The one about sweet Leona

The packages for the Vintage Paper Swap are really coming in now! It's fun to get packages everyday....seeing what others have collected. I have several neat stacks of boxes and envelopes already in my studio.

This little girl arrived today in one of the envelopes. Her name is written on the back in faded old-fashioned swoopy penmanship: Leona.

My memory is shot and I can't remember who's envelope it came from. But my heart just goes out to her. Why the sad face? I instantly wanted to hug Leona. I think I need to use a color-copied image of her and put her in a happy situation.

The one about food.....

Okay, so I got tagged by Kim. She emailed to tell me and then ducked for cover. he he he. I actually like being tagged.

I am now tagging Amy, Janna, Lainie, Kristy, and Linda. :)

This one is about food! Lately all I think about is brownies! Not chocolate candy; just brownies. Cake brownies. Mmmmmm.

I have been asked to post something the kids will eat or at least something where the odds are better that they will eat them! hee hee That's not so easy for my family. Very Picky!!!
(I do not like fish and the kids don't either, so poor Rob never gets fish for dinner.)
Usually they aren't very excited to eat dinner (Mommy, why don't you make GOOD food?), unless it is pizza or tacos......

or this easy casserole:

Enchiladas
Spray 9x13 casserole dish with Pam. Open a can of enchilada sauce (we like Walmart's Red Sauce the best) and coat the bottom of the pan with a little of the sauce. Arrange frozen burritos (or thaw them first in the microwave) in pan and cover with remaining sauce. Sprinkle with grated cheese. Cover and bake 350 for about 30-40 minutes, depending on how frozen the burritos were. Enchiladas are done when cheese is melted and sauce is bubbly!

There are rarely leftovers of this....but I usually make myself a regular 'ole bean burrito cuz I just don't like this dish. :O

This is another easy receipe that I make, but does not go over well with my kids:

Chicken Breast Apollo
Leftovers of this chicken is yummy chopped and mixed with a little mayo and made into sandwiches. Make sure to add a little of the liquid into the mixture and get some of the chives in there, too.

Also, good on a mini whole wheat bagel and some fat-free cream cheese. (did you know that fat-free cream cheese has more protein than the light or regular varieties?)
Yum!~

3/4 c. chopped fresh chives
1/2 c. water
3 T lemon juice
2.5 T teriyaki sauce
2 T olive oil, divided
3/4 tsp. dried oregano
3/4 tsp. course-ground black pepper
4 large boneless skinless chicken breasts

Combine chives, water, lemon juice, teriyaki sauce, 1 T olive oil, oregano, and black pepper. Stir well. Pour 1/4 c. of mixture in a bowl and set aside. Put chicken and remaining mixture into gallon sized zip-lock bag. Marinate in refrigerator for at least 20 minutes.
Place chicken on broiler pan that has been coated with remaining olive oil. Broil 7 minutes on each side. Slice chicken into thin slices. Keep warm. Over high heat, warm reserved liquid about 1 minute. Pour over chicken and serve.

The one about Harper's Monthly

(front)

Book page for Dawn for her Romancing the Past book. 6.25" x 7.75" collage on paper. Dawn sent the image of the woman from Harper's Monthly to use on the page.

(back)

The one about preschool graduation

Amelia had her preschool graduation yesterday morning. Her teacher asked us to dress her up according to the occupation she specified in class last week. Dancer was a new one to me! I am afraid I made her look more like an exotic dancer, though. All we had was the swimming suit and cheesy dollar store ballerina stuff.

yep---she was the only girl in her class.

The one about Momma Bird

This is Momma Bird. Every spring a bird couple (maybe the same couple??) builds a nest under our deck. It's been that way four of the last five years since we moved in. I haven't seen Daddy Bird this year; I hope nothing bad happened to him. I think the baby birds have hatched because Momma bird has been busy lately. I've seen her bringing bug after bug to the nest. Sometimes she lets me see her sitting in the nest. Most times she flies away to sit at one of her watching spots to wait for me to leave.
I am mad at the squirrel, though. I caught him eating my petunia blossoms last week! Maybe he needs more peanuts to keep him fat and happy (and lazy). :)

The one about ArtsyMama's Spring Book

I am slow....I've said that before....but I finally finished my pages in Kari's book! Her first book was lost in the mail (but since found--yeah!!) and this one was put together by Lilia as a quick replacement.

The one about Lainie

I just found out that my friend Lainie is dieting too! I need to point you to her witty and fun-to-read scrapbooking blog, "Scrap Happy".
LOL Read her post about the Cabbage Diet. He he he

The one about Mother's Day

Amelia came home from Preschool with this present for me. I love reading these questionnaires by little kids. But bug spray??? I think her teacher can't understand Amelia-ese. And that's her cute signature at the bottom. She has learned how to make A's and E's.

The one about the Vintage Paper Swap

Okay....
so here it is!
To sign up, email me at MemrieMare@emcity.net. Swap sign-up closes end of the day Thursday, May 24th.

This is a vintage paper swap. Ideally the items you send should be old. If something has an old look to it (like a reproduction) then it would be okay to send. Scrapbooking items are okay, just keep them to a minimum since they are readily available.


have fun!

1. Fill a large ziplock bag (8x11 size) with paper goodies of all kinds. I will trade like bags for like bags (size wise). There is no minimum, just use your judgement of what you think of as fair, things you would like to receive in return. If you send junk you will get junk in return. Reproductions are fine, just make sure they are HIGH QUALITY reproductions. Please no muddy or blurry color-copied/printed images


2. Put it all in a large manila envelope (I use the 10x13 inch size) along with another envelope (folded in half) addressed to you. The easier you make it for me the quicker I can get your goodies sent back to you. Once I receive everything, I should have it all sent out within one week.


3. Include money for postage (the same it cost you to send your envelope to me).


4. All envelopes must be postmarked by Thursday May 31st. Email me when you have sent your envelope. I will wait for everyone's envelopes to arrive, but if the deadline has come and gone and you have not sent, I am afraid you will be outta luck. Please send early.

suggestions on what to send:

Book pages with interesting illustrations, wallpaper, postcards, pretty paper, paper lace, postage stamps, pages of text from books (sepia-toned pages are really fun), old photos, bird illustrations. Text book pages such as math, spelling, botany, zoology, astronomy, ect. Greeting cards, Victorian scrap, wrapping paper, tissue paper, labels of all kinds, maps, paper dolls, tickets, newspapers, game cards, sewing patterns, anything with words or letters, sheet music, legder pages, catalog pages, pages from children's books, magazine pages, photo album pages, letters and envelopes, cancelled checks, receipts, anything with beautiful images...pretty much anything neat made out of paper!

The one about the squirrel

My squirrel is back!

I was afraid all the new construction so close had scared him away or forced him to move his home. He's back! Ain't he cute? I feed him peanuts. I always sits in the sun on the corner of our rock wall. I leave the peanuts for him there. Hopefully this won't be the last year I see him.

It's a cruddy picture---I had to shoot thru the window screen.

I'll be posting about the paper swap tomorrow!

The one about the calendar yesterday

Another scrapbook page share.

This page was up on the calendar yesterday---Amelia and my old Fisher-Price schoolhouse. I posted about this on my old Typepad blog two years ago----about how the slide had been missing (since the day I got the schoolhouse) and I found one by accident at a flea market in Northern California. It really makes me happy to have a slide again.

The one about celebrating

I have lost ten pounds! I have 50 more to go, but I feel like celebrating.

I want to do a vintage paper swap!

I love paper! I haven't figured out all the details yet, but I wanted to put this out there to hopefully get some excitement going! More details to come....

The one about getting tagged!!

I have been tagged for two different tagging games. The Thinking Blogger Award and the one that is going around with 7 weird things about yourself. My buddy Heather tagged me for the Thinking Blogger and it was rally cool with the sweet things she wrote about me on her blog. The only thing my blog makes me think is, "boy, that Marilyn can't write very well!"

I nominate these 5 blogs for the Thinking Blogger Award:

my long-time friend Carin (her posts are fun to read and she needs to post more often)
Dina Wakely (she's a hoot!)
Ashley Calder (I love to read her descriptions of things in life and she also writes poetry)
Kimberly Kwan (funny MIL stories!)
Nathalie (her blog is loaded with fun demos and tutorials)

7 weird things about me, which isn't hard since I am admittedly strange and enjoy it. :) I did a layout last year about it for Designing With Color.

1. Getting jewelry for my birthday, Christmas, or anniversaries is boring.
2. I sometimes eat PB with either cheese or fried baloney on my sandwiches.
3. I don't like watermelon. When I eat orange sections, I spent a lot of time picking off every little bit of membrane and "chaff" that I can before I eat it.
4. I think reality tv is stupid
5. I don't like big clunky shoes and large vehicles (minivans, SUVs). I think it is because I am trying to avoid looking bigger in any way.
6. I am a neat sleeper. When I get out of bed, it barely looks like its been slept in.
7. I find it hard to beat around the bush. I will usually just blurt out what I want to say (see #4).
   

The one about the vintage spring book

These are pages I did for Lilia's gorgeous Vintage Spring book. Can't believe it took me three days of pushing stuff around to finally arrive at the peach-colored pages. Hate it when I am slow. Now it is off to Kari !

The one about Patience

A card for Deryn's folder in our spirit card swap. I choose patience from her list if suggestions. Then I went through some old photos and found this old guy. He just seemed like a patient-looking person to me.

The one about the pink basket

My pictures were eaten by my camera card and Bethany was kind enough to lend her pics for my blog.

Here are the goodies I received from Bethany! I just LOVE all the pink! The first thing I noticed was the fragrance of the whole package. I think it was a combination of the pink taper candles and the Fresh Cut Grass tea lights. She did an awesome job of adding lace and buttons to the basket---and I can re-use it all since it is removable!!The basket was over flowing with rubber stamps (love letter stamps---can never have too many), a vintage atomizer, beautiful pink roses plate, yummy cream lace, a cute little fabric strawberry, millinery blossoms (I needed some of those!), little hankie (have plans for that already :) and the whole thing was packaged in a basket full of pink rose petals. I REALLY love that the wrapping was usable, too--a sheer curtain panel tied with lavender lace.

thank you Bethany!!!