A Week In the Life (inspired by Ali Edwards)

The Daily Inspiration at Scrapfreak today is Ali Edwards "A Week in the Life" project.  (Read more about it here.)  I thought this would be something fun to do as a way to document the last few days until we have a baby in the house with us!  So, manybe mine is more of a "Countdown to Baby" rather than a week in the life.  If I have it my way, this won't last another week, but I think the baby has other plans and this could last longer than a week!  There are a few things I want to get done around the house to prepare, and I also want a way to see how much things change once I am responsible for more than just myself!  I want to scrap these days, but for now I am just going to post some unedited photos and my journaling here in case I don't get to it right away!

Day 1: Monday, April 19, 2010

Today I started the day by cleaning our bedroom so I could put the pack and play in ready for baby to come home.  While I am still standing strongly on trying to get the baby on a good sleeping/eating schedule as soon as possible and having the baby sleep in it's crib right away, I am also not an idiot!  I like my sleep and I know it will take me a little while to get used to getting up with the baby in the middle of the night, so I want to have the baby in our room for a little while.  I decided to put the Pack 'n Play together in the living room.  I wasn't thinking about having to fit it through the doorway into our room.  Needless to say, I had to take the things almost completely apart to fit it through the door to our room and put it back up in there.

After getting my room ready, I organized a few more things in the baby's room.  While I don't remember any more than just the stories, my mom said that I loved Beatrix Potter books when I was a toddler.  She has told me many times about our trips to the library so I could get my books.  This is something that I have always enjoyed hearing about, so with the baby's room, I have decided to do a Peter Rabbit/Beatrix Potter theme.  The bedding I picked out is mostly blue, tan, and white.  It is a bit boyish, but I decided that I can add flowers and other colors to the room after the baby is born if it is a girl.  So, for now, things aren't completely done in there, but I di have everything assembled and washed!  It is going to be a hard day for Zoe when she realizes that the crib is no longer hers!  Everytime I am in the room, she comes in and sprawls out in the crib!

Tonight I invited my family over for dinner.  Lou grilled burgers and hotdogs and we just hung out.  I wanted to have them over for dinner one last time before the baby because I don't know when I will have the energy to make dinner for everyone again!  It might be a while.  Keira had so much fun having everyone around to play with her.  She hung out with Uncle Louie for a while tonight without crying.  She still isn't sure what to think of him!

And of course, there is the never-ending laundry!  It is currently taking over a corner of the dining room because I wanted it out of our bedroom when I cleaned.  So, you will be hearing more about laundry tomorrow as I attempt to get this mountian out of my dining room!!

Scrapfreak Kits!

OK, I know, I'm a blog slacker again!  I realized how much of a slacker I was when I decided that I would post a sneak peek of Scrapfreaks May kit and then I noticed I never posted April debut kit!


So, first off Scrapfreak has made some changes.  They are now an embellishment kit club.  I am so excited about this change.  I have been looking for an embellishment kit for YEARS!  I love to be able to try new things out without having to spend tons of money on a huge package of embellishements.  How many chipboard flowers does one girl need?  In the past I was only able to find an embellishment kit as an add-on to a full paper and embellishement kit that I don't need!  Well, at long last there is a kit out there for people like me!

April was the first month for the embellishment kits, and it is a great kit. 

Introducing the debut kit...

You can find more information on purchasing the kit here!

I have been able to use a few of the kit items over the last couple weeks, and I have to say I LOVE THEM!
Here is a layout I made of my neice Keira making fishy lips.  She is seriously one of the cutest kids EVER.  I already know that she is not going to be able to hide her feelings, her facial expressions give it all away.  It's kind of funny to watch a 6 month old baby look at someone like they just want to tell them how stupid they are though.

For this layout, I used the corrugated alphabet, journal spots, flower centers, rub-ons, plastic flowers, and trim from the kit.  And I still have LOTS of stuff to work with.

For this card I layered the clear acrylic flower and small plastic flowers from the kit.  I have decided that I am in love with the plastic flowers.  This is shocking to me since I am NOT a flower type girl.  Something about the pearlesent plastic flowers is drawing me in!

Now that I have gotten a little bit more up to date, it's time to show a few sneak peeks of May's kit.  If you liked the April kit, you are sure to LOVE the May kit. 

Here is the sneak that is up right now at Scrapfreak.

And here are a couple sneaks at some of the projects I have made with this kit so far.

I can't wait to show the entire kit.  I am so happy with the quality and amount of products.  Be sure to check Scrapfreak on the 25th for the full reveal!  You can find all the details on kit ordering here!  And if you want even more eye candy, check out the sneak peeks on jessica*bree's blog!

My Baby Shower

My mom, Kacie, Stephanie, Andi, and Casey had a baby shower for me last Sunday.  It was tons of fun, but exhausting and a bit overwhelming too.  I can't believe all the gifts I received!  The baby's room is packed full of goodness right now. 
It was nice to see Kelly, Nikki, and Lisa there and get to see how their pregnancies are going too.  I am so excited that there will be so many new babies in the family this year.  I loved growing up with so many cousins that were close in age to me.  I am glad that my baby will get to experience that as well.  Stephanie and I counted and from Sept. 2009 - Oct. 2010 the Lyon family is expecting 6 new babies!  So far the first two born were girls, I'm next and hoping for a boy, Kelly & Dave are thinking about waiting to find out what they are having until the baby is born, and Nikki & Paul and Jaime & Amanda don't have their ultrasounds scheduled yet as far as I know.
When it came time to opening gifts, the kids were all excited to help!  It was nice to have little hands to help when I couldn't reach past my belly, but WOW! that was a lot of help!

Max taking a nap with his Aunt Kimmy.  The shower was exhausting for him too!

Aunt Donna N. and Jake made the baby a blanket and burp cloths with stars and moons on them.  The blankie also has the minky fabric on the back, my favorite.  I'm sure we will be using this A LOT cause Mommy wants to use it too!

Baby's first carseat.  I ended up with two travel systems because of a mix up with taking things off the registry, but Babies R Us gladly gave me a store credit to use when I figure out what else we are needing before the baby is born.

Lucas was really excited to help me open my presents until he realized that there weren't any for him.  The sad look on his face was priceless!

Like I said, I had lots of help with gift opening.  The girls had it down to a science.  Hailey handed the gift to me to open, then I handed it to Rhyan and she handed it to Kadymn.  That way they all got a good look!

When I registered for a baby bath Andi suggested that I register for the one with a sprayer.  She said it would be a lot easier to rinse off the baby that way.  When Lou was loading up the truck after the shower he got a kick out of the fact that our baby has a Soothing Spa Tub!

And of course with my last name, I had to have a lion toy!  Pam and Aunt Karen got the baby the cutest little lion that plays music and his fat little cheeks light up!

Our New Baby (and not the human one yet!)

One night after hanging out with Pond, Lou came home to let me know that we were getting a snake.  This is something we had discussed before since I was going to get him a snake for his birthday last year, so his announcement was fine, I didn't freak out or anything.  The only stipulation to us having a snake is that I didn't want to be around when it was fed, and housing it's food in my home was NOT an option.  While I am not scared of snakes, I am TERRIFIED of rats!

One thing I did not realize at first was how much care a snake requires.  They have very strict heat and humidity requirements to keep them healthy.  It took a little while to get her home ready for her, but once we did, I was really excited to meet her!

So, here she is.  Introducing Miss Chemical Warfare! (I know crazy name, but Lou informed me that when he was a kid he always wanted to name his pet Chemical Warfare, and since you don't call your snake, it finally worked out!)

Here she is investigating Chris' face

One of her favorite things to do is try to climb into the back of the couch.  She's quick too, if you're not paying attention she will be gone!

Lou, Mark Sr., and Chris spent a lot of time working on what I like to refer to as the "Snake Palace" for her.  They built a 4'x2' house for her that takes up a whole wall of the living room.  They did a great job and it's really cool to be able to watch her move around in there. 

Andi brought Rhyan and Taylor over to meet her a few weeks ago.  Rhyan wanted nothing to do with her.  She was fine watching her in her cage, but she had no intentions of touching her.  Taylor on the other hand, this child isn't scared of anything!  She was a little nervous at first since she didn't know how to hold her, but once Lou showed her what to do, she was a pro!

And I took this picture today for the Foto Friday at Scrapfreak to show animals OTHER than the everyday pets.  I like to call this one "Fat Girl in a Little Hide".  When I was buying supplies for her cage, I hadn't met her yet.  I had no idea how big she was and Lou underestimated her size when he was telling me about her.  Needless to say, her hide was a tight fit to begin with, and she has already grown since we got her!  Everytime I watch her slither back under her hide I think of the movie Tommy Boy!

So, that is the newest addition to our home.  Hopefully the next time I blog about a new addition I will be telling you that I finally had this baby!

I'm a bad blogger!

I am a horrible blogger.  I know this.  I have tried a few times to blog more frequently, but every time I fail.  So, after Bree and my mom so lovingly pointed out my poor blogging skills, I will once again try this whole blog thing out!  So, Mom and Bree, it is now up to you guys to help me to keep going!

The Name Game - WTG Challenge #2

It's time again for a challenge from Who's That Girl.  This week's challenge on Who's That Girl is to document a story about your name... it can be why your parents chose your name, how you ended up with a particular nickname or any other name related story.


I scrapped about the spelling of my name.  My mom threw in an extra "e" just to make things confusing!  So, my name is Kimberley rather than the common spelling of Kimberly.  I have become used to everyone misspelling my name, even when I spell it out for them!
 

As if the challenge wasn't a fun enough reason to play, the RAK that Jessica*Bree is offering up this week is AMAZING!  She is offering up these beautiful hand made embellies!

One more this in the Who's That Girl world is our monthly Crafy Idea!  Each month one of the designers will be showing off a crafty idea. While this challenge blog is mainly about scrapping about you, its also about figuring out your style and enjoying this hobby! So we hope the design and technique ideas will help inspire you!  This month Jessica*Bree is going to show you how to make fancy doo-dads. Okay, doo-dads may not be their official name, but this month she is going to be sharing ideas and tips for making your own cute little layered embellies like these:

Check out the blog for a great step by step tutorial!

Scrapfreak January DT Reveal...

This month at Scrapfreak I worked with the Bella Blvd. Honey I'm Home Line.  Ihave to admit, before I had it in my hands I did NOT think it was a line for me.  I am the person that LOVES all things bright and obnoxious when it comes to scrap supplies.  Once I had it in my hands I was very happy with it.  Here is what I came up with this month.

To see more details and what the Team Freak girls did with these products, go here!