Errands . . . ugh!

I had the day off from work today and I had a whole list of errands to run. Usually if I have a day off I plan ahead so that I don't have to leave the house all day - those are my favorite kinds of days. However, I'm still "recovering" from my road trip to Oregon and back and my to do list involved lots of errands.

We all hate running errands, right? Just taking my seat belt on and off 10 times is enough to drive me crazy. It is nice to be able to get things done on a week day though as it's typically not as busy as a Saturday.

I live in a nice little town in the country and that has lots and lots of benefits. The down side is that if you have a list of errands to run chances are you are going to have to leave town. Need some padded envelopes? Not in this town! Need to get new tabs for your car? Think again! An automated carwash? I don't think so! Ok, you get the point, right?

So first I headed east about 6 miles to a nearby town that has an automated car wash, a licensing bureau where you can get tabs, and a quick type oil change place. Perfect. First I stop at the gas station with the car wash. Out of the car (unstrap that seat belt!), in the station and see the big sign: car wash out of order. Perfect. Ok, on to the license bureau. Someone walked in right in front of me (don't you hate that??) and there were already two people in there and there are a total of 2 employees. No problem, I wait my turn and head out. My next stop is the oil change place, and again, someone pulls in right in front of me. Dang! Luckily I brought a book (can you tell I've done this before?) and entertain myself while I wait.

Next I need to travel back to my nice little town with limited shopping opportunities and continue west for 11 miles to the Super Walmart. I know some people avoid Walmart like the plague due to their belief that it's mere existence is killing small towns. I get that, but when I can walk in one store and buy a kitchen rug, a jug of milk and some ring binders, I'm sold. I complete my shopping there and head down the street a couple of blocks to a gas station with a car wash. Just as I'm thinking I can check one more thing off my list the clerk says, "sorry - our car wash is closed". This is when I looked around and thought that maybe I was being punked. Seriously. When I left my house today to run errands I never thought it would be this hard to find a car wash that is IN WORKING ORDER. Do people realize that I have 3,000 miles of dead bugs stuck to my headlights impairing my night vision? AND grossing me out? The friendly clerk, after listening to my exasperated sigh and all out whining suggested that I try the gas station across town that has a car wash. That's how much I was whining. I got my car wash and the clerk at that station surely thought I was nuts when I got so darned excited about it. She has no idea.

So now I'm back home and ready to watch the Minnesota Vikings in a preseason game. I have TGIFriday's buffalo wings in the oven (thanks Walmart!) and Corona in the fridge. Heh.

One more thing. When I was a teenager growing up in this nice little town with limited shopping opportunities there was a hill on the edge of town next to a lake named Spring Lake. The side of the hill was nicely mown and there were rocks painted white that said - yep, "Spring Lake". My friends and I, being huge Springsteen fans, couldn't resist the temptation to sneak out there at night and move a few rocks so that they now said "Springsteen" instead of "Spring lake". Now I'm an adult and the rocks have either been removed or have gown over with weeds. But today, as I was out running errands, I drove past a different hill long the lake and see that someone has once again used rocks to spell "Spring Lake" using regular rocks instead of white. You know they are just taunting me, right? Anyone in?

The Office mini album, art journal

I'm a huge fan of The Office and can't wait for the new season to begin. I also love office papers, so I decided to create a mini album/art journal using office supplies.

It would be a great way to document your profession or everyday life - and it's filled with fun papers that you would typically find in an office. I just added it to my shop - you can find more information there.

I have a new embellishment set that I'm working on and hope to get added to my shop this weekend. Off to work I go!

Road weary

I just returned from a road trip from Minnesota to Oregon and back, all in one week. I'm definitely sick to death of my car! It needs a real scrubbing inside and out . . . oh the bugs! The trip went well; there's really nothing like a road trip. We traveled through Minnesota, North Dakota, Montana, Washington and Oregon . . . and then back. I should say M . . . O . . . N . . . T . . . A . . . N . . . A because it is such a big state!

We saw lots of fun sites along the way - here are some of my favorite photos.

North Dakota is home to the Enchanted Highway - which I guess is a road that features lots of metal sculptures. We never venture off the interstate to check it out, but there is a sample sculpture along the interstate intended to lure you in. It's awesome . . . but didn't work on us. Try harder North Dakota! Just kidding; if we didn't have so many hours of driving ahead of us I'm sure we would check it out.

Once we get into the foothills you see beautiful scenery like this:

One place we stop every year (we seem to be creatures of habit) is Wallace, Montana. It's an old mining town full of little shops and great old buildings like this:

We spent one night in Everett, Washington on my sister & brother-in-law's boat. They just returned from a 4 year trip sailing around the world so we were so excited to see them! They are currently living on their boat so we were able to get a taste of boat living (a very small taste) and they made us feel so welcome. I was surprised to learn that my sister wanted to ride back to Minnesota with me so that she could see the whole family! That worked out great because I had planned to drive by myself (which I've done before) but having her along made it so much more fun! We had 4 years to catch up on and we managed to talk the entire way. Seriously!

I got my daughter all settled into her college house in Oregon. Of course they were having record breaking temps (100+ degrees) while we were moving her in. I love IKEA and their furniture selection and price, but I'm not such a big fan of their directions. We spent lots of time pondering the pictures they provide (no words) and sweating like crazy! We got it done (just don't look too close. Ahem.) and she's ready to start her junior year. Yikes!

I'll post some crafty news very soon . . . but after a week away from home I have a few things to catch up on first. Back soon!

Places We Go mini album kit

In just a couple of days my daughter and I will start our road trip from Minnesota to Oregon. 30 hours of bonding time for us! On this trip I plan to do a better job of taking pictures along the way so that when I get home I can use the Places We Go mini album in my shop to document the trip.

One thing we need to do when we get to Oregon is pick up the bike that we bought off Craigs list. My daughter wanted a bike last year but we couldn't find an inexpensive used bike. This year she started looking early and found this vintage bike:

Isn't it cute? When I asked her what she thought she would put in the basket she said, "puppies". Huh. I was thinking books or groceries.

I'll post pics here when I return - see you in a week!

this girl loves her dog . . .

My daughter has always been an animal lover. Me? Not so much. She spent years begging for a pet. A cat. A dog. A Guinea pig. There's a whole Guinea pig story to tell but I'll save that for another time.

Anyway, the girl wanted a pet in the worst way and I really didn't. She played the "only child" card and said that if she could have a pet she would at least have someone to play with and talk to. She finally decided that it was a DOG she wanted, and she was relentless in her begging. I even got a Power Point presentation emailed to me at work explaining her reasoning for wanting a dog and listing all of the things she would do for me if only I would get one for her. She was GOOD.

So, for her golden birthday, when she was 9 years old, I got her a DOG. A Golden Retriever to be exact. I have to admit, it was probably the best decision I ever made. 11 years later that dog, Hunter, IS still her best friend! She is home from college for the summer and has spent countless hours hanging out with that dog. They go on walks. They go swimming. They lay in the yard and read.

Because Hunter is now 11, he's slowing down a bit and we've had several discussions about the fact that for a dog, he's getting old. She does not want to discuss. At all. But she did decide that we really should do a photo shoot, a girl and her dog. One day last week we walked down the road a ways to a beautiful spot with two rows of trees - our photo shoot location. We took lots of photos of them walking, running and sitting. Here's one of my favs:


He loves her just as much as she loves him. Pretty cool.

e + h. forever.

Exciting news!

I have three pieces of exciting news to share with you!

1. I finished putting together my newest kit - The Places We go. This is a mini album kit with lots and lots of supplies from October Afternoon's new line called Road Trip. The paper colors are so much fun, and there are tons of cool stickers and die cuts too. The kit is listed in my shop so go check it out!

2. My Etsy friend, Andrea from Rooks Paper Scissors had a baby girl! You can find a link to her blog over on the right >>. Go check it out and see a picture of the beautiful baby! Congrats Andrea!

3. I'm so excited to be sponsoring a blog this month for the OH SO CREATIVE Elisa Blaha! Her blog is called enJOY IT and you can check it out here. I don't personally know Elise but I've been following her blog and she seems like a really fun gal. We have totally different working styles - she seems to get a lot done quickly while I sit and think and think about how I want to do something! I'm envious of her talent. Be sure to check her out!

I'm currently working on a custom order - it's a guest book and I've been a bit challenged because I want it to be awesome; it's almost done and it's turning out well. I'm also restocking my shop a bit and then I'm going to get to work on a mini album for summer, specifically gardens.

I have some extra special photos to post in the next few days to please stop back!