.BaG fuLL oF gOoDiEs.

My Aunt Gwen works at a newspaper and is constantly getting press kits from companies wanting her to write about them. She saves them for me because I love to use scraps and odds and ends for my scrapbooking and crafting. It gives everything that I do a bit of uniqueness, simply because you can't buy these in the store (or if you did, I imagine that even 1 roll of this wallpaper would set you back quite a bit!). I can't wait to take all of this apart and see what I can do with it. I already have some ideas for that bag of peanuts! Just look at that wallpaper!! Could you imagine that being on the walls of your house, the purple one is fuzzy and the white one has tiny glass beads on it, amazing!




On another note, my fellow blogger, http://madcapfrenzy.blogspot.com/, posted a link that has an amazing project:

http://talkottown. blogspot.com/2008/11/black-friday-giveaway_28.html

I'm not even sure what I would do with it, but it would be really cool to try and find out!! I am looking forward to getting some crafting done soon!

On an extremely sad note, yesterday a classmate of Mason's, a really good friend of his, did not show up at the party and I was informed by another mom that the boy's mom is not doing so well. She had breast cancer that spread through her entire body. As I read the paper this morning, I saw that she had died yesterday. She left behind 3 kids, my thoughts are with her and her family.

Hint, Hint

Hint, *clearing my throat*, Jason, I WANT this for Christmas. I'm off to watch my Saturday night COPS now!

)Partied Out(

I can't believe that Mason is going to be 8 years old tomorrow! After months and months of planning, the party is over! We had a blast, the Summit was amazing (with the exception of the 'party coordinator'), the pool rocked, good food and good company made the afternoon a blast. We arrived about an hour and a half early (I can never have enough time to set up) and got the party room rockin'. After all the kids got there they swam in the pool for almost two hours and then went back to the room for some pizza, cake and all kinds of sweets.



Mason got a ton of great presents and he was just happy to spend the afternoon with some of his friends. I thought that his cake turned out well and I am so glad that it survived the transport. Well, I will give myself a few months to recover and then we will start planning next years! Thank you, Aunt Gwen for providing many of the 'direct from the beach' supplies. Thank you to everyone who helped out and a special thanks to Amber, Tara and Alex for helping clean up every last piece of confetti (among other items) so that I can use it again!! It was great to see everyone.

{{Happy Thanksgiving}}

What goes better with a day of thanks than The Rocky Horror Picture Show!!


I had no idea what I was missing all these years, although it was around 4 years before I was even born. As I am writing this I have the Timewarp song playing--what an awesome song! I thought it was a bit odd to play this marathon today, however I enjoyed it. So much strangeness, craziness, and humor all wrapped up into one movie! I imagine that this movie was pretty controversial in the 70's! It was playing on my new favorite channel, the 'Chiller' channel. This channel rocks! They play old, cheesy horror movies (you know the ones where the blood squirts out of someone about 2 minutes before they are even stabbed!). I watched one called 'Return to Horror High' (I'm sure the original 'Horror High' was so great that they couldn't wait to make a sequel!!), it was bad, horrible acting and a lot of screaming, however, George Clooney was in it!! It must have been one of his first movies (this was a 1983 movie) because he was not even listed in the opening credits. He's come along way since then! Home Alone is a movie that I love to watch during the holidays. That movie never gets old! Watching Joe Pesci and Daniel Stern in that movie is a riot! We rented a movie for tonight, LineWatch, with Cuba Gooding Jr. It is about a border patrol agent that is forced to smuggle drugs across the border, hopefully it is good. We have rented quite a few bad ones lately, so it's about time we get a good one.

Have a great rest of your Turkey day!!

A Little Bit Of This And A Little Bit Of That

Uggg, all this snow is making me think it is going to be a L.O.N.G winter! I guess living in this part of Pennsylvania we have to expect it, but I'm never ready for it. I am sure in a few weeks I will embrace it (well, I might not go that far) but I will accept it and maybe have a little fun in it. I have been throwing around different ideas in my head about a Christmas tree. We always get a real tree (I cringe at the thought of a fake one), I love the smell of a real one. It is difficult to make it through a season without losing a few ornaments (refer to the last post regarding 8 cats), I have very nice ornaments and then some that are just 'filler' types (they never seem to break!). I have decided this year to get a real tree, but keep all my ornaments tucked away in the attic for another year. I want to have an 'organic' theme. As I am typing this I am drying some 'less than fresh' key limes from my fridge (that Mason promptly took a whole one and ate it, the kid will eat anything!) along with some lemons. I want to get some sticks, whole walnuts, cinnamon sticks, etc. and see what I can come up with. We will put them together with some hot glue and maybe a few googly eyes! We'll see how it goes, at least if anything falls off the tree the cats (and dogs) won't even bother with it.

On another note, I'm not sure if I posted this picture back in October or not, but it's worth seeing again! I wanted the big zombie that I bought on clearance last year to go in the front tree for Halloween. Since we do not own a latter, Jason climbed up the tree to secure the zombie (and in the process I got some really funny pictures) so that strong winds would still ensure that he could make trip up the tree next year. Well, then it snowed. Since Jason needs both of his legs to work, we decided that the zombie will stay in place for a little longer. Then Jason got to thinking....he is no longer the 'Zombie of Halloween', he is the 'Ghost of Christmas Future'! See, now we get two holidays out of him instead of one! Yeah, as soon as the snow clears, he's coming down, though!


I can now officially say that I have 'burned' dinner. I certainly would not call myself a novice at cooking but I am no Rachel Ray (maybe that's not a compliment) or Emeril (*BAM*), for that matter. As I was cooking taco meat (soy meat, of course) I started to smell something burning. I went over to the toaster oven that was warming the taco shells and sure enough they were on fire. I was in a slight panic as I did not want to spray water onto an electrical appliance, but I also didn't want the house to burn down. Jason calmly unplugged and pulled out the flaming taco shells and put them in the sink, where I poured water on them!! So, we ended up having taco salad for dinner, but I actually thought it was better than the original plan!

Happy Thanksgiving everyone! I will be in search of a Tofurkey, I highly doubt I will find one around here!!

Sneeky Peeky...

Here is a picture of some signs that I made for Mason's party. Ironically, the beach signs were right next to the snow shovel in our mud room! Having the mud room is a blessing, I certainly would not expect these beach signs to last very long over night with 8 sneaky cats wondering around!! So the mud room, currently, is full of all beach related items ready for Saturday, including a blow-up palm tree! I am sure the people at the party venue are going to think I am a little nuts, but hey, they wouldn't be the first!! I have a few more items of interest that I am working on, I will post them later.

P.S Pay no attention to the creepy straw head in the bottom left corner! I still have a few Halloween decorations that have not made their way up to the attic yet!!

Positive Thoughts

I just checked the 10 day forecast and it seems that it is going to be cold for Mason's birthday party, however, there are no more snow storms in the near future. I am not one to hold the weather man to his word, but lets hope that he is right this time! I'll update closer to next weekend.

This morning I was going to take Mason to school and then do my weekly shopping at Walmart right after. It was close to the time that Mason gets picked up by the bus and Jason called me to tell me that the roads were horrible. I hate to drive in snow, so I got Mason packed up really fast to see if we could still catch the bus. Since there are hills on all sides of our house, I had a feeling that the bus was going to have trouble getting up the street. As the kids got on the bus at our bus stop, Terry, the bus driver, started to pull away. No sooner did he step on the gas did he hit the stop sign that was about 2 feet away from me! Then he attempted to get up the hill, he did successfully, sideways and with the assistance of the borough salt truck! I really think that we should have had a 2 hour delay, or the hard-at-work borough workers could have come to work before 8 am!! A friend of Mason's didn't arrive at school until really late, turns out his bus got stuck in a ditch and they had to send another bus for all the kids. I have to admit, my stomach had butterflies when I saw Mason's bus slide sideways and down the hill. I remember when I was a kid and had to ride the bus we always got stuck!! The bus driver used to have all of us jump up and down in the back of the bus to get some movement! I remember it being fun, but this morning I had a different perspective of it--it wasn't that much fun knowing Mason was on that bus.

--->Finally<---

Finally, I can buy a pack of smokes for $4.21 a pack!! Not really, haha, I don't get how people can actually smoke cigarettes. It's a disgusting habit and one that costs A LOT of money. If a person were to smoke 1 pack a day (which is probably average) that would add up to $1,535 dollars a year!! How crazy is that?? I could think of a lot of other things that money could go towards. On the same note, I am SO happy that Pa has gone smoke-free in restaurants. The non-smoking section of a restaurant is like the non-peeing section of a pool!! Doesn't make much sense!! That's gross.

Anyway back to my original thoughts. I am so glad that gas prices have gone down so much. I highly doubt that it will go much below $2/gal, but that's ok. As long as we are not paying over $4/gal, I'll take it! The most I ever paid was $4.11/gal. When I started driving at the ripe old age of 16, gas was .99 cents/gal!! Those days are long gone, I'm sure, but as long as the gas prices stay around where they are, I'll be happy.

And Another...

Here is a simple project using an Altoids tin. I let Mason eat the mints because they contain gelatin (I have no idea why, they aren't even gummy!). So from the time it took to purchase the tin at Sheetz to the time it took to get home (less than 5 minutes), Mason had eaten the entire tin full of the peppermint mints!! Well, I guess I should have specified to only eat a few! That got my project rolling a little faster, I guess. This one is a mini scrapbook, also. I used double-sided paper to make it easier. I made an accordion style fold so that it could easily pull out.




I have also made these tins for gift card holders. A gift card fits perfect inside the tin. It's a great gift idea. The tin can be used all year long! I recommend a glue that is suitable for metal, because others would just not hold. I also tried spray painting the tin to make it uniform, I would not suggest it. The paint did not allow the tin to close properly. Trial and error is what crafting is all about! I let the color of the tin (different flavors have different color tins) decide what paper I wanted to use. Then a simple piece of ribbon covers the writing on the sides of the tin.

Yes, Mason did eat all of the mints out of all 5 tins that I've made!! Yuck!

{Just A Few Projects}

Last week I got some of the projects back from the Scrapyard that I had created. I really liked the way these turned out. I was sort of on a 'Go Green' kick, so I decided to use items that already had a previous life. The first one is an old CD case (I officially have about 600 of them) that I turned into a mini scrapbook. I thought it was cute and I used up a lot of scraps, I would definitely make this again.


Next up is a clipboard. We have a ton of these laying around due to our jobs requiring them, so why not put a new spin on it? This one in particular, was really beat up and chipped. So I got some old tissue paper left over from a gift and ModPodged it on there!! This technique is one of my favorites and probably the easiest of all. I had to add a pic of my favorite cat to go with the adorable post-it note pad, of course!

Well, I just wanted to share and spark your creativity. Tomorrow I will post another project...stay tuned!

*Sometimes I Wonder*

At first glance this looks like nothing more than a wholesome, delicious,complete (except for a toy in the box) breakfast. Well, it is, but how Mason ate it was a different story!

While I was cleaning up the breakfast dishes this morning I picked up Mason's cereal bowl to put it in the dishwasher (that is a foreign concept to him, but anyway...) as I picked up the spoon, I saw that he had used the gigantic, over-sized spoon that is reserved for serving food. I thought about it for a minute and then I questioned him as to why he used the biggest spoon in the drawer, he didn't have an answer. Then I asked if he could even fit the spoon in his mouth and he promptly answered "NO". Then why? I guess as an adult you just assume that a kid that can get his own breakfast could easily choose the right size spoon! This was just one of those many moments that you just shake your head and remember that we probably did goofy stuff like this, too!!


What a goofball!!

*It's The Final Countdown*

On a totally unrelated note about this post, Central Cambria won against Tyrone last night 27-20!! Yeah, another week. However, we did not go to the game as planned we went to Toys R Us in search of Christmas ideas. This is how we can tell if Mason likes something: "Oh, yeah, that's nice" means he doesn't like it. "Ohhhh, this is cool" means he likes it, but it would probably sit in his toy bin after one time of use. However, "MOM, Hey MOM, come look at this" means he wants that toy and we should make a mental note! Jason, however, could get GI Joe 'dolls' and be happy for the rest of his life!! He was very disappointed when he showed Mason the GI Joe pack and Mason put his thumb down (indicating that he would never even open the toy) and I saw a little piece of Jason get crushed last night because of it! Oh well.

Now back to my original thoughts. It's the final countdown to Mason's birthday party!! I have so much to do, so little time! I handmade an invitation to my liking (after about 4 attempts, I got it to where I wanted it), so I wasn't going to make 30 of them by hand (I'm not crazy!!) so I went to Copy Rite in Hollidaysburg and they made really nice copies. So I cut out 30 invites and glued them on cardstock, bagged them in ziplock bags and put a little sand on the bottom with a few seashells. Then to finish it off, I put a mini beach ball inside that the kids can bring with them to the party! I think they turned out pretty nice and the beach balls were a hit in Mason's class! I still have a lot to do, but at least the invitations are out. Now I still have to: Make cupcakes, bake cookies and decorate, make Mason's cake (it's going to be awesome!), place the order for pizza, decorate, and then relax? I don't know if I will get to that last one, though! Party planning is so fun for me. Here is a peek at the invitations:

Happy Veteran's Day

I saw this today on my way through Altoona early this afternoon:


It got me thinking about how thankful we should be. Even though we might not have everything we want in life, we have the one thing that matters most, the thing that many, many men and women fought for and died for. That is freedom. I don't know for sure if the man driving this vehicle was a vet or not, I am assuming that he is, but my heart went out to him. Maybe the war permanently damaged his body, mind and spirit. Maybe he has turned to alcohol to forget about what he saw, or maybe he just wants to live like this. I don't know. I know that war is not a good thing, but I know without it we would not be able to have the freedom that we have. The freedom that we sometimes take for granted. To all who have served this wonderful country of ours, thank you. Some gave all. Happy Veteran's Day!

I Am Ashamed To Admit It.

As pathetic and disturbing as this show is to me, I could not stop watching it last night! I would like to blame it on the old adage "There's nothing on TV tonight", but that is far from the case. I fill my Saturday nights with COPS and crime shows, Forensic Files was on at the same time as Paris's My New BFF. So, it couldn't have been for a lack of good TV. I just couldn't stop watching, I don't know if it was the disbelief that early 20 year olds could still act like this well after high school has ended, or if it was just the pure amazement that people do actually live and party like this. Whatever the reason, the show was pretty good! Jason even came in towards the end of the show and I was going to change it, but he wanted to see who Paris sent home, go figure! It must be a good show to hold an almost 30, sports loving, manly man's attention! I can't say much for MTV, but what I can say is, I'll be tuning in next week to see how the next challenge plays out!! OMG, TTYL!

Countdown To Vegas, Baby!

I've always wanted to go to Las Vegas, but I didn't think that dream would come true in the near future. That is up until last week. Jason and his softball team want to go out to Vegas for a softball tournament. Now, normally I would not be interested in a softball tournament, but this is VEGAS! This dream of mine is not going to take place until March of 2010, but it is something to look forward to. A lot of things can happen in that amount of time, so I just hope everything goes as planned.

We have gone back and forth about the travel to the Sin City, I am willing to get on a plane (it would be my first time), however, think of all the beautiful parts of the USA we would miss out on seeing! The plane ride to Vegas would be around 7 hours, and the car ride to Vegas would be 33 hours. I thought of a third option, the train (which Mason was all for!), but that took 4 days!! No thank you! So, I think we are going to rent a car and enjoy the drive, I mean, how often am I going to go that far west?

On another note, when we informed Mason that we are planning a trip to Las Vegas, he was only concerned about on thing. He wanted to know if we could hit up the local Toys R Us! I searched online and sure enough, there are 5 T.R.U's in Las Vegas! That made him happy! We plan on seeing two Cirque Du Soleil shows while we are there. The first one is 'O', the show is done in water, it is going to be amazing (like any Cirque Du Soleil show is). I can't wait to see this one!



The next show that we want to see is called KA, I watched a short clip of it and it looks SO exciting! There are other Cirque shows playing in Vegas like, LOVE, which is all Beatles songs, which I think would be amazing as well, but you only have so much time, you know?!



Well, even though it's over a year away, I still can't wait to see what Vegas holds!!

*Today's Events*

Today I spent the day at the Dogs Deserve Better headquarters and I helped out with the ebay auction. In the process I got to answer a phone call from a very irate woman who, well, let's just put it this way: She was pretty upset that she received a brochure from DDB (an educational brochure, might I add). Well, let's just say that if she were to be put on TV, this is what you would hear:___________%$##*,____________&*$#,________________*&@#______________________. Yep, you would not have been able to hear one word because the entire conversation would have been bleeped out! Then she hung up on me, I didn't even get to say a word! I hope she feels better and I hope someone steals her dogs, because she seemed so proud to have, not one, but two chained dogs!! Aside from that uplifting phone call, I sorted through all the donated ebay items in preparation for the November 20th auction start. We usually bring in about $2000 plus dollars for the dogs. Every year I make something, the item that I made last year went for $167.50. So hopefully, even though the economy is bad right now, DDB can get lots of money to help pay the ever increasing vet bills. Here is the item that I made for the auction:


Here's the back with all the months:


I had made a cookie sheet calendar awhile ago as a project for the scrapbook store that I go to and it was such a hit with the customers that Sandy (the store owner) made it into a class project! I was thrilled. So, since it was a hit there, I am hoping it will be on ebay, too. Here is the one I had made before:

Only The Best Will Do.

What is that you ask (a bad picture, maybe!)? This is THE sandwich that puts all other sandwiches to shame. Doesn't it look delicious? Can you almost smell it? Still can't tell what it is? Now, let me remind you, my taste buds are a little, let's just say, weird, so I can't say that everyone would enjoy this sandwich as much as me. Am I keeping you in suspense!! Ok, here goes. It's a grilled peanut butter and marshmallow cream sandwich, YUM, I know! The marshmallow cream has to be spread on first, now let me also say something that is of the utmost importance. The bread has to be superb. It can't be just your average store bought bread, it has to be bakery quality, or the sandwich will just not work. In this case it is stone ground whole wheat hearty rye bread from Panera. Anyway, after the marshmallow cream has warmed slightly, then it is time to sandwich together the peanut butter side, let brown lightly on both sides in the skillet and then enjoy!

So Proud Of This Kid

Tonight we had our parent/teacher conference and it was so nice to hear positive things instead of what we heard last year! Mason has made great strides in improving his behavior at school. He is above average in reading and got all 'Outstandings' in math, art, science, gym (that's tough, I'm sure!), and library. I know that at this age it's not hard to keep up in class and all it requires is a little attention span to score an outstanding on your report card, but it is such a step up from last year. His teacher also said that he is very good at using his manners! Even when she has to raise her voice to him (when he loses minutes at recess) he always says,"Ok, thank you, Mrs. Nileski."!! He is a good kid that we probably give a hard time to too often, but he's doing fine and is turning out to be a very responsible kid!

{Break It Down} Foodie Time

I am currently brewing this:

It smells FANTASTIC! I love to find new teas. I do brew it in my coffee maker, perhaps not as classy as how my Aunt Gwen brews tea, but it gets the job done! I am also getting ready to roast some veggies for lunch. On my shopping trip to Giant Eagle this morning I saw this:

I am not quite sure what it is, I am thinking it may be a turnup, but not 100% sure. It smells like a carrot, so it can't be bad, right? Nonetheless, it looked interesting. Since I was already planning to roast some asparagus for lunch, I thought I would give it a shot. I could eat roasted asparagus everyday for the rest of my life! I don't care for it many other ways, but the roasting just gives it SO much flavor. Mason likes it, too, however, Jason is not too into the mean-green veggie. Just more for me!


And now roasted:

just a little pepper, sea salt and pam @ 450 degrees for 15 minutes=deliciousness!

I also found at the store this morning Orville Redenbacher's salt & lime flavored popcorn! Oh. My. Goodness. Is that ever a combo made in heaven! I stopped eating popcorn for awhile because the fake butter chemical stuff that they put on there always made me sick. Then I got an air-popper (which gave me memories of elementary school)and it made really good popcorn, but it was a lot of work! So good old Mr. Redenbacher has come out with a line of popcorn that is all natural, just kernels, oil and salt. So, I am now back on the popcorn wagon, so to speak!

Hilarious!

On my way to work last week, I spotted this sign stuck in a tree along Rt.219 towards Johnstown. Upon closer inspection I saw that this political sign was indeed spray painted onto a car hood!! How funny is that? This is, of course, in reference to John Murtha's comments about our area {the area that KEEPS voting him in for some reason} being racist and full of rednecks. Along Rt.22 in Huntingdon, there was also a hand painted sign in the front yard of a farm house that read, "Clinging to God and Guns" in reference to B. Obama's statement that we are bitter here in central PA. Well, today is the last day to see all of those signs littering the highways and all the TV ads that you just end up tuning out anyway, so hopefully by this evening we will have a clear answer on where our country is headed in the next 4 years.

Don't Forget To Vote!

This is one of the most important elections to date. Tomorrow, history will be made, no matter who wins. The safety, welfare and security of our country is in the hands of the voters, so don't forget to get out there and vote!