Memorial Day fun

Well, we wanted to head down to the beach for Memorial Day but the traffic the day before made us change our mind. SO, we just hung out at home and let the kids play on the slip-N-slide. (yep, even Steve is a kid at heart!)


Here are a few of my favorite photos...

Mother's Day

MY SWEET BABY ON MOTHER'S DAY!

Playing at Howard Park in Tarpon Springs

On Mother's day we met up with my MIL, SIL, Step-FIL, neice and nephew. We had a little picnic at Howard Park and then let the kids play.
This was the first time at Howard Park and I know it won't be the last. It was so nice and clean.
There was a little butterfly garden and lots of unique butterflies to watch.

After playing at the park we went back to my SIL's house and had ice cream cake to celebrate
my MIL's 60th birthday. The kids always have fun playing with their cousins.

In my backseat

I took this shot while sitting at a red light. I didn't even edit it! LOL!








Happy boy!
Sitting in his carseat.

On our way to Howard Park for Mother's Day!

Sweet Cheeks

Ok so I've made it to WEEK 9 of the survivor contest on The Memory Safe. Our challenge this week was to lift a layout from the gallery. I lifted a LO that I adore by Jenn Korin. Thanks a bunch Jenn!

Old school photos

This is me at 17 -- graduating from Fort Mill High School. (1988)













This is my brother Jason graduating from
Fort Mill High School. (1990)
He's standing with my Grandmama and Papa
Smith.




This is me in 1st grade -- 1976

Irate

I did this LO for a challenge on

http://www.fromhere2scrapternity.com

The challenge was to scrap a LO about an emotion.

I think this applies! LOL

Jacob -- about 2 years old. Highly Irate!

Seriously

Quick little Layout I did today for the Memory Safe survivor contest. Had to use stamps. We'll see on Sat if I'm still in the game.

I've been tagged

Angela from The Memory Safe has tagged me with the following questions

What's in your
1- Fridge
Milk
pickles
beer
bottled water
cheese slices
Dora yogurt
pineapple
hummus

2- My closet
mostly DH's clothes (he's a closet hog)
some clothes
ironing board
belts
few purses
shoes (again, mostly DH's)

3- My purse:
wallet
scissors (always a good use for those)
few pens
checkbook
stickers
gum
cell phone

4- My Car:
2 car seats
3 strollers
jumper cables
cds
coupons
sunpass (pass to get through the tolls)
sunglasses

Now, it's my turn to tag someone.
I tag Lu!

Happy Anniversary Steve! (5 whole Years)

Oops! I totally forgot to wish Steve Happy Anniversary --
So -- here it is!

Steve, I love you very much. There's no combination of words I could
use to describe how much I love you. We were definitely meant to be together. We have such an awesome future to look forward to!

Love you!
Melissa

I was wrong

So, I really thought I would not go on to the next round of the
Survivor competition, but someone did vote for me. So, I gotta
get busy making another LO for this week. I think it's pretty open,
just have to stamp on the layout....
I can do that.

Could be the last LO for survivor

Well -- I felt this was my best LO so far in the survivor challenge
on The Memory Safe, but I think everyone has voted and I did
not receive any votes. Oh well, must move on.

Photos from Fossil Park - May 13th

Here are a few new photos of the boys.
Some were taken at Fossil park and the
others were at home.

Jacob's Art

Here are some pictures Jacob drew tonight of each person in our family. Pretty cute! He said we were mad, and I'm not
really sure why. Maybe because he's better at drawing
a straight line rather than a curved smilie face line??

Such a slacker on NSD

SO May 6th was National Scrapbook Day and I was a total Slacker! All kinds of challenges
and inspiration going on and these are the only 2 things I made! Oh well! I bet my Mom will like her little photo box. Gonna fill it with photos of the boys and pop it in the Mail tomorrow.

The layout on the right is made from some photos I took Friday evening. Jacob wanted to play in the sprinkler and so I turned it on and the boys ended up in the one spot in our yard that
doesn't have grass (making a mud Puddle) They had a BLAST!

My Star

This is a layout I did for the Amazing Race I'm in at http://www.scraptabulous.com/

We had to use some art work as inspiration and one of the pieces was the Starry Night by Van Gogh. My partner and I chose to use the colors and stars from the painting.
I really like how this turned out, plus I adore this photo of Lukas!

A few other LOs I've worked on recently

Jake drinks about 25 cups a milk a day, or so it seems. He's always asking
"Can I have some milk, Please?"
So I thought I would record this. In the flower I used an old Milk top that was from
my Dad's collection. He's got all kinds of crazy collections.








The gourd bowl in the photos was a gift I recieved while teaching kindergarten. This is truly a treasured gift!Here's the letter that came with the bowl.

Dear Melissa,

I can’t express how sorry I am for forgetting to come Tuesday. It is hard to explain, even to myself, how this could happen considering how I place so much importance in living up to my word or promise. We Native Americans take great pride in sharing our heritage and to miss an opportunity to relay it to your Kindergarten class is disappointing. I am an instructor; my wife as well as my daughter and daughter-in-law are teachers also. I know what inconvenience that I caused you and the other teachers.Please accept this gift as a token of my apology. The gourd bowl is a symbolic gesture of asking forgiveness. The gourd bowl is very fragile unless its rim is reinforced. The bowl represents our life and its frailty. The horsehair secured around the rim represents the trust and strength we each give to others. This trust also is very fragile and easily broken, but when the trust builds up like the many strands of hair, we enjoy a great blessing from others.The bowl contains four prayer symbols; the lettered olive shell, a piece of pottery, the soft strip of fur and the tasseled deer skin. There are other symbols of trust as well. Inside the tasseled deer skin pouch is corn meal, dried beans and seeds. Our legends tell us that these were offered to someone who you had broken trust with. If they chose not to forgive you, they would take the pouch and scatter the meal into the wind never to be seen again. The beans and seeds were also scattered to represent your choice to separate yourself from that person. I hope you chose to keep the corn meal and seeds. I also hope you can appreciate the symbols and enjoy the bowl as much as I have in making it for you.Your friend,Vernon Tanner



Under the #2 there is more journaling and a photo of Mr Tanner speaking with my class.

I remember this day like it was yesterday. I had scheduled for Mr. Tanner to visit our schoolAnd give a presentation on American Indian culture. We had 5 kindergarten classes in the library waiting and he never showed up. I called him at the phone # I had and I was able to speak to himbriefly and he explained that he had forgotten about the presentation that day. I must admit I was a little angry but I was extremely disappointed for my students. Two days later I was called to the office to pickup something that had been left for me. I took it back to my classroom only to find this beautiful handmade bowl inside. I was so surprised and so overwhelmed at the letter that was included with the gift. If you read the letter below, then view the photos to the right, you’ll see that I forgave Mr. Tanner that day and I’ll cherish this beautiful piece ofartwork forever!

DragonLand

Here's a few photos of Jacob having a blast at Dragon Land.