Some sample wedding invitations

I made a bunch of sample wedding invitations a while back now, but have never shared them on here. :) So since life has been a little dry around here lately... I thought I'd share them.

Invitation #1





Invitation #2





Well blogger is having issues... so only 2 invitations for now. :)

They've arrived!

The rest of my cloth diapers arrived today! :) At the early stage, we're trying a couple of each company's diapers that got good reviews. Then we can see which ones work for us and which we want to invest in for the rest of the diapering stages. Although several of them are One Size diapers that can be used from 8 lbs all the way up to 30lbs. So we'll see how it all works out. I've still got to pick up a few more doublers, or make them. Also have to finish making cloth wipes (my project this coming weekend).

Last night we got rain and snow. So this morning when it warmed up again, I heard water running (rather loudly), so I went to investigate. The gutter that goes above our front door was pouring down over the front step (opposite end of the trough as it is supposed to). It wasn't just pouring out... it was waterfalling! There was no way to get in or out of the house! It only lasted about 10 minutes, but it was crazy. Guessing it's something that will have to be attended to this summer. In the winter the same thing happens, then the water freezes on the front step (not so safe).





Since we've put up the baby gate at the bottom of the stairs (we put it up to keep the cats out of the bedroom area of the house while we were working), I've noticed the cats aren't getting as much exercise as usual. Normally they're chasing each other around the house... but this week... they've been laying on their pet bed, and sleeping. But as you can see.... Teemo is definitely more comfortable than he ever used to be.

More Renos

Well we spent our Saturday working around the house. We got the first coat done in the spare bedroom in the morning, and then a second coat in the evening. This room will be used as the baby's room eventually, although right now it has all the furniture for the extra bedroom (which we are waiting for the tennant to move out of before we can do anything with it). So here's couple pictures of the work done:

Here's the room before we started (weird.... it's showing 3 pictures in one.... gotta get Josh on the debugging of that one!):


Here's Josh painting (the first coat):


I also got a chance to work in the garden yesterday. Twenty degree weather in April, not complaining. Hopefully today I'll get some more done in the garden.

I am no officially done classes. :) I'm so happy about that. Have 3 exams to write still, one today (a take home), one this week (just a multiple choice webct based exam) and then one April 24th, which will be brutal (but I'm sitting with 100% in the course, so I am sitting very well going into it). Then I will be a graduate. Only took me 6 years! (or was it 7?)

I've also gotten a chance to do lots of crafting this last month. I'm actually pretty well caught up to my card a day status.... although I usually make 6 -12 at once... not one everyday. Here's just a few of the cards I've made recently:






Josh is headed to Vancouver today, until Wednesday for a conference, so the house will be quite quiet. I'm hoping to get a lot of things done while he is gone, just organization and such. The next two weekends we will also be travelling and getting some visiting in. Then it's May. Time is going very fast!

Guitar customization

You may recall my complaint about the aesthetics of my new guitar. Luckily it was an easy tweak to make the look more pleasing. I pulled off the amber knobs that came on the guitar and replaced them with some chrome ones. Here's the result:

Original amber knobs

New chrome knobs

The new knobs look great, and my repository of chords is gradually growing.

My life at the Enmax

My week of residence in the Enmax Center has come to an end now. Four of the previous seven evenings were spent in the seats of the arena. Thursday night Tamara and I went with some friends to see Paul Brandt in concert.



Because Michael from work went to school with Paul he was able to get us some meet & greet passes for before the show. We got to chat with Paul Brandt for a few minutes and have a picture taken with him. Much like myself, Paul will be a father for the first time in the next couple of months, and like me, he is both scared and excited about it.



Round two of the WHL playoffs started on Friday at the Enmax. We were all heartbroken with the 3-2 Hurricane loss after blowing a 2-0 third period lead. They almost blew a 4-0 third period lead last night (see photo above: 3-0 at the start of the third), narrowly escaping with a 5-4 win in OT. The good news out of that is that we are guaranteed a game 5 in Lethbridge next Friday.

The Enmax Center: My home away from home

I'm thinking of having my mail forwarded to the Enmax Center; I've been spending that much time there. Brian and I took in game 6 of the Hurricanes' opening round series against Brandon on Sunday night. A dominant performance by the 'Canes that was, and they earned themselves a spot in the second round. So Friday and Saturday I'll goto the Hurricane games against Kootenay with some of the guys from work. Tonight, however, we're going to see Paul Brandt, and since Michael went to high school with him, we've managed to get backstage passes.

It should be a fun weekend! If you're looking for me, try section LL at the Enmax.

Birthday comes early

My birthday arrived a week early this year! I got the call from Note-able yesterday that my new guitar arrived. I love the colour and the look of it: an Epiphone Les Paul Standard Plus Top in translucent blue (not quite a Gibson, but close enough for me). The only complaint I have is the amber knobs. I'm going to look into replacing them with chrome ones to match the other hardware.

So far I've had about an hour to play it, and I can't wait for tomorrow to come so I can play some more.

I forgot my camera in Crossfield last weekend; better pictures to come when I get it back.

Weekend Excitement

This weekend was a busy one. We had a couple friends come down from Calgary for the weekend. My friend Melanie, who I grew up with in Revelstoke, and Josh's friend Mike, who he grew up with in Crossfield. Full house, but lots of fun. As usual, Mike brought some group video games with him. Was great fun. But the best game he brought was Rockband. Now, Josh plays this at work quite often, but I hadn't experienced it yet. It's beyond what Guitar Hero is! :) You have a full band, drums, guitar, bass guitar and singer. :) So I snapped a few pics of us playing!


We've got Josh singing.


We've got Mike drumming.


We've got the oh so enthused Melanie (she refused to play). Couldn't even get her to play Dance Dance Revolution (which is very tiring when your almost 7 months pregnant).


Here's a group shot. I think I liked the drums best. Guitar and bass were too much like guitar hero, and I wasn't brave enough to sing!


Also this weekend, my friend Jen threw a baby shower for me with a bunch of school friends. It was a blast! She made quite the feast, and planned a few fun games. I also snapped a few pictures of this event. I realized upon loading the photos on the computer, that I hadn't used my camera since last summer when I was working for the City of Revelstoke. Still had tombstone pictures on it!


Some of the girls at the shower (Melanie, Andrea, and Marissa).


Jen made a massive and delicious spread! Too bad she didn't tell us not to eat lunch first ;).


Check out this awesome cake Jen made. :) It was just as wonderfully tasty as it is wonderfully decorated.

Well...

Things have been very hectic around here.... and when there's time to crash, we've done just that.

School is busy with projects and exams. Last project of the semester is due next week, so will be nice to have that out of the way, leaving only exams and lab assignments. I sure am looking forward to being done school forever! :)

The little one is moving A LOT! Barely any rest for her! It's actually really amusing to watch her movements through my belly. :) Although all that movement is really not helping with my sleep at all. I think she'll be a rambunctious one! We've done a little bit of shopping in preparation for her arrival, and are starting to gather the things we'll need. 12 more weeks!

I have a pile of cards to share, but haven't been able to get pictures of them yet, so they sit and wait. Josh has also launched my website... but I've been slacking and it doesn't have any content yet. I'll keep you posted, and give you an address once I actually have something on it to show!

Hopefully I'll have pictures soon!

Brownies

Apparently these brownies were a big hit at Josh's office. And well they were just delicious... So I thought I'd share the recipe:

Chocolate-Cherry Brownies

1 (18 ounce) package devil's food cake mix
1 (21 ounce) can cherry pie filling
1 teaspoon almond extract
2 eggs , beaten
1 cup sugar
1/3 cup butter
1/3 cup milk
1 (6 ounce) package semi-sweet chocolate chips

Directions
1. Preheat oven to 350.
2. In mixing bowl combine cake mix, cherry pie filling, almond extract and beaten eggs.
3. In sprayed, floured 9 x 13 inch baking pan, pour batter and bake for 25-30 minute.
4. Icing: in medium saucepan over medium heat, combine sugar, butter and milk, bring to boil and stir constantly for 1 minute. Remove from heat and stir in chocolate chips until smooth and creamy.
5. Remove from oven and pour icing over warm cake.

Photo shoot

We hauled out all the lighting gear tonight for some maternity photos.  Here's one of my favourites so far:

A little quiet around here

So it's been a little quiet on the blog lately. So here's the latest exciting news from the Schroeder home:

WE GOT A DISHWASHER! :) That's right... no more stacking dishes precariously hoping that they'll somehow wash themselves. :) Thanks to Josh's dad for doing the dirty work of adding the hookups and tearing out the cupboard to put it in. :) I'm SO happy about this development.

Our new couch has arrived. :) It's glorious chocolate brown leather. Has a recliner on both ends of it. :) Super comfy. Great view of the new LCD TV. The living room is mostly in order now, so we'll have to take a picture to share with everyone. The cats are enjoying having the living room back. Always ready for a snuggle on the couch.


It's currently reading week. SO I've been working around the house, doing some tidying, some crafting, and some project work. Currently working on a project that involves watching lots of movies and compiling clips. :) It's a very enjoyable project so far!

And finally, Josh took a few photos tonight. I'm looking big... and there's still 3 months to go!

It's a....

BABY!

It's actually a girl! But you knew that from the pic... right? ;)

A couple of cards

I finally am getting to do some crafting again:

Christmas '07

Half Dahlia Fold

Outsourcing

Help is getting harder and harder to find...

Living room laminate floors: complete

Thanks to my Readers Digest handyman book, and some support calls to my Dad I finally finished the laminate flooring in the living room. I'd hoped this would've only taken a few evenings, but given that we live in a four-plex, I had to shut down around 9 each evening. Add a couple nights off, and it turned into a week long job.



It's good to have this phase of the project finished. Now we can spend some time enjoying the living room again. In particular, the cats are going to appreciate that the construction has ceased for a bit.

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Thanks Mom and Dad Y.

My lighting gear, a Christmas gift from Tamara's parents, arrived in the mail today. I've now got some lighting umbrellas, stands, wireless triggers, and a few other little goodies to further develop my photography.

Here's my Pentax flash shooting into one of the umbrellas:


And me tinkering with the flash while it's attached to the stand:


Here are Tamara and Oakley posing under the new lighting:

Post weekend update

So after painting all weekend (a little tiring), we've now completed step one of our renvations. The colour looks great. There were a few mishaps, the most major one being this:


Josh accidently bumped into the paint can, which actually left us JUST short on paint for the walls. But on the plus side, we tore up the carpet and are now doing laminate. Josh is hoping to get installation started this week. Currently we have about half of the carpet in the living room pulled up, and we have stacks of laminate now in our dining room just waiting:



So that is this week's project (well, next couple weeks, since we are headed to Calgary on the weekend). We are planning to do the living room, hallway, landing outside the master bedroom, master bedroom and the 3 flights of stairs connecting all that. We figured if we decide to do the other 2 bedrooms at a later date, we can always get a different laminate.

Anyway, just a quick update. Our renovations are progressing and we have laid out our plans for the next few months. Sadly currently the only room that is fully useable at this point in time is our bedroom (which has some extra stuff piled in it, and the main bathroom. Everywhere else is in chaos at the moment. I'm aiming to get the kitchen in working order again today (just a lot of clutter from painting and such).

New Year

So, although we've been really bad about posting for the last year, I'm renewing my commitment to this blog.

I made 1 resolutions this year:
I will produce one card per day of the year
-this means that if I miss a day, I'll have to make an extra card another day.
-this also means that I will have to keep a craft corner permanently set up
-I will do all occasions and hopefully produce more than 365 cards in the year

Josh also made a resolution this year:
He plans to take a picture a day

So this year has started out alright so far. Since we got back from our Christmas travels and visits, we've been organizing and planning our house out a little. We have weekend projects coming out the wazoo. This coming weekend we are painting (living room, front entry, hallways, stairways), as well as replacing all light switches and electrical outlets. We will also be replacing all the baseboards. We decided to get this done this weekend, as there will be no couch in the living room (new one coming soon), and we haven't gotten our LCD TV yet, so it isn't mounted yet. So perfect time to get it done.

Other weekend projects we have planned are:
-painting nursery
-building DVD storage unit
-installing a dishwasher (FINALLY)
-clean basement out, and go through things stored in crawl space

I've got all the furniture planned on where it is going, but until April, when our tennant moves out, we can't access one room, making other rooms a little more crowded.

So this blog will now be converted to an family update (as it was before), as well as a posting site for all my cards and scrapbook pages (I'm just converting to digital scrapbooking. Josh may post some of his pictures here as well (hopefully). So this blog will definately pick up in posts, and hopefully regain some of its readers, as well as gain new ones.

Happy 2008 everyone!

More

Actually, here's one that is a whole series. If you just wanted a series that is slightly different but all quite similar.

For Melanie

New Eagles studio release

Didn't know this was coming until today, but I'm pretty excited about it, especially since my first concert experience was the Eagles' Hell Freezes Over tour on my 12th birthday.

Favourite TV Moments

This is totally random. I'm watching a TV show right now counting down the top 30 funniest moments in TV.

My favourite sit-com moments aren't necessarily the funniest of all time:

• Friends - In the episode where Joey and Chandler win Monica and Rachel's apartment, they make a grand entrance, riding their white dog statue into their new apartment, saluting the girls with their arrival. There's just something about that scene that cracks me up.


• The Office - After a successful prank on Dwight, Jim and Pam "air-five" from their desks. Priceless.


• That 70's Show - Leo giving Eric a tattoo. "Debbie's really gonna like this, man." A physics text book would even be funny if read aloud by Tommy Chong.


• Simpsons - After a successful bargaining session with Mr. Burns, Homer celebrates by spinning on the floor cheering "whooootwhootwhootwhoot." Another one that never loses its funny.

Accidental self-portrait

While shooting some panoramics of the High Level Bridge this evening, I happened to get an accidental self portrait as well. This was just one of my divider images between panoramic series, but the silhouette effect turned out pretty cool.