her kitty

 eye of the tiger, baby.  eye of the tiger.

so close to hitting the magic 365 this year . . . and then never again (whew!).

His Kitty

you might see this as a blatant attempt to get those last two november posts in . . .

and you'd be right . . .

YouTube: Plan with Me #1

b&w stories: grandma (part five)

"November 1920 I voted in the presidential election.  It was the first time women could vote.  Warren Harding was elected president.

I will always remember the day in April 1917 when World War I started."

And at 18 years old, she had no clue that she would send a son off to World War II . . .

b&w stories: grandma (part four)

"When i was fourteen I learned to drive.  There were no starters on cars then, so I had to crank by hand.  Steering wheels were on the right hand side and no license was required.

I remember the sinking of the Titanic in the North Atlantic in 1912."

b&w stories: grandma (part three)

 "I started to school in 1906.  There was a one room brick school house near us with one teacher for eight grades, but my dad did not want me to go there, so I went into town on the streetcar to the Baxter school for the first grade.  By the next fall a new school had been built with two rooms and two teachers, so I went there through the eighth grade then back to town for high school."

b&w stories: grandma (part two)

"I had a sister and brother older, Elizabeth and John.  Two years later on New Year's Eve Harry was born.

In a few months, i think i was about two and a half, my mother gave me away to an aunt, my father's sister that did not have any children of her own so I was raised as an only child.  I was never adopted.  My father would not permit it and I had to go back and stay with my family for two weeks every year.

My aunt, or Mama as I soon started calling her, took me on a train to her home in Ohio where she lived on an oil lease.  I remember all those tall derricks around the house.

When I was about four, we moved jut across the state line to Richmond, Indiana where I lived till I came to St. Petersburg, Florida in 1944."

b&w stories: grandma (part one)

i always thought my grandmother (on the right) looked so elegant in this photo though the young woman i saw there never quite gelled in my child's mind with the grandmother i knew.  the solitary woman who crocheted afghans and pieced crazy quilts ceaselessly, sewed me clothes and made me canned cinnamon rolls when i stayed over occasionally, baked peanut butter cookies on holidays, kept orange slices and jelly nougat in her candy dishes, and brought curried fruit and banana salad to family functions.

while going through some of her things last year i found these notes she had written.  i guess she intended to write her life story and only got three pages in.  these three small pages, however, are packed with the life she lived before children and they match that young woman in the photo perfectly . . .

cocoa daisy: kitty flip card

i made my first flip letter and it was SO much fun!  it's basically a mini-album in a card.  i thought the best way to share it with you would be through a little video.  you can see all the delightful things inside here:

cocoa daisy: christmas goal setting

do you ever set crafty goals?  i do sometimes.  for christmas especially, even though i rarely can keep up with them.  this year i'm making progress already.  hooray!  here are my christmas crafty goals this year:

1. do 2+ christmas layouts from 2014.  i've already done 3!  check!!!

2. finish last year's december daily.  i got all the pics printed last week and these two little spreads done.  still quite a lot to do though.  i would really like to finish it this week, so i can focus on december daily 2015 (those a5 planner dashboards were perfect!).

3. get my christmas mantel in place.  i pulled out my garlands and prints.  i think this might happen tomorrow.  fingers crossed!

4. make 12 christmas cards.  i haven't sent christmas cards since g was born i don't think.  i thought it would be nice to send at least a few this year.  i've gotten 11 done already using this easy format and the free printables from cocoa daisy.  almost there!

5. complete shimelle's journal your christmas, a december daily, and my december daisy dori.  i've got my midori traveler's inserts all ready and anxious to get started!  i think it's going to be so fun and easy with this system.  all my covers are decorated with the cocoa daisy planner add-on from december.

and the not started yet ones . . .

6. 6 teacher gifts (g's in middle school now and changing classes even more!)

7. 2 pages in my ongoing journal your christmas vintage piano book

8. decorate the styrofoam trees i bought last year

9. help the boy scouts make ornaments

10.  make a tassel garland (this one might not happen)

cocoa daisy: christmas parade 2014

i love seeing my boy in that crochet beard!  he reminds me so much of my brother!  I used that black patterned paper in the background a lot.  mostly i used it to look like little christmas trees, but for this layout, i flipped it over to look like little beards.  hee.

cocoa daisy: jigsaw puzzle layouts

i love making these sorts of layouts.  i call them my jigsaw puzzle layouts because i just gather all my little leftover bits and see how i can fit them together.

cocoa daisy: post thanksgiving 2014

i'm slowly but surely finishing up my PL/scrapbooking albums from 2014.  This one I'm calling my post Thanksgiving spread.  It covers the last mow of the season, the Cub Scout Thanksgiving celebration, Christmas ornament making, a first snow flurry, and some random selfies.

cocoa daisy: his and hers kitty layouts

The Cocoa Daisy reveal is going on right now!  These were made with my December planner add-on.

Speaking of the Cocoa Daisy planner . . . oh my, oh my, oh my!  I need this . . .

and this . . .

With January starting out this amazing, 2016 is going to be a heck of a year!!!

Youtube: Cocoa Daisy December Reveal

Come join us for reveal!  Lots of fun chatting, inspiration, and new goodies to see!  7:00 CST today, 11/28/15!   http://www.cocoadaisy.com/forum/viewforum.php?f=55

gatlinburg fall foliage: part three

i took these photos in gatlinburg on november 1st.  it was overcast all weekend, so i didn't expect much from the photos.  i was blown away when i uploaded them.  nature is amazing.  normally when i have too many good pics for one post i'll try to categorize them into different posts.  not this time.  this time i decided to just share them in three posts exactly in the order in which they were taken. sometimes you jut have to let nature tell her own story in her own way.  enjoy.

gatlinburg fall foliage: part two

i took these photos in gatlinburg on november 1st.  it was overcast all weekend, so i didn't expect much from the photos.  i was blown away when i uploaded them.  nature is amazing.  normally when i have too many good pics for one post i'll try to categorize them into different posts.  not this time.  this time i decided to just share them in three posts exactly in the order in which they were taken. sometimes you jut have to let nature tell her own story in her own way.  enjoy.