OHScrap! » Flowers

family of four once again

joscie — Thu, 29 Oct 2009 04:00:16 +0000

Sunday was a very busy day, we took a little trip down to China town to buy lei for Troy’s homecoming and a little snack too. Our favorite Lei Store was called sweethearts back in the day and then re-emerged as Po’ohala a few years ago, same family, new name. I always go there to buy lei for our friends who are visiting or those like Troy, who are coming home. The boys were able to choose their own lei to give to dad, Jalen chose a tuberose and orchid lei, Jordan chose a lantern ilima and tuberose lei, and I chose a hala lei for Troy.

While we were down in China town, we took a walk around the block for our very favorite Chinese treat, manapua (aka char siu bao). My very favorite place to go is Char Hung Sut. It’s the kind of place where you walk in and order from one person, another person runs and fills your order and the girl at the register scribbles the math on a stack of scratch paper. it’s just so good.

I know you’re going to find this hard to believe, but I procrastinated a little bit on making the welcome home banner. I toyed with the idea of ordering a sign, Noel even sent me a link, but of course I waited too long. I also entertained the idea of cutting vinyl and making a banner, if I could just stop off at a sign making shop and get a banner to apply my vinyl to… but in the end I decided to cut and sew a banner, on Sunday.

Jalen commented that our coconut tree did not have any coconuts and did we have to wait 3 days? (that’s a facebook my farm joke, btw)

We expected the ship to be pulling in around 830am-ish so we arrived around 8. We had to park a good distance and I wanted to be sure we had enough time. I let Jordan ride the umbrella stroller so i could load our goods on the handles. There was a cool tent and seats set up for us to lounge while we waited for the ship.

I loved the reflection in Jalen’s glasses, you can see me right in the middle.

We watched as the ship pulled up. Troy was not manning the rails, he said he had something to do inside the ship, I didn’t even ask what it was. When the ships pull in from a deployment to Pearl Harbor, they tie a lei to the front of the ship. It’s made out of plastic (i think it’s trashbags).

the boys held their umbrella signs, even though dad wasn’t on the outside of the ship…

Then we waited and waited, and Troy showed up, checked out on leave in his Tshirt and shorts with all his goodies. Jordan got to give the first lei:

Jalen the second (and me last)

The boys went back to school on Tuesday and Troy fell in with our daily routine. I got my new id card that I have been waiting for. I was so excited to see that the camera was mounted up high on the counter, at a flatteringly higher angle than the chair. It’s the little things that help a girl out, ya know?! Of course i can’t show you the id card, but it does look like me, so I’m happy. Today’s errands included a trip to the pumpkin patch…

ha ha, just kidding. you know on the Wednesday before Halloween, the pumpkin patch is closed. and evidently the Navy Commissary is also sold out of pumpkins. So we took a trip to Sam’s Club and picked out 4 non rotten pumpkins. ha ha.

and have I told you, I love this man?

pumping my gas. **swoon** what a man. and do you know what I did on Monday night? I was able to run out and pick up steaks for dinner, by.my.self! and I was able to come home and cook dinner while he bathed the little. **sigh** it is so good to be a family of four again. We are enjoying and being thankful for all our many blessings. I want to thank all of you who prayed for us and him while he was gone, I really really appreciate it! Tomorrow’s excitement? I’m getting a long over due eye exam. and I’m not only buying new glasses, but I’m also getting sunglasses. prescription sunglasses. eeeeeeee! You lucky ladies who wear contacts or have been blessed with good eyesight have no idea. For people like me, sunglasses require so much effort. I am such a lucky girl. I’ll check in with my new eyewear when they come in, I can’t wait! SUNGLASSES! yay!

Thanks for stopping by, Love Love and Blog you later!

Joscie, rhymes with bossy!

learning a new skill

joscie — Fri, 29 May 2009 00:31:52 +0000

and I’m completely thrilled about it! I have wanted to learn how to crochet for a long time. When I was younger I learned how to knit from my Grandma Galli, my adopted Italian Grandma. Nothing fancy, but I learned how to knit and purl. I’ve always thought that was fun, but hadn’t really pursued it. about a year or so ago I fell completely in love with those crocheted little flowers. You see them everywhere, but I wanted to learn how to make them. I tried asking 3 different people who knew how to crochet, but their skilled fingers were just too fast for my untrained eyes. I tried buying a few teach yourself to crochet books, but those were difficult for me to follow, so I gave up. until last week. My girlfriend KJ posted a link to some crocheted flower patterns and I thought, those would be cool to make, too bad I don’t know how to crochet. (bang head again) then I also started reading this incredible blog the purl bee and I came across this beauty. I fell in love with that scarf. in all it’s golden yellow happiness. sigh. if only I knew how to crochet. I looked at youtube and lo and behold. the perfect crochet teacher for me. a video tutorial for each and every crochet stitch I’ll ever need to know. If you want to learn how to crochet, give this lady a chance. You can watch it as many times as you need and she does regular speed and slow mo. I love it. so I have learned a few stitches and I gave it a try. and guess what? I made my first crochet-flower, ever. She’s not perfect, but I love her anyway! I’m working on counting my stitches more accurately.

and of course I had to try my hand at the scarf right? since I live in Hawaii and it was 93 degrees the other day, right? I know, my head doesn’t always work logically. I really wanted to order the yarn in the demo project, but OUCH! it’s silk. and $29 a bunch or roll or ball or whatever you call a bunch of yarn. and it takes 3 colors. I thought it best not to spend $90 for my first project. instead I’m working a cheaper practice one. I’m in the third row so far.

and lastly, i ordered some goodies last week or so and they came in. I’ve been coveting it for a while… baker’s twine. I tried to buy it locally, but no luck finding it here, so I ordered. look at the pretty colors. it makes me happy. I just want to tie lengths on my wrist. is it silly? probably. but I don’t care! blame it on maria. i too love brown paper packages tied up in string. hee hee!

I bundled these up to send to my mother in law and I also packaged some up for my RAK winners. I also got some fancy crochet pins. ahhh, the pretties make me smile.

I hope you’re doing well. We’re ending up our school year tomorrow. I have to make some cards to thank our teachers (again) this time personally from our family..> We really lucked out with teachers that nurture and lead our boys, and for that we are thankful.

Love Love and Blog you later,

Joscie, rhymes with Bossy!

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I am alive!

joscie — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 19:29:19 +0000

It’s been a while! Boy, nothing like coming home from vacation to set you up for needing another one, eh? We decided, okay I decided that we needed to attack our back yard and eradicate the weeds. When we moved into this house in August of 2007 the landscape guys seeded our lawn. I got out there when I could to weed out the little pests and was doing a pretty good job. Then as the grass really grew in, the landscape company came in to take care of the lawn, with their dirty equiptment. They introduced more and more weed seeds until our lawn was nothing but weeds and some grass. I mostly just ignored it and focused on doing other things inside, but recently declared NO MORE WEEDS! we dug up the back yard (a smallish fenced in area) and got out as many weeds as possible and planted grass. We bought trays of grass but not enough to lay it like sod, hey that’s a lotta jack! we cut it up in little squares and put it out. we’ve been watering and continuing the weeding process and hopefully before we move out of here in 3 years there’ll be grass back there.

Miss Mint is celebrating Peppermint Creative’s Birthday with a huge sale, have you checked it out yet? also there’s a new freebie out called April Morning.

I created this layout with that kit, click for details:

Flat Joscie is headed to Canada to visit with Miss Mint, I can’t wait!

Love Love and blog you later!

Joscie, rhymes with bossy

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POTD catchup, finally!

joscie — Sun, 20 Jul 2008 07:06:14 +0000

I put the music player back up————> but did not turn on auto play because I’ve heard that people don’t like auto play… go ahead and hit play… enjoy the sounds of the islands!

Today was another beautiful day in paradise! It was my nephew Ivan’s 14th birthday, so we joined him for a day out at Ka’a'awa Beach. I love this HUGE umbrella I bought at Sam’s club a few years ago, paired with a handy gadget from WalMart that helps it dig into the sand… Shade! :)

Jalen making a sand castle…

Jordan…

My Niece Belle

My Niece Casey

I saw this super cute group on flickr : http://www.flickr.com/groups/muffintinmeals/

and I was inspired to try this with my picky eaters. in ice cube trays…Turkey, Pepperoni, string cheese, laughing cow cheese, carrots/grape tomato, grapes, strawberries, biscuits cut up, ranch, ketchup and chicken nuggets. Both boys tried everything! this was a huge success, and I think I am going to try this once a week or so. :)

my sunflower is trying to make it’s debut! :)

My mom called the other day and asked if we wanted her to bring lunch… Manapua and pork hash from Libby’s. Manapua (a.k.a. char siu bao) is a sweetish pork filling in a sweet bread steamed. Pork Hash is a dumpling. not sure other than pork. yummy. not health food!

Lahaina Noon fire hydrant. This day the sun travelled directly over the islands at 12:37pm. It’s called Lahaina Noon because it starts in Lahaina. Thanks to Angela Keen for the info, I was able to head out to get this shot :)

Our MOO cards! I found them through Flickr. The company is in England and I love love love these! they are roughly the same size as a sony memory stick. If you want to order, you can get 15% off your first order by using the code: MF685M http://www.moo.com/

I posted this picture earlier, but figured I’d do it again. The little blue pouch is one i sewed to hold my moo cards! :)

My girlfriend adrienne :) we stopped for coffee after our web class :)

Jordan and Dad sharing a berry smoothie from Costco!

My CSS book to help me with designing my wordpress blog! :)

Did you make it through all of that?! There are a few more things I’d like to share. I created a tutorial over at Miss Mint’s Blog for a little prayer book… come see!

Troy is going back to a ship in the next few months… Do you want to see the kinds of stuff he has worked on? Tune into the Military Channel for a special on the USS Lake Erie. http://military.discovery.com/tv-schedules/special.html?paid=52.14319.125185.36048.0

And have you seen the NEW MM Paperie lines? cute cute stuff! :)

Again, thanks for being the most awesome blog readers in the galaxy! PS, I am wondering, how did you find my blog? :)

Aloha, Love-Love and Blog you later!

Joscie rhymes with bossy and sometimes coffee!

Our Second Grade graduate… and waaay too many pictures.

joscie — Sat, 24 May 2008 08:03:00 +0000

We went downtown this morning to buy lei for Jalen’s Graduation…I got this haku lei, Jalen and Jordan got crownflower lei, and we got lei for his teachers too…

Jalen’s class had their “graduation” ceremony today although they still have another week of school. The class sang and danced to a super cute song “Local to the max” (translation: really really local). Jalen was in the middle of the stage (no surprise there) and did really well.

remember those flowers I bought at Sams this week? They are blooming and looking sooo pretty! We took a quick trip to Walmart the other day and found this funny Bat Man Mask… Jordan didn’t love it, but obliged for the picture. it was almost as cute as the basket. That Kid loves to put things on his head.

I am so excited that our cucumber plant has flowers on it! :)
I had such a great mail day yesterday! I got a card from South Africa from KJ! and some cute die cuts! I love it! :)
and on the same day I got a RAK from Jessica… this cute stamp! (How much I love Hula Dancers, even though I am not a hula dancer) and these packages of cute plastic goodness also known as skittles.
and From my friend Happy Scrappy Sam:

some stamps, super cute cardstock stickers, Noteworthy die cuts, a magnetic notepad, brads and buttons… :) These ladies know me so well! :)
OKAY, so I don’t buy guns for my boys, but they pick up toys and pretend they are guns. This is a Mr. Potato Head fire extinguisher and Troy is teaching him the proper way to look around the corner and clear the room.

WOW, did you make it this far? Thanks! I hope you are all having a great weekend!

Ispy with my little eye flowers

joscie — Sun, 18 May 2008 01:14:00 +0000

One of my favorite things to take pictures of… flowers (and plants) Today we headed down to Ala Moana Shopping Center and I snapped some pictures there…

and these are not flowers, but pretty plants at Ala Moana…

flowers from Church last month…

another favorite flower at Bishop Museum… Lei down in china town…
a tiare from my front yard…
Indoor Noteworthy flowers…
Yesterday I took this shot… I think they are called mimosa? or monkey pod? something like that. not sure, but I liked the way the sun was shining on the flower… :) I forgot to add yesterday: these super cute scalloped frames are by Miss Mint at Peppermint Creative here.

what do you spy?

Did you know I am a big drinker?

joscie — Mon, 28 Apr 2008 07:26:00 +0000

Ha, drinker of coffee and diet coke. big 2 liter bottles. I don’t know about where you live, but in our beautiful state of Hawaii, we have a bottle deposit. That means with every can or bottle of soda there is a 5 cent charge at the store when you purchase (sometimes there is a 6 cent charge) and there is only a 5 cent refund when you bring it back. the bottles must be clean and empty and still have the label attached and you have to take it to a redemption center. When the law first started up, I stopped buying 12 packs of diet coke and switched to two liter bottles. It just seemed silly to pay for all those bottle deposits because at the time 2 liters were exempt from the deposit… so we simply made the switch to two liter bottles. We would still recycle the 2 liter bottles and any of the few other bottles or cans that we had. The 2 liter bottles are now a part of the deposit system and Saturday was the day we finally packed all those plastic bags into the van and down to the recycling truck. The truck has “reverse vending” machines. you put a bottle or can in and it gives you a ticket worth money. Our particular redemption center gives tickets for the Navy Exchange. (where we shop most often)

Here are Jordan and Jalen playing baseball on the wii. I love that there is a game they can play together! :)

My POTD for Saturday came from Jalen playing boxing on the Wii. He was so funny punching and playing so hard, he had a somewhat sweaty head when I came in to check on him. Here he is celebrating his victory!

Sunday’s flowers in Church were these beautiful Proteas. I LOVE these. they are just so exotic and amazing looking.

Post Church Lunch routine calls for a trip to Chili’s. as we walked up to the restaurant, Jalen says, they painted the door. Now if a 7 year old notices the paint on the door, I guess we are there too often? I love Chili’s. Today we even splurged and all shared a Molten Lava Cake. Jordan even ordered it from the server! how funny is that?

And I also wanted to share my theory on servers. There are really only two kinds of servers.
1. Those who do it because they are good at it. (and therefore make a decent income out of it)
2. Those who couldn’t find anything else.

Today’s server was from the first category. She was our server last week Sunday and recognized us right off the bat. She was attentive and in tune to our needs. She picked up Jalen’s drink cup and he says, it wasn’t empty yet. I say, Jalen that is the sign of a good server, they can anticipate your needs before you even realize you need it! She remembered that I liked the small spoon for Jordan (not the huge soup spoon like last week). and her pleasant attitude. Just makes paying for a family meal out, so worth it. There is also another server there that we love on Sunday Lunch too. It really makes it a great time! even sweeter than the cake, Jordan calling my mom on his cell phone after we were done….

and just a coolish pic of my morning coffee… :)

By the way, I was shocked that Southern California had Gas more expensive than Hawaii!

Here is the latest Concroption News: Guest Designer for May, the ever incredible Jamie Waters. I am so thrilled! I love her style, and I just can’t wait to see what she has in store! My Heidi Swapp Card should be in the Gallery under swatches at Concroption, and they are having a big sale- 40% off many items! Check it out! The site is under renovation, and I can’t wait to see what the new site will look like!

Making Memories feature is on Friday, I can’t wait!

I want to know, what’s your favorite drink? I love coffee, diet coke with lemon (or mixed with sierra mist free), cold water.

I hope you are all having great day! Thanks so much for your comments! :) Blog you later! :)