Hailey B

The Greatest Machine in Town

2010-11-23T11:53:00.000-08:00

So, for those of you who have yet to see this little wonder.... you're missing out.

behold....

THE SILHOUETTE
(cue angel's singing)

This beauty isn't your typical paper cutter.

It is capable of making so many wonderful creations such as:

these ADORABLE paper Christmas ornaments

BEAUTIFUL cards, perfect for the approaching Holidays

why pay the price for etched glass when you can do it all on your own?
and hands down my FAVORITE part about the silhouette....

creating CUSTOM CLOTHING!!!!
how awesome are those jeans... and the rhinestones.... I CANNOT live without rhinestones!

What's even better about this machine, you're not spending $40 on cartridges that you won't really use. They have an online store with each image costing $0.99!!! How can you beat that?

Just download to your computer and print away!

Check out silhouette on their website:
http://www.silhouetteamerica.com/

OR....

check out the Shanty Sisters
who are sponsoring a WONDERFUL giveaway for this amazing product.
(not to mention they have some of the BEST craft/renovation ideas on their blog for such an economical price)

http://shanty2chic.blogspot.com/

They have some wonderful ideas and how to's for their very own Silhouette inspired projects.

So, SANTA, if you're reading this... I would LOVE a Silhouette for Christmas!! :)

I'm still alive!!!

2010-03-10T13:20:00.000-08:00

It really saddens me that I haven't blogged. Needless to say I feel I don't have much to blog about lately, between school and work, I've become such a boring, uneventful person.

I hope to come back to blogging in full force SOON... just need some motivation.. which hopefully I'll find SOMEWHERE very down the road (sooner than later).

Mikael Wedding

2010-01-14T11:56:00.000-08:00

This weekend I traveled back to "The Big D" for one of my best friends wedding. It was so fun to get to see a few of the girls from Belles again, considering it's been a year at the least since I've seen them. The wedding was beautiful, Madi did such a good job pulling everything together under such stressful and hectic circumstances (her husband is a Marine who was deployed in Irag/Afghanistan at the time). They are two of the sweetest, caring, and compassionate people that you will ever meet. I wish them the best of luck in life and the many adventures that are about to come.

Mr. and Mrs. Cameron Mikael

Apache Belles

Roomates and Best Friends

Madison Alise
Who would have EVER though that the tall, skinny, blonde girl carrying the Louis Vuitton would come sit next to me and IMMEDIATELY become such a wonderful, once in a lifetime friend. You are such a special person, and have taught me so many lessons that I'll cherish. Thank you for allowing me to be a part of your life, and for always being there, I am so very fortunate and blessed to know you and have shared so many special memories (hopefully there are more to come). Thank you for being such a supportive, caring, loving friend. I wish you and Cameron the very best.

While, I was home I was also fortunate enough to spend a little time with my family. OF COURSE that means getting to see Aubrey!!! :) I just love that girl to pieces.

Showin' off her STYLIN' new shades, and no, thats not dirt on her face, the little pipsqueak decided she wanted to put on some of my makeup. :)

The Holidays

2010-01-05T20:07:00.000-08:00

I've been lagging on keeping up with this thing, between work and.... well work, I don't think too much about it. As most of you know, since those who read this are mostly family (so none of this is really much of an update) I was so fortunate to have a week of "vacation" to go home and enjoy Dallas and my wonderful family. It was nice being able to stay longer then just a weekend. Christmas' have drastically changed from when we were kids, I think we can all agree with that, but I always have such a good time just relaxing and getting to visit with my family. It is always so much fun to be in each others company, and I can't help but think how far myself and siblings have come, I would have NEVER thought we would all be as close as we are.
The Christmas festivities started with a Young family Christmas at Josh's house. It's not often the WHOLE family can get together, it was fun to all be able to share this time (we missed you Chris), we had so many laughs, and as well enjoyed getting to see Little Aubrey actually be a part of Christmas.

My wonderful family (minus Chris who had to work)

The Young children

the Texas blizzard that blew through

It was so cute to see Aubrey fascinated by the snow, she peeked out the window quite frequently and absolutely did not like Uncle Josh throwing snowballs at the window!

Uncle Josh & Aunt Amber put Aubrey's presents in a fun big bag!!

I unfortunately didn't take as many pictures as I hoped for while I was home, instead I was too busy spending time hanging out. The rest of Christmas break was spent visiting all sorts of family, and getting in as much time with them as I could. The fun and excitement all came to an end with the dreaded trip back to San Marcos leaving everyone behind. :( Hopefully I'll be back to visit much sooner than later.

Art Fun

2009-12-13T18:21:00.000-08:00

I've been telling Devon about so many fun art projects I've been doing in my Art Education class that I absolutely CANNOT wait to do with Aubrey when she gets older. I as well can't wait to use some of these lessons in the classroom, it has been so much fun to actually dive into education courses this semester.

Assignment: Draw an abstract shape.
Media: Pencil
Not quite as exciting as I hoped it would be.

Assignment: Draw a recent conversation.
Media: Sharpie Marker
Again, not as cool as I hoped.

Assignment: Pick a letter, write a scentence using this letter multiple times, draw a picture protraying your scentence.

Assignment: Place Mona Lisa in a different setting.
Media: Pastels

Assignment: Create a page for an Eric Carle book (The Hungry Little Caterpillar), this project was alot of fun, and really turned out to look like Eric Carle pictures.
Media: Tempra Paint

These next two assignments were my favorite. I couldn't believe how awesome watercolors (the cheap ones you buy at the grocery store) could look, especially using different household items such as salt, plastic wrap, rubbing alcohol, and masking tape to create various effects. We also used crayola resist, such a wonderful simple media I have never been exposed to. These don't look as nice as I wanted but I was a little behind with projects by this point, nontheless they were fun.

I just can't get over that these are painted with cheap watercolors. I use to think these things were so useless.

Assignment: Create a sculpture using Artists as references. (Mine was Van Gogh)

We devoted a class period to learning how to draw realistic faces, though mine are not near as amazing as a proffessional artist, I was surprised at how well they did turn out.

I know, this one looks just a little scary!

Caden even took part in the action:

can you tell who he was trying to draw? :)

And so it begins...

2009-12-01T18:38:00.000-08:00

I have no idea where to start with this thing, but no better way then to just jump right in. Soo here goes nothin!

Living here in San Marcos means I rarely get to see that wonderful family of mine, any chance I have of getting to go see them, I'm on it. I was fortunate enough to be able to go home for a VERY short time to spend Thanksgiving with them, thanks to my amazing Dad who chauffered me to and from Dallas. My wonderful "vacation", if you can even call it that, started with a nice overnight trip to Dallas via I-35 at 11:30pm. Three and a half hours later, we arrived in Cedar Hill, just to take a "nap" and wake up at 5:30 for the first event of the day..... go run the Turkey Trot in Ft. Worth with Devon, Aubrey, Mom, and Rick. All in all, besides the lack of sleep, and freezing cold weather, we had a fun time at the race, needless to say it was a fun sister experience.

Little Aubrey looked so thrilled to be going for a run.

After the run we were invited to Chris' (Devon's husband) parents house where we had an AWESOME Thanksgiving breakfast. Thanks Mr. and Mrs. Baker for letting us come crash your breakfast.
Then off to Grandmas it was for the traditional Thanksgiving festivities. Thanksgiving just isn't Thanksgiving unless Grandma Mary's food is involved. It was fun to see all the Uncles and to hang out with the fam for awhile.

"Scooter" and Grandma outside watching the kitty cats.

Last stop of my wonderful one day trip home was quite a treat. A first time Black Friday for me and Devon both, a hunt for Zhu Zhu pets. Devon talked me into waiting ouside Toy's R Us with her for SIX HOURS to get the hot toy of the season. It was one crazy experience, but in the end a fun time getting to hang out with Devon and distract her from studying!

Waiting outside in the FREEZING weather

Only 1/16 of the crowd there, the line (not seen) wrapped around the building.

It was a short and sweet Thanksgiving Day, I can't wait to go home for Christmas and spend time with my wonderful family. Love and miss you guys.