Laura Vegas

the last few sneek peeks are up this week over on the jillibean soup blog. the last peek goes up tomorrow. and then CHA starts in a few days, and then we can see so much more about all these great new products. and hopefully, we can also share our projects too 😉 one would think i havn't been scrapping lately. i have, just nothing i can share yet. lol!

 

soup staples. i'm in heaven! my favorite two patterns (the grid and the dots) are now in tons of colors. love this. and i was lucky enough to work with these papers for my CHA assignments. it couldn't have been a better fit for me!

 

soup staples on kraft. equally as cool. love the number patterns, they're my favorite.

 

grandma's christmas soup collection. i don't actually scrap christmas all that much, no idea why. but these papers are seriously cute! can't wait to see these in person. and if you like these, go HERE right away. you have until midnight EST to leave a comment to be included in the random draw for the christmas collection (sorry, the soup staples was yesterday). the winner will be posted tomorrow morning.

saturday, we headed out to the county fair. and yes, that is totally a tim mcgraw song.

  

the last time we went to the fair was 10 years ago. i can tell you this for sure. because when we went, sarah was about 2 weeks old. and it was one of the hottest days that summer. i can tell you this for sure, because i dug out the layout today from 10 years ago. and i wrote in the journaling that it was "one of the hottest days this summer". lol! we seriously took our newborn baby girl out in the scorching heat, for a day at the fair. i have photos of us, all literally drenched in our own sweat. as in, dripping down all over. i'm not even exaggerating on this one. i was going to take a picture of the picture, just to prove it. but it was kind of a gross one. what, with the sweat and all. lol!

anyways, enough about the sweat. i will say that this trip was just as hot. well, about 100 degrees is what it was. we have hotter days. but this was still super hot. not the kind of thing that you really want to be walking around in. know what i mean? first up, some rides. and be forewarned, as is the case with any outdoor, full sun, midday photos i take. they're all over the place with color, and a lot of them are blurry. except that first one. love that one. except for the people in that top car, should have photoshopped them out. so maybe i could fix some of these photos a little. but in all honestly, i'm ok with them just as they are. lol!

 

 

 

  

 

notice how sarah and joe's photo is pretty good?

 

what's up with me and alyssa? nice sun glare and shadows. racoon eyes, anyone? i could blame the photographer. or maybe we should have switched sides of the table, since i knew it wasn't a great shot. lol! although, this was before we got too sweaty. since my hair is still sort of full of volumn and my makeup is still sort of on my face. grateful for that anyways.

 

we had to stop at the track for a horse race. joe has missed his horses. not that he has a horse, or knows what's going on with the horse races. but he used to love going to the track. that was in his single days. i put a stop to that one. lol! sure, every now and then you get a good horse and win something. but you get a lot of not so great horses too. for this one race that we watched, he got a good horse. won $19, which paid for our lunch 🙂

 

this was his horse. totally random tidbit for you. i have always wanted to ride a horse. it's something that i'm determined to do one day.

 

back to the rides. no lines, which was nice. this one here was sort of funny. they got on and picked this "car". not realizing it was right in front of the speakers. the speakers that were apparently blasting the music to cover a 100 foot radius. those puppies were loud! and of course, they took a good 5 minutes to start the ride. lol!

  

now this ride here. omg. we didn't even pay attention to what it was all about. so the girls get on, and it starts out kind of boring. it was just swaying back and forth, gently turning in circles. seriously, for about 3 minutes, it was a pretty boring ride. back and forth, back and forth. i must have turned away for a few seconds. i turn back, and the girls are flying in the air super high. i guess it's one thing if you know it's going to happen. lol! and they loved it. but it was just funny, because we didn't expect it to go so high. and yes, my girls ARE in that photo up there. my babies, way up there.

 

i actually think that carnival rides can't be all that safe. this did not help ease my fears. lol!

 

ahhh. a nice photo of alyssa and joe. they look good. a little sun glare on his arms. they really are tanner than that.

 

and sarah and me? not so great. although i think i shielded her from the full sun glare. what a thoughtful mom 😉

 

i know sarah looks irritated or something in this photo. but it's really just her coming off the crazy ride, and it being so stinkin hot. why is alyssa smiling so cheerfully in the heat? because i have her trained so well, that she just automatically puts on a smile when the camera is out. lol!

 

and what trip to the fair would be complete without the "where the heck did we park the car" photo? a huge grass/dirt area, and they park you right next to each other in rows as you come in. a good thousand cars all lined up. genious idea. and we all had a good laugh when we finally did get in the car and cranked the air conditioning. the very first song on the radio was "something like that" by tim mcgraw. actually one of our favorite songs ever. so we all sang "and we drove out to the county fair" as we drove off. perfect ending to a hot, sticky, sweaty day.

what's even more perfect, is that i have all my photos from the day edited and uploaded. and i have already arranged 26 of the photos onto 2 collages, all ready to go on a 2 page layout about the day. what was not so perfect, was that my costco one-hour photo is having computer issues. the new online upgrade that costco did, actually made it so that the girls at the photo center can't even see the online orders. totally not their fault. but my one-hour order turned into a 48-hour order. which will be ready tomorrow night. lol!

we sure have missed these kiddos. well, if i'm being totally honest, we also did enjoy our week without them. lol! it was nice to get some of their "stuff" out of the house for the week. and not pick up toys all day. and not fill sippy cups and change diapers and worry about the potty seat. but we also did miss them. how could we not, with them being so cute and all.

 

just a few photos i had from the previous week. was working on my editing this weekend, and found these tucked away.

 

the crooked ponytails, the cheesy smile and scrunched up eyes. adorable.

 

alyssa and sarah have been hanging out in the downstairs bedroom a lot during the day. and they like to bring their laptop down there. whenever i can't find the little ones, i know they probably ended up in here with the girls. and what are they watching? sarah playing the Wii, of course.

 

i had some crazy setting on my camera for this photo. and honestly, i'm too lazy to spend too much time trying to fix it. lol! the kids are really that dark anyways. nikolas is so cute when he tries to put these glasses on. never quite gets them straight.

 

yep, they still love to stand on the gate. only, they're much bigger now.

 

and this one of miranda was also one that had really bad camera settings. the color version was beyond fixing. but in black and white, it's not half bad.

tomorrow morning, these kids will be waking me up bright and early. i'm not quite ready for that part. i've been staying up later than ever, and sleeping in till at least 10:00 every day. my alarm will not be my friend come 7:00am. lol! but we're ready. all their "stuff" is set back up and waiting for them. the girls are dying to see them. and hopefully, we'll all adjust back to our normal schedules without too many problems. lol!

this past week has just flown by. i can't believe i only have one more day of my vacation left. i'm trying to play catch up on some things, and then i'll be back to my regular blogging. for now, just a few pictures of the family chillin out from earlier in the week.

 

 

 

 

btw. this is grammy and papa's pool. we're not cool enough to have a pool at our house. the girls tell me this every day. luckily, grammy and papa only live down the street 🙂

another btw. i havn't been in the pool in probably about 3 summers. they give me a bad time about it just about every day. i also have not worn shorts in about 3 summers. and we have VERY hot summers. and yes, they give me a bad time about that too.

and one more btw. yes, my girls really are THAT dark. the photo of alyssa wasn't a great one. but she's super dark this summer too. but sarah wins for sure. she's our "sarah bear". otherwise known as our "chocolate bear" this time of year 🙂

some jillibean soup stuff to share this week. this layout of mine went up on the blog today, along with some other really fun ones from the other designers. make sure to check them out HERE.

  

i thought it was important to do a layout about joe and his umpiring. i had done a blog post about it, but wanted to also get it in the scrapbooks.

supplies –
pattern paper – jillibean soup
letter stickers – jillibean soup, making memories (mini)
chipboard letters – lil davis
brads – accent depot
twine – jillibean soup
star stamp, star punch - stampin up
rubon – basic grey

and some sneek peeks that also went up this week. check these out.

 

joe and i are both on vacation this week. i had a few of the daycare kids that were going to miss days this week anyways, so decided it was a good week to officially take some days off. not sure i've taken any this year yet. once again, no big plans this year. we don't have the extra moolah laying around to do anything crazy or big. and we're limited on our time too. joe picks his vacation weeks at the beginning of the year. and once again, the week fell during the same week the girls have bible day camp at the chuch. so whatever we do, we have to be home and ready to go at 3:00. so we can't go far. lol! so this is more of a "staycation". which is totally fine with us, to be honest. so guess what today was?

 

yep, a trip to "boomers" for miniature golf, video games, boat blasters, and a game of laser tag. the girls had coupons for free rounds of golf that they got from school last year. so we finally took those off the fridge to use up. they each brought a friend. sarah brought amanda, and alyssa brought her friend cassie. we ended up getting a deal on the golfing part, since the girl saw our 3 coupons and somehow let all 6 of us go for free. we didn't complain. although partly because i didn't realize joe didn't pay for the rest of us until the fifth hole. lol! we decided NOT to keep score this time, since that usually causes a lot of problems for our competitive girls.

 

warning. my photos from today are all over the place. full sun, high noon. not my favorite time of day for picture taking. but they captured the day, and that's all that's important 🙂

 

 

  

 

this photo of sarah turned out super bad. but i had to keep it, since apparently it was one of the only photos of sarah i got. lol!

 

 

 

we all did pretty well actually. i think i was actually winning over joe on the first half of the course. but then i was too busy juggling my purse and my camera, and got a little sidetracked. my game went slowly downhill after that. lol! after the golfing, the girls played some laser tag and also road the boat blasters. i think that was their favorite part, because the water cooled them down.

 

 

 

 

 

that one seriously cracks me up! sarah is such a fish. get her near water and she's happy as can be! she was having alyssa aim her water blast in her mouth. lol!

 

after all that, we headed over to in-n-out for a late lunch. then back to the house, so that the girls could get ready for bible day camp. sarah and amanda are signed up for arts and crafts camp. and alyssa is helping out in "adventure camp", which is for the 4 and 5 year olds. grammie (my mom) is very involved in bible day camp, and is one of the leaders. so she picks the girls up and takes them there and back. they all had their matching shirts and lanyards. alyssa's and grammie's are filled up with their pins they have received from awana's and helping out.

so while they were at bible day camp for a few hours, joe and i hung out at the house. he watched a movie, i edited all my photos from today and got them all uploaded to order. then we did some work in the backyard, laying down new bark. nice to get some stuff down around the house this week too. and relax a little. we had my brother and sister-in-law's big crab and shrimp boil this past saturday, and the girls were at amanda's birthday party all day. sunday, joe umpired 2 games and i did housework and cleaning. so we're ready to relax a little this week too! not sure what exactly is on the schedule for tomorrow yet. but we'll think of something 🙂

want to see some peeks at the new stamps from jillibean soup? there are lots of cards up today on the jillibean soup blog by the designers, and here is one of mine. 

 

i loved this flower stamp, one of the first ones that caught my eye when i got them. i simply stamped them in brown ink on some of the pattern papers and some on cardstock, and then cut them out. i have a bunch of extras, that i stamped at the same time. figure if i'm stamping and cutting, i might as well do some extras while i have everything out. the "sending you sunshine" is also one of the new sentiment stamps.

 

and here's one more sneek peek that went up last week, and i must have missed sharing. just how cute are these papers?!?! the owls are so adorable! they'll be having 2 more peeks at the new products this week, so keep your eyes out for those.

i have been very fortunate to have worked on a few projects for hero arts in the past, and they have always been so generous and so nice to work with. they're just a great company, that puts out fabulous products. and they're a green company, with products made in the USA. and we all know that is a good thing. next week, they are launching a brand new site. the celebration starts on monday, and the new site launches on wednesday. you know there will be lots of prizes, games, and ideas galore. so make sure and check it all out!

just noticed that one of my layouts went up on the jillibean soup blog today. figured i'd just add it to this post, since it's all related goodness! and check out the link, since there are some great layouts that were also shared today.

 

i knew this photo needed to be scrapped. important to rememer the "not so great" moments in life too. i took the journaling right from my blog, pretty much the same thing i had written the day i posted this photo. i think the layout is pretty self explanitory. i wasn't feeling like i had to re-invent anything, just made a pretty layout. lol! this is a 9×9 layout. 

also wanted to share the next few sneek peeks from jillibean soup. this is peek #3 and peek #4, both of which went up on their blog this week. i think i'm sharing too late to get in on the drawings. but still check it out ;) 

 

 

 

i'm kind of digging this whole "getting back to basics" with the blogging. i don't have to wait until i have projects that i can share, or a huge amount of new photos. i can post some random thing, just for fun. i used to do this a lot. glad i'm getting back to it. so today? just a few of my photos from my project 365 for june. i thought they'd make a fun post.

 

just a shot of my shirts, all in a rainbow. do you organize your closet in color order? i have to do this. i do see a few out of place, over there by the whites. but for the most part, they're always in order. it just makes it look pretty. and i know where to go for the color i'm in the mood for. although, this really makes it look like i have a ton of cute shirts. sadly, i only wear about a quarter of these. lol! my favorite colors to wear? navy blue, a good deep purple, and black. and for the record, joe's shirts are right on the other side. and they're in color order too!

 

i have a HUGE supply of hair products. alyssa's grandma works in a beauty supply store, and hooks us up with all sorts of good stuff. some of it, i admit, i have no idea what to do with. and some of it doesn't seem to work good on my hair. me and the girls have a big problem with finding product that gets rid of the tangles. we have a lot of tangles in this house! i got this "foxy curls" stuff for my birthday. and it is seriously some of the best smelling shampoo and conditioner i've ever used. it's so yummy smelling. i also got some curl mousse and sprays from this same line. but when i used it, i ended up with the straightest hair ever. figures. lol! but i'm sticking with this shampoo and conditioner for now.

 

notice anything different about my hair? other than a few more grey's than usual (which are now back to their "cinnaberry" hair color)? i think it looks like my normal hairstyle. i take the front hair in the middle, and pin it back. and then usually end up pinning back the sides a bit. the thing with my hair, is that i have to have volume on top. maybe it's my head or something. but if my hair is super flat or too tight on my head, it just doesn't look right. at least, not to me. so this usually involves a lot of teasing and ratting, lots of hairspray, and a ton of pins.

 

have you heard of bumpits or seen the commercials on tv? i know you have. i knew i had to try them and hinted around for my birthday. and i got them. it might seem strange, to have this big plastic arch thing in your hair. but i swear, they work. now that i look at this photo, it does look sort of high on the top. but maybe it was the way i was trying to take the pictures. lol! i swear, it looked fine. and ignore the straggling looking ends. it's getting long, and that's when it gets harder to manage on the bottom.

i thought it would be too hard to put in. but it's as simple as lifting up some hair, placing the bumpits in place, and pulling the hair back over. i was nervous that it would get all tangled in my hair, after being in there for a while. but it came right now. i thought maybe it wouldn't stay put or slip. it totally stayed in place, i even slept with it in (i only wash my hair every 2-3 days) and woke up looking the same. i think i have the 2 large ones in here (not the hollywood one though, that thing was huge!). sometimes i use one, sometimes two. it gives me the volume, without having to tease my hair so much. it's a nice short cut to use. i think for thinner hair, it's a bit harder to hide. i tried it on alyssa and it didn't work that great. but my hair is a bit thicker once it's all curled.

so there you have it. a few totally random, girlie things just for fun!