Saw this little friend at the zoo

Love the zoo... Love this little guy... 1 yr old Galapagos Tortise hatched right at the Phoenix zoo. 

Batteling a sinus infection stinks. 

Otherwise life is going well... Scrapbooking tons... And spending a ton of money on it lol. 

On my desk

Today on my desk- Burt's Bees cuticle cream and pans for lunch/ dinner...

Lots of overtime lately making it hard to cook lol... I enjoy panda so it's good to have some now and again. 

Shine on

Shine on... Different than one day at a time ... Different than surviving. I'm ready to start shining. 

Life is good

The driveway

The driveway on this fine Monday morning :) wore flip flops to the car so I didn't get my shoes muddy lol 

Started documenting a week in my life today ... Ali Edwards runs this little project...it's my first time and I'm excited 

Scrapbooking my childhood memories

That's the theme of this years Big Picture Festival... I'm enjoying the prompts and the hunting on the Internet for pics... I should have taken pics of my lunch box etc.. But who knew ? Yesterday we talked about commercials ...I remember this from my childhood but who knew so many would still say it ( or the opposite.. This is not Burger King ) today :) 

Dude.

Dude came into our family during the whole "Dude, Where's My Car" movie era. Joel named him Dude. Dude was also Joel's favorite word at the time, so the poor dog always thought Joel was calling him.

One day, after Joel moved out, Dude got out of the yard. I walked up and down my street calling his name, not thinking of how that sounded. " Dude, Dude, Dude...where are you?" ;/ My neighbor even came out to help figure out just which Dude was missing lol.

He is getting up in years now ( almost 13 ) and its just him and me now. Joel and Josh have gone off into the world and Mocha is no longer with us. Most times I am home you will find him at my feet. Not really at my feet, but on them.

This night I was off from work and gave him a beef soup bone. He loves them. I took a few pictures of him with my iphone4 and made a collage w/ frametastic. I've been taking a little class about phone photography and apps...its been fun.

in other news, I ordered myself a Ninja Crockpot. This name got laughs from a cashier at sprouts this past week lol. I have used it twice now and I must say I am quite impressed. I love the whole brown the meat in the same pot you are going to slow cook in feature, and today the chicken I made when from the stovetop to the oven feature. Its a gabillion degrees right now, so it was pretty awesome not to have the actual stove and oven heating up my kitchen.

Brothers. 1998. Skateboarding. Desert West Skateboard Plaza. Relaxing after a morning of trying not to fall down. Josh sees a huge bug on the wall-Joel does not care.

I loved summers. I was a teacher back then, so I was off when they were off. We were not on a year round school or any such schedule. We had plenty of time to relax, and explore hobbies. We usually went one or two mornings to the park, one morning to the library, and one or two mornings to Ben Franklin Crafts for a kids craft. We went home mid day, relaxed/napped/watched some TV. Afternoons were spent at sports practices, games, or with friends.

I feel incredibly lucky that I was able to do this. That my kids were able to do this. Not every child/family is able to. I can look back now, and even though I struggled to make it at times, I am so very glad that I wanted this for them, and did it. No regrets.