Happy Anniversary ....

Happy Anniversary Mom and Dad. I know it was on the 30th, and well this is the 31st, but I don't have the Internet at home to get this up on time!! I have your card at home, so I can't post it here until I give it to you!! Cause I know you read my blog! I hope you had a great Anniversary and here's to 31 more years! We watched the movie The Fighter yesterday. I can see why it was up for a bunch of awards. It was a great story (it was based on a true story) and the acting was amazing. I have always like Mark Wahlberg. He is a great actor. Check out the guns!!!!!Christian Bale, I have seen in a few different things and he has been good in all the shows I have seen him in. I have heard he can be a bit of a bad boy and hard to work with, so I hope that's all just Hollywood stuff. He totally deserves to win an award for his performance in this movie though. He does a very good job at playing a crack addict. He must have lost a ton of weight to perform this role as well. I saw him on the Golden Globes and he had long long hair and looked "healthy". I would suggest watching this movie, if you have not done so already. Hopefully I will get over to Mom and Dad's with their card tonight so I can post it up here tomorrow! Chow for now Jacqui

Grandma?????

Wow....I was checking out Facebook yesterday and one of the girls I went to high school with became a Grandma yesterday. YIKES!!! I guess if I sit back and think about it, the "potential" is there for me to be one as well.....my kids are old enough for that to happen, but I sure hope they wait quite a bit longer before it does. My visions of a Grandma are something like this.....not the same age as me.....(although my mom who is a Grandma does not look like this!!!!) I guess time does just keep on movin' on ...... I just don't know if I am prepared for it to keep moving! Have a good day Chow for now, Jacqui

Charlie .....Charlie....Charlie.....

Man oh man this dog is hilarious. We have had dogs in the past, but none of them have had the personality that this dog has. She is such a snuggle bug, which is fun, but also interesting since she is not a tiny little lap dog! She loves to be around us though. She will squish in between the couch and the table so she can be by one of us and she will hop up on the couch with us sometimes as well. She likes to curl up in Poppa's chair and she will sit in front of you and "talk" to you if you happen to be sitting in that chair when she thinks she should be. The other day she curled up on the couch with Jade and then she kind of slinked off the couch and then slept like this for the rest of her nap. Then finally she made it all the way off the couch. Too funny. The kids are loving her to pieces and I think she just soaks it up. We are so happy we got her! She is awesome. Chow for now. Jacqui

Allan....Allan....

OMG a friend of mine just sent me this link for animal voiceovers. This is hilarious!!!!



Enjoy
Chow for now
Jacqui

Scary Times....

Well...yesterday some kids at a high school in London got in a fight and one of the kids pulled a gun. The school went on immediate lock down while the police searched the school to find the kids. The police have arrested 3 people in relation with this, but as of the 6:00 news last night, they still had not retrieved a gun. A number of the people I work with have children that go to this school. I was very frightened for them, and can only imagine what they were going through with their kids actually INSIDE the school. What is this world coming to? Don't parents teach their kids how to work out their differences with people any more? Why is violence the first thing people turn to when something doesn't go their way or someone does something they don't agree with? Why has it become necessary for schools to hold seminars and assemblies on bullying and where kids can turn if they are getting bullied at school or outside of school? I'll admit, I need some work in this department too. Not that I am a violent person, but I do make "smart-ass" comments when people do stupid things. Comments like they "would make a nice hood ornament for my car", "do what you're told or I'm gonna smack ya up side of the head", you know things like that. Seriously, I would never purposely run anyone down with my vehicle, and I don't smack my kids, and my comments are made in jest, but maybe, just maybe, if we all take a minute and think about the things we say and do, before we do them, it might make a difference. Remember " a journey of a thousand miles, begins with a single step." So maybe I will make this little step, and if everyone else takes a little step, we can one day, stamp out violence. You know it just takes way too much energy to hate. Lets start today and make a change.
(getting down off my soap box now.....)
Chow for now,
Jacqui

Down Days....

Well to be honest, the last few days have been crappy. Friday, Joel had a basketball tournament that started right after school in Strathroy. Normally, this would not be a problem, except that Jade had a volleyball tournament at Medway, right after school. So arrangements had to be made to have Mr. Fletcher (Joel's coach) bring Joel to Medway after the game was finished in Strathroy. (Thanks Fletch!). We did not get home until 11:00 pm on Friday night, only to find out we had to have Joel in Strathroy at 8:30 AM for his game on Saturday. I played tug of war with Charlie a little bit when we got home cause she just loves that..and well...she is one strong dog and she pulled something out or twisted something or whatever, cause I have not been able to move my neck without pain since Friday night. We got up and got Joel over to his game in Strathroy for 8:30 AM in spite of the nasty freezing rain and windy weather - it was a brutal drive. Unfortunately they lost their game and that put their next game time at 3:00 pm. Well as much as I like the town of Strathroy, I was not going to stick around until 3:00, so we went back home. I laid down and had a bit of a nap hoping it would help my neck a bit - well...it didn't. I did get some rest, but the pain was still there. But off to basketball we went again. They lost that game as well, so the tournament was over for our juniors. I'll be honest and say I was somewhat relieved cause I was quite uncomfortable sitting on those bleachers with a killer neck. On the drive home I was chewing a piece of gum and crunched into something rather hard. Yep...you guessed it....tooth - my dang tooth broke - this was the one that I just recently got fixed at the dentist.....so I guess I will be making a trip back to see them soon. Sunday was pretty much a couch potato day, I tried heat, massage, Ibuprofen and nothing was relieving anything. I took a few naps on Sunday as well. Monday came and off to work I go. My neck was still quite painful, but I was hoping that a day at work would take my mind off of it. (not so much). Then Joe called to see if our CAA was all paid up cause he had to get the van towed to the shop cause something was not working right which made a hose blow off, which put water on something water is not to go on which wrecked something else (who knows ). So the van made it in to Lewis's garage for a fix up and Dave thankfully let Joe bring the other truck home for the evening. I got virtually no sleep at all on Monday night cause of my neck and Tuesday when I got up the pain was just as bad and I was exhausted. So I called in sick to work and cracked out the heat again. Joe got done work early and came home and massaged and massaged and it is feeling a bit better today - better enough that I got some sleep last night anyway. The van is all fixed and I hope my neck is on the mend..so hopefully the next few days will go better. While I was at home though, I started watching Glee. I can't believe it took me so long to start watching this show. It is AWESOME. It is so nice to see a show that lets kids who are different than the main stream excel at something. It teaches some great lessons and is funny too. Most of the episodes crack me up, but I must say the episode where Sue (the nasty Cheerios coach) took a down syndrome girl onto the cheer leading team had me crying. That was quite the twist when we saw that hard-ass Sue has a down syndrome sister. If you have not watched this show, you should. It's great. The characters are great and have such a great chemistry. Mr. Schuster ( he's a cutie - with a wacky wife!) Sue (she is a hard-ass coach and oh my she makes some comments that are just plain wrong, but she adds a great comic addition to the show) Rachel (the very talented female with the gay dads), Kurt ( the very talented boy who told his very macho dad that he was gay, that was a very moving episode as well good on ya Glee, for making his dad very accepting), Tina ( the girl with the stutter - although we come to find out she was faking much to Artie's dismay) Artie ( the fella in the wheelchair - man oh man he looks like he could be the brother of the fella from Big Bang Theory), Finn (what a cutie - that Quinn better tell him he is not her baby daddy) and I cannot for the life of me remember this girls name but she is hilarious and brings in a nice addition of comments with her black roots and her large size. I am LOVIN' this show!

Chow for now,
Jacqui

Time with Friends....

Just wanted to share an email I received. It is so true!!!!!

A thought to share.....

"I just finished taking an evening class at Stanford. The last lecture was on the mind-body connection--the relationship between stress and disease. The speaker (head of psychiatry at Stanford) said, among other things, that one of the best things that a man could do for his health is to be married to a woman whereas for a woman, one of the best things she could do for her health was to nurture her relationships with her girlfriends. At first everyone laughed, but he was serious.

Women connect with each other differently and provide support systems that help each other to deal with stress and difficult life experiences. Physically this quality “girlfriend time" helps us to create more serotonin--a neurotransmitter that helps combat depression and can create a general feeling of well being. Women share feelings whereas men often form relationships around activities. They rarely sit down with a buddy and talk about how they feel about certain things or how their personal lives are going. Jobs? Yes. Sports? Yes. Cars? Yes. Fishing, hunting, golf? Yes. But their feelings?--rarely. Women do it all of the time. We share from our souls with our sisters, and evidently that is very good for our health. He said that spending time with a friend is just as important to our general health as jogging or working out at a gym.

There's a tendency to think that when we are "exercising" we are doing something good for our bodies, but when we are hanging out with friends, we are wasting our time and should be more productively engaged--not true. In fact, he said that failure to create and maintain quality personal relationships with other humans is as dangerous to our physical health as smoking! So every time you hang out to schmooze with a gal pal, just pat yourself on the back and congratulate yourself for doing something good for your health! We are indeed very, very lucky. So let's toast to our friendship with our girlfriends. It's very good for our health."


Please share it with your girl-friends.
Chow for now
Jacqui

Elephants Day Three

Here are the last 4 months of elephants!
Septembers elephants are cute little sweet ones having fun with birds and flowers. Everyone loves Horton! I'm not sure where this guy comes from, but he is a cute one!!! This little fella sparkles like the paper and the trees behind him!
I hope you enjoyed this little elephant calendar! OOps.. I almost forgot to show you the cover!!!
Chow for now,
Jacqui

Elephants Day Two

Here are another 4 months worth of elephants pages from my calendar. I like the way this page turned out with the embossed flowers and then the little gems in the centre of the flowers. There could not be an elephant calendar without Dumbo somewhere! This guy makes me laugh! August is a cute one too! She would like an Elvis one for Christmas next year - so I'm gonna see how I make out with that one. I'm not sure if I should try to find authentic pictures of Elvis or funny character picture of Elvis like this guy.
Chow for now,
Jacqui

Elephants never forget....

Well I don't know if they do forget or if they don't forget, but I had fun making this elephant calendar. One of the girls that Jade used to work with collects elephants, so Jade asked me if I would help her make a calendar for her. It turned out to be me making it and Jade watching me make it, but it was still fun! Here is the one for January. His little ears have diamond dust on them to make them sparkle! Here is the one for February. There is a little gem in the centre of the heart he is holding with his trunk! I love this little "stamp" elephant!
April's little elephant is soooo cute hanging onto the little flower!
I'll post some more tomorrow!!!
Chow for now,
Jacqui

Paul...

I haven't got too much stamping done in the last little while, I was totally enthralled with reading. I just finished The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo and then the second book The Girl Who Played With Fire. Now I just have to wait until my friend's mom is done reading The Girl Who Kicked The Hornet's Nest before I can read it. Wow they are great books. I watched the movie as well, and it was good - but I liked the book much better. I am now reading The House at Riverton. My Mom and Dad gave it to me for Christmas. I am only in a couple of chapters, but it is intriguing so far!
I did manage to get all my papers organized though - took me long enough - but some days it seems like such a daunting task - I wish I was more organized, but then my family would think I was sick or something!!!!
As you know I am a movie freak and I always try and catch the latest trailers and I came across this one the other day. I think it is gonna be hilarious!!!!
Chow for now
Jacqui

Happy Birthday Joel

Well it is very hard to believe that my baby turns 15 today. Where has the time gone? He's a great kid and is maturing into a very good young man. I love you bud Chow for now, Jacqui

American Retirement

I hope you are enjoying these "British bits" as much as me. These girls just make me laugh. The bigger girl is the same one who plays in The Vicar of Dibley. The two of them together just makes me howl!! Ya know...some days, I just don't know what people are thinking. Like the people who own white cars that refuse to drive with their lights on in the fog or in the snow....um it's not rocket science people. The people who pull out in front of you, onto the highway, when no one is behind you, only to put their blinker on at the next road to turn - could they not have waited that 5 seconds it would have taken for me to get past them? But this one....this one takes the cake..... last night at the dinner table, the kids were talking about their day. We quite often get interesting stories of things that have happened on the bus and things the bus driver has done or said......well last night the kids informed us that the previous night (our kids were not on the bus that night - sports and stuff) that the bus driver got stuck and get this.......are you ready for this........MADE THE KIDS GET OUT AND PUSH THE BUS. Can you believe that? It's a bloody good thing my kids were not on the bus that day. There would have been a few phone calls made to various places - like the bus line and the school board. Good Lord, that's why they have those bloody CB radio jobbies in the bus. I just could not believe that when the kids told me that. What next? They will probably have to pitch in $5 for gas each day. Chow for now, Jacqui

My Blackberry is not working......

One of the girls at work shared this with me yesterday. It's quite funny since I was talking about the Vicar of Dibley the other day and the comedy on BBC.
This is very funny (even more so for me since I work in the computer world!)
Chow for now
Jacqui

New Year, New Goals, New Family members....

WOW..2011...that happened really really fast. I still remember the old "freaking out over Y2K" ha ha ...it still makes me laugh when I think back on that. I must admit when I reflect on 2010, I am very glad that it is over. Our family had a few set backs in 2010 and we are positively looking forward to a much brighter year in 2011. We definitely had some good things happen in 2010, don't get me wrong, (my little sister got engaged!!!) but I was not sad to see the ball drop to finish that year. One of my goals for 2011 is to actually "set" some goals. I always say I would like to do this or would like to do that, but I need to actually set the goal and write it down and post it somewhere that I am gonna look at it everyday so I will see it and get it in my brain that I really need to do that. So one goal is to set goals. Another goal is to lose weight. That is always a goal - more like a pain in the arse, but still a goal none the less. I must say I was happy that my weight stayed the same over the holidays in spite of all the tasty treats everyone felt the need to share with me!!!! So goal two, lose some weight and get healthier. Another goal is to try and do some more stamping. I'm still not sure if I want to continue doing all the workshops and things like that, although I do have a blast when I teach a class or get together to teach stampers something. I am just finding it hard to find the time to do all of that as well as working full time. I have also taken on coaching the kids in a couple of their sports teams and that takes up a big amount of time as well. I am enjoying it though, so I am totally not complaining about the time it takes up. I love spending the time with the kids and getting to know some of the other kids at the school. One of the BEST choices I made in 2010 was to move back to the Parkhill area and get the kids enrolled in North Middlesex District High School. It's a great school. It's a small school, and that is the best part. It's like a large family and everyone knows everyone and the support of the parents and teachers is amazing. We have got and are getting some new family members in 2011. In September of this year, we will be officially welcoming my little sister Courtney's fiance Jay into our family. We already have welcomed him in, but it will be official in September. He knows we are all crazy and he still wants to join, so he's a keeper! We had a new addition to our family on January 1st! Charlie came to live with us on that day. She is an American Bulldog and she is the funniest, and smartest, and snuggliest (is that even a word) dog I have ever met. She is a very vocal dog - I don't mean barking, but she kind of "talks" to you. It's very cute. I gave her to the kids for Christmas, but she did not come to stay until the 1st of January. It is now the 5th of January and Jade has already taken 157 pictures of her!!!! Here are a few of my favourite ones! She is very photogenic! She loves her Kong. She will chew on it for hours and she holds it in her paws! I think one is my most favourite picture of her. I like the dim light and the look on her face. It is my desktop wallpaper on my computer at work. She loves spending time with Joel I think she considers him more of her master than the rest of us, but she still listens to us, she just likes to spend most of her time with him, or at least near him. She lays like this a lot. It is so funny! look how muscly her legs are! She is VERY strong. Check out the look on her face!!!! Ha, she loves to get her head scratched!See, this is how you will usually find her, somewhere near Joel. I like this side shot of her. She looks very regal. Here she is patiently waiting for us to finish eating. She is not allowed in the kitchen when we are eating our supper or any meal for that matter and she waits in the living room like a good girl. Look at that sleepy face! I think we were taking too long to eat this time! Here is a front shot of her waiting for us to eat. I love the way she puts her two pays right together. She is very cute when she puts her head down between them as well. This one makes me laugh!! I think I will use it for an album entitled "where's Charlie?" Chow for now, Jacqui