The best part...

This month's theme is focused on telling the story of what we love about our town.

By far, our favorite things to do outdoors in our town, revolve around our trail system.  We can count on the trails to be a shady retreat in the summer, a brilliant display of color in the fall and until the first snow fall, the trees provide a protective screen from the winter winds.

Several times a year we ride our bikes on the trail as a family. We bike all the way downtown and have lunch at a terrific local pub and grill. I also try to run the trail as often as I can.

Here's the layout I created to tell our trail story.

And as you can see, even our dog, Tucker, had to be included.  I just say, "Let's go to the trail!" and he is ready to go.

Here's another close-up.

So, what's your favorite thing to do in your town?

Leslie

waiting...

After I got the kids off to school yesterday, I went to my local running/multi-sport store to buy a much needed new pair of running shoes.  The shoes I've been running in were an Addidas stability shoe and they were wonderful. Loved them and running was good.  Recently, I've been getting sore spots on the outside of my toe and it's been really painful to run past 3 miles, so I knew it was time for a new shoe.

Richard runs in Newton's and loves them.  I thought since they now offer a stablitity version of Newtons I'd give them a try.  I got to "test drive" the original Newton and really was surprised how much I liked them, but after video taping me run in them the staff decided I really did need the stability version (I now mildly pronate on one foot and supinate on the other, most likely due to my foot surgery two years ago.)

Now I must wait for my shoe to arrive from another location, hopefully by Monday.  I will be waiting most impatiently. :)

ah, the first day...

Thanks to Miles' early morning swim team practice for the last week and a half, the rising early this morning was a piece of cake.

Before Miles left to catch the bus, I went over a little list of things he might have forgotten.  Indeed he had forgotten Gatorade for swim team practice this afternoon.  (It's so good to feel useful as a mother at this age.  At least I'm good for reminders. )

Had him pose for a few photos before he started off on his way to the bus stop. I totally can't believe we have a freshman in our house!!

Emily was up and pretty much ready by the time Miles left. We made her lunch, one she had planned the menu for sometime last week. :)  We packed a whole wheat wrap with peanut butter and chopped apples (the recipe also called for granola, but being the busy mom I have been, I didn't get to make any last night).  She also packed celery sticks and Goldfish. Sounds like a healthy lunch to me!

By the time we were ready to go the sun was shinning very brightly, so I had her sit in the one patch of shade still left in the front of the house.  Check out those bags!  She's might proud of her Pottery Barn Teen backpack and lunch box.  (One of which she bought with her own money.)

This is the first year, since we moved here ,that I have committed to driving Emily to school every day.  Richard drove Miles to middle school in the mornings for 2 years because it was on his way to work.  Since Richard is unable to drive Emily to middle school this year, I told her I would take her.

Needless to say, Tucker did not want to be left at home, so he got to ride to school too. He's certainly going to miss catching the bus each morning. He loved that part of the school day routine.

Now, I must totally admit how much I have enjoyed the stillness of being alone in an empty house this morning. I didn't know I missed it. ;) It's not like they are little and are very needy at this age, but it's been quite nice.  I'm totally banking on having more time to get some work done, scrapbook and go to lunch with a friend and most definitely get back into regular posting here on my blog!

A Really BIG giveaway/contest!!

This month's theme for the GCD Studio's Design Team is focused on our hometowns. (My layout will be posted on the 24th of August.)  We want you to play along and have the  chance to win this fabulous prize!!!

Here is how you enter:

1. Simply make a layout about your home/town (this theme is inspired by our DT's theme this month)
2. Send it to HSonboul@gcdstudios.com by Aug 29th no later then 12PM PST
3. You must use at least 20% GCD Studios, which means 1 or two papers or a few embellies :)

Then, Heidi will pick the top 5 layouts and post it on the blog with a poll. The person with the most votes will wins the prize above.

See the GCD Studio's Blog for the post.

Food creativity

It seems in this busy summer I've had little time for creativity beyond cooking.  Just too busy and on the go right now.  I've been looking for a good Lettuce Wrap recipe for a while now and have found one Emily and I really like. (Our friends, who visited a week ago, gave it a huge thumbs up as well.)


The basic recipe was found on Pioneer Woman's blog.  I made a few adjustments based on what I could find locally.  The recipe called for peanut sustay/chili sauce, which I have yet to find.  I realized with the last recipe I had tried that fish sauce is beyond nasty (it stinks like rotten fish!) and will not be using that again.

Here are the basic ingredients I used for the sauce.

I mixed this all into the browned chicken and vegetables...

And then enjoyed it with romaine lettuce which we liked better than ice burg lettuce. :)

Here's the link to the complete recipe.

A quick trip in the name of love...

This weekend I took a quick trip to north Louisiana to visit my dear friend Dana and attend her daughter's wedding. The wedding was beautiful and was filled with such wonderful little personal touches.  I took the opportunity to "play" photographer and did my best to capture the day.

I'm most proud of capturing this moment, as the real photographer had left the bride's room to get ready for the wedding.  Too sweet.

The reception offered great lighting around the cake and then some real challenges elsewhere for the flash-hater that I am. :)  Here it was fabulous.

On the dance floor, the back lighting was pretty severe.  I eventually found some settings that worked pretty well, when people weren't moving. (And since it was a dance floor, that didn't always work so great.)

Most of the time, moving to a new vantage point makes a world of difference, as best illustrated in this photo of my friend Dana, dancing with her son, Ryan.

Definitely a good learning experience.  Don't see myself "going pro" anytime soon. ;) But it was fun!

 I also got to spend some time with my sister-in-law and her family who recently got 2 adorable puppies.  There's nothing quite like puppy kisses! Good quality time with friends and family all around.

Version 2.0

In my last post for GCD Studios, I shared a butterfly necklace I made using the Melody Ross chipboard and butterfly patterned paper.  It was such a hit on the blog, I decided to share a different version of the necklace.  This one was given away as well. I would still like to make another one for me to wear, but now I can't decide which one I like best. ;)

Wearable Art...A Necklace

Today, I have a fun piece of wearable art to share. It's super simple craft to create using the Urban Artsy line by Melody Ross.

I love all the gorgeous butterflies in this line. I can use them on a million different layouts, but unfortunately most of the time the end up tucked away in my scrapbooks.  I wanted to create something that will show them off and make a "statement" piece of jewelry.

Here's what you'll need:  Butterfly paper from the Melody Ross collection, black paint, Dimensional Adhesive (I used Glossy Accents by Close to My Heart) and a large butterfly from the GCD Chipart Chipboard, chain, jump rings, a clasp, jewelry wire and a few of your favorite beads.

I started by selecting a butterfly that closely matched the chipboard piece I picked out.  I painted the front and back of the chipboard black and cut out my butterfly.

Once the paint was dry, I placed the butterfly on top of the chipboard and trimmed around it until it fit just inside the chipboard edges and glued it in place.

Next, I used my Crop-A-Dile to make two holes in the chipboard and applied the dimensional glue. You want to completely cover the piece with the glue. The result will give your butterfly a fabulous epoxy like finish.

Once the butterfly was completely dry (it takes a couple hours to set completely), I added a jump ring to each corner, added some beads and attached it to a chain.

Here's the finished project.  I also used the same beads on the necklace to create a matching pair of earrings.

I ended up giving this one to my mother-in-law, who we visited recently and adores all things butterflies.  I guess I'll have to make another one for me. ;)