First Day of School For My Kiddos

Today  I am going to take a slight detour from sharing about my vacation since it is the first day of school for my kids.  Both of them had a hard time falling asleep last night probably because they were so excited about going back to school.  Thankfully they were able to wake up this morning without too much of a fuss.  :) Before leaving for school we gave them their beginning of the year gifts. (Sorry they were so excited about receiving their gifts that they opened them before I was able to take a picture of them.)

These are Winks- the newest kind of faires on the market.  Sorry my daughter took their wings off.

I was planning to make a beginning of the school year card for both of my kids, but only made my daughter's so far because I am still waiting for some thing that I ordered to finish my son's.  I will post a picture of his as soon as I am done.  (This by the way is the first time that I made a card for them for the beginning of the school year.  We usually just purchase a card for them and write a special message.)  I made her this card using her favorite colors (which are also mine) and with a fairy on it since she loves fairies.

My hubby usually drops them off at school, but as a tradition we take them to school together on the first day.  I prayed with them on the way to school asking for God's blessings upon them this school year and to help them to not only have a good time with their friends, but learning.  Here they are on the way to their classrooms with their new backpacks

outfits, and shoes. 

They picked out their new items all by themselves. We walked my son to class and took a family picture.  I stayed with him until he walked with his class into their classroom.  I of course was a bit emotional watching my little boy start on the next card in his schooling.  My hubby walked my daughter to her class. When my hubby dropped me off at home, we felt odd coming into such a quiet house.

Spending Time With Friends In Oahu

My family and I got back from 11 beautiful days in Oahu last week on Thursday.  It was very nice spending time together going sightseeing, shopping, and eating ono food.  We also had a wonderful time spending time with some friends.  The first friend that we met up with was Teri.  We had dinner at her house.

She gave us lots of  thoughtful goodies in this cute bag  with the tag that she made.

Here is what was inside the bag.

On Thursday, I spent the day with Grace, Jen and Jen's youngest son.

 We ate breakfast at YogurStory.  I ordered macadamian nut waffles. Then we were off to Fujiya's for mochi.

After enjoying some mochi we went shopping at Cute Stuff and Stamps and Memories.  With the shopping and chatting up a storm together, our tummys were growling for some ono oxtail soup from the Kapolani Coffee shop.   With such an ono lunch we were ready to do more shopping and went to J's Knicknacks.

We ended our day together by having shaved ice at Waiola Shaved Ice.   These are the thoughtful gifts that I received - from Grace

and Jen.

That evening my family and I went out to dinner with Michelle and her daughter at Uncle Bo's.

The kids each ordered thier own plates, but the adults shared a kalua pork pizza, kalua pork nacho, and ahi wraps.  These for the thoughtful gifts that Michelle and Amara suprised us with.

Sorry, my kids opened their presents before we were able to take a picture of it so we don't have a picture of it.  My son got an Avenger activity set and my daughter received a Tinker Bell activity set.  Each one received a bag of cookies too.  For our friends we gave these each one boxes of cookies from Knott's Berry Farm and some crafty items. We gave the kids some packages of candy. I also made each person a purse with Minnie Mouse on it.  I put a tea bag in it from Disneyland.  Stay tune for a picture of the purse in a later post as I share about some more friends that I got to spend some time with on our vacation.   Thanks again Grace, Jen, Michelle, and Teri for taking time out of your busy schedules to spend time with me and/or my family. Each of you  made our time in Oahu much more special. Love you all lots!

A Cute Asian Card

Those of you that personally know me knows that I like making and receiving cutsey cards using a variety of stamps from different companies.  I especially like cutsey Asian cards.  My friend Grace made me this amazingly cute card using one of the new stamps from Sister Stamps.

I love it!  Check out all the detail in the card as well as her great coloring with Copics.  Thanks for coming by to see what I have to share today.

A Cup of Tea

I made my friend Gail this card for her b-day.  Her b-day was back in April, but I just kept forgetting to post it.  Both of us enjoy "tea" so I thought it would be fun to have a "tea" theme to her gift and card.  I try to have a theme for the gifts that I give.  I think it makes it more fun and a little easier to go shopping for the items. Here is the card that I made for her.

The cup opens up like a card.  Thanks for stopping by!

Some Quilling and Nice Fellowship

I have always enjoyed my summers, but for this some reason this one has seems to be the best one.  It's too bad that it will soon be coming to an end.  I hope you are having a wonderful summer too.  This weekend I went to my monthly quilling class.  It's always amazes me what Donna comes up with for the class to make.

After class each month my friend Esther and I always enjoy having lunch together and enjoying each others fellowship.

We shared a Bella salad (It has lettuce, grapes, pear, nuts, fetta cheese, and a passion fruit dressing.  It was yummy.)

and a pizza (The pizza had aritchokes, sausage, and  mushrooms.)

We also like to surprise each other with some thing crafty.  :)  This is what I made for her using the
die cut from SU.

Esther made a beautiful necklace for me along with this cute card.  She knows how much I love Hawaiian items so surprised me with the stamp from TAJ too.

I always enjoy spending time with Esther each month and thank the Lord for our friendship.

Projects With a Cool Move

Today I would like to share the projects that I made and received from a swap called "Cool Moves."  Each person was paired up with a another person and was asked to make a card and a 3D item that has a "cool move."  This is what I came up with for  Kim.

These are the awesome items that she made for me.and sent my way.

I especially like the board that she made.  Kim said that she made it out of a black board and sprayed it.
That is just too cool!  She told me that she sent me a little extra to apologize for the delay in sending me her swaps.

A Friend's SU Birthday Party

Yikes!  Is it Monday already?  Time sure does fly by when I am having fun.  :)  I have been having a fabulous summer spending time with family and friends.  Yesterday I went to a friend's Stampin Up annual b-day party.

Each year she invites a bunch of together to celebrate her b-day by having a workshop with one of her friend's that is a SU demonstrator.  It's always lots of fun stamping together, enjoying each other's company, and enjoying yummy appetizers together.  Before ending this post for today, I wanted to share with you the card that I made for her.

I hope that all of you had wonderful weekend like I did.  :)

Our Last Hello Kitty Activity Session

Yesterday my daughter and I went to our third and last Hello Kitty activity session at a local education store.  We had an awesome time as usual together interacting with the other mothers and daughters and of course with each other.  Each session we got to take a picture with Hello Kitty.

The activities that we did during the session was decorate Hello Kitty shaped cookies,

put together a Cricut cut Hello Kitty card, have a coloring contest (Here is the picture that Kylie colored),

and play several rounds of musical chairs. Each of the girls received a bag full of lots of fun Hello Kitty items. (My daughter received the plush HK for winning the coloring contest.)

My daughter  and I came home with lots of Hello Kitty items to add to our collection since all the HK items in the store were 20% for that day.

To thank the all the staff at the store for such wonderful Hello Kitty activity sessions, I made them a card with a special note from my daughter and I on the back.

Cards With a Red, White, and Blue Theme

I hope that everyone is having a good week so far and is having some time to craft.  Today I would like to share what I made and received for the Secret Sister Swap for last month.  The theme was to make some thing with the colors red, white, and blue in it.  Even though I love the patriotic colors, I felt stumped on what to make.  I played around with some ideas and finally came up with is card for Charleen.  I also sent her soem red, white, and blue bling and patriotic cardstock sticker of her pinwheel as a little RAK.

Miyuki made this very cute card for me and sent along these thoughtful RAK.  (Sorry about the quality of the picture.)

Thanks for spending some time with me today to see what I have to share.  Have have a nice weekend. God bless and take care!