Sadie {AKA Poofus}

Hi, I'm Sadie.

I wanted to tell you all a little bit about myself.

I am the cutest puppy evah (I know this because everyone always tells me so!)

I love to cuddle and be carried around like a baby.

I am quiet, and hardly ever make a sound.

My cubby is one of my favorite places, and I go there to rest and I even stay in there all night without crying.

I have gotten so big {if you call 5 pounds big!}

I love all people, even strangers.

When I am happy I wag my tail. When I am really happy, I spin it around in a circle!

When I run I look like a bunny because I hop with my feet together.

I love my new family and they love me!

Now meet my alter-ego, Poofus:

Hi, I'm Poofus.

I was named Poofus due to my poofy fur and my doofus-y personality.

I love to chew on everything. I find amazing stuff in the garbage and think humans throw the best stuff away!

When I find something I want to chew on, I pick it up and run to the hallway (where it is carpeted) to commence the chewing and sliming of said object:

I really love feet. When my family is walking by, I grab on and chew! I will even hold on while they walk and drag me across the floor.

I once found a treasure in the box the cats play in. However, that caused the littlest girl to post this sign:

And if you don't read Kindergarten writing it says "no poop eaters". Discrimination, I say!

In spite of all this, my family loves me, too!

My Scrap Space (don't be hatin'...)

The girls and I spent a lot of our spring break cleaning and organizing our craft room. We purged quite a bit and got all of our stuff organized and easy to use. I now have everything out of my crop bags, store bags, etc. All my patterned paper is organized in the paper towers by vendor. My cardstock is in rainbow color order. The slatwall houses items on pegs that were in packages in categories like alphabets, flowers, bling, ribbon, chipboard, adhesives, and artsy stuff (like alcohol ink, glitter, embossing, etc). The shelves have unused albums, frames, and other projects, as well as a row of cardmaking supplies. We have baskets of paints, punches, buttons and brads. Drawers are holding embellishments by category (ie "girl", "holidays", etc.) I love it! Here are the results:

And one of my favorite parts, my bowls of ribbon! Beautiful!

Something's Missing....

Something has been missing from my blog.

What could it be?
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Pictures of me and Tony? Check!
Pictures of the girls? Check!
Pictures of the new puppy? Check!
Hmmmmmm?
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Of course! My under-photographed oldest child, Michael!

Michael HATES having his picture taken. Like REALLY hates it. So it took a lot for me to get him to agree to the photo shoots. I needed pictures for his high school graduation announcements, so he had little choice in the matter. Day one we went to his school with his friend, Jacob. Here are some of my favorites:

Day two we went to downtown Tempe:

We founds some really cool places to take the pictures. These are all unedited and not cropped. I think I have some good ones to work with in here!

Free Photo Shoot

If you live in the Phoenix area, check out the following blog to enter to win a free photo shoot!

http://ashmadsen.blogspot.com/2009/02/drumroll-please.html

Loser Mom

I had a week of Loser Mom occurrences. Let me tell you, it was not very fun! Here's a recap:

Tuesday was Celeste's GS cookie booth after school. Here was the plan: pick up Celeste and Sophie from school (3:30), meet at the other GS mom's house (3:45), drive to the booth (4:00), sell cookies (till 6:30), drive home. Simple, right? WRONG! Alexa has softball practice everyday after school, and it is each parent's responsibility to get them there. I asked her to get a ride with someone else this time. Well, I get a call from her at 3:15 that she and 3 others do not have a ride! OK, refocus. I called Celeste's school and asked them to get a message to Celeste for her and Sophie to walk home with the GS friend. I would just meet them there. So, I picked up Alexa + 3, took them to practice and headed to the GS's house. On the way, Celeste called to figure out where I was, as it was now about 3:45. I was almost there. When I got there, I went in and made my apologies to the mom, told them what happened, and said "where's Sophie?" Celeste had a really weird look on her face and told me she did not come with her! (FYI- later she showed me the note from the office, and it said for Celeste to walk home with the friend, no mention of Sophie at all!) So, I called my neighbor, and good, she had Sophie! That meant she had to watch Sophie for me for the next 3 hours! After all this, we were off to the booth and all went well. Alexa got a ride home from softball, got Sophie, and put dinner in the oven. What a girl!

Now for my next (and worse) loser mom moment. On Thursday, after dropping the girls off at school, I was home having breakfast, coffee, and reading. Why not? I did not need to be anywhere that day until lunch time. 9:40 the phone rings:

Celeste: "mommy, where are you? you are supposed to be here for my PACE conference."
Me: "what!?! there is nothing on my calendar? When?"
Celeste: "now, I think, all the other parents are already here"

We proceed to discuss the issue, Celeste was upset and crying a little, so the teacher got on the phone and yes, all the 5th grade PACE parents had a group conference at 9:30, the next group was not til 11:30, so I should head over and come now, late. I got there at 9:55 just as all the other parents (including to GS mom from Tues, she must think I am a total loser!) were getting ready to leave. Celeste and I were rushing through her conference when I felt wet/cold on the side of my leg. Well, my water bottle was on it's side in my leather purse and had spilled all into my purse. It was so wet, it soaked through the leather and was dripping out the bottom of my purse. I started pulling out the contents and realized it had been pouring on my camera, I lifted it out and water was streaming from it. Both my checkbooks, receipts, etc all soaked too! I tried to focus on Celeste and her conference, fill out the paper required of me, and not cry! When I got home I spread everything out in front of the fan, switched to another purse, and went to lunch with a friend. Much better!

I was remembering when my kids were littler how things like this used to get me so upset and crying. This time, no tears at all. I guess I go with the flow much better now! I just hate days like these that make me feel inadequate, but my children are all fed, clean, clothed, and pretty damn smart, funny, and responsible, so I guess we're doing all right!

Sweethearts

We all know Tony was gone for my birthday, so I told him all I wanted was him to take pictures with me for this book. We finally got to it on Valentine's weekend (he got off easy, don't you think? My birthday AND Valentine's day and that is all I wanted!). Alexa took the pictures of us at a park in Tempe. She did such a good job! We took over 100 pictures, so I would have a lot to choose from. The book is a mixed media book, with acrylic, chipboard, cardboard, and cardstock pages. We used Glimmer Mist, Texture paste, silver leaf, vinyl, paint, and lots of cutouts, flowers, buttons, and bling. I love how it turned out. Here are a few of my favorite pictures from the day:

We really had a great time and could not stop laughing. There were so many pictures to choose from, I had a hard time narrowing it down.

Later that night, we went to dinner with 4 other couples at a Brazilian steak house. It was so cool! It is all you can eat, with hot appetizers and salad bar (which had really random things like calamari, squid, crab legs, etc,). Then they come around with 16 different meats on skewers for you to have pieces of. There was prime rib, tri tip, chicken, ham, turkey, lamb, and more. They also served us fried bananas, grilled pineapple, rice balls, beans and rice. It was really great food and such a fun experience. I would definitely recommend it as a fun date for all you carnivores!

The Cutest Thing You've Ever Seen....

Introducing Sadie, Alexa's new Bichon Poo.

Alexa has been wanting a small, indoor dog for a long time now. Tony was not sure about another pet, so he has been resisting the idea. He finally gave in since that was all she wanted for her birthday. There were some problems, however. Alexa likes small toy breeds like Yorkies, but has a mom who's morals/ethics will not allow purchasing an animal from a breeder or pet store. There are just too many animals that need homes, I refuse to support an industry that creates more pets. Tony and I visited the local shelter. There were quite a few dogs there, the only small ones being chihuahuas(SP?) which Tony can't stand! Alexa was given the job of searching Craig's list, Humane Society, PetCo adoptions, etc online. She spent hours searching the net for the perfect pet. We found her on Craig's list, needing to be adopted from a family that worked full time and did not have the time to supervise her properly. They also had a larger dog that did not take too well to the new pup. I still feel a little torn since she did originally come from a breeder, and feeling a little hypocritical, but she did need a good loving home. And look how happy she has made my girl: