homecoming and "mini me"

Madi and Eric Forbes. How cute are they?!

Noblesville's Homecoming was this weekend. This is Madi's group! Most of her dear, close friends are in this picture. (Bailey, Kai and Ben are MIA) We took the same picture last year in an alley. Wow what a difference a year makes. They are growing up so fast!

People tell Madi and I that we look identical. I have to admit that there is a resemblance. Kind of fun seeing a little bit of myself when I look at her. .

They are gone and the recovery begins

These three kiddos are the reason I have not posted on the blog since May. Now they are all back in school and I am back on my own. Talk about sad. It took me until now to feel good about it. I love being with them even when I am yelling my head off. Now they are each in a new grade and each in a new school. Madi is at the big high school, Huddy is at the middle school and McGwire is at the intermediate school. I am realizing more and more that my time with them is short and that they will be grown up in just a blink of my eye. I want to slow down time but I know I can't so I am just embracing our time together as much as I can!
Shannon

p.s. Anyone want to do lunch? How about breakfast?

the Nicholsons

These poor souls let me take pictures of them a couple times a year. This week we went to Potter's Bridge to see if we could get any good shots. I have to say the photographer was not on top of her game. Can't wait to do it again. Thanks guys!

Its a crazy life let me tell ya!

I am seriously going nuts. The kids are stressed out with tests and finals and baseball and softball and lacrosse and basketball lessons and football camp. Steve and I spend our days doing a little bit of work and a whole lot of running kids from place to place. We are sinking in a messy house bad food for dinner and grass that won't stop growing. Yikes! I am just so happy to have this beast of a washer and dryer to keep us in clean underware until things settle down at the Plumer house!!

Sha

A new arrival!

Never say never! Barni, Kelly and I said we were all done having kids, dogs and cats. DONE, FINISHED, KAPUT. I believed us too. I am still keeping my end of that bargain but Kelly....well that is another story. The one that is the least likely to cave did just that last Friday when a cute little puppy waltzed her little bitty self right into her garage. "Ella or MeMe" (unsure of her name) has the sweetest little face and her disposition is precious. Kelly, Bill, Bailey and Kylie fell head over heels in love with her immediately and have moved her right into the house. (Kelly and Bill won't admit to the loving her part of course-"she is just staying cause the girls love her".) Bahhh, haaaaa, haaaa! Whatever!! I think surprises are the most fun and I am excited to have another cute little girl in the family!

Sha

Living a crazy life!

Hi!,
Sorry it has been so long since I posted. It has been a crazy few weeks. I had hoped to put up a few new scrapbook pages but the only ones that I have completed don't have pictures on them. They are for my shop and would make a boring post. Maybe this weekend I will be able to do some pages for myself.

A fast update:
We were in Florida for spring break. It was so nice to get away from this Indiana cold and just hang out. Right before we left Madi tried out for NHS cheerleading and made the varsity football squad and the girls varsity basketball squad. Yeah for Madi!! She is also play softball for NHS.
Huddy and McGwire are knee deep in baseball and Huddy is trying to figure out how to squeeze in playing lacrosse. He also had to have an oral surgeon expose one of his eye teeth today. It was impacted in his palate and required an iv sedation. (note to self... get a prescription for nerve medicine before any of the kids have to be sedated again. It stresses me out!) It was easy and he is doing great. He is happy that the Doctor told him that he can't go to school tomorrow. Lucky me!

Huddy's surgery! Look at the cute nurses that helped him!

The stranger is captain Josh. He took my guys on a fishing charter when we were on spring break. Nice SHARK!

Scrapbook pages to come. (I hope!)

Sha

Nationals and Disney!

Madi and I had a great time in Orlando! The weather was in the upper 80's and sunny everyday!!! Madi's team came in 4th!

A loud POP!

Last night I went to bed around 10ish. Fell asleep easy and it was nice! Then out of the blue around midnight I was awakened by a loud "POP". I flew up out of bed trying to figure out what the heck just happened. Were we victims of a drive by shooting? Did something explode? Was a tornado ripping off the roof? My body was immediately hot all over and the adrenalin was pumping out of control. About that time Steve came flying up the stairs. He had fallen asleep on the couch. "What just happened", I asked while searching for my cell phone. I was sure that I needed to call 911. "The cats just popped a balloon", he replied. To make a long story short, it scared us to death. Then it was funny. The not so funny part was when we were done laughing I was wide awake. So awake that I was able to clean my messy scrapbook room (that's right it was messy once again), do some laundry, watch Anderson Cooper 360 twice and eat a Hershey bar. I finally went back to bed at 5:45 only to get up at 7 to take Madi to school and start my day. Why in the world don't cats sleep at night?

I'm tired and gonna go try this sleep thing again.
Sha

I will be taking a little vaca tomorrow to Orlando. Madi has her national cheer competition there this weekend. I will be back on Monday with the results. GO INDIANA ELITE!!! Especially Junior Jungle!!

On the dang wagon again!

I love double stuff oreo's. I have ever since I can remember. I hide them from the kids and sneak them when no one is looking. The best way to eat them is four at a time with a cold glass of milk in a plastic cup!! Yum, yum!! I never ever get tired of them either. It is a great day when I can wake up and can have oreo's for breakfast. Why you ask am I blogging about oreo's? Well let me tell you. I am getting ready to make a couple trips to Florida in the next few weeks and I have been trying on my summer clothes. I will just cut to the chase and say I'm fat and its time to give em up. Start eating healthy and loose a little weight. I have not had any in about two weeks and I hate it. Why can't those suckers be fat free/calorie free? Why does everything good have to be so bad for you? I think about them everyday and to make matters worse I went to Walmart this morning and happened to notice that they had been reduced to $2.45. That is a bargain and I can't have any.
Sha
p.s. I once gave them up for a year and a half.

preserved!!!

For many years I was so worried about how perfect my pages l00ked and how other people that scrapbooked would perceive them. It was a pressure that kept me from getting pages done. I only completed maybe 10 or 12 pages during those years. They are beautiful to me and I am very proud of them but I have a million more pictures waiting patiently to land in one of my books. Now my focus has shifted. (thank goodness) I still want beautiful pages but I really want memories that are important to me to be captured and the stories behind them told.

This page is of my Grandma Mable's house. It was one of my very favorite places to be as a child and I am so happy to have it scrapped. I did not worry about being grammatically correct or how my handwriting looks. It is done and slid into the page protector!! YES!! What a freeing feeling!!

Sha

T-BALL DOGS

Last summer the boys put these hot dog and katsup suits on and waved people in off of the highway to T-Ball Dogs in exchange for a donation to their baseball team. (the fire) I swear it was 95 degrees outside but those little boys didn't care they just had a blast. Of course I sat in the car and watched to make sure none of them decided to play in traffic or kill over from heat stroke. For those of you that don't have 11 year old boys I want you to know that playing in traffic seems like a logical thing to them. Crazy I know but hey that's why they have over protective parents that guard them with their life while teaching them the importance of working for things that you want. I have to admit I had a blast too. I laughed my fool head off most of the time. Thank you T-Ball Dogs for the donation and the wonderful memory!
Sha

HP got his "grills" on today!!!!

Huddy has been counting down the days until he got his braces on!! He calls them his "grills"!!! His count down ended today!!! He was so excited to start straightening his pearly whites and I was excited to put the braces on!!! This is the office that I work in. Pretty fancy huh!! Yep, this is where you can find me every Monday and every other Wednesday morning. Not a bad gig. Anyway, I think my little Hudmeister looks so cute!!

Sha

Winter formal

The winter formal is tonight at Noblesville High School. Madi got asked by the cutest, sweetest boy ever!! Ben Yoder. He came in the house with a beautiful pink rose for her! Awwweee! How awesome is that? They look so stinking good together too!!
Sha

Stomach Flu round 3!!

Never say never!! I got it!! The first time since hmmm... I can't remember when!! Friday morning I woke up with a little tummy ache of my own!!! It was a mild case thank goodness! I was back into civilization by noon and off to Chicago by 5. It worked out for me but who knows what will happen to the 5 other peeps that rode along! I warned them! (I really did)
Sha

Round two of the stomach flu!!

It was to dark in the family room to take a good picture so I will just have to describe how things looked when I got home from running Madi around. UGLY! McGwire was curled up on the chair with a big trash can next to him. Tears rolling down his face. Huddy was moaning and groaning and rolling around on the couch. He was holding his stomach and convinced that he needed to be taken to the hospital. (He always wants to go to the hospital when he gets sick) Steve was yelling about throw up missing the toilet and having to clean it up while running through the house looking for Lysol. You see, I am usually the throw up cleaner upper cause I never ever get it. Therefore, he was out of his element and not to happy. I can catch it in my hands and walk away unscathed. Steve on the other hand has a weak tummy and a very weak immune system to stomach flu. Good thing Madi has a cheer competition in Chicago this weekend and I am the lucky one to go with her!! Otherwise I could be posting a pretty funny picture of my better half in not such a better way!! Oh I am so glad to be me today!! (probably tomorrow too!)
Have a great Valentine's Day!!
Sha

p.s. If you were curious how long Madi was under the weather. 2-1/2 days!!

Stomach Flu:(

Yes it's true. We have stomach flu in our house. It started last night around midnight with Madi and continued until about 5am. Oh that poor girl. It was the worst case she has ever had. Maybe the worst case any of us have ever had. When her tummy started to settle we fell asleep and then overslept until 8 am. That meant McGwire was late for school. Uggh. What a day. She is recovering now and I am waiting for the next kid to start up. I gotta go finish up the laundry and get myself in bed so that I will be ready.
Sha

Logan Village Mall

Have you ever been to the Logan Village Mall? If not you need go. Eleven of my scrappy friends and I have rented a space there to sell scrapbook kits. The name of our cute little space is "Our Creative Outlet". Here is the link to our blog http://ourcreativeoutlet.blogspot.com/ It is really small right now. So small that it is just a wall. It is an awesome wall though and I love it so much. We have pages displayed from floor to ceiling and there are all kinds of paper crafts and hand made cards too. Many of the items that are for sale are listed on the blog but there is still to much to list. Every inch of our space is full to the brim with many one of a kind items or things made exclusively for the OCO (that's what we call Our Creative Outlet). We add new things everyday and since there are so many of us the variety is unbelievable. Oh and our prices are super good too. We are all very excited and hope that anyone that enjoys scrapbooking will shop there so we can grow and eventually become a full scrapbook store! Go check us out!!

Sha

For Gabby's birthday picture!!

I can't believe that my niece Gabriellla (aka Crabriella on cranky days) is all ready 2. Time has flown with that cute little thing in our lives. She is the last of the babies and she is smart as a whip I tell you. Since she is always having to keep up with the older kids she does everything way younger than the rest of the them did. She can speak in full sentences which includes tattling and can even use bad words in perfect context! (I'm not sure why we say bad words in our family, we know better but we just do it. Except our Mom) Anyhoo, I made this layout with her in mind. The next time we see her we plan on having a little bitty birthday party which will include a cupcake! I all ready told Barni to put her in pink so she will match my page! It turned out so cute that I couldn't wait to share it. I think I will duplicate it a few times for the OCO too.
Have a great week.
Shannon

McGwire's 5K run

Here is what inspired me yesterday!! McGwire ran a 5k in November all by himself. It was rainy and cold and by the time he got to the finish line his sweat pants were so wet that they were falling off of him:( HE finished 69th out of 182 and ran a 9.13 mile. As you can see by the pictures he was one of the youngest runners. What a cool kid!!

Another snow day!

Remember the picture of our house covered in a bunch of snow? Well today it looks just like that again. We woke up to 12 inches of the white stuff and another day off of school. It is absolutely beautiful here and my thing 1 and thing 2 spent the day playing in it. Shoveling, sledding, snowballs and we can't forget the 4-wheeler/snow plow that flew up and down the sidewalks. (it really does work by the way)

Since we had time at home I was able to scour the web to get a peek at all of the new paper lines and products coming out of CHA!! YUM-YUM! I can't wait to get my hands on some new things!!

I am going to head up to scrapbook room and work on a layout that is calling my name.
See ya,
Sha

Taaa-daaaaa!!!

Not perfect but at least you can see the desk top!!! I honestly had it cleaned twice before today but before I could run and grab my camera the inspiration got the best of me and I messed it up again. I love the black drawers. I pulled a few of them out so that you could see what I keep in them. This is where I spend all of my time when I am home by myself or when it is late at night! I have to say it is my favorite place in the whole house!!

A new baby in the family!!

My neice Jennifer had this beautiful little boy the day after Christmas. He is the most perfect baby ever. I felt very honored to be invited to take his birth pictures!! Congratulations Jen, Dan and big sister Rosey!!

some fun stuff!

Here are the stress reliever projects that I have been trying to get uploaded. Yahoo!!!

I flipped this little board book on it's side and turned it into a book about my silly kids!

Then I altered this mailbox just in time to receive a few Valentines!!

Now that I have these things done I promise to have pictures of my scrapbook room next week!

Yesterday!

Well I was right!! By 9:30 the cousins were knocking on the door. They are like thing one and thing two if you are familiar with Dr. Seuss. Well my boys are also like thing one and thing two. Imagine it! We had air soft and nerf gun wars in the house (thank you Uncle Bill), balls bouncing off the walls and everywhere else, all the pillows flung off of the couches, power drills humming and the straw that broke the camel's back was when they converted the four wheeler into a home made snow plow and decided to zoom it up and down the alley doing donuts in the neighbors yards along the way!! My goodness I would call that a productive day for four little boys. Needless to say that was when production stopped and the cousins were sent packing back to their own crib (that's what they call their house). The next snow day we get it will be a requirement that Huddy attend work with Daddy!! (he's the ring leader you know)

Since scrapbooking is my therapy and my stress reliever I stayed up until 1 am relieving a little. I finished 2 layouts and 3 projects. I would love to post them but my computer is not wanting to acknowledge the memory stick from my camera. Stressful I tell you! Wish I had more time to relieve it. I'm off to basketball games with my little angels. Only 4 games today.

Baby it's cold outside!!!

We are freezing in Indiana!!! Minus 4 degrees right now!!! It is so cold that school was cancelled. Tomorrow it is suppose to be back up to 25!! That will feel like a heat wave for us. TV, board games, wii, reading, scrapbooking, baking cookies while sipping on hot chocolate and just spending time together! That's my plan for the day. Lets see how it goes. It will probably be fighting, trashing the house and begging for friends to come over. Anyway, have a happy Friday! (This picture is a couple years old and a lot there was a lot more snow on the ground then but other than that it looks the same. Beautiful in my eyes! At least there is some gratification for freezing our fanny-wackers off!!)

I'm moving into my blog and loving it!!

I love looking at slide shows on blogs!! It is such a great way to peak creativity! Sooooo, I decided that I would add one of my own. I have a lot more pages to add when the battery in my camera recharges so stay tuned!! Look out blog world... HERE I COME!

one valentine page completed!!

Isn't Madi funny? She is always walking around the house in crazy get ups and ready for a photo. I seriously love her sense of humor.
I have another Valentine page finished I'm just waiting to get the boys both home at the same time to photograph them together!! Just about ready to post pics of my scrapbook room too.

clean and messy again

I got my scrapbook room cleaned like I promised myself I would. That clean desk perked my creativity so I went to archiver's and got some new Valentine paper. ( I love Valentine paper. It is always so beautiful.) When I got home I dumped it all out on the desk and started lovin on it all and before I knew it..... the desk was a mess again and I was back to square one. Sooo I am going to finish up a few projects, post them and then clean up my desk and take a cool pic of it to post as well. So until then happy scrapping.
Shannon

New Year's Resolution

Here is a picture of my scrapbook room in November. It was a disaster. It took me 2 days to clean it up and I vowed never to let it get like that again. Well, here it is January 2ND and I just realized that it is getting a little messy again. Yikes! I am going to spend a few hours cleaning it then I'll take another picture to remind me of how happy I am when it is tidy. New Year's Resolution -keep my space clean!!

New Year-New Blog!!!

Its a new year and and time to try new things. Spread your wings and branch out. Well that's exactly what I am going to do!! I have loved working on Our Creative Outlet blog so much that I decided to take the plunge and create my own blog. I'm excited about posting pictures of my scrapbook pages and telling the world about my crazy life. So I lift up my glass and say thanks to all the girls at OCO that inspired me to go for it!!!
Shannon