Aggie Shoots. Aggie Scraps.

Where do you get your inspiration to scrap from?

I get them everywhere. Usually I get them from fellow scrapbookers’ layouts and most often the story prompts the design more than the kit or the colors.

However, lately I get them from home design blogs, Anthropologie and clothes. Most specifically, baby girl patterns and colors. Baby Beddings are also a source of color combination pattern inspirations! Look at this cute baby bedding from BabyBeddingPalace.com:

If you read my blog and you know me, you would know that pink and brown are my most favorite colors! I used them as the color motif for my wedding and haven’t forgotten them ever since. Actually, the theme itself was Stripes and Dots so the striped quilt is calling out to me as well! The nice window valances remind of skirts my flower girls could have used! These are awesome!

This 12 piece baby bedding crib set is 100% cotton and 100% hand made in Nepal, assuring you that it will not be harsh to your baby’s skin!

Here is what you will be getting:

• 1 Baby Crib Quilt
• 4 piece Baby Crib Bumper
• 1 Baby Crib Fitted Sheet
• 1 Baby Crib Skirt (Dust Ruffle)
• 2 extra wide Window Valances
• 1 Diaper Stacker
• 1 Toy Organizer
• 1 Decorative Pillow
• BONUS GIFT Free matching high quality hand made zipper bag with handle
• (Fits all standard size baby and toddler cribs)

Notice a new widget on the left side of my blog? It is for the SOA event this Sunday.

You can read more about it at Jen Tapler’s blog. She is a Hybrid Babe at SSD and she enlisted our support for the event. Since it’s going to be an online event, watch out for challenges, prizes and some good ole digi goodness coming your way.

Alzheimer’s Disease is currently the 7th leading cause of death in the U.S. It is a fatal, progressive disease that slowly robs a person of their precious memories. We are involved in the memory preservation hobbies – what better cause for the papercrafting community to join together to support?

Use the "give" link in the top of my side-bar to make your donation – you can determine the amount you donate using the drop-down menu, but we suggest a minimum $5 donation. Once you’ve made your donation, go register on the Stampin’ Out Alzheimer’s site. The challenges and other content won’t be visible until May 25, but you can go ahead and join, set up a profile and visit the "Alzheimer’s in our Community" group to share your own story about how Alzheimer’s has affected your life or that of a loved one. If you are currently providing care for a family member or loved one with the disease, we’ve also included a Caregiver Resources page full of useful information and links to educational information and support.

I did not hesitate to volunteer for this event – my maternal grandmother, was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s when she was just in her early 60’s. Seeing her become like that, from being such an amazing and strong woman, was really heartbreaking.

Here is a layout I made about her:

Credits:
Nancie Rowie Janitz La Belle Provence
Katie Pertiet Messy Stitches
Marsha Zepeda Quote
Steph Krush Paper Tears
Fonts: Selfish and FG Astrid

Journaling:
She lived a very hard life. She suffered tremendously from her mother-in-law, sold meat at the market, sold packed meals, did dresses, styled hair, to be able to send her five children to the best schools. But not once did you see her "suffering". She was always coiffed, postures, elegant, somewhat intimidating but always warm. She suffered from Alzheimer’s for 10 long years before finding peace with God. It was hard for me to see her lose her vibrant self each day. I will never forget her.

I hope you support this worthwhile event!

I am helping my best friend scout for a sexy but elegant top for her to wear to a party. The party’s theme is “Classy in Jeans” which means that everyone is invited to be in their classiest attire – but in their jeans. So the key here would be an elegant top, perfect fitting jeans and a pair of killer shoes.

She already has her perfect fitting jeans – a pair of stretched, indigo, skinny Seven jeans. Her killer shoes would be the one of the many shoes you saw Carrie Bradshaw wearing in the series Sex and the City.

So her only problem would be the elegant top. She doesnt want to bare some cleavage as she sorely lacks some heavy duty merits from that department but she has broad shoulders, a graceful neck and sexy back. I browsed sexy tops from StyleHive.com and came across this Free People top and instantly knew this would be perfect for her. It would look soft and demure at the front but people will get the nicest surprise when she turns her back to them! Pair it with gold hoops like the one the model in the picture is wearing and she will be a winner!

Back when I was working, our company granted stock options as benefits for us employees. It is not much, but at least I get to sell it and get a couple thousand pesos as a bonus every year. Back then, I knew squat about investing. It is so sad that now that Im not working, I have realized I should have spent time investing on stocks. PowerOptions® is the only internet-based data provider that gives investors SmartSearchXL®, a patented decision support technology that identifies the highest return option trades. PowerOptions offers you the convenience and control required to automatically sort, filter, and analyze all 2,900+ optionable stocks and 190,000+ options online to find investments to meet your profit goals. For example, using the iron condor spread strategy, an investor will combine a Bear-Call Credit Spread and a Bull-Put Credit Spread on the same underlying security. By doing this, an investor will potentially be able to double the credit obtained over a single spread position. Since there are two spreads involved in the strategy (four options), there is an upper break even and a lower break even. A profit is made if the stock remains above the lower break even point or below the upper break even point.

I am helping a friend shop for a fashionable cover up dress when they go to the beach next weekend. It’s going to be an all-out party with dancing and drinking and live band music at night so the dressing up part becomes tricky, most especially when you are on limited luggage space.

This  Filippa K dress I saw over at StyleHive.com would be perfect for her. She has a lean, long and shapely body and with her flawless long legs, this would be perfect. It is casual yet stylish enough for beach trips, dining in at beach restaurants and if she just accessorize with layered necklaces, bangles and cool earrings, it will pass for a night out dress come evening.

See, this kind of planning and fashion shopping should be my sister’s job! She has always been a natural when it comes to fashion – and she actually is a fashion stylist once in a while. She coordinated fashion outfits for a model/ramp show once and styled some photo shoots.

I get some tips from her but the problem is no amount of right clothes will look good on me if I’m fat like this – I need to work on losing weight first.

I have serious hangover – from going on swimming trips.

We had our first ever summer trip getaway last weekend – after a month of rains and typhoons, we finally have some sunshine since the month of May started (on a side note, it has been too hot lately but I don’t want to complain because I don’t want rain – let the sun remain for another three weeks until I get sick of it!). It was perfect timing for the swimming party organized by Jacqui for us mommy bloggers and our families.

I wasn’t able to swim because it was the time of the month so you can understand why I want to go on a swimming trip again – soon. Although I would not be able to fit into this very sexy Victoria’s Secret Bikini, I don’t care. I really just want to swim soon!

I still have the blank halter tankini and matching shorts Glo bought for me two years ago, all I need is to go on a little detoxifying diet so at least I wont be retaining any water and I wont look that bloated. But the fats will need to work with me with the pictures

Where am I planning to take my family? To this promising waterfalls resort five minutes from our place. You cannot beat the price at 50 bucks per person! I plan to have my sisters join us and we can just order chicken and pork liempo at Andok’s with fresh mangoes and bananas!

I love that I will be able to work with such awesome and inspiring people and can’t wait to share what I love, believe in and like to do in the scrapbooking world. There are a lot of things I’d want to do – things to make it easier for me to preserve memories aka scrapbook without it taking such a huge chunk out of my time from my family, money and well, space (in the computer and in the house!). And almost four years into this hobby, I’m still learning.

I actually brought out my printed pages last night – sort of me trying to reflect and see which memories need to be highlighted and preserved more. I am on the most amazing creative teams and yet I say this, when that page is off the galleries and just sitting in your house in albums for your family to see – IT WILL NOT BE ABOUT THE KITS AND THE DESIGN ANYMORE – it will be about the story, the pictures, the people in it. There are a lot of people who tell me how much they want to scrap but don’t know how, don’t have time, and are just overwhelmed by it all. The scrapbooking community is so large and can be overwhelming but if you focus and take baby steps, one a time, you will see it will work for anybody

And that, my friends, is why I applied for to be a TDD Artist. I believe I can give that much to a community who has inspired me to keep preserving memories.

I try my best to write down the funny little things my kids say, usually on my blog. I call my collection "Quotable Quotes" and try my best to scrap them. I figured it would make a great fun book when they grow up.

So my challenge for you this week would be to make a page about what you, your kids, or someone in the family have said – be it either a funny one or a serious one. You just need to tell it as it is – just exactly the way they said it.

And here is my page:

"One boring Saturday afternoon when we had nowhere to go because it was raining non-stop and nothing to watch on TV, you children were having a fun time playing with each other – a rarity! I heard you guys playing horsey horsey and naturally, Matthew was the horse and Martha was riding on his back. I had the laugh of the day when I heard Martha shout: “Horse Me! Horse Me!”, meaning, she wanted to be the horse and wanted her brother to ride on her back. Horse Me. Horse Me explained!"

Now off to look for fat burner pills – Ive been eating nonstop last weekend!

I love board games.  I love word games, most especially. Monopoly and Scrabble are a few favorites. Card games, now that is another thing. I have only learned how to play cards when I was fifteen, and back then, I enjoy playing Solitaire than anything else.

My dad though is so good at poker though. I remember when I was pregnant with my first child, he went to the US and passed by Las Vegas for some recreation given by my aunt. She gave him $100 for playing and he sat at Poker Tables for a good night – 8 hours I think. You know what, he won around $1500! Not bad right? So when he went home, he paid for my son’s baptism

My sister, when she went to Vegas two years ago, had such a string of bad luck. She lost a couple of  hundred dollars and now that she thinks about it, that would have been a great shopping spree!

My husband doesn’t really love playing cards – he would rather play online games – but when presented with the idea of a boy’s night with a good basketball game on TV, beer and poker, he is more than game!

Guess what? The sun has been shining everyday since last weekend. And it seems we can finally have a nice summer after-all, even if it is one month late. This weekend we will be having a nice getaway with fellow mommy bloggers and our families. We are hoping for good weather, and no rain so we can really enjoy the place we are going to go to.

That means I need to do some summer shopping for myself. The kids’ outfits and swimming suits have been readied already and I took out the husband’s board shorts and some shirts he can use. It is only I who doesn’t have anything to wear yet. While I am not really eager to shop, I might need to get myself a nice top that would fit well for the weather (and some nice pictures). I am sure we will be taking a lot of pictures.

I was thinking of wearing a dress, a nice summer dress like this Guess dress I saw over at StyleHive.com.

But I am sure I would be taking care of my kids so the outfit needs to be comfortable and fuss-free as well, so I just might get myself a nice top.