Project Life: June 10 - 16

With the start of summer, my time to work on Project Life pages seemed to disappear. I guess we were too busy traveling and keeping the kids busy and home that I just didn't have time to get to creating the PL pages. Luckily I was busy taking lots of pictures and collecting little bits of things along the way. A large pile of goods has been stacking up and now it's time to tackle those Project Life pages.

On our first full week home on summer break, our three kids did a week long summer choir camp where they performed a play with lots of singing and choreography. We spent that weekend with friends at the AZ Grand Resort which is only 15 minutes from our house. They offer great summer rates that include the hotel, waterpark, breakfast and spa credits. How could we resist?

I also spent some time on a web chat with my four siblings planning the 40th Anniversary Party for my parents that we had at the end of June. The top photo show my computer screen with all of our little screens on the chat. Love that technology can connect people in three different states for a real time video chat. So cool.

While we were staying at the AZ Grand, we went to Rustler's Rooste for dinner. It's a fun western style (tourist trap) type restaurant on the hotel property. We had a guy do some really cool magic tricks for us while we waited for our dinner. We were happy to tip him because he really did a great show and it was the highlight of dinner.

Although creating these pages can be a bit tedious when I'm weeks behind and have a big pile of things to fit in the album, it's always so fun to look at the completed pages and have a record of what we did each week. I'm committed to finished this project through the end of the year, but I'm going to have to assess at the end of the year and see if I'm up to doing it again.

This week's supplies:

InLinkz.com

King's Beach Snow Cones

One of our family's favorite things to do on vacation is find a treat to enjoy sometime during the day. While we were in Lake Tahoe earlier this month, we enjoyed some time one day out on the lake kayaking. After coming to shore, we visited a farmers market right at the beach.   When we saw the Shave Ice stand at the farmer's market we knew we had found a treat we needed to test out. (Doesn't it seem like it should be shaved ice? I'm always perplexed by this.)

The best way to enjoy a snow cone is with a big scoop of vanilla ice cream at the bottom of the cup. A fun bonus at this shave ice stand was that ever snow cone came with a lei. Someday I'd like to enjoy a snow cone in Hawaii, but for now, these Tahoe snow cones were pretty near perfect.

Hope you are enjoying the weekend!

Layout Supplies /// True Stories Kit /// August Add-on

Hello, Mexico

Last month we drove about 4 hours south to go to the beach in Rocky Point, Mexico. I was a bit apprehensive about driving into Mexico because tourist have been warned that it could be dangerous. We'd never been down to Rocky Point, but since it's our closest beach, it seemed like it was worth a visit. Thankfully the drive went smoothly. Except for when we thought we had a flat tire about 30 minutes into Mexico in the middle of nowhere. Luckily it was a false warning from a car readout and we didn't have to deal with a flat tire.

We were able to rent a beautiful condo from a friend of a friend and we felt so lucky to get to spend a few days there. There was tile, granite, wood and beautiful furnishings everywhere. We felt like we were at a resort! The view from the balcony was gorgeous. It overlooked the condo pools, the beach and the ocean. The was where I found all six kids (we went with another family) standing when I first came into the condo.

The balcony ended up being one of our favorite places to relax while we were there. We ate all of our meals on the balcony. We'd brought all of our food down in coolers and we had so much good food to eat. We were hoping to avoid and food related illness plus save lots of time and money since we had 11 people in our group. I loved cooking and enjoying our meals with the sound of the ocean waves in the background.

Hopefully we will get back for a return visit sometime soon!

Layout Supplies /// True Stories Kit /// August Add-on

We're on a Boat

A couple of weeks ago when we were at Lake Tahoe, our family decided to rent a boat for a couple of hours and enjoy some time on the lake. We've been out on boats a few times with friends, but this was the first time just our family went out. We only saw a couple other boats the entire time we were out, so it felt like we had the lake to ourselves.

We also rented a tube to tow and had some fun being pulled around the lake. I got most of the ride time because the kids were a little nervous about being bounced around on the tube. They did get a bit braver after a while and let us go over 5 mph!

This was one of those moments that we perfect even if just for a few minutes. The beautiful lake with mountain views surrounding us while we enjoyed time on the water was simply amazing.

This week we are dealing with some kids and my husband not feeling well and I'm still recovering from some dental work, so it's nice to think about the fun we had just a couple of weeks ago. Plus we are adjusting to being back to school and getting back into a more structured schedule. It's always best to try and focus on the good things in life!

Layout Supplies /// True Stories Kit ///  August Add-on Kit

True Stories: You & Me

My husband and I don't have our picture taken together enough. It seems like it's usually one of us behind the camera. Luckily last month we took a photo of the two of us while shoot other family pictures.

This layout was created with the new Scrapbook Circle August kit. I'm really loving the navy and yellow colors mixed with neutrals.

The August kit, True Stories, went live today. Hope you'll stop by and take a peek.

Keeping Cool in the Pool

This summer, one of our favorite ways to stay (sort of) cool is to swim in our pool. I usually do a quick dip in the pool and then spend time relaxing poolside. One of my favorite things to do while watching the kids is take pictures.

I used my iPhone to snap photos of the kids and then played around with a couple of phone apps (Diptic and Picfx) to create the photo collage.

Layout Supplies /// Upcoming Scrapbook Circle August Kit

Here's a peek at the Scrapbook Circle August Kit:

Sketch Challenge at Two Peas

Sorry I've been a bit MIA this week. I had braces put on this week on my top teeth and some oral surgery on a bottom molar, so I've been a little out of sorts with a very achy mouth this week. Thanks to some pain meds I'm feeling pretty good today!

Last week I shared a layout I made with some photos from our trip to Rocky Point, Mexico. One of my favorite things about this page was that I was able to fit 12 photos onto one 12 X 12 spread.

Two Peas is using this layout as a sketch inspiration for CHA Summer '12 Challenge #6 - Use this sketch! You can stop by Two Peas to see the sketch and play along with their challenge. The challenge ends this Sunday, the 22nd.

Hope you have a fabulous Friday!

Summer Bucket List

This month on the Scrapbook Circle blog we have a challenge to scrapbook your summer bucket list. Love that Tessa came up with such a fun challenge!

I decided to play along with the challenge. First, I wrote down a list of things that I'd like to do this summer and then choose a few of my favorite photos that I've already taken this summer.

The photos and list are paired together and I hope to be able to cross everything off the list this summer. Although it's still plenty hot outside, I feel like a bit of summer is coming to an end because my kids go back to school in just a week and a half.

We still have so much to do, so we better get cracking on the list!

If you want to play along with the summer bucket list challenge, you can find all of the details here.

Layout Supplies /// Sunshine Day Kit ///  Summer Sun Add-on

Rocky Point, Mexico

I love the beach. It can be hot weather, cold weather, at the ocean or at a lake. It doesn't matter what type of beach it is, I love to be there. This could stem from the fact that I have lived in the desert nearly my entire life and large bodies of water are a welcome change while on vacation. Since I enjoy the beach so much, I usually tend to take a lot of pictures while we are there. Last month in Rocky Point was no exception and I ended up with many photos that I wanted to scrapbook.

Yesterday I shared the octopus photos on a page and today I'd like to share 12 of my favorite beach photos from that trip on a page. It took some time to narrow my favorites down to only 12 photos, but I can only fit so many photos on a page! All of the photos were taken on my phone because I didn't want to have to worry about our big camera at the beach.

Since I wanted to use so many photos on the page, I printed them out at a smaller 2 X 3 inch size so more photos would fit on the page.

I'm loving all of the bright and sunny colors on this page since it really reflects what our day at the beach was like.

The mini striped bags are one of my favorite elements on the page. I considered adding journaling tags inside the bags, bur decided that I like how they looked as empty bags.

A little fun news...a couple of days ago one of my Glitz Design layouts was the featured layout of the day on Two Peas. Fun!

 Thanks for stopping by today!

P.S. All of the supplies for the Rocky Point layout came from the upcoming August Scrapbook Circle Kit.

Sunshine Day

Today I'm feeling pretty lucky because our family gets to spend the entire week enjoying Lake Tahoe. We spent an hour this morning kayaking on the lake. We didnt really get very far, but we did have a lot of fun.

Since I knew my husband would have to be working part of this trip, I decided to bring along some scrapbooking stuff to use during our downtime. Here's a look at my "office." Not a bad view in sight.

I was able to put this layout together this afternoon using some photos from our weekend trip to Rocky Point last month.  The kids found a dead octopus while exploring some tide pools so of course they had to show it off of the camera.

This was our first trip to Rocky Point and we hope to go back. The beaches were beautiful and the water was warm. 

Hope you are having a fantastic Monday!

Layout Supplies /// Sunshine Day Kit /// Summer Sun Add-on

Surprise 40th Anniversary Party

Last weekend my siblings and I threw a surprise 40th anniversary party for our parents. One of my favorite things about planning the party was the almost daily phone calls with my siblings.  We even did a couple of video conferences since we live in three different states and couldn't get together to plan the party.

The night of the party, we had arranged for my parents and some of their friends to go out to dinner near our house. The plan was that they were then going to check out a house near ours and our kids were going to be waiting out front of our house and spot my parents and ask them to come see something in our backyard. Instead, my mom ended up calling me during their dinner to see if they could stop by and show our house to their friends. Perfect!

My parents were completely shocked when they arrived and saw all of their kids (one sister had traveled across the country to be there and another had traveled from Utah) and then they saw our yard full of 80 friends and family. So fun! I've never thrown a surprise party before, but I'll be on the lookout for another opportunity to do it.

We decorated the yard with hot pink and purple paper lanterns in the trees. Those were my parents wedding colors! We had tables with white tablecloths topped with candlelit mason jars with wedding and older family photos.

We had a few different food sections set up at the party. First, we had a cake, punch, mints and nuts table since these were the food items at our parents' wedding reception. My sister, Michelle made all of the cakes and they were each so delicious. We has a dark chocolate cake, coconut creme cake, fresh strawberry cake and a peanut butter cup cake. She really outdid herself on the cakes.  We made this punch recipe and it was perfectly refreshing and delicious.

Another one of our food tables was cookies and milk station.  We had skim milk, dark chocolate almond milk and regular chocolate milk along with an mix of homemade and store bought cookies. We also added a tray of homemade (by Michelle) brownies plus a canister of homemade vanilla ice cream. We also had some funfetti Chex mix made by my sister Kristen.

Our third food station was a popcorn mix station. We popped a bunch of fresh popcorn and filled a giant basket. We had several little containers that held a bunch of different candies (Whoppers, mini M&M's, Reeces Pieces, nuts, and Junior Mints) plus some flavors that could shake on the popcorn so everyone could do a custom popcorn mix. We bought the flavors from this online store. We decorated white paper bags that everyone could use to hold their popcorn.

My brother put together a video with wedding photos and older photos that we had running during the party.

We set up a photobooth where we asked the guests to pose as they arrived at the party. My sister Kristen ran the booth. Nice work, Kristen!

Once the sun went down, our paper lanterns light up perfectly. We used these battery operated lights in each lantern. The lights were perfect because we didn't have to rig up any electric lights. We also lined our pool fence with white lights.

Overall, I'd say that we threw a very successful party. It was such a fun night spent celebrating my amazing parents.