"My New Stamp Room"

Well, we are finally all moved in and settled in Iowa. I absolutely love it here. The only thing I don't like is the humidity. I really miss my dry heat. I haven't done a whole lot of stamping since we moved in. My two youngest are in softball and that pretty much consumed most of my free time. The girls all have adjusted well here and they love their school. It's so different for them than when we were in Cali. They take a bus to school and home, they have hallways (indoor school) they have lockers and swings on the playground. They said that they are going to a school like they see on TV. They only went to school for 2 months before summer vacation but I did get a chance to make the teachers a little something and I also made something for the bus driver. I have to locate the pictures though, they are on my old laptop, then I will post them. I also made a gift set for each of the 12 girls on Sarah's softball team. I didn't make anything for Molly's team this year. I didn't have much time or enough paper. Oh well, her team will get them for sure in the spring. Thanks for sticking with me in my absence. I miss you all.
Rochelle

Moving Day Is Almost Here

Ok, the past couple months have been such a whirlwind. I came back to MN for my grandma's funeral last week and Katie and I drove down to Iowa to find us a house to rent. It is harder than I thought. I can't seem to find more than 4 places to look at. So we have expanded to town homes and apartments. I have 4 appointments today so wish me luck. I fly back to California on Thursday to get the house stuff all in order and then close on the house in a couple weeks and drive to MN to get my girls and go to our house in IA. I am leaving the girls with grandma while I go back to CA. So, I won't be posting for a while but you can bet as soon as I get settled and unpacked I will be back to stamping. I miss it so much. Thanks for sticking it out with me and being patient while I have been away. Can't wait to re-connect with you all again soon.
Take Care,
Rochelle

"Wylde Women Award"

I was awarded the Wylde Woman Award this morning by De. She said that my blog was the first and only blog that she visited when she started blogging. Thanks for the compliment De. And thanks for the award. I would like to nominate all my readers for this award. You are all Wylde Women and I wouldn't be here if it wasn't for you.

"I got an award"

I received this blog award from Snoopy the other day.
I now get to nominate some of my favorite blogs.

Here are the rules:
1. Pick 7 of your favorite blogs
2. Winners can put the logo on their blog.
3. Link the person who gave your award to your blog.
4. Name the 7 that you are giving the award to with their links.
5. Leave a message on their blogs so that they know they've won!
So I would like to nominate these 7 people who's blogs I enjoy. Go check them out for some inspiration.
1. Diana
2. Nancy
3. Melissa
4. Doris
5. Kristine
6. Kelly
7. Tammy

"Back To School"

My two little ones went back to school today. It sure is quiet here now. I don't know what to do with myself. Katie goes back next Monday, then all three girls will be gone all day. I am so excited. Molly started 1st grade today and Sarah is starting 2nd grade. Whew, they grow up so fast.

Today I will be prepping for a workshop that I am doing on Thursday so I will share those items this week. I am patiently waiting for my SU order to come in. I ordered on the first day and I need things for Thursday so I hope that my "brown guy" delivers. Otherwise I will have to improvise and I don't really want to do that.
Back to school means more gift items, class room treats, and a lot of fun stuff to share with you. So stay tuned.... this year is gonna be cool. I have lots of new and exciting things to share. Have a great day!

"I Have Been Nominated For Some Awards"

I was nominated for this special blogging award from my friend JoAnna. Thanks JoAnna for nominating me. Woo Hoo!!
Here are the rules for this award:
1. The winner can put the logo on his/ her blog.
2. Link to the person you received your award from.
3. Nominate at least 7 other blogs.
4. Put links to those blogs on yours.
5. Leave a message on the blogs of the people you have nominated
I am going to nominate the girls on my Belli Challenge Design Team
1. Chris
2. Holly
3. Laurie
4. Shelly
5. Jennifer
6. Christi
7. Ceal
8. Lorie

I was nominated again for a different award from one of my stampin' sistas Trudi Thanks Trudi. The rules for this BFF Gold Card are:
1.Use the twinks bank icon
2. Only 5 people allowed. (to be nominated) .
3. 4 of the 5 have to be dedicated followers of your blog
4. 1 is to be someone new or recently new to your blog and live in another part of the world.
5. You must link back to whoever gave you the award.
Here are the 5 people I want to award:
1. JoAnna
2. Lisa
3. Sandy
4. Tammy
5. Courtney
Newbie:
Me Me Me From Japan

"Happy Firday"

My neighbor is coming over today so we can finish up the wrapped Hershey bars. We are now doing 150 instead of 200. We are almost done with them. They are turning out great. We are also going to do 150 peppermint sammiches. She punched the scallops and stuff the other day and she will bring them over for assembly soon. I will be stamping tonight. So get ready!!! I feel like such a slacker with my posting lately. Remember when I would post every day? LOL Yeah, me too. Now I am posting 3-4 days a week. What the heck is up with that? I really like the daily posting way better. I know you all do too. So I will get my butt in gear and be a better blogger. Have a great Friday.

"Yosemite Vacation"

We are back from our vacation. I can honestly say that I have never seen anything as gorgeous as I did in Yosemite National Park. We were on the Valley Floor surrounded by beauty beyond belief. This picture is our view from directly behind our cabin. It was breathtaking.

This is the view from the top of the first picture. It is called Glacier Point. It was directly above our cabin. 3200 ft above. If you look by the grassy field in the middle you can see the swimming pool. It was about 70 yards from our cabin door.

Here are Sarah and Molly playing on a big rock in front of our cabin. There were several rocks bigger than this one around our camp. Every kid in the camp was climbing the rocks.

Here are my three tree huggers, hugging the giant cedar tree. The camp was full of trees like this one. The pictures are kinda hazy because of the smoke from the wild fires in CA. You couldn't smell the smoke but you could see it.

This is the famous "El Capitan" People climb this rock. (crazy people) It is so huge. We took a 4 hour guided tour up to the top of Glacier Point and saw the most beautiful views I have ever seen.

Another famous climbing rock is the "Half Dome" Absolutely stunning. People come from all over the world to climb El Capitan and Half Dome.

This is another picture from the top of Glacier Point. The waterfall on the top right is called Nevada Fall. The lower falls on the left is called Vernal Falls. On the way down the mountain we stopped at a viewing spot that showed Bridalveil Falls with a rainbow going through it. It happens the everyday at the same time and we were lucky enough to see it. It was hard to photograph it but I did get a post card of it for my scrapbook.

Before we did the tour to Glacier Point we went to Yosemite Falls. It was so gorgeous. I can't even describe it. This picture is what we saw from the beginning of the hike to the lower falls. That hike was 30 minutes. 15 there and 15 back. The hike to the upper falls was 6-8 hours. You could go all the way to the bottom of the falls and feel the spray from the water. It was truly awesome.

This is another picture of the falls. It is by far the most spectacular thing I have ever seen. I wish it wouldn't have been so hazy from the fires. I did take quite a few pictures of the falls. We even found a couple that spoke English to take our family picture. Believe me, it was hard.
I have a couple more pictures from the hike to show you. I could have stayed there forever. It was so pretty. We were only there for 4 days but it felt like longer. It was so nice to get away.

The thing I wanted to see the most besides Yosemite Falls was the Giant Sequoias. You know the famous one that you can drive through that you see in all the Yosemite Brochures and on the Internet? That is the one I wanted to see. Turns out that it blew down in 1969. Yes, I said 1969. I felt like a dork when I asked the guy at the info desk and he looked at me like I was stupid and told me it blew down 39 years ago. My question is why is it still in the brochures? The Giant Sequoia forest was about 27 miles south of where we were and we didn't make it there. Yosemite is 4 hours south of Sacramento. I can't believe it was our first time there. But I guess when you live there you don't see the sites like the tourists do.

Oh yeah, I have a foot update. My foot was pain free the day we left. I was careful not to over do anything but the pain was totally gone. When we got home there was a message from my doctor on the answering machine giving me the results for my blood work and x-rays. You're not going to believe it but all my tests came back in the normal range. So I guess not walking and having so much pain you can't put a sock on is totally normal. I wonder what it is called when you can walk and have no pain. LOL
Thanks for sharing my vacation with me. I really need to stamp. I am having serious withdrawals.
*We did rent a cabin. They also have three sided tents, tent cabins, and cabins with bathrooms. There are also several campgrounds that you can tent or RV in.* You have to book your vacation to Yosemite about a year in advance. They sell out super fast. When we booked ours lie 8 or 9 months ago, the only thing we could get was the three nights we got. There was nothing else available.*

Saturday Update

I hope you all had a safe and fun fourth. We had our block party on Friday night and it was a blast. I am so mad, I brought my camera but didn't take a single picture. Good thing my neighbor did, I will have to get some copies. We didn't have as many people as previous years but it was still fun. We had a bounce house, sno cone machine, cotton candy machine, carnival games and a margarita machine. Lost of food and lots of fun. At night we blew off fireworks for about 40 minutes and it was awesome. All the kids got glow sticks and had those poppers and sparklers. I plan on stamping today. I had to clean up my area the other day and I didn't want to mess it up to stamp but I am ready to mess it up now. I am totally going through stamping withdrawls. My best friend Shelly sent me some new stamps for my birthday and I can't wait to ink them up. They are penguins and super cute, so stay tuned.....

"Molly And Her Cake"

Molly's party was a big hit. We had 15 kids. It was nuts. The bounce house was super fun too. I did get in a couple times. It was pretty funny. When ever I fell I couldn't get back up, partly cause I was laughing so hard and partly cause the other kids were jumping around me that I couldn't get my balance.

I just wanted to show you the cake that I got for her. It is a cupcake cake. I had never seen these before. Are they cool or what? They are only $19.99 and this one comes with 33 cupcakes.

Now this was a total impulse buy. I totally didn't need it but it just screamed Molly. She is my girly girl. She also went through a phase where we had to call her "princess" instead of Molly. She even asked me if we could legally change her name to princess. So when I saw this I had to get it for her. She loved it. I promise I will post something crafty tomorrow, but I just wanted to show you the cake.

Oh I also wanted to say something about yesterday's post. When I said I quickly made up those goodie bag gifts. It's because I had some of them already cut and scored. I had all the scallops, circles, and scallop squares all ready punched. I like to keep stuff on hand so I can just grab what I need. When I make a gift set or candy wrapper or what ever, I usually cut and score several more so if I need one in that color later on, I already have it. So that's what I do. Don't get me wrong. It still took me several hours to complete them. Tony was at a movie so I did it when he was gone while I was watching TV.

"My Baby Graduated Kindergarten"

This is my baby Molly. She gradutated kindergarten today and it is her 6th birthday as well. What a big day for her. Her dad is out of town this week and she is a big daddy's girl so we got her some flowers from her daddy today to make her feel like he was there. I can't believe that she is going to be a 1st grader. I will have all my girls in school all day now so that will rock! I might have to get a job so I don't go crazy. Or I could stamp all day. LOL

"Birthday Cupcake"

I had a fantastic birthday! Tony was gone at a wedding out of town so it was just me and my two little girls. Molly is feeling better when the Motrin kicks in but when that wears off the fever comes back. We did get to go swimming for an hour and that made her feel a little better. She didn't really swim though, she just laid in her tube and clung to the side of the pool with her head down. Poor girl. She went to lay down at 5pm and is didn't wake up until 9am Sunday. I got to stamp all day, my neighbor came over for a while with a some wine coolers and this super cool cupcake, two new embossing folders and a funny book called Girl Talk. Thanks Lupe for the great gift!! Check out this cupcake. Is it cool or what? I have never seen anything like it before. I wanted to eat it but I couldn't, it was too cool. I wanted to show Tony when he got home. When I woke up this morning, all the petals were on the plate. I guess the frosting was too heavy.

"It's My Birthday And I Can Stamp All Day!"

Woo Hoo!! It's my birthday! Yippiee!!! I am going to have a great day! I bought a Red Velvet cake mix and some cream cheese frosting. I don't know if anyone likes this kind of cake but I sure do so I am making my own cake. Tony is going to a wedding of a co-worker of his so he will be gone, Katie is still in MN, Molly woke up this morning with a fever and will be in bed all day watching movies and sleeping, and Sarah said that she is going to take care of Molly for me so I can enjoy my birthday. (what a sweetie) So I am free to stamp all day!!! I can't wait to spread my stuff out and create. I feel like I haven't stamped in forever. Thank you all for the birthday wishes, the cards, and the gifts. I am truly blessed to have great "friends" like you. Time to stamp!

"A Couple Days Off"

I am taking a couple days off from blogging so I don't have anything to post today. I have my class tonight and I am getting ready for that so I hope to have something to share this weekend. Thanks for understanding and happy stamping. See ya soon!

"Please Read, Your Feedback Requested!"

I have enjoyed assisting everyone on this blog with finding those “hard to locate items” that I like to use in my projects. Therefore, I have been giving some thought to starting an on-line store in order to assist you, my friends, even more. I would post the option for crafters to buy such items as stickles, tacky tape, ribbon, clear boxes and envelopes, cuttlebug embossing folders, alterable items such as CD/DVD tins, containers, glass bottles, etc. Eventually, I would also like to offer the option for my readers to buy stamps. Based on feedback, I could offer up just about anything that my readers would enjoy!

I could also offer kits for sale so that you may create some of the same items that I enjoy making, such as the beaded pens. I would offer all the items you need to make the pens, or other projects, so you wouldn’t have to go to several different stores to get the supplies yourself. Some other ideas would be kits you could do for your classes. I would do all the prep work for you and send a sample of the project, and you would merely need to demo it.

So what I’m asking of everybody on this blog is, please give me your opinion if this would be a valuable service to you. I would appreciate it if you would respond to me with your comments as to whether or not you think you would like to use such a service. You could either email me directly or post a comment as to what services and products you think you would enjoy me supplying. I know some people do not enjoy going to numerous stores to find those products they would need for a single project. I would like to make things easier for you, and give you the option of one stop, or one click, shopping.

I have just begun doing the research, crunching the numbers, etc. to see if we could make a go of it. I wanted to put a feeler out there to see if people would be interested in what I could offer. I get e-mails every day from my fellow crafters that are inspired by my projects, and I enjoy helping every one of you. Some of you live far away from the Target's, the Michael's and the Joann's. I could provide you a place to get it all in one shot, and you don't even have to leave your house! How great would that be?!? I would be your supplier and shipper, all in one. Please leave me some feedback, even if you feel you would not need this service. Thank you so much for assisting me in this project, and I look forward to hearing from you.

"I Met Tim Holtz"

I got to spend an hour with Tim Holtz on Saturday!!!
He is a very funny, talented hottie! He was at my local stamp store all day Saturday. He did demos all day long.

We did a make and take bracelet with his grunge board. We colored it with his paints and then doodled with a white gel pen. I love how mine turned out. We had several colors to choose from.

Then we went in the classroom and sat with him and he did demo after demo after demo. He is super funny and real cute. His talents blew me out of the water. I had never tried his inks before. I am now a fan and I am for sure going to get some.

I loved everything he did. I think I might have missed some stuff though, I couldn't take my eyes off him. Did I mention he is a hottie?

The lady in the picture with Tim is Carol. She owns the stamp store. He even made me a cool thing with his alcohol inks and glossy paper then he signed it for me. Woo Hoo!!

"My Hotel Room"

Here is what I brought with me for this weekend. Yeah, it was a lot and most of what I own but I did end up using almost everything I brought so that makes it all worth it. Plus everyone else used the stuff I brought too so it all worked out. Friday the four of us (Kristine, Nancy, Margaret and I) met at the Fabric Barn around 3:00 when I got to town and we tore that place a part. I got 25 yards of 10 different colors of 5/8 inch grosgrain ribbon and 80 yards of 10 different colors of 1/4 inch grosgrain. All matching Stampin' Up. Woo hoo! The 5/8 inch ribbon is 5 yards for $1 and the 1/4 inch ribbon was 8 yards for $1. Great deals. We stayed up until 2:30 Saturday night stamping and talking. I did more talking than stamping though. I only made one card. LOL I know, that is so bad. But I made up for it Saturday. After the stamp mania and dinner, Kristine went home and Nancy, Margaret and I stamped until 12:00 and I got a couple more things done. Then after they left, I so wanted to go to bed so I jumped in bed and tried to fall asleep but I just couldn't, I ended up getting back up and stamped until 3am. It was fun but I paid for it Sunday. I set my alarm for 9am but I woke up at 6:30am I managed to fall back asleep until 8:30. I ran down and got breakfast and brought it up to the room. I stamped for a couple more hours before I had to put my stuff away and head home. It was a long 7 hour drive cause I packed my I-Pod. I thought it was in the glove box but it wasn't. Oh well.

I brought WAY too many stamps. I only used a few of them, but you never know what you are going to want right? Last year I didn't bring this many and I used something from each set. I guess I just wanted to be prepared. It was such a good time though. I wish I lived in SO Cal. I could get together with my friends a lot more than once a year. Next time I am going to plan better and know what I am going to use as far as stamps ahead of time.

Here is the paper I brought. The brown box is 12 x 3 or 12 x 4 and full of pattern paper that Kristine gave me. Thanks Kristine! I used several sheets from it already. Some SU but mostly other companies. I can't wait to look at it better and see what else is in there and what I can do with it. I had a great weekend with the girls. Not long enough though. Lots of laughs, shopping, and stamping. It was fantastic. I will post projects tomorrow. I also had several requests to change my feed to full so people could see the entire post with google reader. Here you go ladies!

"I'm Back...."

And I had a blast. I left LA Sunday around noon and got home at 7:00pm. Long drive but as you can see by the pictures a very beautiful one. I stopped at the Pyramid Lake Visitor's Center on my way home. I have always wanted to stop and check it out. So I am inside looking at all the pictures and the info and they have three drinking fountains there with a big sign that says. Taste California's Liquid Gold. So I took a drink. It wasn't what I expected, it turns out that California's "liquid gold" is water, not beer. LOL

The hill sides were peppered with orange and purple flowers. I don't know what kind they were but they were so pretty. Also the whole drive down there are orchards and vineyards on both sides of the freeway and you could smell the blossoms from the trees. It was so pretty. It reminded me of my Jasmine plant at home. The smell was intoxicating. It was almost like I had a truck full of flowers, but in between the bouquet of freshness you would have some farms and all you could smell was cow crap and it made you want to throw up. Good thing that the next mile was back to orchards. LOL
I always crack up when I go to LA. Some random things are just funny. Like the random dust tornado's in the middle of no where. I saw at least 10 of them. Literally in the middle of no where. I also think that the tumble weeds that are half the size of Volkswagen bugs are funny when they cruise across the freeway, the single oil well in the middle of the city of Burbank. It is a couple blocks from the High School right down main street. It totally doesn't belong there. I also like the bases of the signs in the freeway in LA. They are lined with barbed wire so that the taggers can't spray graffiti on the signs, Oh and another funny thing is that people carve their graffiti in the side of the dirt hillside through the canyons. I love the drive cause it makes me laugh. Good times. I do have more pictures and I will post them later today.

"See You Soon"

I wanted to post something today but all my stuff is packed and I couldn't make anything. And I'm sure you don't want to see all my 1/2 finished projects. I hope that I have internet in the hotel so I can post some updates and pictures for you this weekend. Otherwise, I will be back Monday morning with lots to show and tell. Woo Hoo!!

LA Here I Come!!

You all have a great weekend too! See you soon!

"Almost Packed"

Look what I found at Joann's. It is for storing beads but I am going to store my brads in. It was $5.99 It is perfect. Before I used a bunch of baggies. I am almost done packing for this weekend.

These two suitcases and duffel bag are FULL! I am bringing all my punches, lots of stamps, lots of paper, all my inks, stickles, cuttlebug, a bunch of ribbons, embellishments, markers and more. Lets just say that I am bringing every thing but the kitchen sink. Kristine said that she is bringing that since it doesn't look like I can fit that in my bags. LOL

Here is the paper I am bringing. I keep folded cards in a photo storage container all the time so I can just grab one when I need it. For this trip I folded 4 cards of each color and put them in the container. Then in the black paper holder, I have at least 4 full sheets of each color plus all my neutrals. Wait until you see all my stuff unpacked, you will die. But I tell you what, last year I brought the same stuff and I used everything I brought. There is a few of us that are stamping in the hotel room Friday night. I can't wait. I think I have enough for all of us. LOL