RETIREMENT - CARD MAKING

Now that I'm retired I'm learning a new hobby.  I purchased a set of Copic markers and started making birthday cards for my grandchildren and children and whoever else I can practice my new hobby on.  I am sure having fun as you can see!

"It's all about Fun!"  This card was made for my grandson, Jordan.  He has big brothers that play basketball and he loves balls too so I thought it matched his interests.  The two little ants along the bottom represent Grandma and Grandpa watching him play.

This card was made for my granddaughter, Daisha.  She's a teenager getting ready to go to USU and so I put a shopping bag behind the "Saturated Canary" digi stamp with her $$'s in it.  I experimented using different colors and the same stamp as you may notice.  I also experimented with the backgrounds.  I'm just using card stock so I'm having a few problems with the inks bleeding beyond the lines.  I may have to splurge and purchase some of the more expensive papers but these cards didn't turn out too bad.  Watching the U-Tube tutorials has been very instructive since I'm a beginner and have lots to learn.  There are a multitude of ideas out in internet land and I am amazed at how many amazing, talented, and creative people there are in this world.  You can follow me on Pinterest under the name "Anita Freeman" and see some of the tutorials and card ideas I am collecting if you are interested.  Pinterest has become my new file cabinet of card making ideas .

DISNEYLAND

Each day we waited outside our hotel, Homewood Suites, to catch a shuttle to Disneyland. It was great! The shuttle took us right to the park entrance so we didn't have to park a mile away. The shuttle came by every half hour so you could go back and forth to your motel if you wanted. Below is a picture of Dick patiently waiting in the warm sunshine of California! The weather was perfect - not too hot - not too cold. Our hotel provided breakfast in the morning and supper in the evenings so that saved us a lot of money that would have been spent eating out. Our room had a small kitchenette and livingroom with everything you needed (even a dishwasher) if you wanted to make your own lunch. It was a children friendly hotel and a great place to stay.


Disneyland was so much fun! Lots of people enjoying spring break just like us! My favorite ride was the Grizzly River Run. Dick's favorite ride was "Soarin' Over California". We saw an Aladdin musical play at the Hyperion Theater. It was fantastic. There were so many cute rides and attractions. "It's Tough to be a Bug!" was really cute for children. The fireworks were unbelieveable and the parades were a lot of fun to watch. We didn't even begin to see everything.

This is a picture of Rafe and Kiya with one of the Park helpers at "It's a Small World" talking to them while they waited in line. Someone got off the boat during the previous ride and they had to check everything out before they would let us get in the boats. They recently renovated this feature.

This is our grandaughter, Daisha, waiting for the shuttle bus.

There were benches in the park so you could rest if you needed a break or if you were trying to decide where to go next.

This is a picture of Russ and Jen and their family.

This was a water feature that the kids had fun playing on. It looked like a giant flower with a sprinkler in the center.

Dick got in trouble so he was sequestered in jail on Tom Sawyer Island. Hmmm. It looked like head hunters were a breath away!!!! Good thing I helped him escape. He doesn't look very scared, does he?

This is a picture of us taken by a sweet lady who saw us trying to take pictures of one another. She offered to take one of both of us.

CALIFORNIA COASTAL HIGHWAY

One day we drove along the California coastal highway. It was a beautiful warm day. We stopped and watched two different guys kite surfing on the ocean. Now that looked fun! They were so good at it. We asked one guy what happened if the wind died down and they were out a long ways. He said they would get pretty tired swimming back. I was surprised at how far out they went and how good they were at using the kite wind sail to take them exactly where they wanted to go.

We stopped at one lookout place and a small elderly lady was painting a small picture of the ocean. She was so friendly and nice. I wished I would have gotten a picture of her with her canvas.

While I walked out to the point, Dick said to her, "It looks like you have a pretty good start there." She said, "What? I'm almost finished!" He said, "Your water looks a little different color." She said, "Well, that's because the light has changed." She was so right....depending on when you are looking at the water, the color of the water actually changes as the light hits it differently. Anyway Dick decided she was an impressionist........and I had to smile! She was so good hearted and not the least offended by anything said. He loves to tease. Anyway she told us about a little place she wanted us to go for lunch. She couldn't remember the name of it but described everything around it. Being the foreigners we are when we are in California, we didn't have a clue as to where to go, but I'm sure it was wonderful as she said.

Instead we stopped at Kentucky Fried Chicken and bought lunch and took it down to the beach to a picnic table. Now this is the life I thought. Gentle breeze, beautiful Pacific Ocean, birds begging for a piece of biscuit.........so fun and relaxing! Where's my paint and canvas????!!!!

VALLEY OF FIRE STATE PARK

On our way to Disneyland we went through Valley of Fire State Park which is west of Mesquite. In my wanderings off the beaten path, I discovered some petroglyphs that were not even marked. Park personnel probably already know about them, but I was so excited I could hardly stand it. This zealousness comes from brushing shoulders, in Dick and my early married days when he was getting his degree, with archaeologists from Idaho State University and working with Dr. Earl Swanson as a research secretary. A year later I was hired as the Museum secretary of the Department of Anthropology, Archaeology, and Paleontology. Our department obtained many grants from the National Science Foundation for summer digs involving students. We published a series of reports and journals (Tebiwa and The Occasional Papers of the Museum). Because Dr. Swanson was nearly blind because of his diabetes, I had the opportunity to read numerous current journals and archaeological reports to him. I learned a lot myself in the process. Working with him and witnessing his thirst for knowledge despite the obstacles that were in his path and watching his careful research gave me a deep respect for the artifacts of ancient American people and their history and for him. If you can, double click on this photo to make it larger so you can see the petroglyphs better.

AWWWW.........

Love is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul and sings the tune without the words and never stops at all.

PICTURE SCANNING PROJECT

Picture of Dad and Velma that I wanted to share with you!

Mindy (my niece) and Marcel, her hubby came to see us this weekend. Mindy and Marcel have an awesome scanner. It can scan six to eight photos or slides at a time and then it will save them individually. She spent all day scanning photos and my home and at dad's.

Dick and I were looking at some of our old slides after they left and they are fading fast. He ordered a scanner like theirs for me for my birthday so we can process photos of our immediate family and share them with our children too. It is a time consuming project but so worthwhile. Some of these old slides are the only photos we have of us when we were newly married and of some of our older children when they were small.

Lona, my sister, and Marcel, Mindy's husband, are looking at old photos and reading some of mom's journals and diaries. So many precious memories. It is so easy to forget events of the past and a good reminder that no one views life as you do. Thoughts and feelings and expressions of love are wonderful to read by later generations. It allows us to get to know them better and feel closer to them. Write your own personal history. It will mean so much to your children.

Mindy Guiterez and her husband, Marcel, and my sister Lona and I spent all day Saturday together. Mindy faithfully scanned one old photo after another. Some of the older pictures are fading and needed to be preserved in a digital format fast. Digital photos are much easier to share with other family members and allow us to store them in more than one place in case of hard drive failure, fire, water damage, acid damage from old photo scrapbooks. Even some of the faded pictures are valuable when they are the only ones that exist.

ALYSSA'S BIRTHDAY CELEBRATION!

Happy Birthday Alyssa!

This is a picture of Alyssa and her little sister, Brea, on Alyssa's birthday.