Pictures from our trip...

Our adventures in Virginia:

We headed up to Centreville to visit our old neighbors, the Wiemanns! Of course we had to hit our old pool (twice!), so here are JP, Alex & Ben goofing off, like normal!


Alex hangin with the Wiemanns - Will, Jennifer, Ben, Alex & JP:


While we were there, we got to see one of JP's soccer games, very fun:


After our short visit to C'ville, we headed back to Spotsylvania to the McGettigan's. Here is everyone loaded up headed to the pool - Krista (she's gonna kill me for not cropping her out!), Jeff (Krista's hubby), Kathryn Ann (Krista's SUPER sweet neice), Ashton (Krista's awesome son), Alex, Bailor (Krista's son & my Godson) and Tyler (Krista's super cool nephew):


Here's Krista and I all dolled up for a Girls' night on the town (we went to Bonefish for a delish dinner and then tipsy shopping at WalMart, FUN!):


While we were there, Ashton had his 3rd grade Award's Ceremony - he got 3 awards - yay Ashton!!!


We went to Warrenton for the day to visit Krista's parents (they are my adopted set of parents from back in the days of Atlanta - they're the greatest!!). Here we are at an Irish pub cooling down from shopping, enjoying some icy beverages and playing UNO & dominos, very FUN!!


Our HUGE adventure to King's Dominion was the highlight of the trip for Alex!! Here's our "guide" mapping out all of the cool rides:


Alex rode ALL of the kiddie rides:


Pilot Bailor:


After lunch we cooled off at the water park before heading back for more rides:


My little dare-devil is now tall enough to ride most every ride in the park and fortunately Krista and Jeff took him on some "big" rides because Mommy does NOT do rides! Here he is on the pirate ship that goes UPSIDE down. Yep, scared me to death, but he had the time of his life and grinned so big his cheeks hurt (he's in the front row right next to Krista - she's on the far left):


Ashton, Alex, and Kathryn Ann:


Kathryn Ann and Alex rode this spin-you-around-at-neck-breaking-speeds ride:


Here come the roller coaster riders:



We had a very fun trip, but are surprisingly happy to be home (yeah, never thought I'd say I was happy to be back in MN, but I'm really looking forward to Haley's arrival on Saturday, so am working to get the house in order and I really did miss Andy - but don't tell him I said that!!).

We're home...

We arrived home safely tonight from our fabulous trip to VA!!

I have lots of pictures to post, but unfortunately forgot to take a picture of all of the super cute blankets that Krista and I made, so she'll have to take a pic and post it on her blog (HINT, HINT!).

So, stay tuned bloggie friends for tons o pictures!

Oh, and CONGRATS to my super sweet Peyton lovin friend, Allison and her guys on the birth of their sweet baby Katie!! 9 lbs - WTG Al!

Last day of school...

Woo Hoo!

Here's my little man this morning right before we headed off to his last day of preschool!



It was sad dropping Alex off this morning though because we both really love one of the assistants and she came to get him from the car, she used to live on our street, so I told her to come visit us anytime she wants! Alex isn't going to be at the same school next year, so it's a little sad for me to be leaving behind the sweet ladies who were so kind to our family.

So, last day of school means tomorrow starts our summer vacation!!!

Tomorrow is errand day and Thursday Alex and I are flying to Virginia to visit LOTS of friends, FUN!! We'll be gone for over a week and I'm a little nervous about leaving home - Andy's never had to stay at home without Alex and I for that long and I'm a little worried how he and Sparkles will fair since she isn't a fan of his, although I'm hoping us being away will make her warm up to him (he'd love to be able to hold her or at least pet her!). I'll have tons of pictures to blog when we get home, so come back after the 15th!!!!!!!!!

I'm SEW excited...

So last night, I got to go out by myself (came home and the boys were still up, playing video games, so of course I had to put Alex to bed, but still just happy that I got to go out for a few hours)!! I went to a sewing class at one of the local sewing shops, very fun!!

I made this placemat and have the fabric to make four more (the others will be different colors though, one yellow for a lemon slice, one green for a lime slice and one red with green trim for a watermelon slice!). It is quilted too, so not only did I learn a bit about sewing/binding, I learned a teensy bit about quilting. I KNOW, I do NOT need another crafty hobby, but just think about all of the fabulous quilts that I could make as gifts/keepsakes!! FUN!

Thanks for taking a peek!

Fun day...

We had a great trip to the lake/beach right down the road from our neighborhood with our friends, the Holms.

Alex loved swimming in the lake:

These are Alex's girlfriends enjoying the lake:

After we had all the fun and sun we could stand, we swung throught the drive-thru at KFC for a bucket o' chicken and went to their house for some slip-slidin fun:



The kids were SO pooped while they ate, they could barely hold their chins off the counter, but an early bedtime for all three of them, so it was a successful and fun day!!

Oh and one more thing...take a look at the little love birds cozied up after dinner in the chair, watching a movie:

Yep, he's got his arm around her!

A couple of cards...

Here are a couple of cards that I made for Nancy V's little workshop that I found through my blog-friend Dawn. Nancy makes beautiful cards, so if you need a little inspiration, take a peek at her blog, gorgeous stuff on there!

Another one...

I forgot about this layout, also for a j4k daily challenge to use a date:


Journaling: "This is the day that you saw the world around you clearly for the first time in goodness knows how long, thanks to your Spiderman glasses. I didn't think it was possible for you to get any cuter, but w/ your glasses on, you are even cuter!"

I copied that button arrow from someone, I wish I could remember who I borrow these great ideas from to give them props, but my mind is mush.

Thanks for takin a peak!

Reusable grocery bags...

I love these little totes, I use them for EVERYTHING, not just groceries and they hold a surprisingly large amount of items. As I was checking out at Target today, this little twerp had the nerve to ask my why people use "these things" - hello, as soon as you hit puberty and start complaining about global warming, then maybe you might see the need for reusable grocery bags! Okay, I'm seriously not turning all "green" on you here, I'm just grumpy I guess - I cheated on my diet yesterday with brownie bites (3) and sugar cookies (4) and a KFC biscuit w/ gravy and a breast WITH extra crispy skin, which makes me grouchy, but it was all soooooooooooo good! Anyhow, pick up a reusable grocery bag or ten (like me, so you can get to the store and have NOT 1 in the car because they're all at home with 2 0r 3 items in each one scattered throughout the house!), I promise you'll love them!

I did a fun challenge at J4K in honor of the last day of school in Edmond, it was to scrap a school layout using non-school paper. Here's mine:

The journaling reads: "SPOT is Speech and Occupational Therapy. Alex goes to SPOT on Tuesdays & Thursdays. They do lots of fun things; Miss Dawn & Miss Betsy work w/ the students so creatively that Alex doesn't think of SPOT as school ~ to him it's like a mini-field trip.

He planted this little cup of grass to work on sensory/touching/working w/ the damp soil. We put it in his special name bowl to keep safe!

Crystal Lake Elem., MN 2008"

I finally used some of my super-cool grungeboard on this (the title), love it! I saw felt flowers like that somewhere and thought, "I can totally make those", so while watching Saturday morning cartoons with my little punkin, I stitched these together - so fun!

Goodwill Hunting and a disaster...

On my mind today:

If you haven't shopped at Goodwill, GO! Yesterday Andy's comment upon seeing our new wine table ("I thought that you just dropped things off at Goodwill and could only shop there if you were 'in need'?") was exactly what I had thought up until a few months ago, but no-sirree, they LOVE it when you come in to shop because the money you spend goes towards community education programs! I've gotten lots of glass w/lid containers for my flowers in my craft room and some awesome pieces of white hobnail milkglass to add to my collection, all ranging from $.49 - $4.99!!! I've gotten some books there too, usually for $.99 and I end up either passing them on to others or just donating them right back to Goodwill.

So here are my treasures from my hunting trip yesterday:

wine table: $6.99 - matches our table perfectly and I plan to cover the top with wine corks that I've been saving for a project (I had originally thought to put some tiles on there, but that would require grout and such, so the lightbulb went off that I had three bags full of wine corks that we've been saving for years from much enjoyed bottles of wine and how perfect to line the top of a wine table with wine corks??).

glass bud vase $.99 - somehow mine didn't make the move, very sad since I got it from an estate sale in St. Pete and have a matching footed candy dish.

small white hobnail bud vase $.49

white hobnail pot $.99 - I think I'll plant a violet in it.

silver two-tier server $1.99 - I just love tiered servers, I'm in the market for a Fiesta Ware one!

white milk glass bowl with pour spout $.99 - I'm going to use this as my trash bowl (if you don't know what a trash bowl is, go watch some Rachel Ray!!)

Not only do I loose weight on the South Beach Diet, but I really enjoy the recipes, so Andy bought me this at Target the other night:

It's got all different recipes from the original book that I have and I'm making a list of items needed from the grocery to try some of the new recipes! If I have to diet, I really enjoy the South Beach, I like having my meals planned ALL out for me, not to mention that I get 3 meals, 2 snacks and dessert every day!

Look at this sweet little treasure Alex brought home from school yesterday (the plant, not the bowl - which, sorry Aunt Jenny, we don't use this awesome bowl often because it's SO special that I'm terrified to use it except on special occassions and now, it's got the perfect purpose and won't be subject to spoons or washing to chip it!):

Of course Andy said, "it's just grass Jonnelle!", but it's grass that my sweet little man planted himself in a little plastic cup that he accidentally dropped when he got home, the cup split and he was sad, so it is extra-special and we put it in an extra-special bowl and placed it on the wine table, it is perfect there!!

Okay, in closing, the disaster:

This is my beloved baking stone - that is a WELL-seasoned stone, I've had it since Andy and I were dating, living in TN, it's cooked so many delights and I dropped it last night on the tile floor (which luckily wasn't damaged because my foot broke the stone's fall - ouch!) and it split in two. VERY sad. I must rush out and get a new one, TODAY!!

Hope you're having a wonderful Wednesday!

A new look!

Thanks to my friend Kristi, I spruced up the ole blog a lil bit! I went to this blog and got the template for free! And you know that I am computer illiterate, so if I can do it, anyone can!!


We had a nice, relaxing Memorial Day weekend, I hope you did too. I even got in some scrappy time - yay me!!




This one is scraplifted from Vicki Boutin in the Scrapbooks Etc. Feb/March 2008 issue.


This one is scraplifted from Tracy Kyle in the Scrapbooks Etc. April 2008 issue.

So, all of those layouts ideas that I tear out from magazines actually do get used sometimes!!

I'm looking forward to a nice, slow week this week - the only thing that we have on the calendar is Alex's kindergarten Open House on Wednesday (yes, it's early, but they'll have another one before school starts - this one is to inform parents so we can help prepare the kids over the summer). No swimming lessons, no ice skating lessons and no meetings about therapies/autism testings, just aaaaahhh, a normal schedule at a normal pace with a much-needed eye brow wax for me as soon as I drop Alex off at school tomorrow!

Okay, I'm off to bed, night!

GoOoOod mail day, so good that it led to a trip to the walk-in clinic...

I'm a Fiskateer!! #3715

Every Fiskateer is sent a pair of scissors with their number etched on the blade, very exciting, I know!! And the scissors are green and orange, one of my fave color combos! There was orange paper confetti in the box to make it extra fun and a green canvas bag just for storing my special scissors - will I ever use them? That is the BIG question, I think I might just want to save them for looks - any Fiskateers reading my lil blog? Do you use yours or just leave them for eye candy???

The box had a cute mailing label with my name/address/ Fiskateer # and I wanted to make sure to keep it, even though to get the box open, I had to cut the label right in half. Well, that would just NOT do. I grab my searated tomato knife that's drying on the towel and proceed to slice through the box to claim my prize and keep the label all in one piece. And wouldn't you know, me being SO (NOT) graceful, I sliced my left pointy finger in the process. Good news, it wasn't that long of a cut. Bad news, it was deep enough that I thought I should go have a professional look at it. Good news, while having my throbbing, bleeding finger wrapped tight in a paper towel, I made sure to take pictures of my Fiskateer delights for you to see (and for me to scrapbook one day!):

So went to a brand new walk-in clinic, I filled out a few papers (they were very thoughtful to my predicament) and the whisked me back to a doctor. He gave me two choices, two stitches with lots of pain to get the finger numb or some steri-strips to close it up without pain. DUH, give me option number 2! What he failed to mention was that he was going to thoroughly clean out the wound which hurt like a son-of-a-gun, yeeeeeoooow, but I was tough (didn't want to cry or scream since Alex was sitting there in the room and it would have scared him off of doctor's offices for good!). Oh and they gave me a tetnis (sp?) shot since there was a metal object involved and I have no idea how long it's been since I've had one, that shot was a breeze, barely felt it at all, until the next day and the day after that and probably the next day too - it is sore around the shot sight. Man, I'm tough!

Okay, three blogs for one night is making my eyes cross and probably more than you wanted to learn about me anyhow!

Nighty-night!

New adventure for Alex...

We went to a children's fair here in Lakeville and Alex actually let them paint his face!

This is huge for Alex, just sitting long enough to let them do it is big, but him sitting down, asking for Spiderman and letting the guy paint on his face, HUGE ! He was very proud of his spider and enjoyed showing everyone!

While we were there, he toured a fire truck and loved trying on the fireman's hat, even though it weighed a ton!

Thanks for letting this mommy brag~

My life right now...

Well, we've become dandilioin farmers! This is our yard:

Yikes, I know, but TruGreen is coming out this week to spray, so we'll see!

Here is the flower bed that only contains three hostas, so on my mind is what to put here?

I'd love a rose bush, but it doesn't get enough sun. So for now, it'll just stay bare.

I'm such a sucker for flip flops, Loooooove them and here is my newest addition to my collection:

I got them at a little specialty store and they fly like hotcakes there, but I've been on the wait list for this style and just adore them!

I've been shopping around town this last week to decorate our office since we now have all of our furniture in there. I'm not having much luck finding anything to put in the shelves of the hutch, so I'll maybe just stick some pictures in there (everything I've brought home has been too tall). I did get some candles for the sconces, but not sure if I like them - what do you think (I'm thinking it needs something taller, so that's why the price tags are still on the candles)?

I got that long throw pillow for $7 at Marshalls!!! Love the lil bit of color that it adds.

Speaking of color, here's our dining room and on the table, that's the swatch of color we chose - Ralph Lauren's Tapestry Green. I wanted a long centerpiece, but not sure if I'm loving this, it reminds me of something that you'd see at the front alter of the church - am I just being too picky??

Other news in my life right now is that I am back on South Beach Diet, started it Monday and doing great (I've even walked a couple of days when it hasn't been too cold!):

We're eating tons of veggies and I just love using lots of fresh herbs, lime juice, EVOO and different vinegars on everything!

So this is my new fave snack - I actually started eating it before I started SB, but remembered that I could still eat it on the diet, so that helped push me along to getting back into action. It's marinated Edamame:

1 bag of frozen, still in the shell edamame (soy beans)

2 T low sodium soy sauce

1 T sesame seed oil

1 t sea salt

1 t minced garlic

Mix sauce together, toss frozen edamame in sauce, stirring to coat, cover with lid, set on counter to defrost, shaking the bowl periodically!

So yummy and delish, got the recipe from my Japanese/Hawaiin friend here in MN - we've nicknamed them the Japanese boiled peanut cause all of the yummy seasoning is on the shell, but you only eat the insides!

Thanks for peeking at my life right now~