Happy Birthday Cheryl!

Cheryl is 25 years old TODAY!!!... and in keeping with the blog tradition, we flash back 20 years ago to 5 year old Cheryl.



It was full of bicycle wheels:



A new baby cousin:



And playing with her brother:



(I had to throw in one embarrassing picture. {grin} )



And a multi-year love of SOCCER!



Extra special Birthday wishes to my special girlie!

Birthday Card

Here is the birthday card that I made for Cheryl.
I used a couple of my favorite PTI stamp sets and some great basic digital paper from Carina Gardner. I printed the paper out on a piece of cardstock and stamped away!



I'm entering it into a couple of challenges:

PTI Make it Monday : Colorful Card Corners
Pile It On : Digi Paper and/or pre-colored digi stamp

Christmas photos....

... are still in my camera at my mom and dad's house... I try really hard not to leave my stuff there, but it seems to happen... A LOT!

So, today I'll leave you with a other photos of Uncle George's wedding.
George and Joann decided to tie the knot!!!

The groom...



and the bride...



Isn't she BEAUTIFUL?!!!



The ceremony...



The wedding party... Joann's daughter, Brenda, and "The General."



The happy couple...



Best Wishes for a happy life!



Great photos, right?... and the photographer was Jim!

Wishing Uncle George and Aunt Joann all the happiness in the world!

Christmas time is here....

Happiness and cheer...



Fun for all that children call
Their favorite time of the year...



Snowflakes in the air
Carols everywhere...



Olden times and ancient rhymes
Of love and dreams to share...



Sleigh bells in the air
Beauty everywhere...



Yuletide by the fireside
And joyful memories there...



Christmas time is here
We'll be drawing near...



Oh, that we could always see
Such spirit through the year...

Merry Christmas, All!!!

Edgar Allan Poe

I always thought of Edgar Allan Poe as a creepy author, as in "The Raven." But little did I know that Poe had a romantic, dreamy side. Here is a card that I made using a quote from Edgar Allan Poe for a challenge over at Stampotique Designers Challenge and Quoth the Raven.



I used the cute Feline stamp by Roc Nicholas.
Thanks for looking, and have a great weekend!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Here we have my first oven baked turkey. Thanks to google, I learned how to prepare, truss, bake and tent a turkey.



I wonder how many other Thanksgiving meals were a success thanks to google...



I hope everyone had a great Thanksgiving with family and friends!!!

Christmas tag

Here is a little Christmas tag using a red rubber stamp from Unity Stamps. I've had these stamps for a long time and this is the first time that I used them. They are cute. I cut the card and added a contrasting color behind adding some interesting stripes.



I'm entering this in the SDC174: Striped Backgrounds challenge at Stampotque.
Thanks for stopping by!

Christmas tag

Here is a little Christmas tag using a red rubber stamp from C.C. Stamps. I added some stickles and bling to make it shine! I'm surprised at how clear the little JOY tag is... I can barely tell that it is a tag in the picture.



I'm entering this in the SDC173: Bling it Out challenge at Stampotque.
Thanks for stopping by!

House - DONE!!!

Our last pillow arrived this weekend. 6 months after starting our living/dining room design with Ethan Allen, we are done! It took us 6-months to finish the whole living room process, but it is finally DONE, and in time for Thanksgiving!... thanks to Caroline!

I love the bright paint, new puffy couch and the coffee table cubes and ottoman



Here are lots of before and after pics!

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AFTER:


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Thanks for looking!

Happy Running

Whoo's in El Moro 50K

I just realized that I didn't share any pictures from Cheryl's first ULTRA race!

We arrived at Crystal Cove State Park so early in the morning that we couldn't see how to get into the parking lot.



This is Cheryl and her pacer, Steve. It's Steve's responsibility to make sure that Cheryl has a successful race. In this picture, he's helping her through some pre-race jitters.



And they're off! Ultra races are not very big... this one had about 120 people in it.



So Cheryl and Steve are gone with the 50K... it's time for me to start with the 25K group.



I met a guy during the race who was expecting to finish in 3:30. That's 30 minutes before the 4 hour cut-off, so I thought that would be good. He let me pace off of him for the race.



I finished in 3:21, 5th in my age group... which was dead LAST!

Then I waited for Cheryl and Steve...



And waited...



Here they come to the finish line!





Cheryl and Steve finished in 7:37! That's 7 hours and 37 minute of running... 23 minutes before the 8 hour cut off... 31 miles!!! Which makes this more amazing is that Cheryl hasn't run more than 18 miles in her training.



She made it! And 6th in her age group!... which is also dead LAST! Well, we have lots of room for improvement for next time! Thanks for joining me on our race recap.