Paying it forward...

A friend of mine, Amanda, Craft Paper Girl saw this post on another blog regarding "paying it forward" I loved the idea so much I wanted to play along and share with you! Here are the details...

The first five people to respond to this post will get something made by me, especially for you. This offer does have some restrictions and limitations:

1- I make no guarantees that you will like what I make but I hope you will.

2- What I create will be just for you.

3-They say I have a year to get it to you. But I promise it will NOT take that long.

4- You have no clue what it's going to be. It’s a surprise to both of us at this point.

The catch? You must repost this on your blog and offer the same to the first 5 people who do the same on your blog.

So the first five people who post, and are willing to pass it along, will get a handmade gift in the mail from me. When you get it, make sure you post a pic on your blog!

(I'm not feeling all that creative this morning in the writing department so I just copied and pasted Amanda's post! But hey, she is a great writer! Oh and picture is one of the boys from last Wednesday, the first day of school!) Have a great week! And do a little something just for you!

Long time no post!

I thought I would finally update my blog. Nothing like waiting until DERBY day to do it! I wanted to add a few of my resent layouts I worked on. The first 2 are from a kit from SLD (no longer in business) The next 3 are from a kits I've been using that I purchased through Apron Strings. Love their kits, lots of fun, good price and lots of product! Here a few:

First Round of the OCYFL Playoffs!

And we are still in it! The score was 6 to 6 at in end of the forth quarter and with a double overtime we finally got a run to declare the game over, Falcons 12, Packers 6! What a painful game! It was a tough one. I don't know who was more stressed, the kids or the parents. I seriously think it was the parents! It was an intense game!

OK, "Coach Doug" here. Raegan says I know more about the game so I should write about it. We had some kids just really gut it out today. The Packers have the best kid in the league on their team. We just know him as #99 and he's huge! (Truth be told, it will be Elijah who is this kid in a couple years!) He's 8 and weighs over 110 lbs. What a tank. Anyway, he smashed two of our running backs and a QB a few times. All of them came off the field at different times after being hit by 99. We had one kid "on him" for the whole game and by the end, he was exhausted. 99 had at least 40 pounds on him but he's the strongest kid on our team. His name is Isaiah and is the other adopted kid on our team, so he and Isaac have a ton in common. At the end, we had to keep telling him: "just one more play." He responded! Incredible.

Isaac had a fantastic game making several tackles once again and caused another fumble - which we recovered, but the refs somehow figured out a way to let the packers keep it. (They really don't like our team and I'm not exactly sure why.) Two of Isaac's tackles were HUGE. He made a 4th down stop on 4th and 2 that would have certainly given the pack a chance to score. He's something else to watch. He just sneaks into the backfield and grabs on and brings 'em down. We've called him "plastic man" all year and he's played true to that.

Our win came at the end of the 2nd overtime. The do overtime like the NCAA does, so each team gets a chance to score. In the first overtime, we got the ball first and had two penalties called on us to back us up even farther from the 15 yard line so we just couldn't get the ball in the end zone. On their possession, they drove a little bit and fumbled on third down. Since in overtime you alternate possessions, they got the ball again. This time, they had seven chances to score! On third down, we got them for a loss and there was a mysterious face mask call for five yards and though I'm not sure why - gave them an automatic first down. (They were no where near the first down.) So they had four more tries and one of those tries was one of Isaac's best tackle, getting the RB for a three yard loss. We held them to the one yard line and they turned it over on downs.
On our second possession, we started at the ten and immediately got a penalty. (Seriously, we had about 15 flags on us versus 3 on them - something seriously fishy going on.) We got to a third and goal from the 15 and our RB took an end around to the four. So, on 4th and 4 we ran up the middle and our RB took the ball outside to the right after dodging three guys, scores the winning TD by a foot! WE went nuts!!!!
I sure felt bad for the Packers in one sense. That was their FOURTH overtime loss this season, two against us. They played 8 games, so half were overtime losses. Poor kids. They were better than their record for sure.
So, NEXT week, we have the Colts. I HATE the Colts. Their coach is a league board member and many think he gets preferential treatment. I tend to agree, but I'm sure I'm biased. They beat us earlier this season but it was a lousy loss. We dominated the whole game but kept getting penalties for really bad calls. They had one lucky run on us and they made their extra point which we still struggle with. I don't think think this game will be as hard as the one today. We'll see!!!!

Happy Halloween!

What fun we had last night Trick or Treating! They kids were out in droves here in KY. The weather was perfect for being out after dark! We had so much candy that we never ran out and even shared with the neighbors! Seriously! I wanted to share a few more pictures from the day. Isaac & Elijah wanted to go as Star War characters. With Elijah having a Star War birthday last month and getting 2 Star War costumes as gifts, we were set for Halloween. No need to purchase anymore costumes! Good thing Isaac wanted to be Darth Vader or we would have been in some serious trouble! :)

Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that we had a visit from Sarah Palin too! She brought her 2 little kitty cat trick or treaters along too! Who knew she would come all this way from Alaska to T or T?!

(Actually, this is my neighbor Diane with her little girls! Aren't they cute!)

So we had a Storm Trooper (Elijah) and Darth Vader (Isaac).

We also had a visit from Pippi Longstocking. She's our neighbor from across the street and she babysits the boys from time to time! But she drives now and works at Red Robin, so those times are fewer and farther apart! I hate it when we find a good sitter and she "gets a life" LOL

So that's the word in the life of the Lalli's! Enjoy your weekend! Look for a football update soon! :) Hint...we play again next week!

Guess Who Turned 5 Yesterday?

Yep, he's five! Hard to believe it! Elijah has grown up so much in the last year! He decided he wanted a Star Wars birthday theme this year with a Darth Vader cake. Well, Darth Vader was not going to happen. With a little Internet search this is what I came up with! Anakin Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi are fighting on Mustafar, and also where Anakin gets all messed up and has to become Darth Vader! A dad came up with this great idea for this cake and I just ran with it! Such a great idea and everyone loved it! You are asking, I'm sure, what the volcano mound is made from, right? It's rice crispy treats! Basically it's lots of red icing and melted chocolate bark all on top of a brownie base. It was a yummy combo.


Darth Vader (Daddy) came to visit briefly and take pictures with most of the guest. It was a bit hot in the house, so it didn't last for long. He was a big hit!

Doug came up with the idea to have Jedi Training. They had to pin the X-wing fighter on the Clone Wars posted while blind folder (think pin the tail on the donkey here). Next it was off to target training. Shooting over figurines with nerf guns. And onto light saber contest to see who was the winner! I think over all the contest was won by our older guests! But truly didn't keep score well enough to do that. It was just lots of fun.

Here you see the Storm Trooper Elijah. He as been seeing these in the stores for several weeks just couldn't stand the idea of not getting one! This is what we picked out for Nana & Papa Lyons to give.
Here is General Grievous' Starfighter! This was a hard to find one, but finally Doug has success and found it ToysRus! Uncle David, Aunt Debbie, Becky & Kelsey gave his this. He was so excited.
And from Grandma & Papaw Lalli he got game cube controls and starwars games that can be played with the Wii. I'm not sure who is more excited about this, Isaac or Elijah, LOL

Over it was a great evening. We keep thinking we aren't going to do these big parties but they just keep happening. They only happen once a year and it's a long time from September to May and I think Doug & I forget how much work they are! But from May to September we do remember and we just can't do for one and not the other, so we do it once again! Doug is the brain child as far as games go and I take care of the cake and other decorations, so we make a great team! I'm thinking a family party sounds so good to me right now!

Thanks for sharing in our day, even it's long distance and from this venue. It means the world to him! He loved each card, phone call, e-card and gift! He was excited all day long and told everyone we saw yesterday NO MATTER WHERE WE WERE or who they were, stranger or not, everyone knew it was Elijah's 5th Birthday yesterday!

Fun In The Pool...

I totally forgot to post pictures of the boys playing in the pool! They have had so much fun it already. I know the water has been a little cold, but they should still get a few more good weeks of use out of fit before it gets winterized. We are planning to have a pool party for Elijah's 5th birthday. He is excited about it. Assuming the weather holds out, he'll be so excited.




I honestly think Elijah's lips are blue in this picture and Isaac is shivering, LOL I know they are looking forward to warmer water this weekend! Have a great weekend!

Football Season Has Begun!

It's August and that means school as well as OCYFL starting! It's a new season, new coaches and new teammates. We had a great season last year and have BIG shoes to fill this year! I thought I would share the pictures I took on Saturday. I got lucky and got some good shots, but we are still buying pics from the actual photographer. We'll keep you posted as the season goes along. We have Jamboree on Saturday, a scrimmage game, which will be most of the boys first experience with an actual game, it ought to be a something to see!

Isaac's First Day of First Grade! August 13th!

The summer was just too short! Truly he only had 10 weeks of summer! It went by so fast. Isaac was very ready to go back, he loves school and was excited to see who was going to be in his class.


We learned on the 7th that Isaac's new teacher was going to be Ms. Jessica Doty. She is in her 3rd year of teaching and is full of great ideas! We love her already.

About the only thing we were less than happy about was that Isaac only has 3 kids from his Kindergarten class. I think I was more upset about it than he was, but then again, isn't that how it usually is, mom or dad upset, kid just rolls with the punches! He has already made some new friends and he does get to have recess with his old classmates, so he will still get to them from time to time.

Oh and he will have this teacher and these classmates for both 1st & 2nd grade. I was a little concerned about this at first, thinking that if we didn't get a good match with the teacher we would have problems, but knowing now who we have, I couldn't be more thrilled.

Isaac asked the other day when he gets a break from school again! It's started already! :) However, he also added that he didn't think First Grade was that hard! I told him he hasn't started to have homework yet, so he might change his mind. Our note says homework will start the week after Labor Day so we still have one more week before it really kicks in!

Pool Install August 13th

Yep, we did it, we bought a pool late in the summer! It was install on August 13th, Isaac's first day back to school! He was excited when he got home!

I was amazed at how fast these pools go in. Did you ever wonder what 6 tons of sand looks like? Well, now you now.


Not that impressive is it? I thought it would be a huge mound! Not that much!

I think the guys were here about 4 hours total, and the hardest part was Doug & I putting the ladders together on Saturday! Our neighbors joked that they nearly divorced over putting the ladder together, we didn't find it that challenging in our marriage, LOL We did however have a few words while putting the pool cover on, yep, just a huge piece of bubble wrap, LOL!!!

Enjoy the pics! Have a great day!

Someone's Having A Birthday!

Our niece Ruth is turning 12 on Saturday! I whipped up this little card for her over at Smile Box

Love this website! I thought I would share it with you!

Make a Smilebox free ecard

Big Picture Scrapbooking

I'm loving the BPS class I'm taking, "Baker's Dozen". With a little direction we gathered embellishments, pictures and some patterned papers and now we are putting embellishments with those pictures and creating layouts, 13 in all when it's all said and done. I've been so inspired by the class. Darcie is a great instructor and with her sketch ideas it has made it extremely easy to whip out a layout every other day. Well, in my case, 4 in one evening. I'm still behind by 3 and another one will be posted tomorrow so I better get busy!



I thought I would share the layouts I worked on last night! It was fun to be creative again, I feel like I haven't really had my creative "mojo" lately, just rolling with the punches. This felt freeing and fun!!!


Enjoy your weekend!