Love, Bessie & Barb {4/8/11}

Beautiful Week !

Glass and Wine courtesy of a great friend ! Totally needed it after a night of studying :)

Us taking advantage of a Beautiful day outside in the back yard ! 

This is my small scrapbook tote, turned makeup/body tote :) 

"Thank you" Mugs

While we are on our vacation this sweetie pie is staying with her Nana (My Mom) for four days and her Mee-Maw (Josh's Mom) for three days. 
Josh and I decided we wanted to get them something simple, just to thank them for giving us this time alone. Because honestly ... we wouldn't leave her with anyone else so without these two we wouldn't be going. 
So ...
We were at Marshall's the other day and I spied this mug: 

My momma is crazy about owls. She absolutely adores them. So I decided to get them mugs as their little Thank You (!). 
So I went onto the Silhouette Store and bought this thank you card design.

 It's 75 cents right now. Which is a steal. There are also a ton of other things on sale for 75 cents at the Silhouette Store right now. I bought some adorable treat bag designs to make gifts for Ashlynn's Uncles who are 8 and 9. 

I wrote a sweet note and placed them on top of the mugs ...

Then I grabbed these sweet pink flowers out from my bow supply. 

And took out all of the plastic. To do this you pull off the big green part on the bottom and then pull each layer of the flower off of the green pole in the middle one at a time. There will usually be another piece of plastic somewhere in the middle. Get rid of it too. You just want the flower petals. 

Then I laced each layer onto a piece of pink string. 

And place it on top of the card. 

You can see in the photo above that there is string coming out of the top of the flower petals. You want about half of the string on each side of the flower. I just pulled a whole bunch of string and cut off the excess at the end. The amount you need would depend on the mug size. 

Push the string that is coming out back down through the petals, not the hole, so that the string is under the flower. 

Then I laced the string around the cup, 

and tied it at at the bottom.

Then I fluffed the flower on the top to hide the string. 

 The result is two sweet little mugs. This is a very cost effective but cute thank you :) 

Mommy & Me

 Each day it's getting harder and harder for me to admit that we're really leaving our little bug for an entire week. Especially because I'm spending so much time doing everything else, like working, getting ready to go, and trying to finish up all of my school work that will be due while I'm gone. Last week consisted of me spending all of my downtime sitting at the table doing homework while Ash played in her play yard and yelled at me for not coming in with her. So ... I decided to spend as much quality time with her as I could before we head out. 
She wanted to play chalk so I pulled out the Chalkboard. 

and she went to town ! 

 

It was so much fun to color with her. 

By the end she was so covered in chalk I had to give her a bath :) 

But it was worth it. 

And she wanted to go outside (which she loves by the way ! ) She goes up to the door and stares out at the yard until someone lets her out, so Sunday we went to the Park with her Aunt. 

She had a blast and it's making it a little easier for me to leave my little bug behind. 

My Amazing Birthday Present !

Last Friday, April Fools Day, was my birthday ...  

I turned  years old. 
It was a truly wonderful day. I spent the morning sewing and hanging out with my little lady. 

 After my hubby got home from work we spent the afternoon getting a new computer because the Geek Squad deemed my old one un-fixable and Best Buy replaced it. (YAY) 
We went out that night with our friends to a nearby pool hall and it was soooo much fun to get out and enjoy ourselves ! 
But ... the best part of my birthday was my gift . 
Everyone chipped in on this one and my husband wont be getting me another present for the rest of the year. 
But I got a DSLR camera. 
This one actually. 

It's a Nikon D3000. 
So far I'm in love with it.
Almost as much as I love my family. 
But not quite ! 
I've taken over 600 photos in the past four days. 
Mostly of Ashlynn <3

The hubby and I are also getting ready for  our first real vacation from our little bug.  She will be 17 months old on Thursday and we leave on Friday.
We're going to Branson, Mo and we can't wait. As hard as it is to imagine that much time without Ashlynn, I am so excited to spend a week with my husband without any responsibilities. We're going to sleep in and go out to eat and go to a show and not have to worry about what's in the diaper bag ! 
And now I get to take my fancy new Camera with me and take lots of wonderful pictures of our week alone !