Hockey Tournament Gifts

The past 2 years I have volunteered to make "hockey mom" gifts for our home hockey tournament. Many times when you go to junior league hockey tournaments the home team will give out little gifts to the moms (or dads). Most of the time they are homemade little trinkets with the child's name and/or jersey number. A little something to show our appreciation to the parents for supporting our tournament.


Last year we made wooden star pins. Each star was spray painted each teams color. We added the players name and number to the front and hot glued a pin to the back. They looked great! Lots of moms wore them during the tournament.


This year we decided to go a different route and make keychains. Each keychain has the teams colors, number beads, and a wooden star with the players name. We just finished making them today---198 of them!! It was a lot of work, but again, I think they turned out great! I hope the other mom's like them as much as I do.

Now to start planning for next year..... :)

Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close

"Extremely Loud & Incredibly Close" by Jonathan Safran Foer---**** (4 stars, out of 5)

Oskar is not your typical 9 year old. He asks LOTS of questions, retains knowledge about everything, and is a avid inventor. On Sept. 11th, his life comes crashing down when his father is killed during the 9/11 terrorist attack. A year after his fathers death he finds a mysterious key among his belongings. He sends himself on a quest to find the lock to the key throughout New York. The quest takes him to many places and different people, including a long lost grandfather.

I picked this book up after seeing and hearing about the upcoming motion picture based on the book. I was surprised to find that it wasn't exactly as I thought it would be, however it made it that much more interesting. The book is difficult to read, especially at first. The chapters written from Oskar's point of view are very jumbled with lots of run on sentences. Other chapters are written from other characters point of view through letter form, with some being written 40 years prior. It can all be a little confusing. While some might find it too hard to follow and give up, I found it interesting and wanted to know how it was going to come together in the end. A definite heartfelt book with so many underlying meanings and feelings. If you can get through the confusion, I would highly recommend the book. Looking forward to seeing how the movie compares.

Should I start again??

So, I'm sure I have zero followers....but I'm thinking about making a blogging come back. Seems like every year around this time I think about starting back up. What to blog about is the real question!? I think more than anything this blog becomes my own personal journal (which happens to be published online for the world to see).

Stay tuned for some fun, maybe exciting, maybe boring posts about the ups and downs of my life.

Snapshots of Life- 9:00pm

A quick photo of bedtime. (Little did I know that I would be up 2 hours later changing the sheets after Adam got sick.....)

Thursday, November 18th- 9:00pm

2010 Christmas Card

I finally made a decision on my Christmas cards! I ended up picking a 5x7 card (with a completely different design from my pick of "favorites" I posted earlier).

Here's what I ended up with:

Back in the scrappin' groove!

Last Saturday I attended a scrapbooking crop to benefit a precious little girl Jordyn. Jordyn is 3 years old and was recently diagnosed with stage 4 cancer. I currently watch her little brother in the daycare and used to watch Jordyn before she went off to pre-school. Immediately after hearing the news my friend and I decided to host a scrapbooking day to help raise money for their doctor bills. You can read more information about Jordyn here: LoveJordyn

This is the first time I have sat down to scrapbook in about 6 months! I don't know what happened, I just lost track of it. BUT, I was really excited to jump back in. With my new-found motivation, I took about 3+ hours on Monday and completely cleaned my scrap desk and reorganized. I'm ready to dive back into my love of scrapping!!!!!

Here are some pages that I completed this weekend:

Dylan as Anikin Skywalker last year on Halloween

My hockey star!

My book club friends & I downtown Mpls.

I love sushi!

Snapshots of Life-10:00am

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Thursday, November 11th, 2010- 10:00am

Yep, every morning around 10am I am in the backyard cleaning up the dog doo-doo. One of my least favorite jobs in the world. But, if I didn't clean it up I would have kids running around with it on their shoes (which is WAY worse to clean up!). Oh, the joys of pet ownership.

Thanksgiving Decorating

Time to take a Halloween decorations down and get ready for Thanksgiving! Here's a few shots of my attempt at bringing the Thanksgiving spirit into our house.

My cute little turkey

Pumpkins! The small pumpkins are temporary until I get another big pumpkin.

My new addition--a cornucopia!

Turkey's hanging out of the front porch.

"The Last Song"

"The Last Song" by Nicholas Sparks---*** (3 stars)

Ronnie & brother Jonah are sent to North Carolina to spend the summer on the beach with their father. Three years prior, their parents divorced causing a great amount of friction between Ronnie and her father.

Ronnie is not happy about spending the entire summer away from her life in New York and does everything she can to show how upset she is. However he father takes it all in stride and is extremely patient and understanding.

The book is written in 4 different perspectives---Ronnie, Steve (father), Will, and Marcus. Each perspective gives the reader a little more incite into the plot and characters.

In the end this book was more than just a summer romance book. It's about change, learning to love yourself and others around you, and building lasting relationships. It left you with a renewed sense of wanting to take moreI time with those you love. I would definitely recommend it to others.

Snapshots of Life- 8:00am

A week has already gone by and it's time for another "Snapshots of Life" photo! Today's snapshot time- 8:00am.

Thursday, November 4th, 2010- 8:00am