Christmas Tree Farm

Last Thanksgiving, Dylan & I accompanied my mother & stepfather to a farm to help pick out their Christmas tree. It was a beautiful, cold day and you could see snow falling on the Blue Ridge Mountains in the distance. Perfect day for cutting down a Christmas tree.

This is the page I created for Dylan's album about our adventure and the inspiration for my Friday Freebie digital template in late February:

I used an edge scraper to rough up the edges of the patterned paper strips and give a little texture to the page:

Supplies: Bazzill cardstock; Basic Grey patterned paper; Making Memories edge scraper; Signo Uniball white pen; business card.

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Ma Ma Ma Ma

Dylan last night playing with his activity table and practicing his new phrase, "ma ma ma ma." Love it.


A few minutes later when I was carrying him upstairs for his bath, Dylan began patting me on the back (another new thing) while saying "ma ma ma ma" over and over. I took that to mean, "good job, mama." ;)

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What's Wrong?

Several things recently have led me to thinking about part of human nature - curiosity - and how we are especially curious about one another. Isn't that what leads you to read a blog? Peek at a page on Facebook? Read a tweet?

I love watching Dylan when we are out and he stares at perfect strangers. Especially other babies and small children. If you or I were to stare like that, we might get a what are you looking at? expression in return. But with children that natural curiosity is sweet, innocent, simple. Partly because they are taking in that person's uniqueness without judgment or predisposition. His stares are typically met with stares from other children & babies and with smiles from adults.

As we grow and we begin to recognize differences in other people, it becomes easy to glance at someone unknown and think, "what's wrong with that person?" Whether it is a physical difference, a mental difference, a different style of clothing, a different hairstyle, a different opinion, etc. I'm guilty of it. And I don't like that. While thinking about this earlier today, I realized that maybe the question we should be asking instead is, "what's their story? What makes them unique?" Because if you look around, there isn't anything wrong with anyone. God made us all perfect. Yes, He made us all perfect. How we choose to live may be another matter. How we as a society and as individuals choose to view and react to the unique differences we all possess may be also another matter. But we were all made perfect and should rejoice in that blessing.

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Friday Freebie - explore brush

I created a brush of the title for the digital layout {explore} that I posted on Monday:


Click here to download the {explore} brush

Enjoy!

Have you missed one of my previous digital freebies? Click HERE to find them. And, don't forget to subscribe to my feeds so you won't miss future freebies!

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Balloon vs Tunnel

Dylan was given a balloon by one of his friends following their birthday party recently. He absolutely LOVES this balloon. We literally had to pry the string out his hands the first night to give him a bath and put him to bed. Each morning when we get downstairs, he breaks into a huge smile and giggles when he spots it. Once he gets ahold of it, he will usually crawl all over the place holding onto it which is what led to this story....

Dylan, of course, can crawl easily through his tunnel. What he didn't realize is that taking his balloon through with him was not as easy. I watched as he began his journey with balloon in tow:

As he reached the other side, he realized the balloon wasn't quite there and gives a tug on the string:

The balloon made it into the tunnel and stopped. Puzzled, Dylan examines the string trying to figure out what to do:

With a little encouragement from mom, Dylan soon figures out what to do and frees his balloon:

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YoBaby!

I recently started buying YoBaby yogurt for Dylan - who loves it and devours every bite. The packaging advertised a rewards program via the Stonyfield Farm website. Being a frugal minded mama, I, of course, went to check it out. While on the website I registered and found the page for printable coupons. I made my selections, clicked print and .... well, no coupons. Instead a webpage telling me I had printed my limit came up. Um, but I wasn't able to print any. I clicked my way over to the "contact us" section, explained my predicament and asked if there was any other way to obtain coupons. I expected I might get an automated response and then, maybe, a real reply in a day or two. I was wrong. I received a response in about an hour's time and was told that some coupons would be mailed to me. Woohoo! This was all last Monday and what did I find in yesterday's mail - my coupons. :)

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{explore}

Used a template to create a quick digital page about our fun at the NC Museum of Life + Science last Thursday for our weekly playdate. It was so nice to be able to get out and enjoy an afternoon in the sunshine.


Supplies: Redifined No. 8 template by Sue Cummings (altered from 8x8 to 8.5x11); Myriad Pro & Antique Type fonts.

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8 Months

I think this has been our busiest month to date. Dylan is on the move and there is no stopping him...

* Crawling, crawling, crawling. We had to add our first gate downstairs and are constantly chasing Dylan all over. One trick to get him to return to you (for now) - build a tower of blocks and he can't resist the urge to crawl over and knock them down.

* Claps (looks a bit like patty cake) or grasps hands together and shakes them up & down when he gets really excited. Here Dylan was clapping before taking a ride (with assistance) down the slide on his new climber in the backyard:

* Pulling himself to a stand which led us to lower his crib all the way down.

* Tried a swing for the first time. I was definitely more excited than he was. LOL

* Self feeding Puffs, Cheerios, peas and a little bit of chicken. All with his left hand:

* Loves reading books especially the touch & feel ones with different textures. He reaches out to touch them and to turn pages using his right hand.

* Likes to play "toss" with his O-ball (ie, rolls it to you) using his right hand.

* Chases after the cats. They usually run the opposite direction or jump up on the furniture to escape. I was quite surprised when Cali stayed still just long enough for Dylan to pat her back before she ran off:

* Was baptized.

* Watched his first ACC men's basketball tournament:
* Is a little dare devil! LOL When my mom & I took him swimming, he repeatedly stuck his own face in the water and tried to get away from us. Then while playing on the climber in the backyard, he tries to go down the slide without assistance - head first!

* Started eating yogurt and loved it:

* First trip to a museum - we went with friends to the NC Museum of Life & Science yesterday where one of Dylan's favorite activities was crawling through a tunnel in the play area. There was a slide at the end, but instead of going down, he made a u-turn and raced back through the tunnel again. LOL

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Fun at the Table

Dylan enjoyed playing with an activity table at a friend's house last month. When I found the exact same one at a consignment sale last week for $12, I grabbed it immediately. He's had a great time playing with it every day and has already mastered pulling up to a stand while holding onto it.

Here he demonstrates how it works:


I recorded the video on my camera so you'll notice he pauses periodically and flashes a smile for me to take his picture. ;)

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Monkey card

We went to a party on Saturday to celebrate the first birthday of one of Dylan's friends. The party had a zoo theme so I thought it would be fun to make a coordinating card.

The inside read:

Supplies: Bazzill (dark brown), Archiver's (tan), and Making Memories (white) cardstock; chalk; Micron black pen; Making Memories snaps; Gilligan's Island font.

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Gymboree

During our few days this week without phone & DSL, I did manage to get a few things accomplished including a 2 page layout for Dylan's album. Love these photos of Dylan & his friends having fun at a Gymboree Play & Learn class:


Supplies: Making Memories cardstock and foam stamps; acrylic paint; Basic Grey patterned paper; Boopee font; scan of name sticker from class. Based on sketch from May/June 2009 issue of Scrapbooks Etc.

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Special Weekend

We had a wonderful weekend. Saturday the three of us spent time just having fun as a family including a trip to a nearby park. Dylan tried a "big swing" for the first time and, as you can see, wasn't too impressed with it. He was having more fun watching the older kids swing off to his left.

With some help from Trent & me, he took a few trips down the slide. Again, not too impressed. Then we showed him a tunnel that he could crawl through. He just sat there unsure what to do until I prodded him slightly and off he went racing his way to his dad on the other end. This was definitely his favorite part.

Yesterday we celebrated with our extended family and our church family as Dylan was baptized. He was so well behaved the entire service and seemed to enjoy all the attention during his baptism.

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cards

A couple of cards I created last week for a friend and her son. :)


Supplies: Die Cuts with a View card; Autumn Leaves patterned paper; EK Success corner punch; American Crafts ribbon; StazOn Timber Brown stamp pad; Studio G stamps.


Inside read:

Supplies: Die Cuts with a View card; Basic Grey & Chatterbox patterned papers; Making Memories edge scraper; Brady Bunch font.

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Wordless Wednesday: Joy

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