Laura Vegas

favorite music – a digital layout

June 7, 2010

since i havn't made any paper layouts that i can share lately (have made plenty though, for the record), how about a digital layout?

i started this digital layout over a month ago. i had seen the mixed tape digikit by brandy buffington on 2peas, and had to get it. the first thing i thought of using was the old school tape. the kind i used to record all my favorite music on, by holding up the tape player to the radio, and waiting for the songs to come on before hitting the "record" button. lol! kids these days don't know what they were missing. lol! i then added the journaling pages from the sunshine day digikit by brandy buffington. i had intentions of learning some new digital tricks, to give some elements a more realistic look. like shadowing. but if i wait to find the time for that, this will never be finished. lol!

i thought it would be fun to do a layout about my most listened to songs these days. i'm not going to say these are my most favorite songs ever. but they are the songs that i seem to play the most on my ipod lately. i just went to the playlist on my ipod, that shows my top played songs. nice that it tracks it for me, so i didn't have to think too hard. lol! it's an interesting mix, right? i have such a varied taste. some of these are songs that the girls like, and i just started to like them just as much after hearing them listen to them all the time. although there are some on there, that you might think are more the girls songs. but that are really my favorites, and not their's. think "high school musical" ;)
i’m teaching at a little event

June 4, 2010

i might have failed to mention this. but i'm teaching at CKC-Riverside in just 2 weeks. it's my first CKC event, and i'm super excited. but it's also been quite a few years since i've taught classes, so i'm a little nervous too. lol! i have 7 classes on my schedule. so if you're out that way in california, check it out 🙂
a new vintage groove necklace

June 3, 2010

i got so busy the last 2 weeks, that i hadn't made any new vintage groove jewelry. it was fun last night, to take everything back out and dig around for pieces i wanted to put together.

i started by taking the corded strand from THIS set. then i took part of the gold chain and the velvet oval pendant from THIS set. and i took the 3 pieces from each end of THIS strand. hooked them all together and came up with this cute necklace.

alyssa was nice enough to model it for me this morning. sarah apparently didn't hear me asking for a model, and was bummed that she didn't get to do it. so she'll be my model for next week 🙂

supplies:
MM vintage groove jewelry kit – floral mix
MM vintage groove jewelry kit – abalone and velvet
MM vintage groove jewelry strand combinations – abalone and button
alyssa’s graduation

June 1, 2010

i'm not sure why it's taken me almost a week to write about alyssa's 8th grade graduation ceremony. it was such an awesome night, and i was so proud of her. i'm actually more emotional now, then i was that night. i held it together that night, and only got a little teary eyed about a half hour before the ceremony. you could just feel the excitement in the air, and it got the best of me. and then i was fine. but now? i'm actually tearing up as i type this. and i have teared up every time i've gone to edit these photos. mainly because i'm just so dang proud of my girl!

doesn't she look gorgeous up there! you'd never know it by looking at this picture, but we had her hair so curly and cute. however, her hair just doesn't hold the curl. it still looked great though. she had the prettiest dress, that was quite a lot of work to decide on. she wanted to wear heels, to make her a tad bit taller. she's still such a tiny thing. although she wasn't actually the smallest in her class this time. there were a few boys shorter than her. it worked out though, since the order they walked in was determined by height. so that put her in the front row 🙂

they had the opening part of the ceremony, and a few great speeches gave by fellow classmates. then they got to the honor roll students. the students on honor roll for the year were wearing the double silver cords. a good sized group of students. then there were 7 students (out of 96) that held a 4.0 GPA for the entire 8th grade year, and they wore the gold sash. alyssa was one of those students. they were all honored with engraved plaques.

then they moved on to the outstanding achievement awards for each subject. there was language arts, social studies, science, algebra, drama, choir, and band. alyssa picked up a nice engraved plaque for excellence in language arts 🙂

then she sat down. and then she got called back up. took another engraved plaque for excellence in algebra 🙂

then she sat down. you see where i'm going with this? she got called right back up. took home another engraved plaque for excellence in social studies 🙂

yes, my girl sort of swept the awards that night! 4 total. and 3 of the 7 subject awards (the hard subjects). and i'm totally fine bragging on it, because she earned it. school does come naturally to her. she enjoys it, and she's extremely self-motivated. but she also works her tush off to get the grades she does. she's read a trillion books this school year (give or take a few), she studies like crazy, and goes above and beyond whenever she can. these awards might also be what saved me from getting too emotional that night. i was too busy WHOOOOOOOOHOOOOOOOOO'ing it up for my girl, to think too much about it all. lol!

sorry. had to go to the house to get the photo of her with her awards. lol! back over to the ceremony. after the awards, the moved onto to the promotion certificates. they called out each student, who came up and received their "certificate". which was really just blank inside. they had to wait until friday, to get the real thing. this was her walking out. she walked in a jr high schooler, and walked out a high schooler. wow!

it was pure madness outside, after the ceremony. kids everywhere, families everywhere, camera's everywhere. and most of my shots turned out super blurry and dark. but i got this good one of alyssa and one of her BFF's, kassidy. every morning, at 8:10am, kassidy has come by the side door on her way to school. and she comes inside, and waits for alyssa and sarah to finish getting ready. and they all walk together.

i love that alyssa has genuinely good and nice friends. and it makes me feel even better, that most of her close friends are going to the same high school as her. quite a lot of students from her class, are headed out to another high school in town. so i'm glad she'll have some familar faces, of good kids 🙂

and this was on the front page of the newspaper the following morning! i love that it says "honor roll and 4.0 grade point average student alyssa accepts one of her many awards" 😉
some fun news

June 1, 2010

have you heard of little light studio? it's the creative venture of kayla aimee terrell and wilna furstenberg. they have put together a fun site, full of tutorials, freebie downloads, tips and ideas, and online classes that you can sign up for. these are two very talented, and very cute girls.

so i was super excited to get an email from them last week, asking if i wanted to join their team. the news went up on the little light studio blog today. i cannot wait to see who else is joining. and i can't wait to get started on some ideas to share 🙂
hey there sunshine – a card

May 31, 2010

hope everyone is having a great memorial day with family and friends! it's been a busy weekend here. we enjoyed our city's memorial day festivities yesterday, so today we're all relaxing at home. which is much needed, after the amount of work and activities i tried to shove into the last 3 days. lol! i wanted to share this card today, that went up on the jillibean soup blog.

i used the new summer squash soup collection for this card. threw in some cool beans buttons, a pink journaling sprout, and a few of the summer squash soup cardstock stickers.

and paired it with the itop brad maker tool from imaginisce.

i love brads. and i love that i can create my own brads, using any pattern paper i want. you can use so many different materials with this tool. i'm thinking i might have to do a tutorial on this tool soon 😉
slice inspiration project – paws and claws

May 28, 2010

i have graduation photos and stories to blog. i have last day of school memories happening as i type this. but i just havn't had time to sit down and put my thoughts into words yet. and i still need to get photos from alyssa's dad, to compare who's are better. lol! so that's definately coming. in the meantime, i figured it's a good day to toss in a scrapping project for you.

this is the closest we'll come to having a dog, since alyssa is highly allergic to them. although, he's much easier to clean up after than a real dog. lol! but i was thinking of grammi and papa's cocker spaniel, jenny, when i worked on these projects using the new paws & claws design card. she looks exactly like this webkinz dog. this is just a fun little treat jar that i came up with. and if you head over to the making memories blog, you can download the instructions and print them out. then you can store the project card, in your slice inspirations box.
how alyssa got to this day

May 26, 2010

seems like just yesterday, that alyssa was starting kindergarten. and yet, it was actually almost 10 years ago. and tonight, my girl is graduating from junior high school. that means that high school is next, in just 2 short months. awwwwwww. this mom is getting a little emotional about this big moment in her life. i'm tearing up just thinking about it. but, before she marches out in her gown and accepts that diploma, i thought it would be fun to look back over the years. i worked really hard to find all the "first day" photos from each school year. only 4 of these are digital. the rest, i had to dig for extra copies laying in boxes, or take pictures of the picture, that is already on a layout in an album. here we go.

kindergarten – 2001/2002

1st grade – 2002/2003

2nd grade – 2003/2004

3rd grade – 2004/2005

4th grade – 2005/2006

5th grade – 2006/2007

6th grade – 2007/2008

7th grade – 2008/2009

8th grade – 2009/2010

i love seeing these all together. in fact, i might just dig out my negatives, have copies made, and scrap them all together for her school album. making a mental note to do that. wish us luck tonight. it's supposed to rain, which means they've already decided to move the ceremonies inside the gym. which means less people can come and watch. which means we got limited to just 7 tickets. sarah was gracious enough to offer up her ticket, so that all 4 of the grandparents could come and watch alyssa. sarah said "it's not that i don't care, but i want them to see her". awwwww. i just love my girls 🙂

update: one of alyssa's friends came across an extra ticket. so sarah DID get to go to graduation tonight 🙂
school projects take 2

May 25, 2010

do you remember THIS POST from a few months ago? where i talked about the absurd amount of school projects that my girls have done during the past year? the girls last day of school is this friday. which will wrap up this year's work and projects. so i thought i would share a few more of the projects we've done recently.

alyssa's mousetrap car project for science. when alyssa brought home the paper and info for this project, i immediatly said that she could work on this one with her dad. lol! it wasn't something that was familiar to me, and it looked complicated. so they did this one on their own. i think it had to travel 3 feet or so, to get an "A" grade. alyssa's went 30 feet.

meet marie clurie. a famous physicist and chemist, who was a pioneer in the field of radioactivity.

alyssa's biography report and project for language arts. this is alyssa dressed as marie curie. the project involved a huge biography report, along with dressing as your famous person and going around to all the classes at school to talk about them. we didn't really plan ahead for the dressing up part. so i dug out the one box of my older clothes from the attic, and she found this shirt in there. then she wore a beige skirt that she borrowed from the drama room at school.

sarah's planet report and project for science. sarah was assigned the planet neptune, and had to do a research paper and make a model of the planet. she was doing all her research on the computer. so at the last minute, i raced her to the library to grab some books. i worried she'd get marked down for not having a book in her bibliography. and the planet? omgoodness. that was more work that i planned on. mainly because she said that the color i made it was all wrong, and i had to start over. at like 10:00pm, the night before it was due. but she just brought her report home today, and she got an "A+".

alyssa's bottle rocket project for science. this was another project that looked like a foreign language to me. they didn't get much direction on this one, but were told to figure it out on their own. lovely. she teamed up with her friend cassie. had some help from papa and uncle scott, finding some video's and instructions. and they did this entirely on their own. all i did was cut one of the 2 liter bottles for them. this took two 2 liter soda bottles, a soccer cone, a garbage bag, string, and lots of teal duct tape. they put water in them at school, and set them off with a launcher. their's stayed in the air for 6 seconds. unfortunately, the nose cone fell off, which may cost them a few points. but still a great job.

i think that's all of them. some other written reports here and there, some book reports, etc. but this is the majority of the actual "projects" that we've done. whew, i'm exhausted just writing about them. lol! so glad that school is just about over, and we can have a break from the projects for 2 months. although alyssa is taking english honors in high school next year, and she already has summer reading and projects for that. lol!
what the kids are up too

May 24, 2010

"what do you put on your blog, anyways? you used to put cute photos of the kids, and of sarah and i, and tell funny stories. and now you just put scrapbooking stuff, and work stuff" – this is what alyssa said to me one day last week. and it's true. i do put more scrap stuff on the blog nowdays. but i think i'm pretty good about working in some family stuff every now and then.

photo: manteca bulletin. alyssa performed in the junior high school musical the last two weeks. they did "alice in wonderland jr", which was such a cute and funny show. alyssa was "small alice", along with a "tall alice" (played by her BFF kassidy), and a "regular alice". she did such a fantastic job. she can be more on the shy side, when up on a stage. but when it was her time for giving lines and dancing numbers, she was perfect. i loved seeing her up there, and was so proud of her. they performed 3 different nights, and we went to see all 3 of them. they put tons of hard work into rehearsals, and it showed.

the girls both finished up awana's a few weeks ago. this is the kids night at the church on wednesday evenings. all the kids were honored at award's night, and the girls took home these awards. sarah's is the "third book award", for finishing up her third book in their series of books. they study the verses, memorize them, and do some written Q&A's also. alyssa got her "meritorious award", which is the second highest award you can get in awana's. memorizing and reciting over 500 bible verses is just one small part of what she's accomplished, working through her books. she's an LIT (leader-in-training), and was a great helper in the little kids groups. so proud of both of them.

sarah performed in the kidz rock choir musical, at the church, about a week ago. they started rehearsing this a few months ago. sarah was a part of the dance team also, so she had extra rehearsals on sunday nights. which i almost always forgot about, until the very last minute. sarah's funny. she LOVES to sing and dance. and she's good at both. but she's also a very serious dancer. i guess maybe she's just concentrating on getting all the moves right. they performed twice on sunday morning, and both times they did a great job.

this is the new baby around the house. meet zachary, who is actually my second cousin. he's been around this joint for about 3 weeks now. which is why it's been about 3 weeks since i've gotten much done around here. lol! he's such a cutie. with a full set of lungs, that he does like to use when he's tired or grouchy. we're working on that whole "napping" concept, right zachary 😉

awwww, miss haley. such an adorable smile. although this photo looks totally different on my laptop. but for some reason, i put in on here, and the color went away. i can't figure it out, so just imagine it more colorful and warm. lol! anyways. this girlie is 3 1/2 now, and such a story teller and talker. half the time, she likes to be independant and do everything herself and help me out. and the other half of the time, she can't do anything at all and expects you to tend to her every want and demand. i get a little bit of both sides of her when she's here.

and i don't have a picture of nikolas to share. but he came and brought me these flowers on mother's day. i hadn't seen him for a while, and he was so cute walking in and carrying these to me. i loved seeing these on my kitchen counter all week. a few of the flowers would bend and break, so i just started putting those into smaller vases. and then at the end of the week, nikolas and his cousin came to hang out with me for a few hours. and i LOVED having him back for the visit. he's such a fun little boy, and it was fun to have that energy back in the house for a while.

ok, the baby is calling me. zachary, and also haley's baby. who apparently i'm supposed to be also taking care of. because at this moment, haley's in her "you must do everything for me, since i can't do anything on my own" mood. lol!

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