Year of the Babies

We've had a lot going on these past few weeks. A few surprises that I just have to share with blogland... specifically the Daily Bee blogland.

I'm officially going to be an Aunt... twice over this summer!

My older brother and his wife are due in August. They've been trying for months and when they finally gave up and just left it in God's hands she got pregnant! A lesson to apply to everything...

My newlywed sister had not planned on getting pregnant and had these symptoms and I told her, "You're pregnant". She insisted that it was probably due to other woman issues... and then late at night this past weekend I get this picture...

Being the sometimes ditz that I can be... I asked "So... what does this mean" haha.

Babies, Babies, Babies... we'll over-populate the world on our own!

Congratulations to my brothers and sisters!

Be'be' Time

Paris has been on my mind. Paris and Babies.
We have a little bundle on the way, the stork is sure to drop by any day now...
A couple of weeks ago (I'm late in posting), My aunt and I planned a baby shower for my cousin Eileen. As I've said before, Eileen is like my sister so this had to be a special one since she was packing up the baby making machine and throwing away the key.

The shower had to be girly, all pink and feminine. I found a tea rental service in our area and put in an order for tea cups, tea pots, tea spoons, creamer and sugar bowls/pots and food stands

The Tea menu consisted of Raspberry Green Tea and Ginger Peach Tea. I think I drank 10 cups of the Ginger Peach Tea it was that good.

The Food - Fruit was skewered, tea sandwiches made, cookies purchased, cheese tray assembled and salad mixed. The highlight was my mom's homemade baked potato soup.

I pulled out my craft skills and made little signs for the food and last minute Parisian cards from an old calender I had.

The Favors were little teapot measuring tapes with a little message from Eileen and baby.

The Guest Book was a children's book I found at Target. It was called Fancy Nancy Tea Parties and shows little girls how to do their own tea parties. Each guest signed a little note for mom and baby girl.
I procrastinated (not unusual for me) so I was like a crazy woman trying to put this together. I ran to Michael's (our craft store) and had a big idea to make topiaries. I have never attempted to make topiaries and just bought what I thought I would need.

• Styrofoam balls (way to expensive if you ask me)


• Stems of pink silk hydrangeas


• Green moss


• Long Dowels (which were cut in half)


• Clay pots

Purchased the following last minute:

• Ribbon


• Pink tissue paper

Pulled out the hot glue and my mom and I tackled the job. A massive mess later, this is what came out...
Everything came together so beautifully. I was so happy with the outcome and was told several times that I should do party planning... sparked a little idea in my head and I quickly put it out.

Here are a few of my favorite parts of the shower...

Full view (this was at a friend's house)

Gorgeous tea pots and little cards I made

(you'll notice I mixed up the pot tops... oops.)

One of the outfits I bought for my niece. I want this sweater for myself! :)

Mom's incredible Baked Potato Soup

The Baby Girl will be here any day now!

I Heart Faces Week 4 Challenge - "Texture"

This weeks challenge at I Heart Faces is about texture. Texture from nature, a building, added texture in editing... I chose to use natural texture and not add it in. I had several photos to choose from and this one just kept coming back to me.

Story behind the shot
While my sister was getting ready for her wedding, I lugged my camera along and kept it glued to my eye. At one bridal store we were crammed in a little closet dressing room with a thousand fluffy wedding dresses and had trouble not being in each others faces. Lucky for me, this brought some great face shots. haha. I'm sure the flash in my sister's eyes was anything but enjoyable.

Join in and add your texture shot!

Disney's Desperate Housewives

For all my married blog readers... haha

Fix-it Friday at iheartfaces! #41

It's Fix-it Friday... this photo has a touching story behind it.

A brave family.

Here is the message from I Heart Faces:

"To go along with our "We Are Family" theme, we wanted to highlight a family that is very special to us - the Zwart family. Angie (co-founder of i heart faces) is friends with Jeff and Adrienne...and Adrienne is also an active participant in our weekly challenges.

The dad in this family has been struggling with cancer for years and they found out the devastating news in December that his cancer is now terminal. They are now doing everything they can to enjoy the rest of the time they have together on this earth."

(Original Photo)

(My Edit)

My Steps:

I used Photoshop CS4

::Adjusted the brightness and contrast
>>>>Lowered the brightness a few notches and upped the contrast a tad.
::Upped the vibrancy almost all the way to the right
::Added a little more saturation

::Burned the edges using an action (can't remeber the site)
::Added a lens flare to the left since there was a lot of light coming in
::Changed the color balance

>>>>less Cyan, a tad more magenta and a fraction more of yellow.
::Cropped the file using manual size

If you would like to join in or visit the families blogs, click the below button!

Stormy Weather

The sky grew dark... black actually. The wind begin to blow and then the rain came. More rain than we have seen in 20 years in Orange County. It wasn't long before my family was calling me at work about a tornado warning... I looked online and begin to get nervous.

People from other states and even in northern CA often laugh at our view of weather but most don't understand that our cities are built for earthquakes not tornado's or floods. So it's much worse than the numbers show.

Here are just a few photos of what we've been seeing in the Orange County.

The tornado hit ground not far from me and stunned everyone here since we've never seen a tornado hit in this area!

(after the unheard of tornado hit at one of my favorite beaches)

As I sit here, tucked inside safe and sound, I have my stormy weather essentials. They don't include umbrellas, flashlights, candles or an escape route to a shelter... but they make it easier for me to get through the day. :)

Ginger Ale, Springtime in Paris CD (A MUST) and a White Chocolate Mocha.

I'm responsibly prepared for the 4th storm to hit today...

A Good Day

I was looking back over 2009 and was overwhelmed with the scary, bad things that happened... but for every bad day there has been a good day. There are so many good moments and of course there are those moments that make you cringe, want to pull your hair out and forget your name. Those insane minutes make the happy as a clown moments all the more wonderful.

I can narrow down the absolute most wonderful day I had this past year. How often does that happen unless you get married or have a baby? Neither of those happened to me, but this one day was just perfect. This memory brings warm fuzzies and makes me get lost day-dreaming of a day like this.

Years ago my dad bought the girls in the family spa certificates. The spa he bought them from was an hour away and we just never made it down there...

It was the beginning of Summer and my sister-in-law, Sonia, and I wanted to plan a day for my mom's 60th birthday. We had no funds to "do it up right" and I had a bright idea. The gift cards. I booked our spa packages and we surprised my mom on her birthday, June 25th.

June 27th, we got up early and drove out. The minute we walked in it was like we stepped into our mini vaca. We got our glasses of ice cold water and our big fluffy robes and slippers and lounged around until our names were called for our full body swedish massages. We would met periodically in the lounge and then got whisked away to a European facial.

We had lunch served to us by the salt water pool and drank our iced tea in the hot sun and chatted about nothing important. The smoothies looked so good in the 100 + Degree heat wave and I had to have one. Heaven.

We were called for pedicures and sat there drinking more ice tea and chatting as our feet got a massage.

It was late afternoon by this time and we were ready to go to our next destination. After showering in the glorious showers (they seemed extra nice after those fully body massages) and washing our hair with the signature shampoo... mmmmm it was wonderful, we headed to Pechanga.

Those of you that are not familiar with Pechanga, look here. It's a casino on an Indian reservation. I have always found it boring since I hate to play the slots, but my mom likes to go here so I figured we should do what she wanted to do since it was her birthday, right?

We met my mom's sister and her husband who were there celebrating my aunt's birthday. My uncle sent Sonia and I up to their room to relax and they played some slots while we waited for our dinner reservations.

Dinner was delectable! Shrimp Scampi, Calamari, Fresh Oysters, Caesar Salad... My favorite menu (minus the oysters). My sweet (favorite) uncle treated us all and made the night even better for me. ;)

I am loving this day-memory so much that I want to replicate it again in 2010!

(On a sidenote - these storms are getting bad... we're right in the middle of one and it's ugly. Praying for everyones safety here!)

I Heart Faces Challenge - We are Family

Family is the theme at I Heart Faces this week.

I did a Christmas session with my Pastor's family and this is one of my favorite Bumble shots to date. I.Love.It. This picture portrays a serious family photo but this session was anything but serious. I laughed more than any other session and so many great shots. It doesn't hurt that they are a beautiful family. That always works in my favor. :)

Join in by clicking the above button and share your family photo!

The Blue Room

In October I decided to renovate my room. I live with the parents and plan on doing so until I marry. I love my family and being with them is important to me and to them so this situation is good for me while others my age are itching to get out. I'm blessed but with a flaw. For 13+ years I've lived in a blue striped world... blue used to be my favorite color but after 13 years it gets to you.

I decided that removing this hideous wallpaper would be a cinch. Easy, breezy...

I bought the tools needed:

>Piranha wallpaper scorer (Huge mistake)
>Piranha Wallpaper remover
>1 bucket
>1 garden sprayer (Life saver)

I scored a small area, sprayed it and after the sitting and waiting process it begin to peel right off. I said, "This is going to be EASY".

The next day I filled up the sprayer, moved everything into the middle of the room and started the process of scoring and spraying.

Days later...

It was anything but easy. I cried like a baby halfway through and gave up several times only to press on and beg for help from whoever was around. Wonder Woman (my mom) came to the rescue and put me to shame by scoring the walls in record time. Once the wallpaper and most of the glue was down I was done. no more. White walls were looking good, glue gunk and all.

I hired a painter and went out to buy paint.

I bought paint without sampling it and put some on the wall... it was peach. Ugly.

I was smart enough the next time and bought samples.

I ended up going with one that my sis-in-law picked out. End result (right photo) was a beige buttery, light gold color. I had/have a design plan in my head that has been put into action that will be finished at some point and time. Just need to win the lottery. ;)

If you want to take down wallpaper I suggest you save your time and hire someone or buy a Tiger wallpaper scorer (I would have given my big toe for it but lucky for me I didn't have to). Just sayin'. I'll never do it again.

Here is a picture of Wonder Woman in the flesh!


Removing wallpaper will scatter the brain... here's proof.


BUT the end result was SO worth it!

Monkey see, Monkey do

Monkey. As in Monkey Bread. Saw it... had to make it.

Oh me oh my.

I love thee...

Dripping goodness, mouth watering yumminess...

Can I say it again... I love the Pioneer Woman site... and yes, I still want to be her.

It's all about Piper...and Lola

Written on 1/04/10 but never posted. : /

I was going to write a "Happy New Year" post but figured everyone else would have that covered. I didn't have anything interesting to say regarding the New Year so let's move on... :)

My new pup, Piper got a long overdue first bath at home and it was traumatic. For me, her and her sister. Lots of crying from both dogs and shivering and sniffling. Sad sad sad.

My brother spared me and washed her for me. I don't think I could have done it. If you heard her you would have thought we were abusing her. Poor girl.

Lola is from the first litter of the same 'parents' of Piper and when Piper first came home Lola was not thrilled. In fact, last week Piper came in the house covered in blood! We think Lola had enough of her puppy ways and bit her in the ear. Straight through. :( Another traumatic event for me and her.

Anyway, when Lola heard the screams coming from the tub she was crying too. She had to see her sister and they cuddled after they were done with their baths, sisters in the truest form. Fight then make up.

Big sister, Lola

So, I forgot to post the above and now have more to add on to this little kid/pup that is really causing me to go gray. She eats everything she gets her paws on. She's never thrown up, so the day she had her puppy shots, yesterday, she started throwing up hours after. No biggie. It became a problem when her vomiting was human sized. Are you grossed out? For this reason I quickly called her vet office and they said to take her to the pet hospital. Oy. All I could see were $$$.

I took her in and poor thing she cried the whole way and they took her in right away. She was going to be hooked up to IV's and have blood work and x-rays done. :( It was just too much to handle. No crying happened until I saw the bill. I cried. I was angry, helpless and just wanted to punch someone. How can a little puppies bill be bigger than me going to the ER? How?

I quickly called for some help (the Father, not a priest.) and sniffled while I signed the papers.

Went home and waited until almost midnight to speak to the doctor. She was doing good and I can pick her up in the morning. They wanted to keep an eye on her.

This is what I picked up...

Home now and doing better! Hopefully her life can calm down from here on out. This girl is a lot to handle. But look at that face... :)