I'm there------->again today

I didn't finish my creative crafts today so I don't have anything artsy crafty to show.

I am however over at . I've written a post about addiction, should be a good read. Do come over and show some love and support..thanks.

What I Meant to Say....Week 4

What I said when my son Chris' high school counselor called me when I was out on a date with my hubby celebrating our anniversary Monday night to tell me that my son is acting up in class, if we're having problem at home was "hump, nope, not that I know of."

What I meant to say and should have said was "nope, there isn't any problem at home but now that you called there definitely is going to be problem at home once I get my hands on my son. You have just succeeded in ruining a beautiful night where I've finally gotten to eat at this great Restaurant I've been dying to eat at for years and you couldn't wait to call and ruin which by the way it is seven o'clock at night...I have been home all day, why in the world didn't you call me then?"

I do would like to know why the school officials or staff like to assume that once a kid misbehave or act like hormonal teenagers that there is problem at home. Don't they know that teenagers are pickle creatures, one minute they can be the world's best kids in the world and the next they are like the devil re-reincarnate?

There ya go...my WIMTS Wednesday...click on the button up there if you'd like to read more of these from other bloggers or if you'd like unload something off your chest that you really meant to say but is too polite to have otherwise done so.

Later!!

Happy Anniversary Darling!!

Today is my hub's and my 19th wedding anniversary. Wow!! 19 years...that is a long time. I am actually being married a lot longer than I was single, imagine that. Pretty soon, I might start thinking that I was born married...eheheh. This is the card I made two weeks ago for my hubby. I bought the stamp a while back and I love using it because when my hub and were dating back in our college days, we were always poor being students and all...the beach was most of place of hangout. He loves the ocean, I have lukewarm feelings for the ocean (well, I did grow up around the ocean so I guess the ocean and I should have some form of bond, right? LOL) so it seemed like most of our dates would either start at the beach or ended at the beach. Those were fun-filled days. Now with all the obligations of being parents, work, and all other obligations, we don't get to spend much time alone like that on the beach anymore.

Anyways, reflecting on all these years we've been married, I've grown so much. Being married is hard but it also has its benefit. I love this man I married so much even when he's driving me nuts and I'm getting under his skin, I never thought I could've love anyone this greatly.

To my hub:

Happy Anniversary honey. Can you believe it? It's been nineteen years since we both said our "I DO's". Did you predict we would have come this far? I guess you did, you've always been one to set a goal and set out after it, no matter how hard the task it, you would tackle it with all the might, mind, strength and power you have to make sure it is completed.

I know there have been many times where I seem to have dragged my feet when it comes to our relationship and on those days, I needed your strength and confidence to pick myself up, to keep rowing or moving forward and I am deeply grateful that you are there right by my side to help me make it through. I guess you never anticipated that this sweet little island girl would have so much issues and rebellion in her, did you?

Just know that even when I'm being a major pain in the butt more often than I care to recall, you are the best thing that have ever stepped into my life. I admire your courage (for always standing up for what you believe in), your tenacity and however twisted it sounded sometimes, I like that you have a sense of humor. I love how even when we're totally in the heat of an argument, you could pull up something really funny out of the blue just to stem the fight right there. There are so many things I love about you and more I'm discovering over the years.

You are a great father and a wonderful husband and I can honestly say I'm truly blessed to call you mine. Although I look at our marriage as a roller coaster ride, I am truly enjoying every moment of it and I am absolutely happy that I am riding this roller coaster with you. I love you and Happy 19th Anniversary.

With all my heart!!

I'm over there------> today!!

Instead of posting something here today, let me direct you here or just click on that button. I am the contributor there today. Do come over and show some love and support. I am writing about how my family dealt with my hubby's job losses he had a few years ago.

Mahalo!!

Book Reviews.."The Wednesday Letters"

I was supposed to post some creative cards I made for a challenge but I didn't finish or even started on them yet so I am going to do a book review today. I just realized that I've read at least two books since my last review for book club and haven't mentioned anything about them.

Last month the book our club read was The Wednesday Letters. This book would have been a great book to read for valentine since it's got some romance in it.

The Wednesday Letters written by Jason F. Wright, a New York Times Bestseller.

They died in each other's arms. But their secret-the letters-did not die with them. True love keeps no secrets. Jack and Laurel have been married for 39 years. They've live a good life and appear to have had the perfect marriage. With his wife cradled in his arms. and before Jack takes his final breath, he scribbles his last "Wednesday Letter."

When their adult children arrive to arrange the funeral, they discover boxes and boxes full of love letters that their father wrote to their mother each week on Wednesday. As they begin to open and read the letters. the children uncover the shocking truth about their past.

In addition, each one must deal with present-day challenges. Matthew has a troubled marriage, Samantha is a single mother, and Malcolm is the black sheep of the family who has returned home after a mysterious two-year absence.

Did that catch your attention yet? LOL It did mine. As soon as I read that I just have to read the book to see what secrets the couple has been hiding. Of course the book also talked about forgiveness. I love the fact that the husband, Jack, love his wife so much that he made the committment on their wedding day that every week on Wednesday he would write a letter to his wife whether she was in the same room or another state. It was totally sweet and romantic. Sometimes his letters were long and descriptive, other times it's short and sweet.

Anyways, as the review above read, the couple died in each other's arm. Jack has been battling a terminal illness so everyone have anticipated that he would soon be gone but no one in their wildest imaginings can picture that Laurel would die on the same night as Jack...in fact, she died of an heart attack and minutes before Jack died. On his final breath, he wrote his last letter to his wife.

I find incredibly hard that the kids didn't even know anything at all about the letters, that they only discovered those boxes in the basement. My first reaction to it was "what?! How can that be? Don't kids usually explore that they discover things that parents often think they've hidden from them?" Obviously, those kids must not be that into exploring...LOL. But then as I read further, I guess you could say I am glad they didn't see those letters while the parents were still alive. You see, the dad when writing to the mom, he recounted everything, day to day life that there was a secret that they had kept from the kids, he revealed it all in his letters. When the grown kids read those particular letters, there were some contentions, anger and feelings of betrayal. But I am definitely not going into detail about what that secret is. You can can find out for yourself by reading the book.

Yes, I would recommend anyone to read this book. It's a great read and totally worth the time and the money.

What I Meant to Say....Week 3

Aloha all....

It's that time again...WIMTS Wednesday. I do look forward to this day because you see, I need to express exactly what I meant to say that I otherwise cannot say in real life sometimes. And my sanity totally depends on this, that's why I chose to participate in this weekly post...It's actually fun and I encourage any of you to try it, if not for any other reason then let it be for the fun part. So, here goes nothing:

To my son when I told him to take the garbage out yesterday. What I meant to say was...take all the garbage out of the house and deposit them in the big gigantic gray garbage can at our front gate, not just the kitchen garbage but every garbage in the house and don't leave them behind the back door where all that garbage is starting to pile up to look like it's the garbage dump itself.

To my daughter when I told her to wash the dishes. What I meant to say was don't just wash plates only...washing the dishes means you wash all the plates, bowls, silver wares, the pots and pans we cook with, all the serving dishes and for the love of all that is holy, will you please wipe down the counter and behind the kitchen sink so that there's not a huge puddle of water sitting on the counter that it practically looks huge enough for a person to fall in and drown herself?!!

Seems like lately when I tell the kids to do their chores, they've been doing the job haphazardly. Now it's your turn...hook up with Chief and play her game or just click on the tag up there.

Mahalo and happy blogging to ya!! God bless!!

Friday Night Date

Last Friday I mentioned that my friend Swirl, myself and a friend of ours are making a valentine dinner for our hubbies and making it a triple date. Everything went perfectly except our friend ended up not coming because they got surprise tickets to see Jon Bon Jovi concert. So we went from a triple to a double date. It was a fun night.

It was THE perfect night...we had it at Swirl's house. All the kids were out of the house, her older boys were sent to a Ward activity while the youngest son was taken to my house to be watched by the daughter. And the food...it was absolutely delicious.

Here we are...Swirl and I in her kitchen getting the food ready before the hubs showed up.
We had Argentinian steak with Jasmine rice which our friend Isabelle, before she left for the concert, was kind enough to prepare for us, the seasoning at least. And I made stir-fry Zucchini to go with the main dish.
Oh, we totally went out with this dinner date. Each of us had an assignment: our friend Isabelle was in charge of the main dish, the steak and the Jasmine rice, I was in charge of making a stir-fry zucchini to go with the main dish...for appetizers, I made spinach/pastry wheel and Swirl made her famous specialty drink called Lime Slushy. And for dessert, we made brownie which was cut in heart shaped and topped with vanilla ice-cream squirted with some chocolate syrup. Yum!!!
First suitor who showed up was my hubby...as soon as he walked in the door, Swirl gave him the drink and told him to have a seat, put up his feet, relax and enjoy the drink. See the look on his face? He couldn't believe his good fortune, u know to be pampered by two gorgeous babes...ahahahah. (Of course, I have to confess to him that while he's at work, once a month I played the role of fine dining cook...LOL..I think he actually gave me an incredulous look that said exactly, "and why haven't I seen any result of that cooking? LOL...kidding.)

Then came Swirl's hubby. She gave the drink and told him the same thing she told my hubby, to relax and enjoy his drink, that dinner will be served in five minutes. Of course we gave them the appetizers to hold them over til dinner is ready.


Here we are showing off our finished products and taking turn serving our hubbies their dinner.
I think Swirl and I might have overdone it a little because my hub was still holding his breath wondering what am I up to and how much that was gonna cost him and the first thing that came out of Swirl's hubby's mouth was: "I feel like we've been set up." How rude!! We did a great thing and they had suspicions. Of course, Swirl and I were in such good mood, so proud of our accomplishments, we even decided to play along and feed on their suspicions that after we finished eating I looked over at Swirl and said; "should we tell them now?"

Both hubbies threw their hands up in the air and declared, "we knew it, you girls were up to something!" Ahahahah...it was really fun teasing them like that. Of course, we had to reassure them that we were joking. We really did want them to have a great night and all that month's preparation to put together that night was a way to show how much we love them and appreciate all they do for us. After which, Swirl brought out a game of Sequence for us to play for the rest of the evening. I know, I was enjoying the evening so much I forgot to continue taking pictures. We had a great time...my hubby was so impressed and enjoyed himself so much he couldn't stop talking about it. Every time anyone asked him what we planned to do for Valentine's day he'd tell them, my wife treated me to a wonderful dinner and of course, he would recount in detail of our fun night.

Swirl and I are planning for more of these fun date nights....hopefully our other cooking partner and her hubby will be able to make it next time. I do look forward to more of this kinda dates. Thanks Swirl and hubby for the use of your home and for a great night. Thanks hub for being a great sport and for cancelling meetings and other obligations for that night to spend it with me.

Happy Valentine's Day

Just want y'all to know I'm thinking about you and am real grateful to have the chance to meet you all through this wonderful world of blogging. I hope everyone is having a great Valentine's day today.

So from me to you...Happy Valentine's Day!!

Love always,

A Little Humor

Aloha,
My BFF, Swirl and I along with another friend of ours are planning a special Valentine dinner for our hubbies tonight. I don't know if I've mentioned before but the three of us have been getting together every month to do a little cooking...Swirl has all these fancy cooking magazine so we thought we'd taught ourselves to make some fun, easy, quick yet absolutely delicious meals that we could introduce to our families during dinner sometimes. It was all her idea and I admit, we are pretty darn good. Anyways, we've decided to prepare one of those fancy meals for our husbands tonight and just have a great valentine. I will be posting pictures and updates next week. In the meantime, I thought I'd share something I got in my email from a cousin of mine...it's a little humor to kinda end the week with...sorta. Hopefully, it might bring out some smiles and maybe a bit of giggles too. Here goes:

When I was a kid, adults used to bore me to tears with their tedious diatribes about how hard things were. When they were growing up; what with walking Twenty-five miles to school every morning.... Uphill... barefoot... BOTH ways Yadda, yadda, yadda

And I remember promising myself that when I grew up, there was no way in hell I was going to lay a bunch of crap like that on my kids about how hard I had it and how easy they've got it!

But now that... I'm over the ripe old age of thirty, I can't help but look around and notice the youth of today.

You've got it so easy! I mean, compared to my childhood, you live in a damn Utopia!

And I hate to say it, but you kids today, you don't know how good you've got it!

I mean, when I was a kid we didn't have The Internet. If we wanted to know something, we had to go to the damn library and look it up ourselves, in the card catalogue!!

There was no email!! We had to actually write somebody a letter - with a pen!

Then you had to walk all the way across the street and put it in the mailbox and it would take, like, a week to get there! Stamps were 10 cents!

Child Protective Services didn't care if our parents beat us. As a matter of fact, the parents of all my friends also had permission to kick our ass! Nowhere was safe!

There were no MP3' s or Napsters! If you wanted to steal music, you had to hitchhike to the damn record store and shoplift it yourself!

Or you had to wait around all day to tape it off the radio and the DJ would usually talk over the beginning and screwed it all up! There were no CD players! We had tape decks in our car. We'd play our favorite tape and "eject" it when finished and the tape would come undone. Cause - that's how we rolled, dig?

We didn't have fancy crap like Call Waiting! If you were on the phone and somebody else called they got a busy signal, that's it!

And we didn't have fancy Caller ID either!
When the phone rang, you had no idea who it was! It could be your school, your mom, your boss, your bookie, your drug dealer, a collections agent, you just didn't know!!! You had to pick it up and take your chances, mister!

We didn't have any fancy Sony Playstation video games with high-resolution 3-D graphics! We had the Atari 2600! With games like 'Space Invaders' and 'Asteroids'. Your guy was a little square! You actually had to use your imagination!! And there were no multiple levels or screens, it was just one screen... forever!
And you could never win. The game just kept getting harder and harder and faster and faster until you died! Just like LIFE!

You had to use a little book called a TV Guide to find out what was on! You were screwed when it came to channel surfing! You had to get off your ass and walk over to the TV to change the channel! NO REMOTES!!!

There was no Cartoon Network either! You could only get cartoons on Saturday Morning. Do you hear what I'm saying!?! We had to wait ALL WEEK for cartoons, you spoiled little rat-bastards!

And we didn't have microwaves, if we wanted to heat something up we had to use the stove! Imagine that!

That's exactly what I'm talking about! You kids today have got it too easy. You're spoiled. You guys wouldn't have lasted five minutes back in 1980 or before!

Regards,
The Over 30 Crowd

Hope you enjoy that. Have a great weekend and God bless!

Totally fun creations and a birthday shout-out

I have been having so much getting back to what I love doing...stamping. I've even join a challenge week hosted by the Splitcoaststampers, they really have some fun stuff there.

I made four different projects from four weeks of challenge on their page. They have been doing their challenges for a while but I just join so here are the first four weeks worth of projects I made.

The first week was called Easel card: You can lay it down flat like in the first picture to mail and the second picture shows you how you display it. Look at that...a card that came with its own easel. You don't even have to lean it up against something for it to stand...clever uh? This card idea came just in time for our card swap so I made a dozen of these for our swap. A lot of work...There are at least three different technique used on this card. The images were watercolored...then I used punches to cut out the sentiments and I used my brand new cricut to make the grass at the bottom of the card. I even use StampinUp's newest punch that's in our Sellabration this month.


The next item is an File Folder Notebook...this makes for a great gift. There's a little note pad inside and can be used for anything. I didn't complete decorating it yet because I haven't decided what I'm going to use this one for. I might add more embellishments later and add some sentiments to it too.Above picture shows what it looks like closed and the next picture shows what's inside and how it looks opened.
The next one is a Valentine Treat Bag Cover. Isn't it cute.

You can open it up and put some treats in it...totally great for Valentine. Of course, you can change the image on there and use it for any occassion.

Now this next card...I'm gonna have to say is MY favorite. It's called Folded Paper Frame card. My anniversary is in a week and this is the card I'm giving my husband. I made a card last year using the same stamp (you can check that card out here). I was soo proud of this one, I couldn't stop showing it off to the kids and my hub. I know, I take the surprise out of it by showing it to him already but I can't help it. He likes it and I know he will display it at work like a trophy...eheheh.

I had so much fun, I decided to make some Valentine treats for Danny and Joey's classmates. Luckily for me, all I have to do was ordered the cut-out treat boxes from StampinUp and make the box below. My boys totally loved this one...loved that they get to play aliens giving away treats to their human friends...LOL.

Of course, I didn't want to stop there...I just have to make this little treat basket...so easy to make. And look, it even has treats in it...eheheh.


The next card was what I demo for our card group last month called Envelope card. Not exactly the same color but the same technique. The idea came from Dawn. See, it looks like a card and then...
you flip oven the flap and you have a little pouch inside to put little treats. Yes, I know, most of the crafts today are treat oriented...can you blame me? It's valentine month and treat giving is a must...no? LOL

Finally...this last little image I have I made it on My Digital Studio, a Christmas gift I got from one of my best and dearest friends. Anyways, today is LoW's birthday. She one of those bloggers I follow and have immensely enjoyed her blog. She just wrote a love story about how she met her husband on her blog...it is a must read...totally romantic....(sighs) If you guys are not too busy, stop by her place and wish a happy birthday...she doesn't even know I made this for her. I wish I could see her face when she sees this..eheh. Happy Birthday, LoW...hope you're enjoying your birthday.
So, there ya have it...I promised last week I was going to put some crafty something something and I am keeping my word. Hope you like my little creations today. Have a great day blogging and God bless!!

Another week of What I meant to say....

When I smiled and kindly responded to my 2nd grader's teacher that I will talk to my son, what I meant to say and should've said was....

"You do not go straight to the principal's office to get them to do something about my son without consulting with me first. If you are so concerned about him like you said you did, why the heck didn't you call me or send me a note? Hell, you have my home, cell, my hubby's cell and work numbers, three of my friends's home and cell numbers....shit, you even have my MIL's home and cell phone numbers and she lives in another state, I'd damn well give you my parents' phone number if they were still alive and the school could afford to have you call long distance, why the heck didn't you call me? Seriously, how hard is it to get a hold of me when you practically have all those numbers within your fingertips?

You have a problem with my son, call me for heaven's sake. Don't say you've been meaning to get a hold of me and then go whining to the principal's office about my son. And another thing, stop comparing my son to his older sister who was in your class a few years ago. I get it, she was a good student, very obedient and happens to like you and your class, that doesn't mean my son will be the same way. Just cuz they come from the same two parents doesn't mean they will act the same way.

And while we're at it...maybe you're just too boring for my son to sit in your class and listen to your monotonic voice for six hours of the day, ever think about that? Sheesh, all I wanted to do was to get a class list to make some valentine treats for the kids and you had to go to all whiny on me...ever heard of the right time and place for everything?"

Now, it's your turn, hit up Chief at her place and play along.

For he's a jolly good fellow......

I just realized that I've overlooked a couple of things from last month. My oldest son Chris had a birthday and yes, we did celebrate it but I forgot to post it. He turned 15 and I don't know, it seems like he just shot up in a few weeks. He went from being a small and short boy to being the tallest among the kids and oh my gosh, his voice is deeper than I remembered. How the heck did he go and grow up on me overnight without me noticing?

Like I've mentioned before, we don't do an all-out birthday party unless it's one of those milestone birthdays. As a tradition we started after kid number five come into the picture was that they get to pick their favorite food and mom prepared a special dinner for them. And it has to be something that we don't eat on a regular basis. Of course the rule was, once a kid requested a type of food, let's say meatloaf, which is a favorite of all of theirs, the next kid cannot request that for his or her birthday in the same year. (A little clever clause mom put in there so she gets to eat practically all the food she likes to eat for the year...LOL.)

So for Chris' special dinner, he asked me to pick it our for him and I chose pot roast, with all the trimmings. And of course, the special dinner would absolutely don't turn out good without Steph's homemade creation of a cake. (She's the baker in the family.) Chris spent the day before his birthday, hanging out at the mall with his friends and on his birthday, he was dubbed King for the day. Which means, he's excused from any chores and he gets to do whatever he wants for the day and everyone can wait on him. (Cool deal uh?)

Here he is on his special day...

See his cake? Yep, his sister made him his cake and it's shaped in the form of a football. Creative girl that one. It's a message to Chris that his next move now that he's tried canoe paddling, would be to try out for football. (Hmmm, if I'm not mistaken, I'm thinking big sister is trying to get little brother to follow in her footsteps.)

We had a couple of unexpected visitors that night. Yep, the missionaries showed up and mom pulled them in to the be entertainment people that night...LOL. Oh yeah, don't pay attention to the back of that head in the picture...that was Step trying to see the reaction on Chris' face to see how he liked his cake. All in all, it was a great day...the roast turned out great and everyone had indigestion that night....ahahah, kidding.

Two nights before that...my son Joey participated in our Ward annual Cub Scout Derby Race. I tell ya, he was soo excited to be in the race that everyday after school for two weeks, that was all he talked about and as soon as Kev gets home from work, Joey's pulling out the door so they can go into the garage to build his car. (I think dad had more fun making the car himself.) They worked really hard to make the car just the way they wanted.

I took a lot of pictures that night but I'm not going to post all of them on here today, we'll be here all day. I put the last four races on here...first, the final four, then the final three and then the final two. My son's car is the white one that's leading the race.Here is his car again...in first place, again. Look at it go!
Now, it's down to the last two, it's a bit of a close race but as you can see my son's car is first, again! Yes, I do sound like I'm bragging and I'm not going to be ashamed to admit that. He and his dad worked really hard on his car, he even fell asleep a couple of times in the garage from his exhaustion...eheh. (I wish I had thought to take picture of him sleeping in there, it was soo cute. And no, we didn't leave him in there all night.)


Here they are...the whole troop from our ward.The three squatting are the first, second and third place winner...from left to right. Look how happy they are. So my son's car came in first, the boy in the middle's came in second and the boy with the red shorts' car came in third. (Notice how my son is not wearing his uniform and not all the boys' uniforms are in coordination? LOL...that's how we roll here in Hawaii..anything goes...no care the uniform brah, we go wear the slippahs and we do good, yeah! LOL. I am so not good at this slang.)
Here's the winner! Now he gets to go to the Makaiki derby that will be coming up in the next few months where all the troops from Hawaii get to compete. Last year, he won second place from our ward and he went to the Makaiki and competed...his car won first place for our district. Anyways, he looks really anxious to dig into his bag of goodies in this picture so I will let him go for now...lol.

Anyways, I am just so proud of my boys. Even when they are pushing my buttons, trying to see how far they can push mom to her lose her temper, they sure add meaning to my life. I hope y'all enjoy this little bit of bragging I feel for my boys.

I ♥ you, Chris and Joey!! Thanks for being part of my family. And thanks y'all for reading....hope you're day is a good one. God bless!!