I can't watch this enough!

I think every product should be advertised with dancing babies.

Oh man, I can't wait for Friday to come!

Oh man, oh man, oh man I am excited! I pre-ordered the new iPhone 3G S from the Apple Store today, and I'm so stoked. It will arrive this Friday, June 19 - and I can't WAIT! I just had to blog about it. I'm especially excited because Chad has had one for a while now, and he loves it - and I've been waiting for this new release to come out before I buy one for myself.... and now the time has come.

WHOO HOOO!

Legendary Birthday Card

I was hunting through a bunch of old papers for something, and ran across this birthday card that Stacy and Nikki (two of my incredibly AWESOME friends - and former roommates) gave me for what I think was my 27th birthday (6 years ago).

I laughed out loud.

HARD.

Man, I love these girls!

Happy Memorial Day Weekend!

I am so looking forward to the upcoming 3-day weekend, you have no idea. My list of things to do includes spending time with friends and hitting up Fiesta Hermosa to check out all the local arts, crafts and live music; playing beach volleyball; and possibly attending a party or two. The weather is supposed to be in the mid 60's, and partly cloudy - which should be okay, although I'd like it to be 75.

Alrighty then... that was an exciting post, wasn't it?

Happy Memorial Day Weekend!

4.7 Earthquake Last Night

Last night, a magnitude-4.7 earthquake hit at 8:39 p.m. with the epicenter located at about 5 miles from our house. My mom and I were scrapbooking at the kitchen table, and my dad and Chad were watching TV in the living room. The house started shaking, and then "BOOM!" came the kind of loud noise that only mother earth can make when she decides to release a massive amount of stored-up energy. I screamed "EARTHQUAKE!" and we all jumped up from our seats. I ran toward our cabinet that houses my cherished hand-blown Swedish crystal champagne glasses, in an effort to prevent them from jumping off the shelves. Luckily, there was no damage. Just a few picture frames fell off of a bookshelf in our home office. My heart was pounding. This was the first earthquake I have felt while inside our house, and it really freaked me out. If you've ever been through an earthquake, you know how it feels - very disorienting. I hope this isn't a precursor to a larger one - but just in case, I'm going to make sure we have our emergency kit close by (we've been keeping it in the trunk of our car, ever since we took our long road trip to Missouri over Thanksgiving). Needless to say - it was bound to happen, since we do live in California. I'm thankful that there was no major damage.

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My "Wordle"

I created a "Wordle" that represents me and my interests, and thought I'd share it with you!

In celebration of ME.

In honor of celebrating ME and my "me-ness", I've decided to treat myself to some LOVELY little items I found on Etsy that made my heart skip more than a few beats when I stumbled upon them last night. Why Not, Right? Not only was I stoked to discover these morsels of happiness, but the Etsy shop owner (Judy) is having a special "Spring" discount special of 20% off all items in her shop -- plus an additional 15% off if you mention how you found her Etsy shop! So, I got 35% off each item I bought, and that turned my "treat" into a delectable gourmet dessert!

The name of Judy's Etsy shop is Silver Dot Jewelry Designs and not only is her jewelry beautiful, but she is SUPER NICE. I had a few questions for her, and she replied to my messages with lightning-quick speed and provided very thorough answers - which really impressed me.

Here are my AWESOME purchases! I can't WAIT to wear them!

Now this would REALLY be Hell.

Holy Navel Orange, Batman!

A beam of golden light shone down....

3:00 PM is officially my daily "chocolate craving" time, and in an effort to try and take my mind off of it, I decided to take a stroll around the office. During my stroll, I couldn't help but secretly hope that someone would have a bowl or tray of sugary treats to offer me during my moment of weakness (which is not uncommon around here). I had almost finished my lap around the office, when I passed by the break room. Something GLORIOUS caught my eye. Chocolate cake. TWO PIECES of GLORIOUS DOUBLE-LAYER CHOCOLATE CAKE, just sitting there, waiting to be snagged up by an unsuspecting person heading in for their afternoon cup of coffee. Oh, thank you God for this cake. I took one piece, and promptly headed back to my cubicle laughing at myself.

So much for my half-hearted attempt to take my mind off eating something sweet.

LOL!

A snail in my Lean Cuisine!??

OMG. Seriously.

I was eating my "Salmon with Basil" Lean Cuisine for lunch today, and as I went in to scoop up another bite, I noticed a SNAIL chillin' among the orzo pasta, spinach, and salmon. Yep - a snail. The list of ingredients didn't include "snail", so I'm assuming this little bugger got in there on it's own at the Stouffer's processing plant. HOW GROSS IS THAT!?





I am TOTALLY going to email Stouffer's Lean Cuisine and send them photos. I'll probably call them too - just to make sure. I am so disgusted right now, you have NO idea.

What really sucks is that I am SO HUNGRY, that I'm actually considering finishing eating it (not the snail - the rest of the so-called entree), but I'm pretty grossed out. I know that I cooked the crap out of it - so it really shouldn't matter, but seriously...??? Ugh. So gross.

My "Ooohhhs and Aaaahhhs...."

I have stumbled upon some REALLY FREAKING COOL things online lately, and I just thought I would share them with you!

These are both from Paper Source, which is an amazing stationery and gifts store.

Doodlebook Frame is an 80-page sketch pad with a photo window.


This Chalkboard Frame would be SO COOL in a home office! I love the idea of using "chalkboard paint" on a wall, and this would be SUCH a cool way to dress it up!

Golfing FUN!

This post has been in my drafts since Monday, and I've been meaning to post it with a little video I took, but I had to rotate the video 90 degrees in QuickTime Pro, and can't figure out how to get the video to display the same way in Blogger. Blogger keeps reverting it to the original "sideways" position. Argh!

Anyway, I played golf last Sunday with Chad, Shawn and Tim in Long Beach, and did pretty well. I kind of stunk it up on the front 9, but redeemed myself on the back 9. When I say "redeemed", I mean I scored a 45 on the back 9 - which is pretty good for me considering I don’t play that often, maybe 3 times a year at best. Every time I play, I think about how much better I would be if I played more often... but golf is such an expensive sport! Anyway, I was lucky to be raised with a dad who is not only passionate about the game, but taught it as a Phys. Ed course at the university I attended. He would tell you that he is “a student of the game”. That is the understatement of the century. My dad is OBSESSED with golf, and plays almost every day at the country club my parents belong to in AZ. After 41 years of marriage, my mom has just recently started to actually love playing the game. My dad bought her lessons from a golf pro, because he has learned the hard way that you should never try to teach your spouse how to play a sport...especially golf. It can get REAL UGLY.

BEST ADVICE EVER: Save your marriage and pay someone else to teach your spouse how to swing a golf club correctly.

Although I totally appreciate my dad's knowledge and take every chance I can to take advice from him while playing a course - I wasn't always so appreciative. When I was a teenager, I pretty much HATED GOLF and would get SO MAD at my dad any time he would offer up advice. My dad wanted nothing more than for his 3 daughters to LOVE the sport he so loved.... but he had to learn the hard way that unless his daughters (and his wife) ASKED FOR HIS ADVICE, he shouldn't offer it up. It wasn't until I was in college when I started to realize how fortunate I was to have a dad who could help improve my golf game so much - and for FREE! Now, if only my husband would start asking him for lessons... My dad would be in SEVENTH HEAVEN! Maybe one day, you never know! ;-)

My Early Valentine...

Yesterday, I made a Scrapblog layout for Chad as a sort of “early” Valentine’s Day gift. I couldn’t wait until Valentine’s Day to show it to him (because I’m a kid like that), so when he got home last night from work I showed him – and he LOVED IT! Then, he said “I’m going to give you YOUR Valentine’s gift early, too! And I said he didn’t have to do that, but he really wanted to – so he went into our home office closet (where he had been hiding it), came over to me and gave me the most AWESOME “early” Valentine’s Day gift in the WHOLE WORLD! I’m not saying I haven’t LOVED his other gifts for me in the past (the Sarah McLachlan concert tickets were A-MA-ZING!), but this one is extra special on a different level, because he put so much thought and personal effort into it – and if you are like me, it’s the little things in life – the ones that don’t take much money, but a LOT of HEART that mean the most.




He MADE this for me! He actually “raided” my scrapbooking supplies when I wasn't home, and MADE this for ME!!! He explained to me that he found the idea online, and followed directions and everything! What cracked me up was when he said “The instructions said to – what do you call it…adorn???" And I said “embellish?" and he said “Yeah, yeah – they said to embellish ‘as you see fit’... and I saw a lot of fittin’!”

I have decided to wait and open it on Valentine’s Day (part of me doesn’t want to open it at all – for fear of destroying the awesome wrapping job), but only on Valentine’s Day.

PS: I am absolutely head-over-heels in love with my man! Chad is not only the most wonderful and perfect husband, but he is also my very best friend in the whole wide world.

Woo hoooo!
GO CHAD!!!

Look at what I made on Scrapblog.com!

Have you heard of Scrapblog.com? Instead of trying to explain it myself, here is an excerpt from the site:

"Scrapblog is the easiest and most fun way to share and print your photos. With Scrapblog, you can create beautiful and completely one-of-a-kind layouts, share them online with your friends and family, and even print high-quality photobooks, greeting cards or postcards."

Here is my very first Scrapblog, and I think it turned out pretty cool!



Scrapblog.com features a SUPER easy drag-n-drop style interface, which makes it really fun to play with, and tons of beautiful designs to choose from. It's basically the easiest way to create a digital scrapbook page and instantly share it with anyone you want.

Seriously - no one asked me to say this stuff. I just really like it, and wanted to share it with you!

Disturbed...

There are so many police car pursuits in Los Angeles that they have become commonplace, and I really am never interested in watching them. But last night was different. Chad and I were sucked into watching news coverage of a "low-speed" police car pursuit of a man suspected of assaulting his girlfriend with a weapon. The thing about this one was the guy was driving a $100,000+ Bentley at about 30 mph for 4 hours. News anchors and reporters were even speculating that it might be a celebrity of some sort. It was the biggest time-suck of our evening, and I can't believe we seriously watched that thing. What sucked us in originally, was when we landed on the news channel, the pursuit was taking place relatively nearby us. The police could have stopped the guy SO many times - he was driving SO SLOW! Why they didn't do it? I have no idea. Basically, they just followed the guy FOREVER all over the Los Angeles freeway system until he finally came to a stop by Universal Studios on Lankershim Blvd. What really bothers disturbs me, is that this guy ended up committing suicide inside that car, and I allowed myself to get sucked in to watching the last tragic and desperate moments of his life LIVE on TV for ENTERTAINMENT PURPOSES. I feel dirty. Ashamed.

I'm not going to dwell on it forever. I just had to get it off my chest.

CAUTION! ZOMBIES AHEAD!!!

Okay, so I'm a little late on hearing about this (since it was posted to YouTube on Jan. 28), but in case you live under an even bigger rock than me... you HAVE to see this video:



My friend Gabe is obsessed with zombies. He has devised a survival plan so if when they attack, he'll be armed and ready with a machete (don't bother with guns, you'll run out of bullets), escape route and hideout plan. What blows me away, is that he is not alone in this type of elaborate plan of preparedness. Apparently, there are MANY people who honestly believe without a doubt that zombies are absolutely real, and that they WILL ATTACK us one day. I first heard of this phenomenon while listening to KROQ on my way to work one morning. People were calling in, talking about their elaborate survival plans for when the zombies attack. These people were NOT joking. One woman said that she is literally more terrified about zombie attacks than she is about terrorist attacks.

Still don't believe me? Check out the Zombie Combat Club, and see for yourself.



That does it. I'm joining the Zombie Combat Club Facebook group.

Squirrel + Obstacle Course = OMG!

You may have already seen this before, but I was cleaning out all the old JUNK in my email inbox, and I noticed an email (that I had managed to accidentally overlook) from my friend Nikki. She sent a link to this video, and I wish I would have opened her email when she had originally sent it to me - because this is the craziest, coolest thing ever. Okay, maybe not EVER... but it's pretty dang cool.



PS: Nikki has a history with squirrels, or should I say ONE squirrel in particular. A squirrel used to "stalk" her when she lived in Hollywood. It would hang out on a branch, and stare at her through the window ALL THE TIME. It wouldn't stop. Nikki is like Snow White - she loves every animal in the world - but this little guy was starting to freak her out a little. There is a squirrel that likes to run along the fence just outside my bathroom window every morning. Sometimes this squirrel gets a "nut up it's butt" and just starts BARKING at me through the window.... like I'm bothering him or something! It really is quite entertaining.

I'm on "Cropped!" Melisa's CHA Diary - Episode 6

My lovely friend (and neighbor) Melisa Sanchez hosts an online scrapbooking video series titled "Cropped!" and came to the Glitz Design booth during CHA and interviewed me about my new line, Rebel. I am SOOOOOO EXCITED, and wanted to share it with you!

The video starts with Melisa checking out beautiful designs and projects in the Tattered Angels booth, and then my interview begins at the 1:14 minute mark. We had a lot of fun, and she even invited me to join her on another "Cropped!" episode to make a super cool project using papers and embellishments from the Rebel line. I'm not sure what the project will be quite yet, or even when we will shoot the episode, but I do know this....I can't wait!

Extreme Makeover: Blog Edition

"MOVE THAT MOUSE!"
"MOVE THAT MOUSE!"
"MOVE THAT MOUSE!"

Oh my GAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!! (throwing my hands in the air)
My BLOG!!!
My BEAUTIFUL BLOG!!!

As you can see I gave my blog an EXTREME MAKEOVER, and I'm totally in love with it.

On another note, I am SO excited for this weekend. Not because it will be Valentine's Day or President's Day - but because our SUPER AWESOME friends Jessica and Peter, and Steph and Jason are coming to visit!!! They all used to live here (except Jason, but we forgive him) and when they moved away it was a MAJOR loss for us. We don't get to see them NEARLY as much as we want, but we are SO grateful for ANY time we get together. Seriously, these people are some of my VERY VERY VERY FAVORITE PEOPLE IN THE WORLD! Okay. I will stop gushing now. I just wanted to share.

Glitz Design @ CHA Winter 2009!

I worked in the Glitz Design booth at CHA Winter 2009 this past weekend, and had a BLAST with Erin, Laura and Ginger - the owners of Glitz Design! They gave me the coolest T-Shirt to wear, and I paired it with a fun little black ruffled vest and the most AWESOME gigantic crown necklace in the WORLD. This necklace is pure "BLINGITY-BLING-BLING" or even better, "GLITZITY-GLITZ-GLITZ"! We set up the booth fairly quickly on Saturday, and needed some lunch - so we hit The Block at Orange and ate lunch at a super cool restaurant called Cafe Tu Tu Tango. After lunch, we browsed the stores for a little bit, and that's when I scored the crown necklace. It was as if a beam of light shone down from Heaven on it... glistening in all it's glitzy glory! AaaaaaaAAAAAHHH!!! That necklace wanted to be mine, and I swear it even winked at me.

See what I'm talking about???


Anyway, the show went really well. Given that there wasn't as large of a turnout as previous years (blame the economy), our booth was really busy on Sunday. I had SO much fun meeting people, and I couldn't believe how many foreigners were there! I met people from France, Norway, Germany, Australia... it was so cool! I was on SUCH an emotional "high" all day, and it felt amazing. I really feel that I've found my calling as a designer. It just makes me SO HAPPY! Who wouldn't want a career that makes them THAT happy!?

Here we are on Saturday, setting up the booth:



Sunday: Doesn't the booth look pretty???












The Pink Donut came to our CHA booth and did a little video of Laura showing some of Glitz Design's new products!

Cheers to a "Glitzy" CHA WINTER 2009!

Okaaaaaay. I am way overdue for a post on this little blog of mine. I just wanted to say how STOKED I am to be working in the Glitz Design booth at CHA WINTER 2009! Since designing for Glitz is my "side job", I can only work in the booth on Saturday (booth set-up day) and Sunday (Jan. 24-25), because I have to work at the office during the regular work week. I would love NOTHING MORE than to work in the Glitz booth for the entire duration of the show, and it's killing me that I can't!

On another note, I'm finally feeling a LOT better after being sick with a combination of things for the last 2 weeks. After we got back from Mammoth, I came down with a "light" cold, which turned into full-blown Laryngitis - lost my voice and developed a lovely dry cough. Just when I started getting my voice back, and feeling "sort of" better (still had the dry cough), I got ANOTHER cold! This time it was a doozy, and I finally made an appointment with the doctor (who is actually my OBGYN but lets me "use" him as my primary care physician). So, I went to my appointment, and was sitting in the waiting room with all these pregnant women, trying SO hard not to appear OBVIOUSLY sick (because I'm sure the last thing they want is to catch my nasty cold, and worse, not even be able to take any medications for it since they're pregnant. FYI: I totally look forward to getting pregnant, but man... that whole ban on medications for 9 months is gonna really suck.) when all of a sudden I got that dreaded “tickle” in the back of my throat. I literally bolted out the door so I could cough my lungs out in the hallway. Of course, they all heard me – they had to have heard me. It wasn’t long after I walked back in that I heard my name to “come on back” to see the doctor. He looked at my throat with a giant lamp and said “WHOOOAAA! Your throat is RED!” and quickly proceeded to take a throat culture, prescribed me some Penicillin, and some cough decongestant syrup with CODENE (or as Chad likes to call it “Katye’s Happy Loopy Medicine”). So – I pretty much lived in one spot on our couch for 4 days straight, in and out of loopy consciousness. Ugh. The upside to all of this is that I watched a BILLION movies! It was AWESOME!

I’m SO glad I got better in time for CHA, and I can't wait to finally spend some quality "face" time with the Glitz girls (Erin, Ginger and Laura). It will be SO interesting/scary/exciting/freaky to witness people's reactions to my designs. I'm especially excited about my newest line, titled "Rebel".


So, if you are planning on going to CHA Winter 2009 in Anaheim, I highly recommend that your first stop be the Glitz Design booth #1241!

Awesome vacation!

For the past 5 years, we have been fortunate to spend New Year's up at Mammoth Mountain - thanks to our good friend Greg, whose parents own a vacation home 2 blocks from Canyon Lodge.

This year, our car was especially packed full with gear. We managed to fit one set of skis, three snowboards, luggage for four people, four wrapped gifts for our "Yankee Gift Swap".... and that's not all!!!! We brought up our PS3 and two guitars for Rock Band (Tim transported the drums and mic in his car)!






Bringing the PS3 and Rock Band was the best decision EVER. I think we definitely started an awesome new tradition.

We officially ROCKED IT.












New Year's Eve was spent at the Clocktower Cellar Pub, a no-frills pub located in the basement of the Alphenhof Lodge, near the villiage - and had a blast taking wacky pictures of ourselves, and managed to even meet a few cool people who were fun to talk to. One of them was a girl named Deena, who is the official Mammoth Snow Reporter on www.mammothmountain.com/MyMammoth. She was super sweet, and seemed like the kind of chick we would totally hang out with if we lived up there.

Here are some pics taken before we headed out to the Clocktower Cellar Pub:




















And of course, here are some pics that were taken at the Clocktower Cellar Pub:




What is with me, and my crazy tongue!?






New Year's Day was spent recovering from New Year's Eve. Need I say more? Only Greg and Charlie hit the mountain. The rest of us took the day to recover and rehydrate --- with WATER!

January 2nd: I woke up feeling nauseous and actually "got sick", which is something that hasn't happened to me since I was a kid! Every muscle in my body was sore - it was the weirdest thing. I pretty much slept all day long. I was just grateful that most of the mountain's chair lifts were closed due to a storm passing through - so I wasn't missing out on any snowboarding that day.

January 3rd: I woke up feeling AMAZING! Like I had never even been sick in the first place! It was so weird!!!! The only bummer was that it was Chad's turn to wake up nauseous that day, and I felt so bad that I had passed my "bug" on to him! We had blue bird skies with new fallen snow on the mountain - so we all (except Chad - poor guy) tackled the mountain.

Chad bought me a new snowboard for Christmas this year!
The Burton GTwin!

I am in LOVE with it! Up until now, I had been using the same board for the last 10 years - and it was time to update my gear. The new board rode like BUTTA, and I seriously think it has taken my snowboarding to a new level!

January 4th: Chad and I celebrated our wedding anniversary of 6 whole years! I love being married to my best friend in the whole world! (Oh yeah - Chad woke up feeling all better. What a weird little 24 hour "bug"!) We cleaned up the house, packed our things and headed back home to the South Bay. But FIRST - we stopped off for lunch at Erick Schat's Bakery in Bishop, and had a STAR SIGHTING! John C. Reilly walked right by me in the crowded bakery! We sat outside to eat our sandwiches, and he sat 2 tables away from ours. It was pretty cool. I don't have many star sightings. Chad has WAY more than I do - but then again - he works on TV and film productions in Hollywood.

I started writing this post the day we got back, but it's now been 4 days and I really need to just post the dang thing. Life is back to ususal, I've gone back to working in my ultra fun cubicle every day. I stayed home sick yesterday (Wednesday) - had a sore throat. No fun. Zicam really works, though!