A Little Girl

It seems like all of my friends have been having baby boys lately! Not that I do not love and adore them, but it is fun to go out and buy something pink. My fellow teacher and friend Shawn is going to have a baby girl in early August. I made her newest little arrival, Addison, this butterfly book. It started out as a wooden book made by Kaiser Craft. I covered it with glittery butterfly paper and then added quotes about girls and big brothers, since she will have two of them to watch over her. Shawn seemed to really like it and, in early August, she will be able to show it to Addison too! Congrats to the Espinzoa family!

Happy Birthday, Mom!

Thursday was my mom's birthday! She does not look a day over 25! I made her this card by using a flower template and poking holes with it. Then I took some floss and did a basic back stitch pattern on it. The flower patterned paper was put on top of some matching cardstock. I stamped Happy Birthday and mounted it on some cardstock that I then put on the front with some pop dots. Then I topped it off with a bow! Happy Birthday!

Bad Blogger!

So sorry it has been so long since I posted anything! I hate when I check people's blogs and they are months old and mine is almost a month old! Ahhh - I will not let it happen again!

Today is National Scrapbooking Day and I spent the day making birthday and Mother's Day cards. I cannot post them yet because my mom is a faithful follower of this blog and it will ruin her special days so check back after next weekend. Instead, I decided to post some layouts that I did a few years ago of my dear friend Kate. (I actually entered these in a magazine contest so keep your fingers crossed!) Kate just turned 5 years old and her parents just enrolled her in kindergarten. I told her, "You are not old enough to go to kindergarten." She promptly reminded me, "Holly, I am already 5 years old. "Kate, stop growing!" I said. She just started giggling. Here is my precious Kate. I am so glad I did these pages to remind me of when she was so little! Enjoy your weekend!

The Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day

Can you tell I am not a happy Holly? This week is AIMS testing here in our great state. (AIMS is our state test!) And today, well today, was not a good day. It is so frustrating to walk around and watch my students make silly and careless mistakes! We have been working on this since the first day of school and to see some of them mess up on the simplest questions just boggles my mind! Especially when so much is riding on how they do! (Too much is riding on this!) Enough of that! My wonderful Joy has a friend who had a baby a few months back and Joy wanted me to make him a name book. She asked, "How many letters can you do?" "Well - I have done a book with six letters but that was pretty long, so no more than six." "Oh," was all she said. "Why? What is his name?" "Johnathan!" That is nine, count them, nine letters long! No way! I suggested doing his initials. She said okay but I knew she wanted his name on there somewhere. So - using my Cricut Design Studio and my Cricut machine, I cut out his name and put an extra little tab between each letter. On the back of each tab, I put a quote about little boys. Best of both worlds! (Isn't that a Hannah Montana song? Oh boy! Time for summer vacation!)

A Year in the Life

A co-worker, and a friend of mine, has a handsome little boy named Evan. He just turned 3 months old. She does not really call herself a "scrapbooker," so she asked if I would make a year long album for her. I said sure! 39 layouts later - I was done. We went from the first ultrasound pictures to his first birthday. It was tough because I am so used to starting with the pictures and getting my colors and inspiration from them. This time, I had to think of the theme of each month and guess what would look just right. I hope they like this album and I cannot wait to see it filled with lots of pics of Evan!

Baby Love

The Mandrola Family just increased by one with the birth of Vincent Joseph. Mom and Dad did not know he was going to be a boy, so I made them this frame a few weeks ago. He arrived last week and is a miracle! Congrats!

Smells Yummy!

Since it is my last day of Spring Break (sniff!), I decided to cook some comfort food and I cooked a roast. Might not sound like a big deal to you, but it is to me! It has been cooking all day and my house smells wonderful. (My neighbor even knocked on my door to see what I was cooking.) It reminds me of Sunday afternoons at Mamo and Papo's house growing up. These were my mom's mom and dad. Mamo used to cook roasts and they always smelled so good. My house smells like her house today and it makes me happy. Hopefully, she is looking down at me smiling. I think the new vinyl lettering I put above my stove helped make my meal complete.