BIL wedding

Well it's official, the baby of the family (Ray's family) is married! They had a long engagement but they did it and the wedding was awesome. They were sealed in the Redlands temple and had a reception that evening, what a long day but thankfully we were smart and left the kids home for the temple photos. (It was hot!) The best part was all the cousins were together, a very rare thing. 11 of the 12 grandkids were there (Taryn and her baby were in Texas and will be out in a few weeks). It was awesome but dang, a lot of girls! lol. (Anyone wondering there are 3 boys, 2 of which are my own). It was fun and we actually got a photo in there while waiting for the reception. The bride and groom really had a ball and it was so fun to watch them, congrats again James and welcome to the family Brittany!!!

She was dancing with no shoes on, I thought it was cute!

This is the best I could get with all these kids... notice my nephew has his tongue out and cross eyes (lovely). Stinker... lol. It's Alex, Trice, Zada, Dennis, Tiffany, Emma, Camden, KateLynn, Jamie, Ariana and Deanna.

San Diego Trip

Well we had our family vacation and gosh am I tired! lol. It was a total blast even if we did have to come home a night early (our campsite flooded out on Wednesday night... oddly enough we were the only ones who got hit when that pipe burst...).

Monday we headed down to San Diego and set up camp with my parents and brother Daniel at our "camp by the beach" site. (Unfortunately my other brother Michael had to work this week and couldn't join us but we did miss him). Our neighbors were all really nice and the kids enjoyed them and their bubbles. lol.

Ariana waiting to leave on our trip

Tuesday we went to the San Diego Zoo and boy was that a blast! Alex's favorite animal was the Panda, he still won't stop talking about it. Ariana fell in love with the hippo and the polar bear and Camden, well, he was awesome the entire time we were there and didn't fuss. Poor baby has allergies to something and his eyes flared up several times and red/watery. Ugh. We had a very fun time but gosh, no one warned me that the zoo is mostly on hills (and those strollers got *heavy*). The worst part was watching a heron sneak into the flamingo/duck pond and steal (eat) a baby duck. (Freaked us out, didn't let the kids watch that). My favorite was the girraffes and the grizzly bear that was running around like a mad man, the zoo workers were shocked to see that. My dad found a peacock wandered around and became friends with it, that bird was pruning his feathers for my dad and had them halfway up! Huge shock! Alex also loved the "scarlet macaw" which talked to him when he'd talk. (My theory is that Alex has a very high pitched voice and the bird liked it). It was funny, he'd talk and the bird was talking back to him, shocked me for sure!

Wednesday was hanging out and an awful puppet show at Balboa park. We toured an aviary (beautiful plants) and then left for lunch at a really good Mexican place and shopping. The kids were playing and Alex got a good cut on his head when he tripped and fell, they were once again playing with bubbles. lol. That night we had a smore roast with the neighbors, that was very nice and oh so yummy.

Thursday we woke up and our campsite had flooded. Odd thing was it was only our site, no one else was wet but a pipe had burst at the park across the road (part of the campgrounds) and it flooded us out. We could either move sites for one more night (what a pain) or just go home. They were willing to let us stay longer for free to make up for it but Ray's brother gets married Saturday so we had to just get our money back. I was really bummed out, we had been having a nice time and it ended very suddenly.

We headed to the Wild Animal park and toured that until we were so worn out we went home. (I am telling you, that park is all uphill also and shoot was that tough with the strollers. One incline in particular sucked only to find this sign at the top...

This means we already *saw* the lions at the bottom of this trail. Shoot huh? The tiger was hiding so the whole haul was a waste. Here are a few photos of our trip though, what a blast.

The lions were so close, it was amazing! (We should have known they weren't up at the other site by the way... duh!)

On second thought I'll get a slide show of the best photos going on here next week... that may be better. lol.

Help here! lol

Anyone know how to change your blog style (okay, no duh's here... something OTHER than the basic templates it comes with is what I'm asking). I really want to play with it and change mine but so far all I know how to do is change the display photo and the colors of everything... boring! lol. You'd think someone who does this stuff a lot would get it but nope, bad at blogs. Can a kind person show me how they do it please!?

My favorite artist

For those who don't know I am also a digital "tagger" meaning I create things with artwork by artists and even write tutorials to teach others how to do these things. I have my own tutorial site (wimpyswonders) and it's a total blast. Well one of my favorite artists is Suzanne Woolcott from Scotland. She has a site here: http://www.gorjuss.co.uk/ and her blog here: http://www.gorjuss.co.uk/blog/ I have had a blast chatting with her husband "Mr G" who hijacked her blog a while ago and is just the funniest guy. Recently he asked to have tutorial writers submit their tutorials for him to try and those chosen get a print from his talented wife (of which I've won several prints, I have quite a few now... lol). If you notice I am a top chatter there, definitely a stalker I guess. roflol. Anyways, had to giggle and share his blog..

http://www.gorjuss.co.uk/blog/?p=503

Sneaking another layout

Here is a new layout, it's of my mom and her twin brother when they were babies. My poor grandma didn't know she was pregnant with twins, they are the 4th and 5th babies of the family (and last I might add). Oh how times have changed!

Kit used is "Heritage baby" by Tina Sudweek if anyone wondered...

Late night posting

Well hubby is at his baby brother's bachelor party tonight (no worries, it was just a dinner at a nice restaurant those party animals! lol). Anyways, got bored so thought I'd post a few pages I recently did for my CT team... also shows off what we've been up to lately without all that work. lol.

This one makes me laugh, can you tell we live in the desert??? (sigh) Oh well, the grass is gone but we tried to help it, darn rabbits. They still have fun though...

Digital Scrapbooking

Well today I was asked how I did the Digital Scrapbooking (it was great to see you by the way Carol) so I thought I'd write a blog really quickly about it.

First you need a program to do it with. I love the program "Paint Shop Pro" by Corel and you can actually download a 30 day trial of it to try it out. Awesome! I also know Adobe has one, I don't know much about that one. It's a photo program that lets you play with your photos and all kinds of cool effects, definitely hooked.

I have some websites listed on the side and yes, a lot of them are expensive *but* I find a lot of awesome free stuff on them and get away without buying much for scrapbooking unless I am looking for something specific. Here are a few favorites and all free!

http://www.dozibaer.com/SiteMap/sitemap.htm

http://sentimentalstyle.blogspot.com/

http://www.shabbyprincess.com/ (so cute!!!)

http://peppermintcreative.com/ (go to downloads at the top and she has new free kits every month and they are SO cute!)

http://ikeagoddess.blogspot.com/ (this is a freebie search engine where you can get some cute kits and page layouts for digital scrapbooking, very cool)

So that should get you started for now. If anyone really does want to know more I am definitely more than willing to help out. Just email me!

Ariana's 3 year photos

We actually got some decent photos of her for her 3 year this time. (Last year we tried photos with her 3 times at the studio, tears every time... grr...) She just didn't stop moving long enough today, ugh! The girl was patient though and got a few I liked which amazed the heck out of me! lol. I also am starting to think she looks a tad like me... just a tiny bit though (laughing).

Photos at a friend's wedding

A family friend's son got married today so we were invited to the wedding and reception. It was very nice and I got some great photos of the kids only to find out I had the camera set on the wrong setting and am not sure if I can print the photos... ugh. Stinker butt. The kids did pretty well considering we were sitting right next to the band too, didn't realize that one of the reserved tables were for our family so my poor kids had their ears blasted. ((sigh)). It was a good night though, too bad our family photo was blurry. Did I mention I had no luck with my camera tonight? lol.

Daddy and Alex- notice Alex's new haircut? We spiked it... so cool!

The "Lizard Wizard" visit

For the end of the year party for Speech this year Alex's teacher hired the "Lizard Wizard" to come show the kids some cool animals. It was something else! He had a bunch of turtles, some frogs, small snakes, a couple of gekkos, a huge tarantula (eek), hissing cockroaches (blah), a baby alligator (Alex's favorite!!!), millipeds (those are gross too)... a few others and a giant boa constrictor (where is the darn spell check? lol).

It was crazy, Alex squeeled the whole time and even helped hold the giant snake! He was so proud and kept stroking the snake, no fear I tell you. I kept squirming when the spider and cockroaches were out, they were quite close. The kids got to pet the animals after and ooh did that freak me out but they sure loved it! I would definitely recommend it, although I'd rather just take photos than touch them! Eww! lol. It was a lot of fun though.

This is that horrible tarantula in case you missed that, this kid was nervous to hold it and I don't blame him! Eek!

This one is so funny, the boy next to Alex kept talking about it but refused to touch it. Alex *loved* that snake. Oh boy, it took 10 kids to hold it!

No fear I tell you! That freaks me out! Not only do those snakes look like they can bite but look at the yellow one sneaking out of the box next to Ariana's arm... stinker snake!

Okay, I'll stop freaking everyone out. I have a bunch more though. Ariana loved the turtles the most and Alex loved that baby Aligator (he insists it was a crocodile though). Oh well right? It was fun...