And The Winners Are...

First I have to thank all of you for commenting and visiting my little corner of cyber space! I love sharing ideas, thoughts and projects with you and I loved hearing about Summer memories and traditions you have all given me such great ideas!!

I put everyone's name on a slip of paper, folded them up and put them in one of the many Tupperware containers I have and my sweet hubby picked the four winners out of the container and so without further ado the winners are:

Sheila: A fun summer tradition we like to do is in my birthday month (aug) we
rent a pontoon boat and gather up the kids and grandkids and spend the day on the lake--always alot of fun--thanks for having this fun giveaway ♥

Mary: Summer Tradition - we really don't have one.. but you got me thinking. I think starting next year we will have a picnic with all family and friends, for the 4th of July.. this is one way to get them all together. thanks for this question. you just started a tradition for us. :-)

Tanya: We love to drive over to Grills at the Port to eat and watch the cruise ships and boats. Actually, we do this year round, not just in the summer, but I really want some of your stash, hahaha!

Betty Anne: Wow great giveaway Danielle. My favorite summer memory is having a family reunion at the cottage we used to go to as kids. I had a treasure hunt just like my Mom used to do with us each summer only this time it was with her Grandchildren and Great Grandchildren. It brought back so many great memories.

Ok gals email me your mailing info at DaniNYC12677@gmail.com and I will get these mailed out as soon as possible!! I hope you will share with me some of the projects you create with these goodies!

The Great Summer Stash Giveaway!

Lately my scrapbooking room has gotten completely out of control. So out of control that I can't actually scrapbook in there! I go in and pull out supplies and then take over the dining room table to actually work and put pages together. So I thought it was time to take action and take back my scrapbooking space!

I started to go through items, making tons of piles, finding products I had totally forgotten about, finding immediate inspiration in other items, but then found products I purchased for very specific projects that I've long ago completed and I also found items that I had several of so I started another pile - A Giveaway Pile!!

A few weeks ago I was very lucky to win a giveaway on the lovely Curious Key blog and after receiving my amazing package of goodies I was inspired to host a giveaway of my own. So in celebration of Summer, in celebration of you my awesome readers and in celebration of being able to see the table in my scrapbooking room again I give you The Great Summer Stash Giveaway!!!

Just leave a comment on this post sharing your favorite Summer memory or Summer tradition and I will randomly select 4 lucky winners! Each will receive a package packed with goodies from my stash! I will choose winners this Saturday!

Here are a few photos of some of the items! GOOD LUCK!

Rut or Reboot?

You might remember that in May I joined Lain Ehman's Layout a Day workshop and I scrapbooked like I never scrapbooked before.

I scrapbooked old photos

This photo was taken in the mid-80s

and new photos.

These photos were taken only 4 days before the layout was created! I almost never get photos turned into layouts this quick!

I told stories I've been waiting to tell and showcased loved ones.

Got to show off pictures from my cousin Denise's visit!!
And I got to tell this story which has been a part of me for a long time

I tried my hand at digital scrapbooking




and did a page with no photos.



Through it all I learned quite a bit about myself and my scrapbooking style. Then May 31st rolled around and Layout a Day ended and since then I have done absolutely no scrapbooking! Did I run out of stories? Ideas? Energy? I sure didn't run out of supplies!!

I started to seriously think I was just deeply stuck in a rut, but then I noticed that Mike and I were getting out and doing things. I was spending more time gathering inspiration from blogs and magazines and doing all that made me realize it isn't a rut I'm stuck in just a reboot. I'm getting out, enjoying time with friends, taking tons of photos as usual and gathering tons of inspiration. I've been focusing on other life things too like doing yoga ever day which has been a reboot for my body and soul. I've been working big time on this little blog and I have huge things in store including guest bloggers and giveaways!

And just like that I'm out of my rut fully rebooted and ready to create and that's just what I did tonight!

These photos were taken just over the weekend - for this layout I used a sketch on Let's Scrap. It felt good to pull out my papers, glue and distress stickles again!!

Summer Lovin' Part 1

Sometimes I take things for granted, sometimes I don't take advantage of all life and the world around me has to offer and oftentimes I let laziness and fear stand in my way of doing things that I know I would enjoy. I am working very hard to change these patterns and I'm doing and experiencing more so I thought a fun way to showcase some of these experiences would be to show what I'm loving about Summer right now! I will probably do this a few more times before Summer is over and then start again with a Falling for Fall series. I hope you enjoy the things I'm loving about Summer right now!!

1. Iced Coffee - especially made at home with Starbuck's iced Via made in my reusable Starbucks cup!



2. The beach!! Oh my gosh I love that we are going to the beach this Summer and I can't believe that we let years go by where we didn't go at all. This year we managed to get there once on our own and once with Monika and Dave both times were so much fun and so special and we have more happy plans to go to the beach in the future!!



3. Buying fabulous fresh vegetables at the Farmer's Market and then using them in fabulous recipes like Rachael Ray's Summer Vegetable Pasta!! I bought the zucchini at the Celebration Farmer's Market one Sunday morning with my friend Claire and I used fresh corn and we were so happy with how this recipe turned out. It's light and flavorful! A great Summer recipe to have in your back pocket.



4. Making new friends! Believe it or not I can be shy about talking to new people and I've been doing a lot to break out of my shell a bit and we've gotten to know many of our neighbors and they have turned into friends and it has been fabulous!!!



5. Yoga! I've been trying to do a little yoga every day this Summer - I spent a lot of time doing yoga before Mike and I got married and like so many things I let it fall to the wayside, I've happily taken it back up and it feels great!! I also get a kick out of how the fur babies play with the yoga mat!



Stay tuned for more Summer Lovin'!

A Super Fabulous 4th of July

I'm not sure it would have been possible to have a better 4th of July celebration then the one we had! Sure it rained and our outdoor barbecue turned into an indoor fiesta but that was the only, and might I say very small, drawback to the entire day. We got together with some of the most awesome people, I mean seriously we are very lucky to call this group not only our neighbors but our friends!



Of course we had so much food that would could have fed most of Central Florida but what can you do when you get so many people together who like to both cook and eat haha! Mike made probably the best ribs I have ever tasted in my life - I can't share the recipe because very simply there wasn't one he just made it up as he went and wow he did an excellent job, he also made barbecue chicken, hamburgers and hot dogs. I added potato salad to the mix, I had never made potato salad before but I think I got the hang of it pretty quickly. I used several potato salad recipes as guidelines but adding my own touches here and there and nothing was really measured. I used red potatoes, sour cream, mayo, chives, bacon and cheddar cheese - I was going for that baked potato vibe! I also made coleslaw for the first time - I made Tyler Florence's Savoy, Lime and Cilantro Coleslaw though I didn't use savoy cabbage I did everything else the same, you can find the recipe here. Wow it came so yummy, even Mike liked it and he's not real big on coleslaw! I was so proud of these dishes but probably my favorite thing I made for the 4th of July feast were these delicious lemon cookies I found in a Rachael Ray magazine - you can find the recipe here. Oh my gosh they were super easy to make and so so so so good! They will be added to my regular cookie rotation I assure you. So that sounds like quite a lot of food already doesn't it? Then we had spicy beans brought by Mara, chicken and fantastic pasta salad brought by Cynthia and Marie, cupcakes from Kathy and Nikko and cookies from Sheryl! And I know I'm leaving out some dishes!! We were eating leftovers for DAYS! And that is so not a complaint!!



It was just so nice having our neighbors here, it was laid back, we laughed a lot and chatted and really got to know one another. Hooper loved having so many people to play with especially Lacey who he absolutely adores - but then again who doesn't I should only be so lucky to have a daughter like her someday! It was fun playing cards with Cynthia and Marie and then to top off the evening we went outside and Mike shot off fireworks! Of course it was raining but we still managed to have fun and what a way to end the night snacking with gals! The next day we took some leftovers over to Claire who I am so happy to be spending more time with these days. I can't say enough how lucky we are to have the neighbors we do, to have these awesome holiday parties with, to hang out by the pool with and just to know we have great people around that we can turn to - it is very comforting. So needless to say our 4th of July was a blast and I see many more fabulous gatherings in our future!



*note - 4th of July embellishments added to the photos are from House of 3*

More Then Meets the Eye

Before Mike and I got together I would have never figured I would not only go to a Transformers convention but go willingly and actually enjoy it!!! Those of you who know Mike, know that he collects Transformers, he's seen every episode of every one of the cartoons, he has the animated and live action movies, he knows everything there is to know about all the characters which is both cute and a bit scary! And those of you who have been to our apartment know that he has a huge wall lined with shelves filled with figures - he has over 300 figures and more then half of them are on display in our office - so when Mike told me that the BotCon was going to be in Orlando - and not only in Orlando but at the Dolphin Resort just ten little minutes from the house I knew we had to go!




Leading up to the convention I seemed way more excited about going then Mike was but once we got there Mike went from booth to booth telling me where each character came from, how much the figures were worth, which figures he had as a kid or still has (I find it kinda hard to tell one from the other) and which figures he was hoping to pick up. I loved listening to him talk about this and I was trying hard to do math in my head to see how much I could get for his collection haha!






It was a great day, taking silly pictures and just spending time with Mike doing something he loves - goodness knows I drag him to enough Danielle things.