Mi Vida Ocupada: My Busy Life!

Thoughts for Thursday

TFT Posters this week:

Kim A on what would you do in a risky situation?

Anne on crazy names

Jenny P on feeling lucky

Michelle on discipline

Helmet who thinks his wife is trying to kill him ( Read for yourself!)

Tom Petty Rocks!!

It was at least 6 months ago that I bought super-sweet-seats to see Tom Petty in concert.  The show was last night and it was awesome!! Our seats were about 20-25 feet from the front corner of the stage.....some of the best seats we have ever had for a stadium concert.  Perfect place to take a million awesome photos, right?
Except i still don't have my camera back from being repaired.
And the sweet camera I borrowed from my dad? The battery went dead and I didn't have access to the charger.
Oh well. Ticks me off, but what can I do??

Time is flying too dang fast.......my first week of vacation is practically over and I still have so much to do and so many people to see!

Look who turned 3 today!

My niece,  Annika Leigh!

 I can hardly believe how fast the time went! Some of you may remember how excited I was on the day she was born because that is the day I became an Auntie.  My SIL Michelle also details an account of Annika's birth on her blog today.

Every year I have made a collage for Annika, celebrating the past year of her life.  First year, second year, and now her third year......

Brian and Michelle had a party for Annika at their house yesterday and the girls had a great time and enjoyed their new gifts. (It is Bianca's half-birthday today, they are exactly 18 months apart)

Annika and her daddy

The girls both got baby dolls, which they loved so much!

 Bianca is totally in love with her new Elmo

Me with Bennett

Oh, he makes the cutest smiles!

A huge thanks goes out to my dad for letting me borrow his awesome camera! Its been killing me not to have my own for all the random Kodak Moments.

Sweetness!!

I finished my practicum today!!! That means four weeks of vacation for me until I go back to work :)

I also got my test results back today from my final Praxis test (Middle school language arts) and I passed!!!

I just have one more assignment and the final for my literature class.  Hoping that will all be taken care of in the next couple of weeks!!

Ahhhh, it feels great!!  This has been such a busy year for me with graduate school and work between two schools (three if you count this summer).  So glad its all behind me now!

Thoughts for Thursday: Does size matter?

Get your minds out of the gutter!!

What I want to talk about today is engagement/wedding rings.  It seems to me that many women of our generation are completely obsessed with their engagement ring....and "the bigger the better".  Don't get me wrong, there is no doubt that diamonds are gorgeous and to some "a girl's best friend", but I am trying to figure out exactly why the size of the ring is so important to women or to the men who give them?  Is it because of the status symbol? Do you think men or women equate the size of the ring to the size of their love?  Does it measure the success of the husband?? Or is a big ring great just because it is so pretty?

Back in the day, our mothers and grandmothers did not have huge rings. In fact, 1/4 carat was the standard back then.  Now it seems like I don't know anyone who has a ring smaller than 1 carat and those who do plan to upgrade down the road.  One of my girlfriends even has a 5 carat ring! Rarely do you see women who wear just a simple band anymore. 

These are just observations of mine, but I am curious to know if the size of your ring is really important to you? Why?

TFT posters this week:

Robyn on grocery baggers

Jessica on plans for the future

Dana M on friendships

Kim A on cravings

Michelle on fate

Jenny on the age factor

Kim B on blog plagerism

Dance of the Manatee

I love manatees....they are so cool!

On the way!

500 cards of each color!

Thanks to those of you who gave your input!

I combined Kim and Dana's ideas for the back side. Thanks for your help, ladies!

Business cards?

Things with the Twin Cities Restaurant Blog have really started taking off lately! I am just a few weeks away from having all of my school stuff finished, so I will be able to devote more time to promoting that site and writing restaurant reviews.  In the meantime, I am desperately needing to get my cards made up. (Like by this Thursday!!!)  Thats where needing your help comes into play....
I cannot decide whether to go with black or white background.  I know white is more professional, but I don't mind being different.  I want the cards to give to people, to leave on tables after I finish dining, and also to send to restaurants in hopes of getting a free meal here and there.
Do you think I should go with black (printed on a glossy paper or plastic)

 or white?

 

Also, the cards will be two-sided....BUT I do not have a catchy phrase or any ideas about what to say on the back.  The only suggestion I have gotten so far is "Eating is my business and business is good".  I would love other ideas if anyone is inclined to help a sister out!!

If anyone has a connection to FAST business-card printing, let me know!

Also- I made the cards in CS3 and on my end the resolution looks crystal clear, but after I uploaded the image to a business card site, my resolution looks really crappy?? This is so dang frustrating! If anyone has any tips for what I may be doing wrong, please let me know.

Camera Update....

Great News for Jeff.....his camera was located and retrieved! Yay

Bad news for me......Best Buy needs to send my camera out for one more repair before they'll replace it.  It'll be four weeks before my worn-out little Canon is back.   Dagnabit!!! I was hoping to come home with a new camera tonight!

Camera Trouble x 2

It has been a whirlwind this past week with my family in town.....lots of fun! Disk golf, bowling, BBQ, fishing and boating.  I have been depending on other people to either take pictures or let me use their cameras since mine broke again.  I hate not having my own! I have had too much going on to drop my camera off at Best Buy, but  I am pretty sure that it has broken enough times (per performance plan policy) that I will get a new camera instead of them fixing it.  I'll update about all of that when I can retrieve the photos from my cousin Dan.
Anyway, I went out to dinner tonight for a very interesting meeting with some of the Interactive Marketing people at General Mills (their treat!).  The restaurant was Wolfgang Puck's 20.21 (totally fabulous).  Because of the nature of the meeting, I invited my brother Jeff along.   Since I am without my camera, I made Jeff bring his out so that I could do a review for Twin Cities Restaurant Blog.  Dinner was amazing but somehow between leaving the table after dinner and the ride back to Jeff's, we managed to loose his awesome camera.  I am totally sick about it :(  We are hoping that the restaurant has it safe and unharmed (if it was indeed left there- Where else could it be if it isn't in the car??).  I'm praying Jeff gets it back.

On a sidenote: Have any of you checked out Bettycrocker.com lately? They have a bunch of yummy recipes....go check it out!!

PS I haven't made it to bed before 1am in the past week (while waking by 5:30am each morning).  I am dooggggg tired

The 60th was a hit!

Words almost can't explain the emotions of having everyone together to celebrate my Gram & Gramps 60th Anniversary.  My camera broke again but I was able to get some pictures from my dad and also from  my cousin Dan....

 

My Gram and Gramp with 7 of their children..... (Don't you hate it when there are a million papparazzi around so no one knows where to look??!!

My Gram and Gramp with 18 of their grandchildren (I am #1).....

Me with my Aunt/Godmother Patti

Cousins Dave, Andrea and Cassie....

Tyler, Segen, Brian and Bennett

Part of the Tucson crew... (Michael, Matt, Patti & Rudy)

My cousin Casey and his girlfriend...

Aunt Connie and cousin Genevieve

My mom and Annika....

We socialized for a couple of hours before dinner and then after a yummy dinner we had our "entertainment" portion of the program, with my brother Jeff as the MC.  He gave a great speech (I will replace this shaky, crappy-quality video with the hi-def version after I get it from my dad)

The speech is kind of a tearjerker toward the end and if that wasn't enough sentimentality, next came my 49-minute-long video which included the interview/slideshow that I worked on all of last week (and months before that, scanning photos!). Definitely a tear-jerker! Everyone loved it and they definitely appreciated that I made them all copies of the DVD to keep.
Other than being a very hot, muggy day, the party was a hit and I can't imagine not being there to spend the special day with all of my mom's side of the family :)

Aboard the Andiamo.....

On Saturday night we met up with a few of my cousins, aunts and uncles for a dinner cruise on The Andiamo Riverboat on the St Croix River.  It was pretty hot out!

These are my a couple of my cousins from Tucson, Dan and Michael...

The cruise included a buffet dinner (decent, but nothing special) and a jazz trio for entertainment.  Here is a pictoral run-down of the evening:

My aunts Connie (my mom's sister) and Chris....

Jazz trio playing "La Bamba"

 

Michael and Bennett (how cute is he in that hat?!)

 

Baby Bonks trying to be a papparazzi (like the rest of the fam!)

 

Me and Tyler

Watching the band....

 

The above picture cracks me up.....my dad is always recording something!! LOL  He is making good use of his new HDD camcorder!  Here he was recording the jazz band's original impromptu  song that they made up in honor of my grandparent's 60th anniversary.  Its called "Lenorby" because my grandparent's names are Lenore and Norby.  It was pretty cute! When I can get the footage from my dad I am going to upload it.

After the boat cruise was over, Brian and Michelle had most of the group back to their place where we enjoyed a fire (in their outdoor fireplace that is so totally cute!)  Later when there were just a few of us left, we rocked out on the Rockband game.  I haven't played a single video game in the past 20 years until last night and I enjoyed it! Even though I am the self-proclaimed worst-singer-in-the-world, I enjoyed the singing part the most!!!

4th of July Party at the Lake

What a beautiful 4th of July we had this year!
The weather was great and I got to see many of my aunts, uncles and cousins.  We have a lot of papparazzi in our family, so the amount of pictures I took were just a sampling....

 

Croquet anyone?? (Insert British accent!)

Here is Bennett (almost 4 mos.) with his 2nd cousin Grace (6 weeks)

 

Looking forward to seeing more of my family this weekend!

Whoa...my week off flew by!

I have been on vacation the past week, most of the time spent working on the movie for my grandparents 60th anniversary party (happening this Sunday!).  I interviewed my grandparents on video on Monday afternoon using my dad's Sony HD camcorder.  The camera is awesome and takes really high quality footage.  Unfortunately I had technical difficulties and no matter what i did, I could not get my computer to recognize the camera and wasn't able to get any of the footage for the first 10 hours I tried.  I tried researching the issue online and it seems many others have had the same problem, but my brother said he was able to get his Macbook Pro to recognize my dad's camera, so I just kept trying and trying until I was ready to throw myself out the window.  Fortunately my dad was able to get the video files onto his PC and luckily he had a program that was able to convert the files into a format that iMovie would recognize.  After what seemed like 10 hours, the video was safely on my computer by Tuesday afternoon.  After hours and hours of editing and teaching myself how to use iMovie, my video is DONE!!  I enjoyed how it turned out, even though it is 49 minutes long!!! I am in the process of burning the video to DVD for all of my family members (going to need around 40 copies!).  I know the family won't know how much time was spent on this project, but I know it will be worthwhile when they see and get to keep a piece of history!!

Looking forward to an eventful weekend and I am very excited to see all of my family!!!

Hope everyone has a safe and enjoyable weekend!

Happy 80th Birthday, Gram!!

Here is my Gram when she was a young woman..... (Yes, my mom looks a lot like her!)

Since I scanned so many photos of my grandparents for their upcoming anniversary, thought I'd share a few of them over the years....

 

 

 

My Newly-Graduated Cousins!!

I have two beautiful young cousins who graduated this year.  (Katie on my dad's side and Cassie on my mom's side). I missed Katie's graduation party last weekend because I was out of town, so I stole this photo of her and her brother Mike from her Facebook!
Congrats Katie!

Cassie also graduated this year. 
Cassie and Katie have never met, as they are not related, but they are both going to the same University this fall! I hope they meet and get to know each other :)
Of course her graduation party last night was a good opportunity of me to take some photos of the family. 
Here is Cass with Gramp & Gramp

Cassie's parents, Bob (my mom's younger brother) and Chris...

Me and my aunt Carol (my mom's youngest sister)....

My parents with Annika and Bennett (I think this one is so cute!)

Carol with two of her daughters and a cute little weiner dog!

I can't wait until next weekend when everyone is in town for Gram & Gramp's 60th anniversary!!! I am so excited to see everyone, especially all of my Arizona and Chicago family!!!

Candlebox at Rock Nightclub

Its been a concert weekend!
Friday night I saw Candlebox at The Rock Nightclub.....
For a bunch of guys who have been around since 1991, these guys still sound awesome!!


I was back at the Rock late on Saturday night to catch Fair to Midland.  Awesome show except for the stupid-ass DJ at 93X (Pablo) who felt the need to stand on stage and tell everyone a million times how much he loves the band. (Even during the band's encore!) It was seriously ridiculous and he made a fool of himself talking the way he was....
Sorry, I didn't take any photos of Fair to Midland.

Needing some clever ideas for my big project!

My Gram and Gramp are celebrating their 60th wedding anniversary next weekend.
60 years of marriage!!
Can you imagine??

Next weekend there will be a big party here in the Cities and all of my family is flying in from AZ and Chicago.
Many, many months ago my Gramps personally called me up and asked me to help out with the party planning.  (I am the #1 Grandchild).  I got a great idea and committed myself to making a fabulous iMovie featuring photos of them throughout the years, as well as photos of their 8 children and their grandkids (21) and great-grandchildren.  I am also planning to interview them on Monday to get some video footage to include in the movie.

Thats where I need some great ideas....

What kinds of questions should I ask them??

"Tell me about a time when you went on a special vacation together...."

"Tell me about something really sweet that Gram/Gramps has done for you....."

I thought I could do something clever and ask them questions game-show style....but what???

I need to come up with a game plan ASAP so that I can give them the questions ahead of time.  My Gramps wants to prepare!

Why did I wait this stinking long to get on this??!! (Oh yeah, grad school)

Why haven't I spent more time learning iMovie? (Oh yeah, grad school)

Did I mention that I am making DVDs of my imovie for each family member?!! I think it is going to be the coolest memento!! I am really excited about how it will turn out :)

Thanks in advance for any awesome idea/questions you can help me think up!

Thoughts for Thursday: Your ideal sleeping conditions

I have had too much going on to think up good TFTs lately...I need to find my little notebook so I can jot ideas down as soon as they come to me! LOL
This week's topic is about your ideal sleeping conditions.... I thought of this one after going up north last weekend.  My SIL Michelle brought a little fan up with her and said she just can't sleep without it because she likes the "white noise".  It reminded me that I used to sleep with a fan on all throughout college and I have now been sleeping with the fan on for the past week and have slept pretty good!  A Fish tank is another one... as long as it has a quiet filter, it is kind of soothing to sleep to... I have gotten to enjoy the fan (although I don't need it), but never can I sleep with a radio or TV on.  Not a good sleep anyway.  I also need the room to be dark...super dark.  And somewhat cool, as I would rather snuggle up than be too hot.  A/C has to be on at night in summer.  Oh...and I use two feather pillows.

Since sleeping is something we all do every night, I thought you'd be willing to share what your ideal sleeping conditions are?

• Do you use something to create white noise? What?
• Temperature level?
• Number of pillows?

Thats about it for today!

Other TFT posts this week:

Robyn on planning

Kim on clean freaks

Jenny on random people who read your blog

Denise on Myspace and Facebook

Heather on DVR technology

Michelle on SEX!!!

Dana on chores

Internships??

I am curious to know who out there had to go through an internship or clinical practice placement?

If so:

• Was it before or after you went to college and started your career?? 
• In what area was your degree?
• Did you have to find your own placement?
• How long was your internship?
• Was it paid or unpaid? 
• Did you get a stipend?
• Did you have to pay tuition?
• Did your internship play a big part in helping you find a job?

I know I have mentioned this before, but I am currently doing a 4-week clinical practice as a state requirement to add the additional two endorsements to my teaching license. (Nevermind that I already did student teaching full-time for an entire school year 10 years ago and have taught for 9 full years under contract).  It has been a good experience so far (although I can honestly say I havent learned anything new), but it really stinks that I am paying tuition to work for free.  $300 per week plus another $100 for gas and lunch. Its BS!!!!

But there is a light at the end of the tunnel.....I have all of next week off and then just two weeks to go until my real summer vacation starts :)

Lots of Layouts....

These are all of my personal pages I did this past weekend.  I also did a two-pager for Erin and a single page LO for Michelle that I did not scan...

This is one of my favorites....

This next batch are all the ones I did for myself on the 2nd day....

 

And another of my favorites...

This one scanned like crap because there are big gaudy rhinestones across the bottom of the page....

 

And there ya have 'em!

Our scrappy trip.....

Got back yesterday afternoon from a fun weekend filled with scrapping....
As I mentioned in my last post, I went with Michelle, Erin and eight other girls to a scrapbooking retreat in northern MN.  Wow, I have never scrapped so much or for so long in my life!!!
The building we were in is awesome!  The lower level is half scrapbook store called Once Upon A Page, the other half is a large crop room.  Here is what that room looked like with all of our stuff spread out at our tables.....