Fireworks and Cupcakes

Happy 4th of July!

(Just a glimpse around our home this morning)

Friday Favorites Found on Flickr

(just a teeny tiny bit late)

The Best Red, White and Blue Candy Ever

These Littlest Pet Shop Guys Are SOOOO Cute!

Littlest Pet Shop, Punkiest Series, originally uploaded by ,,,^..^,,,.

Especially This Little Guy

riverside, originally uploaded by bumblesweet.

Pina Colada Goodness (Just had this for the first time today and boy was it awesome!)

Happy 8th Birthday Conman!

We hope you had a wonderful birthday today!

We miss you!

Love, Jenny and Rex

Right Now

Outside My Window

Dark clouds moving swiftly by, birds chirping happily, balloons in the wind, bright green grass against burnt red cedar chips, Mr. Chipmunk taking a dirt bath in my planter

I Am Thinking

About creating a summer mini-book, I'd probably better stop eating watermelon (after all, the container almost shuts now), I hope family can come to enjoy the fireworks here on Saturday, I need to make a trip to the dollar store soon

I Am Thankful

My husband loves me so very much, we get to spend time with family this week, It's almost time to meet my new nephew Hayden, I have three super cuddle cats, we haven't had to use the air conditioning much lately, my Hawaiian albums arrived today

From the Kitchen

Little spots of watermelon juice on the counter, Spatz bread for toast, our favorite coffee cups in the dishwasher, coconut syrup for our coffee, multiple boxes of our favorite cereals, pool passes for the new year, two giant Maglights in case of power outages

I Am Wearing

My favorite jeans from ten years ago (with holes in the knees), white socks, my comfy MSU t-shirt from 1993, beige toenail polish, my glasses and my hair in a ponytail

I Am Creating

Baby layouts for a book, a summer mini-book, layouts of our trip to Hawaii, some felt fun for a loved one, sketches of dreams of craftiness, summer journal pages, more original paintings, new webpages for upcoming photo events

I Am Going

To spend time with family, to work on my scrapbooking projects, to do a little more cleaning, to watch fireworks off our balcony on Saturday, to read the many books and magazines on my nightstand, to cuddle my husband, to stay up late creating

One of My Favorite Things

My new MSU blanket, handmade by the mom of a very special student I had this year (Such a SWEET family!)

XOXOXO-Jen

So Take the Photographs and Still Frames in Your Mind

I've been on summer vacation now for three days (having finished my classes last Friday) and I feel like I have so much I want to do this summer!

So far this week I have:

*spent six hours at the scrapbooking store starting pages for my Hawaiian album

*cleaned, straightened and did three loads of laundry

*proofed/edited over three hundred wedding photos

*created and printed CD labels for wedding photos

*had a root canal (which I am still taking Advil for)

*taken a couple of naps (due to the fun dentist visit)

*caught up with facebook, email and my favorite blogs

*organized my scrapbooking supplies once again

*cleaned out the fridge and scrubbed the kitchen counters

*ordered two more albums for the photos of Hawaii

and it's only Wednesday!

Here's to a productive and fun summer vacation!

If You Haven't Been to the Air Races, You Really Should Check It Out!

I Might Be Just a Little Bit Out to Lunch

What have I been doing the past week? Well, the school year wrapped up on Thursday, we had a teacher work day on Friday, birthday party for Mike on Saturday, Red Bull Air Races on Sunday, Movie Day on Monday, ran errands on Tuesday and started my summer classes today. How is that for the start of summer vacation?

So, I get to classes today and they tell us that SB-CEUs only count for renewing your teaching certificate if you have a Professional certificate. At which point I start to wonder if I ever fixed the mistake on my last renewal (the state messed up and gave me the wrong type of certificate), and if indeed I did have a Professional, not a Provisional certificate. I know that I meant to renew it. I must have renewed it right? What am I going to do if I have the wrong type of certificate and these classes don't count? How do I find enough credits to renew my certificate by the end of June? (TWO weeks from now!) Let's just say that for the remaining three hours of class today, I was a nervous mess inside.

Fast forward to five o'clock. I get home and immediately check my certificate, hoping and praying that I have a Professional certificate. (For those of you not familiar with the certificate thing, invalid certificate = no job....yeah...that's REALLY not good!) So at this point I realize that although a very grateful one,

I AM A TOTAL MORON!

I not only have a Professional certificate, and had the problem fixed, but I still have three more years left (not two weeks) to take the credits! Wow....apparently I have been out to lunch.

So, as it turns out, although nonintentionally, I am WAY ahead of the game. I'm going to continue to take these two classes with my friends (since I have already budgeted them in) and just wait to use them to renew in 2012. Bottom line...after next week, I have until 2017 to get my next six credits. Who knows, maybe this is someone's way of telling me it's time to settle down and start a family (Pretty please!). One can only hope.....