Thursday, December 27, 2012

Project Life - Week 51

Welcome to Project Life 2012! If you are new to my blog, welcome! I hope you will stay a while. I'm Jessica, wife to Juan, mommy to new baby Maddie. I am also an electrical engineer by day and I am participating in Project Life, a different way to record our lives by taking one photo a day. This was inspired by the fabulous Becky Higgins who has put together a wonderful kit to make this challenge easier.


I am using the digital Cobalt kit, find it at http://www.beckyhiggins.com/blog/2011/10/new-product-has-arrived/ This digital version uses Shutterfly and is SUPER easy to use! See my completed pages for 2012 at http://scraplifterdesigns.blogspot.com/p/project-life-layouts.html

And finally, my POTW (pictures of the week):




Sunday - Today my Christmas layout of Maddie with Santa last year was featured on Colorful Creations; later it was selected as the "Pick of the Week". Super sweet! We spent a lazy Sunday playing with Maddie. I played Peek-A-Boo around the chair with Maddie and Daddy played horsie, much to Maddie's delight.


Monday - Maddie is VERY into BUGS. Every spec she finds on the floor she says "bug" and then typically tries to eat. Today there was a real live ladybug on our floor and Maddie thought it was about the most intriguing thing ever. Also, we countered on the crazy offer we received on the townhouse and they ACCEPTED! YEAH. We are officially under contract, although I'm still a little leary it will actually happen.


Tuesday - Tonight I made "Slow Cooker Garlic and Brown Sugar Chicken" from Pinterest. It was posted by Six Sisters' and the recipe can be found here. It was amazing and we even ate the leftovers....something we never do. It was SUPER easy and the chicken fell right off the bone. I will definitely be making this again!












Wednesday - Today was super busy. We took Maddie to her 15 month Well Baby doctor visit. She now weighs 28lbs-3oz (an increase of just 3 oz since her 12 month visit), is 32-1/2" tall and her head circumference is 18-3/4"; all still above the 95th percentile. The doctor said she would probably begin to get picky at eating over the next three months and to continue to offer her variety, but not to become a short order cook. Offer her the complete meal and if she does not want to eat it then wait until the next meal/snack. She said that most babies this age only eat one meal and pick at the other two. So far Maddie still eats EVERYTHING we put infront of her and anything else she can find on the floor. She is still loves veggies and fruit. We give her milk at each meal and water throughout the day. She also likes Go-Gurts, although she will snack on anything we give her. Poor thing had three more shots today. She definitely knew they were coming and was not happy. She is such a tough little baby. She cried while she was getting the shots and shortly after, but as soon as we left the office, she was running all over. Daddy took her to the park downtown and she went crazy climbing all over the place. She didn't have any reactions at all to the shot and was her typical happy little self. This evening I met my work girlfriends out at Toulouse for dinner, drinks and a gift exchange. It was so great for us all to get together....we chatted up a storm.


Thursday - Maddie loves the door knocker Santa Clause. She kisses him everyday and typically takes him off the door to ride around on her shoulders. I'm not sure if she is taking him for a ride or trying to wear his legs like a necklace!




Friday - Juan had an interview Tuesday with my coworkers wife for a contract job at an interiors firm (ID Group). It went well and he started to work yesterday. It is only 40 hours a week for one month, but at least it is something. Additionally, they indicated after the month is up, they will possibly extend his contract if they still have plenty of work. Today was his second day and the second day that Maria is back watching Maddie during the day. Today her van was overheating, so Juan picked her up in the morning and brought her to our house and I had to take her home this afternoon. With it being the Friday before Christmas, it took me 45 minutes in traffic to get home from work (9 miles) and then it took 1 hour and 10 minutes to take her home. Neither Maddie or I was up for yet ANOTHER hour in the car for the return ride home, so we stopped at the park downtown and met Juan. Then we had dinner at Campisi's, Maddie loved the pizza and then we walked around looking at the Christmas lights.











Saturday - Today was Maddie's first attempt at making Sugar Cookies. She did pretty good at helping me cut the shapes out of the dough, until she tasted it and realized it was more fun to eat the dough. Then Nana came over and brought Maddie and I the most adorable matching aprons. Maddie thought the penguins on them were great! She also did pretty good with the decorating part, but all of the sprinkles had huge holes in the lids. She discovered relatively quickly that the sprinkles were more fun to slide off on the floor and the frosting was more fun to eat then to decorate with. Overall, she did awesome for a 15 month old. I also made rice crispy reindeers and fudge. I boxed everything up in cute little tins with stamped tags to give to our new neighbors. It was a full day of baking!

Thanks for visiting.  Only one more week to go....so hard to believe 2012 is almost over!

Wednesday, December 26, 2012

26 Christmas Season Memories

Hello my scrappy friends and family! I hope you had a fabulous Christmas. It actually snowed here in Dallas! That hasn't happened on Christmas day in 37 years, so it was quite exciting.  I saw a great blog post from The Mom Creative where Becky listed 20 memories from their family this Christmas season.  I thought it was such a fabulous idea, that I made my own list.  Christmas is such a busy time of year and I never quite seem to do everything I had hoped. I often forget to look back at the amazing season we had and acknowledge all of the memories we did make. So here goes (in no particular order):



1. Maddie visited Santa at Neiman Marcus downtown. She didn't smile, but she didn't cry like last year. She also loved playing with the toys at Neiman's afterwards.

2. We decorated our new home for the first time. Daddy put lights and ornments outside on the house and Mommy decorated the inside.

3. Maddie loved "rearranging" the ornaments on the Christmas tree. By the end of the season all of the ornaments were on the top of the tree, with the bottom half bare.  Most of the jingle bells are MIA.

4. Maddie loved reading The Christmas Story book and her Seek and Find Santa book. These were both used daily. The pre-recorded Charlie Brown Christmas book that Daddy made her last year scared her everytime she opened it.

5. Our elf, Rufus Xavier Sasaspirilla, made his first appearance. He was pretty low key this year, but Maddie knew just who he was.

6. Nana and Mommy made and frosted sugar cookies with Maddie for the first time. Maddie thought the icing and the sprinkles were quite delicious. Mommy also made fudge and Reindeer Rice Crispie treats for the neighbors.

7. Mommy and Daddy took Maddie to see the Trains at Northpark, which she LOVED! She ran around crazy for about 30 minutes taking it all in.

8. Maddie loved watching our snow globes each day.

9. Maddie discovered "Frosty the Snowman" and watched it over an over, dancing to the songs.

10. We mailed almost 150 Christmas cards to family and friends of Maddie and her Christmas ornaments.

11. We sang Christmas songs everyday. Maddie's favorites were "Rudolph" and "Frosty the Snowman".

12. We bought Maddie a stocking with her name embroidered on it.

13. Mommy made 10 dozen tamales with her friends Siobhan and Siobhan's sister Sherean. Abuelita taught them the entire process while Maddie played outside with Daddy and his friend David, as they grilled.

14. Mommy hosted her 9th Annual Ornament Exchange Party. Mommy ended up with our new Christmas tree friends Pierre and Margarite.

15. We shopped for presents for a couple of MHE (Moss Haven Elementary) angels to make sure they had something under the tree this year. We also bought presents for the children at Children's Medical Center.

16. We took Maddie to Santa's Village in Richardson, but there were so many people that we never made it into the little houses. Maddie and cousin Ashlyn still had a BLAST running around and around the huge lit Christmas tree.

17. We spent Christmas Eve day at Nana's playing with Cousins, Aunt and Uncle Bradley.

18. Mommy and Daddy attended the ccrd Christmas party at Rick Rome's house and Maddie stayed and played with Nana.

19. Maddie loved kissing our Santa door knocker each day and would even say, "Ho, Ho, Ho."

20. Mommy went to dinner with her girlfriends, Abby, Danna, Sarah, and Janet, from work at Toulouse.

21. Nana made Maddie and Mommy matching peguin aprons, which Maddie had to kiss.

22. We spent Christmas morning at home as a family, drinking hot chocolate and watching Maddie play with her new toys. She loved opening presents and even managed to open a couple that were not for her.

23. We hosted Christmas lunch for the Navarro family. Lots of great food made by Abuelita and lots of laughs with the family.

24. We bought Maddie a monkey ornament for the Christmas tree to represent her love for "Monkey See, Monkey Do" and because she is such a little monkey. She even climbed the exterior ladder that Daddy was using to climb on top of the house.

25. Maddie experienced snow for the first time on Christmas Day and LOVED it, laughing out loud and touching it over and over.

26. We thanked the Lord every day for our numerous blessings, especially our blessing of Jesus! While our little family has a faced a rocky few months financially, we have been over-blessed with love, health, and each other.

I hope your season was Merry and you too can look back on the amazing memories created.  Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Hugs, Jessica!

Tuesday, December 18, 2012

Scrap Friends Candy Giveaway

Scrap Friends is giving away this AWESOME candy! I really hope I'm the winner.  It's still not to late to enter.  Check it out over at Scrap Friends!

Monday, December 17, 2012

Fun in the Sun - Challenge Layout

Happy Monday - only eight days 'til Christmas! Here is a layout from Aruba of my DH and DD.


I created each side individually for different challenges, but designed both with the other in mind.

For the left side I used Sketch N Scrap sketch #22:

I also played along with Frosted Designs 12 Days of Christmas.  This layout was for day 9: use 9 pearls or sparkles.  


For the right side, I used another sketch from Sketch N Scrap sketch #23: I mirrored the sketch to work with my pictures.
I also played along with Frosted Designs 12 Days of Christmas. This layout is for Day 5 (use five gold things on your project! Both gold and yellow are acceptable for this challenge.) I used two different yellow papers, a yellow felt border, a yellow tag and a yellow oval frame.

Finally, I played along with Scrap Fit workout #81 to create a layout that is dedicated to something or many things we have to be thankful for.  I am most thankful for my happy healthy baby and adoring husband. This layout couldn't say it any better.

Closeups:



Materials Used:  Paper - Creative Imaginations, Reminisce & Authentique; pearls - Prima; felt border - Queen & Company; metal embellishments - CTMH;  rub-ons - Making Memories, TLC, and Creative Imaginations; stamps - CTMH; ink - CTMH; tag - unknown; ribbon - unknown.

Thanks for visiting!     

Sunday, December 16, 2012

Project Life - Week 50

Welcome to Project Life 2012! If you are new to my blog, welcome! I hope you will stay a while. I'm Jessica, wife to Juan, mommy to new baby Maddie. I am also an electrical engineer by day and I am participating in Project Life, a different way to record our lives by taking one photo a day. This was inspired by the fabulous Becky Higgins who has put together a wonderful kit to make this challenge easier.


I am using the digital Cobalt kit, find it at http://www.beckyhiggins.com/blog/2011/10/new-product-has-arrived/ This digital version uses Shutterfly and is SUPER easy to use! See my completed pages for 2012 at http://scraplifterdesigns.blogspot.com/p/project-life-layouts.html

And finally, my POTW (pictures of the week):


Sunday -






Monday - We took Maddie to see the Trains at Northpark. It wasn't crowded at all, which was fantastic as Maddie just ran in circles looking at all of the trains. She was absolutely estatic and we just let her run around for about 30 minutes, see the video HERE. It was quite adorable.


Tuesday - Maddie loves to see what Mommy is working on in her scrapbook room. Anything within reach usually ends up on the floor.  She is also quite the little helper. Daddy turned the chair over to fix the squeaking and Maddie was right there "helping" pick it up.


Wednesday - Daddy cooked dinner for us tonight, short-ribs, corn, potatoes and avocado. It was delicious and Mama got a break for the evening.

Thursday - I received some goodies in the mail today. I was the winner of the "Say it With Words" Challenge for both October and November over at Colorful Creations. This month's word is "Joy", so you should head on over and play along. Thanks so much Anne for such a fabulous RAK! I can't wait to use my new goodies.


Friday - Juan had an interview today so Maria came over to watch Maddie and brought us tortillas. Maddie is quite a fan.



Saturday - Juan spent the afternoon making fresh veggies to steam for Maddie. This evening my mom babysat Maddie while Juan and I went to dinner at Hibiscus and then to my company Christmas party. It was a wonderful adult evening! We also got an offer on the townhouse! It was a good offer, except for the Non-Realty items they added..."White Jeep in the Carport". What? Who asks for a vehicle when they make an offer on a house.  It's not even our vehicle, the neighbors have been parking there.  Hmmphh, guess it's not a very serious offer.

Thanks for visiting!