I am so proud of my sister Manda’s digi-scrapping, I can’t even tell you! :) She has gotten like 5 or 6 of her friends so hooked on it that they’re buying laptops left and right! :) She does more LOs than I can even keep up with in her gallery.  I love getting together with her and her friends (known as the digital housewives) scrapbooking on our laptops. We’re such a bunch of geeks sitting around a living room with 6 laptops and all the cords and cases strewn about. LOL Anyway, just had to blog about my little sister. She posted this layout today and it’s my favorite of hers so far! :)

Seems like forever since I’ve posted here. Been busy at work, busy with the nieces and nephews and even a little busy creating again. Finished a few scrapbook pages and finally uploaded something new for the SBB store. Yay! 

And I’ve got a busy upcoming week as well. Hoping to see little Eva again tomorrow after work. Also hoping to spend some time with Paige, Corbin & Ainsley because I haven’t seen them since Sunday and that feels like forever ago. Had Kylie overnight last weekend and miss her like crazy. And I’m due for some serious Braelynn time. Celena’s been keeping track and we’re pretty sure next weekend is our weekend to babysit again. Manda promised every few weeks we’d get her for a night. :) And then Sunday morning we leave for Great Wolf Lodge with Andrew and Celena for 48 hours of water, water and more water! The kids are sooo excited about it and we’re hoping to maybe go kayaking Monday before coming home if the weather is nice. Should be a TON of great photo opportunities so I’ll have to start scouring my scrapping collection for some rustic papers and elements to scrap them with. :)

Eva update – She’s doing wonderfully! She’s cute as the dickens and her test results have all come back clean so she’s as healthy as she looks. :) Poor thing was poked more in her first 5 days than I’ve been in my entire life! Spinal taps, IV tubes, pricks on her feet for blood sugar testing before and after every feeding but now she’s home sleeping like crazy and being completely sweet and adorable. :)

Have I mentioned how much I love Dancing with the Stars?! I can’t say I’m disappointed so far with the couples who have been voted off. That Rachel Hunter was too whiney. And Evander, although I am thoroughly impressed with his effort, come on, he’s like a bull in a china shop. LOL He really did do a great job though and what class for him to even attempt ballroom dancing. I think my favorite of the remaining couples is Joey McIntyre. I’m not sure why the judges are so hard on him. The hottie from General Hospital can definitely move and could she BE more gorgeous?! Ugh! LOL The guy from Seinfeld cracks me up and he really does dance with style. I can’t believe there are only 3 couples left already! Hopefully they’re already lining up the celebrities for round two. Good Morning America said it’s the number 1 show in the US right now so maybe it’ll stick around. :)

Found this on another blog awhile back and thought it had some fun questions. :) Not sure what happened to LAYER EIGHT though. Must be someone along the way didn’t like the questions. LOL And on some of these I’m not sure where they came up with the title for the layer. ??? Still fun facts though. :)

LAYER ONE: On the Outside

Name – Shawn

Nicknames – Shawny, Shawna, Shawnutay

Birthday – January 22

Birthplace – Zeeland, MI

Eye Color – Blue

Hair Color – Auburn/reddish

Height – 5’4"

Righty or Lefty – Righty

Religion – Christian

Sex – Female

LAYER TWO: In The Inside

Your heritage – Dutch as far back as I know

Who do you look like – Mostly like my mom

Your weakness – Procrastination

Your fears – Spiders/Mice

Your perfect pizza – Pepperoni & Sausage

Goal you’d like to achieve – A life with less stress

LAYER THREE: Yesterday, Today & Tomorrow

Your most over-used phrase on MSN/Hello – Probably ‘gotcha’

Your thoughts first waking up – Usually what am I going to wear today

Your best physical feature – Probably my eyes (although even those I wanted to change at one point)

Your bedtime – Oh boy! Should be 11 but ends up being after midnight most nights

Your most missed memory – Probably holding my nephew Jacob. I wish I could remember every detail.

LAYER FOUR: Your pick

Pepsi or Coke – Pepsi

McDonalds or Burger King – McDonald’s

Single or Group Dates – Single

Adidas or Nike – Nike

Chocolate or vanilla – Vanilla with chocolate :)

Cappuccino or Coffee – Neither

LAYER FIVE: Do You?

Smoke – Never even tried it

Curse – Only when I’m REALLY angry

Sing – ALWAYS when I’m driving

Think you’ve been in love – YES

Want to get married – Already am

Believe in yourself – Not as much as I should

Motion sickness – No

Think you’re attractive – Rarely

Think you’re a health freak – Definitely not

Get along with your parents – Very much, they’re the greatest!

Like thunderstorms – LOVE love LOVE them!

Play an instrument – Not well! LOL

LAYER SIX: Have you ever

Smoked – Nope

Done a drug – Nevah!

Gone to the mall – Oh yeah! :)

Eaten and entire box of Oreos – No

Eaten sushi – Yuck! NO!

Been on stage – Only in my 9th grade play

Gone skating – Grew up at the roller skating rink & still take the neats

Gone skinny dipping – Nope

Stolen anything – Never

Played a game that required removal of clothing – Nope

Been caught ‘doing something’ – Nope

Been called a tease – I’m imagine so

Gotten beat up – Nope

Shoplifted – Never

LAYER SEVEN: Getting Older

Age you hope to be married – Was married at 20 already

Number and names of children – No kids of my own, 6 nieces & 2 nephews

Describe your dream wedding – Outdoors, lots of candles, gorgeous flowers and a great band

How do you want to die – I’ve often said it’s one of those things I’m glad we don’t have to choose

What do you want to be when you grow up – Do I still get to pick? :)

What country would you most like to visit – Italy or Greece without a doubt

LAYER NINE: In a partner

Best eye color – The color isn’t as important as the sparkle in them

Best hair color – As long as it’s soft it doesn’t matter

Short or long hair – Short

Height – Taller than me

Best articles of clothing – Jeans and a button down shirt with the right shoes

LAYER TEN: In the numbers

Number of drugs taken illegally – None

Number of CDs that you own – At least a hundred

Number of piercings – 2 per ear but haven’t worn the 2nd pair in ages

Number of tattoos – None (deathly afraid of needles)

Number of times your name has appeared in the newspaper – Maybe 3 or 4 tops

Well, alot has happened since my last entry. On Wednesday afternoon my brother and his wife had a baby girl who is, as we’d hoped, the answer to our prayers for at least ONE brown-eyed baby in the sea of  blue-eyes that are just a given when you come from a long line of blonde haired blue-eyed dutchies. Eva was born 9 lbs 11 oz and 19 1/2 inches long. Thank goodness for her mom she was born C-section! :) She has the most hair I’ve ever seen on a baby! Long thick hair! And she was born almost 2 weeks early. I think if she’d have waited till full term we’d be putting pig-tails in her hair already! :)

Little Eva (pronouned A-va) has had quite a rough couple of days since being born. Her blood-sugar levels were off the first 2 days so they were constantly pricking her tiny feet to test it before and after every feeding. The doctors say this is quite common with larger babies and today it sounds like they’ve gotten it leveled out. This afternoon though she came down with a 101 degree fever. :( Because she’s a newborn they immediately sent her for all sorts of tests, including a spinal tap. Terribly scary thing for my SIL and brother especially being their first baby. Now we wait 48 hours for the results meaning mom and baby will stay at least an extra night before going home. For now they’ve got her hooked up to an IV and under the lights for at least the over-night hours. It’s sooo hard to see her laying all alone in this glass box with IVs and bandages on her feet from the blood sugar testing and the bandage across her back from the spinal tap. This poor thing has been poked and prodded her entire life so far. So right now we’re praying for good test results and that she won’t have to stay under the lights all day tomorrow.

Tomorrow I hope to scrap some of the bazillion photos we’ve already got of our new little Eva. Hoping for a morning of scrapping and cleaning and cleaning and scrapping. Then in the afternoon I’ve got Kylie and Celena (and hopefully Andrew) coming over to sleep overnight. Celena LOVES helping babysit the younger neats so it should be a good time. :)

Quick update on Andrew & Celena…Wendy is now apparently moved back to Georgia as of Thursday. That after letting her kids down continually the day before by telling them she’d be home to visit with them around noon and calling hours later to tell them she’d be there shortly, this happening a few times until she finally showed up around 9:30 to pick up her things. Around 8:30, after calling her cell phone about a dozen times, I ended up sending a couple of nasty text messages to her phone. I’m not necessarily proud of the things I said but I’m not sure I’ll regret saying any of it either. I was just fed up with noone actually saying directly to her how selfish she’s being throughout this whole thing. I’ve wanted to give her a piece of my mind for months now and I must say it felt good to get it out.

Celena seems to be taking everything really well. Almost too well because I have to believe it’s effecting her but so far she’s been as bubbly and happy as ever. Andrew, on the other hand, is taking it quite badly. He has a birthday coming up this week and he doesn’t understand why his mom wouldn’t even stay to celebrate it with him. He’s at that age where it’s much cooler to hang out with his friends and ride dirt bikes than spend the afternoon with his Aunt Shawny so I don’t get to see him nearly as often as his sister but hopefully this weekend he’ll come hang out with us and then next weekend we’re taking both of them up to Great Wolf Lodge so then he’s trapped with us. ;) Thanks so much to everyone who has commented or e-mailed saying they’ve been praying for these two. You guys are the best and so far are proving to be some pretty powerful prayer warriors so I really appreciate it! :) If you could add Eva to your lists I just know she’ll be home and keeping my brother up all night in no time. ;)

Custody/guardianship request granted! My mother and father-in-law are officially the guardians of my niece and nephew after almost 2 hours in the courtroom. It was scary for a minute there as the judge explained that according to the legislation that neglect or abuse alone were not enough for him to grant guardianship. For a minute there my heart sunk. Especially after hearing testimony of instances or situations that I was previously unaware of. A car ride scary enough for my nephew to tell the appointed children’s attorney about it as well as an admission on their mother’s part that in addition to abusing alcohol for the past year and a half there’s been cocaine abuse as well. But in the end it was the fact that she had left on numerous occasions without giving legal authority for the care of her children in her absence. No power of attorney, nothing in writing at all saying that the grandparents were responsible for their well-being/healthcare etc. The most recent and most obvious example being that she left for Georgia for 24 days without taking care of that little detail. Best question of the afternoon was by the judge after reading her letter to the kids stating that she’d call. He asked if she called and she said every day. And the judge pointed out that according to my MIL that the kids had called her and left messages from monday thru wednesday of that week with no response. He said ‘did you get their messages?’ to which she said ‘yes’ and he asked ‘then why didn’t you return their calls’. Basically her answer was that she didn’t want to face her parents.

Anyway, the hearing went as good as we could’ve possibly expected. Just spoke with my in-laws and the kids seem to be handling it well so far. I can’t imagine what thoughts must be rushing through their little heads but I think the stability will make such a huge difference in their lives over the months to come.

Thanks so much to all those who kept them in your prayers today and over the past weeks. Looking forward to the first night ‘good’ sleep in a long time. :)

Been having fun with my Rhapsody player lately and desperately searching Amazon for some new ‘little-known’ artists to check out. I love finding some obscure artist and then looking at the "Customers who bought this title also bought:" list. Tonight it actually brought me to an artist by the name of Tift Merritt whose voice sorta reminded me of the group Texas. I hadn’t listened to their music in such a long time but I just love their music. So now I’m listening to their White on Blonde album and after that I think I’ll check out their more recent album which somehow I’d missed. I’ve been trying to keep up with Nadine’s blog ‘cuz she’s got some great taste in music and seems to like all types and ‘off the beaten path’ stuff just like me. Anywho, lovin’ this rhapsody thing that Amy tipped me off to. So awesome to be able to check out new artists and listen to whole songs before spending the money on the CD’s. LOVIN’ it! :)

Other current favs:

• Jason Mraz – his new live cd – fav song…Not So Usual
• Sarah McLachlan – Afterglow live – best Sarah cd yet IMHO :)
• Robert Downey Jr. – The Futurist – kinda jazzy yet soothing
• Jessica Andrews – favorite song – They Are The Roses
• Rob Thomas – Something To Be – love every song!
• Anna Nalick – Great new artist! Probably my fav style of music.