HAPPY HALLOWEEN!!!

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Just a few more

Children in Miami get brainwashed to attend the University of Miami since birth.



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SO MUCH HHAIR!!

She is less swollen now so she looks cuter!! Look at how much hair she has!! Yes, I am thrilled!

Charlie says that having nieces is waaaayyyyy better than having your own!







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Another picture!!

I am on my phone and just figured out how to upload more than one picture at a time!

She is only a half hour old so still looks quite funky!!! She will look much cuter tomorrow!!! LOL!!






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WOW!

This is the third and its still such an amazing miracle to see a baby born!!

Savannah Grace


7.5 pounds
18.5 inches


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SHE IS HERE!!!

Savannah Grace! Born at 2:52 pm



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We are waiting

For the pitosin to kick in!


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I'M ON MY WAY TO MIAMI

For the arrival (finally) of Baby Savannah - she will be induced tomorrow at 6:00 am. This kid has had more announcement that a new flavor of Coca Cola!!!

I will of course immediately post pictures of my new grand baby!!! Be back in a week or so!!

Charlie is doing great AND I am expecting another grand daughter!! Life could not possibly get any better for me!

AND SAVANNAH WILL MAKE THREE!!

I spent the day with these two monsters yesterday! I really don't know how Kristina does it! They are waaaaaaaayyyyyyyyyy too crazy!!!

But seriously... how beautiful are my baby girls?????

KATHY'S NEWEST PROJECT!!!

You have to go to Kathy's blog and buy this wonderful new project!!!

THIS WILL PUT A SMILE ON YOUR FACE!!!

A friend sent me this and it made me smile..... thought I'd pass it on! Thanks Teri!

STILL on Standby!!!

Well, obviously Savannah is in no rush to meet us!!  Nothing yet.  If Kristina does not go into labor on her own, they are going to induce the labor on Saturday at 6:00 am.  So like it or not Ms. Thing will be making an appearance on Saturday!

Thank you for all the emails!

ON STANDBY!!

Kristina is having contractions so we are all on pins and needles waiting for the birth of my third grand daughter, Savannah Grace.  This is Kristina's 3rd child but it always makes me nervous to see her in labor.

Prayers for my baby and HER baby are requested!

LETTERING

I love the art of lettering.  It takes a lot of practice.  I have not had the time to really get into it.  It is a beautiful art form and, frankly, there is no excuse for not practicing it since you can do it anywhere!  Anyway, I was sent this video by a friend and thought you guys would enjoy it!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY CHARLIE!!!

Well, it's really not until tomorrow but I made him his "birthday dinner" (which is a tradition with my children) for lunch today because he had to go to work this afternoon.

I can't believe he is 31.  Every time I look at him I am amazed that he is still not that 3 year old that followed me around everywhere with his pillow.

He's a good man and he has been fighting a courageous battle WHICH HE IS WINNING.  I can not be prouder of him or love him more.

Happy birthday baby boy.

 The cake looks like it's on fire!!!  Leonor put those trick candles on the cake - all 31 of them - and we could not get them off fast enough to keep them from melting!  It was hilarious.

The pictures are not good because they were taken with my cell phone.  My camera was out of batteries!!  Oh well, I still have a picture!

JUST A FUN VIDEO!

Monday September 26: COCO CAY

Okay, listen, I come from Cuba, I have lived my entire life in places with very hot weather - Puerto Rico, Miami, Key Largo - but Coco Cay???? Jesus!!!  I have NEVER felt so much heat in my life!!!

Coco Cay is a private island in the Bahamas allegedly belonging to Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines.  It is really pretty but we were there for less than an hour.  The heat was unbearable!  You know that phrase "hotter than hell"?  Haven't been there and don't expect to ever visit but if it's hotter than Coco Cay I'd be surprised!

Here are some pictures:   (any blobs you see on the ground were people that melted)

This was the view of Coco Cay as we arrived - not too impressive from here.

The beach is really pretty and they have hundreds and hundreds of chairs set up for everyone. They fed everyone on the ship which is no small ordeal!

 This is my friend Eileen.  She and the heat do not get along well at all!  I was afraid I would find her melted on this island!

Bye-bye Coco Cay!!!

LET'S CRUISE!!! Sunday, September 25th

As everyone knows I went on the Tim Holtz Caribbean Cruise (September 25 - October 2nd).  I have to tell you I can not BELIEVE how quickly a week can go by!!!  It was a great cruise.  Hold on and I'll share some picture with you!

When we get into our state room I was really happy with the room.  It was huge and pretty and comfortable with a HUGE balcony.  My husband had ordered the "romance package" and I had roses and a bottle of champaign waiting for us!  Very sweet of him!!!

 Beautiful roses.  They were still gorgeous when we got back but we were not allowed to bring them with us!

Moet Chandon and cupcakes!  Can't beat that combination.

The room was fantastic!

The balcony was huge!  Bernie's favorite place!

 
View from the balcony to the room.

The huge dome is a jacuzzi.  Our room is directly under the jacuzzi.

More tomorrow!

NEW YORK CITY

Metropolis - A New York City Timelapse from Will Boisture on Vimeo.
My friend Pat, who lives in New York, sent me this video.  I thought it was so great I wanted to share!  I have only been to New York once and only for two days.

I know for a fact I would not want to live there, too fast-paced for me,  but I fell in love with the city I am really looking forward to going back and spending at least two weeks there soon.

Enjoy!

KRISTINA'S BABY SHOWER

I know I still owe everyone a recap of the cruise and I have tons of pictures to share with you of that cruise but I wanted to post pictures of Kristina's baby shower.  My daughter is expecting her third daughter any day now.

Her baby shower had been planned for October 9th.  It had been planned for a long time.  We were doing it at the same park where we have done the other two baby showers and all the birthday parties for the girls.

I went to her house on Friday to help her prepare for the shower at the park on Sunday.  The day was HORRIBLE.  It was thundering and raining and just.... well awful!  Saturday was just as bad and according to the weather channel, Sunday the 9th was going to be no better!

Now, you have to understand Kristina is incredibly anal when it comes to things like this.  She plans everything MONTHS in advance - she has to have everything SET way in advance or like she says, her OCD goes into overdrive!

So here it is Saturday afternoon - 4:40 to be exact - and there was a mini hurricane going on!  So now what?  Her condo is too small to even consider moving the party to; I live in the Keys - too far for everyone to travel to at the last minute.  We were stuck!  She is sitting in the car having a total melt down when - just like in the cartoons - a bulb goes on over my head!!!  I have a client who owns a banquet hall!!!  Okay, so it's about 18 hours notice but it never hurts to ask right?

So I call my friend Gloria and tell her I have a problem.  Problem? What problem?  Come on over and use the upstairs banquet hall - it's empty tomorrow!  Can I hear a loud and boisterous HALLELUJAH!!!

Kristina and I immediately get on our phones texting and emailing everyone the address for the banquet hall.  I was sure we missed someone who would end up going to a park in the pouring rain but nothing to be done!

So now we face another dilemna!  HOW THE HELL do we decorate a fancy-schmanzy banquet hall when all our plans are for a PARK?  UGGHH!  Thankfully Kristina is extremely creative and between us we actually pulled this off!!

The theme was Dr. Seuss.

Instead of spending tons of money on decorations, and considering we had less than 24 hours to put this together, Kristina came up with this great idea to put a basket on each table (nap time, meal time, bath time, play time...) and putting articles relating to it in the basket.  We then put some Dr. Seuss books on the table, some shredded paper, some gold fish crackers and a real gold fish!

 We spent the night before making cupcakes.  I think the colors came out fantastic and very Dr. Seuss-sih!  The cake was made and sad Welcome Savannah.

 My "cherubs" and their significant others.  From left to right, Pipo and Jornelys, Leonor and Brian, Kristina and Derrick and my perpetually single "no way am I getting married" son, Charlie.

 Kristina chose sayings from the Dr. Seuss books, typed them on a computer and laminated them.  They were put all over the tables and looked really great.

 Me and my mini-me.

 I LOVE this picture.  It's become tradition. We have one just like this with Kaitlynn's pregnancy, with Maddie's and now with Savannah's!  For this that are wondering, Bernie is due in December, we are expecting a green little boy named Heineken.

 My nieces and my grand daughter.  It's wonderful how the family keeps growing!

 Another one of the tables.

 Ms. Maddie with her Dr. Seuss bow!

 Can't have a Dr. Seuss party without green eggs!

 I made these little signs for all the food that was all named Dr. Seuss names!

 Kaitlynn is excited about Savannah's arrival and helped her mom with the presents.

Kristina is a school teacher.  Her colleagues at her school made this basket filled with blankets and bibs and all kinds of things with Savannah's name on it.  They did the same thing with the other two girls and it is just a wonderful gift.

It all came out wonderful and we had a great day!

TAKING A FEW DAYS OFF THE NET!

I have so many art commitments that I decided to stay off the internet this weekend and focus on what I need to do.  I am involved in two tag swaps in two different groups:

In one group, (Lillian's Group which is awesome) we are swapping Paris themed tags.  There are approximately 17 in this swap so I made twenty just in case! This is my contribution:

They were fun to make!  We are swapping fabric and lace to go with the tags also!

The other swap is in a private group.  This swap was inspired by a VIDEO I showed you guys recently.  We agreed to make these tags using Tim Holtz products.  This is my contribution for this swap:

Again, tons of fun to make!  We are swapping lace and fabric to go with the tags.

So between yesterday and this evening I have made 40 tags!!  I am quite pleased with the fact that I got these done.  I was worried about not being able to meet the deadlines!!

Hope you are all having a great weekend!

CHARLIE UPDATE!!

So many people have been asking me about Charlie.  After a couple of stumbles he is doing FANTASTIC.   He is sober, healthy and relatively happy (no new girl right now!).  I am so very very proud of him and so grateful that God has taken him into his arms and protected him!!!

Thank you for asking ladies!

TIM'S VIDEO OF CRUISE

Thought you guys would enjoy seeing a little bit of our cruise through Tim's eyes.

Enjoy!

NO TIME FOR BLOGGING LATELY!!

Between my daughter's baby shower yesterday (major drama) and work, I have not been able to post in the last week!  I will, however, do as promised and write about our wonderful cruise.  I will also share the pictures and drama of Kristina's baby shower!

Be back!!!

GO CHECK IT OUT!

I will post the first day of the cruise tonight but you HAVE to go see Val's blog.  She has some fantastic pictures of the Freedom of the Seas.  I have to say I did not take pictures of the ship - none!

So.... go check it out!

A LITTLE... OKAY ALOT... OVERWHELMED!

I know I promised a cruise rundown starting today but I just got home (8:00 pm) after my first day back at work and the crazies were crawling out from under rocks today!  All good.  I just ignored them !

BUT, I have to admit - albeit grudgingly - that I am a little overwhelmed by all my new toys!!!  I have no IDEA on earth where I am going to put all this stuff!!!

Okay, smart ass, I know what you are thinking :  "Oh really?  Poor you!!! NOT!"  Don't get me wrong, I am still quite happy with all my new "stuff" - I just don't handle messes well and right now my studio is a MESS.

Tomorrow I will go shopping for storage solutions but for now I will just do my best to ignore it.

So, let's see... where do we begin?  Oh yes, here goes:

Bernie and I (my husband who "sacrifices" and comes with me on these cruises) left Key Largo early on Saturday morning.  The cruise wasn't leaving until Sunday but (a) it would be quite silly to travel the same day in case something happens and (b) we were meeting Eileen and Pat in Disney.  It was a five hour drive but well worth the destination don't you think?

We stayed at the Saratoga Springs Resort in Disney.  Like everything at Disney, it's very pretty but not a resort I would return to.  Boring.  VERY boring.

I had spoken to Eileen at about 3:00 pm and she had just gotten to her resort (Port Orleans - ABSOLUTELY FABULOUS resort!!  Loved it!).  Anyway, I digress....  We agreed to meet up a little later for dinner.

Once we got to our hotel and showered and changed (it was, after all, Saturday), I spent a couple of hours calling Eileen's cell phone with no success! Of course I did not have Pat's so there was nothing I could do but leave messages.

Could my sweet Eileen have ditched me??????  Not!  Turns out that Eileen and Pat were going through a little drama of their own!  Eileen's iPhone had literally DIED.  Not as in dead battery - as in dead phone!

She is cool without a phone but there was one significant problem with that.... She had my cell phone number on her phone.  So not only could I not contact her... She had no way of contacting me because she didn't know my number by heart.  (This is a perfect example of how we are all so damned tied into technology we cease to function when our toys do!)

Eileen and Pat had to go to the Magic Kingdom on a bus, the tram and then the monorails in order to get to a computer.  Why you ask?  Well, Pat and Eileen and I are on several yahoo groups together so she went into all these groups to see if I had listed my phone number on any of them!  Well, they found it and called me from Pat's phone.  That only took about 3 hours!

Eventually they made it back to their hotel and we picked them up.  Beautiful resort!!  You open the doors and you ARE in New Orleans!  Only Disney.  They have jazz music playing and the "streets" of the resort are exact duplicates of the beautiful streets of New Orleans.  Definitely a hotel everyone should visit!

From Port Orleans we went to dinner at Joe's Crab Shack - one of my favorite restaurants and had a wonderful seafood meal and some pretty fantastic margaritas!  I am sure Eileen and/or Pat took pictures of the meal and it will be on Eileen's blog.  I took some pictures but did it with the Instax so can not share!

After the meal we went back to our hotels to get some sleep before this much anticipated cruise!

I AM BACK!!!!

As expected it was a wonderful time.  I got to see a lot of the ladies I had met during the last cruise, some old friends from Louisiana and of course my peeps that went also!

I have to unpack and rest up for the coming week from hell but it was so worth it!!!

I have tons to tell you about but will do it tomorrow.  Between my blog and Eileen's wonderful wonderful blog you wont miss a thing!

But now to the REALLY important stuff!!!  The STUFF!!!!  And how much stuff did I bring you ask?  Well, I had taken an empty duffel bag and ended up buying another and a small tote.  Yep!!  Lots of very cool Tim Stuff!!!!  Lots of it was given to us, (he's like the male Oprah with these give aways!) and lots of stuff I bought!  Definitely in a happy place.

During the last day farewell party we had food and drinks and most importantly a raffel!   I NEVER win in these things but THIS time was different!!

I won an ENTIRE SET (interpret as every single color) of Archival ink pads; a huge package of letters AND.... ready for it?????  A VAGABOND!  How cool is that!!!   Okay, so I already have all the ink pads AND a Vagabond but it's still totally cool to win!!!

Anyway, here are a couple of pictures of the "stuff" (and NO, I have no idea where I am going to fit all this!). Those of you who have come to my Keys 4 Art Retreat KNOW that my studio is already overflowing!

Tons and tons of deliciousness!!!  I have two great totes and a bunch of products from the new District Market line.  I have... well, just about everything!!!  It's Christmas!

We worked on two great projects, a journal book and a configuration tray but they are still packed.  Will give you guys a run down tomorrow.

Oh, most important!!!  Here are some pictures of my peeps!!!

My husband is so cool to put up with the craziness!! But of course being on a gorgeous ship with pools and bars makes it much easier to BE cool!

I think my biggest accomplishment was not beating the hell out of some of the ladies on this cruise (and yes, you all know who you are!).  Talk about out-of-your-mind crazies!!!  What is UP with that!?  (Picture those girls you see crying and fainting in the old Beatles footage but on CRACK!).  Okay, so maybe they were not crying OR fainting... but they were totally nuts!

I'm only going to tell you that at one point when Tim opened the door to The Market Place which Mario runs (the shopping area) (we were the second group to go in), he actually stepped outside and said PLEASE BE NICE!  The first group had gone nuts on each other over STUFF!!!

Yep, fun filled days of arguing and cat fights OVER WHO GOT INTO THE ROOM FIRST FOR CLASSES!!!  You would think there would not be enough chairs!!  People were in line over an hour early!  Of course Eileen sent me in first so I could get seats for the 4 of us to sit together in case someone had to be punched!!!  Unbelievable!  Wait until you hear the stories!!!

See you all back here tomorrow for day one of our voyage!