This, That, and the Other

I promised to show the card that Sam made me for Mother's Day. Sam is quite the crafter. He even has his own craft station set up in our basement, with a stash of card stock, ink, stamps, crayons, pencils, and embellishments that are all his. Apparently, nothing says "Mom" like gardens and drinks with fancy umbrellas. ha ha! Notice the fancy fold of this card, as it opens from the left...interesting! I love how he matted the drink image. Too cute!



Inside, he wrote "From children who you love, Luke, John, and Sam. We've got a happy family. Sam, John, Luke, and Maggy (the dog)." Isn't that hysterical?


Sam is right about one thing...I do love my garden (and my children, too!). Last fall, you may recall my garden experiment. I decided to bring all the potted plants inside for the winter to see which ones would survive in my basement. Well, right away the petunias croaked. Slowly, the tuberous begonias looked sadder and sadder. In the end, the only potted plants to survive were the hardy geraniums. They are now outdoors again, and blooming away.


I made this card yesterday for the Ways to Use It challenge. The tool? The edge distresser. I liked the idea of making a card that looked like rows in a garden.

{recipe: Tart and Tangy (SU), kraft card stock, Cosmo Cricket papers (Garden Variety), tag punches, versafine onyx ink, tangerine tango cs and ink, wild wasabi ink, red gingham ribbon, edge distresser, white page reinforcer stickers}

The garden is my happy place (well, that and Starbucks). Haven't done much in the garden this week, but I think I'll get busy today.

I've been indoors tackling some cleaning jobs. I have a dishwasher that we purchased two years ago, and it does a crappy job of cleaning dishes. My glasses come out spotty all the time, and food particles just bake on the plates. I decided to clean out the empty dishwasher by throwing in a half container amount of Tang citrus drink mix and running it on a hot cycle. Supposedly, the citric acid in Tang breaks down deposits. It helped a bit. Then I wiped off any scaly residue left over.

My water must be pretty hard here, as all my glasses end up cloudy and spotty. So, I washed all the glasses by hand..twice! First, I washed them in a sink of hot water and vinegar, then a sink full of dish soap. They came out so crystal clear that my teenage son even remarked on how much better they looked!

Correction:

After looking in my recipe file, I had to make a correction. My sugar cookie recipe that is a family favorite came from blog reader Sheryl in New Mexico, not Lorie R. Lorie, you may have a wonderful recipe for cookies, too! Sorry!

It's Friday, and I have a lot of this, that and the other to accomplish today.

*Pick up paycheck.
*Get work schedule for following week.
*Get Sam to kindergarten.
*Get to garden center for flowers.
*Get college son filling out job applications.
*Get flowers planted.
*Get Sam off bus.
*Go to school carnival tonight.
*Go to movies with neighborhood ladies to reward ourselves for surviving school carnival!

It's going to be a busy day!