My Only Sunshine

NOLA

Last week Buster and I went to New Orleans.  He had the annual AAPG convention and I had never been to NOLA so I went along.

It was so lovely and lively.  I can't help but love a city where there is jazz in the streets.  This man was a fantastic clarinet player.

I had such a great time just walking the streets taking pictures and soaking up NOLA.

There weather was perfect and the beignets were even better. 

This last one is one of my favorite photos. 

While in New Orleans we had one of the best meals I have ever experienced.  We ate at Emeril's NOLA restaurant.  The food was very very good but the service was even more amazing.  I wanted to bring home all the waitstaff so they could be my buddies.

We miss Frisco...

...but you couldn't make us leave Richardson.

There are so many things about Richardson that make it home.  I have so much I like about Richardson that it is making my post two days late.  (Oh come on, I can use that excuse if I want to, it's my blog!)

The first thing about Richardson...  I grew up here.

I went to high school in Richardson.

Richardson is close to where my babies are buried.

We lived in Richardson when the beautiful bouncing Bug was born. (she had those crazy blue eyes even then)

We lived in Richardson again when pretty itty Bitty was born. (she was sassy even then)

 

At our house in Richardson we spend our lazy summer days like this.

My friends here are fantastic. 

The boys in Frisco are cute.  The boys in Richardson are cute too.  I can't help but love how funny they are too.  The best part, they are so nice to my Girlies.  The Moms in Richardson are really doing something right.

      

Speaking of moms, look how hard these moms are working to make a great day for their kids.

I love that in Richardson Bit can make friends like M.  Through M she has learned how it feels to be needed.  Through M's Mom she has learned how it feels to be appreciated for being a good friend.  It can be hard for kids to share that with each other.

One of the biggest reasons we moved to Richardson was its proximity to stuff.  Richardson is close to just about everything we want to do.  Most importantly it is close to dance.  We used to drive endless hours every week getting to the dance school in Richardson all the way from Frisco.  This is important because if we were still so far away we wouldn't be able to do Girl Scouts...

...while doing this...

We wouldn't be able to do volleyball...

 

...while doing this...

We wouldn't be able to swim...

 
...while doing this...

Richardson has an annual Christmas parade that we liked to come to even when we didn't live in Richardson.  Add that sense of community to the sense of community we get from our own neighborhood putting on a 4th of July parade and you get a strong sense of small town home.  It feels even more like a small town when our entire neighborhood trick or treats on the same street where our neighbors put on a huge haunted house.

The Richardson school district has a full day gifted program so that little Van Goghs like this...

...can feel inspired to make works of art like this...

 

Our school has an annual talent show so that kids this cute can show how very clever they are.

The best part of Richardson is being close to friends...

 

...and family.

Handy

I know that this isn't so much a hand photo as a funny glove pic but I wanted to use it for i {heart} faces anyway.  My Bug, she is one sassy kid.

i Heart Faces - Dance

Wow, this week at i <3 Faces they are doing a dance theme.  Made for me, isn't it?

 
Here's Bitty as the Brown Mouse in this year's Nutcracker.  This was her dream role and she got it.  Go Bitty.

Invitations

Bitty's birthday is this Sunday.  Bug is a week later.  As you can imagine, it is birthday party season here at the house of Sunshine.  Last year both Girlies were starting a new school and didn't know anyone so we didn't have birthday parties.  Instead we waited until months later and took one kid each to the American Girl Cafe.  This year we decided to make up for the lack of full on party last year by doing it up big.  We are having a Carnival at our house.

 

I am making the invitations myself based on what the Girlies asked for.  I printed the info (including the No Gifts disclaimer, we are having far too many kids to have all those gifts) on cardstock.  I used my Martha Stewart circle cutter to cut them into disks.

 

I used my Cricut to cut out flower shapes to put behind the disks.  Even with the bad lighting my Cricut looks good in photos, doesn't it?

 

I sandwiched a tongue depressor (why would you want your tongue to be sad?) between the invite disk and the cute little flower die cut.

 

I'll have pics of the final product next time.  Check it out though, I only made THIS MUCH mess working on this project.

I need your opinion

I post a large number of pictures.  You've probably noticed.  So the question is, do you like my pictures better with these cute rounded edges?  Should I stick with my standard rectangular images?

(In this pic - Jenny of Craft Test Dummies and Brad, EVP of Provocraft)

I Faces - Funny Face

This is not one of the best photographs I have ever taken, but it is one of my very favorite faces.

 

My favorite booth design - Doodlebug Designs

The Craft Critique reporters split up duty at CHA so that we could get everything done (I'm not sure we did, even with that) so I didn't look at the product of too many scrapbooking companies.  It was impossible to miss some of their booths though.  As an example, I thought Tim Holtz's Idea-ology booth was fantastic.  You can see some pics of it here.

My very favorite booth design was from a company called Dooldebug Designs.  So obviously, since I call my daughter "Doodlebug" that drew me right in.  But how could I not also fall in love with the bright colors and clever ideas?

 

Also, I'm a sucker for a sweet shop.

 

 

And cupcakes.

 

This birthday tree was my favorite but they also have them for seasons and holidays.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I'm pretty sure I like the birthday tree most.  Which one do you prefer?

 

 

I may need to make Bitty's room look like this last one.  What do you think?

Little Windows

Check out my write up on the Little Windows booth at CHA Summer 2009 on Craft Critique.  I can't wait to get my hands on one of these kits.

I've got my feet up

CHA Summer 2009 is over and I have returned home.  These are not listed in order of importance.  Getting home was hard, I missed my kids, and boy am I happy to be here on my couch with my (sore) feet up.  What an amazing trip I had.

I met some really important people in the world of crafting while I was in Florida, which was so much fun.  To tell you the truth, it was just as much fun to get to meet my Co-Craft Critique ladies and also to get to meet so many day in and day out crafters. 

 

I also got to see many lovely things.  These are Tombow's waterbased markers.  And these are alcohol based Copic Markers.

 

Aren't they so pretty?  I do love markers.

 

How about these marbles made from Pardo Clay by Viva Decor?  Pardo Clay is made from Beeswax, cool huh?  The sun holding the marbles drew me right in.

 

This is my friend Jenny of Craft Test Dummies wearing a ring made from Beadalon's new Stainless Steal wire for wire wrapping.

 

Clark Kent left his glass sitting out in the Cricut new releases area.

So there's your eye candy from CHA.  We've been covering the trade show fast and furiously over at Craft Critique.  I didn't get home from the airport until nearly 4am this morning so I think it's time for me to hit the sack.  Don't forget to check back for more on CHA.