocolate.  I used white chocolate chips in my glass 2 cup measuring cup and added just a little bit of olive oil to help make it pour easy and thin it out a little bit.  I microwaved it at 50% for 45 seconds and then stirred.  After that, I would microwave in 30 second intervals (still at 50%), stirring in between, until it is completely melted.

Pour white chocolate into the centers of the hearts.  Pour slowly, or you will over fill them (yeah - I did that on the first one!  You can kinda see in the back left).  It is easiest to start on one lobe of the heart, pour down to the point and then back up to the other lobe.

*tip - I realized about this point, that I should have placed my parchment paper and hearts on top of a baking sheet so that I could pick them up easier and place in frig to harden or move.

While the chocolate is still hot, you can add your decorations.  Use whatever you have.  You can sprinkles, candies, etc.  I happen to have this mold from a Vegas event that I did, so I used my red melting candies to make red hearts.

First, I add red sprinkles in the bottom of the mold.

Then, just squeeze melted red candy in the hearts and let harden.  Then pop them out.  They will be sparkly on top and perfect little hearts!

So, back to decorating the hearts, I sprinkled pink and red sugars on the hot white chocolate.  Then, I placed the red hearts that I made on top.  If the chocolate had gotten to hard, I "glued" on the hearts with a little more melting chocolate.

Of course, after doing half of them like this, I realized that a heart should be on the left, but oh well!  :)

And, that is it!  Let them harden by themselves, or you can speed it up in the refrigerator.  You can wrap them individually or serve on a tray.  They are flat, so you can add them to a Valentine's card, too!

On to the other treats.  I must say that I waited until the 13th to go looking for Valentine's Sprinkle.  I wanted to supplement the red and pink sugars that I had with "jimmies" in VDay colors.  EVERY place was sold out.  I went every where.  I started making my own heart shapes, using the red melting candy.  

Here is what else I made:

I made chocolate dipped pretzel rods.  Super cute, very easy and always a huge hit.  Just melt chocolate in a tall thin container and dip end of pretzel.  While it is still hot,  sprinkle with whatever you want.  I added my hand made heart to each one.

Just your basic heart shaped sugar cookies.  I add sprinkles, balls, and melting candy.  Another tip for you.  After you bake them and they spread out while baking, you can re-cut them with your same cookie cutter to get that sharper edge!

So, that's it!  I hope you have a fabulous (and sweet) Valentine's Day!

Mousescrapper's Speed Marathon

Boy are my fingers tired!

I just participated in my very first speed scrap marathon.  "What is it", you say?  Well, a speed scrap is where you are given instructions every 10 minutes to complete a scrapbook page.  Imagine then a marathon, where you have a new scrap every couple of hours.
For the website Mousescrappers 3rd birthday, they hosted just such an event.  There were 16 chats with speed scraps.  Every page had to be done within the allotted time limit (some as quick as 4 hours), be Disney related and follow whatever rules each host gave out.  It really challenged me to work quickly and to try out new techniques or styles that I would never have tried before.

For every Speed Scrap that you completed on time, you received a participation prize and you would get a "goodie bag" for doing the half-marathon (8 LOs) and another "goodie bag" for doing all 16 by Monday morning.  All-in-all, a lot of fun and a great way to add to your collection of digital kits.

So, without further ado, here are my pages:

So, next time, you have the chance - join a speed scrap.  It's lots of fun and a great way to learn something new

Promise Yourself (to be healthier)

I am not much for New Year's Resolutions (which usually fall to the wayside by March) and I am not one to diet (I just can't seem to do it), but I would like to be a little healthier.  After all the holidays with tons of sweets that I made - and ate, I certainly could use some help in that department.

In the summer, I was really busy - hiking, walking, go places, etc.  Then came the fall, and I rode bikes a ton with my kids.  Then it got colder, I stopped doing anything active at all.  Pile on a bunch of holiday goodies from  Halloween, all the way to my daughter's birthday and you are bound to weigh more!

So, I decided to make myself a promise. . . to be healthier.

I know myself that if I tried some extreme all or nothing scenerio, I would fail.  I am not going to forsake chocolate (bite your tongue for even asking), I am not going to start going to the gym after almost 38 years of not going, and I am not going to set myself up to fail.  So, I decided to give myself some realistic promises.

Promise 1 - Drink more water.  - I am horrible about getting my recommended daily allotment of water.  So, to start with baby steps, I am going to carry around a bottle of water.  Yes, only 1.  Once I can master 1 bottle of water, I will move up to more.

Promise 2 - Light Exercise 4 days a week - I plan to do either 30 minutes of walking or other light exercise at least 4 days of the week.

So far
I started this on Monday last week.  One week ago exactly.
Water - Not so great.  I think I averaged maybe half a bottle and some days, I only had a few swallows.  I definitely need to work on this one.
Exercise - Good.  I did my Wii Fit for 12 minutes on day 1, day 2; nothing, day 3; walked the creek (pushing a stroller) for 1 hour, day 4; walked to the high school (pushing stroller) for 2, 15 minute segments, day 5; walked the train museum for 2 hours (pushing stroller, stopping and started)

I wanted to put my promise here, so that I am more likely to stay up with it.  They say that it helps you to make your promise out loud or to someone else, so . . . do you want to join me to be more healthy?

Drop me a line

Here's to a healthier us soon!