drive by...

quick update to let all 3 of my readers know i'm not dead...super busy right now....
i had a super-fun photo shoot this past saturday with a beautiful family, so i have been crazed trying to get their photos proofed...along with trying to get ready for a yardsale this weekend at my house (email me if you want to know more details about that, as i will have scrapping stuff for sale!) and to make matters worse, they put this new web blocker-filter thingy on our internet at work, so i can't upload pics and post from there anymore...i tell ya, it's like they want us to actually work or something? go figure...
and then we found out this evening that chris may have lyme's disease! ack! anyone know anything about this...if so, email me! doctor said he's pretty sure that's what it is, but did blood work up to be sure. went ahead and started him on meds anyway and will get the blood work back in a few days. seriously, anything else?
well, that's enough whining for now... :-)
i'll be back soon with pics from the photo shoot i mentioned earlier (anyone need pics taken, let me know...i'm for hire...cheap...no weddings)
can't think of anything else right now...
more later...
nikki

Lost in Flickr again...

Oklahoma Photos I loved today, originally uploaded by RaceyGracie1.

Last night I spent about 2 hours clicking around Flickr again...man, I love that place! So many incredible, awesome photos - just pure inspiration! I love to type in a word to search for and just see what come up. Last night I typed in "Oklahoma" - why? Who the heck knows - it's just what popped into my head, and I have this strange fascination with Oklahoma. Anyway, diversions into my warped mind are not what you want to hear...

I found all these amazing pictures! I just keep looking at them...yes, I know...I need to get a life.
Anyway...enjoy!

I Love Summer....

Seriously...what is not to love about all this yummy goodness?



We got tomatoes of all shapes & sizes...not to mention colors...



we got cucumbers...crunchy and just plain yum...



we got sweet corn...need I say more?


We got zucchini...which must be fried now...right now.



And then we have these lovelies...


this is what I had for supper last night and I could have died happy.
I seriously love summer.

LOOK! I scrapped!

I told you all the other day that I acually scrapped something, and see...I did! I had some pictures from the last retreat we had at the store and I made a little mini-book using them! How fun?!
The book is made from 7 Gypsies journaling tags. I also used HS chipboard letters & journaling sopts, a bunch of 7 Gypsies label stickers, some rub-ons from Fontwerks, some bling and a bunch of Prima tape...oh yeah, and a bunch of buttons! Super fun; super easy! Went together really fast and now I have little book to remember all scrappy buddies :-)













Sorry for the crappy pics, but I did it in hurry last night - I had to get the pics done before Big Brother came on last night..yes, it's that time again! Hooray!
Thanks for checking out my mini-book and let me know if you have any questions about it!
More later...

Daytrippin'

Don't you just love daytrips? You get away from the house for the day. They don't involve a lot of planning or packing (which I hate!). They are usually inexpensive. And the kids think it's a big deal! Yep, love daytrips.
This past Saturday, my brother, his girlfriend and I loaded up my niece and my 2 boys and headed west to Elephant Rocks and Johnson Shut-ins. So much fun! Elephant Rocks was very cool...I hadn't been there in many, many years and no, the rocks havn't changed :-)
Here's Nick and Beckah when we first got there - what the heck is up with Nick's pose? He does this now whenever I point the camera at him... weird.

Here's Chris...I have no idea what the heck he was doing...rock surfing?

Of course, the cheesy..."Look, Mom! I'm holding up this 500 ton rock with one hand!" photo. Gotta love these :-) Doesn't that rock look like the head of a turtle?

For some reason I found this interesting. Keith obviously loves Valerie very much to stand in the middle of a state park and carve this into a post...fine for vandelism be damned!

This is a very cool old building that is not finished or maybe it is, I don't know. I just thought it was neat looking. The sign said it was and engine house where they used to repair train engines back in the late 1800's when there was still an active quarry here.

Look, more big pink rocks :-)

And another one of those cheesy shots...except this rock looks like an elephant's butt...hehehehe!

It really is very pretty up here, and the weather was just warm enough that we were all ready to head for Johnson Shut-ins after lunch!

There were names carved in the rocks everywhere - apparently from the quarry workers many, many years ago. I was fascinated by them - they made wonder about who these men were, how they ened up in a granite quarry in the middle of absolutely no where, what there stories were...interesting...

More big pink rocks...

Here's the old quarry...just gorgeous standing up here looking down...the sign said the water here is over 40 feet deep...cool, eh?

We went Johnspn Shut-ins after we left Elephant Rock, and because of the impending thunderstorm and the abundance of water at the shut-ins, I did not get my camera our while we were there. But it was a good time, loved the water and climbing the rocks. So much fun - I recommend taking the drive sometime this summer, totally worth it.

And speaking of thunderstorms...

Here's the one we followed home...

Thankfully, we stayed far enough behind this that we didn't have to drive in it. Scary cool, huh?

More later...

Can you believe it?!?!

Ok, I've always said that I would never go digital with my scrapping...but....since I've been playing with photoshop so much lately, I decided to give it a shot. Yep, you read that right...I made a digital layout:

Now before you get all excited and tizzied - I made this using idiot-proof step-by-step instructions from a kit I downloaded from here: Layout kit

I think I might do this again at some point, but I definitely don't see digital replacing my regular scrapping. I love my glue and paint and ink and paper way too much. I love the touchy-feely aspect of regular scrapping, but I can see incorporating some digital techniques into my normal stuff. This was a fun and interesting diversion, and it made me realize that the scrappers who do all digital stuff are waaayyyy smarter than I am, cause this was a simple page and it had me frazzled a couple of times. there is do much detail and so many steps involved in doing something like this. I could have duplicated the same look with real paper in about a third of the time this took. So kudos to all you digital girls; you have my admiration and respect!

Anyway...just something I thought I'd share... pics from this weekend and an actual scrapping project coming in the next couple days...shocking I know! I scrapped! :-)

More later...

Lazy Sunday & Flickr

Have you ever gotten lost in Flickr? For about three hours? No? Just me then huh? Ah well...so many amazing pictures to be found there! Here's a mosaic of just a few of the wonderful pics I found there this afternoon while I was NOT folding laundry, walking on the treadmill or mowing the yard...

1. the tree, 2. Untitled, 3. Fields of Gold, 4. Untitled, 5. Dainty Daisy, 6. 11, 7. now even newer zealand, 8. In Search Of..., 9. boots & spurs, 10. Cowboys, 11. no bomb can daunt me!!, 12. Flowers & The Tree 花與樹, 13. No Catcher in the Rye, 14. Cherry on the RailRoad, 15. Cow Country #2, 16. Ya gotta love this kid!, 17. Untitled, 18. Alchemy in BW, 19. Kentucky bluegrass?, 20. Untitled, 21. IMG_0988_HDR, 22. kandiliniz mübarek olsun..dua ile, 23. Summer came like cinnamon.., 24. Cow, 25. Untitled


Oh, and Photoshop + Pioneer Woman actions = real problem :-)
Here's another one from the 4th that I just couldn't leave alone...
This is the original...



And here's what I did to it...


PW's quick edge burn action.
I am printing a bunch of these now, so when I finally do scrap again, I will be set for pictures...I will scrap again, too - if I ever leave Flickr and Photoshop :-)
More later...
Nikki

Happy 4th of July....

yesterday :-)
I was just too busy to post yesterday...ok, I wasn't really, but it sounded good! The only thing I had to do yesterday was spend 2 hours cutting up fruit for fresh fruit salad and then take it to the annual 4th of July dinner/camp-out that we go to. Oh yeah, and eat. A lot. And take pictures like this...



It just made me really happy for some reason.

I did manage to take some pics at the camp ground:




Little Miss H. (They are not my kids, so I'm not using their names) There is just something about beautiful little girls with filthy, dirty faces that I love! Miss H. is a friends little girl and she managed to keep us entertained all day! Well, her and this guy... T-man



Between the two of them, we were cracking up all the live-long day.




Then there was this beauty, Miss S. Simply beautiful...even with the temp-tattoo on her forehead!




Miss H. again ...can you tell I really like these kids?




Check this out...we had a chimney log going in the fire pit...very cool!




So cool, in fact, the cows came to check it out :-)




I forgot my tri-pod, so my fireworks pictures...well, they just suck. But I kind of liked this one for some reason.



Here's Nick (pretending) snoozing in a lawn chair. He asked if it was time to do fireworks so many times that I was ready to rip my ears off by the time it got dark...ack!
Now these next two pics are my absolute favorites from yesterday (besides the grapes..hehehe) but I can't decide which I like better... the one with color




or the one without...



what do you think? Let me know...
and please don't count my kid's ribs - I promise I do feed him...really I do...

More later..

p.s. I used Photoshop Actions from Pioneer Woman on most of these photos.

I Read.

I read a lot. Scary a lot. But not all the time; I go through phases - sometimes I have three books going at once and will finish anywhere from three to five books a week. then I will slow down for awhile or just get distracted with other stuff and it will take me a month to finish a book. I actually read ALL seven Harry Potter books in 10 days, but I have been reading "The Bell Jar" for about two months. It just depends on what I am reading and what else I have going on. And for the record, "The Bell Jar" is facsinating, but also a little scary - not Stephen King scary; real life scary - so I can only read a little at a time. The Harry Potter books were fluff compared to it!

Anyway...I am working on this right now:

This book will floor you. It is powerful and stunning. It will make you cry. I haven't read a book of hers yet that didn't make me cry, but hey...her books rock!

And just so you don't think I only read deep, thought provoking intellectual books (go ahead, laugh out loud!!!!) here's the book I just finished:

Basically, I'll read darn near anything that's not nailed down, but my favorites are books that make me think and definitely books

that let me escape...wink, wink...

p.s Blogger is pissing me off with this stupid formatting crap...