NEW52 - Week 9, a new tradition

For this week, I have many NEW things to share.  First is a NEW tradition.  For the past 4 Saturdays, Bostyn and I have been making pancakes for breakfast.  This gave daddy some extra time to sleep in while we enjoy this great mommy daughter activity.

First a bag of Betty Crocker blueberry muffin/pancake mix.  I love these, only $.83 on sale.  All you need to do is add 1 egg, flour, water, and oil to make the pancakes.  I also love to mash in 1/2 a banana for some extra sweetness.

Here's Bostyn mixing away.

And now enjoying her pancakes with some syrup and strawberries.

Another new for us is a visit to Re-use Hawaii.  Re-use Hawaii is a non-profit organization working to reduce waste through building material reuse and recycling.  You can find tons of recycled lumber, doors, windows, sinks, and fixtures of all kinds.

Tate was on a mission to find some old doors for his chicken coop and we knew this is where we could find some.  Sure enough, $15 a door.  This is old for someone but NEW and perfect for us.

Another NEW this week are some super special finds.  So sweet and cute and I had to take a photo of them together and actually put together a layout last night.  Just in case you can't read the text, a pair of TOMS wedges, heart boxes from Target, China Glaze nail polish, and Hello Kitty boots for Bostyn.

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NEW layouts for the week.

This first set is for Liz and Peppermint's Designer Spotlight at the O.  Here are my Q&A layouts submitted for their challenge.

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These pages are done using DHD's products that I just fell in love with!!

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One more thing before I forget, be sure to sign up for Karla's Lift Me Up scraplift challenge.

NEW52 - Week 8

Back again to share this week's NEW52.  On Sunday, we went to the Honolulu Academy of Arts, Family Sunday.  This Sunday, they were celebrating the Chinese New Year. They had various art and cultural activities for the children but our favorite was the Gee Yung International Chinese Lion Pole Performance. These two young men display amazing balance and discipline as the Lion moves on top of 10 foot poles.

Here is a photo of the "head" guy warming up before the performance.  Look at that leap and those poles!!

and now for the video . . . 

Many thanks to my very dear friend, Leigh, whose blog informed me of this great family outing.  Leigh's blog, hapahale, always direct me to the very best in island attire, delights, style, photography, sales, and entertainment.  If you haven't already checked it out, please do.  It is a must for anyone who {hearts} anything and everything hawaii.

NEW52-Week 7, Persnickety Prints and Mavro

For this week, I really wanted to try Persnickety Prints for my 8x8 pages.  I've heard really good reviews about them + they were having a sale.  What a perfect time to try out their services!  Typically, I print out my pages at Costco for $1.49 (glossy only).  I can then pick it up in an hour.  Persnickety Prints were having a sale of $.89 per print + free shipping (regularly $5).  So how did they come out?  Gorgeous!!  I loved the matte paper and didn't have to trim the pages to fit into my page protectors.  I printed out 25 pages for $22.25.  If I had ordered them from Costco, then I would have paid $35.76 + tax.  This was an overall saving of $13.51.  So would I order from them again, YES but probably only when they are having a free shipping sale.

For a belated Valentine's dinner, Tate took me to Chef Mavro.  How do you describe his cuisine?  A bit of contemporary Hawaiian mixed with his contemporary French.  The sauces were rich yet very delicate.  The food perfectly cooked.  The little bits of attention to detail will drive me back here again.  Every seasonal dish has a wine pairing, if you choose to partake.  When I stop being a cow, I will gladly try it with all the pairings.  

Here is my menu.  (sorry forgot my camera, no photos to share).

four courses

MARINATED BIGEYE AHI

picholine olive tapenade, quail egg-sauce verte, espelette

DOMAINE DE L’HERMITAGE, 2009 BANDOL ROSÉ

“strawberry, raspberry, mineral, herbaceous”

DAY BOAT CATCH BOURRIDE “MODERNE”

medallion poached in bourride, leek and onion étuvée, aïoli sabayon
sea asparagus tempura

DOMAINE LAROCHE, 2006 CHABLIS, SAINT MARTIN

“lemon, lime, mineral, beeswax, and toast”

KUROBUTA PORK

loin roasted with a shallot & szechuan peppercorn crust, bacon wrapped shank

mustard cabbage, black garlic sauce

FINCA CORONADO, 2004 LA MANCHA, SPAI

“ripe berries, violets, rose, vanilla”
or
our sommelier rare wine selection,
DOMAINE DUPONT TISSERANDOT, 2004 GEVREY CHAMBERTIN“dark berries, plum, spice, iron, vanilla”
(add 9.50)

LILIKOI MALASADAS

guava coulis, pineapple-coconut ice cream

BLANDY’S, MALMSEY MADEIRA, 5 YEAR

“spicy, pear, happy to find his friend from portugal”

85.00
wine pairings 55.00

George Mavrothalassitis chef proprietor
Kevin Chong chef de cuisine	Wai Kit "Perry" Ho pastry chef	Todd Ashline director /sommelier

Tate decided to swap out his ahi in exchange for this, 

TRUFFLE POACHED EGG “OSMOSE”

peterson’s upland farm egg served with a potato mousseline
serrano ham ribbons

DOMAINE ZIND HUMBRECHT, 2008 PINOT BLANC, ALSACE

“apricot, orange, lemon, dry & crisp”

(photo courtesy of Chef Marvo's blog)

So that was my two NEW adventures for the week.  I'm working on getting my week8 things ready, hint hint, it involves a video.  I can't wait to share this one with you.  

For now, just a few NEW layouts.  These two were for challenges at Design House Digital. 

This morning, I got a nice surprise when I learned that this layout was the Layout of the Week at DHD.

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I'll be back in a bit with the video.

Preschool today . . . college tomorrow

Yesterday, Bostyn got her first acceptance letter into preschool.  This school, Alphabetland, was our first choice so we quickly sent in our comprehensive fee to hold her spot.  I can't believe that Bostyn will be going to a 3 year old preschool on August 1st.  Boy, time sure flies.  Like I said, preschool today . . .  college tomorrow.  It makes me so sad to think that this little girl will grow up and leave for college someday.

Today, Bostyn had her first dental appointment with Dr. Uchida.  Dr. Uchida is an old friend of mine, I actually worked with him when I was in high school and college.  He is the most gentlest dentist I know of so of course we had to send Bostyn to him.  She got a good report saying that all her teeth and gums were healthy.  This is a picture of Bostyn showing off all her teeth.

I'll be back on Sunday to share my NEW for this week.

NEW52-Week 6, Valentine's Day Edition

Happy Valentine's Day!

Thanks to Liz of Paislee Press for this wonderful valentine's day project.  I printed this out and framed it for my husband.

Surprise, surprise, we tried a NEW restaurant.  My fb friend mentioned eating at this hole-in-the-wall, take out eatery called Monarch Seafood.  I couldn't take my mind off of the "nori wrapped crab stuffed ahi katsu" and knew that this had to be my NEW for the week.  Is your mouth watering yet?  Just have a look and it will,

Next, is the citrus basil shrimp.  This was also very ono (delicious).

What I loved best about this take out counter is that you get gourmet dining in a box and at reasonable prices.  Each plate was less than $9.  They also use fresh nalo greens with their own homemade creamy garlic dressing.  Next time I go, I am going to buy a bottle of their dressing to take back with me.  This is definitely a place where I will go again.

A second NEW for the week is a NEW family portrait (minus the husbands).

I also want to wish my nephew, Nicholas, a Happy Un-birthday.  His real birthday is next month but we all wanted to wish him well so we celebrated a little early.

Since November, my mom has been taking Bostyn to a mini preschool program.  They meet only once a week for 2 hours.  At every class, the kids do a simple painting art project.  I really wanted to collect these precious memories so I made a shutterfly book using her scanned art work.  I just used the premade  templates from Shutterfly to make this super fast art book.  My husband came up with the idea to mimic "Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What do you See?" by Eric Carle.  The best part of this was that it was free, I just had to pay for shipping.

Click here to view this photo book larger

Here are my NEW layouts for the week.

This is my absolute favorite one out of the pages I submitted for the joint designer spotlight challenge featuring Paislee Press and One Little Bird.  I love the circle design elements and this cute kit from Liz.

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This layout is to remind my husband of something he says every year after running/walking/crawling the Honolulu Marathon, "never again."  What a crazy guy!!

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The rest of the layouts are for different Oscraps challenges.  Now, the rest of the month is going to be spent getting Design House Digital challenges done.

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So sorry, I don't know how these posts get so long.  See you next week.

New52 - week5

I can't believe that we are already on week 5.  So this week, I tried 2 NEW recipes.  I'll only share with you one because I totally botched the other one.  I've been following the Pioneer Woman and always drool over her mad cooking skills.  All of her food look so amazing that I finally decided to try one of them.  I made her Beef Fajita Nachos, but I didn't make the nachos part just the fajita.  I thought it came out really good, a bit on the spicy side but with homemade guacamole really tones it down.  So what you see below are my sliced flank steak, guacamole, and stir fried bell peppers, onions, and mushrooms.  The second picture is my fajita all assembled.  The full recipe and stunning photo can be found here.

My sister, Jill, is in town visiting with her son.  We went shopping on Saturday and I bought NEW makeup.  Just a simple Chanel highlighting powder.  I couldn't resist after Ed put some on me and the fact that Jill kept telling me that it is only "limited edition."  It is always nice to indulge a little, especially on makeup.

Here is just a quick photo of my daughter with all of her cousins.  Grandpa and grandma must love all the extra company at their house.

From left to right, Nicholas, Luke, Josh, and Bostyn.

Now for some NEW layouts for the week.  There is nothing that a great challenge to get my creative juices flowing.  This time it is the joint designer spotlight on Paislee Press and One Little Bird at Oscraps.  I've already created 7 layouts for this spotlight.

These photos were taken the other week when we were at the Bishop Museum.  We were outside eating gummy bears and Bostyn wanted to play, "which hand" game.

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This layout is about a story Bostyn told us about the babies.  Well, she really doesn't tell "stories" yet but it was her first real attempt at recalling an event that happened at grandma's house that day.

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This photo was taken on our outing to the park.  Bostyn wanted to go down the slide over and over again.  This became her catchphrase for the day, "one more time . . . one more time . . . "  I later found that Liz of Paislee Press had "spotted" this layout on shared it on her blog.  What a wonderful surprise and such an honor because so many layouts have been submitted for this challenge.

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 This layout is using the freebie template, Conversation Piece no. 2 by Paislee Press and One Little Bird.  I wanted to use it for this layout showing Bostyn stuck in a box saying, "help me please."  You can see her hand reaching out to you wanting help out of the box.

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This layout is using another great template, Conversation Piece no. 3.  I wanted to keep the page white and use these photos of Bostyn.  I love how the blue dress and adorable white shades just pop off the page.  This page documents all of Bostyn's first words up until 24 months.  After that, I couldn't keep up.

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Ok, this layout had to be photo-less.  Why?  because it is a conversation that Bostyn had with her daddy while he was in the bathroom.

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This layout was simply saying Bostyn's new favorite word, "oh-tay."  She can't pronounce the /k/ sound so it comes out at /t/ instead.  It is so cute to hear her say, "oh-tay."  Surprise, surprise, I got a Gallery Standout for this one.  I did not expect such an honor because there are so many cool layouts in the gallery lately.  I know all of you in the digi scrapping world would appreciate a gallery standout and be totally thrilled and excited to get such an honor.  However, all my sisters did was mock me.  They just don't get it.    

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Now onto the Superbowl Inspired Challenges at Design House Digital.  I totally jumped onto this late.  I wish I had done a few more layout and blogged about it earlier.  I really wanted to win their Wacom Tablet giveaway.

This layout was inspired by the Superbowl Ads.  Remember the Snickers commercial where the guys are playing football and then one guy tells another, "You're playing like Betty White, out there."  Too funny.  I love that commercial.  So I made a layout showing Tate playing basketball with his friends.  I love these frames from Karen Funk

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Superbowl team logo inspired challenge.  I took the G from Green Bay Packers' logo to create the title on this layout.  Yes, my daughter picks out all the green candies out first.

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I love this template by Deena especially the word art that comes with it.  So this layout was inspired by the Pittsburgh Steelers' team colors.

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This layout had to incorporate the "vs."  It was perfect for the sequence of photos that I took of Bostyn and Tate going down the slide.  I love these alpha digital brushes from Karla Dudley.

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Sorry, for this incredibly long post.  I promise it will be shorted next week.  Thanks for hanging in there.

NEW 52 - Week 4

Okay so we just finished week 4 of NEW52.  This week, we kept it simple and went to a NEW park.  Well, actually the park itself is not new.  It is not new to my husband as he remembers playing baseball there when he was younger.  However, it was NEW to me and that is what matters.  It is a quiet little park with a nice playground for Bostyn to play in.  However, the whole time I was there I kept asking myself if I am letting Bostyn play in a gigantic kitty litter.  Immediately she wanted to take off her shoes to run and play in the sand.  She had fun and we made sure to wash her up as soon as we got home.  I love the bottom photo because it is very rare for me to capture such a smile on film.

This week, I spent a lot of time scrapping as I was very inspired by Fei-fei's Stuff spotlight at the O.  So to start things off, here are a few double pagers using Shaui's stuff.

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I also completed my Ostash challenge using this new kit, Dialogue, by Paislee Press and One Little Bird.  They will begin their month long spotlight tomorrow and I can't wait to see what this dynamic duo has in store for us.  I really loved using this kit to document all the funny things Bostyn is saying at 27 months.

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Now onto Mscraps 1st birthday celebration.  It all started with an awesome blog train where I collected tons of new goodies to play with.  I had a free day at home yesterday and a bunch of challenges to participate in.  I have to say that the mscraps team is very unique with their challenges and I think that is what drove my creativity in overdrive yesterday.

To start, I love a great template because it usually allows me to break away from my regular style.  This one is no exception.  I was going to do a very monochromatic color scheme but I felt that it needed some sort of pop of color, so I added the red.  To my surprise, I found that I had received a Gallery Standout for this layout.  Thank you Katie for noticing, this just made my day!

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A scraplift challenge using a photo of my cousin's daughter celebrating her 1st birthday.

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Non-photo challenge, a very sad piece for me to write and scrap about.

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Topsy-turvie template challenge, this was my favorite challenge this week as they gave you pieces of a template and you had to use only those pieces to create your layout.

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I love a good white space challenge, especially when paired with Nini's wonderful word art.

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I'll leave here as this was a very long post.  Have a good week!