Kaila Pinned It, Did It!

Kaila and I love to pin food on Pinterest ... her mostly dessert ... me mostly savory foods. But she is way better at actually trying out the recipes she pins. This is not her first attempt (more like her third or fourth). But this is the first time I got pictures of the process.

To make this delicious Key Lime Cheesecake with Pretzel Crust, she took out all the ingredients. Sometimes if she has questions she will ask dad, the other cook in the house.

First step was to blend the lime juice, lime zest and cream cheese. She likes to bake so much we got her an electric mixer for Christmas. No one needed one in our house before this. 

The pie part of this done! And it's no bake cheesecake. I tested it at this point and think it would be a great dessert dip too.

Then out comes the magic bullet to grind some pretzels. I like the idea of a salty crust much better than a sweet one.

And this is what it's supposed to look like mom.

Add the butter and the crust is ready for assembly. This recipe calls for each serving to be built in a glass rather than made into a pie. So pretty for parties.

But it's not Pinterest worthy until it's garnished. Cut up some limes, add a few sprinkles and a pretzel.

The finished product looks yummy!

For complete recipe, click here. We love Pinterest and we love it more when we pinned it and did it!

Summer Frenz Layout

Our friends from Chicago came out to visit last summer and the kids had a great time together. They are close enough in age that they immediately bonded ... much like their moms who bonded years ago in Hawaii when chance put them together as coworkers.

Time spent at the house, time spent at the beach, time spent together ... we are pretty blessed to have good friends that despite the miles are so close at heart.

Used several edge punches here. Also took out the cuttlebug and made texture paper from scraps rather than tossing them out. Sometimes old school techniques are just as fun as new ones. My favorite part about this double page layout is the picture of Lena and Olivia. They are so sweet!!!

Seaside Layout

We are pretty lucky to live in such a beautiful place. These are good times with family at the Oside Pier. Sunset is the prettiest here even with the colder weather during the winter months and the fog during May Gray and June Gloom.

We sometimes will head out all the way to the end of the pier for lunch or dinner at Ruby's Diner. While we wait for our table, we check out the fishermen and the sunset and the city view ... trying to find all our familiar spots in our little city.

In this double page layout I actually scrapped a picture with me in it. As the kids get older, they are learning to take over the camera and snap a few of me. I think I have junior photographers on my hands and it's pretty funny when the DSLR is bigger than their face as they peer into it. LOL

My favorite here is the pom pom fringe. I also got to use my edge punch, the ripped notebook paper one, and I saw the folding over technique somewhere in blogland. It's fun to see that this paper is double sided. Also fun is the glitter brad. Bling is a good thing. :)

First Day Layout

Kaila's first day of school was a big one this year. Wasn't it just yesterday that she was starting Kindergarten? Well now she's in middle school. Middle school means no uniforms, no single teacher (aka second mom during the day), and no recess. Middle school also means more classes, more homework and being responsible for your own schedule. But with Kaila, we were not worried ... she has been an A+ student from the start.

The school we chose for her to attend was not close to home. Enter carpooling as the saving grace. It was also a 7:30-3:30 school day, much longer than she's used to. But this school had a unique bell schedule where 2 days a week they had extended periods of 1.5 hours to be able to delve deeper into each subject matter. More like a college schedule ... allowing the kids to have discussions, work on group projects and do science experiments. In addition, at GPA, Kaila gets to play in the orchestra and join the after school science club. Now that the first year is almost over ... we can reflect back and be happy that we made the right decision for her. She's very happy with her new school and her new friends as well.

This layout is special for the memory ... my baby is growing up. It's also pretty special for all the colors. I love color and am realizing how much happier it makes me when I scrapbook this way. No more vintage, no more muted colors for me. I love bright and cheerful ... even if it means printing the pics in black and white sometimes. I also love the notebook paper, the ruler paper and the banner. Again with the banner?!? Yep, love it.

Pretty Girls Layout

Last year we took advantage of the girls dressing up for an American Girl tea party and took them to the park for pictures afterwards. These days, Nani girl seems to wear only skinny jeans. Lena, however, is more girly girl and will put on a dress or skirt just because. Either way, having them all in pretty clothes was the perfect opportunity for mom to take pictures of them together looking "pretty".

My favorite part about this layout is the picture. The expression on the girls faces are so genuinely happy and I want to remember this innocence and joy forever. Also love the vinyl thickers from American Crafts and took out my Martha Stewart glitter pack that I scored at a garage sale a while back. Thick star glitter is soooo fun. And in my favorite color ... teal!

Retainer Layout

Kaila's braces days are over. She had them on for about a year when she was nine. I almost forgot to tell that story until I found these pictures of us breaking her retainer now that she's eleven. The orthodontist told us that her teeth were larger than her mouth so the pre-brace stage would help widen her mouth to make room so that the permanent teeth could come in straighter. It worked! But an unexpected bonus was the discipline it taught her to take care of her teeth ... and the awkwardness of braces at a younger age when kids were not as image conscious made it an easier experience overall.

After the braces came off, she continued with retainers for a couple more months. Then the orthodontist said no more to the retainer too. Yay! We celebrated with a hammer in hand. In this layout I scrapbooked those fun pictures we took as we did this ... playing with macro settings and getting messy with the misting ... I am NOT a "messy" scrapper, but it still worked out. I even got to make a banner ... I really love banners.

Haircut Layout

Kainani's hair wouldn't grow for the longest time. And even when it did, it remains pretty thin and wispy. But when she gets a big piece of gum stuck to the top of her head and decided to cut it out, it left a mini mohawk. Professional help was called in to "fix" it. She was a little scared but was okay once the girl started talking to her so nicely. Other than a little tickle here and there, she stayed calm and came out with a style rather than bits and pieces of cutup hair in uneven lengths.

Here I tried my luck at the new chevron technique to capture this story. My favorite part is the owl with googly eyes and the color scheme. I even added a Dear Lizzy button.

Take Twelve March-Luck

Take Twelve for this month was about luck.
I am so lucky to have this life.

My wedding ring symbolizes a wonderful marriage.I am lucky to have found a wonderful man, a caring father and a supportive life partner. I am not just lucky but so blessed to have my 3 children, Kaila, Kainani and Kaiolena. They are my everything. Family and friends are more than just words displayed in our kitchen ... they are a huge part of our lives ... they are our cousins and our neighbors. 

I am lucky to have technology. After discovering Apple products we are grateful to own ipods, iphones, ipads and imacs. My wine glass rack on our bar stands for the joy of downtime ... wine. The side door we use to enter reminds us to keep the spirit of aloha alive in our home. Displayed in our home is a globe of the world. In this house, we know we are lucky to have the life we have so we are open minded to learn about other cultures and those less fortunate than us.

Being from Hawaii, we believe in aloha. We feel lucky to know the beauty of the islands and it’s people, it is within us and keeps us grounded with its spirit. Love for one and for all. Love for our environment and for our life. Love for our God.

This is the luck and good fortune that make up our so called life. Symbols of it are all around us. Remember.

I won! Time to start training ...

... Ella Publishing is a great inspiration for scrapbooking and photography. I am (sort of) doing their 12 for 2012 where I take 12 pictures on the 12th of every month this year 2012. Every month there's a theme and you only have to commit one day a month. I've taken all my pics, just haven't gotten around to scrapping them and blogging it yet. Oooops!

But this Spring Training class is exciting. I'm hoping it will jump start my weekend scrapbooking into summer and beyond ... maybe all the way to Survivor Crop in April. I miss my late nights with girlfriends, I miss unleashing my creative spirit, I miss remembering all the "fun times".

I'm so excited that I won! Rebecca Cooper is a great photographer, scrapbooker, crafter and mom. I get so many ideas from her. This is also my 3rd time winning something from her blog. Can you believe it?!? What are the odds? I've been reading her blog for years ... winning prizes is not the reason but wow, how fun is this! Yay!!!

Can't wait for the videos, the training and the inspiration. Details here. Who wants to join me?

Currents

time: 7:07am
location: work, waiting for computer to load TGIF
eating: had Thai from George's Bistro yesterday. Miss working in Costa Mesa sometimes.
drinking: water ... dehydrated
watching: Got ABC Family app on iphone ... Switched at Birth, the Lying Game, Jane by Design
thinking: how some friends are for life, saw high school friends last night and we pick up right where we left off even after months
wanting: to open my mind to the heaven series at New Song Christian Church
needing: some raw foods, too much coffee and meat this week makes me feel bloated
wondering: if we're really going to get it together to do a vegas girls trip
loving: that the home is really "less" as I walk around trying to find things to get rid of at neighborhood garage sale this weekend

currents idea from here

Project Life March

More March madness ... lots of opportunities to party, go out to eat and enjoy music concerts. Blew the restaurant and entertainment budget this month for sure ... but some months are worth it and you just re-prioritize everything else ... like housework and errands and laundry. LOL.

Favorite things to eat included oyster shooters at Monterey Bay Canners, chicken and waffles at Roscoes, omelets at Broken Yolk, sushi at Love Boat, pizza at Pizza Port, escargot at Oceanaire, shrimp cocktail and prime rib at the Red Rock resort in Vegas.

We never go to concerts ... except this month. I'm always amazed at the $50-$100 prices for well known musicians here in Socal. Plus, you see a dot on stage and end up watching it on the big screen anyway. So we usually pass ... but in March, we had an opportunity to see some smaller bands in smaller venues at smaller prices. We took advantage more than once ... Soja with Anuhea, Green with Passafire, Skanic with English Beat. Love standing in front of the stage and rocking out for sure!

Enjoying birthday goodies and feeling very blessed so many are so thoughtful!

Project Life March

Randomness is the best way to do this Project Life. Things that were part of March get captured here just because and I think I like it better that way. The baseball card size also helps to use the scraps from my scrapbooking stash and I'm hoping to whittle that supply down. In this year of less, I'm not acquiring any new stuff by choice but shopping my stash and using what I forgot about is great!

Business trip to Las Vegas was jam packed with work but time spent with coworkers is always fun. The job I have now is pretty independent and so much is online that having face to face time with my team mates that I'm always talking to via email and instant message is valuable. 

A couple family birthdays in March also brought time together with family. Our extended family (called Hanai in Hawaiian) includes cousins and aunties and uncles. Just hanging out and catching up is always joyful ... plus the kids keep growing so every time we get together, we marvel how life moves so fast.

And only one candle to blow out, let's not keep that one real. haha. Mom always gifts us birthday money in a lucky envelope too. It's an Asian tradition around Chinese New Years but she uses the nice symbolic envelopes year round for love and good fortune.

This year will be one of being brave and to keep going. Focus less on the fears, on what others think and focusing more on just doing it and having a good time. Remembering the important moments here in Project Life is something I'm really excited about too.

Project Life March

Rather than doing Project Life by taking a picture a day, I'm finding that I'm taking the iphone pictures taking randomly throughout the month and just getting them into my Project Life binder. These are the happenings of this month and I'm remembering. That's LESS and really just good enough. I think this is the easiest way to scrapbook yet.

March was birthday month and a tradition amongst my girlfriends is to do happy hour together for each of our birthdays. I chose Monterey Bay Canners because they have wonderful seafood appetizers and dollar oyster shooters. I think my 2 all-time favorite things to eat is always shellfish and noodles.

Wines, martinis and margaritas are always nice to add to the mix. I'm so grateful for these friendships and the good times we are sharing together. 

Just snipping bits of memorabilia like the birthday card keeps this memory keeping process easy. I've never been one to scrap souvenirs and memorabilia before. I always save things from vacation but am never organized enough to get them into scrapbooks. As for the everyday, I dump everything! Starting now to keep a few items here and there in a folder for Project Life and getting them into these pages here. Keeping to this baseball card size keeps it simple too.

Project Life March

I know it's April but I'm finally getting March scrapped into my Project Life album.

Journaled the tabs from the pre-made cover page I started at the beginning of March. This album will be very informal and a gathering of memories one month at a time. No pressure, just whatever I remember. Less is more ... at least I'm getting the memories captured and that's the best part.

Not one to usually scrap 8.5 x 11 page layouts, I'm now discovering that they are easier. There's less space to fill and it's easier to just keep it simple. The same layout ideas and plans still work but just less. I'm liking this very much and looking forward to getting more of the everyday stories told. Plus, I'm printing wallet size pics from my iphone and hope to get better at emptying out that sometime 500 plus photo cache!

Are you doing Project Life? Do you have a billion pictures on your iPhone too?