I was recently asked to be a host for a challenge blog that I've been participating at, and my challenge is now up! So go check it out! ;)

Finally Friday

I came up with the challenge topic and then created my card, along with making up my own (silly) bio. What do you say on those things?! It was fun though, so go take a look at the challenge blog linked above, and you can also see a bonus card I made on my Krafty Blog.

OH WOW! Pop on over to the CARDS Magazine Blog for a little surprise! This TOTALLY made my day! As if my Friday could have been any better?! Had dinner at Ruby Tuesday's and ate my favorite...quiche with the salad bar and a raspberry lemonade, went to Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs in 3-D, and then came home to find this little surprise! See that card at the very bottom announcing the new challenge on the blog? That one is mine! That my friends, is actually my very first published card that is in the November CARDS Magazine!! WOW! Thank you SO, SO, SO much to Paige and the Cards Peeps!!

(P.S. I was so sad when I saw in the november mag that my little card must have had its little corner bent in the mail. *sadface* oh well, but this was so exciting!)

Ever since I was a little kid I've been a huge reader. I loved The Boxcar Children, The Baby-Sitters Club, Amelia Bedilia, and anything else I could get my hands on really!  My love of reading has certainly not diminished over time, and I love that my family always read a lot when I was growing up. Both my Mom and Dad are avid readers as well, so it was natural to pick a book of our bookshelves and start reading. They introduced me to sci-fi and fantasy, and later on Mom introduced me to romance books. It kills me that Jake could care less about reading, but he will always listen to me as I rant or rave about a book I just finished. He's been there when I was bemoaning a forever away book release, and then he was there when I finally got that book and then ignored him and the fam for several hours while I devoured said book. I love discovering a new book or series, and getting lost and caught up in that world. I love that my sis Shae, lezlishae is always recommending new books to me! It makes me laugh that she refused Romance books forever until I got her to read the Black Dagger Brotherhood series. After that she was hooked, and has since repaid that recommendation with some superb ones of her own! (Nalini Singh Psy-Changeling series to name just one!)

I also love finding friends that have the same book passion as I do. I love talking books and hearing about new books to read. I love speculating plots for a sequel with someone else who has been reading the series, and hearing their ideas. I seriously love, love, love meeting people that share this interest with me. Sometimes I may go a little overboard with it haha! So on Friday night we had our group stamp party and a girl named Holly came from Jake's work. Steph (stephldunn ) and I started talking books and I asked Holly if she was a reader too. Yay she was! We started talking different books and she gave me a recommendation for The Hourglass Door by Lisa Mangum. Apparently, she and Jake work with the authors husband! How cool is that?!  She couldn't really tell us much about it because she didn't want to give anything away, but she also said it was hard to explain haha. I thought ok cool I'll check it out. So then last night we were at a housewarming for a lady Jake works with and she had a copy of the book. (I think she'd borrowed it from Holly). So we start talking about it and I asked if I could borrow it. She's like oh of course just send it with Jake when you are done.

So this afternoon I settled in to start and maybe read for an hour or two....3.5 hours later I had devoured it! It starts out a little slow with setting up all the characters, the back story and the plot. But after awhile it just draws you in and you have to know what's going to happen! Think Twilight but no vampires. A mysterious stranger that's drawn to a high school girl. He has his secrets and can actually hurt her if he's not careful. He's centuries old and is practically immortal, he disappears for long periods of time, and shys away at touching her.  But what's his deal, right?! Then enter the protagonists and odd happenings, throw in a few surprise twists and turns, and you're left guessing at the end how in the hell the story will come out in the next book. (summer 2010)  I'm a series kinda gal, always have been, and I'm so looking forward to this one. This book was really interesting and I'm wondering if the next might be even better because you already know most of the back story at this point. 

So if you are looking for something new to read, check it out! Hope you all like it as much as I did! 

Jake has been watching these programs all about the Mayweather vs. Marquez fight for the past few weeks. They follow the fighters around for weeks or however long before the actual fight. Its pretty interesting honestly! Last night before bed I swore I heard something really strange (as I was dozing off) so I had to confirm it with Jake to be sure this morning.

Mayweather weighed in 2 pounds over the set weight, so now he has to pay Marquez $600,000 dollars!!!! WOW!! Talk about a severe penalty. Holy Crap! One, I can't imagine even having that kind of money to pay such a fine, and two, dumb ass, you couldn't watch your weight before the weigh in and now you lost that much money for two pounds? ;)

Anyway, I just found that interesting!

Here it is! The New Haircut...cut and color that is! Its taking a bit to get used to, but I'm liking it. I don't regret cutting it at all. My hair is really thin, and as every stylist tells me, very fine (which is why it breaks an has split ends so often...), so its better short right now. I don't really have the patience to maintain long or highlighted hair at all now. Anyway, I don't know if these really show off the cut very well, but its layered around the face and through the rest of it.

( Picspam )

Oops - somehow I deleted the whole section I had on here about getting my halloween treat things done...oops!

I've been debating cutting my hair these past few months, and finally decided today was the day. I cut off 9 inches and dyed it a dark(ish) brown. Yep, a HUGE change from my medium length blonde highlighted hair for sure!! Its about shoulder length with a little layer. I'll be taking pictures tomorrow when I get ready for work so you can see it all then!

K, this seriously made my night. I was dying laughing when I saw this.

So our HR manager at work was talking about this site called www.awkwardfamilyphotos.com and so tonight I finally decided to check it out. This picture caught my attention because I was trying to figure out what the deal with it was...why was it awkward?! And then, well it hit me...



Here is the original post on the site, and here is the pic on flickr in case you need it bigger. (haha and bigger is better in this case so you can see it!)

Hey everyone!
Some of my favorite three piece sets are:
- Of the Earth
- Morgana
- Just Beachy

So its been about 3 weeks since I've posted on here, a record or something I think!

The kids have been in school for 2 weeks now, and I'd like to say I could blame it on that, but really, I've just been a crazy/lazy lady. Either things are so hectic when I'm home, or its been hectic and all I want to do at home is just veg. Ugh, vicious cycle!

There are probably lots of things I could talk about, but for now just a quick hello to everyone!

Oh also, something that I'm insanely proud about at the moment...tomorrow Gwynie will start taking violin lessons! :) We took my old violin to Riverton Music on Saturday, and a cleaning, stringing, and new bow...(and $116 bucks later) she is all set! I started playing at her age in 5th grade, but we moved to Idaho after 5th grade and the only teacher in teeny tiny Montpelier moved after I'd only been with him for 3 weeks. So that crushed me, but I am so super excited for Gwynie now. She is in love with it and kept calling it my violin, but I told her its hers now so she is over the moon about that! Really makes me want to get back into it because I truly did love playing it and I miss it even though that was *ahem* 17 years ago! However, time constraints make me realize now is not the time, haha!

Anyway, hope to finally catch up with life and LJ in general this week/weekend!

So last night we went and saw the movie. We were going to wait until today or tomorrow, but the kids had a little nap so they were good to go to stay up late.

Of course my thoughts don't mean a whole lot, but if anyone is interested....I'm about to spill my geeky side. xD

First, I have to agree with a lot of flisters reviews that this has been the best movie so far. It is my favorite book of the series, so I hoped it would be amazing...which it was.

( My Review... )</p>

Ok, for all you Harry Potter Peeps out there...

Look how cool this is!!

Sure we all have our own Butterbeer recipes by now, but have you ever seen such an amazing presentation?! I was blown away!!

And for fun....Candy-coated Cock-roach clusters.

She'll be posting recipes all week according to her blog...how cool right?!

Remember the games we used to play a kids and how we would mimic playing house, etc?

Well, I just had to post here real quick about the game Gwynie and Brady were playing last night...Zombie Wars!!! (My sis lezlishae will probably appreciate this the most...haha!)

The game was - They we recruited by a spy organization two years ago when the zombie outbreaks first started (Gwynie's exact words, lol) and their parents died, er were turned into zombies, (gee thanks...) and so they are the last two people on the planet and they have to kill all the zombies. It shouldn't have been a surprise, but you guessed it...we were the zombies they had to kill. xD Randomly they would pop into the family room with their guns and "shoot us", but mostly they did recon and "tracked" us, haha. It seriously cracked us up, and I thought..."Only my kids would play a zombie game they invented..." :D

WOOOOO FREAKIN HOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!

Holy crap I am so excited right now!!!

Remember how I said in a TTMT video that I was hoping to get cards published in a magazine?

Well......the deadline for acceptance passed for the one card magazine so I was feeling pretty bummed about that. I didn't receive an acceptance so I thought oh well, I will try for another magazine.

So I did...last night I worked on two different cards (different theme) and submitted them. The deadline to submit was LAST NIGHT at 12 pm MST. So....I submitted them (all via email luckily!) at about 11:15 pm last night. All day today I thought, meh who knows, I really have no idea what they will like or if I won't get any acceptance from them either. (which felt better saying not accepted than rejected...haha!) I was telling Jake last night when we were getting ready for bed that I just feel this overwhelming pressure to get accepted. I don't know why, but probably because that was a goal that I had for myself this year, was just to do it and try for it. This has been a hobby that I've been passionate about and like I said in my video, I'm really starting to take it more seriously this year. Soo........... 

WELLL......I JUST CHECKED MY EMAIL AND THERE IS AN ACCEPTANCE FOR ONE OF THE CARDS I SUBMITTED!!!!!

Holy crap I am ecstatic!!! I can't believe it!! In the acceptance email there are steps for me to send it to them, which has to be mailed by Monday the 15th. So you know what I'll be doing this weekend! ;) Also in the email they say that they will return my card to me after its been photographed for the magazine, along with scrapbooking supplies (WIN!!!) and 2 issues of the magazine!!! Which, if any of you have seen this CARDS magazine, its freaking amazing. Its like a small, sturdy coffee table book almost and normally run about $20.00 bucks. So needless to say I'm super excited for the little prizes, but mostly for the sense of accomplishment. That honestly gives me so much motivation to keep creating and keep submitting to them, and maybe the other magazine, haha. ;D

However, I can't show you guys the card until DECEMBER 1st!! Haha! That's just one of the rules so its kept fresh for the readers, etc. etc.  Anyway, come the first of december I will show it off to you guys then! :D

Whooo hooo! Ok I can now show you what I had been talking about on Sunday! I made some little crochet flowers to put on my cards and scrapbook pages!!!

I haven't taken pics yet because I just did some practice ones that aren't that great. So...you can see them in the video here. Also, this is probably how I really, truly am in real life. I think this week for me it was like talking to a friend about crafts, and not trying to be "smooth" in front of the camera. I really am this blonde, energetic and ditzy in real life. LOL that was so hilarious for me to watch and totally fun to record, so its ok, you can tell me how big of a dork I am...yet again! :D

Oh and how do I STILL not have a TTMT icon? I really need to go do that tonight!

This post is mainly for ofenjen and anyone else that has told me I CAN do something with yarn and crochet hooks and things of that nature. Jen told me that she was sure I could do that type of craft, but I really didn't think I could. I'd tried cross stitch (I taught lezlishae actually!) and I'd briefly tried doing a crochet blanket 7 years ago when I knew I was pregnant with Brady. Needless to say that never really took off for me. I would get bored or irritated with it, and just stopped doing it. I told Jen that if I did do another yarn-ey type craft/project, it would probably be because I had found a great project that I could really get into.

Well, I think I have finally found the project I want to try. All I need is a crochet hook that is a size 2 and some DMC floss. I have quite a few colors of the floss, but I want to get a few other colors for this particular thing. So, hopefully I can whip this up sometime this week and show you! :) So I'll keep you guessing, but I promise I'll share it soon. Just to tell you a little though, that is probably not surprising...it will be directly related to cards and scrapbooking by the time I'm done with it. :D