Words To Live By

A friend of mine sent this article to me on "Words to Live By." Thought I'd share it with you. Read each sentence slowly and think about it. They are all so true.

1. What you put out comes back all the time, no matter what.
2. You define your own life. Don't let other people write your script.
3. Whatever someone did to you in the past has no power over the present. Only you give it power.
4. When people show you who they are, believe them the first time.
5. Worrying is wasted time. Use the same energy for doing something about whatever worries you.
6. What you believe has more power than what you dream or wish or hope for. You become what you believe.
7. If the only prayer you ever say is thank you, that will be enough.
8. The happiness you feel is in direct proportion to the love you give.
9. Failure is a signpost to turn you in another direction.
10. If you make a choice that goes against what everyone else thinks, the world will not fall apart.
11. Trust your instincts. Intuition doesn't lie.
12. Love yourself and then learn to extend that love to others in every encounter.
13. Let passion drive your profession.
14. Love doesn't hurt. It feels really good.
15. Every day brings a chance to start over.
16. Being a mother is he hardest job on earth. Women everywhere must declare it so.
17. When you don't know what to do, get still. The answer will come.
18. "trouble doesn't last always" otherwise phrased as "this too shall pass"

Happy Birthday to ME

Today is my birthday. I hit the big 5-0 Yep. I can't believe it. It hit me really hard when I turned 40, but this isn't quite so bad. Now I just laugh. It's just a number. I feel a lot better than when I was in my 20's and 30's. I wish that I knew as much then as I do now. I wish that I had as much confidence. And that I didn't worry as much about what people thought. I I have grown so much over the years. I didn't know that growning older was going to be such a blessing. On Saturday, we celebrated my birthday with my family. Here I am with 50 balloons. I'm surprised that I am not being lifted off the ground. lol. Here are some of the special people in my life who were there to celebrate with me.

Left to right are: My sister-in-law Diane, Jennifer's Mother-in-law Tammy, Me, My sisters Chris and Lynnette.
My son Ryan and his adorable girlfriend, Katie.My daughter, Jennifer. Jennifer's daughter and my grand-daughter, Lexi. Lexi and her Dad, Ryan
Lynnette's husband Filemon with my husband, Bill

Brother-in-law, Chet and Diane.Chris' husband John with son Brian and daughter Riley.Christina and Brian with daughter, TaylorTaylor and Lexi Chris' son ChristopherChristopher's wife Aggie and daughter ArianaChristopher and Aggie's daughter JocelynLynnette with husband Filemon and daughter Miranda

Miranda's son AidenFilemone and Lynnette's twin boys Milesand DiegoChris' daughter Yvette

Yvette's husband Edgar Yvette and Edgar's son Chase Yvette's daughter Nikki
Lexi and Taylor

Miranda and Jennifer

Jennifer and me

Thank goodness they didn't put 50 candles on the cake!!! It was a Champagne cake with Chocolate Fudge filling. Yum

At the end of the party, the children set the balloons free.

Off they go and another year gone by

Gifts from Vicki

My Sister-in-law Vicki sent me the most heartfelt gift ever. In her package were individually wrapped presents . Each gift was numbered in the order to be opened. And they each represent a decade in my life. I am sharing each one of them with you. Have a tissue ready. As I said, they are very heartfelt.

Thank-you so much Vicki. You have made me feel very special. Love, Lori.

Moon Doggie Layout

Here is another Moon Doggie Layout. I am slowly plugging along to finish scrapbooking my Hawaii pictures. It is hard for me to just sit down and start scrapbooking. It just doesn't come that easy. I like to have a special layout for each set of photos. And, often I have to go magazines and books for inspiration. This layout was inspired by one in the July issue of Scrapbooks Etc. I love this magazine. I stop everything when it comes in the mail. It's kind of like getting the new CTMH catalog. lol. I used Nestabilities to cut out the circles. The CTMH font stamps used are: Solo S, Atomic Lowercase, Charm Uppercase and Precious Alphabet. The inks used are Cranberry, Sand and Dutch Blue

OMG!!!! Look what she did!!!

I layed down on the couch and closed my eyes. It couldn't have been more than 5 minutes. I heard Bill in the bathroom frantically yelling "OMG, OMG. Look at all that hair!!!!" I got up and went in the bathroom and looked in the trash can at all the hair. I thought that she cut off her dolls hair....but it was her own. Bill said that she was under the coffee table laying down. What he didn't see was that she was cutting her hair. She said that she wanted to look like Bella. A little girl at the gym. Lexi's hair was all the way down her back. To her rear end. This is her first hair cut. She did it to herself. We had my hair stylist trim the ends a year ago, but this is the real thing. Her mother is at work and is not too happy. But, she did this to her little brother when she was Lexi's age. I'm not sure what to do. Maybe we should just leave it alone. It is shorter on the sides and longer in the back. I have two nieces coming over tomorrow who cut and style hair. Maybe they can even it out. I am not looking forward to seeing Jennifer's face tonight when she sees all the baby curls gone.

Bella's Show and Tell Challenge

The challenge this month is to make a card showing what you do when you need a little less hard time and a little more bliss. When I need to relax or have had a bad day, I love to get out my stamps and paper and make cards or scrapbook. For this card I used my new "June Bug" paper from Basic Grey. I thought that it went well with "Stamping Bug" because it has a crafty feel to it. It reminds me of a cozy handmade quilt. To add to the quilt feel, I added a button tied with hemp to a crocheted flower. These items are from CTMH. I used this weeks Mojo Monday sketch.

Gifts from my Bella Sister

I have a new Bella Sister named Shaela. I still have my former Bella Sisters and will never forget them or how special they have made me fill. Shaela sent me this wonderful package of Fancy Pants goodies. This is one my favorite scrapbook lines. She must have read my mind, because I am seeing so much Fancy Pants stuff lately and have been wishing for some. She sent me this little book filled with Notebook Journals and Matching Rub-ons. She also sent me some delicious raspberry & Cream candies. And, this very special card. Thank you so much Shaela.

My heart is heavy

NienieMy heart is heavy for this beautiful young woman named Stephanie. She goes by Nienie. I came across her blog a week ago and can't get her out of my mind or my prayers. If you click on her name above the picture, it will take you to her blog. She is married and has 4 small children. She and her husband were in a tragic small plane crash. The plane burst into flames leaving her body almost completely burned and her beautiful face disfigured. My heart is so heavy for her. So much that I have to share her story with you. This may be too heavy for some of you to take. There are no burn pictures on her blog. I understand if you can't go to her website, but Please keep her in your Prayers.

4th of July Layout

These are my 4th of July Layouts. I was inspired by the layout used for this months Stamp of the Month called "You've Got Flair." This layout was fun to make. I used all CTMH products. The paper used is from two different paper packs. The red polk-a-dot paper is from the "Perfect Day" paper pack. The blue polk-a-dot paper is from the "Magic Moments" paper pack. Both paper packs can be found here. The nice thing about CTMH papers are that they are interchangeable. This is a good way to use up those last pieces of paper that you have hanging around. The stamped colorful, swirly pieces are from the "You've Got Flair" stamp set that is available only until the end of the month. When I finished coloring them, they reminded me of the pieces of pottery that I saw Mexico. Another fun thing that I used on these pages were the felt pieces. These are called "Heartfelt Whimsy Die-Cuts". Lastly the 4th of July stamps are from the "July Word Puzzle".

Leave Only Footprints

This photo is of Lexi running down the beach in Kauai. When I first saw this picture, I knew that it warranted its own special layout. I have been puzzled as to how to make it stand on its own. Yesterday, I was going through my magazines and came across the Summer Keynotes magazine from Close to my Heart. On the cover was a layout that said to me this is the one. That was the inspiration that I was looking for. My layout uses the "Moon Doggie" paper pack. The post card is from the "Journey Journaling Spots" and the sentiment is from the stamp "Footprints". The flowers are from the stamp set "Extreme Happiness" and are stamped in Sunflower, Hydrangea and Sunflower Ink. The title is stamped in "Atomic Caps" and "Amore Caps". The ink used is "Vanilla Creme".

Happy 4th of July from Lexi

Lexi helped me make Oatmeal Walnut Chocolate Chip Cookies this morning. They are so good.

Here is the recipe:

1 cup shortening
3/4 cup packed brown sugar
3/4 cup white sugar
2 eggs
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
2 cups rolled oats
1 1/2 cups small chocolate chips

1 cup of walnuts


DIRECTIONS
Preheat oven to 350 degrees

In a large bowl cream shortening, brown sugar and granulated sugar. Add eggs and mix thoroughly.
Combine the baking soda, salt and flour and stir into creamed mixture
Add oatmeal and chocolate chips and stir until well blended.
Drop by teaspoonfuls onto greased cookie sheet. (I used a cookie scoop to make the cookies larger)

Bake for 15 minutes.

Happy 4th of July

Happy 4th of July everyone. What are your plans? Tonight Bill and I are going to have a picnic at the park and watch the fireworks.
This card of "Kinibella" was made for this weeks Bella challenge on Splitcoast Stampers. The challenge was to make a Summery Card. I used my new "Lemonade" paper by Basic Grey. Hope you are having a great day and summer.

Best Friends

This is a layout of me and my best friend Jackie. My sister had these old photos of us when we were kids. I was able to scan and reprint them. The first page pictures are from 1972. I was the chubby one celebrating my birthday and Jackie was the little red head. The second page is of us now. The titles on the second page are hard to read, so I may have to do something to make them show up. We were seperated in 1973 when her family moved to England. They eventually moved back. We were reunited in 2008 when she recognized me at a Weight Watchers meeting. The paper used is called "Happy Bird-day".

Home of the FREE because of the BRAVE

I am posting an early "4th of July" card so that you can take advantage of this awesome downloaded sentiment from my new Bella Sister, Shaela's, blog. She designed this stamp for Paper Makeup Stamps and is making it available until July 4. I love the strong statement that this sentiment gives. I found this paper yesterday at the local scrapbook store. It is from "Best Creations".

http://shaelaodd.blogspot.com/2009/07/4th-of-july-freebie.html

Lexi's Dance Recital

Today was Lexi's dance recital. Here she is all dressed up. She loves dressing up.

Lexi is on the end on the left side. It was hard to get a good picture, because we couldn't use a flash and I wasn't close up. I will have to eventually get a telephoto lens. She danced to "My Favorite Things". This morning I recorded her singing the songs that she was dancing to. I have these little recorder boxes from CTMH that you can put on your scrapbook pages.
This is the "Daddy Daughter Dance". It was so sweet. The song that they danced to was one that gets you chocked up. It was a song about a little girl dressed like Cinderella and wanting her Daddy to dance with her at the ball. But he was always so busy. And, she tugged on his shirt saying "Daddy Please". The last part of the song is of her engaged to be married and asking her Daddy to practice dancing with her. A real tear jerker. Lexi and her dad are the 5th from the left, close to the middle.
And, lastly here is Bill and me with our little "Cinderella".