Lainey's Altered Ego

{exciting weekend ahead}

first off, tomorrow brett and i are going to see this:

sigh.  

it will be heavenly.

then, on sunday, we leave to visit my sister in ny.  she has a new house and we have to bring her this:

back on wednesday - be good while i'm gone!

{xoxo}

{three weeks and counting}

just three weeks left until we leave for florida!

we've made all our final arrangements, including dining reservations and upgrades.

we purchased the book, passporter's walt disney world 2009, which is an amazing resource.  it has envelopes and pages in the back for recording the whole trip.  we've already begun flagging pages and marking it up - so much fun!

i also have the travel journal i made ready to go on the trip with us as well!

we'll be spending a few days with my parents in port orange, then heading to the parks for four days...then on to this:

off to plan some more!

{xoxo}

{so excited about this project!}

i've signed up to take cathy zielske's class me: the abridged version through big picture scrapbooking.

this class is based off of amy krouse rosenthal's book, an encyclopedia of an ordinary life, which i have read, love, and blogged about before.

i just can't express how excited i am about this class!  so excited, in fact, that i waited by the computer to register at exactly 10 am pacific time on the day registration opened and apparently i was the first one!  yay - happy mail for me (and, yes, i'm aware that they have me as "lorraine" - they must have gone of the name on my credit card, lol!).

one of the pre-class assignments was to put together a tag book to start jotting down ideas for our encyclopedia entries.  the template was provided - so i dove right in and got to work!

i decided to use the little yellow bicycle traveler line because the colors are so me.  i love how it turned out and am so inspired to begin brainstorming!

{xoxo}

{orange julius}

ever heard of orange julius?  these yummy fruit smoothie drinks were a big part of my childhood.

my mother in law gave us a recipe for these glasses of yummy goodness.  i haven't made them in forever, but jake and i pulled out the recipe the other day.  he's now in love and i have to keep a freezer stocked with frozen orange juice!

you'll need:

6 ounces of frozed orange juice concentrate (or other frozen fruit juice as desired)
1/2 cup of sugar
1 cup of milk
1 cup of water
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
10-12 ice cubes

blend all ingredients together.  you do not want to fill the blender with ice.  it's not a frozen drink, really, it comes out all frothy like this:

serve with a straw (it definitely tastes better that way) and enjoy!  this is the most authentic orange julius recipe i've come across.  

and yes, i recognize that milk and orange juice together may make your skin crawl.

you'll just have to trust me.

{xoxo}

{freedom carnival}

a week or so ago we attended the annual freedom fire department carnival.

now, note this: i hate carnivals.

seriously.

i don't mind roller coasters and other rides - just not ones that arrive at the beginning of the week on a truck and are literally screwed together days or even hours before i ride them.  

which is why i do not go on the rides at carnivals.

kings dominion? busch gardens?  hershey park?  fine, fine, and FINE.  freedom carnival?  NOT fine.

apparently, zack is of the same opinion. which is why he didn't come with us this year.  and why poor jake didn't have a riding partner.

and why you see this:

and this:

if you were to zoom in on that last one, you could probably see my WHITE knuckles.  

sigh.

i'm such a good mom.

i did, however, REFUSE to go on this:

jake was on his own for that one.

never fear, though - i definitely got rewarded for my {sorta} fearlessness.  or at least for not screaming too much.

and yes...i'm aware of how pathetic it is that i can be bought with food.

and i'm okay with that.

{xoxo}

{meet jeff}

our garden gnome, jeff, wishes each and every one of you a happy fourth of july!  have a safe and fun-filled holiday weekend.

happy birthday america!

{xoxo}

{covert ops}

a few weeks ago, we took a day trip up to gettysburg, pennsylvania, to see the memorial day goings-on and have lunch at devil's den.  while there, we took the rare opportunity to do a letterbox in town!  we've never had to do one on the sly like this before - all of our previous adventures have been in the woods somewhere.

this letter box was situated behind mark nesbitt's ghosts of gettysburg shop in the city itself.

 

unfortunately {or i guess fortunately in this case} the shop was closed, so we couldn't check out the inside.  

but what we were really there for was in the back behind the red fence.

there was actually some guy back there at one point that we had to dodge...we weren't sure if the owners knew about the box, and didn't want someone to find it and get rid of it!  according to our clues, the box was hidden behind the bricks under the wooden porch.

sure enough, we found it right away, and jake and i rushed to stamp both log books and get out of there!

whew!  that was certainly our most thrilling letterbox yet!  it was not easy to be sneaky...i hope we didn't give the location away to the owners!

raining here in maryland this week...i hope it clears up soon - we need another adventure!

{xoxo}

{housewarming}

my sister cheryl and her husband just bought their first house.  in 2 weeks, zack, jake, and i will be visiting for the first time...which struck me with the question: what do i get her for a housewarming gift?

they just got married in august...and came away with a complete collection of kitchen, bath, and general household supplies.  they don't really need anything {except maybe a winning lottery ticket, but don't we all...}.  so what do i get for them?

one of the perks of their new house is their finished basement, which means that cher finally gets her own scrapbook/craft room!  she's beyond excited, so the wheels admist the dustbunnies in my head started spinning when i found this at big lots for $3 {without the tins}:

what a great storage shelf for a scrapbook room, even if you don't own a quickutz!  i bought 2 - one for me and one for cher.  

and then i did this:

a great use of the cosmo cricket girl friday line, if you ask me.  and better than any kitchen gadget or tchotchke i could purchase for her.

now to figure out what line to use on mine...any ideas?

{xoxo}

{backlogged projects, continued}

here are some more:

finally starting to get my mojo back since the school year ended last week...stay tuned for something special tomorrow.

here's a little sneak:

{xoxo}

{backlogged projects}

having issues with my usb ports on my laptop, so haven't been able to upload photos from my camera.  brett finally got it working last night, so here are some layouts i've worked on over the past few weeks...

more tomorrow -- stay tuned!

{xoxo}