Beautification continues.......

This weekend we got some nice weather. We went to the nursery and bought a few of the plants that we wanted to add. We got 2 Hydrangea's and 2 Lavendar's. Ouch! Didn't realize how much that stuff costs! Sunday we got it all planted and watered. Love how it is looking already!

This is the front area we worked on today. We took the rest of the rock and grow-over all out here. We still have the small area to the right of this (but theres a LOT of rock there to do). This
was really a hard job to finish! There were alot of little tree stumps and one bigger. Theres a picture below of all the 'stuff' we've pulled out of here. (minus the round stones)





I just had to share this one! Today I got a little more then just my hands into the job!! We were trying to pull up a tree stump and well it was rooted pretty good!! I ended up sitting on the ground using my feet/legs to push on it to work it loose. Just a little dirty!!!

This is the HUGE pile of the grass and weeds and some rocks that we pulled up with the black clothe stuff (that is laid to prevent weeds and such growing through the rocks). On the top is the tree stump we pulled, well rather dug out.





This is my Butterfly bush. During the winter we had some really bad wind storms that ended up blowing this over and uprooting part of it. Then we went through our winter freezing. We lost at least half of it. This is what is left of it that is still alive. We are hoping staking it and holding it up like this will help it reroot in the upright position.








This is where we planted some new lavendar. We put a plant in each corner. It smells soooo good!!

This is our side of the driveway (where we had the round stones). Here we planted two Hydrangea's. The yellow one is called a Lemon Daddy, because the leaves are yellow. The flowers will be either pink or blue. The other one is called Glowing Embers and it will have reddish pink flowers. After we put these in we still have space to fill so we are going to get another one that will have blue flowers and planted to the right of the yellow one.

I can't wait for them all to bloom!!

Now I gotta go out and water everything real good!!

Beautification continues.......

Well today we got up and were going to do some more work on the

front yard. Got outside and it was raining! But of course!

It was just a small light rain that ended quickly. We went outside

again decided to work on a different area instead.

So we started on the 'rock wall'. Well thats what it was supposed

to be. It was sooooo over grown the rocks, as huge and as many as there were, were completely covered over. It was even overgrown onto the driveway. We had to dig out most of the rocks. It took about 2 1/2 hours to dig it all out and place them all back in neatly. It was actually fun. Not to mention a KILLER workout!!!

Then while we were cleaning up the mess and the excess rocks, we noticed the 'grow over' on this side of the driveway. So we cut it all back and in the space between the driveway and the ground we placed these bricks.

If you look to the right some where those round stones are, we are going to plant some type of tree/shrub. Right now we are thinking Hydrangea's & maybe something else.

This is the full shot of the whole driveway. Unfortunately I didn't

take a before picture, but believe me when I say it looks 100%

better then two days ago!!

Now to keep the growover from happening again!

Our Beautification Process!

So we have finally had some awesome weather to go out and do some yardwork with, and we both weren't working. I started with the flower beds while Donnie mowed and weed-eated.

This top photo I planted irises beside the rose bush. I think I put 12 bulbs in there.

This is along the walkway. I planted irises in the back (thats what you can see here). Theres maybe 30 here. In front of the irises we planted two rows consisting of tulips and daffodils.

I found the daffodils and tulips in the garden dirt. While weeding I dug up clusters of bulbs that were to bunched and not growing anymore. So I seperated them all and replanted them!

In the far left corner of the space there is a plant. It's hard to see. It is lavendar and I am really hoping it stays alive!!

This is the right side of the house. We dug all the rocks out and the cement steps. We are going to try and put a small vegie garden here.

And here is the biggest part of our beautification process! The front yard. We are removing alllllll the rocks and the weeds and the black ground sheets from the whole area its in. We want to put back the green grassy front yard it once was.

We knew it was going to be alot of work, but we kinda missed the word 'hard' from that thought! It's going to be alot of 'hard' work!! That black stuff is not easy to come up now that the grass and weeds are growing through it and the weight of the rocks on it!

Oh ya, another thing we've realized. This is going to make for some really great weight loss workouts!! I burned some major calories today!! WOO-HOO!!

I'll share more as we see improvements!

Spring Break!!

Well we got lucky this week and the weather was very Spring like!!
As well as doing some work around the house, we took the girls to the Pt. Defiance Zoo & Aquarium. It was a perfect day to go! Elizabeth had a blast and couldn't see everything fast enough!! The big girls went off and look at everything on their own. They didn't care much for the snakes and things like that. They all had fun feeding the goats though. One tried to eat Kurestin's (Jacquie's friend) jacket.

Then yesterday I took the girls out to Mom & Dads. Carrie's boys were there and Elizabeth played the whole time with them. They spent most of the time looking through the creek for froggies!! Yes, they did find them too. Elizabeth ended up with 4 in her can and the boys stopped with about 4 in theirs. But they kept finding them and just putting them back. They had so much fun! Elizabeth kept hollering about the 'Muck', getting stuck in it or getting it on her somewhere. It was soo funny!!

Then afterwards, after they ate their smoothies, Jacquie played sprinkler and sprayed the 3 kids. They were running all over the yard screaming and hollering.

Then when they were done, the laid out on the porch on towels and read while they dried off!

I'm a Sketch Diva!!

I am now designing layouts using sketches from the blog, My Sketch World.
Lucy sends a sketch and I have to create a LO using that sketch. She then uploads it to her sketch blog with her sketch.
Go check it out!! The link to her blog is on the right sidebar. You'll be able to see the LO I did!!

Then check back every Monday. A new Sketch is posted and the LO's to go with it!

In like a Lion!!

Well we thought our white winter was over. But we didn't get that lucky!!
We ended Feb. with snow! We woke up to it and it snowed
off and on all day. Snowed to make everything white, then it stopped long enough to melt away, and then start snowing again. All day!!

Well March came in like a Lion!! We woke up the 1st of March to a good
blanket of the white stuff!! It stayed for a little while but was all gone by evening time!
We got lucky this time round. It was a wet snow so it melted easily and it didn't go
down into the freezing temps that we had with the last snow storm system.

Now we are all ready for Spring to arrive!! We've had enough snow. We are all done with the oohs and ahhhs o fit all!! It's lost its 'pretty'.

Well we are back to our rainy winter weather! YUCK!! Now its wet and dreary!!

Where is the Spring???

Scrap-Jacking!

Here is my 'Jack'!

This looks much better IRL!! The painted colors around the photo are much brighter!!

This was fun. Doing something a bit different for me, and I like how it turned out.

For those that don't know what that means, click on the link in my sidebar. (Scrapjacked)

That'll tell you what Scrap-jacking is about.

Another layout

Heres a layout I did yesterday, finally.
I've been tyring all week to get this one done.
I used my DW 2007 calendar for it.
Day Feb 24/25 - Create a layout composed entirely of photos.
I wasn't really sure about the idea, but I really like how it turned out!

So my Little Girl LOVES Ribs!!

We went to TGIF's for my birthday dinner out. On the kids menu they
had ribs. Elizabeth insisted on ordering the ribs. Promised she would eat them all.

She scarfed them!!

All over her face and everything!!

She ate them all, like a big girl!!

A HUGE prize pkg I won!!

Thought I'd share here this HUGE prize pkg I got.

I got it from Rachel Cohara after answering 15 questions on her Blog(linked on my sidebar) and getting them ALL right!!

Here are the pictures of everything I got!!!!

WOW!!!

Some new Layouts I've done.

Heres more of the pages I've done in this last month.
I did this for a contest.
Had to do one on my Favorite....??? This is done as my Favorite
Christmas present!
This was done for the http://timelessinspirations.com TI race. I had to use paint to make my background paper. This didn't turn out
quite like I was visualizing, but I'll keep it cuz it's different.
I used a http://www.pagemaps.com/index.htm Becky Fleck sketch for this one. It was a contest on http://www.pubcalls.blogspot.com/ Pubcalls. This was done for the http://timelessinspirations.com/ TI race. I had to have a few things on the page. 5 different alphabets/fonts/stickers etc, a Triangle, 3 photos, 4 ribbons & the colors Black and Red.
This was for http://timelessinspirations.com/ TI too. I had to make an altered Doorknob hanger with these items-- three different lettering visible (three different types of stickers, dies, stamps etc...), chipboard, three stars, swirls, distress ink . This is for Jacquie's door.
Another for the http://timelessinspirations.com/ TI race. I had to incorporate 25 circles somehow.

This is another I did for the http://timelessinspirations.com/ TI race. I had to do Hand-Stitching on the page somehow. Again, it didn't turn out as I visualized, but theres parts I like so I'll keep it.
This is a photo of the room Donnie and I stayed in last year for our anniversary. I LOVE this picture. I sat down to do a page with this photo and saw this sketch, at http://ericassketchit.blogspot.com/ Sketch it! and knew it would be perfect. I LOVE how this turned out!

Cheer Camp

So we signed Elizabeth up for Cheerleader Camp. She's always telling us she wants to cheer and she's always cheering with Jacquie, so when they planned this week we decided to let her do it.

The girls went everyday for a week with the Wrestling and Basketball cheerleaders teaching them. They learned , I think, 4 cheers and they will perform at one (or both) of two basketball games.

Here are a couple pictures of
Elizabeth during her practices. She did pretty good learning
the cheers!



Here are a couple I took of Jacquie
with the group of girls she and her partner had to teach. The top
one is great! I caught them right in the middle of the star form jump.
Great action shot!

This is ALL the little girls that signed
up for the Cheer Camp. There was quite a turn out and it was fun
watching them all!


It was a fun week and Elizabeth will perform on Friday night at the
boys basketball game.

Look what I did!!!

This is my first!!

I was at http://www.theshakerbox.com/ and she gave awesome step by step
directions to teach how to do it.
This is my very first ever DIGITAL LO!!! :D
It's missing the ribbon and one of the papers isn't placed where it's
supposed to have been, (we can't figure out why it won't place right)
but it's still done and I DID IT!!!

You can see it here:
http://i14.photobucket.com/albums/a326/donlu4/LOVEPGSCRATCH.jpg

I used my new program I got for Christmas, Photoshop Elements!!!
Now I'm going to try again, seeing what I can remember (probably using the
tutorial again).


OK well blogger won't let me add a picture right now, so I'll try later! UGH!!

Couple more pages

Heres a couple more pages.
This was done from my DW 2007.


This on eI just did. I love these pictures of the girls!