Ugh...

You know how I put up this really nice photo of the sky...

Well, it really doesn't look like that outside.  It looks more like this...



Kinda-sorta.  My trip to the Netherlands has not started off so good.  First off I got a call at 5:57am telling me that there was weather in Newark (where I'm flying through) and that they were offering me an earlier flight so I could get my connection.  The earlier flight meant I needed to be at the airport at 7:30am...yikes!  My original flight was at 1:30pm so I had left a few things to do in the morning before leaving for the airport.  Thank goodness I prepped more last night to try and give myself an easy morning.  This did not happen.  I didn't rush too much but I did forget my ipod, had to write out some checks for bills on the way to the airport and realized on the way out of the house that the phone charger was not plugged in leaving me with an uncharged phone (and headed overseas)!  Ugh.

Now, I'm sitting here in Newark and Kimber's flight has been delayed.  She may or may not get here which means she may or may not make her connection.  If she doesn't, she'll start all over tomorrow and get into the Netherlands at 7:00am on Saturday.  We teach on both Saturday and Sunday.  Ugh again.

Can you send some good vibes this way?

Hopefully better news tomorrow. 

Jill

I'm leavin' on a jet plane....

The day is here...Netherlands, here I come!  Can you tell I'm excited?  Excited, anxious, nervous I forgot something!  I'm also nervous that I'm not going to be able to find one of these...



Most of you know I LOVE my diet fountain drinks!!!!  They do have diet coke over there but seriously, they don't use ice.  I've asked...

Oh and hopefully I won't burn down the place with one of these...


I didn't realize I was going to need a physics review to understand which appliances do what and what I need to do so I don't end up without a hair dryer!!!!  Wish me luck.  I might be wearing hats the whole time if I can't dry my hair!

I'm sure I'll have lots of photos to share!  I'm taking my laptop so hopefully I can load some while I'm there. 

Have a great weekend everyone!

Jillibean

Fun Bits for the Week

Fun Bits for the Week of September 20th...

*I finally got to see Leah play soccer!  This was her 3rd game (we were out of town the first one and I was out of town for the 2nd).  She did great but seems to get tired faster.  She scored a goal and assisted on a second.  I'll have pics next week.  My laptop (with my pics on it) needs a new cord - the last one was smoking last week. ;)
*I've started designing my collections for the January CHA show.  It seems like we just finished shipping for this last release!  Think bikes, party hats and vegetables.
*Brooke attended her first Sunday School class.  I walked by the Nursery and realized I would no longer have children in there.  Made me sad. 
*Kami is in the 93 percentile for height.  She's going to be taller than all of us!
*Leah had a major meltdown today over pants and boots.  This chick is only 7..
*Brooke loves school and when asked what she did today just talked and talked and talked.  She loved learning about "wed" and "gween" apples. 
*Kami and Leah wanted to ear money the other day to spend at Justice.  I would totally pay them but neither one wants to do any hard labor to earn their money!  They spent about 10 minutes cleaning up walnuts in the backyard and then they were done.  I gotta whip these girls into shape!
*The new TV season caught me off guard!  I don't have my DVD set-up yet! 

Have a great week everyone!

Jilsy

CK Guest Blogger...

It's kind of amazing to me that I'm a guest blogger on the Creating Keepsakes blog today.  3.5 short years ago I was admiring the blog from my bed.  I was on bedrest with Brooke (our youngest) and I had plenty of time to keep up with TV shows and the internet.  I was following the CK blog and message boards because I had applied to the CK Scrapbooker of the Year that summer.  Here's a couple of layouts that I sent in...

Still love this layout.  I cut out all of the stamped flowers on the front.  Love the black/white with the pink/white accents.

I don't know how many times I changed that "Sour Strawberry" title in this layout.  Look at that face!  I thought I was pretty cool because I stamped on the very popular Heidi Swapp letters. 

One good way to use up all those "extra" letters.  Love that face too!  Cutie Kams!

There's that kraft paper!  Still love this photo. :)

I still like this one.  This looks like something I might still do today.

I was ahead of the times with this one. ;)  All those punched circles forming a border...that's a trend now, right? ;)  Ugh, I see how crooked everything is in these pics. 

I've certainly evolved since then but it's fun to look back.  I guess while I was on bedrest, I was inadvertenly researching my company too.  It was after getting on blogs, forums, applying to the Scrapbooker of the Year and not making it that prompted me to start a company.  The SOY contest was in July of 07' and the concept of Jillibean Soup started in the fall of 07'.  Imagine that...

Have a great weekend everyone!

Jilsy

Wooden Shoes?

One week and counting....


So excited!  My first trip to the Netherlands...in fact, my first trip to Europe!  Wish I had more time there!

Have a good one!

Jill

Couple of Cards to Share...

I posted these on the Bean Talk blog a couple of weeks ago but thought I would post them here - better pics.  These cards were used for my Celina class and an upcoming class at B&B.  Hope you can join me!

Love how simple this card was.  It's a 4x8 piece of olive colored cardstock folded in half to form the card.  I sanded the edges of the orange damask (yes, I still have problems saying that word) paper and tore it in 2 places to reveal the backside houndstooth print.  I punched a 2.5 inch circle and cut it in half to form the red half circles on the sides.  Then I added 3 stacked Jillibean canvas flowers and voila! 

Another simple (but cute) card!  Again, I used the orange damask and houndstooth paper (Shell Macaroni from the Pasta Fagioli line).  Overlap the red houndstooth with the orange damask.  Attach a 2.5 inch brown cardstock circle to the patterned paper base.  Hang it slightly over the edge and trim the excess off.  Ink the blue heart and adhere it with foam squares.  Add the button and sentiment.  Oh, and another little thing I've been doing alot lately...cutting the "v" in the sentiment so it looks like ribbon. 

Have a good one!

Jill

Fun Bits for the Week of 9/12/10....

Fun Bits for the week of 9/12....

*Lily celebrated her 8th birthday on 9/8.  She has the gray hairs to show it. ;)  She's our dog in case you didn't know. ;)
*Leah decided to carve her name in our kitchen table.  She received her first grounding.
*Brooke looks too little to be attending preschool.  Her teacher says she's the perfect little student.
*Both Kami and Leah are taking dance classes this year.  Tuesday evening after dance, Kami sat down at the table to eat and said "I still have my tard on". 
*While discussing being a Mom, Kami insisted she was having 3 kids and when they grow up, they would tell her that they were "bugging her".  Wonder where she heard that?
*Today, I heard Brooke singing Justin Bieber "Baby, Baby, Baby, whoaaa". 
*I just found a dollar bill in the bathroom garbage upstairs.  Who knows what else has been thrown away!
*Two weeks ago, I enjoyed a weekend with the girls - Stephanie Hunt of Bella Blvd and Nikki Sivils of Nikki Sivils Scrapbooker.  It was such a nice weekend!  We spend the weekend at a scrapbooking B&B in Illinois called Lets Get Croppin.  Steve and Susie are the owners and we enjoyed visiting with them.  I left feeling re-inspired.  Love those gals.  Here's a couple of pics...

We also had a little visitor that came with Nikki...his name is Alfred.  Alfred is the cuttest little Yorkie mix (I think) and he recently had a run-in with another dog.  Unfortunately, the other dog won and Alfred was left with a drainage tube, stitches in his neck and several other bruises and bites.  He slept most of the time he was there and didn't really want to socialize with the rest of us.  On the last day, he did let me pet him which made me smile.  Here's a pic of Alfred with Nikki.  He only has a couple of teeth, so I loved getting this pic with his snaggletooth sticking out!

Have a great week!  Thanks for stopping by!

Jill

Hangin' with the ladies in Celina...

It's Sunday and I'm hanging out on the couch...I've got a terrible head cold and it's knocked me down a notch today.

Yesterday, I really enjoyed the Power of Purple Crop (supporting the Mercer County Family Crisis Network - domestic violence) in Celina, Ohio. Jillibean was asked to attend and teach a class.   I have lots of stuff going on this month and next so I wasn't sure we would be able to attend at first.  I'm so glad we did.  Who knew it would be such an emotional afternoon! 

We had a great card class with ladies from all over Ohio...some who came just to meet me...awww, shucks.  Thank you for supporting Jillibean Soup and me! 

The guest speaker was Lisa Bearnson who is the founder of Creating Keepsakes magazine and a super sweet person.  She shared some photography secrets, a family album (that was created by having a photographer follow her family around for 24 hours), and inspired us to continue to keep preserving our family's memories.   I found myself missing my family and feeling sorry for the little things I've been missing out on. 

Chiara, the woman organizing the event shared some of her own personal experiences with domestic violence and had all of us do an exercise with different domestic violence incidents.  I found myself thanking God that I have such a wonderful husband and support system.  Chiara and her sister have amazing voices and sang the song "For Good" from the Broadway show "Wicked".  It was beautiful and I had to try really hard not to cry (it was right before my class). 

I had no idea that I would walk away from this event with so many new friends and a renewed faith in myself and a praise of thanks for my family.

Thank you Karen, Alecia and Patty for helping with my classes and booth! 

Have a great week everyone!

Jilsy

First Day of School Pics...

Thank you Karen for asking for these.  I'm so glad you're still checking the blog.  I know my posts have been few and far between - I just haven't had as much interest in posting (or time).  I'm going to make it a point to sit down on Sundays and try to get a few things in here...that way you can see what's going on with the girls every once in a while. ;)

Leah started the summer with two missing front teeth (which are now most of the way in)...

Leah and her best bud Emma. Ahhh, they both wore purple too!




Brooke and Kams started school in September. 

Look at that forced smile on Brooke!  Cracks me up!

Their school bags are bigger than they are! 

Have a great day!

Jill-o

My Monday...

It's Tuesday, right?  Well my Monday was - can I say - absolute MADNESS! 

Aaaahhhhhhhhh

To set the tone, I came home Sunday from an exhausting but awesome weekend with friends Stephanie Hunt and Nikki Sivils.  We had a great time creating and talking!  Talking into the wee hours of the morning, that is.  My 6 hour drive on Sunday was increased to 7.5 hours when I had to swing by the in-laws and pick up my children.  Hubby left Sat for work so the kids were with Grandma and Grandpa all weekend (thank you) :).  Soooooo, we were all tired.

Monday morning comes and it's time to get Leah to school at 8:50, Brooke and Kami to school at 9:15.  This is both Brooke and Kami's first full days of preschool (full meaning 2.5 hours).  I was late for both...how does that happen?  I had fifteen minutes to get Brooke and Kami to their school that is 2 minutes from Leah's school.  I decided I had time to go get my favorite morning diet Coke from McDonalds.  Love my fountain drinks.  Ooops, guess I didn't have enough time.  Last kids in both classes.  Oh well.

In my short 2.5 hours of time at home, I'm doing everything possible to stay ahead but it's MONDAY and this was just a CRAZY Monday for us.  Returned phone calls, e-mails, orders, orders with specific instructions and in the back of my mind I know I still need to get my kits done for my Netherlands classes so I can get them in the mail.  Oh yeah, somewhere in this crazy day, I need to make a 3 hour trip to my warehouse, I keep reminding myself.

11:20 comes and I go to pick up the girls...I'm early.  I didn't need to be there until 11:45.  Ah, crap...I had more time I could have been working on stuff.  15 minutes of quick e-mails from my phone. 

11:45 take Brooke and Kami to the babysitters.  Pick up some packaged product at M's house.  Thank you Missey! 

12:15 head off to my warehouse with the packaged product.  I made plans with a friend to pick up Leah just-in-case I would not be back in time.

12:45 I'm headed back home.  There seems to be a fire somewhere on the highway (can only see the black smoke) and cars are stopped.

1:15 phew, got a few minutes to myself.   Then, more e-mails, phone calls, think about designs for minute,  e-mails, answer questions, e-mails.

3:25 off to get Leah.

3:50 off to the bank.

4:00 stop at a store (it's a secret - something I'm working on)

4:55 pick up Brooke and Kami at the babysitters. 

5:30 cook dinner - which consists of mac n' cheese, grapes and carrots :)

6:30 hmmm, can I sit down for a minute.

8:00 everyone is in bed and it's time for me to answer more e-mails.  That's what I get for taking the weekend off.