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Who knew under all that hair that Skippy was really a chihuahua? HA! I took him for a long overdue haircut yesterday and told the groomer to cut off as much as possible. It’s just been so hot here that poor Skippy is constantly panting. I don’t have a recent photo of Skippy with his long hair, which is probably best as I might get reported for animal abuse! I took him to the local groomer, a place I’m not totally crazy about (apparently it has been 2 years since I took him there!) because I don’t really like how they cut. But I spoke with the groomer and she was very friendly and seemed to generally care about her clients. I told her she could cut it all off, even the face. I wasn’t aware that they could cut off his whiskers! I think he looks super cute! We took him to the park afterwards and Sienna was so very responsible with him. She didn’t let go of his leash at all and didn’t even go play at the playground because she just wanted to stay with Skippy.
It’s hard to work with kids and animals! I couldn’t get them both to look at the camera at the same time. I tried again this morning:

Now if only I could get Neo to pose! HA!

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I joined a Minion swap that was sponsored by Universal Pictures to promote the release of their latest film, Despicable Me (came out Friday, the 9th). They sent out a blow up minion to all the participants and all you had to do was take it around and take photos of it (like the Flat Stanley project and a similar Where in the World is Crusher swap I did). I was surprised at the nice quality of the minion and that it was weighted. We named ours Larry. First we did some shopping. Sienna was nice enough to lend Larry one of her hats.

Then it was time for lunch!

Now every time Sienna sees a commercial or an ad for the movie, she gets all excited and says Look! Larry! ha!

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Continuing on the earring kick, I joined an earring swap and made these for 2 partners (preface to say I am not totally happy with the photos! They didn’t really capture the essence and I have to work on that):

One partner got the green pair and the other red. I also made these for them:

And of course here are a couple for myself (although I did make myself a pair of the above copper hearts too!)

And guess what I made? Something I’ve been wanting to make for awhile…

I painted a couple of wooden frames with a new kit I got that is eco friendly called Earth Safe Finishes and I used Mod Podge to secure some fabric and my dad gave me some screen door mesh for this…

And do you know what it is?

Woohoo!! The top one is 8×10 and the bottom one is 5×7. There wasn’t really any rhyme or reason to how I laid out the earrings and am happy to have room to add more. I’m so glad that I am now able to see most of my earrings (my post earrings and ear wires are still in the jewelry box.)

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I made some t-shirts recently and they were so much fun!

As part of a going away present for Geneva and Co. I made them all Brooklyn shirts (ya know, in case they forgot where they moved from or also to let those Maine people know they are tough!) I pulled out the ColorArtz again (first time here and then here). I love using it and plan to use it more often (I just bought a big can of air too!). I learned my lesson the 2 previous times and really taped around the stencil (I used freezer paper) and used plenty of scrap paper. I did not get any overspray. I used a different color for each person. I even made one for Lennox but it is a bit big for her right now. I had grand ideas of putting a few images on the shirts but I was afraid it would be overkill so just kept it simple instead.

The gray one is for Layne. I couldn’t find a white pocketless T.

I also made a t-shirt for Nico’s birthday and finally put the t-shirt vinyl to good use. I bought a sample kit from Craft Vinyl and I love it! So easy to work with and I just noticed that he now has glitter and glow in the dark t-shirt vinyl! Fun! When I first bought it, I had a question and he had me call him on his 800 number to help me out. He is super nice!

Traced out the letters and cut them out.

I ironed them on and once cooled, peeled off the protective layer. It’s really easy to get off.

Nico likes robots so I stenciled a robot on the bottom. I had in mind to try out the new Earth Safe Finishes kit for the stencil but when I mixed it up, it seemed too watery to hold up so opted to go with the gocco fabric paint (tried and tested!). I plan on doing some tests with the Earth Safe Finishes for another post. I did use the Tackifier included in the kit to hold down the stencil. That worked really well and much better than using the stencil spray.

You can see Phoenix and Nico wearing their shirts in my Hugs post.

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Our dear friend Geneva and her family have made the move up to Maine. Starr and I threw a send off party for her and to also welcome their new addition, Lennox Ava. We threw the party on the 13th of June and I had posted the photos on flickr here. I baked some cheesecake cupcakes (with a gluten free ginger snap bottom!) and flourless chocolate cake (no one seemed to notice/mind the couple of pats of butter that did not mix in well). There was other delicious food there too. I made Geneva a collage and Brooklyn shirts for the whole family (I will show them in another post). Here are some shots of what I tried to do for the cake (due to the condensation, it melted into the cake, which you can see here). I cut out the letters with my Sizzix machine. Sienna helped me too.

I just drove Geneva, Phoenix and Lenni to the airport last night. They stayed with us for a few nights. Layne and a friend had loaded up a truck and drove up to Maine on the 30th and they had to vacate the apartment. We were happy to have them here and Sienna and Phoenix had such fun together. Most nights they stayed in the basement but Friday night we had a slumber party. The girls watched Alice in Wonderland (the original) and the adults later watched Up in the Air. Here are some photos from the stay:

Let Loose!

Watching Alice in Wonderland

Storytime

We also had one last picnic all together Friday afternoon.

The cool hat gang (if Sienna was wearing one of my shirts, it would have been the cool shirt gang!)

I made chocolate banana cupcakes that could use more banana flavor (altho I did not make the banana chocolate frosting, which probably would have made it better)

I forgot what we asked Nico but his answer was Nooooooooooo!

Hugs

Ride home from the park

Me Me First! from Lisa on Vimeo.

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I am participating in Christy Nelson’s craft challenge for June. They are turning out to be quite fun and not as stressful as I thought it would be. For this month, I am also hosting a swap for the challenge where we mail out our completed projects to our partner. A chance to win a prize AND get someone else’s wonderful creation! True to form, when the packet came, I thought to myself, “Oh boy! What am I going to do with this stuff?” I was a little concerned because the packet included some clay. With all the crafts I dabble in, I don’t do clay (besides precious metal clay) so I am not very familiar with working with it.

I thought I took a photo of all the supplies but I can’t find the image! Argh! I know I said that about last month’s challenge and couldn’t find the image. Well, I found it while looking for this month’s image. I guess I’ll find it during the August challenge (there is a month break for the challenge so no July challenge). Anyhow, Jennifer aka hippofairy has posted an image on her blog so here is a link. The only difference is I got white clay and my glitter paper were blue and green. So we got some clay, a pill bottle, raffia, glitter paper and a favor cup. Really, what was I going to do it this???

I did not take step by step photos of my project. I really have to get better with that. I promise to do that for August. Anyhow, I somehow came up with an idea way before deadline. Truly shocking! And I was really happy with the idea so went with it. And I got to pull out my dremel! I love my dremel and I don’t use it in my crafts as much as I thought I would. I used it to drill a hole on top of the bottle and a little window on the side.

I applied some gesso to the pill bottle, painted it blue and used the raffia as a cord to hang (if my partner wants to). I flattened out the favor cup and painted it a bright yellow. I used my sizzix to cut out a scallop shape and the letters E A T. I worked the clay into something that resembles a bird (it may not be the best bird but I’m happy that it somewhat looks like one!) baked it and painted it. Put it all together and this is what we have:

A miniature bird feeder complete with sun roof! HA! The “seeds” are little shake on beads made by Tulip that I got ages ago at 75 percent off. It finally came into use! I really think it is so cute! I hope my partner likes it!

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The Pool! We all really enjoyed the pool, especially Sienna. She was so confident with her floaties, going in the deep end and everything. Whenever the noodles were available, I snatched it to use and Sienna even used it once.

The Eats! The most stressful part of the vacation was figuring out where to eat. There were lots of options and part of the problem was reading all the reviews online. Every place had both bad and good comments so it was still hard to make a choice. The hotel gave coupons for a few restaurants like Beach Bun and Burgers and we actually went twice. The first time was better than the 2nd but the cook was different so I think that made a difference. There was also Blue Fugu Japanese Steakhouse. I thought it would be fun for Sienna to see the chef cook food in front of her. She really wasn’t that amazed. The food was good but like all Japanese Steakhouses, pricey. We probably wouldn’t have gone if we didn’t have a coupon. Plus we met a woman who recommended Buono Pizza for Italian, which we ended up going to when we saw the Thai place we originally planned to go was too expensive. It was really good! We both got sandwiches (not pizza) and they were huge. Of course there was the Waffle House, an Yves favorite. We went there almost every morning for breakfast. The last standout is a Thai restaurant we went to the very last night and if we discovered it sooner, probably would have went back. Nori Thai which also has sushi. The food was very good. The one place we went to that was a real disappointment to me was a seafood restaurant called Friendly Fisherman. I was bugging Yves to go to a seafood restaurant and we didn’t go to the one I really wanted to and went to this one out of convenience, well, we paid for it. The food was tasteless. There was also Bella Habana, a Cuban restaurant that everytime we passed, I told Yves we should go there. Finally got him to go and he LOVED his dish (fried cow) while I thought my ropa viejo was just ok. At least Sienna loved the chorizo.

Most lunches were mainly in our room.

We only ventured away from the pool and beach a couple of times. One time to check out the Pier, which was disappointing because it really wasn’t much and it’s “aquarium.” I use the quotes because I feel aquarium is used loosely. It was basically a big room with tanks in it. Literally took 15 minutes to walk around and only because we slowly looked at things. At least we ran into a pelican. One afternoon we went to a playground across the street. Bad move. That lasted 5 minutes! It was too hot and no shade. We went back to the pool. HA!

The hotel had a parrot named Houdini and Sienna went to say hello to him every chance she got, which was several times a day!

And somehow Sienna managed to get Yves to buy her a Minnie Mouse doll at Wal-mart.

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Yes, I am finally getting to the Florida beach vacation photos. It’s been 2 weeks since we got back and I miss the pool! We stayed at the Plaza Beach Resort. We were looking for a place that was cozy and not so commercial feeling. This place was it. It is family owned, 2 levels and very laid back. We got a suite, which basically had a little kitchen, living room and bedroom. Now that Sienna is older, we can’t all stay in the same room anymore. She used to be able to fall asleep while we watched tv quietly (like at the Jersey Shore 2 years ago) but we learned last year at Sesame Place that it wasn’t working anymore and who wants to go to bed at 8-8:30?

I didn’t take that many photos (I did bring my holga and 5 rolls of film, which went unused because I FORGOT the extra roll needed to spool the film! ARGH!) since it was a relaxing vacation. Our routine was pretty much breakfast at the Waffle House, beach, lunch in the room (cold cuts), nap for Sienna, pool and dinner. And I was pretty happy with that arrangement. The most stress was figuring out a place to eat. I will say that 75 percent of our choices were good ones. We were really close to Busch Gardens but opted not to go. Sienna is still too young to warrant paying the admission price for that place.

Anyway, this post will be all beach photos! The first few days the water was really nice and calm. And there were a couple of rough water days but Sienna and Yves really enjoyed those too.

The resort had a box of beach stuff you can use so some of the stuff was not exactly in the best working conditions. Like the umbrella.

This was like the fourth shot I tried to take so that is why Sienna was making that face!

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I totally forgot to post about what I made for Craft Challenge May. I didn’t take a photo of all the “ingredients” but they consisted of styrofoam beads, small round mirrors, wreath and floral wire. I didn’t win and rightly so. I literally made my challenge item the night before. But I actually like what I made anyway. Every time the packet comes and I see what we get, I always say to myself “Oh, boy! What am I going to make with this?” So I am always so happy that I actually think of something! Here is what I made:

And here are some things I made for swaps! I joined a faux stained glass swap because I already had the fake leading and little containers of stained glass paint that I got from a kit someone bought me for my birthday ages ago. I was excited to play around with them again and it was so much fun to do! My partner loves coffee and voodoo dolls so I made her two. The photos suck and do not really show how cool it looks in the light. I ended up also using Alcohol Inks to make colors I didn’t have in the paint. FUN!

(the hearts are for me)

The butterfly and Eiffel Tower didn’t actually make it into a swap as I was just doing more playing around with the UV lamp and UV resin.

This Raccoon bookmark (resin) was part of the Woodland Lucky Parcel

Hand carved stamp swap

These last 2 were for the Handmade Specialty swap.

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We finally got a chance to meet Stella at Eric and Robyn’s BBQ on Memorial Day Monday. Robyn gave birth to her back in January! She is such a cutie!

Sasha, who is 8, loves to read and was excited to read Green Eggs and Ham to Sienna

Eric, the grill master

Sienna was so happy when it was cupcake time!

We didn’t get a chance to try the ribs!

Sienna sang in the car on the way home. This is what happens when you have a late lunch, no nap and a chocolate cupcake!

Sienna singing in the car from Lisa on Vimeo.

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