Relay for Life Update

24 Hours that really seemed to fly by.... except for the short time when some of us tried tried to power nap in the chairs and froze our tootsies off, but other than that it was a very positive and sometimes emotional time. Friends getting together. Shirley Mewharter and her daughter Star Mosely. Note the colors of the shirts. "Survivors" of cancer wore purple shirts, attendees white and light blue for those who have spent a year in planning and preparations for the event.

The event was held at Woolsey Stadium, Kings High school in Shoreline, and was begun with opening ceremonies and finally the Survivors led the others in the first lap around the track.

Games.... This is one that I actually lent a hand in. It was the Frozen T-shirt contest. Each team had to thaw out t-shirt that was very solidly frozen in a block of ice and then someone had to put it on. At first it looked more like "eat the t-shirt" while some chewed and tried to rip it open. Then everyone lent a warm hand or leg to rub the block of ice on.

Then it became "tug of war" as we tried to pull it apart.

Even though we finished in 4th place, we did get it unrolled and on our waiting model to the right in the dark blue shirt (not pictured in the frozen shirt)

More games... They had 10 minutes to decorate their "cars" and racing suits and head to the starting line.

There was also entertainment by beautiful Tahitian dancers and more games.

The evening highlight was the luminaria, which I don't have pictures of, but was very fitting and emotional at times as hundreds of candles were lit for loved ones who have died and some who are still fighting this incideous disease. The luminarias were placed alongside the track after dark, all lights were extinquished and a bagpiper led the way for a solemn walk around the track. Dave was able to come and light a candle for his Mom who passed last October from bladder cancer, and I lit a candle for my Mom who died from leukemia in 2003. The bags were lovingly decorated by family and loved ones and some just stood or sat on the ground by their luminaries. I thought about my own dear Mother as she shared her thought process as she was dying and wondered if she would be remembered by anyone after she was gone and I made an attempt throughout the night to walk the track and read every name on each bag. Moms, Dads, children, sisters, brothers, uncles, aunts, grandparents, neighbors, teachers, co-workers, friends. This disease knows no boundaries. It doesn't matter how much money you have, what race you are, how old you are, how short or tall, or how many people that are going to grieve your absense. I'm not a doctor or a scientist and I'll never be able to come up with a cure, but maybe I can have a small impact by raising money for research for detection and cures for all types of cancer.

A few gift cards

I reached my goal for cards for Relay (103), and still wanted to play, so I made some little 3x3 gift/thank you cards. This first bunch has some inking techniques. Some alcohol inks on glossy and other sprayed on ink and perfect pearls overstamped.

Somebody told me about this store in Kent called Tuesday Morning. It's kind of like a liquidation store. They have a whole bunch of scrapbooking stuff. Some of it is these little chipboard pieces, that also came with alpha's, I think it was like 900 pieces in all. Great deal. I don't do much baby, but thought they'd work good for gift cards.

Used my Cuttlebug for some of these. Sure makes for an easy card.

Various techniques.

The brown one in the middl section is really pretty IRL. Aside from the stamped image, there is no ink in the background. I put gold alcohol ink on glass mat with a little blending fluid, then rubbed the card stock in it. You're suppose to use a craft mat, but it works just as well for me on the glass. I sure can get messy though with these techniques.

I'm all packed up and ready to go in the morning for our 24 hour Relay for Life. Dave and Walter are going to man the home front. Don't know if I can stay up all night like I used to, but going to give it a good try.

Relay Album

The album itself was very inexpensive but it inspired me to do this girly girl album. The cover looked kind of cheap as well, and I would like to be able to get a larger donation for it. I finally found the paper I wanted to use on our way home from our trip today. This is the next two pages, kind of hard to see the detail here. The "You" and the flower have a bling frame. Flower is heat embossed. The strips on each piece are pleated with sparkly brads on them.

Mt. Rainier Scenic Railroad?

We read about this on the web and thought it sounded so great. Do you see the name? It says "Mt. Rainer Scenic Railroad." Now wouldn't you think that meant they took you around the mountain? First of all we were towed up a ways by this deasle, deasil, deasal (? how do you spell it?) engine. So, we thought okay, I guess it's a fake steam engine. But alas, soon came our little steam engine puffing up behind and hooked on the other end and brought us down the track.

This was our first.... and last view of the mountain. Everybody was wondering why we were riding away from the mountain. Soon we found out that they build this nice new depot in Elbe and had the route to go around the mountain, and section of the tracks washed out and it was closed! I was pretty bummed at first.

It was pretty fun though, just to have the experience of riding a steam train. The sound effects were quite something. The clinkity clink of the tracks and the breaks screaching, the puff puff chuga lug of the steam engine and of course the horn. Our fireman was quite artistic with his whistle.

We got only a mile or so down the tracks when they stopped and someone met them along side the road and they got out and were looking under the train and we were all wondering what was wrong. Finally we got rolling again and a porter came back to our car and I asked what it was. He said it was the toilet. I could have told them that before we ever left. There was no water and I just thought they were waiting until we got rolling for it.

We were in the open car. It was once just like the rest of 1920's era cars that were last used in San Francisco as a commuter train. They just cut the top of of this one (made it a convertible). I can't see doing it any other way. It was a beautiful day and so nice just to feel the fresh air after being in the city every stinkin day.

We got a little further up the road and we stopped again. Now we see the engine being unhooked and leaving us behind!

Okay, here it comes back again.... and passed us by. But eventually he did come back and hook up again and pushed us up the hill to the next scenic highlight. Yes, the first one was leaving Rainier behind.

Scenic tressle

Then it was back to the station. We did get to climb aboard the engine of this 1929 American Locomotive Company engine and I'll post more about that later. We ended our day by stopping to see some dear friends that live in Mineral, just a few minutes from the loading station. I was going to call them on the cell until I had my "duh" moment, realizing there are no cell towers in the mountains.

Wednesday

Last night I couldn't sleep, so I got up and did a couple more pages for the album. The background one the first two are stamped with CTMH Rustic Flowers. My pink ric-rac didn't match the pink here, and my pink ribbons were'nt the right shade, so I sprayed the white with my new-found fascination of reinkers, water and perfect pearls. It came out just the right shade.

This one I did last evening. It was fun to do with all the different little random flower stamps, all acrylic of course.

This one strangely enough, took hours to do. I had to have the little square frame and I forgot how to do it using the Creative Memories square punch. So I called Christy, who doesn't actually have one, but has used it before, and she told me what I was doing wrong. The white cardstock background is lightly sprayed with a mixture of two drops of tulip reinker, about three small scoops of green perfect pearls and water. The green didn't really even show as green, but as kind of goldish. That's alright because it gave it the effect that I wanted.

After doing a couple hundred cards in the last year, it's really quite refreshing to do some layouts. It's been really slow in the office this week and with the wet weather I haven't been able to get outside and do anything.... tsk, tsk. Have to do something with my time, hey?

Tuesday

I haven't posted for a bit here, so just thought I'd add these layouts. I haven't done any actual scrapbook layouts for months. This is for a girly album I'm doing for relay. It's 8x8 and every page is pink and has some time of flourish on it. They could be turned on the side for a different orientation picture if need be.

This is the Tickled Pink paper from CTMH.

Thank You Tags

When we were at Snohomish we had a big double bulletin board and during the spring/summer half of it was my "Kudo's Korner" where I would post pictures of people's yards that were exceptionally well maintained or most improved. It was met with much enthusiasm. Here we don't have a bulletin board but I still want to acknowledge good work. So I was thinking that I would do a bunch of these tags and hang them on people's door knobs just to tell them thanks for .... whatever. Then I will write on the back. What do you think? Today is day 5 of Nutrisystem, and I think I'm doing pretty well. I was hoping to get to 5 lbs by the end of the week, but don't think I'll quite make that. I told Dave to take the scales and hide them and he didn't, so I keep weighing myself every morning. I can't help it, it's an obsession. The food actually tastes good. I was afraid it would be like the frozen dinners you buy in the store, but they are really nothing like that. The deserts are nothing to jump up and down about, but it's just enough to make it feel like I'm actually being "treated." If I can hold out with the $300 a month I should be able to do this. Still no call backs from customer service after my trying four times last week to answer her messages.

Things will be a little slower this week with Marjie and Steve back from their trip and rents almost all in. Did a bit more painting on the house that's going to be for sale, and hopefully it will be ready to carpet by the end of this week. I'm anxious to get it advertised and sold! Also got to work outside a little today with a project I've been contemplating for months. The area next to the front steps to the office is nothing but moss, so I wanted to make a flower bed there, but I have to have a walkway for the mower to get through because it is raised and we would have to lift the mower up.... not going there! So I bought four 12"x12" red brick pavers for a pathway. Then after looking at it, I didn't like the look. But then I thought about breaking the pavers up and doing a mosaic. So yesterday I went out and dug up for the little flowerbed, leveled the ground for my walkway and put them down on top of landscape fabric. I was going to put fine gravel in between, but Dave said something about sand, so today we picked some up and poured it in between the broken pieces of brick. I kind of like the way it looks. The pavers were on sale for $1 each, so the biggest expense was the bag of pavers sand. The flower bed still has some work to be done on it, but I got the biggest hunks of sod out and have to wait for it to dry up a bit before finishing and putting some topsoil on top. When I get it done with flowers etc, I will post some pics. Now I'm "kind of" thinking about doing a walkway on the other side. Already have the flower bed there, put it in last summer.

More Tulips

It still amazes me how I can take two bulk packages of tulips and end up with a clump of just one color. These are the last of my tulips to open and they were such a nice surprise for bulk bulbs. While we were sitting watching tv tonight some girl came running down the street and grabbed a handful of tulips, bulbs and all and ran off with them. I guess that's what you get for trying to beautify the neighborhood.

Today is day 3 on nutrisystems. The manager of customer service never did get through to me. I called her back four times and she was never at her desk. Just typical of their "wonderful" customer service. But the diet is going well despite them. I was actually full after dinner tonight too. The only problem is..... well.... how do I put this nicely? There's a blue cloud floating over our house. I got one dinner that was shrimp and since I don't eat that, I gave it to Dave and he had it tonight. He got the same problem just from eating one meal! Oh boy, are we in for it or what?

Isn't it Friday yet?

I got a message from the manager of Customer Service today for NS, but I wasn't home. Guess I'll call back tomorrow. In the meantime, the food came today so I'll be starting tomorrow. I'll post my progress when it happens.

Got some cards done tonight from the inky backgrounds I've been working on. The first two are done by spraying reinkers on to cardstock with perfect pearls in it. Unfortunately you can't see the shimmer in the scans. I tried photographing them and it didn't make any difference. The stamps on the first one are CTMH Friendship puzzle. The paper is Wild Asparagas and the chipoard flower is CTMH. Leaves are cut from PP and flower is on with pop dot for dimension. Same technique with different colors. Stamp is a 2001 PSX.

For the background on this one I dropped the reinkers on a glass mat sprayed it lightly with air to move it around and then blotted the cardstock on it and lifted up. Then I lightly sprayed it with the reinker/perfect pearls solution to cover the white left on the cardstock. I also sprayed the paper flower with the same color that is on the background. It is also shimmery, but you can't see it. I think this background is my favorite. There was another one that was really cool too, but I messed up with the stamp and didn't have the stem aligned with the flower. I might try and use it anyway because the background is so pretty. Stamps are CTMH.

With these fun new techniques I'm learning I might just make it to 100 for Relay. I'm at 86 or 87, can't remember.

Incompetancy

I am taking a break from my fun stuff to vent. If you don't want to hear about my venting, then stop reading here.... it's not pleasant.

So, I decided it was time to get serious about loosing some weight. I get an email about a flex plan and decide to do that for $235 a month. I thought it was Jenny Craig, so I call them. Customer service: "We don't have anything called the flex plan". I say.. "yes, I got an email and it said it was $235 a month." Customer service, ahemmm... clearing her throat: "We don't have ANYTHING at THAT price. Our programs start at $550." Now I could be wrong on the exact amount, but I heard five hundred plus and kind of went catatonic at that point, in which I responded that I guess this just isn't the company for me. So, then I figure that it must have been Nutrisystem, so I go online and I find the flex plan. Viola! I try to order my food online and I accidentally hit the basic plan where you get what they send you. I get a letter saying thank you for your order, blah, blah, blah. So I call customer service and try and explain that what I wanted was to pick my own food. So the person says they are going to cancel my order and then I can go back in and re-order. Fine and dandy! I go back in, and guess what? No flex plan available! Where did it go? Hmmm.. It's a PC mystery. But I google flex plan and find it. I order, put my CC info in and it's done. But no confirmation email this time. So I send an email to customer service explaining the situation. That was on May 1st. Yesterday I get a phone call from a Nutrisystem rep. At first she says that she can't find any record of the order I made. But then she gives me this great deal if I go for the full plan and not the flex plan. Now, all of a sudden she can see the foods that I ordered, so she will just repeat that order and increase the amounts to make up the difference of the two different plans. So, okay, I get that. I'm happy, my food is on the way and I can get started on yet another weight loss journey. I get a quantum notice from UPS saying it's on the way. Good. Then.... today I get a response to my email of May 1st, that they were "unable to cancel my order" so they have tried to contact UPS to have them stop delivery. ARGGHHHH! So, I just emailed them back and said that I wasn't asking to have this order cancelled and that if they do manage to stop delivery that I better see a refund to my account immediately! Then to top all that off, while I'm writing this I get an auto response from my last email and it says "there is a normal 3 day lag in email responses, you may wish to call customer service between....." I know what it is! You loose weight because you spend so much time fighting with idiots!

More alcohol...

Inks that is.. fooled you! This is a tin that I bought at Target's $1 Spot the other day. It is done in the conventional way using AI, blender fluid and the dauber with felt attached. It's kind of cool. But Daria (djc from TwoPeas) was telling me how you can use it to "paint" on metal, glass, etc.

You use a waterbrush paint and fill it with AI Blending fluid. Using your glass mat, or you could use an acrylic block or piece of glass even... put a drop of alcohol ink on it and use the blender fluid to pick up the color and paint it on to your surface. The waterbrush can't be used for anything else, but I'm sure that I will be doing more of this.

I did a bunch of backgrounds today with the misters and reinkers and will post the finished cards when I get them done.

Relay Set Up

Okay, what do you think? This will be my display for the Relay booth. I got the display box from Walmart. It was holding some little fans, they said I could have it. The card holder holding the prices was a card holder I got from the MCHW Convention from a vendor. Just put the flower over their name. I want to go to Walmart today andsee if I can find another box. I have 85 cards now. These are just the Birthday and Thank You. I think I need to get more Birthday ones. The rest of the cards are either no greeting for note cards, generic phrases that can be used for anything, friends and get well.