Getting ready...

for the AtoZ Blogging Challenge.  Heard about it on NJ101.5 this morning and had to check out one of the hosting blogs.  Turns out, you play along by choosing to blog daily (except Sunday) on any topic that begins with the letter of the day...tomorrow is A and we'll go through the alphabet in the month of April.  Hey...I haven't started yet, it's just that alphabet and April all begin with A.  Stay tuned for my post on my "A" word of choice tomorrow...and that's not an April's Fool trick!  If you're interested in playing along, too...just click on the button on the right and sign right up!  See you back here tomorrow!

It's her birthday...and she's 11!

My oldest turned 11 today--even though this is posting the next day (I'm a night owl, what can I say?).  Hard to believe that eleven years ago, on March 23rd, at 5:20pm, she came into this world and made me a Mommy for the 1st time.  She is growing into a beautiful, intelligent young lady and we love her very much.  We are proud of her accomplishments and look forward to what the future holds.  This week alone, she earned her blue belt in Tae Kwon Do and performed for us at band rehearsal during a visit to her school.  Her trombone playing has come a long way in a few short months. Today, we went out for dinner and then came back to the house for a little cake--one of her favorites--Red Velvet.  Last weekend, we took her to Washington, DC-at her request-as her birthday gift from us.  We had a great time and she was excited to bring back some of DC's finest cupcakes to enjoy this week.  Here are some pictures of our trip and of our celebration today.  May you have many, many, more happy and healthy birthdays ahead, baby girl!

Time flies when your stressed out!

Well, I'm having fun, too...but I have been really, REALLY busy between LOAD, prepping for my classes here at home and getting the girls back and forth from activities.  Let's not forget the ultra-active 2 year old with a naughty streak...he has me on my toes constantly.  I also had a vendor fair to prepare for, which unfortunately was a big DUD.  Wish I'd known that before stressing out about getting things ready the night before!!  Oh well, live and learn...I'm never doing THAT again!

LOAD was a blast!  It was relatively stress-free (if not for those OTHER committments), very inspirational, and I FINISHED ALL 28 LAYOUTS!  Plan to post these here in a bit, but first, I've fallen a bit off the Yesterday & Today wagon (and my One Little Word wagon, for that matter) and plan to start back up with those layouts.  This Friday, I'm having a HUGE decluttering sale on a ton of my business and personal scrap and rubber stamping supplies--so if you're nearby and want to score on some awesome stuff-then swing by any time between 7pm and 1am Friday night, March 11th.  It's my SCRAMP night, so I'll be here all night :-)

In other matters, I have managed to lose a total of 19 pounds since starting my new eating plan on January 1st.  My hope is to keep it going, but boy, are these grey, winter days starting to drag me down.  Can't wait for spring to get here.  Excited we're finally moving the clocks ahead this weekend...that will mean we lose an hour of sleep (and God knows I can't afford that!), but anything for that extra hour of daylight.  For those of you who don't know the eating plan I'm on, just look at my string of layouts below...I dedicated an entire spread to "The Belly Fat Cure".  Discovered an awesome spread that makes  a good chicken taco out of this world...so happy that it's Belly "good".

This weekend we are hopefully (!) picking up some bed frames for the girls' new and improved SHARED bedroom...and we hope to finish "toddler" proofing Adam's room so we can try to put him down there for naps and bedtime (instead of with us!).  Next weekend, we'll be celebrating Yasmeen's 11th (!!!) birthday with a weekend jaunt to DC.  She asked us to take her there as her present, so we'll be hoping for good weather.  Really HOPING for good weather...nothing worse than walking around the city in the cold and rain.  After our return, the following weekend is for ME!!  I'll be going to an all day crop nearby and spending time creating and hanging out with friends (even Aileen is coming!!).  Can't wait for that.  Last but not least, that SAME weekend, we're giving Yasmeen a gift of--ahem...-The Red Cross babysitting course at the local hospital.  She can't wait to take it, and frankly, we can't wait for her to take it-LOL!  In a couple of years, both she and Adam will be perfectly suited to hanging with each other when Mohammed and I finally decide to sneak away for a bite to eat on any given evening.  Well, a girl can dream, can't she????

Enjoy the rest of the month, and let's hope that March does indeed go out like a lamb.

Here is a close up of my handmade flower. Really proud of this one :-)

Well, if you've lasted this long...thanks for looking.  I'll be back here again soon with some more babbling.  Have a great week!!