here's what's new

love to listen to her talk ...

Everyday, Rebecca is starting to say more and more words.  She still mumbles most of the time, and still DOESN'T call me MaMa, but she does manage to say the following words/phrases.

• dog
• apple
• moo
• who's that
• what's that
• wow
• uh-oh
• duck
• ba ba (bottle or brother or basket)
• da da (this is what she says the most)
• ball
• cookie
• bye-bye
• hi
• bam
• boo (for balloon)
• meow (this is her new word and the way she says it is so sweet)

 
She is still not walking on her own yet, but I'm not worried about it, especially since she is already our little dare devil, so when she starts walking, watch out.  Nicholas didn't start walking on his own until about 16-17 months.

And speaking of Nicholas, he is the topic for the One Little Word - Captured challenge for my word patience this week. 
It is all about him sucking his two fingers.  He has been doing this very annoying (to us) and unhealthy (for him/his teeth) act since he was a baby.  I don't remember exactly when he started, but it's been way too long.  He has gotten better in the fact that he only will do this at home, because he knows when he is out and about there are lots of germs everywhere.  However, as soon as he walks in the door at home, he goes right into the bathroom to wash his hands, and in go the two fingers.

His two front (permanent) teeth are now starting to move forward because he is pushing them forward with his fingers.  We just don't know what to do.  We have tried an award calendar; we have tried to tell him that if he wants to suck his two fingers he can only be in one particular room to do it.  Nothing is working!  Does anyone have any advice?

Thanks for listening!

For more entries for One Little Word - Captured, go here.

Enjoy your evening everyone!

the winner is ...

If you only knew how stressful it is for us to get Nicholas to get his hair combed.  He doesn't have short enough hair for him to just get up every morning and go about his business.  If he decides to step out of the house (to go to school, or anywhere for that matter), we need to comb his hair.

 
He fights us to the end in getting his hair combed.  We usually want to do it while he is doing something else, like playing on the computer, or using his iPod Touch, or watching television.  There is an argument every single day that puts both Rob and I over the edge.

So, with that said, my photo above is for this week's One Little Word Captured challenge for my word PATIENCE, because we all need to work on patience in these situations in our house.

For more photos for the One Little Word Captured challenge, go here. 

And here is my layout for LOAD from Day 11.  I really like how this one came out; however, the color of the cardstock is not orange, it is a dark pink.  A sketch was used from the BPC 28 Days of Sketches workshop. 

 

And the winner of the Mini-Album special edition magazine is ...

True Random Number Generator Min: Max: Result: 2 Powered by RANDOM.ORG

That means Jill is the winner.  She said ...

Laura your photos are adorable. A nice sunny day is a delight when taking pictures!

Chad, Alec and Alyssa took me to lunch. What I will remember most about this Mother's Day is that both Alec and Alyssa gave me "serious" cards (I cried). Until this year I always got humorous cards and at least one of them was about a body function LOL They grow up so fast.

Posted by: jillconyers | Tuesday, May 10, 2011 at 04:50 AM

Congratulations Jill, if you could please send me an email to latbaskets@embarqmail.com with your home address, I will get the magazine shipped out to you.

Thank you all for participating ... hope you stop by again soon!

by the numbers ...

In the newspaper last weekend within the Parade flyer, there was an article on America by the numbers.  I thought I would share with you some of the stats I thought were most interesting.

• Biggest Spenders ... Austin, TX
• Most Tattooed City ... Miami Beach, FL
• Most Sun ... Yuma, AZ (90% of the time)
• Top Beer in NY ... Samuel Adams
• Top City for Cosmetic Surgery ... Miami, FL
• Sleepiest State ... West Virginia
• Most Popular Breed of Dog Across America ... Labrador Retriever
• America's Most Favorite Cookie ... Oreo
• America's Most Favorite Candy ... M&M's
• Best-Selling Vehicle in 2010 ... Ford  F-Series
• Most Popular Baby Girl Name in 2009 ... Isabella
• Most Popular Baby Boy Name in 2009 ... Jacob
• The Number of People Living in America ... 308,745,538

My photo for One Little Word - Captured (PATIENCE) this week is a photo of my lottery tickets.

 
You are probably wondering how this has anything to do with having/finding patience.  Well, I have been playing the lottery for quite some time now.  I am NOT a gambler.  I usually purchase one number and play it for a few days during the week.  I randomly come up with a number each week, because I'm afraid if I play the same number every week and then miss a week, that would be the week that my number would come out.

So, I am patiently waiting to hopefully win something someday ... even if it is only a few hundred dollars.  Every bit helps, right?

For more One Little Word - Captured pictures, go here.

And, my LOAD layout from yesterday is below.  It is a layout telling Rebecca why we spelled her middle name the way we did. 

 

Have a great day everyone!

x is for xerox ...

I thought it would be appropriate to do today's post for the A to Z challenge for letter "X" on Xerox.  I'm sure this is a name familiar to all of you.  It became very familiar to me about a year ago. 

The company that I have been working for over the past six years was purchased by Xerox.  We are still known as Affiliated Computer Services (ACS), but now have the extension of our name ... ACS, a Xerox Company.  Everything else is pretty much the same.

On to this week's photo for One Little Word Captured (patience).

 
If you guessed finding the patience to deal with complete meltdowns, you are correct. 

For the most part, Rebecca is a laid back, very happy little girl.  That is unless she is very tired, or you take something away from her that she really wanted.  In this case, I believe she was biting the wires on Nicholas' mouse for his computer, so he took it away from her, and this is what happened.

She does get over it very fast; she just goes and tries to find something else to put in her mouth.

For more posts for One Little Word Captured, go here.

Thanks for stopping by.  And for those of you being hit by this nasty weather, please be safe.  We are actually being hit here in NJ today.  We are just praying that the tornadoes stay away.

r is for rob's cooking ...

My post and picture today go hand-in-hand ... A to Z challenge for letter "R," and One Little Word Captured for my word PATIENCE.

My post is all about the times when Rob (my husband) cooks for us.  Let me tell you first that whatever he creates (usually the recipe is something he comes up with himself) is delicious.  I think I only remember one meal he created that we tossed in the garbage in all the 12 years that we have lived together.

Anyway, even though he does make great things to eat, he is the MESSIEST cook EVER.  When he is done, there is stuff spattered everywhere, and I can't stand it.  When I cook, I am the type of person that cleans up as I cook so there isn't a huge mess to clean up after dinner is made and we have eaten.  Just knowing that I have to clean up his mess in the kitchen after we eat stresses me out.

The other night, he made onion rings.

 
There was a greasy, splattered mess everywhere.  I hate frying food on the stovetop (our Fry Daddy is so much better and less of a mess).  There is nothing more disgusting than grease splattered everywhere.

So, I just need to learn that if my husband is going to make a meal for us, especially on the days when I get home from work at 6pm or later, I need to find the patience of dealing with the cleanup afterward.

For more One Little Word Captured photos from this week, go here.

Enjoy your evening everyone.

k is for kentucky fried chicken ...

I know, Kentucky Fried Chicken is not healthy for you, but I just LOVE their original chicken, and can NEVER pass up their mashed potatoes and biscuits.  There have been times (not recently) that I have just gone through the drive-thru to get a container of mashed potatoes.  What are some of your favorite places to stop for a non-healthy quick bite to eat?

For more A to Z challenge posts for letter "K", click the link to the right.

It's a day earlier than my normal posts for One Little Word - Captured, but I thought I'd share my picture with you today since I just captured it about five minutes ago.

 
 
Here is Rebecca refusing to take a nap today.  It's already been a very LONG day, and now this little one is going to be very grumpy as the day goes on.  So my "patience" lesson this week is to accept that this little girl may not want to take a nap everyday (just hope it's not EVERYDAY from now on).

For more One Little Word - Captured pictures, please go here.

Hope everyone is having a happy day!

g is for goodreads ...

Even though I don't read as much as I would love to read, I do LOVE books.  One of most favorite things to do is head into Borders or Barnes & Noble and scan the new books.  When I find a book I think I would like to read one day, I got it down and put the title into Goodreads. I used to not be able to walk out of the book store without a book in hand; however, I do not have any more room on my bookshelves at this time, so I decided to join Goodreads to keep track of what books I want to evidently read.

So, with that said, my post for the A to Z challenge for letter G is Goodreads.

I currently have 138 books on my "to read" list, 82 books on my "read" list (I know I have read more than that in my lifetime, but don't have the time to list them all), and 2 books on my "currently reading" list.

Some of the books that are on my "to read" list are:

• The Shack
• Look Again
• Lift
• The Wednesday Sisters
• The Weight of Silence
• Father of the Rain
• Perfection
• Room
• Knowing Jesse
• Dangerous Neighbors
• The Art of Choosing
• Man in the Woods
• Saving Max
• Still Alice
• Time of My Life
• A Piece of Cake
• Sing you Home

And many others.  You can find more of the books on my list if you click on my Goodreads button to the right.

And, getting to my One Little Word - Captured photo for this week. 

I have realized that my One Little Word (Patience) needs to be worked on by everyone in my family.  This week's picture is of Rebecca trying her hardest to get a pen cap back on the pen. 

 
You can see her face, but she had a complete meltdown when she couldn't get the cap on (she was trying to put in on backwards), and ended up throwing the pen/cap across the room.

We need to practice patience together.

For more One Little Word - Captured photos, go here.

Thanks for stopping by everyone!  Enjoy the rest of your day.

thought it would never happen ...

Since I am friends with my mom's cousins on Facebook, and there are a few of her friends also on there, I went ahead and opened an account for her.  She is very excited about it; however, she is a bit clueless on what to do first.  I will need to sit down with her (hopefully over the weekend) to teach her the in's/out's of using FB.  I didn't think she would ever take part in joining FB, but glad she took the leap.

Speaking of FB, I reconnected with a friend that I grew up with from birth until the third grade.  We were next door neighbors, and you can say that he was definitely my first crush.  Oh how I remember the days of making/eating mud pies. 

For this week's One Little Word - Captured photo, I decided to take a picture of a book that is on my "to read" list.

 
I'm hoping that when I finally have time to read "The Happiness Project" that it will not only help me in bringing more "happiness" to my life (even though I am very happy), but that there will be a lesson on patience in there too.

For more One Little Word - Captured photos, go here.

I'm going to close today asking all of you to say a little prayer for my dear friend Christine.  She hasn't been feeling very well over the past week and is having some tests done.  She is such a kind soul, so please keep her in your prayers.

Enjoy the rest of your day!

the art mess ...

You would never know that Spring arrived in my town this week.  Over the weekend the temps were almost in the 80's, and these past few days have been quite cold with snow showers and school delays.  The roads this morning were even a bit icy.  When will Spring arrive and STAY?

Have I told you that I'm on the committee for planning our 20-year high school reunion?  Well I am, and yes, we are planning it.  I have a feeling we are going to have a good turnout (at least I hope so).  Most of our classmates are on Facebook.  There are really only a handfull of our 150+ classmates that we are still in search of.  I think we are off to a great start.

Since it is Thursday, it's the day where I post my One Little Word Captured (PATIENCE) photo.  Almost EVERY DAY my kitchen table is covered with Nicholas' artwork and supplies.

 
So, my patience lesson for this week is to accept the fact that my son LOVES to be creative and will always have something on the table related to his passion.

For more One Little Word Captured photos, click here.

Enjoy your evening everyone!

some quotes and new BPC classes ...

I found some quotes for my One Little Word Captured word PATIENCE on a blog that I was visiting this week.  I couldn't pass up printing out the quotes, taking a picture, and using that picture as my picture for One Little Word Captured this week.

 
I definitely need to start taking action by following what some of the quotes above state.  LOVE ...

• Listen more, talk less.
• Sit back and wait.
• Just breathe.
• Relax and let go.

For more photos, go here.

On a different note ... I've been participating in Big Picture Classes (BPC) since 2006.  I just love the variety of classes they are constantly offering, and the classes/workshops are taught by stellar instructors.  Two classes that are on my radar at the moment are:

28 Days of Sketches

(just because I use sketches 99% of the time when creating a layout and I think this would be a fun class)

 

and

Just Curious

(just because I LOVED another class that Tami Morrison taught, and still rate that as one of my all-time favorites that BPC offered)

 
Are you signed up for any classes at BPC?  I highly recommend trying out one of their workshops, but I am warning you ... once you take one workshop, you will be hooked.

Enjoy your day everyone!

the wee hours of the morning ...

I really don't know what got into Rebecca early this morning ... she was up at 2am, 4am, and 5am.  I have a feeling it had something to do with the excitement of Nanny and Poppy's arrival.  Last night was actually the first night she ever cried when I picked her up to bring her to bed.  That little one didn't want to miss out on what was happening downstairs (which was nothing but watching TV).

And, this brings me to my photo for my One Little Word - Captured (patience) for this week.  I need to learn to have a little more patience when Rebecca (or Nicholas) decide to get up in the wee hours of the morning when I'm trying to get in as much sleep as possible.  It actually doesn't bother me that much since I can fall right back to sleep, it's just the having to crawl out of bed at crazy hours in the morning that bothers me. 

For more photos from this week, visit here.

I hope to be back tomorrow ... enjoy your evening!

the dreaded laundry pile(s) ...

So, I am getting back to my commitment to participate in One Little Word - Captured (to take a picture every week) for my One Little Word (patience) for 2011.

I know I'm not the only one that dreads laundry day,or in my case laundry days.  I really don't mind doing the laundry, it's the putting it all away that gets to me.  I'm embarrassed to say that sometimes the laundry that just comes out of my dryer sits on the back of one of my living room couches for a day (or two, or more).  I really don't know what it is, but on most days, I can't bring myself to just put the darn laundry away.

 
So, for this week, I need to take time to have more patience in dealing with my piles of laundry and just put the clothes away.

For more One Little Word - Captured entries, go here.

To my Idol fan peeps out there, "Did you watch the guys sing last night?" I seriously thought the show was just "ok" last night.  There were just too many ballads for me for one night, and it was getting a bit boring.  In the end, I'm hoping the following five guys get to stay.

• James Durbin (even though I am not a fan of rock)
• Stefano Langone
• Paul McDonald
• Casey Abrams
• Clint Gamboa

Looking forward to hearing the girls sing tonight.

Have a great evening everyone!

then and now ...

I have lots to post today ... Thursdays seem like crazy days for me.

The prompt for the joy of love challenge is "then and now."  Below are pictures of my two loves.

Nicholas then (April 2004)

 
Nicholas now (December 2010)

 

 Rebecca then (January 2010)

 
Rebecca now (February 2011)

 

For more joy of love photos, click on the button below.

For my One Little Word - Captured picture this week, I thought I'd take a picture of the definition of my word PATIENCE.

 
Go to One Little Word - Captured for more inspiration.

And last but not least ... here is my layout from LOAD day 2.  I was inspired by one of the sketches on Inspired Blueprints. 

And I'm also participating in 52 Photos in 52 Weeks ... check out my album to the left for all of those pictures.

Enjoy your day everyone.

so much snow ...

We are getting hammered already this year with snow, and the scary thing is that it is only January.  Yesterday and last night, we were left with about 24 inches of snow (and there was some freezing rain mixed in there too). 

Living in NJ, you would think that I would be used to snow, and don't get me wrong, I do love to see it on the trees after the storm, but as soon as it's done snowing and I can look at it from my window for about a day, I want it all to go away. 

With that said, I thought today's picture for my One Little Word - Captured assignment would be a picture of the snow we've been battling for weeks now.  A good lesson for me ... have patience with the weather.  I just have to realize that I'm safe inside, and there is nothing I can do with what Mother Nature brings us.

 
For more One Little Word - Captured photos, go here.

Enjoy your day everyone!

what a mess ...

I have come to realize that having a baby in the house is going to lead to a daily mess in our living room.  We don't have a designated play room in the house.  We have the basement which has tiled carpeting on one side, but it's not a finished basement and the temperature down there most of the time is 65 degrees.

So, with that said, my photo for my One Little Word - Captured this week, is a photo of Becca sitting amongst just of few of her toys in the living room.  I need to have patience in dealing with this mess everyday.

 
You can see more entries here.

So, who will be watching American Idol tonight (the auditions)?  I'm hoping to catch some (if not all) of the show since the auditions on tonight's show were held in NJ.  Should be entertaining.

Have a great day everyone!