Farewell Penpal

My final pen pal letter from my pen pal.I volunteered some time last year and this year and was a pen pal to a girl with Girls Inc. I really love this project they do and I love being a part of it. In this letter my pen pal L told me about her plans for her plans for the summer, that she likes horses and that she liked writing to me. How Cute. I hope L has a great little summer. I sent my last letter off a few weeks ago and told her I also liked being her pen pal. learn more about Girls Inc. here.

This is the thank you note I got from the coordinator today via email

Dear Michelle: Thank you for participating in this year’s Pen Pal Program. The girls really enjoyed receiving your letters. Some of the skills they learned were: adjectives, spelling, the structure of letter writing, the joy of writing to others, and learning they have things in common with people of different ages. We truly appreciate your time and creativity. You made the Pen Pal program fun and a complete success! We look forward to your participation next time.

It was fun and looking forward to next years letters.

OMG , Finally DONE

The massage pods project for the CVMC Pamper Event if finally done thank God I was sick of making these things. Hopefully, the moms in the club will like them and I can get some business from them.

Cupcake Cards!

I wrote in an earlier post that since I began blogging I have come across many a crafty little blog and craft idea. I found these delicious cards here. I made them up for the the moms in our lives. My mom, the boys godmothers oh and my sis because she is such a help you know. I have yet to deliver the cards to the godmothers so I hope they don't read this posting just yet.


So cute huh!

Weekend adventures

We had lots and lots going on this weekend. Friday I headed over to Palomares Grill for a cocktail event with the CVMC. There was a live band playing and it created a fun atmosphere. I have lived here forever and never been to the PG for cocktails and live music but it was different and I enjoyed it

Saturday we headed over to our little cousins 6th b day party, another fun event. We chilled there for bit then took the littles to my parents house to spend the night. After E and I headed to another cousins house for his b day party. This was a busy house party, lots of music, talking and drinks ... I only partaked in a small rum and rootbeer{ they were out of coke =( } After chillen thee for a bit we headed home.. for a quite house and an opportunity to sleep in!

Sunday morning , after some sleep in time we headed over to the cheesecake factory to pick up breakfast, I had french toast and bacon, as well as one of theur espresso bar treats. I totally chucked points out the window this weekend. As usual we selected cheesecake to end the meal. it was E's turn so he selected the Key Lime. It was tart and sweet all at once and the only bad thing I can say about oit was the abondance of whipped cream on the slice.

Sunday afternoon picked up the littles and headed home to do a fun art project. Hand print canvases to hang on the wall. I found these at Red Envelope... one of my favorite places to shop. The hand print canvases wasfun All of them cake out well. I wish i had selected another color for my print as it really can not been seen well enough in my opinion. Posting pictures of the hung items later.

Pen Pal Letter

A snap of the pen pal letter I wrote to my pen pal with Girls Inc. I could not find stickers to decorate my letter so I made up a little doodle.

Take a look at the letter she sent me here

Girls Inc. Pen-pal

Last year I volunteered for the pen pal project with Girls Inc. Girls Incorporated is a national nonprofit youth organization dedicated to inspiring all girls to be strong, smart, and bold. I really loved being a pen pal to two girls last year. When the opportunity arose again this year I was really excited to join on again. Need to sit down and start penning my reply ASAP.

Rainy Day Blooms

I adore flowers, I prefer to be given some by my love E, but he is slacking in the romance department these days and with all the wet weather I needed a pick me up. I picked up these blooms at Trader Joe's. When I got home I chopped them to size built them into the vase with pebbles to secure them and then stacked orange slices around the vase (on the inside) to add a dash more color and scent to the room. I love the way citrus fruit looks sliced up and added to flower arrangements.

I decided as I was admiring my flowers tonight... I much rather have fresh flowers in a couple of rooms in the house than Starbucks coffee during the week. Starbucks, is expensive and it's a quick treat, but flowers they are beautiful and can keep a smile on your face all week long. Less Buckys more Blooms.

Exciting project

I found a fabulous idea at V and Co. for a fantastic little foot warmer, because like the author of that blog my feet are always cold too. A major regret I have in my life is that I can not sew a stitch to save my life. No, seriously I never really payed attention to the home economic class in junior high and had no desire to take home economics in high school. Who knew that I would fall in love with Martha Stewart, a man, and stylish ideas in my twenties... woe is me to go back and relive the opportunity I would in a heart beat. ANYHOO, I digress. I sent an email to my gal pal KS with Scaboozie. KS and DKM her business partner and fellow CVMC moms make these fantastic handbags, burb cloths, and bibs in the most whimsical patterned fabrics. I own a couple of their bags and knew that KS was the girl to help me put the idea together.

I dodged to her place after work picked out my fabric choices and took the first one home over to my mom...its exactly her cup of tea and I wanted to give her a little thank you for all of her hard work with the boys.

I will be getting the rest of my Scaboozie loot later this week and looking forward to my foot warmers one for myself and one for my massage business, two eye pillows one for myself and one for massage , and a new bag... cause a girl can never have too many Scaboozies available to her.

Fab-u-baking 101: Chocolate banana bread

One of my favorite things to do when I have a free moment( that is a rarity... as we know) is read one of my favorite magazines. Sunset magazine. I love the articles, the website, the recipes and the ideas on where and when to travel, garden and how to live a little greener. I was thumbing through the other night and found an interesting recipe Chocolate Banana Bread. The recipe seemed simple enough I had most of the ingredients in the pantry so I thought I would give it a whirl as my first Fab-u-baking 101 project. Simple instructions and a little patience that I lack from time to time churned out a bread that is tasty. I would say it's along the lines of a scone ... yes defiantly this bread is scone-y . I would highly recommend it as a breakfast bread . The jury is still out on it as E and the littles have not tried it out. You can find this recipe here (my pic looks pretty close to theirs so big snaps to me!) Fab-u-baking 101 week one down 51 left to go.

Baking Boo Hoo

I had a crazy craving for corn bread yesterday, it was cold and wet outside and with a pot of red beans and rice on the handy dandy crock pot it seemed like a perfect pairing. I had a boxed corn bread mix in the pantry. I mixed the Trader Joe's mix together with all of the called for ingredients. I was very delighted to smell the warm yummy-ness oozing from my kitchen and I was so pumped to have a piece because it has been a long while since I have had me some corn bread.... AND then disaster struck. My cornbread turned into semi charred mounds of not so fabulous. UGH I am the worst baker in recorded history. It seemed a waste to dump the not so bad cornbread so I kept and served those but I was ashamed to serve it...well not really cornbread is cornbread and when it's warm and buttered you can almost pretend that it is not charred. My little crumb bum bbD did not seem to mind either.


This cornbread fiasco has really snapped me back into reality, I am not the domestic goddess I thought I was if balancing, a career, a family, a happy marriage, a social life, and an overloaded TIVO if I can not cook a simple box recipe. I am now vowing to become a better baker.

How will I do it? Not quite sure maybe I will call it a project: fab-u-baking101.

I will bake once a week, bread, cake, pies, cookies, bars etc. until I master my baking skills and become a confident if not accomplished baker. I am not just talking boxed mixes I mean real baking. Up to my elbows in flour, from scratch baking. I have plenty of cookbooks and now its time to get crackin'. Stay tuned for more of my misadventures in baking to see if I get lazy or stick ( and I don't mean the pan, at least i hope it won't ) to it .

Photo faux pas

I recently purchased a new camera a Nikon CoolPix. I basically needed a new digital camera to snap pics of the littles and for my blog. The one we had just kinda fell off. I wanted something smaller and chic. My gal pal Christine told me about some free photography classes on-line. I signed up last week and started working on what not to do when taking photos.

Flattening the world

Another consideration when you are taking photos is that you are turning a three-dimensional world into two dimensions. You are flattening everything the camera sees into one visual plane. In reality, a light pole may be 50 feet away behind your subject and therefore not seem to be a problem. On film, the two objects will look fused together. Figure 1-2 shows an example of what can happen if you don't pay attention to the faraway objects as well as the nearby clutter.


To prevent this from happening in your photos, make it a habit to look behind your subject and detect any objects that may be a problem. Move yourself or your subject to put the distracting background somewhere other than directly behind.


Posted above is the very first lesson. I was going through some pics recently and saw a huge photo composition mistake screaming out at me when I saw this picture of BBD. E took the snap and when you look at my baby in those funky little glasses it looks as if he has antennas growing out of his head. The whole look he is sporting the glasses, the orange shirt and the "antennas" is very alien babyish. I will be posting other photo mistakes as I learn more in my class.