Sunday, July 8, 2012

Destination: Vancouver

Well, I hope everyone else's week went better than mine!  Mine was a frickin' nightmare, to put it mildly!!!  Of course you want to hear all about it, but I'll keep you in suspense until you see this layout I created:

Still working with my June Counterfeit Kit.  I love the mix of colours in this one!  Not one I would normally choose, I don't think, but seeing I limited myself to the contents of my kit, I had to make it work.  These are photos of Nolan with Jason's brother Mike - he's a cop down in Surrey, and we don't see him that often.  (He's single, by the way - loves history, Ireland, Irish whiskey, and rugby, if you happen to know of any eligible bachelorettes in the area!)  When Jason and Nolan traveled down there for Nolan's hockey tournament, Mike drove them downtown to Stanley Park and all around.  Good thing, because Jason hates driving down there - it's scary!  Here are a couple close-ups:

Not sure if you can see, but I took a length of Tim Holtz tissue tape, cut it lengthwise, then ruffled it up along the top and bottom of the photo mat.  The challenge at Frosted Designs for Fabulous Friday is washi tape, so I'm going to enter this over there.  I also made a little flag out of a pin and some patterned paper, just for the heck of it - I've been seeing them everywhere and loving them!  This Page Maps sketch helped me out:


And speaking of "scary driving" brings me to the next installment of Roxy's Idiocy!  You ready for this?  Okay, after a (very) long weekend of ups & downs with Nolan, I decided on Tuesday that we all needed to get out of the house, despite the fact that I hadn't showered or made myself up.  I proceeded to tow all three kids to a parenting group, finding out when we arrived that it was not on this week.  Not to be deterred, I decided to head to the arena to sign Nolan up for a science summer camp.  Alas, the arena was not the place to sign up for said summer camp, so I loaded everyone up once more, pulled out of my parking spot, and proceeded to ram the front left corner of my car into a lamp post.  It had a concrete base.  There was no reason to hit this lamp post except for... 
  1. it was in my blind spot?  
  2. I was talking to Nolan?  
  3. I'm an idiot.
If you chose reason 3, ding ding ding!  You are correct!  After swearing a blue streak and getting out to examine the damage (extensive!), I drove to GM, the car making funny sounds all the way.  The guy there referred me to another shop, where the owner kindly fixed my signal light and tacked up the fender so that my Stabilitrac sensor wouldn't be lighting up the dash.  I drove home, emailed my husband in the bush to give him the heads up (the "please-don't-kill-me-when-you-get-home!" type of email) and cleaned the house from top to bottom out of guilt.  Oh yes, made a wonderful dinner, too.  I am not above brown-nosing!  Anyway, Jason was pretty good about the whole thing, even though this is my second stupid accident in two years (remember when I backed down a long driveway and dented the door on a telephone pole?)  You know, if I lived in the big city, I might just cut up my license and take transit.

Let's see, what else went wrong this week?  Spilled a whole cup of coffee on two scrapbooking mags and a library book.  (Heat embossing tool works pretty well to dry that out, by the way!)  Several monumental fights with Nolan, to the point where the posters in his room were destroyed and the card I was working on for this month's Seriously Creative Challenge was ripped up.  Many tears were shed, by all parties involved.    Jason was away on his annual guys fishing trip, with no cell service, so he was absolutely no help at all, and my parents took off to Calgary for two weeks.  Argh, worst timing ever!  I'm trying to be optimistic that this is all due to the change in routine and/or a change in medication, and hopefully this coming week will be better (please, let it be better!!!)  I'm not sure I can survive more days like these last ones!  Ailis is going to summer camp tomorrow, and I did manage to get Nolan signed up for the science camp, so maybe keeping busy will mean everyone is happier.

It wasn't all bad, though!  I got to visit with one of my best friends and her sweet new baby who I haven't seen in years.  She's moved to New Zealand with her kiwi husband, so I'm glad she's around for a couple more weeks visiting her parents nearby.  I was chosen as a fave at Another Freaking Scrappy Challenge for this layout, and I made Top 3 at Sketches in Thyme for this layout!  Oh, and I won a blog hop prize from Channa for a comment I left during the Frosted Designs blog hop a couple weeks ago.  Also, my very sweet friend stopped by after a particularly rough day and dropped off half her six pack of Palm Bays, restoring my faith in humanity once more.  If ever I needed to drown my sorrows in yummy sweet booze, that was the night!  So, I can occasionally see the glass as half full (well, maybe only a quarter, but still, not completely empty.)

Which brings me to the announcement of this month's challenge at Seriously Creative Challenges:

Are you still with me?  Hope you can join us with all your new and unused products this month.  It's surprising how many things I have in my stash that I could use for this one.  Off the top of my head, I can think of some new ribbon, paper, 2 stamps, a new digi (freebie from Saturated Canary here, scoop it while you can!) chipboard labels and brads from Fiesta...  I'm trying not to hoard, really!

16 comments:

  1. Oh my I rember weeks like that when the kids were home.. won't say I don't have them now cause that would be not true.. but with kids in tow it always seems to be worse.. Hope this week gets a lot better.. Oh yes lovely layout.. Take Care

    ReplyDelete
  2. Wow, you did have a rough week! I've had a few of those "can't explain how it happened" accidents myself, and they sure can ruin your week! Glad to see you got a little scrappy time, though - love your layout! Thanks for joining us at Frosted Designs.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Oh Roxy thanks for sharing your 'bad' days, it always help to tell others and get it 'off the chest'. You sound fine again now so happy scrapping, take care.

    ReplyDelete
  4. Hugs Roxy!!!! I hope things turn around for you this week!! Love all the texture in your layout! Fabulous!!

    ReplyDelete
  5. Oh Roxy, I'm pouring you a drink right now and virtually sending it to you. what do you want? wine, bellini (something frozen today might be good!), beer?
    Congrats on the wins! That layout you made for Sketches in Thyme WAS pretty amazing so I'm super happy it came in top 3! Ditto with the one for another Freakin Challenge (I remember really loving that one at the time!) Way to go girl! oh, and your layout today ROCKS! maybe it's just the little tag that says Vancouver but something about this layout is really speaking to me! :)
    hang in there with the kids. Whatever the problem - medication, too much time with them, general kid crap - it will pass eventually. Remember that. It will pass! Before you know they will be back at school! Yikes! Mine are currently away at "Granny Camp" so I am backing in a kid free house. Ah, peace and quiet! Once Greg leaves for work tomorrow it will be even quieter!! heaven!!
    Great job! Crack a cold one and know that you're not alone out there! xoxo

    ReplyDelete
  6. Oh hun I feel for you !! Those days are awful and unfortunately may happen again.lol.So glad to see that you had a good visit with Mike.Fabulous layout btw. Congrats on your wins !!Well deserved...Have a cold one for me lol

    ReplyDelete
  7. oh my gosh, you poor girl! I hate those weeks and really hope next week will be better! Congrats on the wins (and friends with drinks!) and this layout turned out fantastic, I really love the color combo and all your fab details!

    ReplyDelete
  8. Oh Roxy.....what a story!!! Glad there were some happy parts to it. :) Great layout! Love the colours and the way you've used the tape. Thanks for playing along with us at Frosted Designs!

    ReplyDelete
  9. I absolutely love that blue background paper!!! It adds so much "texture" to the page!!! This is a really awesome page!!! Great colour combo, embellishing and so many little details!!!
    I'm sorry you had such a horrible week!!! but at least you are all OK!! It is so hard adjusting to everyone being home!!! Aidan was driving me crazy for a couple of days, he always has to be busy doing something or playing with someone and all I want to do is NOTHING, relax.... He is at camp this week and then Lee is on holidays the week after so it will be good for a bit (:
    I might have you beat on the car thing, just in case it makes you feel better, We just finished paying $1200 to fix the transmission in my car on Friday and then yesterday I took Lee's car to drive Aidan to camp (better on gas and it was a long drive). I stopped to have lunch with my parents and when I went to leave the car wouldn't start, and it wasn't the battery ): We're still not sure what happened but it stayed where it was and my mom drove us.
    I hope this week goes better for you!! HUgs!!!

    ReplyDelete
  10. LOVE the colors on your page and what a great use of the Tim Holtz Tissue Tape!! I am a big fan of the Flag trend too and I love that you created your own!! Hope things are better for you this week!! Thanks for playing along with us @ Frosted Designs!!

    ReplyDelete
  11. Well, I love the layout. You're little tag banner thing is brilliant! Sorry to hear about your crummy week. :(

    ReplyDelete
  12. Wow Roxy, I really love this layout. I love all the layers, and texture!! And I hope you have been having a much better week.

    ReplyDelete
  13. I love the colors and texture of your layout... Thanks for sharing with us at Frosted Designs!! Hope things smooth out..!

    ReplyDelete
  14. Roxy, I read your post a couple days ago, but I wanted to sit down when I had some more time to comment...I think I might have a lot to say or something! lol Anyway, don't feel like a total idiot about your driving...I can make you feel better about it I think. The year that I was pregnant with Caleb, I drove my van through the cement pillars at Zellers, and scratched up the whole side...2 days later, someone ran into me while I was parking...when the van was in the body shop, I got rear ended. Now fast forward to last year: I left Chris's car in drive in Safeway parking lot and it rolled into someone's car (who is now personally suing me because she's a total scam artist beeatch), then I dropped my sister in law off at her house on a long weekend (can't remember which one) and backed into a tree in her yard...smashing out my whole back window, denting the frame of the window, and taking out my tail light...then (oh, I'm not done yet) a couple months ago, I rear ended someone...I am SO with you on the taking my own license away thing! lol So don't feel too bad about the driving...you aren't alone sistah! As for Nolan...I hope that things get better soon...my kids are going a little crazy too...I'm thinking it's to do with the routine thing...(I just had to leave in the middle of this post to go threaten a spanking to my older two because they have been "going to bed" for almost an hour now!) I hope by now that your hubby is home and you're enjoying some much needed relaxing :)
    Every time I hear the phrase "glass half empty" it reminds me of this thing I saw on facebook. It had 3 pictures of animated glasses half full of some yellow liquid. The first one said "My cup is half full" the second one said "my cup is half empty" and the third one said "I think this is piss" LMAO!! It makes me laugh EVERY time I think about it!!
    Take it easy!

    ReplyDelete
  15. Oh yeah, and I'm absolutely LOVING your layout!! That background paper is stunning with the orange and black and kraft tags..which I love that you made into a banner! How freakin crafty are you?! I was so busy blabbing in my last comment I forgot to tell you how cool I thought your layout was! haha

    ReplyDelete