A Crafty Day...

My niece will turning one this Friday. I'm still wondering where the time has gone. It's even harder because we're so far away. I've only seen her on three trips. Poor Justin just met her over Christmas break. We're missing so many of the day-to-day things: her first words, her first steps, and all of her little quirks. It makes me sad.

For her birthday I decided to start an album for her. It will be pictures of her with Justin & I. My hope is that when she gets a little older, she'll pull it out and flip through the pages whenever she has an urge to see her. I hope she looks through it and knows how much we love her, no matter how far away we are. So, I spent the evening (and most of the night) putting together some pages to start the album. Every once in a while I'll make two more and send them down so Jay & Natalie can add them to the album.

Here are some pics:

This is the first page and has a note for Bella. (I have a thing for these cute owls!)

This page is based on a challenge from a scrapbooking blog (Sketchy Thursdays).

This one was also inspired by a page I saw on Sketchy Thursdays' blog.

I hope you enjoyed! I also made some Mother's Day cards yesterday, but I won't be posting pics of those. :)

Back from Sunny Miami!

Hello all!!

It's been a little while since my last blog post. I just got back from sunny Florida late last night. We landed in St. Louis at 11pm and didn't get home to Mattoon until almost 2am. It was a long day. Justin and I had a fantastic time in Miami visiting family and friends and getting lots of sunshine. We even hit the Dade County Youth Fair and went shooting with my brother! But I'm getting ahead of myself. I'll be posting pics over the next few days and telling you all about our trip.

Now, my family is amazing. Just thought I should put that out there. My brother picked us up from MIA. He came prepared with croquetas and drinks for both Justin and myself. A malta for me and a coke for Justin - he's never acquired the taste for malta. :) This was the perfect start to our vacation. We then went to see my beautiful niece and sister-in-law. It's amazing how much kids grow in such a short period of time. We saw Bella for Christmas, and we could see immediately how much she's grown and changed. She has 8 teeth and she's on the verge of walking all by herself!! Crazy. I still can't get over how beautiful she is. It's strange how she looks soo much like each of her parents. A perfect blend. :) After that Jason took us down south to mom & dad's house and they had Pollo Tropical waiting for us. To those of you who live in Miami, this isn't anything special. But when you live in the midwest and the only "Latin" food you can find is mexican food, Pollo Tropical is like ambrosia!

The next day I woke up early and ran 6 miles around the lake behind my parents' house. The sun was shining and there was an incredible breeze. The lake was reflecting the sun - I could NOT have been happier to run. After that, we spent all day lounging in the back yard. This is exactly what I imagine a vacation being. Relaxing in the sunshine by the pool with a good book and a bottle of water. I love that Justin reads just a much as I do, because this is something we can enjoy together.

Later that night we hit up Sgt. Peppers (my favorite sub shop) with some of my favorite people - Duy and Lissette! After that we got some ice cream from Coldstone Creamery and chatted all night. I really try to like that place, but it just doesn't blow my mind. I prefer Baskin Robbins - but I digress. All in all it was a pretty perfect day. ::contented sigh::

Here are some picture of my mom & dad's back yard. It's a little slice of heaven to me.