Baby-Fiona Month Stickers

I mentioned that I'd made month stickers for Fiona. I finished months 1-8 yesterday before going to take her photos for month 1. Today, after preparing for Primary sharing time this Sunday, I finished up months 9-12.

I started collecting digital scrapbook papers, elements, etc. about five years ago. I have the most wonderful

never-gets-used-up-stash EVER!

I'm still amazed at the generosity of so many talented designers. Almost all of my digital papers were FREE or at a very low cost.

I incorporate polka-dots into each design and each month corresponds with the holiday of that month (ie-Fiona will be three months old in December- so red and green). I am so pleased with the results!

I made a layer template (thank you Jessica Sprague for all of the wonderful classes I took with you! I learned SO MUCH!!)

If anyone is interested I will share my template with them. Sadly I don't feel that I can share the finished stickers since I drew from so many people's digital work.

The nice thing about the digital template is that you just open it in PhotoShop then drag your digital papers above the mask and *clip* the paper to the mask.

** AND I believe in giving credit, where credit is due...

1-  Shabby Princess French Countryside FrenchCountryside_SP_paper (1).jpg & FrenchCountryside_SP_paper (6).jpg

2-  Misty Mareda @ Little Dreamer Designs mmareda_paper5.jpg, Shabby Princess FrenchCountryside_CR_paper (3).jpg

3-  Designer Digitals Jen Adams Donnelly Giving Thanks- JAD_20061112_AdChallenge_Grateful.jpg & JAD_20061112_AdChallenge_Thankful.jpg

4-  Sweet Shoppe Designs Carnival dmogstad-carnival-paper.jpg, Dirty Feet Designs aka Heather Benson (the best I could find here was a Facebook page that MIGHT be this designer) dfd-dotsgrunge-p8.jpg

5-  Shabby Princess SP_SeasonalSampler_Amore_Paper_Hearts.jpg, & SP_SeasonalSampler_Amore_Paper_Stripes.jpg

6-  Designer Digitals Jackie Eckles Breathe Nature: JHE_BreatheNature_Paper6.jpg & JHE_BreatheNature_Paper7.jpg

7- Designer Digitals Dana Zarling dz-adchall-5-4-paper2.jpg, Shabby Princess SP_RummageChic_Paper_Plaid.jpg

8-  Shabby Princess SP_OliviaCollection_Paper_VanillaFloral.jpg, Designer Digitals Jackie Eckles Breathe Nature JHE_BreatheNature_Paper7.jpg

9- Shabby Princess SP_SpringBreeze_Paper_BigCircles.jpg & SP_SpringBreeze_Paper_Stripes.jpg

10- ScrapArtist Mystery Scrap Challenge (this is what I have for the TOU but couldn't find a website) SA_muse_gmiller-acidrainbow-paper.jpg, Shabby Princess ShabbyP_Celebrate_StripedPaper.jpg

11-  Sweet Shoppe Designs Carnival: hroselli-carnival-paper-dots.jpg & aslagle-carnival-paper.jpg

12-  Jessica Sprague Type+Writer online class kit: NotebookCoordinates-1.jpg, & KHMize-PacificPoint-Stripes.jpg

(Whew, do you have any idea how long it takes to note each of these? But not nearly as long as it took these wonderful individuals to create them!)

Fiona's Polkie-Dottie Quilt

Yesterday when I did photos of Fiona, Camille wanted to start with her on Fiona's polkie-dottie quilt. That's when I remembered that I've never blogged about it.

To say that Camille loves polka-dots would be an understatement... so when I saw a quilt pattern for a table runner with random polka-dots several years ago I clipped it out and have been saving it for Camille's first baby!

I even bought some very cute Riley Blake polka-dot fabric to use on said quilt. But when I pulled all of it out it just wasn't Fiona's quilt...

What to do? What to do?

I dug into my stash and pulled out 20 different purples (granted, 4 were fat-quarters I'd bought for this quilt that didn't go with the Riley Blake fabric). I sent a photo of them to Camille and Kevin and they were very pleased with the idea of a two-color quilt.

I cut four different sizes of dots and then appliqued them onto the background. Then I added a checker-board border to finish it up. I also did a polka-dot quilting (actually I think it's called pebble quilting)

It's been finished and living at Camille's house since her baby shower in August. Maybe I'll have to do better with my blogging.

Fiona's Already a Month-old!

Maybe it's because I'm not the sleep-deprived mama but it sure doesn't seem like one whole month since baby Fiona was born! She is such a sweet little baby.

In recent months I've seen these darling month stickers that one sticks on baby's onesie to take a photo each month. What a great idea!

I was talking to Camille about this a few days ago and asked where she thought I might find them.

 Pinterest! 
 (Duh! I said the duh-part, not Camille.)

"But you could probably make them yourself!" exclaimed Camille. (Hmmm, who is sleep deprived here?)

So I went a lookin' on Pinterest and found some good ideas.

Enter PhotoShop and my whole supply of polka-dot digital paper that NEVER gets used up! Yay! (Can I just say that it used to stress me out to use my cute paper!) As I worked on the template for the basic sticker I had a brainstorm! Why not use month appropriate papers (orange for October, red and green for December, etc)?

I absolutely love that Miss Fiona has her Daddy's dimple!

But you know... even good babies get tired of Grammie taking their photo! I couldn't resist one of this darling little boo-face.

Zuppa Toscana

I made this recipe for Zuppa Toscana a few nights ago and it was a marvelous hit!!! It is a wonderful rich, hearty soup. If you like Olive Garden's zuppa you will love this. I tweaked the original recipe to make on the stove top instead of in a crockpot.

Zuppa Toscana **

1 lb. Italian sausages (use spicy to get that signature Olive Garden flavor)
4-6 russet potatoes, diced
1 onion, chopped
1/4 c. REAL bacon pieces (optional)
2 Tbsp minced garlic (about 3-4 cloves)
32 oz. chicken broth
1 c. water
1 c. kale or Swiss chard, chopped
1 c. heavy whipping cream
2 Tbsp flour

Brown sausage links and onion in a sauté pan. Cut links in half lengthwise, then cut slices.

Place diced potatoes, garlic, water, and chicken broth in large dutch oven or pot. Bring to a boil. Lower heat and simmer until potatoes are almost tender. Add sausage and onions and continue cooking until potatoes are soft, about 30 minutes. Whisk together flour into cream removing lumps. Add cream and chopped kale to the crock pot, stir.
Cook another 5-10 minutes until broth is thickened. Add more cream if desired.

BEST. SOUP. EVER!!!!




** Disclaimer: I got this recipe (and photo) from Facebook posted by Jessica Lee Anderson. I don't know if she *cooked-up* this recipe or was reposting. What I do know is that this is wonderfully yummy soup and you should make some.

An Autumnal Explore

Our sweet Kevin (Camille's-kind-of-Kevin) told us he would be working up at the Timber Wolf today and asked if we'd like to come up for lunch. YES! We always love it when Kevin cooks! We dined out on the deck with this beautiful view and the warm September sun adding to our enjoyment.

As we were leaving Gordon asked if I was up for a drive up the canyon. This time we decided to take Right Fork instead of Left Fork. Right Fork almost immediately turns into National Forest land. It was a perfect fall day for a drive!

The aspens have started changing... this isn't the best specimen but beautiful nonetheless.

One of the things that I like best about this drive is all the free-range cattle. The *alpine air* must agree with them because many of them are enormous! Not fat... just BIG! I convinced Gordon to stop and let me take a photo of this cute mama and baby.

However about fifteen minutes later we came upon the KING OF THE MOUNTAIN! Holy-freakin'-cow-BULL! This dude started giving us the stink-eye as soon a we rounded the curve in the road and we didn't even think once about stopping to ask HIM if we could capture his likeness! He will have to remain in my mental photo album.

I had no idea that bovines could give the stink-eye!

Pumpkins!

I'm not sure that fall was always my favorite season but for much of my adult life it has been. I love the cooler daytime temperatures and the crisp nights. I love snuggling in my sweaters. And I love all of the rich fall colors.

The other joy of fall is pumpkins! Each year, as soon as they appear in the markets, I buy some and decorate my front porch. This year I decided to try my hand at growing pumpkins. I wanted some warty pumpkins that I'd seen several years ago but I couldn't find any warty pumpkin seeds. *sigh* What I did find was a package of bright orange pumpkin seeds AND a package of mixed decorative gourd seeds.

I planted them in the back half of my raised garden plot that normally goes unplanted. OMSH do pumpkins/gourds/squash want to take up a lot of room! The pumpkin vines seemed to grow all right but they only set two pumpkins (that I could find), right along the garden fence. The gourds, on the other hand... I had a fair time of it trying to keep them from climbing up my tomato cages and in some cases failed.

So a couple of weeks ago I decided that I'd had enough of losing the War of the Gourds. I'd just mowed and was headed to the green waste dump anyway so I pulled up all of the pumpkin and gourd vines,harvesting as I went, and put them into Fernando's bed. That was when I found a third and fourth pumpkin stowaway!

I have a wire fence that encloses my raised garden area to keep the dog out! Buddi used to EAT MY GREEN TOMATOES! (Tomato-snatchin' dog!) Harley, who isn't interested in eating anything, just loves to charge through on his way to bark at something and knocks off the tomatoes.

I discovered that the pumpkin vine had climbed said wire fence and grown a pumpkin right there... in the fence! I had to get out my wire cutters and snip this little cutie free!

The fourth pumpkin was hiding in the corner, under the grape vines. So the smallest and orangest pumpkins grew in my garden, the two larger ones and the warty guy I bought. But all of these happy little gourds grew right here on my productive 1/4 acre of heaven. (And that is a locally grown and produced grapevine wreath... that means I made it from my grapevines a few years ago.)

Usually I put out my pumpkin display as soon as pumpkins/gourds become available and they stay there until it is time to put up Christmas decorations (read- AFTER Thanksgiving!). By then they are usually a frozen and somewhat squishy mess and all go to the trash. BUT this year I may try bringing in some of my favorites gourds to *dry* and keep them from year to year!

Happy fall!

For This Child I Prayed

I can't think of a better sentiment or, in this case, scripture to describe the arrival of a healthy baby.

(Do I see Grampy fingers here?)

We did a mini photo shoot yesterday but Miss Fiona couldn't like it! Before I knew I needed to stop torturing the baby I got some wonderful baby-parts photos.

And the rest of this darling baby...

We love you so much baby Fiona. Indeed, we did pray for you!

Fiona

Our little Fiona, Camille and Kevin's first baby girl, arrived on 10 September 2013 at 1:46pm. She weighed 8 lb 1 oz, was 20.5" tall AND she was eight days late! (The good news is that they don't let mamas go three weeks over-due anymore!) We are so grateful to have her here!

Camille checked into Orem Community Hospital Monday evening to be induced, since baby-cakes didn't want to get things started on her own. Not every thing went as planned, because of complications it was decided that Fiona needed to be born by C-section. Kevin, the family and I all discussed how even 100 years ago he would very likely have lost one or both of them... yes, we are so grateful to have baby Fiona here save and sound.

We were allowed to watch through the window while they did the C-section (and, yes, I got LOTS of photos, but I won't be showing them around any time soon!) It was the most interesting thing to watch... a couple of times I had to look away (look out of the way!). But the whole process helped me understand why women with C-sections take a while to heal.

They cleaned little Fiona up quickly and sent Daddy out to show the rest of the family! Here she is... only 11 minutes old!

As my mother-in-law used to say, being born is "no joke"! Poor little Fi was pretty swollen for a couple of days.

Here she is 1-day old.

I love watching Camille with her new baby... you'd never know she was a first-time mom!

Fiona at 2 days.

After four days it was time for the new little family to head home. Fiona's first time in "for-real" baby-girl clothes.

Fiona's first impression of being in her car seat was not a happy one! But here she is having her first car ride.

Bye-bye Baby Fi! You are headed to a wonderful, loving home.

We are so glad to have you in our family!

Hot & Cold Running Water...

Maybe most people wouldn't get excited about this concept but I'm pretty pleased to have HOT and cold running water in my bathroom sink again!

Three weeks ago I turned on the water to wash my hands before going to visit teach... I pushed the lever down (say LEE-ver) and there was a drip! What the chicken? I turned it off and on again but now it was now a steady stream! I crawled under the sink and turned off the water. (Wow... I didn't know my dirty hands had such magical powers!)

Now the important part about the visiting teaching is that I knew Vicki had just replaced a cartridge in her bathroom so I casually commented to her what had caused my delay... that's when I learned a happy fact-

MOEN

Buy it for looks. Buy it for life.

isn't just a cute advertising campaign!

Moen will ship you, free of charge, replacement parts. How cool is that?

So, I awaited the arrival of my replacement cartridge so I could have water at my sink again. The part arrived a few days later. I installed it... dang! It still leaked. So I called the 800 number again. The gal told me to remove the handle, while she waited, to make sure that the cartridge was closing completely. She then informed me that the whole faucet would have to be replaced. Great!!! Now I have to go and buy a new faucet!

Over the next day and a half I was too busy to even look at my email so imagine my surprise when I found an email from Moen stating that my new faucet had been shipped! ARE YOU KIDDING ME? They really back their products that well? Apparently so!

I finally found time today (happy birthday) to install my new faucet! I don't have to wash my face in the bathtub any more...

Now THAT is what I call good customer service!

{{This is not a paid advertisement. But I'm very impressed!}}

Photo-bombing

I love the new name for something I've done most of my life... photo-bombing.

The other night, after a long day and a not so restful night's sleep, I was trying to wind down and go to bed. I decided to take one last look at the internet on my iPad mini... within minutes I was in hysterics!

First I watched this video which got me started... (the last scene is my favorite).

Then I found these photo-bombing animals on Pinterest by the time I'd gotten to the bottom I had tears running down my face (keep in mind that it was nearly midnight).

I watched video and looked at the photo-bombs again... just for good measure.

But you know what it left me with? An insane desire to have *Pirate Cat* to do some personal photo-bombing just for me...

Aahhh! PhotoShop... I love you!